Q's Universe

Origins, the Good, the Bad and the Ugly
7.2.04

THE GOOD

Once again I have been amazed by Upper Deck and their commitment to run great events. I’m not saying the 10K and the X-Men #1 tournaments were ran perfectly and that there where no disappointments but you’ll read about that later on.

What I do want to mention in this section is that in the many years of playing in major events I have never, EVER seen any company out there set up a table with three judges and have them look over every SINGLE deck list. I was shocked when I noticed that there were judges looking over all the deck lists that were turned in to see if there where any illegal decks out there.

I don’t know if they where doing random deck checks or not but I did notice they were going up to players who had turned in an illegal deck list to check if their deck was illegal or if they had just made a mistake when writing down the deck list. I know this might not seem like such a great thing to many out there, but even if you’re not impressed you should note how much effort Upper Deck is putting into their major events.

The next thing I must mention is that there was great coverage of the two major tournaments. I don’t know if this was done by Upper Deck or not but being able to see the deck list of most if not all decks in the tournaments online just a couple of hours after the tournament had ended is simply AMAZING! I think it was late Sat night when I got a call from a friend back home (Tx) telling me he was looking over the deck lists of the players that played in the 10K.

The last thing I have to mention is that whether you feel Upper Deck cares about what you think or not about the game they have shown an interest in what the players have to say. During the weekend there was a girl running back and forth with a lap top taking quotes form the players regarding what DC had to offer and how they felt about the set. I don’t know what those quotes are going to be used for or why they were taken but I can assure you nobody would send one of their representatives to take quotes and opinions all day if they didn’t care about what the players had to say.


THE BAD

Now that I have covered my arse by mentioning some of the great things Upper Deck did at Origins I think I can get away with a couple of complaints. ^_<

The first one and most important one has to be regarding some of the volunteer judges they had working on the floor. I know Vs is still a new game and can see how it would be a bit difficult for Upper Deck to find volunteers who are willing to get themselves to the convention so they can judge all weekend. But there where a few volunteer judges who either were burnt out or simply had no idea what the game was about. I heard a lot of wrong rulings during the weekend and noticed not everyone requested to call the head judge. I saw players lose games they shouldn’t have because of bad calls, and saw some judges that would simply stared at the players wondering what they were asking them.

Like I said before, I know it’s almost impossible to find qualified volunteer judges at every location where a major convention will be happening, but I think someone needs to tell those judges that if they are not sure about a ruling as simple as it may seem to ask for help. I saw too many bad calls and it was obvious some of the judges had no idea what the OFFICIAL rulings where but they were still making their own calls. I don’t know what level a volunteer judge has to be to be working on the floor at a major event and pray that they have to be level 2 judges because just about anyone can pass the online test with a little help from a friend.

The next thing I would like to mention is the consistency of penalties and how a lot of the higher level players where shocked at how lenient the judges were being. I have not read or seen or know if there is even a judges manual yet but I did noticed some players get penalized by certain mistakes while other didn’t and when they did the penalties varied. For example, I heard about a game loss for illegally recruiting a character before building (playing a 5 drop on turn 5 while you only have 4 resources because you played the character before you played your 5th resource) while I saw two different penalties being enforced for making the exact same mistake. One of them was that since you don’t have to build you were considered to have chosen not to build so you couldn’t play that character and the other was that it was ok to take your move back, build and then play the desired character.

There were a lot of other times during the weekend when a judge was being too lenient on a certain call and another judge was being very strict on the exact same scenario. I heard some of the judges say that they were being a bit lenient because there were some new players; the game was still new and so on. I sympathize with those judges but I wish they would see that you can not be lenient in a major event where there is a high prize up for grabs. If it was a small side event I could see them doing such things to help the new players understand the rules but if you’re costing a player a game because you allowed his opponent to back track in a major event, then we have a problem. Different events have different K values and the higher the level of the event and the higher the K value of the event the more strict the judges should be whether it’s a new player or a PRO…. in my opinion and that of many high level players.

THE UGLY

[[WARNING: Rant Ahead]]

Here we go.

The following is regarding Upper Deck’s sneak peek DC events. I love the new set, I think it’s a bit overpower, I feel it has a very high refresh rate and that it’s initial sales will be really good for the company, but I hate the fact that their sneak peek events were ruined for many players because of the way they were ran.

Magic was the very first card game I ever played and I had always dislike playing in their Pre-releases because you have to open up your product, write down every card and then turn it in and you get the product some one else opened. I know they do that to keep players from cheating or to scare players and make them think they can cheat. Irregardless, I always thought it was a big waste of time and that it wasn’t necessary… until the DC sneak peek events came along.

I participated in the very first sneak peek DC tournament and I was able to see the following first hand. There were A LOT of players who were using cards from their personal collection in their sneak peek decks and claiming they got those cards in their packs. I can’t remember how many claims of multiple rares per pack I hear and to tell you the truth there is no way to know if they actually got 2 rares in every single one of their Marvel packs or not. But I did see some of the players decks get a lot better from game 1 to game 2.

One of the guys sitting next to me in the first round was very exited about his pulls and allowed me to see his deck before the first match started. When I walked by his table during the second match I noticed he had a 7 drop Thing in play which was not in his initial deck and was not one of the cards he had pulled. But it was ok because his opponent had managed to pull a Dr. Doom (4), a Doom (6), Robot Destroyer and Mystical Paralysis. 0.o

After I noticed there where a lot of players who had gotten what one would refer to has god packs with multiple and very playable rares I decided to drop. I walked around during a couple of the DC sneak peeks that followed and saw a decent amount of players adding cards from their binders to their decks. I think the most common addition was Dr. Doom, Submariner, Thing (7) or any other decent 5 drop or higher. At this point I had to face reality which was either cheat like everyone else or simply don’t play in any more of the DC sneak peeks.

I mentioned to one of the Upper Deck representatives (not a volunteer judge) what was going on and I believe his response was “The DC sneak peeks are more like casual play” or something along those lines. After hearing that I refused to play in any more of the DC events even though I really, REALLY wanted to. Everyone in my group of friends that participated in the DC drafts mentioned they noticed the exact same thing was going on and while some of them decided to cheat themselves others where playing their first game and whether they won or lost they were dropping because it’s very aggravating to play against a player who you know is cheating and you just can’t do anything about it.

It’s really sad that the ongoing joke for the rest of the weekend and the trip home was “it’s all about going 1-0 drop”.

I hope Upper Deck does something about the problem they have in their hands and can understand there wasn’t much they could have done at Origins because they were pretty much winging the DC events thanks to the large number of players who wanted to participate in them.



 

IQ

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