UK tournament series?

[lunchmoney]

Agreed, a UK wide series cant do any harm, and if it moves even one coach to attend more, happy days

[Sizzler]

This is a great idea. I agree that only a pre-selected stable of tournaments, with an even geographical spread, should contribute points. Seeing as the main purpose of this is to unite a fractured Blood Bowl community it wouldn't do if somebody was able to win without travelling more than fifty miles.

4 Southern
1 Midlands (NAFC)
4 Northern
1 Scottish
1 Welsh

Good spread. Could a way forward be perhaps a voting thread to decide which of the Southern, which of the Northern etc? There are obvious contenders within each, but people may have preferences.

[Hung Donkeyman]

Is the thinking to have the same Tournaments or change them around each year? Seems to me that any of the chosen few get free promotion as people from different areas of the country will only travel if it's going to be ranked .

[lunchmoney]

Rotation is a good idea.

[Pipey]

Sizzler I think it's better to take a carrot rather than stick approach, so give a big bonus to points accrued at the chosen set of established events, but still allow smaller points scoring at the others. To exclude tournaments completely could marginalise TOs and that's not what we want.

Rotation sounds like a good idea. My thinking, if using this approach, would be to seek consensus with the RTCs for Wales, Scotland and England (North and South) re a good spread of established, traditionally best supported tournaments. So I guess the rotation option would be one to include in that conversation. RTCs are Purdindas, Hawca, Don_Vito, Rodders, Joemanji.

[Darkson]

Seeing as the main purpose of this is to unite a fractured Blood Bowl community it wouldn't do if somebody was able to win without travelling more than fifty miles.

Though in some cases it will. Say the minimum is 6 events, and I manage to do all 4 southern ones plus the NAFC. To do a Northern one means taking an additional days holiday (maybe two) and accommodation for at least one extra night. For that sort of outlay I could do 2 (or more) southern events. Given that no everyone has unlimited nerding funds/days off, if I want to compete I have to withdraw from two local events, reducing their numbers and potentially putting them at risk of having to cancel.

I don't think having some tournaments as "better" than others is a good idea.

[sann0638]

My numbers were saying that all tournaments could count, but only a maximum of that number from each area.

[Sizzler]

Sizzler I think it's better to take a carrot rather than stick approach, so give a big bonus to points accrued at the chosen set of established events, but still allow smaller points scoring at the others. To exclude tournaments completely could marginalise TOs and that's not what we want.

A fair point, Bren. Anything that gets people playing is good news. It's always horrible to see the death of a tournament. If my comments came across as advocating the poaching of players from one tournament to another then that wasn't the intent.

Though in some cases it will. Say the minimum is 6 events, and I manage to do all 4 southern ones plus the NAFC. To do a Northern one means taking an additional days holiday (maybe two) and accommodation for at least one extra night. For that sort of outlay I could do 2 (or more) southern events. Given that no everyone has unlimited nerding funds/days off, if I want to compete I have to withdraw from two local events, reducing their numbers and potentially putting them at risk of having to cancel.

Indeed. I've tried to write a couple of replies to this but each made me sound like a servant-whipping aristocrat with loads of money, which sadly I'm not. I guess it comes down to the fact that everybody has a threshold on the time and money that they're willing to spend on Blood Bowl and a UK Championship would maybe act as a catalyst for people trying out different tournaments. I hope that, whatever format the UKC takes, it doesn't exclude anybody, but this will also need to be balanced against the question of whether somebody can be considered a 'UK Champion' if they've only played one grouping of players from a confined geographic location.

[lunchmoney]

a servant-whipping aristocrat with loads of money,

[Chris]

If you limit things to a pre-set bunch of tournaments would you weight for the number of naf members in that region? Population? Etc etc. One essential factor is accessibility. People should be able to make it to the tourney easily. Ideally on the morning. I know small towns are cheaper, but the difference for me in getting to Nottingham or Mansfield by train on Saturday morning is missing the first game.

[mike.clee]

Hi Guys,

I've been thinking about running a tournament in the Midlands for a while. Currently in Worcester there are quite a few players and over the years the leagues seem to have disappeared. I was thinking that if there was a local tournament it would encourage the local players to participate, with the incentive of having new coaches to play from other regions across the country.

A tournament series would be a great way of bringing players into the midlands as a intoducing more regions into a national series would increase it's profile.

mike.clee

[Pipey]

This sounds fantastic.

I'd recommend running your ideas by one of the English RTCs e.g. Joemanji or Don_Vito. Or discussing on here.

More midlands tournaments please

[sann0638]

Yep - Worcester would attract the Welsh, Bristol and Swindon as well as some of the Northern guys I would have thought. Happy to talk you through using Score for running the tournament, and lots of others will give plenty of advice. Maybe start a new thread in the Tournament Discussion section, and have a look at the British Calendar to find a good date (often the most challenging bit). Some people start with one-day tournaments, but others think two-dayers might mean that people are likely to travel. Lots to ponder!

[mike.clee]

I thought Worcester would be an ideal location for people to travel to. I'm already in discussions with joemanji. I've pretty much got a venue and rules. The tricky part is finding a date. November looks the quietest month so far. I'll start a new post shortly. I'm meeting my old gaming group in a few days so I'll ask them if they're interested. I think a one dayer is the way to start. One thing in interested I knowing I what the prizes are like as ill need to factor that into prices along with venue hire. I'm thinking £15 for a 3 game 1 day tourney. Does that sound reasonable?

[mawph]

I thought Worcester would be an ideal location for people to travel to. I'm already in discussions with joemanji. I've pretty much got a venue and rules. The tricky part is finding a date. November looks the quietest month so far. I'll start a new post shortly. I'm meeting my old gaming group in a few days so I'll ask them if they're interested. I think a one dayer is the way to start. One thing in interested I knowing I what the prizes are like as ill need to factor that into prices along with venue hire. I'm thinking £15 for a 3 game 1 day tourney. Does that sound reasonable?

Price is reasonable, the cheaper an event is the more likely to have folks turning up, obviously only thing for November is the World Cup in early month, which may take people's disposable cash away