SCAG Thread

[StinkyEttin]

Then wouldn't a more a balanced approach be making sure that an equitable amount of certs are provided to admins across the globe? If there are no admins in a particular corner of the world, then the RC for that area would be the one with the certs. These certs can be further split among the LCs for ease of distribution. My point is that certs that aren't distributed are just wasted WotC dollars on printed paper.

Gaming culture has evolved away from the concept of purely exclusive add-on content towards an acceptable middle-ground of timed exclusivity. Pretty much every AAA developer releases the exclusive content to the general public, after the early adopters have had enough time with it to feel their early adoption was worth the privilege. I'm not saying that all certed content needs to be made available wholesale, but there needs to be a distinction between which things should eventually make their way into the greater AL community.

There's a fine balance point between something being rare enough to be special and something that appears so infrequently that no one gives a kobold's arse about it. As far as the opinions at my FLGS is concerned, no one cares at all about the certed content because none of them attend cons outside of the area. If there was a way to get con certs from a RC or LC, then it'd entice the population to expand their convention horizons. None of the cons here offer certs outside of the ones we already get at the store, nor do they wish to make the investment on Fai Chen.

Mind you, all of this is what I observed here in South Florida, sitting a 3 hour drive away from Orlando and even less to Miami. I can only imagine how sparse con cert distribution is in lesser populated areas of the planet...

The last round of certs (Gen Con 2015) did see RCs leaving with a complement of certs.

 

[Pauper]

Any player option deemed balanced enough for use as a cert is balanced enough for general play.

Disagree. An option that's deemed OK to allow a limited number of players to use, so that it will rarely appear at any given table, isn't necessarily balanced if every PC has access to it. This is one reason, for instance, that AL dropped the old LFR system of 'every character can choose the magic item if they want to'.

Also, describing the con process as a 'paywall' does a disservice to the admin staff -- they're not just handing these things out to people who pay the most money (except for Skerrit, I hope ; ). They serve as rewards for people who volunteer to run the registration table, for mustering officers, for folks who love to play the game but see the need to give up some of their own gaming time so others can enjoy the game. Those folks can and should be rewarded, and if a cert that lets them play a Season 3 aasimar is the reward, I'm OK with that.

If you want to talk about just the 'certs as VIP experience' concept, that's a different thing and one I'll agree leaves a bad taste in a lot of players' mouths, but I'm not sure how prevalent that really is.

--
Pauper

 

[Tia Nadiezja]

The con certs are in part a reward for the folks who went to the con and put up with the trouble and expense to have a large group of players and DMS in one place to make the experience epic. Right?

I think it would be a huge mistake to take that incentive away or water it down. How else would you entice a large collection of players to bother?

Those folks should be rewarded.

I've been to cons. They're fun, you get to do things there nobody else does, meet the designers of your games and actors in yoyr shows (I had drinks with a group of voice actors including Scott McNeil at AKon).

In other words, going to the con is its own reward. Denying certs to people who can't afford to go is wrong.

Pretty much every store should, in my opinion, get a couple of every cert. Let the people who make direct contact with the vast bulk of AL's playerbase - and who will be most responsible for translating play into sales, and who sit at ENORMOUS competitive disadvantages in spite if being essential to the life of the game - reap the benefits of the system.

 

[darjr]

I agree that there are other reasons to go to cons. But I don't agree that the cert situation is wrong. I wouldn't mind if some special certs were also in the stores but I like the idea of con certs. Amni a bit jealous? Not really, though I would like to know a clear way to get a local con to qualify.

 

[Tia Nadiezja]

I agree that there are other reasons to go to cons. But I don't agree that the cert situation is wrong. I wouldn't mind if some special certs were also in the stores but I like the idea of con certs. Amni a bit jealous? Not really, though I would like to know a clear way to get a local con to qualify.

Eh. I don't do jealousy. I think that having the stores able to give out all the certs would be good business and good for the health of the game.

That I also think it is the right thing to do helps.

 

[Tyranthraxus]

The last round of certs (Gen Con 2015) did see RCs leaving with a complement of certs.

ahh... now I get it. It was the RC's who were at Gencon!.. For ages there I had thought it was all RC's (ie even the ones not at Gencon.. like Martin from the UK or my own RC Fern from Australia). I mentioned something about 'special certs' to him and he didnt know much about them when we were both at PAX.

I have no issue with special certs beyond the cult of expectation they build up in the player base. I dont ever want to get a point where I hear 'Hey Dave, you want to go to Gygaxcon? I hear the RC there is gonna be handing out Umber Hulk race certs. ArnesonCon is also on at the same time but no RCs will be there so we will only get to play some cool scenarios.' (lets say both cons are on at the exact same time)'

In a way it kinda reminds me of the recent Gencon issue with the people will the cool passes feeling shortchanged by the quality of experience that the same pass had provided the year before. Because there was no 'swag' there was the inferior event vibe when they still got to play awesome games. Sure there were other issues at work there but it came off looking a little bad for our jhobby.


PAX AUS:
Which btw.. was great. We ran 4 tables (mainly Bane and Harried) on a revolving cycle over 3 days. A LOT of new players were had and great times.

Ive stated my response on the Admins spending their own cash on the certs on the facebooks

 

[Steve_MND]

With that said, I've gotten a cert at my FLGS -- but that's largely because our Regional Coordinator runs games out of that store, and I was fortunate enough to get a reward that way. Skerrit's point about possibly inviting admins and RCs (I'm not aware that many LCs get access to certs to distribute, but that may be just how things are done in our region) to your store is a solid one; just don't expect that it'll be like Oprah ("And YOU get a cert! And YOU get a cert!")

I'd actually like that less. That would mean whoever is lucky enough to be available at the store that day might be the one who gets the cert, or it might be a person who is playing that day but may not ever show up at another table again. And then even if it is given to the store owner to hand out, you're having to deal with playing favorites, or if not, then the possible appearance of playing favorites, etc. Regardless of the terms in which it's couched, a cert distribution system like that is going to leave large gaps and potentially cause bad feelings. When it comes to stuff like special race/class combos, unique items and other things one can't get within a module itself (whether that be playing in it or running in it), I think it should either not be there to begin with, or else available to anyone.

Disagree. An option that's deemed OK to allow a limited number of players to use, so that it will rarely appear at any given table, isn't necessarily balanced if every PC has access to it.

Allow me to disagree with your disagreement. The argument of "well, yes, it's unbalanced, but only for the table they are at," or "yeah, it's unbalanced, but only if there are a lot of them at a table," does not hold water IMHO. An item or feature added into a game should be balanced in and of itself, regardless of local circumstances that might be 'hoped' for in order to keep it under control.

Also, describing the con process as a 'paywall' does a disservice to the admin staff -- they're not just handing these things out to people who pay the most money (except for Skerrit, I hope ; ). They serve as rewards for people who volunteer to run the registration table, for mustering officers, for folks who love to play the game but see the need to give up some of their own gaming time so others can enjoy the game. Those folks can and should be rewarded, and if a cert that lets them play a Season 3 aasimar is the reward, I'm OK with that.

Except that if they are being handed at at big cons and such, they're not being handed out to just the people that volunteer or give up their own time, etc. They are giving them out to people who volunteer or give up their own time AND just happen to be able to make it to those cons. There are hundreds of people out there who do the same thing, or even more, and just don't happen to be able to get to cons like that.

A person at our local store has probably run twice as many tables of AL for folks than all the rest of the players there, combined. Another started running Encounters at the local store purely because he wanted to see the game grow in the local area, even tho for the first two seasons, he had to run it at the same time as another tournament he was marshaling on Wednesdays. I'm sure there are similar situations out there all over the place. Should they not get the opportunity to get those special certs as well just because they don't happen to be able to get out to cons and such where they are being handed out?

 

[RealAlHazred]

Again, that's fine. But then, what would you suggest as an alternative for conventions, so that they can compete with stores and home play? Why would I ever want to go to a convention, if I can play exactly the same modules for exactly the same rewards at the hobby store?

 

[Z. H. Darkstar]

Again, that's fine. But then, what would you suggest as an alternative for conventions, so that they can compete with stores and home play? Why would I ever want to go to a convention, if I can play exactly the same modules for exactly the same rewards at the hobby store?

Cons still have the wholesale exclusivity of Epics and timed exclusivity of Expeditions. They also have the upside of having more resources to provide a more memorable experience. Plus all of the non-D&D things that take place at a con are incentive to attend.

While you may feel that the cons have to compete with stores, those of us running games at stores feel the opposite. The level of support given to stores feels minimal, like they only want us to push books on the players.

Truthfully, my real beef is with the DM rewards structure and the secondhand sales of certs. Since changing the former isn't possible at the moment, my focus is on the latter by reducing their value. There are plenty of other things that can be given to con attendees and resold by those who wish to make a buck, just don't let game mechanics be something that can be bought and sold. This isn't MtG, where a collectible nature is part of the game, thus justifying secondhand sales of game mechanics for a competitive advantage. D&D is a collaborative game, not a competitive one. Prevent arms races whenever possible.

 

[Steve_MND]

Why would I ever want to go to a convention, if I can play exactly the same modules for exactly the same rewards at the hobby store?

I'd say that if a person is just going to a convention only for the rewards, they're going to a convention for all the wrong reasons to begin with.

Truthfully, my real beef is with the DM rewards structure and the secondhand sales of certs.

Man, don't I know it. I'm sitting here with probably a couple hundred dollars worth of certs from mods we've just not run enough tables of over the last year and a half (if I were the sort of person who'd stoop to those sorts of shenanigans and was motivated enough to bother figuring out how that'd be done). Ideally, I'd love to be able to take any of these extra certs we have to a big Con one day (like GenCon or something) and hand them out to players who have the applicable non-certed versions of the items. But I kinda doubt that'd be an option, so, ah well.

Except for Wingwear. You couldn't pay someone to take a Wingwear.