demo or tournament?

[headcold]

I'd like to see the number of scapers increase in the Louisville area. I know two. Since the cool game shop can't sell Heroscape because Hasbro isn't mom & pop friendly, I'm not quite sure where to hold the event. The game shop owner might be cool enough to let me do it anyway at his place.

I'm just brainstorming here. Has anyone had any luck trying a tournament or doing demos to boost the amount of players in their town?

[K/H_Addict]

i've thought about it, but the local hobby shop here doesn't carry HS either, and haven't bothered asking the manager of said hobby shop if i could run an all day demo kind of thing.

[Codeman]

Jormi_Boced has held tourneys in Minnesota at public places ( Open Store Front next to a Piggy Blues BBQ & a Coffee House on the corner). The coffee House in particular generated a lot of interest as the customers inside as well as people looking thru the window wondering what was going on. Several people did stop and ask what this was all about and showed interest in the game, if not for themselves but for their children or grand children. I will say when I stopped at the Target in Austin the following week I notice only one HS master set left on the self were I think they had maybe five the week before! I also am holding a tournement in Iowa during October at a Godfathers Pizza.

I can also say all these businesses have let us use their stores free of charge. I also like the fact they can accommodate all of us and have tables and chairs provided. I would recommend looking into these types of places…. Of course encourage your participants to support the business hosting the event.

Good Luck

[countblah]

Running a demo or tourney is cool and all, but if you can't buy the wretched thing in stores, there's not a lot of point in raising interest, is there?

[Nooblar]

At least new 'Scapers can get in with the lonely Master Sets on the shelves. Boosters are another story...

[countblah]

That's like including the disclaimer at the bottom of the screen on a car commercial: "professional driver, closed course". As in, if I run a demo with all my cool figs, then leave, and others buy the master set, then they'll never be able to get to the fun stuff. Not that the MS isn't fun (Jason), but it's nowhere near as fun as having a load of the rest of the stuff.

[Oprime]

I went to my local gaming store "Battleground" and joined a SWM tourny so I could meet the owner and some people.

while I was there I talked to the person running the shop/tourny about HS.

Not only was he warm to the idea of me playing/teaching HS to bring in new customers, but he actually had HS in stock (only 1 MS and wave 4 but hey thats a start) and said he would carry/order it if people were gonna by it!

Now this shops ENTIRE left wall was Warhammer and the counter area was all CCGs.

My point is I USED SWM to get in the door and shmooze with the crowd for a while and then introduced the Idea of HS to them, It went over pretty well.

[Codeman]

Originally Posted by countblah

That's like including the disclaimer at the bottom of the screen on a car commercial: "professional driver, closed course". As in, if I run a demo with all my cool figs, then leave, and others buy the master set, then they'll never be able to get to the fun stuff. Not that the MS isn't fun (Jason), but it's nowhere near as fun as having a load of the rest of the stuff.

There is nothing wrong with the masterset.... I remember Spider Poison winning our first Tournement with a master set only army, against they rest of us with all our expansion sets. You can have the same fun with a master set, but I would agree the expansions do add and will continue to add to HS. I would not let easy access to expansion stop someone from enjoying this game... were there is a will there is a way ( mail order for one).

[countblah]

Mail order is prohibitively expensive...to the tune of doubling the cost of the product ordered most of the time. You have to admit it would be a kick in the pants to play HS with a whole bunch of figs, then rush out to TRU to buy you some of that action, and find out that you'll be playing with 1/5 of the figures that you were playing with before. Plus, two of those figs are zettian guards. Ew.

[Codeman]

Originally Posted by countblah

Mail order is prohibitively expensive...to the tune of doubling the cost of the product ordered most of the time. You have to admit it would be a kick in the pants to play HS with a whole bunch of figs, then rush out to TRU to buy you some of that action, and find out that you'll be playing with 1/5 of the figures that you were playing with before. Plus, two of those figs are zettian guards. Ew.

I still stand behind my statement ( mail order is only one way ) & I applaud Headcold for trying and asking for help. Countblah maybe you could come up with some positive info for him.

[LilNewbie]

I'm not sure why you are so negative about someone trying to drum up some local opponents to play HS, countblah. I agree it can be a little discouraging not being able to pick up HS stuff but that shouldn't stop anyone from showing the game to others and hopefully meeting some people to play the game more regularly. It's even better if you can find neutral ground like a FLGS to demo or run a tourney so you can meet people and get a read on them whether you would want to play with them on a regular basis.

To answer your question, headcold, I would run some demo days before doing any tourneys. That way you can meet people and drum up interest in the game and possibly get others interested in helping you run some tourneys later. Teamski (and others) have posted pictures and recaps of going to a FLGS, setting up a cool map and just letting people play the game after teaching them the rules. Good luck in your endeavors and let us know how it goes (i.e. post pics )

Newb.

[countblah]

What he's doing is totally cool where he is. No problem. A good idea if the stuff's available, which I'm sure it is. Don't mean to sound like I'm giving him the business. I'm sure there's way more than the MS where he is.