Quoted from Mrhide

The fact that it is in toronto ...

Yeah... there are positives and negatives between Montreal/Ottawa and Toronto. I did go to a Toronto gameroom show years ago, and wasn't impressed. Turn-out was very small. Pretty much was only collectors that showed up. Very closed-community. But this was years ago.

But when it comes to Montreal, up until MAACA took off, turn-out would have been just as shy. It was a nearly-closed community until we came along. And to make the crowds come, it has to be big... not just a few pins displayed with a vendor or two. Allentown seems to have the right formula, as there is other stuff for families to do around there (Dorney park...). It could be done in TO or Ottawa/Montreal, but it would need a lot of work. what gets Allentown going are the vendors... a lot of people show up there JUST for parts and the flea market.

Arcadia is an expo that works in Montreal, but that is mainly consoles, and there is a lot of money involved in that.

I dunno... just rambling on... but many would have to get involved.

Guess a few things need to be cleared up.

Starburst wants to do this obviously from a promotenal standpoint.  They want to premote what they are selling and figure holding a tournament is a goo way to do this.  Their original idea was to just offer a $500 prize and not take an money, just a free Canadian tournament with a $500 prize, so $500 + staffing costs would be what they are out to run the event.  We brought the idea to the table of adding the qualifying entry fee so that we might be able to up the prize pot which would make it more attractive to other players.  My assumption as again this is very early is that all qualifying entries would be used for prizes, I don't know what or if they would take any of their overhead costs to run a tournmanet into account when creating the prize pool that will be something that has to be worked out.  But considering they were willing to pony up $500 and have the tournament for free that says to me they are open to the idea of spending some money on this thing because they can see the value of getting a bunch of players/collectors into their show room to play their games.

The other thing is this wouldn't be a show, it would be a tournament only, it would be most likely be only Sterns.  So no swap meet, no other distributors or anything like that, that what the Toronto Game Room Show would be for, which by the way is going to happen this year.  Now while you can go to the showroom any day of the week and see the machines, the only oppertunity to be Canadian Pinball Champ wouldonly  be at the tournament.  Now the common theme I keep hearing is well why bother, I can't win.  My response is how do you know that?  How do you know unless you try?  As an example, because I won PAPA B yea, this Aug I'm going to PAPA and have to play in A, I have to go up against people who designed the games I'm going to be playing on, but I'll never get better competitng against myself or the small pool of people in TOPL unless I play against the better players.  So I go and hope for the best.  Yea the running joke "I'm not playing if Vengeance is playing" but really there are some really good Canadian players and I'm not even begining to assume at all that I would be able to win and anything can happen on any given day but it won't happen unless you try.  

Quoted from Vengeance

Had a very interesting converstaion with Starburst yesterday, they are interestead in hosting and organazing a Canadian Only Pinball Championship with the winner being crowned as Canadian Pinball Champion.  They are looking at running the event sometime in the fall, right now the entire thing is it the very early stages of development.  

But I wanted to approach everyone here and see what it would take to get people to attend an event such as this.  What would the prize pool have to be to make it worth your while, $500, $1000, $1500?  Also what is an aceptable duration would you prefer a single day tournament or mabye a 2 day tournament?  What would you consider an acceptable price to pay for Qualifying?  

Things like that, what would make or break your attendance to something like this?

... That could open up a whole other discussion... what is the pinball-capitol of Canada?   If they did this tourney, it would be fun to check the totals of top players per city!

...Since I consider myself between Ottawa and Montreal, I say OTT/MTL rules.

Leafs suck.

What it really comes down to is, who is willing to pony up the Money/Time/Man Power/Effort/Space/machines to do something like this.  

Satrburst obviously is, just as another interesting note, TOPL did not come up with this idea, Satrburst contacted us saying they wanted to do something like this and were wondering if we could help them.  

So while Toronto may not be Pinball Capital of Canada   It is where Starburst Head Office is and since they are the ones who are going to be ponying up all that is involved for this it makes sense that it is at their flag ship store in Toronto.  

Who knows, if this was sucsful mabye they would be open to the idea of one at the Montreal office one year.  

Quoted from Sparky

... That could open up a whole other discussion... what is the pinball-capitol of Canada?   If they did this tourney, it would be fun to check the totals of top players per city!

...Since I consider myself between Ottawa and Montreal, I say OTT/MTL rules.

Leafs suck.

Quoted from Vengeance

... Now the common theme I keep hearing is well why bother, I can't win.  My response is how do you know that?  How do you know unless you try?  As an example, because I won PAPA B yea, this Aug I'm going to PAPA and have to play in A, I have to go up against people who designed the games I'm going to be playing on, but I'll never get better competitng against myself or the small pool of people in TOPL unless I play against the better players.  So I go and hope for the best.  Yea the running joke "I'm not playing if Vengeance is playing" but really there are some really good Canadian players and I'm not even begining to assume at all that I would be able to win and anything can happen on any given day but it won't happen unless you try.  

I hear ya... but Gottlieb said it best... IT'S MORE FUN TO COMPETE! It is just a blast to have a tournament. And yes, anyone can win.

Case in point, JD3 is the only guy I know that has his name simultaneously on the MAACA champion cup AND the toilet trophy for last place. He was always the one saying that he sucked in tourneys and cleaned everyone's clock at another tourney.

10$ entry fee and 5$ per qualifying round... I would show up with a few greenbills.  

I would definitely and I would agree with the idea of two divisions .. $5 a qualifier sounds fair to me or if you prefer have a $10/qualifer top division and $5 qualifier second division. Too bad it couldn't be affilated with the gameroom show but I can understand why they would want to stick out on their own. Where would it be held Starburst Retail location ?? or would part/all of the $500 go to rent a place ?

Squid

Quoted from Vengeance

What it really comes down to is, who is willing to pony up the Money/Time/Man Power/Effort/Space/machines to do something like this.  

For participation on this in any of these capacities it would come down to who is going to benefit from it.

If it is solely for the benefit of Starburst I would have to say not very interested.

If it is for the benefit of stimulating a pinball community for this and future local events than I would be more inclined to get involved.

As for loaning machines, I think someone would have to provide movers that can be trusted for people to loan them. My most dreaded aspect of collecting is hauling pins. A. They are heavy and B. They are prone to damage anytime they are moved.

Starburst isn't asking for any of that, what I meant by that stament was who as an individual or company is going to pony up the Money/Time/Man Power/Effort/Space/machines

Starburst at this point has they they are willing to pony up all of it.  

The are going to provide the Money buy fronting any cash prize that is decided on.
They are putting the time in to organize the event as seen by them contacting us
Their staff is going to run the event, or they may ask for voulnteers I don't know, we spoke with a staff memeber who runs all of the Golden Tee tournaments and she was asked to patricpate in the setup
They are supplying the space with their show room.
They are supplying the machines, they were willing to offer up as many as 50 machines if needed.  

So Starburst at this point is the driving force behind this not me, not TOPL, I'm just trying to help out where I can by communicating with people I know in the community to see what the intrest level is like and what people would want to see.  

Quoted from necro_nemesis

For participation on this in any of these capacities it would come down to who is going to benefit from it.

If it is solely for the benefit of Starburst I would have to say not very interested.

If it is for the benefit of stimulating a pinball community for this and future local events than I would be more inclined to get involved.

As for loaning machines, I think someone would have to provide movers that can be trusted for people to loan them. My most dreaded aspect of collecting is hauling pins. A. They are heavy and B. They are prone to damage anytime they are moved.

50 machines is a serious commitment. If they are willing to provide that much support and promote it effectively, it should be a notable event.

While Starburst is thinking about this idea, they may also consider holding mini-tournaments in cities across Canada. I know that if Fun On the Run (a Starburst subsidiary in London) were to have a mini-tournament with one or two machines at one of their very few locations here in town, I would be there in a heartbeat. Hopefully they would shop out their notoriously poorly maintained machine(s) beforehand.

It would be a good way to promote the big event in Toronto.

agreed with cooke.  there is a starburst in montreal you know... so technically, we could have something if they are willing to involve 'em

That would be an interesting concept.

One idea they wanted to do was to coincide the tournament with the release of a new Stern, that is where the 50 number came from, get 50 of them set them up and have everyone play on the new machine only for the tournament.  Would be an interesting idea for the satelite offices to have that same new game and allow for players to play remotely at their other locations across Canada.  

The one road block I see is how do you do the playoffs?  It's one thing to qualify on diffrent machines, it would be completely diffrent to have to try and run a single elimination tournament across country, not sure that would be fesible.  

But I'll bring it up none the less and see what they think.