The last year has been one where I lacked focus in Magic. Why? Numerous reasons: I've never slept this badly for this long in my life, work has been quite involved, I'm recovering from significant burnout after years of going hard at Magic for minimal reward, but I think one thing has to be at the top of the list.
The way that WotC incentivized people to play this year, competitively, was a complete departure from the last... roughly 13 years since the original creation of the Pro Club. Even Planeswalker Points Season 0 wasn't as much of a departure as this, although it was a departure. And I spent the previous 7 years of my life learning and training to work in that system.
First, a quick history lesson (I can do a longer form of this if people care, but I spent 7 years talking about Magic Organized Play and almost nobody cared). SO. The changes around Planeswalker Point Season 0 and 1 were focused around dealing with Magic's growing popularity. Why? In the 2011-2012 time frame, GPs were getting too big for WotC's tournament software to handle. PTQs started to grow to the point where stores didn't, or couldn't, reasonably schedule proper spaces for them, and had to figure out how to deal with the world where maybe 100 people showed up, or maybe 355 people. Also, the world is large and how do you deal with countries that aren't the US?
The response to this by WotC was to cut invites from GPs from top 16 no matter the size, to top 4, top 8 if the GP had than 1200 players, and put those into more PTQs around the world, as well as to simplify the pro point system to its platinum/gold/silver structure and remove rating-based invites. At the time, Helene B. (rest in retirement) stated that the rough idea was to get 30 plat, 50 gold, 70 silver, with 400 person PTs (the PTs at the time were creeping on 600, 'too much'.) The bye system at PTs was moved from rating to Planeswalker points based: after a short season 1 that had pros freaking out about the ease of getting byes, a 1500 per quarter line was set for 3 byes that was suitably insane to try to reach (I did, but... yeah.)
Over time, Silver gained an invite, RPTQs (32 per season) came into place to further allow for growth dealing with PTQs, a cap on GP attendance came into place to deal with burnout in the 2012-2013 era, and when we started seeing GPs above 2000 people, eventually WotC added the '13-2' qualifier line. This era also had special invites that were 'near-miss' invites, explicitly stated to be so that people who got close didn't get discouraged. This was obviously arbitrarily applied: people who were known getting the invites, people with the same level of near-miss ignored. Also, the number of byes available got cut down to 2 and made yearly, so as to be less punishing (Helene responded to me at the time saying 'see, we listened to your criticism!' so... monkey's paw.) After 2013 or so this system as described was more or less stable.
Going to GPs in this era was always pretty rough when you didn't have pro status. I got a couple GP top 8s, but never got status. Finally, after much pleading and arguing, we finally got Bronze (see: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1WqCYww-TJhnzhIz7j-iMVeufAzfc9L7Tg-0yg6_k0kc/edit for the detailed argument) the year after it really would have helped me. It was finally possible (although not ideal) to claw your way into benefits from either the RPTQ or GP path for a year or two.
And then, kablooey. Back to a single-layer PTQ system, with GPs as bigger PTQs, and the MPL.
The losses caused by this change were significant to me in multiple ways, and not just because of the structural rewards that were no longer available: there were second order effects. I first went to GPs because it was the only way I could interact with higher level players for certain. It was, and still is, one of the biggest pieces of advice people give on how to improve at Magic: play with better players. In the era right before GPs grew, it was even possible to get money drafts going and really get some dedicated time with people who would soundly beat you, and give you the chance to learn the whole way.
In the new system.... the best players are not incentivized to play against you, at least in paper, at GPs. They certainly won't travel to them. If you can catch them on Arena, maybe you get a small chance of it. But... Arena. The latest Table for 2 Podcast episode (https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/anchor-podcasts/table-for-2-an-mtg-arena-podcast/e/65360394?autoplay=true) has Hayne talking about how he doesn't get to see his friends anymore because of the new PT structure. That's been the case for a year (and he knows that well): I only see him when going to a GP in Canada, or a GP alongside a PT. The high level pro and mid level pro community has been fractured by this change, simply because they no longer attend the same tournaments most of the year.
And then there's Arena. Arena competitive play is a huge structural change. No longer can you engage in focused practice, no longer can you practice limited in a way close to how it will be at GPs and PTs. It's all about a massive grind which has never been my bag, except in limited. For some people this works, and I've seen some people brought back to the game with it. But for me, this is... not what I know how to do well. Playing online for me is a necessary evil, a draining exercise in not being able to connect with any humans. Whether this is good for Magic or bad is a discussion for another time, but it wasn't good for me.
Okay, well. After a year of chaos and lack of communication, we've got something 'new' for our esport. A very complicated upper tier, and a middle-lower tier which is... PTQs that qualify you for 3 regional Players Tour qualifiers, and fractional invites available at GPs which carry between seasons.
That's right: they spent a year to figure out a very rudimentary version of the same system they wanted to try 7 years ago. To say this is a bit insulting is to say that Oko was a bit playable: peoples' entire lives were changed this year, with regards to Magic, with regards to their ability to be semi-professional players, and not only was it never acknowledged, now we're back on a skinnier version of the old system? Yeah. Yeah.
So now we're looking at a brand new year, where what I've trained myself to do is back in play. Somewhat. So here's to a year where maybe being practiced at tournament play is worth just enough to get some Players Tour action.
PS: WotC, you want someone who cares about organized play to give you another angle of insight? *mimes 'call me' motion*
PPS: Call people who are from other countries too, I'm not an expert in the other countries' situations.
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