My summer season of big events is finally over. Since my last column, I worked three major events. I'm not going to give you a full report on each of those three because that would take too many pages and too much time. Instead, I'll focus on the most interesting aspects of each event.

July 22-23: Grand Prix Malmö
GP Malmö was held in a former slaughterhouse: an old building with concrete floors, brick walls and low ceilings. As soon as I saw the inside of the venue, I knew we would have a problem. With only a dozen people inside (the Wizards of the Coast crew and a few judges), the place was already uncomfortably hot and humid. Add five hundred gamers and you'll get one of the most physically demanding GPs ever. I don't think the place had any air conditioning system.

I was deck check team leader on Day 1, and had a very bad day with that job. Day 2 was more interesting for me—I was side events manager. This is a job I had not done in a while, so I was very excited about it. We would be running Coldsnap release events with very nice prizes (an iPod Nano for the winner of each of the first three flights), a GP Trial, a Junior Super Series event, a Legacy tournament, and, of course, plenty of 8-man drafts.

My job as side events manager was to assign judges to the various events, make sure that everything was running smoothly, coordinate breaks, and act as the Head Judge for most of the events. I also helped out with scorekeeping (for most of the day I had two scorekeepers). It's an important job with a lot of responsibility. After all, only 64 players compete in the main event on day 2 (at most GPs)—everyone else will be in side events (or sightseeing, or enjoying a hangover, but that group is small enough that we can ignore them). A side events manager should make a plan, have judge meetings, and provide structure to the operation. Side events should not be a chaotic mess run by guys who are disappointed about not being in the main event. Even though the REL is lower and the prize pool consists mostly of booster packs instead of cash, a judge should bring the same professional attitude to side events as to the main event floor.

At this particular event, it was not very easy to make plans or to have judge meetings, because most of my staff was in a seminar in the morning, and some of them would be assigned to other things throughout the day. The attendance was slightly higher than we expected, and several judges who signed up for the weekend had not showed up, so we were understaffed both in the main event and the side event room. Coordinating breaks was a challenge. Table assignment was also a challenge, because the room we were in was very small and we soon filled it up with four Swiss events and a handful of drafts. I had to assign some events to the main event room, which I couldn't see from the scorekeeping table and where they could not hear our announcements.

The lack of staff and the heat were our major problems until about 5 pm, when one of the floor judges came to me and told me that he'd seen a player peek in a draft. Now, many of you might be thinking that this is exactly what happens in side events—cheating happens because the judges are not watching, they don't really care, and after all, it's only side events. In fact, the last sanctioned event I played in (before I took a job with my local distributor, which prevents me from participating in sanctioned events) was a side draft at Worlds 2003. In that draft, two little kids were quite blatantly looking at each others' picks and telling each other what to pick—and the judge didn't do anything.

Even though random side event drafts should be quite casual, that doesn't mean that they're REL negative 1. Rating points will be affected; the normal rules of sanctioned play still apply. You're not supposed to peek.

I ended up disqualifying two players from the side draft: the guy who peeked and the (willing) target of peeking. There's a bit more to this story, but that's all I'm willing to share, even though the investigation seems to be finished. The important part is that illegal behaviour was punished, and we sent out a strong message that we take cheating seriously even in side events.

You shouldn't feel like a jerk for calling a judge if your fellow players are doing something shady in side events. You also shouldn't feel like a jerk for penalizing players who are doing something illegal in side events. However, it's always better to prevent cheating before it happens than to penalize it when you catch it. When you run side event drafts, don't just slap the product and the pairings sheet on the table and run off to do something else—take a few minutes to ask the players whether they've drafted before and to remind them of the rules. Stick around to watch the draft if you're not needed elsewhere. Be present—players are more likely to call a judge if one is standing nearby.

GP Malmö was a very valuable experience for me. I learned a lot about planning, leadership, diplomacy and my own abilities. I also learned that Ramlösa (a local carbonated mineral water) is the key to succesful judging.

August 5-6: Finnish Nationals
Nestled between the difficulties of GP Malmö and the unpredictability of Ropecon, Finnish Nationals seemed like a peaceful interlude. I was not the Head Judge, as it was Pasi's turn to be in charge. We had 80 players in the main event, and a staff of 9 judges: Pasi as HJ, Jari Puranen as scorekeeper, myself as event manager/certification manager; L2 judges Eugene Bazhenov and Irina Samonova from Russia; L1 judges Kosti Jokinen, Jani Ohtonen, and Jarkko Rundelin, and L0 judge Kenneth Peltokangas. As the distributor representative, I acted as event manager. This meant that I could not always concentrate on actual judging as much as I would have liked. Our Russian visitors did an excellent job on the floor, both in interacting with the players and in educating the Finnish judges. They commented that they had never seen such a smooth event, and while our players are in general very nice and well-behaved, this was indeed a rather boring tournament from the judging perspective.

August 11-13: Ropecon
It's time to shamelessly plug my local Cool Event. Let's get the inevitable jokes out of the way: Ropecon is not about ropes or bondage. It's a roleplaying event, and "Rope" is short for "Roolipeli", which is Finnish for "roleplaying game". In the context of Ropecon, "roleplaying" is understood to mean the whole gaming hobby, including tabletop roleplaying games, live action roleplaying, collectibe card games, miniature wargaming and board games. The convention also includes various fringe activies such as boffer-sword fighting, cosplay, fantasy art and this year, courtesy of some visitors from a Swedish convention organizing committee, Live Action Tetris. The entry fee for the whole convention is 20 EUR, and that includes participation in all events (so players will bring their own product for all Limited Magic events, and the convention provides some gift certificates for prizes) plus floorspace for your sleeping bag. The convention is organized by a non-profit organization, and the people who work on it are all unpaid volunteers. Most people work an 8 hour shift for free entry to the convention; some work more and receive lunch money and a sense of achievement.

This year, I was the Card Game Coordinator, which meant that I was in charge of all card game tournaments and events. I had to put together a schedule of events, which meant that I posted an open call for event organizers at a local messageboard and accepted everyone who e-mailed me, including the guys who contacted me just three days before the convention. The schedule included games such as Vampire: the Eternal Struggle, Munchkin, the Decipher version of Star Wars CCG (dead), Babylon 5 CCG (dead), Legend of 5 Rings (technically not dead) and Hecatomb (probably dead). I also recruited some folks to demo some of these games at my demo booth.

For Magic, I planned the whole schedule myself. Ropecon is different from most Magic events in Finland because we get a lot of people who have never played in tournaments before. I planned the Magic event schedule with those people in mind, but I also kept in mind the local PTQ crowds. Thus, the Friday main event was flight-style Standard events with 4 or 5 rounds—the format is accessible to newbies, and the serious tournament players still have their decks from Nationals. On Saturday we had a Team Sealed tournament. This is a Ropecon tradition and the event is always well-attended. This year we had 20 teams, while in some previous years we've had over 30. The Sunday main event was Vintage with 39 players. We also ran plenty of side event drafts, an Arena league for the casual players, a deck clinic starring Jussi "Mozzie" Timonen, and a judge seminar. My judge staff consisted of four judges. Every day one of the judges was assigned as scorekeeper/CCG Information Desk Person, whose job it was to answer random questions ranging from "Where can I sign up for a draft" to "Where can I find the RPS tournament".

Judging at Ropecon is always challenging because the room we use is not quite big enough, and there's a constant stream of people walking through it, on their way to the dealer's room, or just wanting to see what's going on. It's noisy, because of the VtES tournament (which is multiplayer by nature and involves a lot of talking) and the miniature tournaments in the next hall. It's very different from Finnish Nationals or PTQs because we have to deal with all the non-Magic people. On the other hand, meeting other gamers can be very interesting—two non-Magic judges showed up for our judge seminar and everyone learned new things as a result. Occasionally I even have time to try out new games or to attend lectures and seminars.

Every year, Ropecon invites a few international gaming celebrities to attend the event. Mark Rosewater was a guest of honor many years ago, and we've also had Steve Jackson (GURPS), John Kovalic (Dork Tower), and many others. These guests always seem to enjoy the relaxed atmosphere of the convention and the booze, food, sauna and naked wrestling [! ?Seamus] of the afterparty. I recommend Ropecon to anyone who likes gaming in general. It's one of those events where you can feel like the most normal person in the room.

That's all for me this month. See you in a few weeks, and in the meantime, don't steal my pen, don't write your life totals on the result slip, and be nice to your local judges.

Thanks for reading,

Johanna Virtanen
DCI Level 3 Judge
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