Instore Prerelease and release dates

[Ralph Herold]

Given the new situation set into motion by the new Instore Prerelease promo card, I plan to add a little information about these Instore Prerelease Tournaments. Basically, I need to know three things:

1. Have the Instore Prerelease Tournaments always taken place exactly one week after the regular Prerelease Tournaments?

2. When have the Instore Prerelease Tournaments begun to take place? (The first regular Prerelease Tournaments were held for the Ice Age set.)

3. What exactly is the difference between an Instore Prerelease Tournament and a regular Prerelease Tournament?

Another, related question at the end: Is the official release date for each set somehow linked to the date of either Prerelease Tournament? Since release dates are badly documented, this would make it a lot easier to track them.

[MagicRumorMill]

Given the new situation set into motion by the new Instore Prerelease promo card, I plan to add a little information about these Instore Prerelease Tournaments. Basically, I need to know three things:

1. Have the Instore Prerelease Tournaments always taken place exactly one week after the regular Prerelease Tournaments?

2. When have the Instore Prerelease Tournaments begun to take place? (The first regular Prerelease Tournaments were held for the Ice Age set.)

3. What exactly is the difference between an Instore Prerelease Tournament and a regular Prerelease Tournament?

Another, related question at the end: Is the official release date for each set somehow linked to the date of either Prerelease Tournament? Since release dates are badly documented, this would make it a lot easier to track them.

They are called "Release Tournaments"  they happen on the release weekend of the set to the mas market.  This is the first time they have had a card to represent such a thing, unless you count "ass whoopin".  Unhinged had a "Release Tournamrent" as well.

[Ralph Herold]

MagicrumorMill: Sorry, this is incorrect. The Release Event is yet another kind of event and is indeed new. Whether this will become a tradition remains to be seen. Instore Prerelease Tournaments on the other hand are taking place for quite some time (I remember we had them in Germany already years ago). They have never been mentioned by WotC, if I recall correctly, so they might even be a European phenomenon. Further research is required.

[sylvanstu]

When my buddie had his store he took it upon hinself to have his prerelease the weekend after the prere;ease because everyone went to pastimes prerelease it was alot bigger and good time to trade and buy. sohe had his the following weekend and had a good turn out

[MagicRumorMill]

MagicrumorMill: Sorry, this is incorrect. The Release Event is yet another kind of event and is indeed new. Whether this will become a tradition remains to be seen. Instore Prerelease Tournaments on the other hand are taking place for quite some time (I remember we had them in Germany already years ago). They have never been mentioned by WotC, if I recall correctly, so they might even be a European phenomenon. Further research is required.

If a tournament is going on for a set that has already hit the market, you cannot call it a "prerelease"

first you will note that this is said: The Betrayers of Kamigawa prereleases were last weekend, and the in-store Release Events are this weekend.  Here: http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=mtgcom/daily/jc25

http://www.magiccan.com/modules.php?nam ... cle&sid=42  Here shows that there was an 8th edition release tournament in stores.

http://www.magiccan.com/modules.php?name=tournies  this shows some of the unhinged release tournaments

[silver.paladin]

If a tournament is going on for a set that has already hit the market, you cannot call it a "prerelease"

first you will note that this is said: The Betrayers of Kamigawa prereleases were last weekend, and the in-store Release Events are this weekend.  Here: http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=mtgcom/daily/jc25

http://www.magiccan.com/modules.php?nam ... cle&sid=42  Here shows that there was an 8th edition release tournament in stores.

http://www.magiccan.com/modules.php?name=tournies  this shows some of the unhinged release tournaments

I think you are missing the fact here, that as Ralph was stating, is that the releases in Europe happened LAST weekendm before the actual release of the cards.  So yes, they are still considered pre-releases.
As for the US release, you cannot quanitatively say what is happening or how the US releases are to be described, because of the weather 2 weekends ago precipitated a number of stores to re-do their pre-releases last weekend.
Europe has already been doing the official pre-release as well as a secondary pre-release (or perhaps an early-bird release for lack of a better term).
Its just bad timing with the US weather, so unless an 'official word' is made, there cannot be known what to call this 'release' or what to label this new 'promo card'
And, also, since there has not been much of any kind of fanfare for this new card (Budoka Pupil), its best not to label the card anything just yet, in case Wizards has some other kind of use for the card that is not yet known.

[Ralph Herold]

MagicRumorMill: This does not reflect the situation. Let us have a look at Betrayers of Kamigawa:

general Prerelease: 2005-01-22
Instore Prerelease: 2005-01-29
Release Event: 2005-02-05

Now things become a little more complicated, because  the Instore Prereleases only seem to take place in some parts of Europe (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=ev ... ses/europe / http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=ev ... ases/italy) and Australia (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=ev ... eases/aunz) while the Release Events seem to take place only in North and South America (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=ev ... ic/release).

While it seems plausible now that the Budoka Pupil promotional card is handed out either at the Instore Prerelease Tournaments or the Release Events dependant on the country, the question remains what happens in the countries which have neither an Instore Prerelease Tournament nor a Release Event. Do they not receive the card at all?

(Note: I called the Release Events a new type of event, because it has not been done before for an expert level set. My hope is that this becomes a tradition, especially for the advanced level sets.)

[mintcollector]

Ralph:  I can vouch for these new instore release events being new.  I kept trying to get a hold of Alan yesterday, and finally got a call back on my cell phone last night about 9pm.  Pastimes is signed up as a venue hosting one of these in store events, however, the only event Pastimes has listed is a booster box sealed event on 2/5/05.  This is an release event they have run internal themselves at a cost of $99 as you get a full box to draft from to make a 40 card deck.  I digress, here though, as Alan did state he was unaware of the disconnect and is going to phone WOTC to see what happened and where his prize shipment is.  I explained to Alan what the event was supposed to be a Champions starter with 2 Betrayers boosters......aka a normal draft event, but that there also should be a Budoka Pupil release card given out to first 32 registrating.  He told me I can call him later in the day and he should have his stuff overnighted for an early morning delivery so he can run the event.  

Since Alan is unaware of such an event and he is one of the major US event hosts, this would be the first event of this type, at least for Expert level product.  I agree with MagicRumorMill that both 8Ed and Unhinged have had these type of events, with promo cards being handed out, and I would not discredit his point he made.  

My suggestion would be to have a pre-release section hosting all the pre-release cards.  A second section for release event cards should be created.  I also feel that the 8Ed Rukh Egg and Unhinged Ass Whuppin' be moved to this new section as well.  I can vouch for sure that there was no 7Ed release event, as my ties to many venues here in Chicago were via my WizKids event organization and I would have heard about any such event, and I also was actively playing FNM back then.  

So in summary, Betrayers if the first Expert level event run sanctioned by WOTC as a large scale event with a promo reward.  8Ed and Unhinged were the first release events that did take place though and should warrant entry into the release event section.  I feel that 8Ed/Unhinged were test pilots of release events to see how well they would be accepted.  It is obvious that the expansion into Expert level product has proven that this should be a new level or organized events we should see in the future.

I will post any information I receive from Alan in my talk later on today.

As regards to your concerns of what to do with regarding the country variations of when the Budoka was released, I think there simply was a disconnect on overall organization.  Think about it.  It makes no sense for a second pre-release card to be issued.  A release card does make sense.  I think Amigo just got the promo cards and then since Europe holds a general pre-release followed by in-store pre-releases, they decided to issue the prize card there.  Since the fit seems to work for Europe since they already have their organized play structured so, you may see this behavior moving forward, but in the US, you will have a general pre-release followed by a release event.  So Europe will be the lucky ones to see the release event card one week sooner.  I still feel that the card should be organized under release event, as it only makes sense this way.  Amigo obviously decided to make the change to best fit their organized play structure, therefore making it seem to be a in-store prelease card.  Until we see the next set to ratify this or any other theory, maybe a temporary choice should be made as a place holder for organization.

[Ralph Herold]

mintcollector: Good points. I will do what you suggested.

[Buffalo_Bob]

A few years ago there were sneak peak events that were held the week after the prerelease like the instore prerelease talked about and gave away arena land prizes as the door prize for playing. Atleast that is what they did in Tomah, WI, but when that store went under that stopped around here. WOTC seems to be trying a lot of different marketing tactics.

[rick21n]

Many of what you are calling In-Store pre-releases happened in North America due to incliment weather.  Attendance at the Pre-Release 1/22 was very low.  Boston for instance got almost 3 feet of snow that weekend.  WOTC decided to let The same stores run a pre-release again the next weekend to try and help make up for numbers.  The second release happened in stores more often then not since no plans had been made to use the larger locations.

Dunno if this helps any.

[Ponagger]

We have had "sneak peak" tournaments since Darksteel, with the tourney being an instore, sealed deck event scheduled for the week before the set is released. Betrayers sneak peak was on 29th & 30th (yes we had two)

Usually this was just a day when we had access to new product for tournaments (the sealed event and drafts) but we were still not allowed to sell it. This is the first time there has been a card associated with this event.

Reading on the Wizards site, I got the impression that the release events (on the weekend of BoK's actual release) were the "instore pre-release" that was pushed back a week due to the weather in the States - but this is speculation.

All of the promotional items we received (posters etc) call the event a release event, and have (date) check boxes for Sat 5th and Sun 6th - we crossed these out, and wrote in our dates (as above).

Feel free to ask for more info (I know this post is a little unclear)