NEC XIII - Dec 1st-2nd - Philly, PA - NEW VENUE

[meanestrage]

Hey Guys, this is Jeremy.

I wanted to give a huge thanks to everyone that came out this weekend for KoF. I was really energized and motivated by everyone and their attitudes. I also wanted to thank everyone for their kind words and informative feedback. When a few of you said that these were the smoothest brackets you played in out of the whole tournament I was surprised and humbled, after all this the first time I ran brackets at a "major." Summer Jam is like a minor major if you know what I mean. I also wanted to make a public post to address some concerns. This post reflects only my personal thoughts on how KoF (singles focused) went this past weekend, which was my responsibility. This is not an official Big E Gaming statement.

First off I would like to address the issue of feeling "shunned." This feeling can come from a few different areas, but I feel as if it all branches off of two issues, and that was starting late with a limited number of setups. We started 30-45 minutes late, and that was due to me trying to do too many things at once. I was setting up the stream feed in the bar way too close to having to set up the brackets. I would like to personally apologize for that. While I haven't received word that we may have made it on the big screen, we would have had a better chance to do so. The number of setups also goes hand in hand with finishing earlier and a chance on stage. Late into the second pool, monitors opened up that I could have utilized, but I didn't have systems to place there. I apologize for not asking everyone if they had extra setups because again, we may have finished earlier providing a greater chance at recognition.

This is why I feel there is a feeling of being shunned. We had to then play our top 8 during the two largest (and loudest) finals of the weekends, incidentally towards the corner of the ballroom during the last few hours of the whole event.

The stream quality wasn't something that I could control, but I would like to thank bifuteki for streaming, because I remember a time when it was a big deal just to be able to record game play for youtube (it is standard fare now a days I know, but no reason we shouldn't at least appreciate it.) I just hope that he looks into a dedicated hotspot and not phone tethering for the future.

I will be working all year to make NEC14 much better then NEC13 for all of us. I will be more involved with the community and will make it something to remember; seriously, I don't mess around. With that said, I will start playing more KoF then Garou:Mark of the Wolves, but I don't expect my skill to amount to much in either title, lol.

Any feedback is appreciated, both positive and negative. You can count on me using it either way to make a positive change in any future events I run or I am apart of.

Again, thank you all for coming out and being rock solid community. Cali, you guys were amazing coming out to NEC, I hope return the gesture and to see you all at EVO (I haven't traveled out of the tri-state area majors, so it is a big deal to me). To all my East Coast players, keep your eye out for me, I hope to kick off a few KoF only events in the coming months. To ATLUS if you are reading, you are the best company a FGC community could ask for when making and supporting a game. Thank you for your continued support.

Goodnight guys and happy holidays. Congratulations to our winners this weekend.
-Jeremy @DES_Mono out

Shout outs to mono for having the least hiccups in a tourney. You ran the smoothest brackets that i have noticed and was chill with everything. Let buy this guy a beer next time we see him

[desmond_kof]

Hey Jeremy, thanks for explaining things. Next Sunday I'm interviewing Romance about NEC for the podcast, would you (or any others here) would be interested in talking with us? We will be on Skype. Let me know.

[FM Sway]

To be honest, it just felt like a lot of stuff just didn't go our way. From the power outage to the teams that no one knew we had until 2 hours beforehand, to the constant downtimes on the stream (terrible wifi made everyone use 3G/4G. I'm talking 56k to dialup speed here, so that was out of Bifuteki's control), to the timing of our singles tournament (running a final against Marvel Top 8 was brutal. Simply brutal.) Just so many things felt like the dice refused to roll in our favor that the real saving grace was that we were all able to get together and at least drink and play together.

As I said in KOFCast, I remember falling asleep during pools (only ran on 3 hours sleep before), and when I woke up we were still in pools 1 and 2. When I saw Soul Calibur on stream, I just couldn't believe it, thinking to myself "Since when has SCV been on the main stream in 6 months?" It's not necessarily a jab at SCV, but they do have a dedicated streamer in Jaxel, but because FilthieRich was there, they had to put SCV up on Spooky's stream. It was just so much bad luck, and it seemed like, with the exception of a (godlike) Persona scene, everyone got on spooky's stream. Persona was blessed enough to have stickbug hold their entire event and create a memorable Top 8. We didn't have a dedicated streamer like MK or Persona or the 3D fighters. We had none of those. Heck, we only had 4 setups and 1 1/2 hour warmup, and with 56 people willing to play KOF and a good number of them coming ONLY for KOF, it just looked really bad. As I said on the podcast, Romance and Bala took the risk of coming to NEC knowing fully well that KOF was a side tournament and nothing else so they shouldn't really be super upset. But just the way things were going period, even for a side tournament, it was easy to understand the frustration and anger everyone was feeling. We were all tired, and a bit agitated. I completely understand the reasoning why Bala and Romance came to NEC in the first place; and that was to show love to the EC KOF scene and, I think and believe, to get Spooky to stream at least Top 8 and show the stream that, hey, KOF is alive and well, and there IS interest for it. And the biggest thing was that there WAS a great amount of interest for it. I don't know how anyone else feels, but 56 people feels great in my book, and it was a solid amount of skill too.

So much bad luck happened that there's no way I could really say anything that could balance it out. KOF just wasn't in the cards in NEC. I didn't even know we had a $750 pot bonus; I just happened to hear it from a Tekken player.

In the end, I don't really think we were shafted, but with the way things were going, if you didn't know anyone in the staff to talk to and were just some guy who entered KOF cause you wanted to, it's not hard to think you did. Thankfully Bifuteki was there for us and took care of us through teams and Top 8, and I'm supremely grateful, but we all want to be on that grand stage, and show everyone just what they were missing the entire weekend.

-FM Sway

[desmond_kof]

As I said on the podcast, Romance and Bala took the risk of coming to NEC knowing fully well that KOF was a side tournament and nothing else so they shouldn't really be super upset.

So, if a tournament game is labeled as a side tournament, that means that people should risk traveling to that tournament and not try to make that tournament as hype and skillful as possible? Even if it had a good show the last year, and there is a pot bonus?

[FM Sway]

So, if a tournament game is labeled as a side tournament, that means that people should risk traveling to that tournament and not try to make that tournament as hype and skillful as possible? Even if it had a good show the last year, and there is a pot bonus?

I don't think a lot of people even knew there was a pot bonus. But for guys who travel such a long way, it's a bit of a risk since those people pay a lot of money to come through and support. A lot of games get pushed to the corner for the main event games, and while I want a huge turnout for every game I support, if I see that it's not even on the pre-register list, I don't want to have huge grand expectations of it because obviously the TOs didn't have that much to begin with.

Yes, it was awesome last year. But when I noticed that we weren't even able to pre-register, I kind of had this inkling feeling that KOF was going to be overlooked for a lot of other games, especially when the other games had dedicated streams.

All I'm saying is, if you're gong to come through, then come through and let's make it as hype as possible; let's do our best and get in there. But if it's labeled as a side tournament, don't be -too surprised- if stuff like this happens. And by stuff, I mean being told we're able to get a bit of the main event spotlight not just by staff members but even on the stream itself when Spooky closed out that Saturday night, but suddenly, we're not there anymore.

By no means do I say not to come or not to try and make it as hype as possible, I really hope I'm not making you guys have that assumption. But it's hard to have expectations when they tell you beforehand that KOF isn't on the pre-reg and we're starting the entire singles tournament on Sunday. I wanted it to work out, I think we all did, and we were so close. I wanted to get on Spooky's stream and hype KOF the way it deserved to be, but it just wasn't in the cards, and it sucks.

[solidshark]

Got this quote from NeoGaf about Jaxel talking about what happened with KOF at NEC

"Jaxel discussing what happened to KoF.

Kor had to make a flight out mid-day, so the entire Tekken tournament was pushed up by NEC staff going out of their way for Kor instead of DQing him and therefore fucked up the entire schedule and leaving no time for KoF. "

Looking for the stream where he talked about this now.

[MonoTekETeA]

Hey Jeremy, thanks for explaining things. Next Sunday I'm interviewing Romance about NEC for the podcast, would you (or any others here) would be interested in talking with us? We will be on Skype. Let me know.

I would love to, but what time? I have work on Sunday and will be home 6 PM EST. After then, let me know when and I will make the time.

Fredie, thank you for the words. I have a streaming setup from a couple years ago when streaming my team's local tournament "Body Shop." If you need help, let me know, a lot of it is written about now a days though.

Sway, after Eric's post on FB, you can bet that KOF is faaar from a "side" tournament at NEC. Thanks for the support!

Solid, I'll keep everyone up to date as I get news as well as establish things.

Thanks for the comments everyone.
-Jeremy

[desmond_kof]

Hey Jeremy, thanks for explaining things. Next Sunday I'm interviewing Romance about NEC for the podcast, would you (or any others here) would be interested in talking with us? We will be on Skype. Let me know.

I would love to, but what time? I have work on Sunday and will be home 6 PM EST. After then, let me know when and I will make the time.

We will be talking 9pm central time which is 10pm eastern. Is that okay for you? That time will be 7pm, and we might start recording 30 minutes afterwards. Pm me your skype details if you can!

Thanks.

[FM Sway]

I would love to, but what time? I have work on Sunday and will be home 6 PM EST. After then, let me know when and I will make the time.

Fredie, thank you for the words. I have a streaming setup from a couple years ago when streaming my team's local tournament "Body Shop." If you need help, let me know, a lot of it is written about now a days though.

Sway, after Eric's post on FB, you can bet that KOF is faaar from a "side" tournament at NEC. Thanks for the support!

Solid, I'll keep everyone up to date as I get news as well as establish things.

Thanks for the comments everyone.
-Jeremy

I saw the news, and you can bet that, despite the things that happened, I know E is a good guy, and I'll still go to Winter Brawl regardless. I had a fantastic time meeting pretty much most of the EC KOF community and learning from them, and I'm sure WB will be something great!

[GunsTariq]

Hey Guys, this is Jeremy.

I wanted to give a huge thanks to everyone that came out this weekend for KoF. I was really energized and motivated by everyone and their attitudes. I also wanted to thank everyone for their kind words and informative feedback. When a few of you said that these were the smoothest brackets you played in out of the whole tournament I was surprised and humbled, after all this the first time I ran brackets at a "major." Summer Jam is like a minor major if you know what I mean. I also wanted to make a public post to address some concerns. This post reflects only my personal thoughts on how KoF (singles focused) went this past weekend, which was my responsibility. This is not an official Big E Gaming statement.

First off I would like to address the issue of feeling "shunned." This feeling can come from a few different areas, but I feel as if it all branches off of two issues, and that was starting late with a limited number of setups. We started 30-45 minutes late, and that was due to me trying to do too many things at once. I was setting up the stream feed in the bar way too close to having to set up the brackets. I would like to personally apologize for that. While I haven't received word that we may have made it on the big screen, we would have had a better chance to do so. The number of setups also goes hand in hand with finishing earlier and a chance on stage. Late into the second pool, monitors opened up that I could have utilized, but I didn't have systems to place there. I apologize for not asking everyone if they had extra setups because again, we may have finished earlier providing a greater chance at recognition.

This is why I feel there is a feeling of being shunned. We had to then play our top 8 during the two largest (and loudest) finals of the weekends, incidentally towards the corner of the ballroom during the last few hours of the whole event.

The stream quality wasn't something that I could control, but I would like to thank bifuteki for streaming, because I remember a time when it was a big deal just to be able to record game play for youtube (it is standard fare now a days I know, but no reason we shouldn't at least appreciate it.) I just hope that he looks into a dedicated hotspot and not phone tethering for the future.

I will be working all year to make NEC14 much better then NEC13 for all of us. I will be more involved with the community and will make it something to remember; seriously, I don't mess around. With that said, I will start playing more KoF then Garou:Mark of the Wolves, but I don't expect my skill to amount to much in either title, lol.

Any feedback is appreciated, both positive and negative. You can count on me using it either way to make a positive change in any future events I run or I am apart of.

Again, thank you all for coming out and being rock solid community. Cali, you guys were amazing coming out to NEC, I hope return the gesture and to see you all at EVO (I haven't traveled out of the tri-state area majors, so it is a big deal to me). To all my East Coast players, keep your eye out for me, I hope to kick off a few KoF only events in the coming months. To ATLUS if you are reading, you are the best company a FGC community could ask for when making and supporting a game. Thank you for your continued support.

Goodnight guys and happy holidays. Congratulations to our winners this weekend.
-Jeremy @DES_Mono out

Jeremy,

If you are the guy I'm thinking of that ran SJ6 and NEC, this is Gunz.  I'm 75/25 for WB cause I'm trying to be ready for Atlanta.  I can also help out as well.