Disney Lorcana's First Regional Challenge Event Was A Triumph (2024)

As I stepped out of the Hartsfield-Jackson Airport in my standard flight uniform of jeans and hoodie, a wall of humid Atlanta heat slammed into me. By the time I found the Uber pick-up spot on the opposite end of the terminal from where I thought it would be, I was a sweaty, tired mess. Though I had worked hard to get ready for the Disney Lorcana Challenge (DLC), my first major competitive TCG event, there were so many things about this past weekend I just wasn’t prepared for.

While this was my first time competing in a massive, 2,000-player regional tournament, this was also Ravensburger’s first time hosting one. Both the Atlanta and Lille events were the kick-off for Lorcana’s organized play program, and a template for what official tournaments will look like going forward.

While issues inevitably arose, and unforeseen complications were occasionally cause for disappointment, the event put on by Ravensburger and tournament organizer Pro-Play Games was a remarkable success. Morale was high, the event ran efficiently, and the staff worked quickly to resolve problems and make amends to attendees. There are a few things that need to be improved before the next DLC event in Chicago, but if Ravensburger and PPG are using this first tournament as a learning experience, then this bodes very well for the future of competitive Lorcana.

The Tournament

The event took place at the Georgia World Congress Center, a 3.9 million square foot exhibition center that’s the fourth-largest in the United States. While the Lorcana Challenge occupied a single massive hall in the convention center, another, even bigger event called MomoCon was happening at the same time.

Friday night check-in required Lorcana competitors to pick up their badges in one hall, then navigate through a mass of anime cosplayers across to another building, down several floors, and finally fight through the crowd to reach an inconspicuous escalator leading to the tournament area for promo card distribution.

It was chaotic to say the least, evoking memories of the infamous GenCon mess last year, but getting there a day early and having to fight through that it before the tournament helped me learn the layout of the convention so I could easily find my way to the game the next day (PPG also made this helpful video to show people where to go).

Those who registered the night before earned a bonus Flotsam & Jetsam promo, but, because this prize wasn’t revealed until many people had already booked their flights, Ravensburger decided to gift all competitors a Scrooge McDuck promo card as well. This is just one of several examples of Ravensburger going above and beyond over the weekend to ensure attendees felt well taken care of.

The tournament started Saturday morning at 9am with a player meeting… or at least it was supposed to. By the time Melee, the software used for keeping score of the tournament, updated with everyone’s assigned seating, it was almost 9:20. When the player meeting and the opening remarks from brand manager and co-designer Ryan Miller and community and engagement manager Richelle Brady ended, it was time to go right into the first round.

The tournament utilized a new 2-Game Round format, which has been controversial among players since it was first revealed, and, after playing it myself, I have some mixed feelings. Clearly, the format still allows the best players to excel, with many well-known top performers able to make the cut for Day 2. As someone who ended up with more ties than wins overall, I can say that there are some downsides.

After three or four ties it starts to feel like you, your opponent, and everyone at the tables around you with the same record are all crabs in a bucket, holding each other back from being able to get ahead. The complaining started to get more frequent from those around me going into the middle rounds as people felt like their matches were pointless.

The format is designed to make every win matter, but in practice, a 1-1 result makes both players feel like they’ve lost, especially when the tournament is only half over and they’re already fighting to stay in contention.

On the other hand, the 40-minute 2-Game Round format made the nine-round marathon a lot more manageable. Most of my matches ended in 20 to 30 minutes and I almost never had to rush from one match to the next. Even though it took from 10am to 9pm to finish the day, it was a lot more manageable than traditional best-of-threes would have been.

Day Two transitioned to a more familiar best-of-three, single-elimination format for the top 64 players, while the other 97 percent of us who didn’t make the cut were free to participate in a variety of side events and earn tickets for additional prizes. The top eight winners were announced on stage by Miller around 7pm Sunday night, where Joshua Paultre became the first-ever winner of a US Disney Lorcana Challenge with his extremely-off meta, never-before-seen Amber/Amethyst Mufasa deck. This was the coolest ending possible for the first Disney Lorcana Challenge, and the Into the Inklands season itself.

Room For Improvement

Aside from a few pain points that were widely discussed by attendees throughout the weekend, the event went remarkably smoothly.

The biggest issue was one that was outside of both Ravensburger and PPG’s control: the aforementioned delays with Melee. It seems having a couple thousand people try to access the website at the same time - and potentially many more whenever the time for round pairings overlapped with the event in Lille - was causing too much of a strain on the servers, leading to significant delays in the tournament.

No round was able to start on time because everyone had to wait up to 15 minutes to find out where they were supposed to sit. There were also issues with incorrect point totals showing and misreported wins that led to even more complications.

Anyone who attended Set Championships last month or goes to a store that uses Melee is already well aware of how fickle it can be. Other TCGs like Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh! use their own proprietary tournament software, and it seems like Ravensburger will need to do the same if it wants to avoid major issues like this in the future.

Melee created issues on Day Two as well. When sign-ups opened for the first side events of the day, there was a major malfunction in Melee that forced the organizers to transition to in-person-only sign-ups. This led to a massive mob of people attempting to sign up for a limited number of events, while judges were pulled away from their posts to help manage the lines and keep people organized.

It was chaos. There were mixed messages coming from the staff that led people into the wrong lines, and many who had planned to run side events all day ended up spending a lot of their time standing in lines. The Melee issues were eventually resolved around 2pm, but by then many felt like their plans for the day had been ruined.

To help make amends, the number of prize tickets you could earn in each event was doubled. This allowed me to get both the Rapunzel and Cinderella non-foil promos after going undefeated in two sealed events - the maximum I was able to play on Sunday - which felt like a fair compromise. A lot more people were able to get the promo cards they wanted, and that’s a great thing.

But there were some issues with the ticket economy, even before the payouts were doubled. Those with attendee badges were given six tickets, while competitors were given none, which led to competitors buying attendee badges just to get the tickets they wouldn’t be able to earn while competing on Day One.

There was a stunning foiled Cinderella playmat on the prize wall for 100 tickets, far more than anyone could earn in two days even with a great performance in multiple events, which led to a secondary market on the event floor. While it was against the rules to buy and sell tickets, there was no other way to get the playmat unless you somehow got tickets from other people. Some people pooled them together with their friends, but throughout the day I was bombarded by people asking to buy my prize tickets for as much as $20 per ticket.

I’d much rather see exclusive items like promo cards and playmats awarded to winners of side events while the prize wall is reserved for sealed products and merch. That way, people aren’t incentivized to be predatory or underhanded in order to get over-valued prize tickets. Considering the playmat is going for over $2000 on eBay and the promo cards are $500 a piece, it's no wonder people were willing to behave badly to get them.

A Difficult Tournament To Spectate

The way spectators were handled was the most perplexing thing about the tournament. No one was allowed to watch their friends play, and after finishing a round everyone was required to leave the competitor area entirely - leading to big traffic jams of people at the start of every round. While the casters did a fantastic job commentating the game, they were casting over recorded footage of the matches instead of commentating live.

As a consequence, results of matches were made public on Twitter hours before the games were seen on Twitch, including the finals. During the final match, you can hear Miller announcing the top eight players, including the winner, in the background of the caster audio.

It also seems like it's on the community to record, save, and publish the VODs from the tournament. The official Twitch stream doesn’t keep any videos, so players have had to upload their own VODs of the matches to their own YouTube channels. This was also an issue for the LoreCast livestream when Ursula’s Return was revealed. I don’t know why this policy exists, but the VODs from the official streams need to be easier to be easier to find and access.

The Community

All of those issues are things that can, and should, be addressed for future tournaments. But what matters most at an event with this many people is how much those people enjoy being there, and, despite some bumps in the road, the attitude of the players throughout the weekend was overwhelmingly positive.

My competitive TCG experience is limited to Pokemon, and even then only as a reporter and collector rather than a player, but I still think there’s something special and unique about the Lorcana community. Their ability to roll with the punches and stay positive is a big part of what made this weekend such a success. Ravensburger and PPG facilitated things wonderfully, but it was the players and attendees who made the Lorcana Challenge such a fun event to be a part of.

I had very few negative experiences with other players. None of my opponents were rude or aggressive, and everyone I played with made it a priority to ensure I was having a good experience, just as I did for them. At least half of my opponents throughout the first day were competing for the first time ever, just like me. I’ve heard many horror stories about bad actors at tournaments in other games, but for the most part, all I saw from others was an overwhelming love for the game, and passion for playing it.

This will always be the most important factor. If 97 percent of players can go to regional events and fail to make the cut for prizing and still have an incredible time there because they got to see all their friends and play a game they love, then every Lorcana tournament will be a huge success.

Having more fan-focused activities will only make the DLCs stronger too. Photo ops, artist signings, cosplay contests, and other activities for attendees will be important for these events as the game continues to grow. For a first run, I’m incredibly impressed by the execution from both Ravensburger and PPG, and I can’t wait to see how Disney Lorcana Challenges evolve and improve.