Standard Pauper Players Clan : an assessment after 3 months of existence

The title may sound a bit solemn but it's an important thing to do within a young, not to mention newborn, playgroup.

Rather than an assessment, I want to give you feedback and some thoughts on what's been going on.

It's been three months or so now since the utility of a blog for the clan showed up and I decided to create this platform on Blogger. But as you know, no man is an island, no man stands alone, and living that busy and lightspeed life like you all, I made several calls for help and arms so that the playing community for standard pauper would maybe become more active, more structured and invested in its own development and achieve format recognition. And there's joy in my heart from the fact that these calls were heard. Moving forward ?!

Way back !

We need to know where we come from to better understand what we are now and furthermore where we are going in general, so it's background time !

The storytelling

- September 2013 : Decision is made. I'm sadly leaving the PauperKrew MTGO Clan after several years of fun there and with an observation : very few people here care about Standard Pauper. There are lots of great players but rare discussions on this format.

Move to Community / Clans on MTGO for an excavation campaign in search of a new home. Scrolling down, digging again, a Clan called "Standard Pauper Players" is there. It has 45 members at the time and Fyz is the Clan leader. I leave him a PM and we end up chatting with each other shortly after that.

I want to join !

And I want most of all to help the Standard pauper Player base increase and gather around one goal : making the format more popular, more friendly, and trying to contribute having it sanctionned on MTGO one day. The Clan had no mail adress and neither the Blog nor forum back then, and Fyz agreed those tools would be good but he really had no time for them. "I'm up for that" if this can be my contribution.

I receive and immediatly accept the Clan Invitation, and very surprisingly the Clan reins right after. Shock. I want to be a part of it but not really the Captain. Embarrassment. More discussions with Fyz about that and building a stronger and more active community on the format.

I then tought to myself "OK let's give the Clan a try, i have a bit of time and will and we'll see where it's at in 2 or 3 months". Really took it as a challenge, and I was motivated ! But Clan leadership meant "you're going to spend a lot of time on it and play less. Sacrificing a bit of family time too". We will go deeper into that discussion on the Clan forums soon but I always thought Clan leadership should be a game of thrones, turning tables, with responsibilities rotating every year. Not that I plan on leaving my tasks already, but let's keep rotation in mind.

From there, things had to keep on moving, spreading the Clan's existence on the Web and on MTGO, recruiting players, and building teams.

- September 2013 : Standard Pauper Players Clan : A call for action and information posted on PDCMagic.com forums.

http://forums.pdcmagic.com/viewtopic.php?t=8178

Some Clan objective has been posted on the blog :

http://standardpauperplayers.blogspot.fr/2013/10/getting-ready-or-trying-at-least.html

For every action, there's a reaction and several observations can be made since that adventure all started :

The good things

- Many regulars and old online fellows involved in the format joined the clan (check Clan member list on MTGO)
- The clan's existence and objectives started to spread across the web and community, thanks to Gwyned !!
http://writeradept.blogspot.fr/2013/11/clan-standard-pauper-players.html
- The pageviews count of the Blog increased significantly since this was published and we have worldwide visitors. The majority are from the United States, then Europe and Asia and last, but not least, South America.
- Jason Moore published an article about the format and the Clan blog on Blackborder.com, thanks for the mention !
http://www.blackborder.com/q/node/17681
- Linking personal blogs spread all over the web on the Clan's blog is good, as it brings wider representation and interest in the format. Check out our contributors own blogs :
http://cabelthepauper.blogspot.fr/
http://thedraftbrewery.wordpress.com/
I mentionned Gwyned's Writer Adept earlier.

The very good things

- Many of those regulars are active, talkative, and willing to contribute to the fomat and community.

- Lone wolves are turning into wolf packs. Communication between members is increasing.

- BigBee stepped in as Forum Creator / Moderator and made it technically possible, great job, mate!

- Author rights were given to active members so they can contribute and write deck reviews, articles on the

Blog.

And they are prolific ! Below you will find links to articles published in november.

Thank you Clanmates writers : Gamelen, Gwyned, BigBee, Chaotic Crawler, MundisV, Rhysticy, Cabel, NT-Smith, DrChrisBaker.

The clan blog is open to your pen, other clan members, just ask the Captain for Authors Rights and Fire at will !!

There are more to come in december and i do hope it never stops, here's what we wrote about :

The Clan Online Chat does not "shine" in V3 when someone types in it while you are in another chat, so the chat is often silent though many clanmates are online. That's a pity !! Be aware of it. It's not a big problem, because we have other tools to keep in touch with Clan concerns. The Clan chat is mostly used during events, spending time with clanmates attending "live" is really cool and entertaining.

Clan vs Clan ? If all standard players online join the Clan, we'll have no one from other clans to beat or play against, i was told few ago. Is that really a problem? Clan is a small community dedicated to an objective, even several objectives. One of them is sharing bettter play experience, and you can beat clanmates or lose to them, you'll keep getting better and improve your metagame knowledge. You can work with clanmates on dedicated matchups to get better in events with scheduled test sessions. Other objectives have to be discussed by Clan Board, see Perspectives below.

Month of November : most prolific month ever ?
wow, 10 articles using 12 hands on Frontblog this month of november 2013 !!
I do hope this one will not stay in the unclassified things section if we hit less articles next month !!
2 articles in september, 3 in october, increasing authors' investment in writing on the blog feels so good !

Perspectives

- Building a Clan Active Board is mandatory so we can discuss and choose the directions we want to go, according to objectives and priorities. A discussion is up on the Clan forum, step into the board if interested !

- There is an important player base turnover in the format : we need more active players and prospective Getting started / New Players Rooms on MTGO, who's up for this with me?

- Really not complaining on the numbers of posts on the blog in november, but scheduling a post publishing schedule would be good, authors, let's do that on the forum what do you think? What about a post per week, could we afford more? Readers, what is your opinion?

- Gathering ressources on the format : we need a team keeping an Eye of Sauron on everything about the format online and linking them to the forums and blog, who's up for that?

- Working on another assessment with the Clan Board for the month of March 2014 once objectives and priorities have been discussed on the forums.

- Clan is still recruiting active / talkative / prolific members, just send us an Email !

standardpauperplayers@gmail.com

For strength of the wolf is the pack, and strength of the pack is the wolf.

Thanks for reading and see you online or on the forum.

Adner
(Thanks to Cabel for the article revision !)

2 comments:

Cabel the Pauper12/04/2013 07:14:00 PM
Great assessment for the first quarter.

I'm pretty sure that Standard Pauper has experienced some kind of Rennaissance after a brief Dark Age. The return of Gwyned to hosting at just the right time and then Adner stepping up to take over and build up the Clan with lightning speed have played a big role, thanks guys!

If things were prolific this month, I think it was part of a move to capture more attention to the format in an effort to help keep it alive. I think we've all been successful!

The only thing I'd stress is to make use of the Clan Boards and get them buzzing and to keep an eye on the Clan Chat in game since it is easy to lose track of. Thanks for the round-up, Adner!
Unknown12/05/2013 10:12:00 AM
that's a good round-up, Ad! It looks pretty good for the clan atm.

I moved to another flat and don't have internet till middle December:(( see you later all!

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Standard Pauper Players Clan : an assessment after 3 months of existence

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