Hello and welcome back to Illumination, the Disney
Larkana podcast. My name is Max. I'm Sam. And
we have a guest. Cliff. Cliff got back in. I
did. He snuck back in. Back door. He was hanging
out with us and he just stayed. I did. We didn't
notice. But he is here and we are excited because
there's a bunch of new information coming out.
of the world's broadcast that just happened this
past weekend at time of recordings at the very
end of June here. And we are talking all about
it. First and foremost, thank you for listening.
And a big congratulations to the first ever Lorkana
champion, DKP himself. The hardest working individual
in the Lorkana space. Just constantly grinding,
grinding, grinding. You'll never see more grinding
on a Maui half shark in your entire life. hot
it is this is a children's game this is a children's
game what did i say that wasn't child appropriate
sam grinding oh i see all right no more grinding
but dkp way to grind moving on from the world's
coverage we have news and that's what we're really
excited about right we're news we're not world
champions we are not none of us are dkp correct
but we would like to be dkp in as much as we
want to win a championship correct So new information
was announced about all of the Disney Lurkana
challenges, with many of them including dates
and specific locations, which is particularly
exciting. I'm going to run through a quick list.
Obviously, this information is available, which
in and of itself is good news. Yes. And we're
having three of these in North America, three
in the EU, two in Brazil, two in Japan, three
in China, one in Australia, along with a challenge
qualifier event. two, we believe, in Southeast
Asia. Pretty exciting. That is a lot. 16 Disney
Larkana Challenge events across the world and
some places that have never had them before.
Yes. So more people getting more access to this
really, really fun game. So we're excited about
that. Some other changes that came up and feel
free to jump in because I only have a few listed
here. One of the big ones is possibly one of
the most exciting is the format has changed for
all the Disney Larkana. challenges it is now
best of three matches thank god and the finals
i think is it from the 32 cut up or is it higher
than that where we go five just finals just finals
just the last two is best of five yeah And he
can appreciate that, I think, more than us since
he's had to experience it. Playing best of five
for the finals, I think, is the best way because
then you don't lose because you had one bad draw.
Right. Luck becomes less of a factor. Correct.
Which is really awesome. And the fact that we
don't have to deal with the much maligned two
game format. Which was horrendous. It just created
so much in my very, very little experience with
it. Left me with a feeling of emptiness. Like
I just. don't know. Like a lot of one ones where
I just wasn't sure. It's not satisfying. There's
no gratification of I won, and then there's no
really letdown that I lost. I know both of you
helped me test for Vegas doing the two games.
It feels really bad that at the end of round
two, you have two points and are effectively
dead for the day. Yes. You didn't lose a round,
but you're out. But yeah, you didn't do enough
because that winning two with the extra points
was so big in determining if you could proceed
into the top cut. Three points for the 1 -1.
Yeah, it's nuts. And seeing that change, knowing
that Ravensburger has been listening to the community
is a heartening thing. So I'm really happy that
that change was made. Yes. We are now a two -day
format. So we are going to finish up our rounds,
last four of the rounds, I believe. Eight rounds
day one, four rounds day two with a top 32 cut.
Correct. After that. That's a lot of Lorkana.
Yes. So we're not missing out on any of the games
because they really want us to play the Lorkana
games. Well, guess what? A lot of Lorkana. kind
of games we played yeah feasibly you'll have
to be 1002 yeah or 912 to like really be in like
better standing yeah that's fair you want to
win which hasn't changed right like that's still
top 32 we don't yet know the size cap for these
events at time of recording but obviously if
we're talking about like something like a 5k
and only 32 of those people can make it that's
a very small percentage right so you've got to
be playing your best there's just no doubt about
it and with it being 12 rounds before the top
cut we can assume more than a 2000 player cap
right we don't know that for fact no but Just
from a previous gaming experience, we can assume
that if you're playing 12 rounds, it's more than
2 ,000 players. Working on some calculations,
right? Grinding them numbers. We can kind of
figure out that this is approximately the world
we're living in, which is good. I mean, we've
seen that at the size they were during season
one, they were easy sellouts. Easy sellouts.
So I'm hoping personally for something like a
5K main event. That would be lovely. Now we're
questioning, can we sell that out? Sure. Less
DLCs overall is kind of the downside to that,
but it also means that there's a higher chance
that these things will sell out at a much larger
cap. Right. But we, on the bright side, we know
more than 40 days in advance. One of the biggest
difficulties in terms of season one was short
notice to make a lot of very important adult
decisions on deciding travel, lodging. Being
able to take the time off from work. Being able
to take the time away from family. Transporting
the entire family. Things that are very difficult,
not easy to do on a 40 -ish day notice. Even
saving up money for it. Right. Like just things
that you can't do when you just have limited.
A month and a half. Yeah. I mean, I talked about
it, I think, when we did my Vegas recap. I had
everything booked for Vegas before I even knew
I was in. Yes. Flight, hotel, everything. Sam
and I did not get tickets, but we had a hotel.
hotel before we found out we weren't getting
tickets yeah like just because you wanted to
be able to get things before theoretically they
went up because of the extra couple thousand
people buying in right and know that you're able
to go i think we kept the hotel room for a month
because you were on the waiting list yeah yes
we were hopes that we would get there absolutely
for One of the events, I mean, I'm going to jump
a little out of order. I apologize. We know an
event in June of next year. You're on actually
in order that we have dates for many of these
events. EU, NA have event dates. Some of the
other places are still TBD, but they're getting
their first ever ones. And I'm hoping that they're
continue to give them as much notice as possible.
Right. Because we're going to have different
groups, right? Different companies handling a
lot of the tournament organization. And Ravensburger's
never done that in those countries. So I'm not
trying to defend them. too, too much. Goodness
knows I give them guff from time to time when
they need it. But I think that the fact that
they're talking about these, they're planning
these, they've laid them all out. We know approximately
what the season's going to look like. Be a little
bit mushed this time because of how late things
got pushed from season one. We're working our
way through. It feels like season two very much
is a, if we can hold through this year, we're
going to see what in season three Ravensburger
really has planned for the scope and the breadth
of their organized play. The real idea. Yep.
We're going to see what the full beast is right
now. It seems like we're getting pieces of it
and we're getting a lot of decisions that are
made because there's so much. pressure in terms
of time and lack of resources which is okay hey
we're getting something it's better than nothing
i'm hoping i can do one this season which is
more than we got to do last season because of
the weird lottery style admission so i'm just
hoping that even if i can't play in the main
event i'm still allowed to go connect with other
enjoyers of this game and experience a dlc for
the first time it does look like it'll be like
that just knowing how past times which is the
to for north america runs things they've already
posted that badges will be coming on sale so
it's not like a main event ticket right so there'll
be different badges and in general like a badges
system for magic it's like your baseline badge
gets you into the main event and allows you to
be in the venue generally different tiers to
give you Maybe a couple extra prize wall tickets
or access to some side events or like a special
lanyard or like random. Playmat, water bottle.
Yeah, some tchotchke of some sort to help justify
the extra cost. Yes, I love when they offer the
VIP room as one of my favorites. It's usually
just a room with a couch in it. It's a couch
room with water cooler in it so you can fill
your tchotchke and that's it. And that's it.
Yeah. Love that. Yeah. I'm happy to see that
Eventbrite is probably no longer in the picture.
sure it does seem like that yes yeah yeah time
of recording it seems like past times past times
like cliff said handles a lot of different card
games including match the gathering so they are
no stranger to events of this size and making
sure that and i'm sure ravensburg are still feeling
the sting from the community over how season
one went in terms of the amount of people that
wanted to go to a dlc versus the amount of people
who actually were able to attend a dlc and like
i know there's a lot of current fan outrage online
like about where the locations of the dlcs and
the black of total amount of DLCs. But we have
to remember that Ravensburger just hired a whole
new team to help handle this stuff, what, two
months ago? Three -ish, like two to three months
ago. They haven't been in place that long. I'm
generally a very cynical person. Max can attest
to this, but I think in this case, we have to
give them a little bit of leeway just to see
how this plays out. They've been more transparent
than they ever were about anything. And we know
about an event a year away. It's not that bad
to plan for an event 300 and... 60 days away
as opposed to 40 ish yes it's a big change and
also just in terms of last in season one we had
six in north america but the largest one was
a little over 2 000 people where if these caps
are much larger 5 000 people for just the main
event you're just about as many people who are
allowed to participate in a dlc obviously that
strongly diminishes your chances of performing
at a high level at a because luck's a huge factor
you'd be the best player in the room but when
there's that many players in the room you're
going to draw bad every now and occasionally
right you're going to make a suboptimal decision
every now and again and it's going to get punished
and that further punishes you when there's that
many other illumineers in the room but at least
everybody gets to register and play in a large
volume which is exciting one of the other changes
is how the prize cards are given out Yes. Per
win right now. Well, no, it's for participating.
You get the Pegasus. The Pegasus. Prior to you
had to wait until round three to get the Dragonfire.
Right. And then it was top 128 got the Let It
Go. Top 64 got one. 32. Yep. Stout hearted Rapunzel.
Yeah. And the Playmat. And then. Yes. And then
the Mickey. Yeah. But now it's after playing
in round five, you get the Mulan. Yes. And then
if you make top 32, you get the Simba. Yes. A
big deal, too. I think we're going to see the
value of the Mulan be a lot less than the Letico
was, but we're also going to see that Simba worth
probably a little bit more than the Cinderella
Stout -Hearted would have been, closer probably
to something like a Rapunzel. And my other hope
would be, since they're sticking with the prize
wall, is... the amount of prize wall tickets
you can earn for the main event. Yes. It was
a little frustrating. If you had to get to 30
points in the tournament to get 20 prize wall
tickets, and that equated to just one of the
promos. Right. You spent effectively an entire
day to get less prizes than if you just ground
out side events. Exactly. Like Olivia and I played
in three side events, got first and second in
each one, and in less than two hours got 1751
prize wall tickets in two hours. Right. I played
an entire day for $20, and that was the most
tickets you could get. Right, exactly. Huge difference,
and obviously the price difference. And also,
that was at Vegas, when if you kind of roll back
time to Atlanta, it was even worse. Where the
really awesome Cinderella Stout -Hearted playmat
was just basically unachievable without some
shady dealings for other people's prize tickets.
People going in together for it. Yeah, the thing
that they said not to do. For all of the shortcomings,
and a little bit of the ones we alluded to, I
will say that my hat is off to... Ravensburger
for addressing so many of the previous issues
already and we still have more information yet
to come about some of these events and we're
also in exciting news getting an infinity format
DLC as one of these usually it's going to be
the last one in the grouping if there's three
if there's three the third if you have one will
be an infinity format DLC which is really cool
to see they've all pull back the previous we're
not sure but we think maybe we're gonna continue
the band list from Core constructed into Infinity.
We see that's kind of evaporated. Obviously,
Bucky is the unfortunate receiver of all of the
punishment, as that poor squirrel always will
be. R .I .P. And now we do see that Hiram, Flabbersome,
Toymaker, and Fortisphere are unbanned or will
not be put on a banned list for Infinity at the
start of the format. Obviously, data will change
things. From their conversation about it, it
feels like they do have their crosshairs pointed
firmly at Hiram. Yes. I feel like Fortisphere
just was an unfair bystander to be banning. That
blue steel deck was just operating on such a
different axis than anything could answer that
it just was, yeah, it was collateral damage.
But it's at least nice to know that they're going
to have their own ban list. They've pointed out
that they will remove things from a ban list
because Hiram's not just starting on a ban list.
Correct. Yeah, I think keeping your ban lists
evergreen is a great thing to do because as games
evolve, power level changes. So even though...
Hiram is extremely powerful now. There might
be a time far flung from now, a couple years
from now, if they do end up adding him to the
banlist for infinity. Maybe he's not that bad
and maybe he just is too expensive and too clunky
for the game anymore. So he's very safe to unban
or at least test unban. Right. Yeah. You pull
him off the ban list and you see, oh, literally
people are trying and it's actively bad. Yes.
He's 100 % A -OK. Yep. Totally safe to do. So
yeah, that's exciting that they're supporting
the Infinity format and not just saying, hey,
there's this other thing that you can do. It's
for side events. Yeah. Yeah. It's really nice
that they're actually supporting it and you're
seeing it in a large scale event and not just
a side event. Yes. My fear was strongly because
of the way they're rolling out the whole new
world promos, the non -foils, that they were
like, oh, we encourage the stores to do an infinity
format, but we're not offering any additional
prizing for it. It's like, oh, okay, this is
just going to be hardcore swept under the rug.
But again, this is people, I can't emphasize
this enough, one takeaway from this podcast episode,
be patient. Wait and see before you start making
leaps and assumptions and start. pouring out
all of your strong guttural reactions on the
internet for everybody else to see. Take a moment,
compose yourself, think about what it is. Think
about can this change over time or will this
possibly change? And let me just take a breath,
take a night, take a sleep and figure out. how
bad or good this is or what potential or maybe
why this decision was made or what potential
could come of it. We need to come together and
try to work together to enact change. And I think
we have done that effectively. And I think Ravensburger
has been insanely receptive to it. But I think
you need to conduct yourself in a manner that
is respectful of Ravensburger the way they've
respected our opinions. So just be patient. Let
them work. They have people now to help do these
things. We're getting very quick responses, even
if the response is we are working on. it we have
no further news at this time you're being acknowledged
it's a lot more than proof before right it's
light years better than it has been which means
that they've been trying and that's at the end
of the day the best thing they can be doing for
us in the health of the game right like i can
like even say like after doing vegas they asked
everyone for like a recap or like thoughts and
opinions on it like i got an email i filled out
a very very long and detailed issues things i
was happy about and what does he change if when
past times it announces milwaukee which is the
first one as having a 5 000 player cap at a Right,
exactly. We don't know how all of the tournament
organizing went. We don't know how contracts
were laid out. We don't know what obligations
were made. We just don't know. So be thankful
in a way that we have something at least to grab
onto in season two. And I do think that we're
going to see more of what the The entirety is
for their plan for organized play come the next
season. Because like a worse thing could have
been, hey, we're going to work on this, but season
two is not happening until next year. You're
going to have nine months of nothing continuing,
like another nine months, and then we'll roll
it out. We at least have like a stopgap kind
of feeling. And that's sort of what this feels
like. Absolutely. It's an attempt, right? And
there are other things we can see moving forward.
We've been talking a lot about this since the
announcement is the concept. of something like
an event that will feed into a DLC or a way to
gain points on your newly added Ravensburger
Playhub account so that it can help you with
things like maybe early round buys. Or we've
seen now that challenge related events that are
happening. Ravensburger supported events. Are
going to include, it seems like, compensation
for travel and lodging, which is amazing. What
is effectively an invite to the DLC. Yes. Travel
and lodging. Crazy, right? Right. Even if it
doesn't cover your whole flight and hotel, that's
a massive weight off of somebody's back. Yes.
That makes what was impossible likely to happen,
which is amazing. So seeing things like that
happen at certain point levels, even if they
don't want to buy into the system of buys, which
I know the community is not always a fan of,
I think that comes with over time you learn why
buys are important and what buys can do. And
I think that there is a value that can be added
to events like locals or store champs that can
echo. and push people to try to make these attempts
at a higher competitive level. And I think that
any way you can encourage that amongst people
who may be too nervous to want to do that otherwise
is something to be encouraged. So I'd like to
see what understructure can support this DLC
moving forward. Are they just going to do more
of them? Or are they going to keep it to a smaller
number, maybe a quarterly number or something
in every region, but also create somewhat smaller
events, something along the lines of what we
see at the store level, at Charlie's Collectibles,
Southside, some of these great stores. supporting
100 to 200 player large scale events exactly
stores are fronting all the prizes yes it costs
ravensburger next to nothing to be like hey you
can add an invite to upcoming dlcx yep and the
winner gets a ticket in exactly it's free almost
ostensibly for them to do this right so i'm hoping
they do something like that because why not use
the community that's been supporting the game
these i will say every single time they bring
up the game they wholeheartedly thank these hobby
stores and game stores that are supporting and
keeping the game alive. They recognize that they
truly are the heartbeat of Lurkana and they absolutely
are. I want to believe that they will be supported
in that way because it's such a small lift from
Ravensburger because these stores are already
doing a great job. World Class Cards, Charlie's
Collectibles, Southside, all these places are
just doing an insane job. Close to us, Safari
Zone definitely gets a shout out for this. Encounter
Games, all these places just do a killer job
already and being able to back them more and
say, hey, we appreciate what you're doing here's
a way we hope we can get more people into your
store buying more off your shelves as a thank
you man that's killer and that's what it's all
about truly right i think it it would be cool
to have an event slightly more competitive too
than a store champs yes but still not the like
dlc level i feel like the store champs they rolled
back the hyper competitiveness a little bit yes
with the non -foil promos going to and that's
fine everyone gets a cool looking card yep awesome
like that is 100 needed so it's less feels bad
if you're not top aiding or feeling like you
have to top eight to get the thing you really
want but i think the community also really wants
a little bit more competitive because then maybe
you have less people traveling for the store
champs yes so your store champs can stay a little
more local And now you just have people more
like, now I'm only really interested in traveling
for these events that give me a invite to the
huge event. Absolutely. There's great conversations
to be had at the top tables at a store champs.
If there's a point system, right? Where it's
like, oh man, I need a few more points and I
can get my travel for the next DLC. The other
person goes, I have no intention of going to
DLC, but I need that play mat. So if you, I'll
take the mat if you take the points. Right. Awesome.
Yeah, let's do it. That's great. Everybody's
walking away happy. There's no further. It's
not like we're demanding more product. There's
less cutting. up of top play mats because everybody
truly is getting something they want. And that
just really helps. And I can't imagine the lift
is too big from a tech side for a card .io to
add a little section for points for us to track
for all these events that we're playing and add
something to locals. It just, it makes the people
who are grinding and want to get better, who
are investing time to do so, get something out
of it, which is huge. I think the other neat
thing that like the buys or as we would refer
to them, sleep in specials can get you is if
somebody pro where like you're excited to see
this person show up and start playing where like
you showed up you you don't have the sleep and
special but you three owed you're starting around
three and you get paired against this pro that
like you now you really want to see so it gives
you a better opportunity like they don't have
to worry so much about losing around one or two
because of bad draws or whatever so like it establishes
the pro is like somebody to look up to and to
chase yes as like a something that the game can
provide absolutely you can be the professional
right it helps so much in terms of making all
of your games matter. but it helps promote getting
out and playing the game more. It gets more people
into game stores. If you want the game stores
to support your game, support the game stores.
I think something like an understructure in a
point system with a slightly larger style, regional,
whatever you want to call it, that can help really
feed into the DLCs, which feed into Nationals,
which feed into Worlds, is such an elegant system.
It's time -tested. We know other games have done
this. It just works really well, and it does
look to me like Lorkana is moving. in that direction
they tried to do something very different initially
realized that's like you know what probably is
a time -honored tradition amongst many games
for a reason let's try to take our cool ideas
and innovations but also let's try to be a little
bit more traditional at the same time Yeah. So
I'm excited. I think this was insane news. I
couldn't have come away more positive about it.
Do I wish there were other things as well? Absolutely.
Do I wish I had to look farther beyond the veil?
Of course I do. Will I be patient and just continue
to hope for the best and prepare for the worst?
Yeah, I will. I'm no fool. It does feel like,
and I think we talked about it a little bit yesterday,
it feels like they're trying to move how the
seasons line up. Yes. To where it feels like
Worlds is going to end up ultimately being somewhere
in November, December. Right. And then whatever
the next season is, we'll start in January. Like
they want it to be just on the normal yearly
calendar. Absolutely. Which makes sense. Yeah.
And it's just easier for everyone. Right. You're
home for the holidays. You're doing all that
kind of stuff. So you get to just relax and watch
people play the game, which is really cool. You
can assume season three will start January of
27. Pretty exciting. Sam, what do you think as
a newer player to all this? It's the Cliff and
I understand all this stuff and we kind of see
the picture forming. How does this make you feel
looking at it from a new player perspective?
I'm excited. I'm excited at the chance that it
seems like we'll actually be able to get into
one of these DLCs. At least that's, you know,
our hopes. So that's exciting. I wish there was
a couple more in the North America that we could
try to get to. But I'm happy with what we have.
And like you guys said, we'll wait and see and
be hopeful. And you have time. Oh, yeah, definitely.
It's nice. It's nice to be able to be like, oh,
well, we're going to just try to go to Richmond
in January. And we have six months to save up
and plan and put in our PTO. Yeah, like I don't
have to. worry about it i can save up vacation
time like i know i really want to play in the
infinity one so i know i'm saving for indie really
deep look behind the illumination veil is as
soon as the news was announced on sunday sunday
night all of us had our hotel booked right yeah
so we were already ready for richmond ahead of
that it's easy we paid a slight fee to be able
to refund the make it refundable yeah make the
hotel rooms refundable so it was a very small
cost if we don't end up being able to get tickets
once we get tickets our plan will be making sure
we affirm all our travel and put in our pto at
work plenty of time and even like the shorter
side like for myself i'm theoretically trying
to get to milwaukee by the end of world i had
flights a train from the airport to the place
and a hotel already sorted out and was telling
everyone how much it would cost to do what i
was doing We're all really, really excited, which
I think, if nothing else, is an indicator that
at least what they're doing is working for some
of the player base, right? We're some of it.
A very, very small percentage, but we're some
of it. So I think that they're making a lot of
positive decisions. They're making mistakes,
but they're willing to go, hey, we recognize
this mistake, and we don't intend to repeat that
mistake, which is the hallmark. And I know it's
a little off topic, and I apologize for the moment
on this, but they announced that they know they're
going to be trying better for set champs cards.
Yes. Making them ones that they assume the player.
base will want more absolutely not just random
card in set that's the first time i've heard
you excited to jam a set champs i'm so ready
for fabled yeah well yeah that maleficent matt
i don't even know what the this one is This is
Jafar. Yeah, it is. It's the Jafar, you know,
the High Lord of Lurkana. Sure, whatever. Is
it High Lord? Is it Grand Illusionist? I don't
know. Something like that. I don't know. I don't
know. Who cares? I'm sorry, I'm a bad Lurkana
player. I've literally, I don't even think, no,
I didn't have it in any limited pool, so I've
never played that card. I don't even know what
it is. It costs five and it's uninkable. And
a quest for three. High Sultan of Lurkana? High
Sultan of Lurkana. Okay. I'm the best of us.
I just want Maleficent, the Grand Poobah of Lurkana.
So I can stack four of them up to establish dominance.
For myself, it's the first time I felt like happy
or optimistic about where the game's going. They've
had to take some steps back with things and it
felt terrible, but it feels like they're actually
trying to do the right thing by the player base.
We just have to see it through. Could not agree
more. Yep. So there's only one thing left to
do with all of these cards. We need to win a
lot of these big events. Not deck out. We need
to win a lot of these. Not deck out, but more
importantly, we need to... Keep questing.