Talk about the advantage of sheer numbers—if the competitors at February 13’s Columbus, Ohio, Shonen Jump Championship tournament had decided to rise up against the judge staff, we’d have been in trouble. 300 sounded like a decent number of entrants to hope for, but when the tournament staff arrived to see about 50 people already lined up at the door an hour before registration began, we knew we were in for an interesting day.

Registration opened, but the line never seemed to get any shorter. The room began to fill, and the line didn’t get any shorter. As the 10:00 AM registration deadline approached, the line still didn’t get any shorter. Judges opened up an adjacent hall and moved in new tables, set up chairs, covered the tables and set out table numbers . . . passing 300 and going up to 361 as registration closed a half hour later, with 723 entry forms processed.

The judge staff consisted of Ian Estrin acting as Head Judge, and James Hooker, Jason Westfall, John Alderfer, Peter Luichinger, Stephen Rasiah, Tom McDowell, Tony Murray, Tony Slater, and myself as floor judges. We geared up for what promised to be a long, intense day! We were lucky, since many of us were at least level 2 judges and had sufficient previous experience to carry us through this colossal event.

The sheer logistics of this event were imposing. We had a ratio of about one judge to 70 players in the initial rounds. What you need to realize, though, is that it isn’t just the walking up and down watching people play or waiting for them to yell for a ruling that’s tough to manage with a ratio like that. Judges have a lot of other responsibilities too. There are pairings and standings to post and match slips to distribute. Then, throw in a high proportion of first time players (and their non-participating parents, significant others, or siblings) who need help with everything. They need to find where to sit, want Swiss rounds and tiebreakers explained, wonder where the bathrooms are, and want to know if there was some kind of mall or something nearby to entertain themselves later. Once you’ve donned an official-looking shirt and lanyard, you’re in for it.

It was a long day, even though the massive number of players put us into 10 Swiss rounds. 40 minutes each isn’t so bad, but when the competitors are spread across two large event halls, it takes some legwork to make sure all ongoing games end as soon as possible after the round, and that all slips have been handed in. Scorekeeper Kristin Allison wasn’t fazed at all by the stack of slips and got the rounds and pairings processed rapidly, even when besieged by questions from entrants. Downtime between rounds was usually around ten minutes, meaning there wasn’t a lot of break time for duelists and judges alike.

The biggest problems we faced, apart from trying to give the most attention possible to each entrant in a gigantic event while making sure all the non-player interaction (pairings and match slips) duties were taken care of, were the duelists who didn’t have much experience or knowledge of basic tournament procedure. Instead of raising hands when they had questions, many entrants got up and wandered about looking for a judge. Few seemed to know the correct procedures for matches where time ran out, and there were quite a lot of disputes over life points from duelists who had relied on their opponent to keep track of the scores. I had to give out several game losses for playing the incorrect opponent, as well as major procedural errors. There were a lot of first time players at this event.

Ian did a good job, sticking to more traditional head judge duties of staying off the floor and near the judge’s station (when possible) so we could find him. In an event with over 700 players, even a 6’4” head judge can be hard to spot. Organizing us into separate duties wasn’t going to work, since we were all needed to post pairings and run slips to the tables, but we sorted ourselves out into “territories” and covered them fairly well. Most rulings questions were about the same sorts of cards and mechanics, which made things easier, but there were several rather esoteric decks and a lot of beginning duelists so there was an interesting mix of questions.

Whatever doesn’t kill you supposedly makes you stronger, so we figure that we each deserved to be promoted a level for keeping the event running so smoothly! Most matches ended on time, and while we couldn’t watch everyone at once, we helped keep the tournament going as quickly as possible. Keeping a sense of humor helped get us through the hard work and effort, and I was proud to be part of a team that shared such a rapport. Judges and TO staff are one of the biggest factors in the success of any event, and our team rose to the challenge of a turnout over twice as high as expected. There is always some Internet buzz about this judge or that judge making a bad call or costing someone a game, but overall, the participants were complimentary about the job we did.

We got some soda and concessions food, some booster packs and a Chinese dinner at midnight and that was all good, but I quite enjoyed the part I played in one of the largest Yu-Gi-Oh! events in North America to date. It was fun to be a floor judge and free of the head judge’s responsibilities, and it was nice to see so many familiar faces out on the tournament floor. It’s likely that attendance will continue to climb as the tournament series continues. If you’re on the staff list for an upcoming event, start exercising, brush up on your rulings, get prepared for a sea of duelists . . . and good luck!