If there were an OTB variant tournament, would you show up?

Do people who like variants also participate in tournaments?

If you saw that there was a Bughouse tournament after a "conventional" chess tournament, would that make you more likely to show up?

I occasionally organize OTB tournaments, but I've had very little luck getting people to show up to anything with variants.  Is it because I can't manage to get the word out, or is it because variant players just don't like the games well enough to give up a Saturday afternoon, and the ten dollar entry fee, to play against people they don't know?

I wouldn't. I like classical chess the best

Only Bughouse, and only if you had the same pair, who you knew, all tournament

Interesting.  The one time I tried to throw in Bughouse, I did do it as a mix and match team play, where you wouldn't have the same partner each game.  My rules were pseudo-Swiss.  My idea was that as players won points in the tournament, using the standard 1 point for win, 1/2 point for draw (never seen one in Bughouse) and 0 points for loss, they would be teamed up based on their rank in the tournament.  Players 1 and 4 would play players 2 and 3.

I didn't figure that there would be very many experienced "teams" out there to play together in a tournament.  At any rate, no one stuck around to play, anyway.

 If you heard about one, would you show up?

I find I have a very different view of the word "tournament" than a lot of people.  My view of a tournament is that it is a place to play in a structured format.  That's it.

I think other people tend to view it much more as an opportunity to prove their worth as a chess player, especially as demonstrated by the all important rating.  As a result, I think a lot of people won't play in some sort of offbeat game tournament, including a variant tournament, because they aren't "good enough".  To me, I just don't think that way.  If I saw a tournament of Xiangqi, I would absolutely show up as an opportunity to encounter other players of a game where I have a hard time finding opponents.

Meadmaker

I think the idea of certain tournament variants would take away a lot of fun from them, i.e. Bughouse. Instead of going for random chaos and a good time, players would coordinate their moves, and show up with an NM who dictates the moves that both boards play.

Yeah, I would show up!  I love OTB chess & would be curious how I'd fare against opponents I know in a varient like 960.

The chess club I go to has held both a bughouse and a chss 960 tournament. I participated in both.

Well that's encouraging.  It means it might work if I try it again.  My current plan is to have a "regular" tournament, but simultaneously have a much smaller section of a variant, like Chess960.  I don't think Bughouse would be a good choice for that venue, though.

Only variant I would play would be 960, maybe Bughouse but only if I had a friend in the tournament. I used to attend a lot of OTB tournaments and I love 960.