The Future of the TopDeck Championship Series

After two massive seasons, the biggest question we receive is "will the TopDeck Championship Series return?"

The 2025 series currently boasts over 100 stores and organizers as part of the series, with almost 2000 events and 5400 players as the season comes to a close.

When we floated the idea of bringing back the TopDeck Championship Series, we wanted real feedback from our community. Over 380 respondents weighed in, players, local game stores, and independent organizers, to tell us whether they're excited for another season of what many dub "the CEDH Pro Tour."

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Original Survey Results

You can view the raw results here

Across all respondents (380 total)

• Yes: 313 (82.4%)
• Maybe: 30 (7.9%)
• No: 37 (9.7%)

Players only (336 total)

• Yes: 281 (83.6%)
• Maybe: 26 (7.7%)
• No: 29 (8.6%)

Stores & Organizers only (44 total)

• Yes: 32 (72.7%)
• Maybe: 4 (9.1%)
• No: 8 (18.2%)

Key takeaways:

• A decisive majority of players (84%) want the series back.
• Even among stores and organizers who carry the logistical burden, nearly three-quarters are on board.
• Only a small slice (under 10% of players, under 20% of stores/orgs) said "No" out of the gate.

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Adjusted Results: "Maybe" → "No"

Not all "Maybes" are the same. When we dove into the free-form comments, we found many of the "Maybe" respondents expressing general distrust of the TopDeck.gg brand. We've reclassified those as straight "No."

Overall (380 total)

• Yes: 313 (82.4%)
• Maybe: 16 (4.2%) ← down from 30
• No: 51 (13.4%) ← up from 37

Players (336 total)

• Yes: 281 (83.6%)
• Maybe: 14 (4.2%)
• No: 41 (12.2%)

Stores & Organizers (44 total)

• Yes: 32 (72.7%)
• Maybe: 2 (4.5%)
• No: 10 (22.7%)

What shifted?

• Brand Trust: 14 of the original 30 "Maybes" cited exclusively broad brand concerns.
• Uniform Across Audiences: Both players and stores/orgs pointed back to the same brand objections rather than technical or logistical issues.

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Initial Thoughts

It's undeniable that the series, both in 2024 and 2025 has been wildly successful, not only for competitive commander, but also for the stores hosting events. In 2025, on average, stores who join the series see a 60% increase in attendance, with larger events benefitting the most. The initial decision to not host a 2026 series was based on the playerbase's concerns and the shifting priorities of TopDeck itself.

We put this survey out after some of our customers reached out asking to hold another series, fearing attendance would drop after the series ends (something we personally agree would happen, just based on numbers).

Only 44 stores and organizers actually responded to our survey though. Based on the numbers, we are getting a positive directional signal for hosting 2026, especially since we have just a little over 100 stores on the series this year.

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Thoughts On the Future

There's still a lot to chew on for us at TopDeck in regards to another series. The 2025 series plans were mostly jumbled last year and so it's not representative of our best work. We had initially planned to host Diamond events ourselves, but stopped holding events late last year.

If the series were to come back, it'd require several changes different from previous years. We'd still have a running points leaderboard (something you guys love) and tiers of events, but with us out of the game we need to consider weighting the tiers a bit differently.

If the series were to come back, initial thoughts would be to offer Bronze for free to anyone subscribing to the software. This way all events can at least gain some points. Additionally stores who have trouble reaching that 32 player number regularly won't feel discouraged to join as a partner.

We'd keep Silver partner the same otherwise, and then pass out Gold partner on application again as well. We found that the new way to offer Platinum events was actually very successful too, especially for driving engagement and attendance for these larger events.

Which leaves us with Diamond events. Moving forward we'd either need to scrap this tier entirely or find 4-5 trusted partners to run large events. The issue we ran into this year is even when giving people Diamond tier events, their attendance would be a question mark. This is different from when we would host these ourselves since we would sell out a 300 person event in a few hours. I'm leaning towards removing this tier if we run another series.

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So, What's Next?

The demand for another TopDeck Championship Series is undeniable, even after reclassifying brand objections. Over 80% of respondents still want to bring this back.

We at TopDeck want to deliver the best experience and products to you guys, so we're going to need a little bit longer to figure out what bringing the series back even looks like. The landscape of how we operate, and how players and stores operate, is different than when I first had the vision for the series back in 2023.

If you want to join the discussion or let us know your thoughts, please join our Discord or email us at [email protected]

Zain
TopDeck.gg Team