Hey! I am the guy that basically ran the tournament in your absence. I might sound harsh here, but I am just going to give my ideas to improve your tournament.
- You should try to use a more standard stage list. Such as: Smashville, Town and City, FD, Battlefield, and Lylat as neutrals, with Dreamland/Duck hunt as counterpicks. The players were already used to Halberd, Castle Siege, and Delfino being banned and thus they pretty much ignored the stages. Most players just used the stage list I suggested, assuming it was the correct one.
- Have your stagelist and ban process printed out so that people at the venue can see what is and is not legal. Every tournament is different and many players had no idea what was and was not legal. Some people thought there were two stage bans while others thought that there was only one stage ban.
- Be more transparent on Smashboards and be good about responding to questions in the tournament thread. When several players ask for doubles to be an event or ask about clarification on a rule, they need to know the answer a few days before the tournament minimum. As a huge fan of doubles it was frustrating not knowing if there would be doubles or not and having to convince the "TO" that we should have doubles.
- Detail everything about the tournament in the tournament thread. You never said if there was an additional venue fee, if the store took part of the entry fee, what the payout went to (60,30,10), etc. It is fine that you charged $10 for a singles tournament, but it lacked a venue fee. Usually it costs $5 to enter the tournament and then there is a $5 venue fee. Some players were upset that they were not told beforehand that the store was taking a 20% cut of the total pot. Also the doubles tournament that I set up on the spot ended up being a winner take all event. That is also fine due to the low number of entrants, but again it just lacked transparency.
- Tell the players if there is going to be a delay or what is happening. The tournament started late because no one knew what was going on and upon asking when the tournament would start I was told that he did not know. It is frustrating to players when there is no real person running the tournament. I arrived an hour before the tournament started with two setups ready to go. I was told that we did not need anymore setups because we already had 4. More setups is always a better thing. Even if it will not be used for the tournament, players that are out early can go play friendlies. I also asked the person who was the "TO" of the event when it was starting, when to signup, what the bracket link was, etc and he had no answers for me. I would've been glad to help out with the tournament more than I already did, but I need to be able to. I shouldn't have to continually ask the "TO" to let me help before he finally cracks. I know that this could've been avoided if you were there, but it is still advice nonetheless.
- Show up to the tournament. I understand if there are issues that come up last minute, but you can tell the players that. Ask for help running it or inform the people that are supposed to run it in your place how to run a tournament. If you asked for help running the tournament on Smashboards then I would've been glad to lend a hand and I am sure that other players would've done the same.
I apologize if I sound too harsh in my constructive criticism. Good luck in the future with your tournaments and I hope everything goes smoothly.
