Can a problematic AL DM/organizer prevent me from running a separate AL-legal game at the same store?

Question

I have an self appointed organizer at my local store that is harassing other DMs that want to run AL content. This person has berated myself and another DM at the store for wanting to run AL content that we prefer. They even went on to post that I was refusing to cooperate with them. I've been playing in this DM's game for around three months and have enjoyed the games. Our groups started getting larger, so large that we had to start turning away players. So, I offered to run a second table instead of playing myself to handle the overflow.

When I advertised the game as rotating weekly from AL Content to Non-AL personal content, they started sending me messages and posted I was refusing to work with them and should not be allowed to post my event on the store or Adventurers League site. Then they started berating me in text messages on our private Discord server. They have argued with another DM that was running AL-compatible content on Saturdays that did not have any support from the store.

I'm not sure if this person is an "official" AL organiser, or if they just say they are, or how I would go about checking. They have no affiliation with the store at all; the store knows nothing about AL, and does not officially have any role in running or organising it.

Do I even have to deal with this person, or am I allowed to run my AL-legal games apart from them completely? I just want to run my game and have a good time; I don't want to deal with this person.

Am I required to work with an organizer that is bullying other DMs and being rude and harassing in texts and posting such nonsense on my event listings, just so that I may run AL-legal Content at the same store? Do they have any authority to control what games I can run there or what I do?

Answer 1

You can run an AL game no matter what anyone else says.

From the Adventurers League website:

It is simple and easy to become a Dungeon Master for the D&D Adventurers League. You do not need to register or log your play anywhere online. Simply ensure you are running games that follow the D&D Fifth Edition rules and the Adventurers League rules, and ensure your players are using characters created with the Adventurers League rules.

You, as described, are doing all these things and so are perfectly within your rights to use the AL trademark to describe your games.

When DMing in a store ...

Now the store may only be happy to host you if you participate in whatever they've set up, including their delegation of some authority to a store "coordinator." I'm not quite clear on whether that's happening: you say the employees don't know anything about AL, but you also say there's a store site where AL is posted and apparently the store "supports" some AL games. There may be more going on here that you aren't aware of?

Back to Adventurers League....

AL used to be, well, a League. There were site coordinators and regional coordinators and you had to sign up and have a password and whatnot. (I was a site coordinator for one site and a GM at another.) Circa season 4, with the launch of DMs Guild, all that went away. Adventurers League is, frankly, now a set of published play-conventions.

This is all to say that this "self-appointed organizer" has no business telling you what to do in order to bill your game as AL. But they may be used to being in the position of telling other AL DMs what to do, if they were a coordinator.

Solving your problem

You need to get the store involved, in my opinion. You are trying to run a game in the space they provide (presumably hewing to whatever rules the store has for that). Another store patron is harassing you. (Again: it may be the case that they're coming from a place of confusion or habit, not malice.)

There are "official" organizers of AL who these days mostly (to my understanding) work with conventions and the online community. You can find their contact info either at the website or on the AL facebook page (very active, that one), but I don't think that's the best way to go. Having been a site coordinator for years and then having that support disappear four years ago, I advise just working with your store.