I think it's seriously fucking stupid to have a requirement on the 500pt tournament, for the main reason that it's a casual 500pt tournament. Seriously, if I wanted to show off my artistic prowess and be king of the Paint scene, I'd do it.
You really wanna know why though I don't paint? It's because it's makes my army already MORE expensive than it currently is, it makes it more of a time consumer than it already is, and TBQH, I have many more important things to be worried about than painting my models for a 500pt "casual" 40k tourney.
Also, I mean seriously. it's a 500 point game. Do we really want to make it More rigid than a normal tournament? If you take 500 points seriously then it's just broken and not fun. This is why i think there should be a lower entry fee than normal tournaments (sorry chase ).
Wasn't that the point of this anyway? to suit the needs of the casual player?
I agree with Kevin on this one. If we don't have the large tournaments Painted Only(Which I mind considerably less than a 500pt painted only, to the point where it's totally understandable), then why make this paint only?