Tournament Protocol

[Daxx]

Okay, so we've had a few issues with the first tournament (mostly resolved, eventually) but I think teething troubles were inevitable. Congratulations to jmizzle7, our first winner, and thanks to Cisco, who organised.

I think, however, that a few general tournament rules would be very useful in making sure that the difficulties we encountered don't happen again. Input would be helpful, so feel free to suggest your own or critique my ideas:

The signup thread should specify the rules of the tournament and carry a master list of entrants in the first post, as well as specifying a start time and deadlines. Entrants post to the thread in order to enter a tournament. In order to minimise the effect of dropouts between signup and start, a reserve list should be kept alongside the main list of signups. The TO may wish part of the main list to be randomly drawn from the reserve list for the wildcard factor.

At the specified start time, players should show up in chat with their IGN as their nickname (names can be changed in chat by typing "/nick name"). Players should stay in chat to co-ordinate matches. Results of matches should be posted in the relevant tournament results thread.

The TO (Tournament Organiser) shouldn't draw up brackets until those who have signed up respond in chat. At this point, anyone on the reserve list can be added in the place of dropouts. This bracket should not be redrawn after this point.

The brackets should be drawn such that byes completely eliminate any remaining deviation from a square number as early as possible. Possibly at this point some sort of seeding system should ensure that top players do not face each other. Byes can be awarded either randomly (for fairness), to seeded players (to promote the top players), or to unseeded players (for the wildcard factor).

If a player drops out mid-tournament, then they are replaced by the player they most recently beat (and then by others down the chain of beaten players). If they had yet to beat anyone and there are reserves left, the reserves should be offered a slot. If a replacement cannot be found then the place becomes a bye.

[vrt]

From my experience in competitive gaming, being present N time pre-match was always a requirement to not get a no-show loss. I think this is an excellent way to apply it to elements.

[Delreich]

At the specified start time, players should show up in chat with their IGN as their nickname (names can be changed in chat by typing "/nick name").

Some time before the start would probably be better, though I suppose you could separate the start of the tournament from the start of round one...
If it's possible (should be), a dedicated channel for tournaments would probably be a good thing.

The brackets should be drawn such that byes completely eliminate any remaining deviation from a square number as early as possible. Possibly at this point some sort of seeding system should ensure that top players do not face each other. Byes can be awarded either randomly (for fairness), to seeded players (to promote the top players), or to unseeded players (for the wildcard factor).

Using a balanced tree ("seeded bracket", from that site Cisco used), the last N slots should be empty. That way the holes are spread evenly over the tree.

[Cisco]

I agree with pretty much everything that was said sofar. Also add the size.  32 Is enough to allow a faster gameflow with a bigger backup of players ready to join. Six hours Is to much.Three schould be the Max. And another  problem Is quite a few noshows were because of the time.In the asien region the Tournament was in the middle of the night . Dragoon brought this up before and it may just be best to make two tourneys compensating the times. Not on Sundays but Saturdays seems to be what many have asked for. My mistakes were at the beginning Getting the tourney list right after round 1. It took wayyy to long and there was confusion at who played, still was playing,who never showed up, who eventually did show up and still played etc. With only 32 players it would of saved loads of time and made for a cleaner tourney. Also whene I went to a 16 player bracket in round three that we did not fill upm. I did not think and missed out of adding buyes to compensate for the uneven number. This mistake got Jmizzle a buy late in the rounds and forced a Duell with already eliminated players for 4th spot. Leonard2 Would of had to be a part with the Duell for 4th but was to late in comming back. Bye the Rules he would of been eliminated anyways for not beeing there whene the new rounds started. Obviously thats a mistake that won´t be repeated again. So the situation on that is mute. Celidion wasn´t there allthough I was helped bigtime from almost everyone there needs to be more that 2 people keeping an eye out for everything. Too really have this Tourney work out the group needs to be bigger that hosts and waches out. Although this may be a mute point if we go with 32 player tournaments. For my part the first two Rounds I had no chance of keeping up with the Chat. All work went in on constant updating.

[Goldfish2]

Evening all,

first of all congrats to all for running a successful first tourney.

I have a background in running MTG tournaments and may I make a few humble suggestions that may help with future tournaments (I would have volunteered to help out with the tourney but unfortunately it was right in the middle of my kids bedtime so couldn't)

Sorry, I was stuck in a 2 hour meeting at work today and the below are a few thoughts that may help. May I suggest an order of events as below (some of which has already been mentioned);

1) Preregistration for events on a forum thread prior to the event on a dedicated thread (limits eg 32 or 64 players made know and reserve list posted) [as happened]

2) All participants (including reserves) must report to one of the Tourney Mods in chat 5 mins before the tournament starts to register they are ready to go (5.55 GMT for yesterday)

3) Tournament registration then closes with no exceptions (5.56 GMT is 1 min too late. If you are late you don’t play)

4) If reserves are required, due to no shows, they are drawn at random from the reserve list (and their participation confirmed with them in chat by a tourney Mod)

5) 5 mins after (i.e on the hour) the pairings for round one are drawn and posted in the forum

6) Mods post start of round in chat with the finish time and link to pairings (for the purposes of this say the round limit is 45 mins)

7) Mods post time left in chat at 15 min, 30 mins, 40 mins and call time at 45 mins

8 ) All results of the matches posted on the forum thread by participants

9) All games cease at end of round and result taken then (if it is a draw or a desync then a further 10 mins is allowed with Mods spectating)

10) At 55 mins all games are called. Finished or not and decided on game state by mod if required i.e. the games are still drawn (criteria to be decided eg life totals or such like)

11) 5 mins after (i.e on the hour) the next round is paired and posted on the forum.

Repeat until steps 6-11 as required.

Note: 5 mins given for opponents to find each other. If player B does not show then Player A contacts tourney Mod on chat. Tourney Mod the shouts on chat for Player B. If they do not respond promptly then a no show is call and Player A wins

Pros:
Structured, Everyone knows what is happening and when (if they finish early or by no show they can leave their PC until the next round starts)
Start time and approximate finish time know (there should be no time limit for the final)
Players can play their day to ensure they can play the full tournament

Cons:
Potential problems with player registering with the Mods ie chat problems
Participants unhappy with games called by the Mods (In the unlikely case of a draw after 55mins)
Longer tournament as the round go on for an hour each time (or whatever the best round length is)

Anyway I hope this helps and provides a framework the Tournament Organisers can build upon/change.

Couple of other ideas;

Rotate tournaments from non-upped cards inc (shards ect) and no restrictions at all

Rotate start time to ensure different nationalities can compete.

I only mention all this as I believe the tournaments are a major step forward in the Growth of the Elements growth and community. A game we all love and play

Matt aka Goldfish2

[Cisco]

Thanks for all this feedback I will run some stuff through Zanz and post a Rules and Prot. compiled off these suggestions. In all the threads.

[yeehaw]

Posting here as promised. To accommodate people in different timezones, two options:

1) Shift it to Sat and make it start earlier, e.g 12 to 4 GMT.
(Sat important for staying up late)

2) Have separate tournament. In need of other organizers. I can help a bit I guess.

[Scaredgirl]

Thanks for all this feedback I will run some stuff through Zanz and post a Rules and Prot. compiled off these suggestions. In all the threads.

There's no need to "run stuff through Zanz" regarding every time we come up with something new. Zanz is not the tournament organizer and I doubt he wants to micro manage it so we shouldn't bother him with every single little detail. Lets give him some room to do what he does best, that is develop Elements.

If he has a problem with something regarding the tournaments (highly unlikely) I'm sure he will inform us.

[jmizzle7]

I think we also need to make sure that our tournament organizers are both qualified and dedicated to running them. I'm all for Cisco being our guy but he needs help. I'm not too sure where your partner was on Sunday but a no-call, no-show for a TO doesn't cut it, and leaves a bad impression on the Elements community and staff. We should have at least two Tournament Organizers per tourney so one guy doesn't have to do all the work. I'd probably say no more than three, but either way, we need people to step up and help run these. In the ideal situation, we would have maybe 6-8 people on the tournament team so the same people don't have to do it every time and can play in some. But this would be further down the road.

[Cisco]

Yes Sg your right. The post you quoted was before I asked it to be a weekly thing. That and giving prizes for monthly challenges was what I wanted to run through Zanz.

Jmizzle absolutley right.There has to be more people running the tournaments. Most importent you have to be there and not disapear before it starts. Another thing is I won´t have the chance to be there every week so a group of Tourney cordinators is a must imo.

[Scaredgirl]

I think we also need to make sure that our tournament organizers are both qualified and dedicated to running them. I'm all for Cisco being our guy but he needs help. I'm not too sure where your partner was on Sunday but a no-call, no-show for a TO doesn't cut it, and leaves a bad impression on the Elements community and staff. We should have at least two Tournament Organizers per tourney so one guy doesn't have to do all the work. I'd probably say no more than three, but either way, we need people to step up and help run these. In the ideal situation, we would have maybe 6-8 people on the tournament team so the same people don't have to do it every time and can play in some. But this would be further down the road.

Yes, definitely.

In my opinion there should be one Tournament Organizer and about 6-8 people on the tournament team (like you suggested).

When the 32-man tournament starts, players would be divided into 4 groups of 8 players, each group managed by one of the tournament team people.

GROUP A - 8 players - managed by Jack
GROUP B - 8 players - managed by Bill
GROUP C - 8 players - managed by Jane
GROUP D - 8 players - managed by John

Players in a group would fight each other until we have a group winner. Winners from all four groups would then fight for the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th place (all of these would give you some kind of reward).

For example:

Group A winner
                           --------- Group B winner
Group B winner

                                                                 ------- Group C winner      <- winner of the tournament   

Group C winner
                          --------- Group C winner
Group D winner

[Cisco]

Well that be a good thing. Best SG would be that you add aplications for tournament mods into the news and announcments thread. I´d say 8 is enough. 2 T mods would have to be there at the least for a Tourney. Those 2 would have to be their for sure whene picked to run it. The others would be the added improvment for a clean and fast tourney but don´t have to show up for sure. I´m saying this as a minimum,since it  may be hard to always have 5-8 mods present for it. Having a Global Mod or a Chat moderator around would be big to as a troll can really screw up the chat during a tourney. who runs what tournament can be handeld between the T mods. A rotation be a possibility.