Single elimination. Win and you keep playing. Lose and you’re done.
Players will be seeded by AREA rating. Unrated players will be ranked below rated players.
The tournament will be organized to have no more than 1 bye in the first round. In either the second round or the third round (depending upon the number of participants), multiple byes may be awarded to get to the optimal number of people for subsequent rounds. (There will be no byes awarded in the semi-finals.)
The brackets are not fixed. Adjustments may need to be made to handle byes or withdrawals. Pairings will be announced at the beginning of each round.
Once registration has closed, but before the season starts, I will publish the league structure. this will include the regular season schedule, the number of teams advancing to the playoffs
Players are responsible for scheduling their own games.
For scheduling individual games, prime playing hours are being defined as Mon-Fri 5 PM-10 PM EST, and 9 AM-9 PM EST on Saturday and Sunday.
People are free to schedule their games at any agreeable time, but these are the windows of time considered “most acceptable”.
If your only time to play is going to be 1 AM - 6 AM EST on Tuesday and Thursday mornings, you’re going to have a tough time getting your games scheduled.
(Yes, this is biased in favor of US Eastern and Central time zone hours. If you don’t see yourself being available at all during these times, you may not want to commit to this event.)
While any reasonable and mutually agreeable method can be used between two people to try and schedule a game, I recommend using email. Each player will receive a complete list of all participant’s email address.
If you do use email for communication, please send me a copy of all scheduling requests and your actual agreed-upon time to play. If you don't use email, please send me an email summarizing your attempts to get the game scheduled.
If two people are unable to complete their game during the round, I will adjudicate in favor of the person who has demonstrated the most initiative in trying to get their game scheduled and who has made themselves most available during the prime playing hours.
If I have no evidence from either player that an attempt was made to get the game played, both players will be awarded a loss - eliminating both players from the tournament.
I also have access to the server logs showing when people are present on the site, and can verify no-shows.