Try to Quad 2

Sunday February 10, 2012

The qualifier begins at 11:30 AM and ends at 12:30 PM.  All players must enter by 12:15 PM.

Bracket rounds will begin at 1:00 PM.

The tournament will be played using ITG 1-3, Rebirth 1-2, and Try to Quad 1-2. With the exception of the Try To Quad 2 pack, which is currently being assembled, these packs are already installed on the Acme machine and will not be changed before the tournament.

Qualifier

UPDATE:  The qualifiers are Banana Bay (9) and Sweet Things (10).

The qualifier will consist of two songs. The qualifier songs will be selected randomly from the allowable packs. One will be a 9 foot Expert chart and the other will be a 10 foot Expert chart. No long songs will be allowed as qualifiers.  The organizers reserve the right to veto a random qualifier if it is deemed to be too unusual or otherwise inappropriate as a qualifier (for example, Golden Palms is not a representative 10, so it should not be allowable as the 10 foot qualifier.)

Entrants will be ranked by score on each qualifier song separately, then an overall ranking will be determined by ranking the players in ascending order by the following formula: score = ((rank1)^1.1 + (rank2)^1.1). In the event there is a tie score, the tied players will break the tie by playing head to head on an Expert 9, randomly chosen from the allowable packs and different from the 9 used for the qualifier. No long songs will be allowed as tiebreakers.

Bracket Format

A special format is being used - players will be seeded into a double elimination bracket and matches will continue until 4 players remain in the winners bracket and 2 remain in the losers bracket. At this point, the losers bracket players will face off; the loser will take 6th place and the winner will join the 4 winners bracket players in a round robin bracket.  The double elimination bracket will be made to hold 16 entrants, however the organizers reserve the right to extend the bracket with rounds of single- or double-elimination play if more than 16 players enter and there is sufficient time for the extra matches.

The results of the round robin bracket will be used to determine the top 5 places. The round robin bracket may end with tied scores, see "Sudden Death" below for information about breaking such ties.

Match Format

Matches will be scored as best 2 of 3 on charts played by both players, head to head. Both players will provided a card and asked to prepare a list of 3 song/difficulty pairs to present to the other player. One player will then select one option from their opponent's list to be played; after the first song has been scored, the second player will present their card to the first player, who will select one to be played.

If there is no clear winner after 2 songs, random charts will be chosen from the allowable tournament packs until the tie is broken; subsequent tiebreakers will be played until a winner can be determined. Each time a tiebreaker is being chosen, each player will be allowed to veto one of the random songs that appears; if multiple tiebreakers are needed for a match, the players will both have exactly one veto for each subsequent tiebreaker regardless of whether they have vetoed any songs previously. If the random song is on either players' card for this round, it will be skipped automatically. Only one long song may be played as a tiebreaker in a given round - the organizers will automatically skip any subsequent long songs that come up. Rules regarding the selection of charts for cards and the difficulty of tiebreaker songs will be specified later in this document.

Songs will be scored by the default machine scoring formula - your score is exactly what the game says it is. In the event of a tie, the match moves on to the next song with neither player awarded a partial or complete win.

At the beginning of each match, the higher seed will select their preference regarding either
- What side of the machine they will play on
- Whether they present their song card first or second
The lower seed will then make a choice regarding the remaining preference.

Sudden Death

In the event of a tie in the final round robin bracket scores, sudden death tiebreakers will be used. Tied players will play the same Expert chart, randomly selected from the full set of playable charts (qualifier songs excluded), and the tied players will be ranked according to their score. No vetos will be allowed. In the event of a continued tie, this process will be repeated for the tied players.

More than two players may be tied with one another at the end of the round robin bracket. Should this happen, 2 players will play the tiebreaker chart while the remaining are sequestered until it is their turn to play (to prevent them from gaining an advantage by observing the chart in advance).  Play order will be determined randomly by the organizers.

Arbitration of Pad Errors

If there are concerns about machine errors, alert the organizers immediately after the song ends - if a player stops halfway through a song due to errors, there is no way to properly arbitrate and the song will be scored normally. The organizers will establish the likelihood of the error having happened given the machine's condition, and may ignore a player's claims accordingly, so be specific about what arrow caused the problem if possible.

If the claimed errors lower a player's score sufficiently to cause them to lose, then their score will be recalculated with each claimed error treated as +3 points. If this is a winning score, then the recalculated score will be considered a win for that player, if not, then the opponent is considered the winner.

If both players claim pad errors, the recalculations will be done simultaneously.

Players are asked to report all errors, even if they don't affect the outcome of a song, so that the organizers can repair the pads when deemed necessary.

During the qualifier, errors will be recalculated as +3 points.

Chart Selection

A "selection" is defined as a unique song/chart pair. The same song on a different difficulty (e.g. on Hard instead of Expert) is a distinct selection.

(1) At all times, all charts from the allowed packs are selectable with any difficulty from Easy to Expert (Novice charts are not allowed due to the C120 mod being forced on the player), regardless of rating.

(2) Each match has a point value set by round-specific means. The three selections that a player makes must add up to this point value exactly; for example, if point total is 27, players may pick three 9's, two 8's and an 11, or even two 13's and a 1, or any other set that sums to 27. Players will be given a card to write their set on and tournament staff will validate the set before the opponent sees it; if the sum is incorrect, the player will be asked to replace a single selection to achieve the correct sum.

Some charts, for example, those from ITG Rebirth, have been rated differently in different versions of the pack. The rating of a chart as it appears on on the machine will be considered correct; if a card is found to use erroneous ratings, the player will be asked to replace the erroneously rated chart with a chart which actually carries that rating - the other selections may not be changed in this situation. The organizers reserve the right to rerate charts selected for the tournament pack, but always use caution when exercising this right and will no longer do so once the tournament pack has been published.  The organizers will attempt to provide a reference list of the valid selections with correct ratings so that players do not depend on the machine to make their selections.

(3) Some long songs are included in the tournament packs. To keep the tournament moving at a smooth pace, a player may only write one long song on a given card. If a player writes more than one, they will be asked to replace all but one with standard length songs of equal rating.

(4) A player may not write a selection down if it was written on their card for a previous match.  Players may not put the qualifer on their card in any round; this rule does not apply to charts used as tiebreakers during the qualifier, and any player may pick those tiebreakers in tournament rounds so long as the remaining rules allow it.

(5) During the double elimination bracket, the point values are set per round and increase from round to round. The two winners bracket rounds will be set at 27 and 29 respectively, with the four losers bracket rounds set at 28, 28, 29, and 29 respectively. Tiebreaker difficulties will set according to the current round's point value. The tiebreaker will be set at one third the point value, rounded to the nearest whole number - this means the the tiebreakers have at a difficulty of 9 for the first round of the winners bracket, and have a difficulty of 10 for the second round; the losers bracket rounds will be set at 9, 9, 10, and 10 respectively.

(6) During the round robin bracket, each player will have a pool of 126 points to allocate to cards for each of their four opponents as they see fit.  Players must allot all 126 points between these four cards, but there are no restrictions on how many or how few points may be allotted to a single card.  A player may choose to set their cards at, for example 31/31/32/32, 30/30/30/36, or even 40/40/40/6, provided that they can then fill each card with a set of selections adding to the allotted total for that card.  Per (3) above, a player must not use any selections from cards made during elimination rounds and there can be no repeats among the 12 selections made between the four round robin cards.

(7) Players need not be able to pass their own selections - if a player fails to pass a song, the score as shown on the machine will be used for that player, regardless of who picked the song. This is a break from the "You pick it, you pass it" rule used in the past. This change is the result of careful consideration of previous tournaments by the organizers.

General Rules

Sandbagging - intentionally playing under one's known ability to alter the sequence of tournament matches or the seeding order - is not allowed at any point during the tournament. Sandbagging is unsportsmanlike at best and a form of cheating at worst, thus sandbaggers will be automatically and immediately disqualified if caught. This is admittedly hard to determine, so this rule will be applied with extreme caution, but it is an insult to both the organizers and the other players to try, so a severe penalty is justified.

After finishing a song, players must not clear the results screen until the organizers tell them to do so. Any player who does so once will be warned not to do it again; if a player continues to clear the results screen without permissions, the cleared scores will be ignored and that player will automatically lose the song.

Information about the order of upcoming matches will be made as visible and accessible as possible to entrants so that they can report for matches in a timely manner. If players need to or want to leave the arcade before they have eliminated from the tournament, they are responsible for knowing when they need to return for their matches; tournament staff will do their best to estimate the time until a player's next match, so that a player can have a reasonably safe idea of how long they may leave the arcade, but these estimates are not considered binding and cannot be used to justify a player's failure to report for a match.

Players are to report to the tournament desk for their matches during the immediately previous match to provide time for players to make their selections and to ensure a smooth and timely progression through matches; players must report for a match before the end of the immediately previous match. If the current round has other matches remaining, then the players in the subsequent match will be found and asked to go first if present; if the missing player(s) are not found by the end of the first song of this match, then the missing players will be immediately disqualified. If players are missing for the final match of a given round, they will be disqualified immediately upon the end of the previous match.

During the first round only, players eliminated during the qualifier, if there were any, will be offered a chance to replace disqualified players. Such players will be offered the chance to do so according to seeding order upon the disqualification of another player.

Matches will be scheduled to prevent players from playing in consecutive matches as often as is possible, but consecutive matches may be required. Players will be allowed up to 5 minutes of rest between consecutive matches if desired, but resting players are asked to report to the tournament desk to prepare song cards as soon as possible after their previous match - the 5 minute rest period will be considered to include time spent preparing song cards; completing a card does not automatically end the rest period, so a resting player may complete their card at any time without forfeiting remaining rest time.

Finally, and most importantly: players are expected to know the rules to a reasonable degree - ignorance of a rule does not excuse violation of the rule. Some rules only apply in specific circumstances, so the organizers will be understanding of confusion as it arises, but it is expected that all entrants have a general idea of what is and is not acceptable and/or required during the tournament. There will be a printed copy of the rules at the tournament for arbitration purposes and to provide entrants the opportunity to read them for clarifications as necessary. There will be no admissible reason for an entrant to not have a reasonable understanding of the rules as written; the tournament organizers will be happy to offer clarifications if a player is confused about some part of the rules.

The tournament organizers reserve the right to make changes to the rules as necessary before and during the event, but will only do so following discovery of either major inconsistencies or easy opportunities for a player to exploit the rules and achieve an unfair advantage. Unless one of these situations arises, the rules are finalized as written.

The tournament organizers additionally reserve the right to disqualify or refuse entry to any entrant or potential entrant for any violation of the rules above or behaviors deemed sufficiently inappropriate, disruptive, or unsportsmanlike; the appropriateness of disqualification is left to the sole discretion of the tournament organizers.