Guys, I'm really sorry for announcing all of these so late.  Things have been really hectic on my end.  That said, we've got a bunch of tournaments going on at Sakuracon this year; two DDR tournaments run by myself, and two ITG tournaments run by Tony/ancsik.  

Dance Dance Revolution No-Bar Tournament
Saturday April 19th
- Sign up and qualifiers are 5:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m.
- Tournament rounds are 6:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m.

The qualifier will be a random 7-footer on Heavy difficulty.

The bar will not be used (obviously.)  It is acceptable to briefly (5 seconds or less) grip the bar with one hand in an event where you are falling, but we will all be watching you and will know if this is really what happened.

There will be ample Windex available so as to make no bar play less perilous for all involved.

Dance Dance Revolution Tournament
Sunday April 20th
- Signups and qualifiers are from 10:00 a.m. to 11:00 a.m.
- Tournament rounds are from 11:00 am.m. to 2:30 p.m.
 
The qualifier will be a random 8-footer.

Both tournaments:

Song selection:

High seed gets choice of side or song selection order.  Each player picks a song, then the third song is a random tiebreaker.  You’ve been to 100s of standard-issue double-elimination dance game tournaments by now.  I don’t really need to explain how they work.

Scoring and arbitration:

Because this DDR Extreme cabinet is at least ten years old and I want to reduce the impact of pad errors on my job, scoring for both tournaments will be perfects only.  You get a point for perfects, and 0 points for anything else.  Greats are the same as misses.  

If you believe you received a pad boo or miss (I will not acknowledge pad goods or pad greats for the purpose of this tournament, and if you ask you will receive a strike against your badge,) please PLAY THE ENTIRE SONG ALL THE WAY THROUGH and then let me know immediately after the song is over.  The reason for this is that due to the scoring system, there’s a good chance that you will beat your opponent even if you receive pad errors, and it saves all of us time if you don’t restart the song when it isn’t necessary to do so.

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ITG Tournament Rules:

Sakuracon 2014 will feature two ITG events, Stamina and Tech. Players are welcome to enter both if they so choose.
ITG Stamina is on Friday from 6:00 p.m. to 9:30 p.m.
ITG Tech is on Saturday:
- Signups and qualifiers are from 9:30 a.m. to 11:00 a.m.
- The tournament rounds are from 11:00 a.m. 10 5:30 p.m.

Packs

ITG Tech will feature Try to Quad 1, Try to Quad 2, and the Fort Rapids VII Lower Division packs.

ITG Stamina pack(s) TBD

Qualifiers

ITG Tech will start with a qualifying round. All players will be seeded according to their score on a 9 foot Expert chart selected randomly from the allowable packs. The qualifier will also be used

ITG Stamina will have no qualifier. Entrants will be randomly seeded into a double elimination bracket upon signing up.

Bracket

Both events will use double elimination brackets.

If ITG Tech has more than 16 entrants, the bracket will be extended to 24 entrants, with the first round being a single elimination round of up to 8 matches, followed by a 16 player double elimination bracket for the remainder of the tournament.

If ITG Stamina has more than 12 entrants, the bracket will be extended to 16, with the first round being single elimination, followed by a normal 8 player double elimination bracket for the remainder of the tournament.

Match Format

Matches will be played as best 2-of-3 with a random tiebreaker as necessary.

The higher seed will decide either which side of the machine they play on or which player selects a song first. The remaining decision is given to the lower seed.

Song/Chart Selection

ITG Tech will use the point-card system featured previously in some year's Sakuracon ITG events as well as the Try to Quad tournament series. Each round will have an associated point value and entrants will select three songs from the allowable packs such that the difficulty of the songs sums to that point value (e.g., for a 30 point round, three 10's, a 9, a 10, and an 11, or two 9's and a 12 are all acceptable) and write them on a card to present to their opponent. The opponent will pick one of these charts to be played. All three options on a card must be unique. The point values for each round's cards will be set as follows:
- In the Winner's bracket, the point value will begin at 29 and increase by 2 points each round, reaching 35
- If the bracket is extended to 24 entrants, the first round will be set at 27 instead
- The Loser's bracket will begin at 30 and increase by 1 each round, reaching 35
- The Finals will be set at 36

ITG Stamina will use open chart selection - when it is your turn to pick, you may pick any allowable chart from the allowable pack(s).

For both events, the same chart may not be selected multiple times by the same player in different rounds. For ITG Tech, this applies specifically to played selections - if it goes on a player's card and the opponent picks it, it is barred from future cards written by that player, but the unused options from that card are allowable iagain in future matches.

For ITG Tech, long songs (i.e. those over 3:30 in length, which normally count as 2 songs when selected) are included in the playable packs. A player may only put one such song on a card at a time.

Players' selections are subject to a you-pick-it-you-pass-it rule. For ITG Tech, if a song is selected from your card and you fail it, you lose regardless of either player's score - players should only write a song down if they are confident they can play it to completion. For ITG Stamina, failing your selection is considered an automatic loss regardless of either player's score - players should only select a song if they are confident they can play it to completion.

Scoring

Both tournaments will use direct machine scoring. Scores may be recalculated at the discretion of the organizer to compensate for reported pad error(s). A player claiming pad errors must play to the end of the song before reporting the error(s); it is impossible to recalculate a score if a player stops midway through a song following pad errors. In the case of a significant machine failure, such as the complete non-responsiveness of one or both sides of the machine, directly leading to the failure of one or both players, replaying the song may be necessary, but such errors are rare and if such an error is claimed, it is up to the organizer to decide whether a replay is appropriate or necessary.

Pad errors will be recalculated by converting the erroneous judgment to a value of +3 points - that is, a pair of pad errors will be recalculated as equivalent to one great and one excellent - and a winner will be determined based on the recalculated scores. Holds and rolls missed because of a pad error on the initial step will be given a value of +3, but holds and rolls that were started correctrly and later dropped are difficult to arbitrate and will taken at face value - i.e. 0 points. Erroneously triggered mines will not be recalculated either. Regardless of the effect on score, players are encouraged to report all percieved errors to the organizer in case pad maintenance is needed.

Sportsmanship

Good sportsmanship is encouraged. Poor sportsmanship - including, but not limited to, the intentional harassment of competitors and sustained complaints about a ruling made by the organizer may result in a player being disqualified and removed from the tournament. As this is a heavily subjective matter, such disqualifications will be considered carefully and will normally only happen following a directly issued warning about poor behavior.

Arguing about the rules of the event falls under the label of poor sportsmanship. If there is a legitimate issue with the rules - e.g. a serious loophole with potential for abuse or a contradiction is found - then by all means, alert the organizer; however, suggestions to change the rules based solely on personal preference will be promptly ignored and repeated suggestion to do so may result in a warning or disqualification. The rules have been developed through testing and consideration of player feedback over the course of several past events and selected based on the appropriateness to the specifics of each event. Other rules and formats may work equally well, some may even be better in some respects, but these are the rules and they work very well given the time constraints and entrant pools were are talking about. By participating in one of these events, you agree to the rules of the event; if you disagree with the rules, you may opt to not enter.