Tournaments
Pay once to enter. Play a group, then a knockout. Every entry goes into one pool and the last three standing split it. Some tournaments are free to enter. When one is, its card says so.
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What happens once it fills
A tournament is not a game you drop into and leave. Here is the shape of one, with the real timings, so you can decide whether you have the evening for it.
- 15 minutes before the start timeEntries closeEntries close and the draw is made, so your first game time is known before it starts. If every place is taken sooner, the draw is made then, but never earlier than an hour before entries close. Nobody can pull out after the draw. Nobody new joins after entries close either, unless the field is short: then entries stay open a few minutes longer, and it runs if enough players arrive.
- At the start timeRound oneGroups of 4 as the numbers allow, and you play everyone else in yours, usually 3 games, and in a group of three you sit out one round. The first round starts at the start time itself, no waiting around.
- As you finishThe rest of the groupEach later group game starts as soon as you and your next opponent have both finished, and never sooner than 1 minute after the round before. There are no fixed times for these. Your next game shows on the tournament page the moment it is set.
- After your group gamesTop two go throughTwo out of every group reach the knockout. If the whole field is one group, four go through.
- Same sittingBracket, then paidStraight knockout to the final, plus a match for third. The money lands as soon as the final and the third-place game are both done.
Every tournament game gives you 5 minutes on your clock. The first group round starts at the start time. Every later group game starts once you and your next opponent have both finished your previous ones, and never sooner than 1 minute after the round before. Knockout rounds are set as they come: each one starts 1 minute after the round before it is decided. Your clock waits up to 30 seconds for you to open the board. After that it runs whether you are there or not. Miss a game and your clock runs down without you, which is a loss. In the knockout it ends your run, except in a semi-final: a semi-final loser still plays one more game, for third place. And if neither of you plays, the player whose clock was running takes the loss. The other player is awarded the win, and it counts toward the prize places like any other result.
Every time you see is your own local time. We keep the schedule in one universal clock and show it in whatever zone your device is set to, so you never have to work out the difference.
You can watch without entering
Every tournament game in play is open to watch, live, with both boards and both clocks running. You do not need to be in the tournament and it costs nothing. There is a chat room for each tournament too, so the crowd watches together.
Enter a tournament and its games close to you until your run ends, your own included. Watching a game whose winner you might face is scouting, so nobody gets to do it.
The moment you are out you can watch the rest of it. Anyone signed in who is not playing in a tournament can watch its games at any time.
Ordinary lobby matches are private to the two players. Watching is a tournament thing, which is part of why they are worth entering.
Where the money goes
- Winner
- 60%
- Runner up
- 20%
- Third place
- 10%
- Ours
- whatever is left over
Fourth place gets nothing. Each share is worked out from the pool at the moment the final ends and rounded down to the cent, and we keep the remainder.
XP, at every rung
Tournament XP comes from getting somewhere, not from the games themselves. It all lands on the leaderboard when the tournament settles.
- Win a group game
- 50
- Reach the knockout
- 100
- Win a knockout round
- 150
- Finish third
- 200
- Reach the final
- 300
- Win the whole thing
- 600
Win it and you collect the final and the title together, on top of every game you won getting there.
The parts people worry about
If fewer than 4 have entered when entries close, entries stay open a few minutes longer in case the field fills. If it does not, the tournament does not run and everyone gets their entry back in full, before the start time.
Pull out any time before the draw and you get all of it back. The draw is when entries close, or sooner if every place is taken, but never earlier than an hour before entries close. You just cannot enter that same one again afterwards.
It sits in the pool untouched until the last game is decided. If a tournament is called off, before the draw or during play, every entry comes back in full and no result stands.
Groups are seeded by when you registered and spread evenly, so no group is stacked.
Three points a win, one for a draw. Level on points goes to whoever won when you two met, then wins minus losses, then XP, then who entered first.
The fee comes out of your balance the moment you register, so top up first if you are short. Practice games stay free either way.