• Swiss Tournament App

Hi,So I've been reading the tournament rules which are quite straightforward, but there are lots of things that aren't covered. I've never competed in a FFG sanctioned tournament for any of their LCG's and I have a few questions on how they implement the Swiss format (with pairings and such).Just as a side note, I am aware that there are tools that one could use for Swiss pairings (such as the excellent walkthrough on ), but I'm curious how FFG actually does stuff during their tournaments.I tried searching for official guidelines from FFG on how to run a Swiss tournament but I couldn't find any. If someone knows of such a description (or a description on running Swiss tournaments for other CCG's) please point me in the direction.Anyways, here are my questions:1) How are the pairing groups decided between rounds? I assume it is by prestige points, so that players with 6 prestige points get paired with other players with 6 prestige points et.c. But it wouldn't surprise me if they grouped together all players who won their first match with other players who won their first match (regardless of how many prestige points were acquired).2) How are pairings determined within pairing groups for new rounds? Is it randomized, or does the highest seed (after tie-breakers) play the lowest seed within that pairing group (or a completely different method), as long as a player doesn't play the same opponent twice?3) How are tie-breakers determined for group pairings between rounds? The tournament rules specify two different ways of determining tie-breakers at the end of a tournament.

For a tournament without elimination rounds, it is:a) Prestigeb) Match points forFor a tournament which ends with an elimination bracket it is:a) Prestigeb) Strength of Schedulec) Match points for4) How is a bye scored (how many prestige points & match points)?I'm sure I'll have more follow-up questions but I'm trying to wrap my head around how this works if I had to do it with pencil and paper. 2) How are pairings determined within pairing groups for new rounds?

Is it randomized, or does the highest seed (after tie-breakers) play the lowest seed within that pairing group (or a completely different method), as long as a player doesn't play the same opponent twice?Generally random. Unless you have a laptop tracking opponents strength of play (and deciding round 2 this is redundant) it's so much easier to just randomly determine pairs (after removing invalid pairs, e.g. Pairs who've already played). 3) How are tie-breakers determined for group pairings between rounds? The tournament rules specify two different ways of determining tie-breakers at the end of a tournament.

For a tournament without elimination rounds, it is:a) Prestigeb) Match points forFor a tournament which ends with an elimination bracket it is:a) Prestigeb) Strength of Schedulec) Match points forMy understanding of this question is what happens if you have an odd number of players at the same rank (in answer to 1, the same number of prestige points). Again, just randomly.

Trnsys 16. 1) How are the pairing groups decided between rounds? I assume it is by prestige points, so that players with 6 prestige points get paired with other players with 6 prestige points et.c. But it wouldn't surprise me if they grouped together all players who won their first match with other players who won their first match (regardless of how many prestige points were acquired).Normally you pair people that have the same amount of matches won, since most games don't employ a prestige point system.Therefore most likely that every program you come across for running tournaments will do that, and you might have to alter it. 2) How are pairings determined within pairing groups for new rounds? Is it randomized, or does the highest seed (after tie-breakers) play the lowest seed within that pairing group (or a completely different method), as long as a player doesn't play the same opponent twice?What's the difference?Unless you have a global or even a local ranking system to prevent a newbie player from playing the world champion, it should be random.And even then, I would argue that playing the world champion is a good thing.So it should be random, within the boundaries set before(same number of prestige points and not been paired before). 3) How are tie-breakers determined for group pairings between rounds?

The tournament rules specify two different ways of determining tie-breakers at the end of a tournament. For a tournament without elimination rounds, it is:a) Prestigeb) Match points forFor a tournament which ends with an elimination bracket it is:a) Prestigeb) Strength of Schedulec) Match points forI would go with prestige, followed by match points, followed by when the players scored his most wins(early or late in the tournament). Is that what strength of schedule means?

Swiss Tournament App

Swiss tournaments for Netrunner are easy. You can do it on index cards.Each card represents a person in the tournament. It needs only two columns, really - your score and your opponent's score.For the first round, you are randomly assigned an opponent. You play a match against that opponent - one game where you're the runner and another where you're the corporation.At the end of the round, you report the scores of the two games to the judge, who records them on your card. So, if you won the first game 7-2 and lost the second one 7-6, he'd record a 7 and a 6 in your score column and a 2 and a 7 adjacent to it.After each round, the judge subtotals both columns on each card from all of the played matches.

So a card would have two rows for round 1 followed by a subtotal row followed by two rows for round 2 followed by a subtotal row.To pair for the next round, just sort all cards by the player's total score (highest to lowest), and tiebreak them based on the opponent's score (lowest to highest). The first two cards play each other, then the next two cards, and so on.Play n rounds, where n is the smallest number so that 2^n is greater than the tournament participants (so, if you're playing with 15 people, 2^4 is 16 so you play 4 rounds, or if you're playing with 22 people, 2^5 is 32 so you play 5 rounds). Then do a final sort after the last round and cut to the top four or eight for a final single-elimination tournament. Swiss tournaments for Netrunner are easy. You can do it on index cards.Each card represents a person in the tournament. It needs only two columns, really - your score and your opponent's score.For the first round, you are randomly assigned an opponent.

You play a match against that opponent - one game where you're the runner and another where you're the corporation.At the end of the round, you report the scores of the two games to the judge, who records them on your card. So, if you won the first game 7-2 and lost the second one 7-6, he'd record a 7 and a 6 in your score column and a 2 and a 7 adjacent to it.After each round, the judge subtotals both columns on each card from all of the played matches. So a card would have two rows for round 1 followed by a subtotal row followed by two rows for round 2 followed by a subtotal row.To pair for the next round, just sort all cards by the player's total score (highest to lowest), and tiebreak them based on the opponent's score (lowest to highest).

The first two cards play each other, then the next two cards, and so on.Play n rounds, where n is the smallest number so that 2^n is greater than the tournament participants (so, if you're playing with 15 people, 2^4 is 16 so you play 4 rounds, or if you're playing with 22 people, 2^5 is 32 so you play 5 rounds). Then do a final sort after the last round and cut to the top four or eight for a final single-elimination tournament.This appears to totally ignore the Prestige system, which weights games that have actually completed higher than simple match wins. Here's what Challonge does.In a field of 16, the first round pairs by the seed (which is probably randomized):1:92:103:11.8:16I first simulated a single game tournament where each person scored (17-seed) points.1:52:63:74:8-9:1310:1411:1512:16So all of the 'winners' were against each other, but seeds 1 & 2 were NOT paired. It looks like the top half of the field was against the bottom half of the field.This pattern continued, so that if the game were actually seeded - the top two seeds (assuming flawless victories) would pair off in the final Swiss round.-=-=-=-=-I reset the tournament and this time each person got their seed score in points (which would mean we were 100% seed reversed).This time the 'top' 9:13, as expected.-=-=-=-=-I then jumped into my Mock ANR tournament using the scoring I've outlined. (A test tournament of 10 participants I've used to work through various scenarios.)I did rapid fire testing, but concluded that underlying game scores (as suspected) are not taken into account when dealing with tiebreaks - it is strength of schedule (based on match points) followed by underlying original seed value.From both of these tests, it is pretty clear to me that you get paired with the next person down an ordered list that you've not already matched up against. If you are in a 'field' of similar match points, the 'field' is split into two parts and the 'top of the field' is paired to the halfway mark+1:Example:Joe: 4Alice: 4Donna: 4Henry: 4Iris: 4John: 4Joe would first be paired off with anyone 'above' the '4 point field', if needed. If not, pairings would be:joe-henryalice-irisdonna-johnThis helps break up the seeds to cause the 'best two players' to be more likely to face off in a final round.-=-=-Challonge isn't using Agenda scored during individual games as a tiebreaker.I have not found any way to override it (and I've attempted to get very creative).I have a trouble ticket opened.-=-=-Addendum: You NEVER play the same person twice in a Swiss format.

If you are scheduled to play against a previous opponent, you skip continue down the list until you hit the first opponent unplayed.Provided you have not scheduled too many rounds, you won't get any conflicts (where too many is more than about half to two-thirds of the field in rounds (64 might foobar above 32-42 matches for example).