Swiss

A fixed number of rounds, no elimination, reliable standings in few matches.

Teams: 2 to 256
Elimination: None
Rounds: ⌈log₂(N)⌉ + 1
Tiebreakers: Buchholz & co.

IN SHORT

The essentials

Every team plays the same number of rounds, set in advance: nobody is eliminated along the way.
Each round, you face a team with the same number of points as you.
The final standings are read by points, with ties broken by how tough each team's path was.

Top group
Bottom group

After each round, teams regroup by score and play within their group.

IN DETAIL

Mode rules

How it works

The Swiss system produces reliable standings with far fewer matches than a full round robin: instead of playing everyone, each team faces an opponent of similar tournament level every round.

The number of rounds is set at creation (recommended: ⌈log₂(number of teams)⌉ + 1, suggested by default).
No elimination: a team that loses its first matches still plays to the end.
The points system is adjustable at creation: 3 points for a win, 1 for a draw, 0 for a loss by default.

First round

Initial seeding comes from the site ranking: every team starts at 500 points, and each match transfers points from the loser to the winner — the more unlikely the result, the more points move. When a tournament ends, it hands out points again based on its final standings — the stronger its field, the more points. Seed 1 = best team.

The top half of the seeding faces the bottom half: 1st meets (N/2 + 1)th, and so on.
Top seeds therefore don't knock each other out from the start.

Pairings for later rounds

Teams are grouped by points and paired within their group. The draw explores the possible combinations to avoid rematches, pulling from the neighboring group when a group is stuck.

Undefeated teams play undefeated teams, teams with one loss play each other, and so on.
Two teams never meet twice as long as another combination exists.
If the team count is odd, one team gets a walkover worth exactly one win — given to the lowest-ranked team that hasn't had one yet.
Correcting an earlier score automatically re-pairs the next round, as long as no score has been entered there.

Standings and tiebreakers

Standings are by points, recalculated after each match. On a tie, the tiebreakers measure how tough each team's path was rather than the luck of the pairings; they apply in this order:

Buchholz: sum of the points of the opponents faced.
Sonneborn-Berger: sum of the points of the opponents beaten (half for a draw).
Win percentage of the opponents faced.
Head-to-head between the tied teams.
As a last resort, the initial seed — never a random draw.

Withdrawal

As in Survival (cuts), a team can leave the tournament along the way. It keeps the points it already earned but is no longer paired, and drops below every team still in the running in the final standings.

Final standings

The tournament ends after the last scheduled round: the top of the standings is champion. There's no final — the standings are what count.

ALL MODES

Common rules

The same in every mode: match launch and match format, score reporting, forfeits. Open a rule to read it.

Match launch

A playable match doesn't start right away: at its start time (or as soon as it becomes playable if it has no schedule), it enters launch. A window then opens for the players of both teams, showing the host team and the useful contacts.

Each team confirms it's ready — captain, manager or owner; in a solo tournament, the player themselves. The assigned caster confirms too.
The match is launched once everyone is ready, when a referee forces it, or automatically after 15 minutes.
No score can be reported before the launch.

Match format

The match format (Bo — maximum number of maps — or FT — number of maps to win) is set when the tournament is created and applies to the whole tournament. Without a setting, any score can be entered (free score entry).

A score that exceeds the format, or that names no winner when the format requires one, is rejected on entry.
Draws only exist if the tournament allows them; they never apply to an elimination bracket.

Score reporting

It works the same way in every mode: each team reports its match score from the tournament page, through its captain, one of its managers or its owner (the player themselves in a solo tournament).

Two matching reports validate the match immediately.
A single report opens a 10-minute confirmation window, which only starts once a plausible series duration has passed since the launch (15 minutes per map the format allows): if the opponent doesn't dispute it, the score stands.
Two conflicting reports put the match in dispute: a referee decides and records the official score.
A referee or an admin can correct a score as long as the next round has no score entered; after that, the score is locked, for them too.

Forfeit

A referee can declare a team's forfeit on a match: the match is settled in favor of the opponent. For the forfeiting team, it's a loss like any other: in single elimination it's out, in double elimination it drops to the lower bracket, in BlueGenji's Survival it loses the format's full score and stays in the running with the pool it has left.

In Survival (cuts), Swiss and BlueGenji's Survival, a team can also withdraw from the rest of the tournament while it's in progress (or the referee can withdraw it): it's no longer paired.
Its final standing takes into account when it left.

Double forfeit

When neither team shows up, the referee declares a double forfeit: the match is closed with no winner and no score, and both teams lose it.

In elimination, both teams are out and nobody advances: the next match becomes a walkover for the other qualified team.
In Swiss and Survival (cuts), each takes a loss; in the qualifier of BlueGenji's Survival, each loses the format's full score.
In a final, a double forfeit crowns no champion: both finalists are ranked tied 2nd.

COMPARE

Other modes

Single elimination Double elimination BlueGenji's Survival Survival (cuts)Multi-stage tournament