Everyone that wins a Regional has a spot in the Worlds event reserved for them already. No planning needed.

There are two possibilities here, either you bought your ticket to worlds event with the travel and hotel costs included and the knowledge that you would win your regional, highly unlikely for anyone even for two time world champion pheaver. Or you win a regional and now have to purchase travel tickets/hotel rooms which the best ones already reserved for.

I am not saying the reserved ticket for worlds is a curse, it just seems a bit weird to me.

I can get lunch right? And eat it too.

I would be surprised if more than 2 or 3 Regional winners actually end up playing at Gencon/Nationals since you had to plan to be there (get a ticket), and then win a Regionals (not the other way round).

I think I worked out that byes excepted Nationals will produce a top 16 with 7 rounds. Those top 16 will be everyone 7-0 and everyone 6-1. Two losses and you are done I think.

That being said, the concept of playing in four person 3 round pods makes a lot of sense. Top 2 in the pod move into a winners bracket, bottom 2 move into a losers bracket created new 4 person pods and 3 more rounds. Top 2 in each winners bracket pod advance, and Top 1 in losers bracket advance to an elimination or something. Numbers are a bit tricky to work out, but the theory is there. Always a reason to keep playing and you tend to play players of equal(ish) skill.

7 rounds? I thought it was 8. Now I'm sad lol

Right now Store Championship BYEs are totally worth it. FFG software isn't complex enough to match by MoV meaning it randomly matches same scores. I had a perfect MoV until the last round and don't think I paired against the top once.

Right now Store Championship BYEs are totally worth it. FFG software isn't complex enough to match by MoV meaning it randomly matches same scores. I had a perfect MoV until the last round and don't think I paired against the top once.

That's a good point. FFG is running US nationals right? I've heard their software isn't 100% efficient, I'm wondering how that will affect pairings

I would be surprised if more than 2 or 3 Regional winners actually end up playing at Gencon/Nationals since you had to plan to be there (get a ticket), and then win a Regionals (not the other way round).

I think I worked out that byes excepted Nationals will produce a top 16 with 7 rounds. Those top 16 will be everyone 7-0 and everyone 6-1. Two losses and you are done I think.

That being said, the concept of playing in four person 3 round pods makes a lot of sense. Top 2 in the pod move into a winners bracket, bottom 2 move into a losers bracket created new 4 person pods and 3 more rounds. Top 2 in each winners bracket pod advance, and Top 1 in losers bracket advance to an elimination or something. Numbers are a bit tricky to work out, but the theory is there. Always a reason to keep playing and you tend to play players of equal(ish) skill.

7 rounds? I thought it was 8. Now I'm sad lol

Well with a cap of 200, 7 rounds with a top 16 works out well (6-1 makes it in, 5-2 doesn't). If you go to 8 rounds then you end up with some 6-2 making it in, but nowhere near all of them and then you have MoV tie breaking. From memory you end up with 24-30ish players at 6-2 or better, meaning most of them are kicked out of elimination on MoV.

I was basing the 7 rounds off best numbers for 200, they may well play 8 rounds at Nationals. At Worlds with 256 or thereabouts they almost certainly need (well should) to play 8 rounds.

Right now Store Championship BYEs are totally worth it. FFG software isn't complex enough to match by MoV meaning it randomly matches same scores. I had a perfect MoV until the last round and don't think I paired against the top once.

That's a good point. FFG is running US nationals right? I've heard their software isn't 100% efficient, I'm wondering how that will affect pairings

It's not so much the software that is causing the Super Bye VS Super Bye matchups on round 2. It's the rules. The players get ranked by points, MOV, SoS, then by some random value as a last resort.

The pairings are then done 1v2 3v4 5v6 7v8 etc. Since everyone with a Super Bye has the same MOV it is very common for those people to be paired against each other.

I have heard reports that the current FFG software is not pairing correctly based on those rules. I suppose we'll see how things go. I figure they will get it right eventually, or just change the tournament rules to whatever they want

Right now Store Championship BYEs are totally worth it. FFG software isn't complex enough to match by MoV meaning it randomly matches same scores. I had a perfect MoV until the last round and don't think I paired against the top once.

Talking with the TO at the regional, that's how it's supposed to be. Let's say there are 20 people at a given score. When it was SoS as a tie breaker, #1 was supposed to play #11, #2 plays #12, etc. Then when they swapped it to MoV, they set it up that #1 plays #2, #3 plays #4, etc.

However, the TO was saying that the software FFG rolled out seems to be matching #1 against #20, and #2 against #19. Therefore, if you got a super bye, you theoretically shouldn't match up against another super bye player in round 2. (You could potentially play a super bye if enough people who won had a 100-0, since everyone would be in a direct tie for first and last place).

Right now Store Championship BYEs are totally worth it. FFG software isn't complex enough to match by MoV meaning it randomly matches same scores. I had a perfect MoV until the last round and don't think I paired against the top once.

Talking with the TO at the regional, that's how it's supposed to be. Let's say there are 20 people at a given score. When it was SoS as a tie breaker, #1 was supposed to play #11, #2 plays #12, etc. Then when they swapped it to MoV, they set it up that #1 plays #2, #3 plays #4, etc.

However, the TO was saying that the software FFG rolled out seems to be matching #1 against #20, and #2 against #19. Therefore, if you got a super bye, you theoretically shouldn't match up against another super bye player in round 2. (You could potentially play a super bye if enough people who won had a 100-0, since everyone would be in a direct tie for first and last place).

I wasn't really a fan of the 1v2, 3v4 and so on style so I really wouldn't mind if they changed it.

I find it interesting that TOME doesn't follow that guideline. Either they are going to change it, it is that way in the regionals rule set that comes with the kit that I haven't seen, or they simply aren't following their own rules. One of those has to be true. I'm curious which it is.

It is a reward yes.

That being said, I think something people haven't touched on in this thread is that if you are playing your first game against a strong opponent (typically someone else who got a bye, but maybe not) you run the risk of coming in cold. I have had this issue in the card game before. I used the bye and then made an unusual amount of mistakes in round 2, causing me to lose. On the other hand, times where I played in round 1, you get a relatively easy opponent and can make a mistake or two and still come away with a W and be setup to play mistake-free (or very near it) the rest of the day, which is likely more important than maximizing your tiebreaker in one round.

This is far from solid evidence, but there is something to be said for playing more.

So the moral is, bring your laptop and get in a quick game on Vassal during your bye round? Or find another bye haver and play a warm up game on the floor somewhere.

So the moral is, bring your laptop and get in a quick game on Vassal during your bye round? Or find another bye haver and play a warm up game on the floor somewhere.

But do you really want to be playing a warm up game against someone who's obviously skilled and talented that you may play against in the elimination rounds?

I think it could be changed to work like college exams - at the end of Swiss rounds, you get to replace your lowest-scoring round with a 200-0 score.

Leave all your tie-breaker scores the same - you didn't actually beat that player, after all, but it would give your score a really nice boost without messing up the standings for everyone else and without forcing all the regional winners to face off in round 2.