2016 Tiltyard Open format

It's time to reveal the types of matches at this year's Tiltyard Open tournament. A few things have changed from last year, so use this as your guide to what's ahead.

Swiss rounds

As before, players will earn a number of points in each match equal to their goal value times a pre-determined weight for that match. The four players with the highest number of points at the end move to the finals.

Matches in these rounds will use a play clock of 15 seconds. The single-player game and "two-player puzzle game" will use a start clock of 240 seconds; the start clock for the remaining games will be 120 seconds.

In some cases, the number of players will not divide evenly among the match assignments (unless we get lucky with the number of participants). In that case, some players will receive byes. In most cases, a player receiving a bye will be among the lowest-performing players at that point, and will receive the highest score of any player in that round (usually 100). Some non-fixed-sum games have their players matched up randomly; in those cases, the points for a bye are instead the average of what other players received.

Single-player game 1: One match, weight 2
Two-player game 1: Three rounds with two matches each, weight 0.5 per match
Two-player, non-zero-sum game ("two-player puzzle"): One match with each player in each role. One role is guaranteed a score of 100 in each match, one is not. Weight 2 per match
Two-player game 2: Three rounds with two matches each, weight 0.5 per match
Single-player game 2: One match, weight 2
Two-player game 3: Three rounds with two matches each, weight 0.5 per match
Three-player game: Four matches, weight 0.5 per match
Two-player game 4: Three rounds with two matches each, weight 0.5 per match
Four-player game: Four matches, weight 0.5 per match
Two-player game 5: Three rounds with two matches each, weight 0.5 per match

The total weights for two-player zero-sum games are 3 each, and for the remaining games are 2 each, plus an automatic 200 points from the third game. The highest possible weighted total score would be 2700.

Final rounds

The four players that rank highest after the Swiss rounds will play on Saturday for the championship in a single-elimination bracket. Matches in these rounds will use a slightly longer start clock of 180 seconds, but the play clock will remain at 15 seconds.

The semifinals are a "best-of-five" and the finals are a "best-of-seven", but there is some ambiguity about what that means when players can draw matches. In this case, the winner of the semifinals is the first player to accumulate at least 251 points in their matches and have more points than the opponent. The finals work similarly, but with a goal line of 351 points.

There will be specific games lined up for the players to play; in the event that they finish the first five (or seven) matches tied, additional matches will be scheduled until one player outperforms the other. (All games will be fixed-sum.)

The winner gets bragging rights and Internet immortality; if they RSVPed, they may also receive a small prize.