Level One - Lesson 13

Tournament Regulations

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Hello there and welcome back to the Judge Program for Star Wars™: Unlimited - Level One certification track lessons.

As always, I’m your host Jonah, and we’ve finally broken free from the tyranny of the comprehensive rules and will be looking at the Tournament Regulations. The Tournament Regulations and its partner documents, the Competitive Policy Guide and Relaxed Policy Guide are a set of documents that guide tournament play. These don’t apply to kitchen table games at home or even a pickup game at your local store, but they should apply to all planned events.

If you’ve been involved in organized play for any game, you’ll hear concerning stories of how events were run, contrary to player expectations. The TR, CPG and RPG are key components in the structure of Organized Play, because they give a solid foundation on which tournaments rest, and it means that players can expect a degree of consistency.

It means that a player who plays in a store showdown at their local store who happens to be on vacation on the other side of the continent during a showdown weekend can generally know how the event is going to be run, and the standards of competitive integrity that players are going to be held to.

You don’t need to memorize the Tournament Regulations or either policy guide to be a judge, but it’s important to understand the skeleton of a tournament, and why the rules and regulations are such that they are. We’ll go into more detail regarding these documents when we get to the level two lessons because that’s when we’re going to ramp up the education for competitive-tier events.

Level One is focused on relaxed tier events, and while maintaining tournament integrity is still fundamental, the stakes are much lower, so it’s safer to put more emphasis on education and refinement than on strict enforcement. This means that we’ll cover the Relaxed Policy Guide, but not the Competitive Policy Guide

Event Tiers

There are four tiers of play - Casual, Relaxed, Competitive, and Master. Casual play is anything that is unstructured - it can be playing at lunch at school or work, at your kitchen table, or even open play at a club or game store.

Relaxed tier events are the entry level for Organized Play. Relaxed-tier events include:

The level one certification focuses on these in-store casual-tier events. These events, especially prereleases, are going to be most players’ first foray into structured Organized Play. It’s also going to be where most judging takes place. While there may be huge tournaments with hundreds or thousands of players, every week, hundreds, if not thousands, of stores across the planet host dozens of players each. Making sure that these events are fun and welcoming is a critical first step in growing the community.

It’s also very important to remember that casual tier or relaxed tier doesn’t mean that the players are casual fans of Star Wars. There will be many players who watch all the shows, read the comics, play other games... There will be fans who have multiple complete screen-accurate cosplays. There will be fans who have Darth Maul’s full-face tattoos (although maybe less frequently than other indicators of fandom). Just because someone isn’t interested in or ready for competitive play doesn’t mean that they’re not deeply invested in the game.

Competitive events are intended for players with a deeper understanding of the game and it’s rules. The FFG-sponsored competitive events are Planetary and Sector Qualifiers, as well as the Regional Championship. Master tier play is reserved for post-cut play at the Regional Championships and at the Galactic Championships. However, keep in mind that while expectations are higher for Competitive Tier events, every player in a competitive event has to have their first foray, and they may not be as polished or knowledgeable as other players

The difference between the two is that at relaxed, while the rules should still be enforced, penalties should be lessened - we’ll go into more details about what that looks like in the next lesson, when we cover the Relaxed Policy Guide. The other significant and pertinent difference between Relaxed events and the more competitive events is that individuals in leader roles at an event - judges, tournament organizers, and other staff are allowed to participate at events that they’re working at Relaxed tier. It’s still recommended that for events with more than thirty or so players, simply due to the logistics that you don’t judge and play at the same time. For Competitive Tier events, judges are only allowed to play if they are not working the event in any capacity.

All casual tier events and all qualifiers are open events - that means that any player can sign up and register for them, and they do not require an invite.

Formats

There are a few different formats available play for sanctioned events, which were covered in depth in the previous lesson Comprehensive Rules sections 9, 10, 11, and 12.

One distinction that the tournament regulations cover is sideboards.

During best-of-three matches, between games (but not before game one) players can add cards from their sideboard to their deck, and remove up to that many cards from the deck for their next game, allowing some flexibility in their deck construction.

In premier, players have a 10-card sideboard. In Trilogy and Twin Suns, there are no sideboards. Finally, in draft and sealed play, all cards that the player had in their pool count as being part of their sideboard.

For instance, players can side in all ten cards of their sideboard and not remove any cards against strategies that try to deplete their deck. As long as the minimum deck size (fifty) and maximum sideboard size (ten) aren’t exceeded, players can make any adjustments, and the total number of cards in the sideboard can not exceed the number the player started with. A player who started with a 55 card main deck and 5 card sideboard (both legal), can sideboard in all five cards, and present a 60 card deck for game two. They can swap out five cards and present fifty-five and five again. They cannot side out five cards and present 50 and 10, despite those being legal for the format generally speaking. For limited - a player will have a much larger pool of cards, and are even allowed to switch their leader and base from among those in their card pool. Sideboarding must not take an excessive amount of time, so if a player in a limited event wants to have a second deck, it should be prepared before the match.

Tournament Preparation

Players are expected to come to an event prepared to play, and are expected to have the following items with them at the start of the event and every round:

Card Legality

A player must play cards that are legal in the format, and cards become legal in a format the day the set releases. Cards obtained in a prerelease are only legal in that event, and are not legal in any other events until the set is released. Cards that have been reprinted in a newer set are legal to be used, as long as they meet other legality requirements, even while the rest of that set is not yet legal. For example, you could play a Shadows of the Galaxy printing of Underworld Thug after the Shadows prerelease because it had previously been printed in Spark of Rebellion.

Cards can have signatures on them, but no other alterations are allowed - whether they be physical modifications or changes to the art.

Cards can be in any language, so long as the card is a legal, officially-released card. However, the English version of cards, like with the rules, is the authoritative reference, in case of confusion or uncertainty.

Marked Cards, Judge Proxies and Counterfeits

A card or sleeve that has been damaged or altered, such that it is possible to identify the card without seeing its face is considered marked. It is a player’s responsibility to ensure that their deck does not contain marked cards.

This is something that can be a lesson and a half all on its own, but I want to touch on a few key highlights. First, cards and sleeves will naturally become marked over the course of play. Some players are rougher on their cards than others, and it’s possible that sleeves may need to be replaced after one event. Some other cards, due to their printing treatment can warp or bend in certain climates. In either case, it’s very reasonable that a player has not noticed these markings on their cards.

Furthermore, with enough inspection, any card can be determined to be marked. If you have to have a certain awkward angle, in certain lighting, and only then can you figure it out... the card isn’t marked.

Sometimes a card will become unplayable for an event. Perhaps a player accidentally bent their opponent’s card while shuffling at a prerelease - there aren’t spares of the card available because it’s the first event where players can open packs, so the judge can issue a proxy. Similarly, if a legendary is marked due to normal wear and tear and the player isn’t able to acquire a copy from the venue or other players, a proxy can be considered.

Only the head judge can issue the proxy, and the proxy is only valid for the event it was created in. Finally, the original card must be available for reference during the player’s matches.

Counterfeits - which are fake cards created by third parties that can resemble officially released cards - or any other unofficial card - can not be used in tournaments.

Tournament Concepts

A tournament is divided into phases, phases into rounds, rounds into matches, matches into games... and games are divided into their own rounds, phases, and turns, which we’ve discussed in various lessons.

The two phases of most tournaments are Swiss Rounds and Single-Elimination Rounds. During Swiss rounds, players are paired against another player who has as close as possible to the same record as them, while also being an opponent that the player hasn’t played before in that event. For the first round of the event, players are paired randomly. If there are an odd number of players, a random player with the worst record receives a bye - which is treated as a match win.

Single Elimination is generally reserved for competitive tier events and takes place after a progression cut - where players of a certain standing or record advance, and all other players are eliminated. In single elimination where play proceeds from Swiss Rounds, players are seeded into a bracket so that the player in first place plays the lowest-ranked player who makes the cut, the second plays the second-lowest, and so forth. If a player drops after a cut, their opponent (or next opponent) receives a bye. When a player loses a match in a single elimination portion of an event, they are removed from the event.

Each of these rounds will either play single-game matches or best-of-three matches.

Single game matches are played exclusively in casual tier events, and never in competitive. Players do not sideboard and a round is 25 minutes long for the game.

Best of three matches are played at all competitive tier events, and sometimes at casual tier events, depending on a store’s needs. Players play games until one player has won two games, and that player is the winner of the match. If a game is a draw, it does not advance either player’s wins. Players have 55 minutes for the match, and 75 minutes if the match is during a top cut.

When time is called, if players are still in a game, they finish the current round, including both the action phase and regroup phase, then play one more action phase, at which point the game will end, if it does not end before then. In single-game matches, the game is a draw, which results in neither player receiving a match win for the round. In a best-of-three match, the player with the most game wins wins the match. If players have an equal number of game wins, the match is a draw, and neither player receives a match win.

Tournament Play

Finally there are a few broad points about tournament play that need to be discussed. There’s the discussion of randomness (covered under Additional Rules in the Comprhensive Rules), various types of game knowledge, and sufficient randomization.

That last one is the only one we’ve not discussed in various lessons, and it’s an important piece of guidance. A player must shuffle their deck until they can not know the order of the cards in their deck, then present the deck to their opponent. Their opponent may either cut or shuffle the deck themselves before returning the deck to its owner. Once returned, a player may cut their deck if their opponent shuffled it, but may not shuffle it again.

The method of distributing the cards into several facedown, equal-sized piles is not a method of randomization. Because it is sequential, after a specific number of distributions, it is very possible to deterministically know the location of specific cards. This is sometimes called “pile shuffling”, but is more accurately described as pile counting. A pile count is allowed for a player to verify that they have the correct number of cards, but does not count as randomization.

This section also mentions tiebreakers (and an early section covers rankings and standings). You can dive into the math of these, but the tournament software generally handles these calculations. It’s not your responsibility to help players with tournament math if they’re trying to figure out what record they need for a certain threshold - and I’d generally recommend not giving advice to players about what record they need. If you’re wrong and a player drops early because of your advice, that will result in a frustrated player.

There’s a lot more in the Tournament Regulations, but a lot of it is detail that only comes up infrequently, or is more necessary for larger or more competitive tournaments. It doesn’t hurt to review the whole document, but it’s not an expectation for level one judges.

Alright - that’s the first dip into the Tournament Regulations - as the game continues to grow, these documents will grow and evolve as well, to reflect how players play the game, how stores run events, and the overall needs of organized play. Next up we’ll cover the Relaxed Policy Guide, which contains information about how to fix things when something goes wrong! As always, if you have any questions, comments, or insights, be sure to join the Judge Community Discord and make your voice heard. Until next time, good luck and have fun!

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