Worldwide Combos

Starting date: 2018, February 26th, 00:00 UTC
Registration is open until then.

Contest format:

One pool round, with groups of 4 or 5 players in each pool. One player's seeding is determined by the following criteria: number of tournament points, then multiplayer elo rating, then survivor personal best, then sprint personal best, then tournament registration date. Before pools are created every player with even seeding has 50% chance to be swapped with the player with the next better seeding (1 with 2, then 3 with 4, etc.).
One single elimination table, with players seeded according to their ranking after the pool round. The ranking is determined by the victory rate, then there are various tie-breakers such as the points difference, number of rounds won, etc...
The number of players who advance to the single elimination round is Min(number of participants, 16).

Match rules:

Rounds last 2 minutes, with no Knock-Out limit. Handicap type is usual garbage (with holes).
Pool matches: first to 5, win by 1.
Single elimination matches: first to 7, win by 2.

Registration process:

You need a validated Worldwide Combos account to be able to play.
In order for the server to schedule automatically your matches, you need to tell us at which times of the day your are available. Since the tournament should last less than four weeks, we only need informations on these four weeks.
In order to avoid scheduling problems, it's better to be available at least 21 hours a week, on at least two distinct days.

Rewards:

All players win tournament points. If A is the number of participants in this tournament, B the number of participants in Beta Tournament 2 (Div. 2), and C your ranking in this tournament, you win 64*(1.01 - ln(C)/ln(A+B)) points truncated to two decimals, where ln(X) stands for the natural logarithm of X.
The winner gets a fancy color on the Discord server. This might not apply to Div. 3 if there is one.

Other rules:

There is nothing much to win, so please don't cheat. If you somehow find a critical issue on the website, please don't exploit it in a way that would influence the tournament's outcome, and report it.
Not showing up for matches is not fair for other people. If you miss too many matches you may not be able to compete in future tournaments.
If you realize that you are not available anymore when your match starts, you can ask for a schedule change, through the website. Please don't delay matches too much as people usually like when tournaments finish quickly.
By registering for the contest you agree to receive e-mail notifications about the contest itself. Don't worry, most of the time you will be told when your next matches have been scheduled, and that's all.
The final match will probably be uploaded to Youtube, and by registering you agree with this.

Tips:

Beta Tournament 2 is splitted into two divisions. Best players should go to Division 1. If you don't know where to register, register in both tournaments, and the administrator will choose for you according to your statistics.
Joining the Discord server might be a good idea as this will help you rescheduling matches when needed.
In the Options page, it is possible to make your blocks spawn one line higher.
You can start your match at anytime once it is scheduled, as long as you start earlier than the official time.