Here you can find rulings pertaining to Smogon Tour, general tournament rules here
In this post i'll link past and future rulings for ease of access.
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Smogon Tour Administrative Decisions
- Thread starter Luigi
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Here you can find rulings pertaining to Smogon Tour, general tournament rules here
In this post i'll link past and future rulings for ease of access.
RE: xImRaptor vs ABR, Season 29, Week 1, Tour 2.
Situation: In their Round 4 game, xImRaptor was in position to win but around turn 32 made a series of plays that can only be described as throwing, and later in pm admitted to losing the game deliberately.
Result: xImRaptor's score for this week will be changed to -3, he will be infracted for unsportsmanlike conduct.
Since this happened in week 1, and ABR didn't gain any points as a result (his score from friday was higher than his score from saturday), xImRaptor won't be tourbanned, but this is the exception, not the rule. If you deliberately throw in Smogon Tour, this is the lightest punishment you can get.
Situation: In their Round 4 game, xImRaptor was in position to win but around turn 32 made a series of plays that can only be described as throwing, and later in pm admitted to losing the game deliberately.
Result: xImRaptor's score for this week will be changed to -3, he will be infracted for unsportsmanlike conduct.
Since this happened in week 1, and ABR didn't gain any points as a result (his score from friday was higher than his score from saturday), xImRaptor won't be tourbanned, but this is the exception, not the rule. If you deliberately throw in Smogon Tour, this is the lightest punishment you can get.
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RE: Crown Tundra DLC, Smogon Tour 30
The Crown Tundra DLC will be released October 22nd, otherwise known as the next Thursday. We were then set with the difficult decision of either freezing the SS OU meta as it is now or allowing the new Pokémon in two of our tournaments: SSD and Smogon Tour. There are, however, significant differences between both: while SSD is nearing playoffs, Smogon Tour at this moment is slightly more than halfway done.
Furthermore, as Smogon Tour features only one current generation OU tier, we'd have only one tier/weekend impacted with the new (and returning) Pokémon for the regular season. As such, the TD team has decided to adopt a DLC2 metagame for the last three SS Smogon Tours as well as playoffs.
The Crown Tundra DLC will be released October 22nd, otherwise known as the next Thursday. We were then set with the difficult decision of either freezing the SS OU meta as it is now or allowing the new Pokémon in two of our tournaments: SSD and Smogon Tour. There are, however, significant differences between both: while SSD is nearing playoffs, Smogon Tour at this moment is slightly more than halfway done.
Furthermore, as Smogon Tour features only one current generation OU tier, we'd have only one tier/weekend impacted with the new (and returning) Pokémon for the regular season. As such, the TD team has decided to adopt a DLC2 metagame for the last three SS Smogon Tours as well as playoffs.
RE: Playoffs, Smogon Tour 30
We have been working closely with the OU council so that our players can play SS OU to its fullest potential and without any broken elements. We have been pretty happy with our communications with the council and the results shown on the first three SS tours post-DLC2. We have been asked for members of the OU council for more time to evaluate the tier before playoffs - and considering a survey will be sent to a select few OU players soon - the TD team has decided to comply and postpone playoffs by one week.
Result: The first round for Smogon Tour 30 playoffs is now scheduled to start November 22nd. Any tiebreaker will take place normally on the 15th with the metagame that exists at the time. The first round of the playoffs will not be locked to the tiebreak's metagame.
We have been working closely with the OU council so that our players can play SS OU to its fullest potential and without any broken elements. We have been pretty happy with our communications with the council and the results shown on the first three SS tours post-DLC2. We have been asked for members of the OU council for more time to evaluate the tier before playoffs - and considering a survey will be sent to a select few OU players soon - the TD team has decided to comply and postpone playoffs by one week.
Result: The first round for Smogon Tour 30 playoffs is now scheduled to start November 22nd. Any tiebreaker will take place normally on the 15th with the metagame that exists at the time. The first round of the playoffs will not be locked to the tiebreak's metagame.
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RE: Amoonguss, Smogon Tour 30, Week 9, Tour 1.
We have been given evidence of user Amoonguss being in a call with other 6 users (two of them permabanned from this website) while playing for today's Smogon Tour. Our rules are pretty clear: do not engage in any calls with other Smogon users when you are playing for any tournament.
i guess one shouldn't mention that in stour's lobby as well
Result: The following users have been tourbanned for 1 year: Amoonguss, m00la, solonor24 and pizzq.
We have been given evidence of user Amoonguss being in a call with other 6 users (two of them permabanned from this website) while playing for today's Smogon Tour. Our rules are pretty clear: do not engage in any calls with other Smogon users when you are playing for any tournament.
Result: The following users have been tourbanned for 1 year: Amoonguss, m00la, solonor24 and pizzq.
RE: Playoffs, Smogon Tour 30
Juuls has been discovered to have, at a minimum, account shared with/received ghosting from a permabanned user(s) during at least some points of their Smogon Tour and OLT runs; they are permanently banned from the forums, disqualified, and their results voided.
If this had been caught before any games were played, we'd have simply reseeded the bracket to account for the missing spot. This unfortunately only came to our attention after the Giannis vs Juuls match, as such we have 3 options:
1. Give a bye in the quarterfinals Giannis lost and his opponent was then disqualified, leaving an empty space in the bracket that would then be filled with a bye. This can't be done for the rather obvious reason that someone advancing straight to the semifinals without having to play while the other players have to win their matches is bad.
2. Put Giannis in the quarterfinals Giannis lost, but his opponent was found to be cheating, so he should be given a free win. This effectively gives Giannis a bye in the round of 16, which is almost as bad as the above example. This leads us to:
3. Pair Giannis with the 17th seed. This isn't perfect, as Giannis is effectively getting 2 lives here, but it's the fairest solution, and the one most similar to the scenario that would have happened had we caught this before the playoffs began in earnest.
Juuls has been discovered to have, at a minimum, account shared with/received ghosting from a permabanned user(s) during at least some points of their Smogon Tour and OLT runs; they are permanently banned from the forums, disqualified, and their results voided.
If this had been caught before any games were played, we'd have simply reseeded the bracket to account for the missing spot. This unfortunately only came to our attention after the Giannis vs Juuls match, as such we have 3 options:
1. Give a bye in the quarterfinals Giannis lost and his opponent was then disqualified, leaving an empty space in the bracket that would then be filled with a bye. This can't be done for the rather obvious reason that someone advancing straight to the semifinals without having to play while the other players have to win their matches is bad.
2. Put Giannis in the quarterfinals Giannis lost, but his opponent was found to be cheating, so he should be given a free win. This effectively gives Giannis a bye in the round of 16, which is almost as bad as the above example. This leads us to:
3. Pair Giannis with the 17th seed. This isn't perfect, as Giannis is effectively getting 2 lives here, but it's the fairest solution, and the one most similar to the scenario that would have happened had we caught this before the playoffs began in earnest.
RE: Grimbert, Smogon Tour 31, Week 2, Tour 2.
During Round 1, Grimbert told the host he had won the match when he did not. Even when the host questioned him and asked for a replay, he still stood his ground. However, from the replay it is clear that Grimbert lost the game and was lying to the host. Falsying results is against the rules and therefore repeated lying, especially in a live tour format with strict time constraint, will be punished.
Result: Following the precedent set by the Bugzinator case, Grimbert will be tourbanned for 6 months.
During Round 1, Grimbert told the host he had won the match when he did not. Even when the host questioned him and asked for a replay, he still stood his ground. However, from the replay it is clear that Grimbert lost the game and was lying to the host. Falsying results is against the rules and therefore repeated lying, especially in a live tour format with strict time constraint, will be punished.
Result: Following the precedent set by the Bugzinator case, Grimbert will be tourbanned for 6 months.
RE: Beraldinhoo vs TDNT , Season 31, Week 7, Tour 1.
Situation: In their Round 1 game, Beraldinhoo brought a self-proclaimed "meme" team (5 Water absorbs Pokemon and Ferrothorn) and made multiple questionable plays. This is made even worse by the fact that he mentioned in game that he "wants gives his friend an opportunity to win" and "doesn't want to ruin their dream with a meme team" , which shows a clear intent of throwing.
Result: Because TDNT is still in the playoffs race and this happened very close to the end of Smogon Tour 31, Beraldinhoo will be tourbanned for 3 months for throwing as established by the thelinearcurve vs Fakes case.
Situation: In their Round 1 game, Beraldinhoo brought a self-proclaimed "meme" team (5 Water absorbs Pokemon and Ferrothorn) and made multiple questionable plays. This is made even worse by the fact that he mentioned in game that he "wants gives his friend an opportunity to win" and "doesn't want to ruin their dream with a meme team" , which shows a clear intent of throwing.
Result: Because TDNT is still in the playoffs race and this happened very close to the end of Smogon Tour 31, Beraldinhoo will be tourbanned for 3 months for throwing as established by the thelinearcurve vs Fakes case.
RE: Saturday 6AM Tournaments
Hello,
We have tried and unfortunately found out that the early Saturday time is not working as we expected it to. The very low number of signups from the previous two 6AM Saturday tours do not just make the Smogon Tour experience worse for spectators - they also do not help the players at all. Using one of your 2 tournaments/week in a very small tournament may very well set oneself in a worse scenario for qualification, and we may see even smaller tournaments later in this Season as joining the 6AM Saturday tournament might very well become a liability to players in contention for playoffs.
Therefore, we will be reverting back to our usual tournament times for the remainder of this season. I'm sure you're used to them, but here they are nonetheless:
Friday @ 6PM EST
Saturday @ 4PM EST
Sunday @ 2PM EST
Last but not least, I'd like to thank the hosts and players that stayed with us for these past three tournaments.
Hello,
We have tried and unfortunately found out that the early Saturday time is not working as we expected it to. The very low number of signups from the previous two 6AM Saturday tours do not just make the Smogon Tour experience worse for spectators - they also do not help the players at all. Using one of your 2 tournaments/week in a very small tournament may very well set oneself in a worse scenario for qualification, and we may see even smaller tournaments later in this Season as joining the 6AM Saturday tournament might very well become a liability to players in contention for playoffs.
Therefore, we will be reverting back to our usual tournament times for the remainder of this season. I'm sure you're used to them, but here they are nonetheless:
Friday @ 6PM EST
Saturday @ 4PM EST
Sunday @ 2PM EST
Last but not least, I'd like to thank the hosts and players that stayed with us for these past three tournaments.
RE: bbeeaa (formerly beatiful), Smogon Tour 30
The TD team has been given evidence that bbeeaa provided specific advice on moves during Smogon Tour 30 via private messages during a game. This is a textbook example of ghosting.
The evidence provided to the TDs indicate that the messages went unread until after the game was completed and that the ghosting was unrequested, so the player who was given this advice will not be tourbanned.
Result: bbeeaa will be tourbanned for 3 months.
The TD team has been given evidence that bbeeaa provided specific advice on moves during Smogon Tour 30 via private messages during a game. This is a textbook example of ghosting.
The evidence provided to the TDs indicate that the messages went unread until after the game was completed and that the ghosting was unrequested, so the player who was given this advice will not be tourbanned.
Result: bbeeaa will be tourbanned for 3 months.
RE: Yelodash vs RedEmption
In his Round 2 match of Sunday's tour, RedEmption had what was a guaranteed win regardless of luck against Yelodash. He then made an inexplicable play that took away his surefire victory. This was followed by a series of similarly inexplicable moves that lead him to lose the game. This can only be interpreted as an intentional throw, which is in direct violation of the rules.
This was confirmed via internal investigation of RedEmption's movesets on Pokemon in question as well.
Following the precedent from FMG vs Always!, we will be counting that game as illegitimate due to the fact that RedEmption had a guaranteed win, but deliberately threw it away. We will be voiding any points Yelodash earned from or following that game given that he would not have advanced without RedEmption's throwing.
Result: RedEmption will be tourbanned for 3 months for throwing important games. Yelodash will not be rewarded points for his win against RedEmption or the following round (meaning DonSalvatore will take over the 16 seed).
In his Round 2 match of Sunday's tour, RedEmption had what was a guaranteed win regardless of luck against Yelodash. He then made an inexplicable play that took away his surefire victory. This was followed by a series of similarly inexplicable moves that lead him to lose the game. This can only be interpreted as an intentional throw, which is in direct violation of the rules.
This was confirmed via internal investigation of RedEmption's movesets on Pokemon in question as well.
Following the precedent from FMG vs Always!, we will be counting that game as illegitimate due to the fact that RedEmption had a guaranteed win, but deliberately threw it away. We will be voiding any points Yelodash earned from or following that game given that he would not have advanced without RedEmption's throwing.
Result: RedEmption will be tourbanned for 3 months for throwing important games. Yelodash will not be rewarded points for his win against RedEmption or the following round (meaning DonSalvatore will take over the 16 seed).
RE: Raptor,
Raptor qualified for the Smogon Tour playoffs, but indicated to the host prior to the playoffs going up that he cannot participate for personal reasons. While we wish all of our top achieving competitors could participate, we respect his decision and will not punish him due to him letting us know prior to playoffs going up.
Result: All players below Raptor move up a seed, there is a 3-way tiebreak for the sixteenth seed, and r1 is now two weeks long to accommodate.
Raptor qualified for the Smogon Tour playoffs, but indicated to the host prior to the playoffs going up that he cannot participate for personal reasons. While we wish all of our top achieving competitors could participate, we respect his decision and will not punish him due to him letting us know prior to playoffs going up.
Result: All players below Raptor move up a seed, there is a 3-way tiebreak for the sixteenth seed, and r1 is now two weeks long to accommodate.
RE: SV OU,
The metagame will be locked into pre-HOME for the duration of playoffs. Having just the last two rounds in an entirely new, unsettled format would not be a responsible decision.
The metagame will be locked into pre-HOME for the duration of playoffs. Having just the last two rounds in an entirely new, unsettled format would not be a responsible decision.
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