Adventurer's Crown 2021 Rules
Format
The Adventurer's Crown is Althanas’ official questing tournament. Whereas other tournaments often feature a player vs player combat setting, Adventure’s Crown features a collaborative quest setting. Players are provided a prompt and judged on their ability to advance a quest with others (or on their own, should they advance that far in the tournament).
The tournament will be limited to 16 participants. No alts will be allowed to participate, so be sure to register with your best character. Participants must post at least once or they will be disqualified, but a minimum post count of 3 is recommended to give you the best chance of success. Read on for individual rules.
Registration Rules
1. You must have a registered Althanas character to participate. Nexus characters are ineligible. Characters are also level locked, meaning even if your character levels up during the tournament, it must remain at the level it was when the tournament began.
2. To register simply post the word “Registered” in the Registration Thread, which is open now. Registration is first come, first served.
3. Administrators and moderators are allowed to participate, but they must wait until registration has been live for one day to sign up. Registration will continue until all 16 slots are filled or one week has passed.
Seeding and Progression
The random teams rule will be abolished for round one. Instead, once registration is finished, members will be allowed to seperate themselves into teams.
However, we will be operating a seeding system to ensure balance and fairness throughout.
The top seeded players will comprise "Pot A", and no two seeded players will be allowed to pair with one another. Unseeded players will comprise "Pot B." Seed will be determined by character record and standing (previous tournament winner, achievements to date ect).
Teams will be built by a combination of Pot A and Pot B members for round one.
The staff will provide a loose prompt which will provide some backstory and provide players a starting point. Every team will have the same prompt. Thereafter, progression of the thread is entirely up to the teams.
Posting order is entirely up to the teams. There are no penalties for double posting, or skipping players; however, participation will be considered in scores and awards. Placeholders are not allowed. Only post when you are ready. Edits are only allowed until the next post is made.
Collaboration is encouraged. This can be achieved through any means including Google Docs, Discord, or chat; however, plagiarism and copyright infringement is not allowed. If there is any evidence that someone wrote for someone else, or heavily edited their post to the point where it was no longer theirs, the staff will initiate an investigation. If plagiarism or copyright infringement is found, the entire team will be disqualified.
Bunnying of dialogue, dialogue related actions (such as nodding or smiling), and time advancing actions (like walking together) is allowed, but bunnying of character combat actions (such as attacks, blocks, etc.) and/or internal thoughts/perspectives is not.
Round one will last two weeks, concluding on 20th December 2021 in time for Christmas. Judgments will be posted silmultaneously once the tournament judge(s) have scored threads.
After round one, the winning teams will advance to the semi-finals (see below).
The staff will provide a second loose prompt to provide some information about how the story has progressed. The semi-finals will last a further two weeks.
After the semi-finals, the winning teams will advance to the finals (see below). Remaining participants will write solos to determine final placement.
The staff will provide a third loose prompt to provide some information about how the story has progressed. The finals will last two weeks.
After judgments are completed, the staff will post an epilogue.
Judgments
Threads will be judged by a member of staff using the full rubric format. It may be the case a second judge is assigned to assist, but as at time of writing this has not yet been decided. It goes without saying that the tournament's designated judge cannot participate, but will be compensated with EXP and GP per round judged, and an award to recognise the contribution.
The wildcard and story scores will be strongly influenced by how well your group followed the prompt. Participation will strongly factor into story and pacing scores, so make sure everyone pulls their own weight.
After each round, threads will be closed for judgment for between one and two weeks (with consideration given to Christmas). We will communicate clearly when we expect judgments to be up.
Judgments in round one and the semi-finals are judged as a group, with only one total score provided. After round one, the two highest scoring groups will advance. After the semi-finals, the two highest scoring groups will advance.
The finals will be judged individually and the highest scoring player will win the tournament and related awards. Second and third place will also receive awards. Fourth place will receive no awards.
Rewards
1st Place: 5,000 EXP, 2,000 GP and a special item
2nd Place: 3,000 EXP, 1,500 GP and a special item
3rd Place: 2,500 EXP and 1,000 GP
All participants will receive normal EXP and GP awards for each completed thread.
Those are the rules. Please post here if you have any questions, suggestions or comments.
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Changelog
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22/11/2021 Made edits to the posting requirements
23/11/2021 Made edits to rules on teams
