Announcing TUGR's Unusual Opening Cup!

TUGR's Unusual Opening Cup, or TUOC for short, is a tournament with prizes which has slightly different rules and a different format than all of the Antichess championships held. If you would like to participate, please make sure to read all the rules. If you need additional clarification, feel free to message me.

Synopsis

The main idea of this tournament is to get players to try out new openings. As such, certain moves first moves for both sides are banned! White cannot play 1. e3, 1. c4, 1. a4, 1. g3, or 1. Nh3. The chart that contains which moves are banned for black is below. Should a player not abide by these bans, the game in question will be ruled as a win for their opponent, regardless of the outcome of the game. You are free to use the table during a game.

TUOC splits competitors into divisions of players of similar skill levels. Within those divisions, there will be groups of 4 or 6 players who play round robins (divisional stage), where the top half advances to an upper bracket, while the rest move to a lower bracket (final stage). The format for both stages is 10 games of 3+2 casual antichess. All 10 games must be played in the group stage, as they may be used for tiebreakers, but players may stop once 5.5 is reached during the final stage.

No players will be eliminated after the group stage finishes. This is not a championship, but a way to freshen up games and an opportunity to safely try out new ideas against similarly strong opponents. However, the final stage is single-elimination for both sections, so if you lose a match, your run stops there.

To register, respond with some variation of "I am in and I understand what openings I am not allowed to play" in the comments of this blog or send me a DM with the same message. The weekly pairings and standings will be posted in another blog.

Note that this synopsis is a general guide. For what tiebreaks are used and how divisions are sorted, please read the full rules. Good luck to all competitors!

Full Rules

1. Organization
   1. TUGR’s Unusual Opening Cup (TUOC) will be played on Lichess.
   2. The Tournament Director (TD) is TheUnknownGuyReborn.
   3. In case of disputes between participants, the TD should be contacted, who will make the final call.
   4. Failure in complying to the rules can lead to a match forfeit or tournament disqualification, at the TD's discretion.
2. Player eligibility
   1. Entry requirements
      1. Your Lichess account must be created prior to April 23rd, 2024.
      2. You must have played at least 100 rated Antichess games on Lichess prior to May 6th, 2024.
   2. Qualifications will be handled by the TD. Disqualifying elements include:
      1. You already entered TUOC with another account. Your already entered account will also be disqualified if you try to join with two accounts.
      2. You have a red Terms of Service (TOS) mark on your profile.
      3. BOT accounts cannot play.
3. Acceptable openings
   1. The player with the white pieces (White) shall not play 1. a4, 1. c4, 1. e3, 1. g3, or 1. Nh3.
   2. The player with the black pieces (Black) shall not play any moves prohibited by Table 1 (see synopsis).
   3. Any game in which a player does not abide by 3.1 or 3.2 will be adjudicated as a win for their opponent.
4. Format
   1. All games are casual and have 3+2 as the time control.
   2. The tournament will consist of two parts: a Divisional Stage (Round-robin groups) and a Final Stage (single elimination).
   3. Divisional Stage
      1. The Divisional Stage consists of multiple divisions of 16 or 24 players, depending on the number of entrants, where each division is split into 4 groups of 4 or 6 players. The upper round-robin groups will be split into four groups according to the following cases:
         1. 16 players per division will be sorted into groups containing the seeds [1, 5, 9, 13], [2, 6, 10, 14], [3, 7, 11, 15], and [4, 8, 12, 16].
         2. 24 players per division will be sorted into groups containing the seeds [1, 5, 9, 13, 17, 21], [2, 6, 10, 14, 18, 22], [3, 7, 11, 15, 19, 23], and [4, 8, 12, 16, 20, 24].
      2. The bottom division may have a different number of players. If so, the groups will be adjusted fairly.
      3. A won game gives 1 point, a tie gives 0.5 points, and a lost game gives 0 points. All 10 games must be played, since game scores may be used for tiebreakers.
      4. Your seeding rating is equal to the average of your Antichess rating on April 23rd, 2024 and your highest Antichess rating between January 1st, 2024 and April 23rd, 2024.
      5. Ties will broken (in order) by:
         1. Mutual match score.
         2. Variety of openings as White.
         3. Mutual game score.
         4. Seed in Divisional Stage.
      6. Pairings will be taken care of by the TD and will be posted on Lichess weekly.
   4. Final Stage
      1. A double single-elimination tournament will be played among all competitors in each division.
      2. The players that go into each bracket will be divided accordingly:
         1. If there are 4 players in a group, the top 2 players from each group will advance to the “upper” bracket, while the remainder will advance to the “lower” bracket.
         2. If there are 6 players in a group, the top 3 players from each group will advance to the “upper” bracket, while the remainder will advance to the “lower” bracket.
         3. In the case of a disqualified or withdrawn player, all available players in the group move up one place. This results in a bye for the lower bracket.
      3. Each player plays a 10-game match against their opponent. A won game gives 1 point, a drawn game gives 0.5 points, and a lost game gives 0 points.
      4. A player may stop when they reach a score of 5.5.
         1. In case of a tie, two more games shall be played at a time control of 3+0 until a winner is decided.
      5. The brackets will be sorted accordingly:
         1. If there are 4 players in a group, the top and third finishers will play the second and fourth finishers of a different group, respectively.
         2. If there are 6 players in a group, the second and fifth finishers will play the third and sixth finishers of a different group, respectively. The first and fourth finishers will receive a bye.
5. Timeline
   1. There is one match per week in all rounds.
   2. The pairings for the first matches will be published on May 6th, 2024.
   3. The pairings for all subsequent matches will be published on subsequent Tuesdays.
   4. All matches must be completed by the following Monday 23:59 UTC.
6. Match negotiations
   1. Each player is responsible to offer at least 3 separate times for the match, by Friday 23:59 UTC at the latest, unless an offer has been accepted before that number is reached.
   2. Players may begin negotiating a playing start time as soon as their next pairing is known. When a time is agreed on, it must be shared in the pairings forum post.
   3. To prevent (most) time zone confusion, players must communicate their times in UTC.
   4. A player must be able to accept new messages while they are still included in pairings.
   5. The 3 offered times should be no closer than 3 hours to each other and no more than 2 on a single date.
   6. If 3 offers are not made in time the player at fault must accept a time chosen by the opponent.
   7. If both players fail to make 3 offers by the deadline then the match will count as a draw and both players will count as having forfeited a game.
   8. A player should respond to an offer by accepting or making a different offer, preferably within 24 hours.
   9. If both players make 3 offers but no agreement is made before the weekend then the TD will determine if fault lies with a particular player.
   10. If a player is at fault then their opponent will decide the match time, if no player is at fault then the match will be ruled as a draw.
   11. Case-by-case exceptions may be made to the aforementioned rules at the TD’s discretion.
7. Match rules (applying at all stages)
   1. Each player has the right to call a break once during the match, between two games. The break lasts at most 10 minutes.
   2. If no break is called, a rematch must be offered and accepted immediately. Repeated failure in doing so leads to a forfeit.
   3. If a player is offline at the time of the match, they have a 10 minute grace period to come online and start the game. The appearing player has to message the TD that their opponent did not show up and again 10 minutes afterwards if the opponent still didn’t show up. The appearing player has the choice to reschedule or claim a win. If the appearing playing does not claim a win and rescheduling fails, the match will be forfeited in favor of the appearing player.
   4. If a player leaves the match while it's still ongoing, they get 10 minutes to come back and this counts as their break. If they don't come back in time, their opponent gets the option to claim a win (similar to rule 7.3).
   5. If a player gets forfeited in two different matches, they get disqualified from TUOC.
   6. After a match, the winning player is responsible for posting the results in the Pairings forum post unless the players have agreed otherwise, or a player is chat banned.
8. Reporting cheats
   1. Accusations of cheating must be made privately to the TD. Any accusation in public will result in a disqualification of the accuser, regardless of whether the accusation was correct or not.
   2. If an accused player is found guilty, they will be disqualified from the tournament.
   3. If a player receives a red TOS mark on Lichess during TUOC but for non-TUOC games, they also get disqualified from TUOC.
9. Disqualification and withdrawals
   1. Divisional Stage: If a player withdraws or gets disqualified from the Divisional Stage, their games will be disregarded.
   2. Final Stage: If a player withdraws or gets disqualified from the Final Stage, their last opponent takes their place in the bracket.
10. Prizes
    1. Patron Wings will be gifted to the winners of each group in the Divisional Stage for one month.
    2. The winners of the “upper” brackets will receive $25 CAD.
    3. The winners of the “lower” brackets will receive $15 CAD.
    4. Prizes will be paid out through PayPal.