May 5, 2020 May 15, 2020

Grand Pirate Championship 2020

Tournament#1: Spar Chamber Showdown

I’ve been running a variety of tournaments on our site for the past couple of years to great success. However, I think it’s time to take things a step further. Announcing, the first annual Grand Pirate Championship 2020! What is it, you may ask? Well, it’s a way to truly determine who the best of the best are. Do you want a chance to win eternal bragging rights on a E10+ video game? Do you enjoy competing among friends for great prizes? Then read on!

Tournament #1 Signups

Format

Over the summer we plan on having 3 normal tournaments, no different than what we’ve done in the past. There will be one in May (this article), one in June (announcement later), and one in July (announcement later). However, instead of just having 3 single, disconnected tournaments that each end when the winners take home their prizes, we’ll be adding a second stage to this tournament series.

This second, championship, stage will be an 8 person tournament in early August, accessible by invitation only, featuring a 80,000 crown grand prize, 40,000 crown second place prize, 20,000 crown third and fourth place prize, and 10,000 crown fifth through eighth place prize! This format takes inspiration from the Grand Chess Tour.

Note that the 3 normal tournaments are open to everyone, regardless of performance in the previous tournaments. Furthermore, participating in one does not mean that you have to participate in the others, or that you are automatically signed up for the others. As always, we’ll still be giving away tens of thousands of crowns, bundles, and mounts as prizes, so you definitely don’t want to miss out! It’s also a great way to get your feet in the door, so I’d love to see some new faces in the mix.

Qualifying for the championship tournament will be based on your performance in the three normal tournaments we host. Six of the slots will be auto-bids, going to the winner and second place finisher in each of the normal tournaments.

The last two slots will be at-large bids, based on overall performance across the three tournaments. Essentially, the best-performing individuals that didn’t get auto-bids will get these at-large bids. We’ll calculate this using a point system, explained below.

Points

As mentioned above, the at-large bids will be determined by a point system. This point system will also be used to determine the seeding in the championship tournament. If the prizes weren’t incentive enough to participate in multiple tournaments, this should also be an added reason to participate in as many as you can!

If you win or get second in more than one tournament, your auto-bid in the later tournament(s) that you win will go to the next highest placer in the tournament in question. For instance, if someone gets second in the first tournament and wins the next one, their auto-bid for the second tournament will actually go to the person that got 3rd place. Furthermore, if you decline an auto-bid altogether, your bid will also go to the next highest placer in that tournament.

Here’s how you earn points in each of the 3 tournaments:

32 points – Win a tournament
16 points – Get second place
12 points – Get third place
8 points – Get fourth place
4 points – Eliminated in a round of 8
2 points – Eliminated in a round of 16
1 point – Eliminated in a round of 32+

Everything related to point totals will be tracked on this spreadsheet. Now that all of the explanation is out of the way, read on for the rules and signups for the first tournament.

Tournament #1 Info

Note that all of the following information will apply to all of the qualifying tournaments (signup dates will be difference, of course).

All participants must be on the US Pirate101 server and be level 60+. Players declare a single pirate during sign-ups. There will be no switching pirates between rounds.
- You can obviously declare different pirates across different qualifying tournaments. If you qualify for the championship, you can also declare any pirate you want regardless of the choices you made in the qualifiers.
The tournament will be a single-elimination, bracketed tournament and will start May 15th (signups remain open until the 14th at 11:59 PM eastern time).
- All rounds will be best of 3.
All participants will join a tournament-exclusive Discord server in order to schedule their matches with their opponent. Within this server, participants are to be civil to one another and refrain from using inappropriate language. Breaking these rules are grounds for immediate disqualification. You will receive a Discord friend request from Matthew#9684 to invite you to the server.
- Also worth noting: this server is not a general gameplay server. While you’re welcome to chat with fellow participants, pinging everyone to ask for help farming for something or to do random PvP matches isn’t this server’s intent. There are lots of other wonderful places to get in-game help.
- Being disqualified from one of the tournaments in this series for unacceptable behaviour will disqualify you for all 3 tournaments + the championship, if applicable.
Participants have 1 week to complete the matches for each round. However, if you and your opponent cannot schedule a mutually acceptable time, let an organiser know and we can look into providing an extension.
All matches will take place in the Spar Chamber.
Your internet connection is your responsibility. Should both players disconnect simultaneously, however, (due to a server DDOS attack, for instance), the match will be restarted with no consequences to either player.
If you have any conflicts during your match (an opponent breaking the rules, a game-altering glitch, etc.) it is your responsibility to provide concrete visual proof of these claims, preferably a screenshot or video recording. Only then can I force players to redo a match.
There will be a third place match between the losers of the semi-finals for scoring purposes.
Prizes are as follows:
- First place: 25,000 Crowns + Baar Companion code
- Second place: 10,000 Crowns + Baar Companion code
- Third and fourth place: 5,000 Crowns
- Fifth through eighth place: 2,500 Crowns

Gameplay Rules

Players are subject to the following rules in all matches during the tournament. Breaking these rules may result in your disqualification. This ruleset will apply to all tournaments in the series.

All Doubloons are banned.
Old Scratch is banned.
The Spring and Fall Champion weapons are banned.
All tiers of the Beastmaster Banner are banned.
The Imperial Robes of Moo Manchu are banned.
Ghor is banned, due to his Eagle Eyes glitch.
Overwatch 5 is banned.
Firstmate’s Boon is banned.
Blast of Discord is banned.
All elixirs are banned.
Haywire Companions are legal, but note that Overwatch 5 cannot be given to them.