Tourney Rules

Important information about the tournaments will be provided together with the announcement. The tournament direction assumes participants to actively seek to schedule their matches and play their matches in a fair and respectful manner. The following rules provide a basis for the decisions of the tournament direction in what will hopefully remain a rare case of nonconsensual perceivings. In case of missing regulations the tournament director deceides by analogous use of the international tournament-rules:

  1. Eligibility
    WBIF Germany offers international as well as national tournaments. To be eligible for a national tournament German citizenship is sufficient, regardless of the domicile. If a participant is a citizen of another country he is still eligible for German national tournaments as long as his main residence is in Germany and he renounces to any future participation in a tournament of another of WBIF's National Associations.

  2. Change of address and of other personal information
    The participant has the possibility to view and change his data after login under MY WBIF - MY DATA. The participant shall ensure that he/she receives emails to the address he/she has provided. If emails cannot be delivered or are declared as spam, this is the responsibility of the player.

  3. Admissible backgammon servers
    The games can be played on any server that provides a log file. These are for example GridGammon, FIBS, Tigergammon, BG Studio Heroes or Galaxy. The participants agree among themselves on which server they want to play. They can also agree to use a clock. If no agreement is reached, the game is to be played on the server namend in the announcement. It is also possible to play the game live if the game is recorded and transcribed.

  4. Disqualification in case of wrong starting class
    If PR-dependent starting classes are defined for a tournament, the participant is responsible for choosing the correct starting class for him/her. The technical restrictions for registration are based only on values in the past, but cannot replace a forecast for the future. If the average PR from the last 10 matches at the time of the draw for the next round(s) falls below the PR limit for his playing class, the participant will be automatically disqualified. If the participant has not yet played 10 games, the average PR of all games is decisive. In both cases it does not matter in which tournament the games were played. If the participant is disqualified, the matches of the current round - in case of a Triple-KO of rounds 1 to 3 - will be rated against him/her afterwards.

  5. Making of contact
    The participant seeks to schedule his matches actively and timely. Timely means to propose dates for the match at least 10 days before deadline. A form is provided to that pupose at WBIF's website. To document their efforts to schedule their matches, participants should keep a copy of their email or screen. Since GamesGrid's email system is not widely used, contacting your opponent via GamesGrid email will not be acknowledged.

  6. Appointments
    Appointments are to be agreed by mutual consent. If a participant confirms the proposal of the other participant, the proposing participant must have sufficient time to take note of the confirmation. If more than 24 hours elapse between the proposal and the confirmation, the tournamentdirector will evaluate the confirmation as a new proposal, which in turn requires the confirmation of the other participant.

    Publishing of appointments on the WBIF Germany Website is optional. Is not allowed to publish appointments, if one player don't agree with the appointment or publishing. Violations have to be reported to the tournament direction. For published appointsments the central european sommer- resp. wintertime obtains. The current time is published in the headline of the website.

  7. Missed appointments
    If an arranged appointment cannot be kept, the opponent should be informed immediately. If a participant does not show up to play his match within 15 minutes after the scheduled time, the match starts with one point for the present participant. For each additional 5 minutes delay the present participant wins an additional point, so 1-0 after 15 minutes, 2-0 after 20 minutes, and so on. If the present participant reaches more than the half of the required points, he wins the match, for example 6 points in a 11-point-match. If the delayed participant appears, the points have to be entered at the beginning of the match by using the resign-function.

    For the purposes of the rule, absence is when the participant is offline, when they are online but not ready to play, as well as when they are online and ready to play but do not accept the invitation.

    Please note, that the delayed participant has to bear responsability for his delay. He cannot claim to waive points or to reschedule the match, especially not by asking for fairness or respectful behaviour. If the tournament director gets information about a missed appointment, he checks the correct agreement of the matchdate and decide about the match.

  8. Unplayed Matches
    If a match cannot be finished within the specified time, the participants shall inform the tournament direction not later than on the last day before the deadline, documenting that they have actively sought to schedule the match. The tournament direction will make a final rule based solely on the information provided in order to keep the tournament process on schedule. If both participants didn't try to schedule the match timely, the match generally will be scored as unplayed. In that case both participants lose the match.

    Note about missed appointments and unplayed matches:
    If the tournament director has to make a decision regarding a match which has not been played in due time, the only consideration will be what periods of time the players have offered their opponents to play their match. The director is not interested in excuses as to why a player couldn’t play, such as being on holiday, moving flat, being stuck in traffic and so on. This also applies to temporary or permanent restrictions on Heroes. It is the responsibility of the players concerned to ensure that the matches are played in the time stated. However, in terms of fair play and sportsmanship, the times suggested should be reasonable and not to the disadvantage of the opponent. If a genuine problem does arise shortly before a match is supposed to be played and this means the deadline for the completion of matches will be exceeded, please ask by email for an extension of the deadline.

  9. Backgammon rules/Unrated Matches
    All matches shall be played in accordance with the international Backgammon rules using the doubling cube, if there's nothing against that in the present set of rules. WBIF is not committed to the rating systems at the differnt servers where WBIF matches are played. Therefore all WBIF matches may be played unrated.

  10. Different Matchlength
    When a participant invites with a different matchlength and the other participant accepts the inviting, the different matchlength is regarded as decisive matchlength, if the match is not interrupted immediatly after inviting. It does not matter, if one participant notices this later, because he has to feel responsible for his inattention.

  11. Matches in public
    All matches shall be played in public in order to guarantee fairness and transparency. As long as they do not exert any influence or disturbance upon a match kiebitzes shall be allowed to watch a match.

  12. No aids
    Participants must not use any aid when playing their matches. This extends particularly to consulting by a third party and to support by electronic or written aids. Pipcounters from online-servers, however, may be used. The Participants who violate this rule will be excluded from any future WBIF tournament and lose their title, if any, and rating, upon ruling by the committee.

  13. Playing time and breaks
    The games should be played without interruption and within a reasonable playing time. The tournament committee recommends playing with clock and using the following settings: 10 seconds per move plus two additional minutes per match point (Heroes-Clock-Setting: Standard).

    The players can agree upon breaks by mutual consent. However, there is no entitlement to a break beyond the respectful interaction with each other.

    If a participant in a match without a clock feels disturbed by inappropriately slow playing or excessive breaks, the opponent is to be informed in a friendly manner. If there is no improvement even then, he can inform the tournament director with the resultmessage, stating the facts and the total playing time. As a rule, however, the tournament director will recommend to play with clock in future.

  14. Loss of connection
    Each participant is responsible for his technical access and the organization of the playing time. If a participant loses due to the passage of time, he/she bears the consequences, even if he/she did not cause the disturbance himself/herself.

    In case one of the players loses connection in a match without clock, the player who lost connection is expected to contact his opponent without delay in order to schedule the continuation of the match.

  15. Reporting and match log
    After completing their match both participants report to the tournament direction by sending the match result and the match log by using the appropriate form on the website. The tournament direction might decide that one player's report might suffice if his report is plausible and complete. If one of the players does not report to the tournament direction and does not provide the match log even if asked to do so a ruling might be given against him, and he might lose the match, since the tournament direction might assume he has dropped out of the tournament.

  16. Matches without match log
    Matches without match log cannot be rated and shall be retaken. The tournament direction might, however, rate the match if the loss of the log is the doubtless result of a server crash.

  17. Match log analysis
    The tournament direction will analyse with the software eXtremeGammon 2. Every participant's experience and his performance rating will be publicised in a ranking list on WBIF Germany's website. Upon entry the participant will be notified about the analyses and agrees to the publication of this information when registering.

  18. Respectful behaviour
    The participants and the tournament direction behave in a corteious and respectful manner. This includes for example, to date your matches early, answer match-requests in a short time, play your matches without unnecessary interruptions and in a reasonable speed, particularly to go without whining in the course of a match and to relinquish to point out to your opponent how lucky he got. Arguments should be settled personally among the opponents. If there is no agreement between the participants, the tournament direction have to be informed by email. Disputes shall not be carried out in public.

    If there are disputs during a match, the participants could not reconcile, the match is to finish if possible. After the match the tournament direction have to be informed by email. Regardless of the result the tournament direction will decide about a infringement of rules, scoring or repeating the match by using the method described below.

  19. Infringement of rules
    The tournament direction shall ensure compliance with the tournament rules. If the tournament direction gets knowledge about violating the rules directly or by a participants message, he asks the accused for a statement. The tournament direction decides immediately after getting the statement and informs the participants about the decision by email. If one of the participants do not agree with the decision, he may protest by giving a substantiation by email. About a protest the Committee decides by majority vote.

    If a participant violates the rules repeatedly or in a special extent, the tournament direction may exclude the participant temporarily or perment from tournaments with the approval of the committee.