Board Game Arena

I know it depends on the game, but in general, which type of tournament excites you the most when it comes to casual games:

1. Single or Multiplayer Elimination
2. Round Robin
3 Swiss

I host a few tournaments and would love your feedback on which style you are more inclined to play.

The tournaments I host are usually for quicker or more casual games like Shifting Stones, Harmonies, Ticket to Ride, Targi, Flip7, Pixies, Lost Seas, Forest Shuffle, Exhibition: 20th Century, etc.

Thanks for your input!

I generally won't play Round Robins because of the many simultaneous games that get assigned to you at once. I know there are more than a few users who share my opinion on that.

I don't claim to be particularly expert at any game, so I know an elimination tournament is likely to be shorter for me (every so often I surprise myself). So if I want to play a number of rounds, I'd choose Swiss. Though in reality, if I'm going to play tournaments, I take whatever is on offer that suits me - turn based, 24 hours, at least 2-3 days of time per player, either Swiss/Elimination - in games that I want to play tournaments (usually games I know reasonably well).

Depends on the game. If it is one i have played a lot. Single elimination best. .... if it is a game i am fairly new at ...Swiss. so i can get in a few games to get better at that game. Many players bash the round Robin. Yes. It starts all the matches at the same time (freaked me out 1st time ) but then you realize you have time to play and dont have to jump in right away. And those tourneys will completely finish in just a few days. Where as nearly all other tourneys style last at least a month for even the quickest games. Yes. They probably should stagger times on starting. But that would defeat the purpose of a round robin tourney finishing within a few days. ... multi player by far the worst to me. Virtually never finish a game as tourney maker doesn't give enough time for players and most run out of time. Leading to the dreaded kick out issue. Overall to answer questions. Swiss would be my favorite. Chance to really practice strategy

If it's a game I'm happy to always have a game going for, then I like long swiss system tournaments just as a way to give me a constant feed of that game and new opponents. If it's a game I'm happy to only play occasionally, then I prefer elimination tournaments.

Of these three categories, the Swiss system is obviously the best for me. If there aren't a lot of players or I really like the game, I'm ready to play a round-robin system (I've played a two-stage tournament twice, each with a round-robin tournament for 15 people), but it takes a lot of effort. And the Olympic system is in a distant third place, It's disgusting to get knocked out because of one loss, especially if the game is random. Even in the case of a not very random game, this type of tournament is only good at determining the first place.

Single or Multiplayer elimination only for me. The slow/absent players get eliminated in the first 2 rounds, and after that you have high confidence that you're going to finish the game.

Swiss has been a disaster for me, because "you can't play the same player twice" means the slow/absent players pollute the entire tournament.

Elimination and round robin both have their advantages. Elimination gives more weight to the individual games, with the stakes feeling higher and higher as you progress. In round robin, while the games hold less individual importance, it feels good to be competing against everyone at the same time, like an arena of sorts.

The format I'm not crazy about is the swiss system. It seems to be by design a non-ideal system, since it was invented as a shortcut in order to determine a ranking in competitions where it would be unrealistic to make everyone meet. It's basically the same as round robin, with the disadvantage that you don't play everyone, and with a ranking system that can feel unfair sometimes, because it resolves ties based on metrics that are not within your control.

Group Stage starting with Swiss with single elimination finals. This is great for 2p games and allows for a blend of casual and competitive players to play together and provide some skill-based matchmaking. This is the most popular tournament format for TCG tournaments with the only difference on BGA is needing 2+ groups instead of only 1 group (trying to get this fixed).

Qualification for finals should be configured around allowing 1 or 2 losses (whatever you prefer) while still qualifying. This allows players to a chance to recover from a loss similar to a double elimination style tournament. Most BGA games have a little bit of randomness so this helps offset those very unlucky games. Strong players tend to dominate the finals a bit more than single elimination which leads to exciting final matches.

More specific settings:
min 24, max 64 players, Group Stage, stage 1 swiss 5 matches, 2 groups, 7 qualify, stage 2 single elimination.