Tournament mode, I think, should have limited options and not function like an actual tournament as Bo3 or conquest. Waiting to play should be avoided as being part of it.
Instead it could function like Arena. Instead, you get to make 3 decks with our own cards and then attempt to go on win streaks. I'd base Tournament Mode on Bo3 and it'd go like this:
Enter Tournament Mode (for a certain fee?) Create 3 decks Start a game Select 1 of your decks If you win 3 times you advance to the next bracket and will be matched against players who're also in that bracket If you win you can't play the deck you've won with There are 5 brackets to advance through If you lose 3 times in a single bracket you're out
Each bracket has its own rewards, like Arena. The further you advance the better the rewards.
I think this structure keeps the game simple, as Blizzard prefers, there'll be no waiting or having to set up anything between players. Also fits the game where you will matched against a random 'unknown' player. No invites, no friends to cheat with. :P
5 different tiers based on your wins, the format should be like that of 32 players tournament. If you win tier 1 (32 players) you move on to tier 2 (only 16 players in tier 2 now). Now you fight until you win 5 players or lose.
You only face people in the same tier.
Different rewards based on the tier you got to. If you lose at tier 1, you get 30~40 gold (didn't want to make it too low to discourage people, and you can still get 10 gold from 3 win bonus). Tier 5 win (won 5 players) means guaranteed epic, fair chance at golden epic and possibly other rewards such as packs, maybe even a low chance at legendary.
To make tournament mode have rewards, you must require gold otherwise people would just be able to get unlimited rewards.
5 different tiers based on your wins, the format should be like that of 32 players tournament. If you win tier 1 (32 players) you move on to tier 2 (only 16 players in tier 2 now). Now you fight until you win 5 players or lose.
You only face people in the same tier.
Different rewards based on the tier you got to. If you lose at tier 1, you get 30~40 gold (didn't want to make it too low to discourage people, and you can still get 10 gold from 3 win bonus). Tier 5 win (won 5 players) means guaranteed epic, fair chance at golden epic and possibly other rewards such as packs, maybe even a low chance at legendary.
To make tournament mode have rewards, you must require gold otherwise people would just be able to get unlimited rewards.
If you want to implement an ingame tournament mode, I think you should give up on the "best of 3" idea.
Just imagine if your opponent gives up in the 1st match ( and it will happen, a lot) you may have to wait 1 hour if some people are playing control vs control. From my experience from other TCGO, having to wait 15min after finishing a match in a tournament is quite annoying, so 1 hour ... (and you need to stay available all this time cause you don't know when the next round begins).
If you opponent leaves on tier 1, you go to tier 2 and face other players at tier 2. The player could be someone who just got to tier 2, or someone who was there days, weeks, even months ago. There is no guarantee who you will face in my idea of the tournament mode (unless you queue with another player at the same time at a higher tier).
Every week new tournament starts. You can join only on the first day. Every day you play three bo5 games (each is played between those with same position, i.e. won 0 games, won 1 game, won 2 games...). Don't win all three - lose the tournament. Thats 2^(3*7) = 2097152 players in a week. So you have high chance of ending tournament before other tournament starts.
Maybe a little harsh (as any single elimination is), but given the number of participants, i can't think of anything else.
1. I would like blizz to release an app/game manager to allow tournaments to be setup more easily by individual people and / or game shops / online sites. As it stands right now, the game is awful for 3rd party organizers (which are the only organizers atm). Simply having an App or add on that would allow the tournament manager to see the bracket in real time and allow for automated matchmaking between clients connected though the app. This would be a HUGE step in the right direction and would allow for more tournaments to be created without the help of blizz and improve the scene tremendously.
2. In game tournaments. The way I envision this going is as follows:
- You enter a tournament mode, lets say best of 3 - with your 3 constructed decks. You play 6 rounds of best of 3, so 18 possible games in total. You can que for these like arena, with the only difference being that you commit to 3 games, if you leave during those three games, 2 wins will be allotted to your opponent.
-After your 6 rounds are over, if you win less than (arbitrary number incoming) 59% of your games, you are out of the tournament and win a prize based on the number of wins.
-After your 6 rounds are over, if you win 60% or more of your games you move into the winners bracket. In the winners bracket you commit to 6 possible games when you accept the challenge.
-When the challenge is accepted, you will be matched up with 3 other players that also won more than 60% of their games in the first round. Since this may not be an immediate challenge, you will enter a que that goes to the bottom left of your screen and notifies you when your tournament is ready at which point you will have 90 seconds to accept or decline. If you accept, you will auto concede whatever your current game is and move into deck selection where you will select 3 decks to use in the winners bracket.
-After decks are selected you will be matched up with your opponent. Then you enter into a best of 3 series with that opponent. Winner moves on and loser is out w/ the appropriate prize for their overall record.
-The winners of the two series will then matchup for a final showdown. This will work just like the challenge when moving into the initial winners bracket. You will get a message after you finish your first round that either reads "congratulations! you will now move into the final round, please wait while your opponent finishes his/her matches" OR "congratulations! you will now move into the final round, your opponent is waiting for you, entering que now"
-winners will then again enter deck selection, select 3 decks and be matched up for the final best of 3 series. Winner is the tournament winner (perhaps can enter a tournament winner tournament at the end of the month?) and loser gets prizes based on their overall w/l.
-At any time you can forfeit, if it is during a best of series or during a match, your opponent will be given the number of wins they need to move on in that round.
In my opinion this would be a close way to approximate a real tournament setting in a digital environment.
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SWCCG World Champ- Star Wars CCG, best card game ever
I think a number of people have posted this - constructed Arena format, selecting three decks, playing until either all three are eliminated, or twelve wins. I can't see how a "real" tournament mode could be implemented - I suspect the developers want all play modes equally accessible to all players, millions of whom only play a few games each day, or less. Personally, if constructed Arena were available, it would be my preferred play mode.
I'm not sure how to implement it (yet) but imo it's better if it's organised in specific timed formats by Blizzard. The fact that you can't play all the time is what makes tournaments feel so special (no boring grinding all the time). If it's been offered constantly like Arena, then It's just another game mode.
They could put a timer in between. Like open that kind of mode to a specific time, like they do with Tavern Brawl. That way you dont have access to it at all times and makes it a bit more special.
I meant how to implement the tournament mode in general not the timed format. I'll fix it in my post (y)
there are a lot of options for playing tournament mode...
1) arena type; 150 gold entry, select a constructed deck, that deck gets locked in, so you cant change it anymore, and you start playing your games just like in arena... with same prizes as in arena.
2) Hearthstone is a game where people dont want to wait... but for those who are willing to wait, dont let them wait so long. I saw someone come with the idea of having a tournament without brackets, and as soon as someone wins it gets paired with someone who won about the same time as he did. this would cause the bracket to become aggro vs aggro and control vs control, as most times agro games are over quick, and control games takes a bit longer. So every round gets 30 minutes, and after 30 minutes you get paired with someone new. 1 game either win or loss, in the mean time if you have enough spare time, you can play a casual game but you get automatically removed from that game when your next round starts.
3) Ladder like tournament; a new ladder for tournament players, your amount of wins are counted, and entering would cost around 200 gold per month (if you like to play that month). then you start laddering. your percentage of wins determine how high you get on the standings. A minimum of 3 games played a day, and for every game not played you get an automatic loss. So not playing will give you 3 losses. There will be a hidden ELO ratings behind your profile so you will be paired against someone with the same ELO rating like you; this means your opponents will be around the same powerlever like you.
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To live is to suffer, to survive is to find meaning in the suffer!
I have a lot of weird ideas, but what I can see as something viable are:
1- Entry fee: 150 gold like arena, or even more, like 200 is fine. Can put real money as well;
2- You can only submit deck from heroes you have something like, level 20. Incentive people to level up heroes, give this level up something useful (only gold cards for me is too shallow), and make only people with a minimum understanding of a class to enter;
3- Arena like rewards, even a cardback for the "champion", like the legendary card back from ladder;
4- The tournament need to be like arena, for me its impossible do something different. Something like Ecnarongi said is excellent:
For example, in an 8 person tournament there will be 3 legs: First Round, Semi-finals, and Final. If you start and stop after winning the "First Round" when you come back to playing an 8 person tournament you start in the "Semi-finals". When you queue you will get paired with someone with a similar record.
I prefer swiss: you pay the fee, submit three decks and can play 12 games. You only face people with the same record (if you have a 5-2 record, face someone with similar record). Reward based on number of wins. You can stop and play latter, with no problem with waiting time;
5 - Monthly rules: Like brawl, without being ridiculous. Something like "this month only classic and gvg card are allowed", or " only common cards", making tournament very different from other modes. Without something like that, tournament will be only a glorified ladder.
The most important thing to me is that tournaments should feel very special. An upcoming tournament match should be something which you plan your deck(s) for and get excited about.
If players are just able to queue in to a tournament immediately after finishing the previous one then it will soon lose its lustre.
A weekly knockout tournament with a round per day would fit this criteria. If the tournament started on a Monday then you would have a whole day to play a match against an opponent who you are randomly paired with once you are ready to play. You only get to play in Tuesday's round if you won on Monday.
However, for practical purposes, this wouldn't just be a 2^7 = 128 player tournament since, even on the Monday, there would still be some queueing time and you'd never bump in to your Sunday opponent unless you were automatically friended with them. Thus, I would have the whole region involved in the same tournament such that there were still thousands of players with 6 wins going in to Sunday's final round.
Winning a weekly tournament should then give you entry in to a Champions tournament which would be the same thing but run monthly or quarterly, depending upon numbers. It would be nice if those Über-tournaments worked on a cross-region basis but that might be a bit much for Blizzard's coders.
Also for fee to enter the tournament can be 100 200 500. 1000 or more because i see pplin twitch havein over 10000 gold and they only play arena no need packs no need constructed cards no need adventures blizzard can let this ppl spend their gold maybe aso will be so fun to watch for me. Imagine they pay 1000 gold and how serious they will be
I'd probably never play a tourney mode which is like a constructed arena, because I see no reasonnot to play regular arena instead. Arena actually requires skill instead of playing the same decks you know inside out basically on autopilot against the same other decks you know inside out, and your success is bound to your luck with matchups and draw. Sure, there will be some people playing their decks not optimally, but most people do. Especially once you won a game or two, which means you get better opponents on average. Therefore, even a 60% win rate in the long run is unrealistic.
In traditional arena, there is much more thinking involved, because the decks you run (usually) do not feature constructed synergy, you don't know your opponents deck, and you need to draft it from a limited card pool, which is another thing were skill in deckbuilding is a factor. As there is much more room for errors here than in netdeck...eh... constructed mode, skill actually makes a significant difference, and I can keep my ~70% win rate in the long run.
So why would any decent arena player waste their time and gold in a constructed arena mode?
I would structure it like the Arena. At the beginning of your tournament you choose three of your pre build decks you want to bring in the tournament. Each game is a best of 3. To start a tournament you have to pay a certain amount of Gold. Once you loosea game you are eliminated. Player with equal amounts of wins are matched against one another. Your rewards depend on how many wins you manage to get. You can start a tournament at three different Levels. Beginner for new Players, Advanced for Players who already collected some Cards and Master for Player with a full or Close to full collection. The game will determine automitcally in which category you belong depending on your collection. WHile this is tricky to do, it will prevent Players from abusing the System by entering the mode in a lower category. Rewards should be equal for all three Levels.
It would also be possible to make Players bring more decks and have a ban Phase before the match starts.
I'd probably never play a tourney mode which is like a constructed arena, because I see no reasonnot to play regular arena instead. Arena actually requires skill instead of playing the same decks you know inside out basically on autopilot against the same other decks you know inside out, and your success is bound to your luck with matchups and draw. Sure, there will be some people playing their decks not optimally, but most people do. Especially once you won a game or two, which means you get better opponents on average. Therefore, even a 60% win rate in the long run is unrealistic.
In traditional arena, there is much more thinking involved, because the decks you run (usually) do not feature constructed synergy, you don't know your opponents deck, and you need to draft it from a limited card pool, which is another thing were skill in deckbuilding is a factor. As there is much more room for errors here than in netdeck...eh... constructed mode, skill actually makes a significant difference, and I can keep my ~70% win rate in the long run.
So why would any decent arena player waste their time and gold in a constructed arena mode?
They shouldn't because 'constructed arena' isn't meant for arena players. It's more like using arena elements for a Constructed styled format. It's not going to be appealing to Arena players, but it may appeal to Constructed players who want Tournament mode.
meanwhile:
There seems to be two different ideas that can happen side by side: an in-client tournament system to go along side Arena/Brawl/Ext and a toolset that allows for third parties to create their own tournaments. I think we can generally agree that the latter is good and there's a general way to make that happen. I THINK the big issue is how the former will work.
Reading over the other ideas, some folks have a point: tournament mode really shouldn't be always available as that takes away a lot of what makes Tournaments so interesting. It also takes away from the skill element of it.
The trick is the wait times. For one thing, I think we really have to be careful with how many 'brackets' we put in (or required games in swiss formats). The issue isn't when we have 5000 people all queuing in. It's when we're at, say, 5-0 win rates and most people have been eliminated. Arena can cover by flexing who you play with: if they can't find a 5-0 they will give you a 4-0 or a 5-2. It also has no problem with, say, one person playing 10 times in a row and another playing only 2.
Tournaments are more messy. Swiss demands that everyone plays the same amount of games. So what happens if you join a match, your opponent autoconcedes and you're the first hasn't played their first match yet. Arena would just grab some newcommer for you. Do we want a 1-0 to fight against a 0-1? Does that mean if I win my matches quickly I could potentially win all of my matches off of 0-0s and never face someone with my own win rate? If we force lock them to wait for everyone else to play does that mean said player will have to sit for a while?
If I'm allowed to step away and play other games while waiting, does that mean when someone is 'available' that they are now waiting for ME to accept it? What if I'm in the restroom and miss it? Do they win or do they have to wait for another, who may also be in the restroom. Meanwhile I come back and, what, did I lose, or am I still waiting if someone else isn't available? That's the potential for a lot of waiting (or a lot of free wins/losses). And remember best of 3s take around 40-60 minutes but you COULD be finished your match in 5 seconds if your opponent autoconcedes the whole tournament.
So it needs to be a system that appears different from Arena/Constructed (even if it usese similar mechanics, it needs to 'feel' different) yet doesn't result in a mass waitfest or someone winning the whole thing by RNG giving them wins against mismatched opponents and no-shows.
Sidenote: Blizzard has one thing right about this: we HAVE been rather 'meh' just screaming "OMG TOURNAMNET MODE JUST DO IT SO EASY" withotu even getting into what that actually means.
There's obviously a lot of challenges present when it comes to implementing a tournament mode. The timing aspects of having a bracket pose a lot of challenges so I have two thoughts to try to get this accomplished:
1) Not everything needs to be done all at once. Providing tools that would aid in tournament play, if not running an entire tournament within the client, would still be very useful. In that vein, I would suggest Blizzard should allow the challenging of a player on your friends list or whatever to not simply a single game, but also a best of 3/5/7 where you can then choose one of the formats that have been used for WCS tournaments (Last Hero Standing/ conquest whatever) and then select decks and state a number of bans. You could then play the whole matchup out in a structured manner. This tool would be of use to smaller tournament organizers, though obviously not solve all their problems. It would also give a consistent visual across most tournament play as presumably Blizzard would use the same tool for the actual WCS tournaments. Also, if you want to just play a friend this could be a fun way to do it.
2) In the long term obviously having a full bracket in game would be great. When one plays a tournament in nearly any other game/sport in the time between rounds one doesn't typically go for a walk with the intention of contributing on your phone... when you compete in a tournament you are committed to that endeavor until you're eliminated or you forfeit. Why should Hearthstone be any different. You join a tournament in some sort of tournament lobby in game that is scheduled to start at some time and date. Tournaments could be smaller 8 player brackets or larger things. If you figure 3 rounds should take no more than 3 hours and something runs long and you have to leave, tough. You forfeit and the tournament moves on without you. Just because Hearthstone is playable in a mobile environment doesn't mean that a tournament has to operate in an equally lose/free manner. If you want to play in as structured and competitive a thing as a tournament then you presumably are ok with that.
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Tournament mode, I think, should have limited options and not function like an actual tournament as Bo3 or conquest. Waiting to play should be avoided as being part of it.
Instead it could function like Arena. Instead, you get to make 3 decks with our own cards and then attempt to go on win streaks. I'd base Tournament Mode on Bo3 and it'd go like this:
Enter Tournament Mode (for a certain fee?)
Create 3 decks
Start a game
Select 1 of your decks
If you win 3 times you advance to the next bracket and will be matched against players who're also in that bracket
If you win you can't play the deck you've won with
There are 5 brackets to advance through
If you lose 3 times in a single bracket you're out
Each bracket has its own rewards, like Arena. The further you advance the better the rewards.
I think this structure keeps the game simple, as Blizzard prefers, there'll be no waiting or having to set up anything between players. Also fits the game where you will matched against a random 'unknown' player. No invites, no friends to cheat with. :P
To make tournament mode have rewards, you must require gold otherwise people would just be able to get unlimited rewards.
I'd like it to be like this:
Every week new tournament starts.
You can join only on the first day.
Every day you play three bo5 games (each is played between those with same position, i.e. won 0 games, won 1 game, won 2 games...). Don't win all three - lose the tournament.
Thats 2^(3*7) = 2097152 players in a week. So you have high chance of ending tournament before other tournament starts.
Maybe a little harsh (as any single elimination is), but given the number of participants, i can't think of anything else.
Personally I would like to see two things happen:
1. I would like blizz to release an app/game manager to allow tournaments to be setup more easily by individual people and / or game shops / online sites. As it stands right now, the game is awful for 3rd party organizers (which are the only organizers atm). Simply having an App or add on that would allow the tournament manager to see the bracket in real time and allow for automated matchmaking between clients connected though the app. This would be a HUGE step in the right direction and would allow for more tournaments to be created without the help of blizz and improve the scene tremendously.
2. In game tournaments. The way I envision this going is as follows:
- You enter a tournament mode, lets say best of 3 - with your 3 constructed decks. You play 6 rounds of best of 3, so 18 possible games in total. You can que for these like arena, with the only difference being that you commit to 3 games, if you leave during those three games, 2 wins will be allotted to your opponent.
-After your 6 rounds are over, if you win less than (arbitrary number incoming) 59% of your games, you are out of the tournament and win a prize based on the number of wins.
-After your 6 rounds are over, if you win 60% or more of your games you move into the winners bracket. In the winners bracket you commit to 6 possible games when you accept the challenge.
-When the challenge is accepted, you will be matched up with 3 other players that also won more than 60% of their games in the first round. Since this may not be an immediate challenge, you will enter a que that goes to the bottom left of your screen and notifies you when your tournament is ready at which point you will have 90 seconds to accept or decline. If you accept, you will auto concede whatever your current game is and move into deck selection where you will select 3 decks to use in the winners bracket.
-After decks are selected you will be matched up with your opponent. Then you enter into a best of 3 series with that opponent. Winner moves on and loser is out w/ the appropriate prize for their overall record.
-The winners of the two series will then matchup for a final showdown. This will work just like the challenge when moving into the initial winners bracket. You will get a message after you finish your first round that either reads "congratulations! you will now move into the final round, please wait while your opponent finishes his/her matches" OR "congratulations! you will now move into the final round, your opponent is waiting for you, entering que now"
-winners will then again enter deck selection, select 3 decks and be matched up for the final best of 3 series. Winner is the tournament winner (perhaps can enter a tournament winner tournament at the end of the month?) and loser gets prizes based on their overall w/l.
-At any time you can forfeit, if it is during a best of series or during a match, your opponent will be given the number of wins they need to move on in that round.
In my opinion this would be a close way to approximate a real tournament setting in a digital environment.
SWCCG World Champ- Star Wars CCG, best card game ever
I think a number of people have posted this - constructed Arena format, selecting three decks, playing until either all three are eliminated, or twelve wins. I can't see how a "real" tournament mode could be implemented - I suspect the developers want all play modes equally accessible to all players, millions of whom only play a few games each day, or less. Personally, if constructed Arena were available, it would be my preferred play mode.
'There is nothing more deceptive than an obvious fact'
Sherlock Holmes
there are a lot of options for playing tournament mode...
1) arena type; 150 gold entry, select a constructed deck, that deck gets locked in, so you cant change it anymore, and you start playing your games just like in arena... with same prizes as in arena.
2) Hearthstone is a game where people dont want to wait... but for those who are willing to wait, dont let them wait so long. I saw someone come with the idea of having a tournament without brackets, and as soon as someone wins it gets paired with someone who won about the same time as he did. this would cause the bracket to become aggro vs aggro and control vs control, as most times agro games are over quick, and control games takes a bit longer. So every round gets 30 minutes, and after 30 minutes you get paired with someone new. 1 game either win or loss, in the mean time if you have enough spare time, you can play a casual game but you get automatically removed from that game when your next round starts.
3) Ladder like tournament; a new ladder for tournament players, your amount of wins are counted, and entering would cost around 200 gold per month (if you like to play that month). then you start laddering. your percentage of wins determine how high you get on the standings. A minimum of 3 games played a day, and for every game not played you get an automatic loss. So not playing will give you 3 losses. There will be a hidden ELO ratings behind your profile so you will be paired against someone with the same ELO rating like you; this means your opponents will be around the same powerlever like you.
To live is to suffer, to survive is to find meaning in the suffer!
I have a lot of weird ideas, but what I can see as something viable are:
1- Entry fee: 150 gold like arena, or even more, like 200 is fine. Can put real money as well;
2- You can only submit deck from heroes you have something like, level 20. Incentive people to level up heroes, give this level up something useful (only gold cards for me is too shallow), and make only people with a minimum understanding of a class to enter;
3- Arena like rewards, even a cardback for the "champion", like the legendary card back from ladder;
4- The tournament need to be like arena, for me its impossible do something different. Something like Ecnarongi said is excellent:
I prefer swiss: you pay the fee, submit three decks and can play 12 games. You only face people with the same record (if you have a 5-2 record, face someone with similar record). Reward based on number of wins. You can stop and play latter, with no problem with waiting time;
5 - Monthly rules: Like brawl, without being ridiculous. Something like "this month only classic and gvg card are allowed", or " only common cards", making tournament very different from other modes. Without something like that, tournament will be only a glorified ladder.
The most important thing to me is that tournaments should feel very special. An upcoming tournament match should be something which you plan your deck(s) for and get excited about.
If players are just able to queue in to a tournament immediately after finishing the previous one then it will soon lose its lustre.
A weekly knockout tournament with a round per day would fit this criteria. If the tournament started on a Monday then you would have a whole day to play a match against an opponent who you are randomly paired with once you are ready to play. You only get to play in Tuesday's round if you won on Monday.
However, for practical purposes, this wouldn't just be a 2^7 = 128 player tournament since, even on the Monday, there would still be some queueing time and you'd never bump in to your Sunday opponent unless you were automatically friended with them. Thus, I would have the whole region involved in the same tournament such that there were still thousands of players with 6 wins going in to Sunday's final round.
Winning a weekly tournament should then give you entry in to a Champions tournament which would be the same thing but run monthly or quarterly, depending upon numbers. It would be nice if those Über-tournaments worked on a cross-region basis but that might be a bit much for Blizzard's coders.
Also for fee to enter the tournament can be 100 200 500. 1000 or more because i see pplin twitch havein over 10000 gold and they only play arena no need packs no need constructed cards no need adventures blizzard can let this ppl spend their gold maybe aso will be so fun to watch for me. Imagine they pay 1000 gold and how serious they will be
I'd probably never play a tourney mode which is like a constructed arena, because I see no reasonnot to play regular arena instead. Arena actually requires skill instead of playing the same decks you know inside out basically on autopilot against the same other decks you know inside out, and your success is bound to your luck with matchups and draw. Sure, there will be some people playing their decks not optimally, but most people do. Especially once you won a game or two, which means you get better opponents on average. Therefore, even a 60% win rate in the long run is unrealistic.
In traditional arena, there is much more thinking involved, because the decks you run (usually) do not feature constructed synergy, you don't know your opponents deck, and you need to draft it from a limited card pool, which is another thing were skill in deckbuilding is a factor. As there is much more room for errors here than in netdeck...eh... constructed mode, skill actually makes a significant difference, and I can keep my ~70% win rate in the long run.
So why would any decent arena player waste their time and gold in a constructed arena mode?
Arena Leaderboard EU - September 2018: #47 (@7.77 Wins Average)
I would structure it like the Arena. At the beginning of your tournament you choose three of your pre build decks you want to bring in the tournament. Each game is a best of 3. To start a tournament you have to pay a certain amount of Gold. Once you loosea game you are eliminated. Player with equal amounts of wins are matched against one another. Your rewards depend on how many wins you manage to get. You can start a tournament at three different Levels. Beginner for new Players, Advanced for Players who already collected some Cards and Master for Player with a full or Close to full collection. The game will determine automitcally in which category you belong depending on your collection. WHile this is tricky to do, it will prevent Players from abusing the System by entering the mode in a lower category. Rewards should be equal for all three Levels.
It would also be possible to make Players bring more decks and have a ban Phase before the match starts.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
#JeSuisFieryWarAxe!
One does not simply walk into Mordor,
unless they want to be the best they can be.
There's obviously a lot of challenges present when it comes to implementing a tournament mode. The timing aspects of having a bracket pose a lot of challenges so I have two thoughts to try to get this accomplished:
1) Not everything needs to be done all at once. Providing tools that would aid in tournament play, if not running an entire tournament within the client, would still be very useful. In that vein, I would suggest Blizzard should allow the challenging of a player on your friends list or whatever to not simply a single game, but also a best of 3/5/7 where you can then choose one of the formats that have been used for WCS tournaments (Last Hero Standing/ conquest whatever) and then select decks and state a number of bans. You could then play the whole matchup out in a structured manner. This tool would be of use to smaller tournament organizers, though obviously not solve all their problems. It would also give a consistent visual across most tournament play as presumably Blizzard would use the same tool for the actual WCS tournaments. Also, if you want to just play a friend this could be a fun way to do it.
2) In the long term obviously having a full bracket in game would be great. When one plays a tournament in nearly any other game/sport in the time between rounds one doesn't typically go for a walk with the intention of contributing on your phone... when you compete in a tournament you are committed to that endeavor until you're eliminated or you forfeit. Why should Hearthstone be any different. You join a tournament in some sort of tournament lobby in game that is scheduled to start at some time and date. Tournaments could be smaller 8 player brackets or larger things. If you figure 3 rounds should take no more than 3 hours and something runs long and you have to leave, tough. You forfeit and the tournament moves on without you. Just because Hearthstone is playable in a mobile environment doesn't mean that a tournament has to operate in an equally lose/free manner. If you want to play in as structured and competitive a thing as a tournament then you presumably are ok with that.