Beyond the Sun

Beyond the Sun 2023 BPA PBeM Tournament

Registration is now open for the 2023 BPeM Beyond the Sun tournament. Register by sending your name, e-mail address, BGA login name to jeffcswu@gmail.com before November 1, 2023.

This tournament is run in association with the Boardgame Players Association (http://www.boardgamers.org/).

GM: Jeff Wu

Assistant GMs: Chris Wildes

Boardgame Players Association:

All players must have at least a PBEM-level membership at the time of tournament start.   The cost of this membership is $10 and you can apply for membership on their website: http://www.boardgamers.org/. You can still register for this tournament at any time.

Approximate Schedule:

• Registration will be open via email (jeffcswu@gmail.com) until November 1, 2023 at 11:59pm EDT
• Games will start one week later (November 8) pending BPA membership confirmation.
• The first round will consist of 4 simultaneous games for all players, approximately November 2023 to December 2023.
• The second round will consist of 4 simultaneous games for all qualified players, approximately January 2024 to February 2024.
• The third round will consist of up to 4 simultaneous games for the top qualifiers from Round 2, approximately March 2024 to April 2024.
• These schedule estimates are conservative, I expect the rounds will be completed more quickly in practice. I will start the next round shortly after the previous round has been completed.

NOTE:  A minimum of 24 players are required for this to be run as a BPA sponsored tournament. If the 24 players are not registered by December 1. I’ll attempt to recruit players to reach the minimum for one week. If this number is still not reached, then the tournament will be cancelled.

Website:

We will be using Board Game Arena for game play: https://boardgamearena.com/. Players must register on Board Game Arena and notify the GM of their usernames.

All games will be 4 players (unless extreme conditions warrant a 3 player game like restarting a game if a player times out).

Beyond the Sun is a Premium game on BGA which requires a Premium account to create a table for the game. I will not be checking every account to ensure they are Premium, nor will I be pairing tables to ensure that there is at least one Premium account at each table. Players with non-Premium accounts may join the tournament, but if a table has only non-Premium users, either a) one player will need to upgrade their account, or b) the game will count as a loss for all players.

We will be using the Updated techs option. Currently the Updated Tech are in Beta status on BGA even though they have been in use for over a year. Rio Grande has produced the updated techs designed to replace the old tech in the Leaders of the New Dawn expansion.

The site allows most actions to be undone after clicking, but any action that reveals new information cannot be taken back. I recommend playing a one or more games before the tournament starts to get familiar with the interface. If there is a difference between how something works in the online implementation, and how it is typically implemented in person, we must abide by the online implementation.

The unfortunate nature of online board games is that sometimes mistakes are made that would not be made in person, but cannot be taken back. There is no way of resetting or rolling back a move once it has been committed.

Time Controls

Players are expected to make a move within 24 hours of the previous move (and encouraged to move faster). We will be using the “Turn-Based: 1 move per day” option on BGA. This timing control should allow a player to make a move once in every 4 days (4 times longer than the expected rate). This should be enough to cover unexpected absences.

If a player times out, the other players should remove the player from the game and continue as a 3 player game. They should also report it to the GM. The player that times out will be relegated to last place in that game. Players that time out more than once in the tournament may not be eligible to advance at the discretion of the GM and they might be ineligible to participate in future tournaments run my the GM.

Unfortunately, having a player time out might change the dynamics of the current game. If a table feels that a timed out player overwhelmingly changes the dynamics of the current game, they can alert the GM and the GM can decide to cancel the current game and restart the game as a 3 player game.

Please inform the GM if an unexpected event occurs in your life and you are no longer able to continue the game at the expected pace.

Reporting Games:

We will use a Google Sheet for reporting game results.

Rounds:

Players will play 4 simultaneous games during the first and second rounds. The final round will be up to 4 simultaneous games. Players will score points for each game according to the following formula:

• 1st place finish: 1000 points plus (your score/second place score)
• 2nd place finish: 100 points plus (your score/winning score)
• 3rd place finish: 10 points plus (your score/winning score)
• 4th place finish: 1 point plus (your score/winning score)

I will avoid pairing family members together as much as possible.

Ties within games will be broken by the following (these are the official tie breakers in the rules):

1. The player with the fewest remaining food and ore production discs on their player mat. (Not automated discs)
2. The player with the highest number of remaining population cubes.
3. The player with the highest number of remaining ore.

If there is still a tie, the tied players will all get the points of the position but the next position points will not be awarded.

Players will be ranked accordingly and the field will be cut after each round.

Between 30-50% of the field will qualify for the semifinal round.

Between 30-50% of the semifinal participants will qualify for the final round.

The numbers qualifying for the semifinals and finals and the number of games in the final round will be announced after the total number of participants have been determined, but before the tournament starts.

After the final round players will be ranked to award laurels to the top six finishers. BPA awards the winner of the tournament with a shield plaque.