The ESL Major Series WCIP Rules Version 2.0

I. Definitions

1. Clan: Participating teams will be referred to as "Clan". Each clan must consist of at least 5 players.

2. Two teams from the same clan: In general the WCIP will not allow two teams owned by the same individual or company to compete in the WCIP. Nevertheless, the WCIP supervisor can grant exceptions from this rule if all of the following criteria are met:
1. Both teams have to be a team from a specific country or geographical region. (e.g. Clan ABC New Zealand and Clan ABC International or Clan ABC Asia and Clan ABC Europe).
2. The team names have to include the geographic or national distinction (Clan ABC New Zealand and Clan ABC International NOT Clan ABC Blue and Clan ABC Red or Clan ABC New Zealand and Clan ABC).
3. The teams cannot share players or organizers. The players have to be distributed among the two teams according to their geographical or national place of residence. A player or orga who joins one of the two teams is barred from playing in the other team or handling the organization of the other team for the rest of the running season, even if his geographical or national situation changes in a way that would have made him a player or orga of the respective other team. (Clan ABC New Zealand cannot have members that are no residents of New Zealand and Clan ABC International cannot have members that are residents of New Zealand).

3. Team Manager: A Team Manager is responsible for a Clan and is the entity that will receive the prize if its clan wins.

4. Team Captain: A Team Captain is an eligible player responsible for a Clan.

5. Player:
   a) Each player belongs to one and only one clan within the ESL WCI series. Furthermore a player is not allowed to represent another clan than his WCIP-clan in any other event which has prize money, which can be:
1. Online or offline;
2. National or international;
3. Qualifiers or play-offs,


b) Clans and their players are responsible to know whether the event provides prize-money or not.

c) "Representing a clan" is defined by any of the following:

4. Playing for another clan
5. Using a clan's clantag on the official event homepage (if the website/webmaster use the wrong clantag for your nickname, that should be corrected as soon as possible).
6. Using a clan's clantag in the Battle.net name or LAN name of the player
7. Wearing a clan's uniform or identification when participating in off-line events.


d) In case a player has a private sponsorship (as individual person), the player may use the sponsor tag in addition to his WCIP clantag in prize-money events.
(so it is not allowed to use only the sponsor tag without the WCIP clantag).

e) "Another clan" according to the player definition is defined by: a group of three or more people playing Warcraft 3 - The Frozen Throne under the same clantag within the past 1 Month before the start of the next WCIP competition stage (Qualifiers, Regular season, Playoffs).

f) Excluded from these rules are:

8. Players participating in official on-line tournaments run by Blizzard Entertainment
9. Players taking part in events in which players clearly represent an "Allstar Team" (such as Korea / Europe etc.)
10. Players playing for their national team in any kind of "Nationscup".


g) WCIP team captains are requested to reply to an e-mail whether or not they understand and agree with the rules regarding players and their ESL WCIP Premiership.

h) False, incomplete or missing statements according to g) will lead to at least 2 Penalty Points for the clan and can in extreme cases even lead to disqualification for the remainder of the ongoing WCIP season.

i) A player who violates the rule according to a) will automatically lead to a 4-playday exclusion for that player from the current WCIP season and 2 Penalty Points for the clan. Off-line play-offs are counted as 1 playday. This exclusion begins the day an ESL WCIP Premiership Headadmin or Supervisor is notified or aware of the violation.

j) ESL WCIP Premiership Headadmin or Supervisor deserve the right to reduce or extend the playday exclusion according to i) in cases not clearly covered by the definitions mentioned above.

6. Headadmin: The Headadmin is the Official designated by the ESL WCIP Premiership as such. The Supervisor is the final authority on all rules.

7. Leagueadmin: Leagueadmins are persons designated by the ESL WCIP Premiership for the purpose of administering, monitoring and judging any aspect of the ESL WCIP Premiership.

8. Matchadmin: Matchadmins are persons designated by the ESL WCIP Premiership to observe and administer matches.

9. Match: A match consists of a set of 4 one vs. one (1on1) and 1 two vs. two (2on2) games. Matches are being played between 2 clans.

10. Game: A game is part of a match and being played between either 2 (1on1) or 4 (2on2) players. The first player who achieves 2 victories wins the game.

II. General

1. These rules apply to all players and clans participating in the EMS WCIP. When registering the clans and their players agree to have read, understood and accepted the rules, as well as to regularly check for updates, additions, etc.

2. Players, team-managers and orgas are expected to be courteous and respectful of their fellow gamers and admins. Bad manner will be punished with a yellow card and penalty points. If a player collects two yellow cards he will be barred for one match. In case, a barred player is used in the lineup, it will lead to a default loss in that submatch.

3. Admins reserve the right to change or modify these rules, and in special cases make decisions not covered by these rules to preserve the spirit of competition.

4. An updated list of the official EMS WCIP staff is always available on the EMS WCIP homepage.

5. Clans are responsible to complete their clan and player profiles as well as to keep them up to date.

6. In order for a clan to make changes to their EMS WCIP Series clan profile, a clan manager must submit a support ticket to the EMS WCIP Series containing the change they want to make to their team i.e. add player(s), remove player(s), change team name, etc. Upon Administration approval, the team will be unlocked for a 24 hour period to allow for the authorized changes. After the authorized changes have been made the clan profile will be once again locked. If any unauthorized changes is made during the unlock period, a clan may lose all rights to make any further changes to their team for the rest of the season along with other necessary consequences that may be applied.

7. Upon any clan entering regular season of WCIP Series, the clan will be locked to prevent any unauthorized changes to clan profile. (See II.g. for how to make authorized changes to clan profiles)

8. Every player must enter his Battle.Net ID and Garena ID in his EMS WCIP profile and always use the account written in the profile when playing in the EMS WCIP. If he fails to enter the Battle.Net ID and Garena ID before an upcoming season, the clan will receive 0.5 Penalty Points for every 48 hours it is delayed.
   (New players who join during a running season have 10 days to enter their account before the penalty stated above is effective, however it becomes effective immediately in case they are part of a lineup for a certain match before the 10 days are over.)

9. Using a wrong account (or having no account) when playing in the EMS WCIP will cost 1 Penalty Point for every clanwar concerned, no matter if it was done in one or multiple games.
   (Player's marked as 'Inactive'/'Honory' are excluded from this rule, however they are not eligible to play when marked as 'Inactive'/'Honory'. When the player status is changed, the rule applies again from the moment a player is marked as 'Active').

10. The EMS WCIP Premiership is not responsible for additional agreements between players or clans and these agreements are only allowed if they do not violate any of the existing rules. There is no way that the ESL WCIP Premiership is going to enforce an agreement.

11. These channels are important to the ESL WCIP Series and its clans:

• Public IRC channel: #wcip on irc://irc.quakenet.org
• Public IRC channel: #WCIP-Coverage on irc://irc.quakenet.org
• Private IRC channel: #WCIP-Players on irc://irc.quakenet.org
1. Only players competing in WCIP are allowed to be in the private IRC channel

12. Each team-captain has to put the IRC channel #wcip in his perform (auto-join) list. We also recommend that all online WCIP players idle in that channel.

III. Warcraft III

1. Maps: Valid map choices for 1vs1 games are all maps of the ESL WCIP Series 1vs1 mappool:
• Echo Isles
• Turtle Rock
• Twisted Meadows
• Secret Valley
• Melting Valley
• Ancient Isle
• Plunder Isle 2.0
• Amazonia

2. For 2vs2 games valid map choices are:
• Avalanche
• Gnoll Wood
• Lost Temple (ROC version)
• Turtle Rock
• Twisted Meadows
• Centaur Grove

3. Games are to be played on the Warcraft III - The Frozen Throne version of the maps, if it exists. It is not allowed to play on map versions that differ from the Blizzard ladder maps or the official WCIP custom maps that can be downloaded on the ESL WCIP series page.

4. Games are to be played on the Garena client. In the case that a player is unable to play on Garena client, both teams must agree to play on battle.net or the submatch may result in a default loss for the player who is unable to use Garena client.

5. Using the third-party programs Garena from Ocean Technology And Media CO.LTD, Singapore and Listchecker is allowed in case both clans agree to it and a ESL WCIP Premiership official has been informed and agreed to its use. When using such a program, clans agree to play on their own risk, ESL WCIP Premiership cannot guarantee the stability of these programs and problems such as disconnections will be treated the same way as on Battle.Net. Teams should agree on one third-party program before a match starts.

6. Modifying the behavior of Warcraft III in any way and/or using third party programs which give the user an advantage over other players will be considered as cheating and punished.

7. Evading the cooldown on usable items by swapping items in a hero’s inventory will be considered cheating and punished with two penalty points. The game will be replayed if this exploit leads to a victory for the cheating player. The game will also be replayed in case both players take advantage of this bug.

IV. Competition System

1. The competition consists of 3 parts:
1. Qualification
2. The regular ESL WCIP Premiership season
3. Playoffs

V. Qualification

1. Clans that would like to participate in WCIP Premiership must sign up at the designated time to be evaluated by WCIP Premiership Admins for acceptance.

2. Qualification matches are being played according to the cup (knock-out) system. The clan, which wins a qualification match qualifies for the next stage. When a clan is defeated twice in the qualification it will be eliminated from the competition.

3. The participating clans from the previous ESL WCIP Premiership season will be seeded on the top 4 seeds according to their ranking in the previous regular season

4. The 5th seed spot will be given to the 1st place champion of WC3 Clanwar Amateur SEries. If 1st place champion is currently seeded in ESL WCIP Regular Season, then seed spot is transfered to 2nd place and so on.

5. The four top ranked clans of the Qualification will be qualified for the next ESL WCIP Premiership season.

VI. The Regular ESL WCIP Premiership season

1. The regular season consists of 12 clans. Each clan must play 11 matches per season, once against each one of the other clans.

2. The period from Thursday, 0:01am CET, until Wednesday, 11:59pm CET, is being referred to as "playday".
   

3. Per day a maximum of two clanwars is allowed. Postponed matches are to be played until Sunday, 11:59pm CET after the playday.

4. If a clan is not able to continue the regular ESL WCIP Premiership season it might be replaced by another clan that will continue the season with the current amount of points of the leaving clan. In case that the clan can or will not be replaced all clanwars against this clan will be erased and count as if they never happened.

5. The six top-ranked clans after each regular season will be qualified for the playoffs as well as for the succeeding ESL WCIP Premiership season.

6. The clans with the ranks 7 - 10 will have to play a playdown match, consisting of #7 vs #10 and #8 vs #9. Both matches winner's will be requalified for the succeeding ESL WCIP Premiership season, the loser's will have to play the next season's qualification tournament, but start the tournament in the 2nd round

7. The maps of the Playdowns will be generated by the ESL WCIP Admins.

8. The clans with the ranks 11 and 12 will have to play the next season's qualification tournament and will start in round 2.

9. Clans are ranked by how many points they achieved in the regular season according to X.b.

10. If two clans have the same amount of points at the end of the season the one clan who won the match between those two clans will be the higher ranked one.

11. If three or more clans got the same amount of points at the end of the season, the first criterion to determine who will be the higher ranked one, is the number of direct matches won. The 2nd criterion is the amount of points a clan gained in the two direct matches. The 3rd criterion is the map difference score during the whole season. If all those criteria's do not lead to a decision, a rematch between all the clans affected will decide.

VII. Playoffs

1. At the end of a season, the top 6 clans will go into the Playoffs.

2. The clans finishing the regular season as 1st and 2nd qualify directly for the semi-final.

3. Each clan in the Playoffs recieves 1 wildcard. A wildcarded match can not be scheduled to past the playday.

4. The quarter-final matches in the Playoffs will consist of the clan ranked 3rd vs. the clan ranked 6th and the clan ranked 4th vs. the clan ranked 5th. The winner of #4 vs. #5 will meet #1 and the winner of #3 vs. #6 will meet #2 in the semi-finals.

5. ESL WCIP Admins will decide all the maps for the WCIP Playoffs Rounds.

6. The quarter-finals will be played in single-elimination.

7. The clans losing the quarter-final matches will play a match in order to determine the 5th and 6th place. ESL WCIP Admins will decide all the maps for the WCIP 5th and 6th place.

8. The semi-finals and any further rounds will be played in double-elimination.

9. In case a clan qualified for the Playoffs withdraws from the Playoffs before the end of Playday 11, the clans ranked behind the withdrawing clan will move up one rank at the end of the season up to the 7th place becoming #6 and thus being able to participate in the Playoffs. However the Playdown ranks remain untouched, meaning the previous ranked 7th clan still has to play its Playdown match.

10. In case a clan that qualified for the quarter-finals of the Playoffs withdraws from the Playoffs after the end of Playday 11 it will not be replaced

11. In case a clan that qualified for the semi-finals of the Playoffs withdraws from the Playoffs after the end of Playday 11 it will be replaced with the #5 ranked clan of the Playoffs, no matter if the quarter-finals have been started or not.

VIII. Scheduling

1. Each clan is obligated to autonomously schedule its match together with its opposing clan until Saturday 11:59pm CET before the Playday begins.

2. The WCIP officials will enforce a date in case the both clans are not able to agree on a certain date.

3. Scheduling matches beyond a playday period is not allowed, unless its permitted by an ESL WCIP Premiership Supervisor or Headadmin due to special circumstances.

4. For each 24 hours the match is scheduled beyond a playday scheduling deadline, both clans receive 1 penalty point. In case a clan feels, that only the opposing clan caused this situation, it may send a formal complaint to a headadmin or supervisor within 48 hours in order to eventually remove the penalty point.

5. Each match has to be played as a whole. Postponing / preponing single games is not allowed (see exception VIII.g.).
   A game is being considered as "postponed" / "preponed" when it would start later / earlier than 3 hours after / before the scheduled begin of the match and when it is disrupting the flow of a match, i.e. making the opposing clan wait more than 45 minutes.
   Each team is however allowed to prepone one game without using a wilcard if it doesn't start earlier than three hours before the clanwar's begin.

6. Each clan receives 3 wildcards during the regular season, which can be traded in to postpone a game. A clan may only trade in one wildcard per Playday. If a player is missing who is supposed to play both 1on1 and 2on2 games, the clan is allowed to replace that player in the 2on2 game without having to draw a wildcard or asking the opponent for permission. Each saved wildcard at the end of the regular season will remove two penalty points

7. Only 1 mutual postpone is allowed per clan war. A mutual postpone is an agreement by both teams to move one match in a clan war to another date. If a mutual postpone is achieved, no wildcard will be charged to either team.

8. Postponed games can be played until 4 days after the end of a playday (Sunday, 11:59 pm). For each 24 hours (beginning monday 00:01 am after the original deadline)a game is being played beyond the playday deadline, both clans receive 1 penalty point. In case a clan feels, that only the opposing clan caused this situation, it may send a formal complaint to a headadmin or supervisor within 48 hours in order to eventually remove the penalty point. When clans use wildcards for postponing they have to reschedule it with the opposing team captain. When a clan has no wildcards left any postponed game will be punished with 2 penalty points.

9. Forfeiting 3 matches or more in a single clan war is considered for forfeiting a clan war. Forfeiting a clan war may result in the ban of the organization and corresponding players from the next season of ESL WCIP Premiership.

10. Clans dropping out of a running season may not play in the next season's qualifier.

11. A clan can ask for a default win 30 minutes after the opponent failed to show for a scheduled match.

IX. Lineups

1. A clan is responsible for the correctness of its lineups and has to choose a lineup for each match and enter it in their administration tool. The lineup has to be chosen until 30 minutes before the according match starts. A clan receives a penalty point, if its lineup is delayed more than 10 minutes.

2. The lineups of both clans will be published on the ESL WCIP Premiership homepage 30 minutes before the match starts.

3. Lineups cannot be changed anymore after they have been published unless both clans agree to it.

4. It is not allowed for a player to play 2 1on1's in one match. It is however allowed for one player to play a 1on1 and a 2on2 game in a match.

5. When a clan in the ESL WCIP Premiership acquires a new player to their team profile, that player is under a 10 day barrage from playing in ESL WCIP Premiership matches. The player however can play during this 10 day barrage if both teams in a clan war agree.

6. A person is a WCIP player if he or she is or has been listed in the clanroster of the current season on the ESL WCIP Premiership’s website.

7. For the ESL WCIP Premiership, a player "joins" a new clan when he is added to the new clan's roster.

8. According to I.c, a player can't be member of more than one clan at any time.

X. Matches

1. Matches and games are being played according to I.i/j. It is suggested to play the 2 vs. 2 game first.

2. For each game won a clan receives 1 point. The clan which achieves three points or more, wins the match, the opposing one loses.

3. Each team has to write a statement for each of their matches in the relegation and playoff rounds of the ESL WCIP Series. In the event that a clan match is chosen for Match of the Playday during regular season, each team in that match has to write a statement for that match. This match statement has to be posted at least 24 hours but no more than 7 days before a match. This statement has to be written and saved as a match pre-report (not as comment in the match). The statement has to be in an adequate quality and should contain around 50 words. Missing, too short or inappropriate statements may result in a penalty.

4. The lineup has to be chosen according to IX - Lineups

5. For every clanwar each clan must appoint one, and only one, responsible organizer to handle upcoming issues of the clanwar. A failure to inform the responsible administrator results in one penalty point per clanwar.

6. In order to improve the communication between the clans and admins each clan should send a responsible person 30 minutes before a clanwar actually starts into channel #wcip. That person should be available from then on until 30 minutes after the last game has been played.

7. A clan is supposed to have all attending players ready to play during a match. If a player can only show up at a later time the team is supposed to inform an admin about it at least 30 minutes before the match starts.

8. 6 hours after the end of a game a clan receives 1/2 penalty point for each replay it failed to upload.

9. 48 hours after the end of a match a clan receives another 1/2 penalty point for each replay it failed to upload. (Any replay uploaded later than that will not result in removing penalty points.)

XI. Games

1. Games are to be played according to I.j.

2. All games have to be played with the most up to date version of "Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne". The game speed hast to be "fast".

3. 30 minutes before a clanwar every participating player has the right to remove one map from the WCIP mappool as possible loser's choices. Vetoes are made during or immediately after the first game of the submatch. The first map of a best of three series is a random map predetermined by the ESL WCIP Premiership and the second and third map are chosen by the losers of the first or second game.
   Incase both players or teams veto the same map - only this one map will be removed from the pool of choice.

4. The pool of available maps can be found in III - Warcraft III.

5. No map may be played more than once in a submatch.

6. Observers are only allowed, when both players agree on it. It is however not allowed to chat in games which are being covered by any major broadcast that a WCIP Premiership administrator will notify of.

7. Players aren't allowed to have any kind of contact with other people while playing (except for their allies while playing 2on2).

8. Players have to use in-game colors Red and Yellow when ESL WCIP Live is covering the match. (ignoring this, can lead to Penalty Points)

9. Admins of the ESL WCIP Premiership, shoutcasters and reporters of our partner sites have the undeniable right to observe. Constantly kicking those people out of games can result in penalty points in extreme cases.

10. It is not allowed to start any game with more than two clan members "observing", unless it is specifically permitted by an ESL WCIP Premiership official. Ignoring this will result in Penalty Points.

11. It is not allowed to start and play any matches without an ESL WCIP Premiership Official present in the game unless it is specifically permitted otherwise by an ESL WCIP Premiership official. Ignoring this can result in Penalty Points for both clans involved.

12. Every team is supposed to bring at least two hosts that suit their needs to every match. The hosts need to be fair for all attending players and may be ruled out by ESL WCIP Premiership officials. Not bringing any hosts to a match revokes any right to veto against a host. In case the players can not agree on a host, admins will decide.

13. In case the players can not agree on a host, admins will decide.

14. In case of a disconnect from a player during the first 3 minutes, the game is to be restarted with the exactly same settings as the first one. If a player disconnects at a later point it counts as a loss in a 1on1 game. In 2on2 games the remaining second player is free to finish the game without his partner.

15. In case a host disconnects and the game cannot be continued with another host, the game needs to be replayed unless the player's can agree otherwise. If one player had a very clear advantage at the time the disconnect happened, a League - or Headadmin may decide to give the player a direct win.

16. League & Headadmins reserve the right to decide for a rematch in case a player with a clear advantage disconnected, in order to preserve the spirit of competition.

17. Once a game is started there may be no more delay than 10 minutes between the next maps. Ignoring this can result in Penalty Points for both clans involved.

18. All WCIP players are obligated to save all replays of every game they play in the ESL WCIP and immediately send them to their team captain afterwards or upload them directly on the ESL WCIP Premiership page.

XII. Penalty Points and Punishments

1. Penalty Points applied by the ESL WCIP Premiership will not expire until the end of corresponding Regular Season. If the points still exist on team profile after Regular Season has ended, contact administration to have them removed.

2. For every 3 penalty points the clan's score points will be substracted by one at the end of the regular season.

3. A clan that collects 12 Penalty Points at any point during a running season will be disqualified from the ongoing ESL WCIP Premiership season and may not play again in the next seasons qualifier.

4. Any violation of the ESL WCIP Premiership rules may be punished with all possible severity.

5. Cheating in the ESL WCIP Premiership will be punished with all possible severity.

6. Fraud and deception of the ESL WCIP Premiership officials in any way will be punished with all possible severity.

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