STAQ Cup of Harmony 78 Bid - Siovanija & Teusland and Québec

[Independent Athletes from Quebec]

STAQ - Cup of Harmony 78 Bid: Siovanija & Teusland and Québec

Thanks to Krytenia for coming up with a catchy nickname to add!

---

Dear Esteemed members of the World Cup Committee,

The Siovanija & Teusland Football Association (STFA) and Federation Royale Québécoise du Football (FRQF, 퀘벡왕립축구협회) hereby submit the following bid to jointly host the 78th Cup of Harmony, to be held in the cold, icy winterlands of Québec and Siovanija & Teusland.

THE NATIONS

Siovanija & Teusland is a large island nation of about 75 million people located in southwestern Atlantian Oceania. Since 1896, and the end of the Great War between the former Teus Empire and Siovanijan Republic, the country has been united as the United Republics of Siovanija & Teusland. A strong democratic country, the nation boasts a strong economy and is a great place to live. Sporting-wise, the people have two major loves in the sporting world. The first is ice hockey, the national sport, and the second is association football. Since Siovanija & Teusland’s debut on the world stage at World Cup 80, the team have quickly risen up the rankings and boast world class players like Thorsten Kramer in their ranks. Having played host to several key sporting events in recent years, the nation is prepared and excited to be bidding to host one of the most important tournaments on the world football calendar, the Cup of Harmony.

Located in Northern AO, Québec is a nation known for its environment, rich cultural diversity and claims one of its region's most educated and cultured population. Led by Her Majesty Christine II, the country is a semi-constitutional monarchy, with both the royalty and the democracy playing a huge role in Québécois politics. With a high HDI rating and affluent economy, Québec is an advanced nation with long years of peace and stability within the nation, while still allowing for societal and economic progress over the course of its history. With a beautiful environment, advanced economy, state-of-art infrastructure and love of association football, Québec is your place to go for your once-in-a-lifetime voyage that welcomes every traveler with a smile and cheer.

FORMAT

Of course, it is impossible to determine a specific format at this time without knowing the exact number of nations.

Due to the fluid and open nature of the Cup of Harmony when it comes to hosting, on top of the peculiar selection criteria, various options will be available depending on the availability of RPers not only meeting our selection criteria, but also being able to participate. As have been and will be the case on this bid as well, the preferred format will be the conventional 8-group, 32-team format. Both hosts, however, will also be open to expand the tournament size to 36, 40 and 48 team format.

The format will be decided based on the criteria - we'll be looking for people who have posted a roster and RPed at least twice, with RP quality used as a tiebreaker to round the numbers down a bit if required. As for selection criteria, quality will be taken with particular emphasis over quantity.

Should two nations be tied on points at the end of the group stage, we will use the following tiebreakers:

1. Head-to-Head points
2. Goal Difference
3. Head-to-Head Goal Difference
4. Drawing of lots (roster/RP bonus)

SELECTION CRITERIA

As longtime participants, and in Québec’s case, host in the WCC community, both co-bidders understand and take into account the fact that Cup of Harmony is a tournament where invitation is earned through one's participation and quality of roleplays. Invitations to the Cup of Harmony participation is going to be limited to those who did not qualify for the World Cup 86 and posted a roster and at least 2 RPs. From the very pool, the co-hosts will make the final decision using various criterias. Those who were selected for their spot in Cup of Harmony will receive a telegram from either Québec or Siovanija & Teusland, but will have to confirm their invitation to play by posting a roster. Otherwise, it will not be accepted.

SCORINATION & RP BONUS

Games will be scored using xkoranate 0.3.3 (NSFS), with additive style modifiers. RP bonus will be very generous and cumulative throughout the tournament. We want to reward promising new players who show effort and/or creativity. As hosts, we will do our best to facilitate quality roleplay and make this CoH a great opportunity to foster RPing among those competing. RP bonus will be graded by each host individually, though we prefer not to release our exact grading scale.

PREVIOUS EXPERIENCE

Siovanija & Teusland, the junior co-bidder, has hosted the 14th World Junior Hockey Championship and the 9th Sporting World Cup during their time on the forum. In addition, the user behind Siovanija & Teusland previously participated as Sicoutimont (2012-2014) and co-hosted World Cup of Hockey 22 (with Northern Sunrise Islands, currently Kita-Hinode). As Siovanija & Teusland, the user has also been active in having domestic football and hockey leagues.

The user behind Québec, the senior co-bidder, has hosted or co-hosted the World Cup 73 and 77 with Apox and San Jose Guayabal, Cup of Harmony 64 and 68 with Krytenia and Schottia, World Bowl XXIV (with Vettrera) and XXVIII, World Cup of Hockey XXV (with Vaugania), XXVI, XXIX-XXX and XL; Baptism of Fire LVII and 62 with The Sarian and Cosumar, International Basketball Championships 17, 18 and 21 with Saintland, San Jose Guayabal and Drawkland. The user behind the nation is the current president of the NationStates College Football (NSCF), and has also served as the inaugural President for the World Cup of Hockey Federation (WCoHF) for its first six editions. In addition, he has served as a longtime member in many sporting committees.

THAT'S ALL, FOLKS

Feel free to ask us any questions with replies to this post.

[Siovanija and Teusland]

Confirming my participation in this bid! Looking forward to your questions!

[Northwest Kalactin]

I have a few questions regarding the format.

If I recall correctly, the most recent COH was 60 teams, do you have any concerns about fitting in RPers with your preferred formats of 32-48 teams?

In an 8 group, 32 team format, will a double round robin or a single round robin take place?

Other than these questions, I see no reason why I would not vote for this bid, both bidders in my eyes are very trustable having participated in tournaments run by them.

[Siovanija and Teusland]

I have a few questions regarding the format.

If I recall correctly, the most recent COH was 60 teams, do you have any concerns about fitting in RPers with your preferred formats of 32-48 teams?

In an 8 group, 32 team format, will a double round robin or a single round robin take place?

Other than these questions, I see no reason why I would not vote for this bid, both bidders in my eyes are very trustable having participated in tournaments run by them.

Hi, Kalactin

First off, thanks for the questions!

1. The most recent World Cup had a great deal of participation thanks to the COVID-19 situation in the world, which saw many people with more free time on their hands to participate, and many users returning to our community. It therefore made sense for the CoH to have an expanded format to accommodate this. On the other hand, the three CoH tournaments prior to that one (74, 75 and 76) had 32, 35 and 42 participants respectively. Therefore, we've made our format proposals based on this historic precedent. Of course, we are perfectly willing to open up the tournament beyond 48 should the numbers work out.

2. With the 8-group 32-team format, we would be looking to run the tournament as a single round robin.

Thanks again for your questions, and let us know if you need anything further clarified!

[The Sarian]

Given the issues with the last WCC event hosted by Quebec, what steps will be taken to assuage worries about whether the results will be fair and untampered with?

[Independent Athletes from Quebec]

Given the issues with the last WCC event hosted by Quebec, what steps will be taken to assuage worries about whether the results will be fair and untampered with?

1. I had been mostly out of hosting for personal reasons (mostly academic) for past three years, but based on my hosting record between those (several cycles of multiple conference scorinations on NSCF + solo hosting a largest World Cup of Hockey in over 15 editions), it would be safe to say that the hosting should not be an issue. If you do doubt so, ask fellow members of the NSCF scorination team (primarily Banija and Drawkland during the past 4-5 years, Cosumar until a year ago as well), who can get back to you on the matter.

2. In case people may ask, the choice of using NSFS on this CoH bid, at the same time, is due to keeping consistency with the World Cup. This was something that was proposed by my co-bidder and I am going to make that clear.

3. Personally, I am also going to be running public scorination, live on NS Sport Discord server, for the Quebecois half of the CoH. This has been under discussion for the previous month and half with Farfadillis, who had tried this for AOCAF to great success, and I am particularly open to the idea of public scorination. The reason why this was not stated on the OP was that the format was not universal for both sides of the CoH, and the possible cutoff hour differences on both sides.

4. It would be appreciated if questions are to be asked and redirected in a more constructive manner.

[Siovanija and Teusland]

Given the issues with the last WCC event hosted by Quebec, what steps will be taken to assuage worries about whether the results will be fair and untampered with?

I wasn't active on NS Sports at the time of this event, however, as someone who has participated in events hosted by Quebec since my return, and knowing his overall hosting resume, I have full confidence in his hosting abilities. I wouldn't have entered this bid otherwise.

Just to confirm, while I'm totally fine with Quebec running his scorination publicly on Discord, I will not be doing the same. I haven't had experience with the Discord streaming system in the past, and while I'm open to it in the future, I don't feel a potential first WCC hosting job is the place for me to do so.

[PotatoFarmers]

Will there be any RP bonus carried over from the WC Qualifiers? Pretty sure this is the question on many people's minds when it comes to a CoH bid.
Also, based on what has been posted so far, will you see yourself making the qualification criteria (into CoH, of course) more stringent?

[Kelssek]

I think The Sarian raises an important concern that I wasn't aware of. It's easy enough to find on a search of the WCDT, but on a skim through I haven't the heart to wade through all of that.

But from what I've seen, I'm not gonna sugarcoat it - this raises issues of trust rather than competence. Citing experience does not address the trust problem. Promising to screen-share the scorination I suppose is one measure than can address it, but it seems faintly ridiculous - if people do not trust the host, the answer isn't to let them host as long as we can invade their privacy.

That said I think we'd all benefit if The Sarian can lay out the key concerns they have now - keeping in mind that those wanting the gory details can easily find them and there's no need to rehash what seems a pretty toxic episode. Tell us whether you think Royal Kingdom of Quebec should get a second chance, and if not, why not. People can change in three years.

[Independent Athletes from Quebec]

Will there be any RP bonus carried over from the WC Qualifiers? Pretty sure this is the question on many people's minds when it comes to a CoH bid.
Also, based on what has been posted so far, will you see yourself making the qualification criteria (into CoH, of course) more stringent?

RP bonus won't be carried over from the WC qualifiers. This is partly due to logistics related issues, especially if the CoH is not expected to be run as a part of the overall Vilitan Plan bids. At the same time, we also have to consider that the Cup of Harmony is still a separate tournament on own, for the RPers who have contributed but were unable to make the World Cup. It has its own merits and values on own right, on top of generous RP bonuses in general, as well. That's something to be considered.

That said, however, I would still say that it wouldn't be a bad idea for a prospective Vilitan Plan bidding team to consider using RP carryovers into CoH.

Promising to screen-share the scorination I suppose is one measure than can address it, but it seems faintly ridiculous - if people do not trust the host, the answer isn't to let them host as long as we can invade their privacy..

As have stated on a previous response, this goes well beyond a minor promise.

As someone who have known Farfadillis for years and have seen how he has run the public RP bonus and public scorination on AOCAF, I have held positive opinions about both and have been discussing about them with Farfadillis for at least a month and half. The reason why this was not stated on the OP was that the format was not universal for both sides of the CoH.

Also, based on what has been posted so far, will you see yourself making the qualification criteria (into CoH, of course) more stringent?

It is certainly a possibility, but to what extent depends on the number of RPed nations and the quality of RPs. The previous CoH did see a particularly larger number with CoH because of COVID-19 and how it rendered people's lives for months, so it is possible that the numbers could continue to be large. But it is also possible that with the current situation, the number of RPers eligible could be smaller.

So all I could say is that it's up in the air.

[Farfadillis]

Just poking my head in to confirm that Queb has had public scorination in his mind for some time now. Not because (or, at least, not just because) of past controversies, but instead because he likes the idea as a whole. Our conversations about it stretch back to March or so, when Kry and I were live-streaming our AOCAF Cup 60 scorinations, so I think this is a carefully-considered decision. With this in mind, I wouldn't say public scorination would be an invasion of his privacy. At least, I never felt it was an invasion of my privacy, since I was doing it of my own volition.

[Kelssek]

I did not mean to imply that this was live streaming thing was something thrown in because of the past unpleasantness which I had no knowledge of (or memory, if I was in the World Cup at the time, I don't think I was) until a couple hours ago.

But I do want The Sarian to help the rest of us make up our minds by laying out if they think trust is still a problem and why they think so. I am guessing it must be if you are raising it. And if so, what could address it.

Speaking generally, I'm extremely wary of this becoming a precedent or creating an expectation where people feel they need to do such a thing in order to host. Because I'd certainly feel it as an invasion of my privacy.

[Independent Athletes from Quebec]

Speaking generally, I'm extremely wary of this becoming a precedent or creating an expectation where people feel they need to do such a thing in order to host. Because I'd certainly feel it as an invasion of my privacy.

I totally agree where you are coming from.

Personally, I'm with Farfadillis on that I don't view this as an invasion of my privacy. But I am also firmly on my front that this should not set any kind of precedence nor expectation of specific sort. This works for some but doesn't for others, which is perfectly fine- S&T and I maintain different stances on it and that's very much the reason why it won't be implemented for whole CoH, but rather my half of CoH.

As for answering Sarian's question, I was originally going to ignore it, but decided afterwards to respond for the sake of answering questions and also to explain the public scorination part on Quebecois half. I was going to make a response either way with public scorination part and his question just happened to be the first question asking for anything.

Besides, I feel that the presence of such question is a good way for me to explain the Public Scorination side, if somebody were to ask the question along those lines (but for others, it doesn't have to be at all!).

[Graintfjall]

I do not have a vote.

I would like to clarify something. You have mentioned "public scorination" (on Quebec's side) but also said you will not be releasing your RP bonus scale publicly. As Zwangzug pointed out on Discord, given ranks are public knowledge, wouldn't the public scorination thus end up revealing the RP bonus anyway? If you publicly scorinate a match between Bigtopia, who has rank 10.93, having assigned them a rank of 12.93, then clearly you have given them 2 RP bonus.

I mention this as someone implacably opposed to RP bonus, for clarification, and I apologize if I've misunderstood what you're proposing. Could you explain how both "public scorination" and not revealing RP bonus scale can co-exist?

[Sarzonia]

I feel the need to remind Graintfjall that, in regard to their stated opposition to RP bonus, that ship has LONG sailed.

I'm also adamantly against any public revelations of RP bonus in any tournament. That happened in AOCAF 60 and I was profoundly bothered by it.

[Graintfjall]

Lol, good spot: that was a dreadful typo on my part! I'm so sorry, I missed out the word "public".

I mention this as someone implacably opposed to public RP bonus.

[Sarzonia]

Lol, good spot: that was a dreadful typo on my part! I'm so sorry, I missed out the word "public".

I mention this as someone implacably opposed to public RP bonus.

Now THIS I can get behind!

[Independent Athletes from Quebec]

I do not have a vote.

I would like to clarify something. You have mentioned "public scorination" (on Quebec's side) but also said you will not be releasing your RP bonus scale publicly. As Zwangzug pointed out on Discord, given ranks are public knowledge, wouldn't the public scorination thus end up revealing the RP bonus anyway? If you publicly scorinate a match between Bigtopia, who has rank 10.93, having assigned them a rank of 12.93, then clearly you have given them 2 RP bonus.

I mention this as someone implacably opposed to RP bonus, for clarification, and I apologize if I've misunderstood what you're proposing. Could you explain how both "public scorination" and not revealing RP bonus scale can co-exist?

It is something that is still in the works. Partly what complicates it is whether the 'public' part counts from the very beginning of xkoranate or the very part where they press the button. There is also a deserved concern, about lack of RP feedback and subjectivity. The latter part can be addressed with both cohost being readily available for feedbacks on TG and Discord. RP feedbacks, of course, will be private.

I certainly think that it could be worked out. More has to be seen, but it is being worked out at the moment. I will get back to you in due time.

[Riennic Isles]

I have gone through the finer details of the incident alluded to by The Sarian, and I would like to echo Kelssek's call for him to lay out his concerns about Quebec. I hope that he does so in good time to prove that the initial question was asked in good faith, and not because of a personal vendetta against a fellow NS Sports user.

That said, as an uninvolved (and hopefully objective) party who was not around at the time of the Quebec-SJG WC, I do think that Quebec is a flawed host - not in terms of competence or experience, but in terms of character and temperament. Anyone who is familiar with Quebec knows that he is an opinionated person who has an unfortunate tendency to react strongly against perceived slights and/or people he dislikes. I speak only for myself, but this facet of his character has always been highly concerning for me, and is the main reason I would be hesitant to endorse any bid with his involvement - simply because I am unconvinced that he could be impartial towards anyone who runs afoul of him.

I don't mean to imply that Quebec has committed any wrongdoing, nor do I have a personal beef with him. That said, I feel it would be remiss of me not to bring up my concerns, especially since the issue of trust has been brought up. I'm sure that Quebec is a good person at heart, not to mention a valued contributor to the NS Sports community - but I'm not so sure that he has the capacity to be a neutral, objective host.

[Drawkland]

FORMAT

Of course, it is impossible to determine a specific format at this time without knowing the exact number of nations.

Due to the fluid and open nature of the Cup of Harmony when it comes to hosting, on top of the peculiar selection criteria, various options will be available depending on the availability of RPers not only meeting our selection criteria, but also being able to participate. As have been and will be the case on this bid as well, the preferred format will be the conventional 8-group, 32-team format. Both hosts, however, will also be open to expand the tournament size to 36, 40 and 48 team format.

The format will be decided based on the criteria - we'll be looking for people who have posted a roster and RPed at least twice, with RP quality used as a tiebreaker to round the numbers down a bit if required. As for selection criteria, quality will be taken with particular emphasis over quantity.

SELECTION CRITERIA

As longtime participants, and in Québec’s case, host in the WCC community, both co-bidders understand and take into account the fact that Cup of Harmony is a tournament where invitation is earned through one's participation and quality of roleplays. Invitations to the Cup of Harmony participation is going to be limited to those who did not qualify for the World Cup 86 and posted a roster and at least 2 RPs. From the very pool, the co-hosts will make the final decision using various criterias. Those who were selected for their spot in Cup of Harmony will receive a telegram from either Québec or Siovanija & Teusland, but will have to confirm their invitation to play by posting a roster. Otherwise, it will not be accepted.

Hey there! World Cup host here.

Just to give you a heads-up, I've decided to look at our WC host bonus sheet to see how many nations currently fit your criteria for inclusion. I'm not going to attempt to discern what you consider "quality" or "not quality", so I decided to see how many nations have posted a roster and at least 2 RPs.

There are currently 88 nations which meet your criteria for invitation. This doesn't include nations who've RPs for the cutoff coming tonight, as they have not yet been graded. Obviously, a good chunk of these nations will be qualifying for the World Cup (I think we'd all hope that'd be exactly 30 from this list but it's possible a few rank-coasters slip through), so you're looking at about 58 minimum eligible nations. This number will of course fluctuate based on who qualifies, who you consider a quality RPer, and if anyone starts posting more in the second half of qualifying. This number will likely continue to grow, since we still have 6 cutoffs (including tonight) until qualifiers concludes.

Since you've outlined in the bid thus far that 48 is your intended top limit on invitations, I just wanted to pose this question for you so neither you nor the voters are caught unaware. Like last World Cup, this has been a great cycle for RP, so by limiting your CoH to 48 nations, you will likely be leaving a lot of quality RPers behind. Are you willing to expand your format to include more nations, or are you sticking with 48 as your upper limit?

For the sake of transparency and convenience for the voters, I've posed this issue to both bids.

[Independent Athletes from Quebec]

FORMAT

Of course, it is impossible to determine a specific format at this time without knowing the exact number of nations.

Due to the fluid and open nature of the Cup of Harmony when it comes to hosting, on top of the peculiar selection criteria, various options will be available depending on the availability of RPers not only meeting our selection criteria, but also being able to participate. As have been and will be the case on this bid as well, the preferred format will be the conventional 8-group, 32-team format. Both hosts, however, will also be open to expand the tournament size to 36, 40 and 48 team format.

The format will be decided based on the criteria - we'll be looking for people who have posted a roster and RPed at least twice, with RP quality used as a tiebreaker to round the numbers down a bit if required. As for selection criteria, quality will be taken with particular emphasis over quantity.

SELECTION CRITERIA

As longtime participants, and in Québec’s case, host in the WCC community, both co-bidders understand and take into account the fact that Cup of Harmony is a tournament where invitation is earned through one's participation and quality of roleplays. Invitations to the Cup of Harmony participation is going to be limited to those who did not qualify for the World Cup 86 and posted a roster and at least 2 RPs. From the very pool, the co-hosts will make the final decision using various criterias. Those who were selected for their spot in Cup of Harmony will receive a telegram from either Québec or Siovanija & Teusland, but will have to confirm their invitation to play by posting a roster. Otherwise, it will not be accepted.

Hey there! World Cup host here.

Just to give you a heads-up, I've decided to look at our WC host bonus sheet to see how many nations currently fit your criteria for inclusion. I'm not going to attempt to discern what you consider "quality" or "not quality", so I decided to see how many nations have posted a roster and at least 2 RPs.

There are currently 88 nations which meet your criteria for invitation. This doesn't include nations who've RPs for the cutoff coming tonight, as they have not yet been graded. Obviously, a good chunk of these nations will be qualifying for the World Cup (I think we'd all hope that'd be exactly 30 from this list but it's possible a few rank-coasters slip through), so you're looking at about 58 minimum eligible nations. This number will of course fluctuate based on who qualifies, who you consider a quality RPer, and if anyone starts posting more in the second half of qualifying. This number will likely continue to grow, since we still have 6 cutoffs (including tonight) until qualifiers concludes.

Since you've outlined in the bid thus far that 48 is your intended top limit on invitations, I just wanted to pose this question for you so neither you nor the voters are caught unaware. Like last World Cup, this has been a great cycle for RP, so by limiting your CoH to 48 nations, you will likely be leaving a lot of quality RPers behind. Are you willing to expand your format to include more nations, or are you sticking with 48 as your upper limit?

For the sake of transparency and convenience for the voters, I've posed this issue to both bids.

Hello.

I'll be answering to this question since my co-bidder is currently in class.

Our answer for this question is: Yes, the upper limit can absolutely be adjusted to as high as 64. The initial estimate of anywhere between 32 and 48, with the 48 nations as initial ceiling, was given before I have received this information. This was due to the assumption being that there would be less number of participants due to people's lives slowly returning after a rare, COVID-19 influenced situation that was the WCQ85 and CoH77.

The numbers you have given would say slightly differently, so numbers of course have to be adjusted if needed. 48 is a solid number to work around, but 64 would be ideal in that it would still give a fairly conventional 3 matchday group stage with little need for byes or longer group stages, and you just need to add an additional Round of 32.

That said, any number on the upper threshold in a revised situation, whether it be 40, 48, 56, 60 or 64, would be adjustable as well, and we'd like to wait until we get exact numbers in likely a week. This WCQ having play-off stage and whatnot also helps with timeframe-related flexibility and the ability to finish the CoH before or around the time of WC Final, so something to note as well.

[Sarzonia]

Three matchdays sounds like an awfully short period of time for roleplaying for a Cup of Harmony, which is supposed to reward players who RP'd but just didn't make it to the proper.

Just wanted to mention that since it is something I'll take into consideration when it comes time to vote.

[Banija]

I will say, as a voter, I would like to respond to a few concerns brought up of RKQ.

1. I do not think personal attacks on Quebec, of course, are warranted in discussion. I do think the Riennic Island's post here is one, unfortunately- in his/her own words, direct and specific criticism of Quebec's character. Every experienced host on the boards has a personality behind our nation, and we all have opinions and beliefs and what not. Saying that he would not be able to fairly grade or score for somebody, simply because he "didn't like them", is a very serious accusation in terms of his ability to host a tournament, and I believe it is both incorrect and uncalled for. He is a veteran host who has hosted all sorts of major tournaments on the boards, both historically and recently, the most recent won being WCoH 40 which was hosted without any problems.

2. In terms of the main concern about WC77, I would like to note this. The main concern then was that THE's results were essentially impossible to replicate(maintaining a 5 goals per game average over 18 games). Now, I haven't gone through any other Qualification campaigns to see how often this has been done, but I'd just like to note that I myself am currently on pace to score more goals during this campaign, than THE did during WCQ77. He averaged 5.06 goals per game(rounding up), and by the same rounding up method, I'm presently averaging 5.18 goals per game. I have a higher rank now than he did then, but he RP'd those qualifiers much more than I have RP'd the present-day qualifiers, and used the max(presumably +5) style mod, while mine is not that high. Nobody knows whether or not I will match THE scoring 91 goals across 18 matches, but it certainly seems safe to say that it's certainly possible that I can. So even though we were not able to replicate it at the time, these qualifiers, at least so far, show that those results are, indeed, possible. And if it's possible over 11 matchdays, while consistently RPing, those results should be possible over 18 matchdays as well.

3. In terms of ability to host, I think both S&T and Quebec have shown that they have the ability to host these tournaments, and have demonstrated their ability to earn the trust of the community. Quebec, even very recently, has hosted the WCoH 40 without issue, and has hosted the last two NSCFs without issue as well. NSCF, I'd argue, is much more involved in terms of having him compute the ranks and set the brackets and matchups and such, and there has never been a reason to once question the ability to trust him.

If he wants to use this opportunity to use public scorination, so everyone can see his grading and what not, I think that's a fair way for him to address issues of trust in him(he can speak for himself, but issues that I personally believe to be unfounded). Nobody is suggesting public scorination will be a model for everyone going forward, and it's only been done once on these boards in recent times(AOCAF 60). But like the double scorination matchdays, it doesn't hurt anyone, and just because it's done once, it doesn't obligate future hosts to do it.

[Siovanija and Teusland]

Three matchdays sounds like an awfully short period of time for roleplaying for a Cup of Harmony, which is supposed to reward players who RP'd but just didn't make it to the proper.

Just wanted to mention that since it is something I'll take into consideration when it comes time to vote.

Hi, Sarzonia

Thanks for your question! We've decided to run with a single round-robin in all of our proposed formats for the tournament, including the 32 and 64 team formats which would end up with three matchdays. With 48 hours between matchdays there will be plenty of time for all participants to RP, and with generous RP bonus available each participant has the opportunity to have success at this tournament. In addition, the majority of Cup of Harmony tournaments have been run with a single round-robin format, as does the World Cup proper itself. Thanks again for your question - let us know if anything is still unclear.

I also want to make clear: we aren't boxing ourselves into one format as of today. There are still 3 more matchdays (and 7 total matches) as well as playoffs remaining in World Cup Qualifying, so as of today the ultimate fate of most teams is not yet known. Therefore, we are very much open to formats including 48, 50, 56, 60 and 64 teams. While 64 teams is our upper limit, there are plenty of ways to make the final numbers work that we can't really know until the end of Qualifiers. So while we can't give you a guaranteed number right now, we can give our best estimate with what we know today.

[Sarzonia]

I'd like to address The Riennic Isles comment about character as well to state that I find it disappointing that they would question Quebec's temperament and tendency to lash out.

If you wanted everyone here to be Zen masters, mistresses, or whatever the gender-neutral equivalent term would be, number one, that's fucking impossible. Number two, that would make this a boring place. A lot of us have strong opinions about a lot of shit and some of us make them known much more forcefully than others.

About Quebec lashing out, the last time I saw it, it was a well deserved, if somewhat belated diatribe toward Free Republics. He had it coming for blowing up his bridges with a cocktail of nuclear warheads and napalm with a kerosene chaser, so I have no problem with that.

As for The Sarian, I think you need to be specific about what your objection is here. It's getting close to put up or shut up time.