Under the Hood ft Keeegs | #4 A Live One
Under the Hood ft Keeegs | #4 A Live One
The People's Guild: A Splinterlands Podcast
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Welcome back to the People’s Guild.
Today we’re diving back into A Live One, and this episode is all about tournaments — the formats, the frustrations, the future, and everything in between. Fresh off his post about reshaping the tournament landscape, @keeegs sits down with none other than @ducecrypto for a full-on tourney conversation.
This one goes deep: participation trends, prize structures, competitive balance, new-player hurdles, format diversity, and what a healthier, more engaging tournament ecosystem could look like. It’s exactly the kind of candid, community-driven discussion that makes A Live One so much fun — part strategy session, part round table, part open forum.
If you care about tournaments, competitive play, or the future of Splinterlands events, this is one you won’t want to miss.
Enjoy the show!
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Whether you're a seasoned vet or just getting started, if you've got insights, feedback, epic battles, or just want to say hey, don’t hesitate to reach out.
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Join the conversation on The People’s Guild Discord
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Join us in our Splinterlands journey by creating your own battle mage!
We love hearing the stories that make this community special.
Whether you're a seasoned vet or just getting started, if you've got insights, feedback, epic battles, or just want to say hey, don’t hesitate to reach out.
You can find us at 📬 [email protected] or Twitter.
Join the conversation on The People’s Guild Discord
and the Team Possible Weekly Chat.
Join us in our Splinterlands journey by creating your own battle mage!
Had a blast riffing about the future of Splinterlands Competitive Play. There is so much for us to do if we want @sps.dao events to serve their purpose as engaging, exciting, competitive events that help to drive attention and growth.
Yea man! Love the conversation gettin goin on these things and just rampin up the community's engagement and transparency on these things. Thanks for hangin, Duce! Lookin forward to the next one!
I just waiting to see
Fixed Battle Conditions - Auto battle (Always the Same) (Banning of card can be included)
Every battle in this tournament uses the exact same setup: (example)
🟦 Mana Cap:
28 Mana
🟪 Rulesets:
Little League
(Only Monsters with 4 mana or less are allowed)
Backfire / Deflection
🟫 Allowed Splinters:
Life
Death
Tournament Format
1️⃣ Auto-Battle League Phase
All players participate in X rounds (example: 30 rounds).
Each round uses one submitted lineup based on the fixed rules.
All battles are run automatically by the organizer.
A league table is created based on wins/losses.
After all rounds, the Top 4 players advance.
Top 4 Finals – Best-of-5
The top four ranked players enter the final showdown:
Semifinals (Bo5)
Finals (Bo5)
All final battles still follow the same fixed ruleset:
28 Mana • Little League • Backfire • Life/Death Only
On the side event : players can place their glints ( fix amount ) on top 4 battles to choose the winners. Payout is 1:1
Well this is interesting! Not sure I entirely understand the format, but I like the concept. If I am understanding the example set up correctly, it feels like there might be a lot of copy/paste teams with such a limited card selection though, no? How do we avoid that?
Thanks for always participating in the conversation, @l4l4l4 !
@keeegs @ducecrypto
This format is inspired by Ever Legion’s Season Coliseum — players pre-submit multiple teams, all under fixed rules, and all battles (including the Top 4) use those pre-submitted lineups with no changes allowed. In my simple version of addressing copy/paste issue, maybe can do (
3-Team Submission Format (A, B, C)
Players submit:
Team A (main team)
Team B (alternate lineup)
Team C (another alternate lineup)
They can reuse monsters or create variations — up to them.
Usage rules:
Qualification / league rounds:
➜ Only Team A is used for auto-battles
(everyone fights 30 auto rounds using only the A lineup)
OR
➜ Team A,B and C is used for auto-battles
(everyone fights 30 auto rounds using All teams lineup)
Top 4 Finals (Best of 5):
➜ Players may use Team A, B, or C
➜ They choose a team order BEFORE the BO5 starts
➜ All 5 battles still use locked submissions
They CANNOT change teams during the finals — only before the BO5 starts.
How This Helps the Format Even More
Copy-paste becomes MUCH harder
If a player tries to copy someone:
They have to guess Team A
AND also guess Team B
AND guess Team C
That’s 3 lineups instead of 1.
This massively increases strategic depth.
Even if 2 players copy the same “meta concept,” their B and C teams will rarely be identical, which affects the BO5 finals.
IN SHORT: Just like MTG Sealed format, you construct and register your main deck ( example : White/Black ) . All your rnd 1 games have to use the registered decks, but after rnd 1 ( sideboard time ) your deck could changed into pure white/pure black or even 5 colours .
Hopefully you all able to grasp the idea.
This section is another copy/paste concern which i intreperate differently and needed chatgpt to help. I assume you referring to BoTs .
Delayed / Batched Auto-Battle Tournament Flow
Step 1: Player Submission
┌───────────────────────────┐
│ Players submit Teams A/B/C │
│ via official UI only │
│ Lineups stored server-side│
│ Hidden from API │
└───────────────┬───────────┘
│
Step 2: Tournament Start
┌───────────────┴───────────┐
│ Server generates matchups │
│ - Swiss / league / bracket │
│ Each match queued in batch │
└───────────────┬───────────┘
│
Step 3: Auto-Battle Simulation
┌───────────────┴───────────┐
│ Server simulates matches │
│ - Uses hidden RNG seeds │
│ - Positioning, abilities │
│ - Determines winner & points│
│ Battle logs stored internally│
└───────────────┬───────────┘
│
Step 4: Batch Result Processing
┌───────────────┴───────────┐
│ Update leaderboard in bulk │
│ Public API shows only: │
│ - Player ranks │
│ - Wins/Losses │
│ - Points │
│ Battle details remain hidden│
└───────────────┬───────────┘
│
Step 5: Post-Batch Reveal (Optional)
┌───────────────┴───────────┐
│ Full battle logs / lineups │
│ released for content │
│ - Replays │
│ - Analysis / highlight │
└───────────────────────────┘
Key Notes
Server-side only: Lineups never visible until after batch completion.
Batched processing: Allows hundreds of auto-battles at once.
Bot-resistant: Bots have zero reactive advantage.
Content-friendly: Reveals can be scheduled for streams or articles.
Flexible: Works with A/B/C pre-submitted teams, fixed rulesets, and Top 4 BO5 finals.
Am not familiar the codes and stuff , just an idea I ask chatgpt to translate it to human language :)
ANOTHER idea which may be Chaotic and haven't dive into much is CHAOS ASCENSION .
CHAOS ASCENSION: A League-Scaling Auto-Battle Tournament
One team. Four leagues. Pure chaos.
The idea popped up while refining the “fixed-rules autobattle tournament”…
What if your single submitted team didn’t just fight once, but ascended through Splinterlands leagues?
Not by rank grind —
but automatically, round by round.
That’s the concept behind:
CHAOS ASCENSION — Tournament Format v2
Core Concept
Players submit ONE lineup.( Team A)
The lineup fights through multiple rounds.
But each round uses a higher league ruleset, unlocking more:
card levels
abilities
stats
This creates a progressively intensifying tournament, where your TEAM evolves even though your CARDS never change. I forgot whether bronze allows legendary unit to be played or not. Probably will delve more once i have some information.