Organizer Guide

This guide covers everything you need to run a tournament on PlanesForge, from creating the event to completing it after the final match.

Creating a Tournament

Go to My Tournaments and click Create Tournament. Fill in the details:

  • Name — the tournament name as players will see it.
  • Date and Time — when the event starts.
  • Location — where the event takes place.
  • Description — optional details about the event (displayed on the tournament page).
  • Format — the Magic format (Pauper, Modern, Pioneer, etc.).
  • Min / Max Players — player limits. Defaults are 8 minimum, 32 maximum.
  • Price — entry fee in EUR. Set to 0 for free events.
  • Round Timer — time limit per round in minutes.
  • Best of (Swiss) — best of 3 or best of 5 for Swiss rounds.
  • Best of (Finals) — best of 3 or best of 5 for Top 8 matches.
  • Rounds Override — leave empty to let the system calculate the number of Swiss rounds based on player count, or set a fixed number.
  • Top 8 — toggle to enable a Top 8 single-elimination bracket after Swiss rounds.
  • Finals Timer — separate timer for Top 8 matches (optional; can be disabled).

Your tournament starts in draft status. It's invisible to players until you open registration.

Payment Setup

If your tournament has an entry fee, configure payment details in the tournament settings:

  • IBAN and Account Holder — for bank transfers.
  • PayPal Link — a direct link to your PayPal.
  • Payment Instructions — free text shown to players after they register (e.g., "Please include your name in the transfer reference").
  • Payment Deadline — players must pay before this date.
  • Refund Deadline — players can request a refund until this date.
  • Payment Reminder — days before the deadline to send a reminder.

Players see the applicable payment methods and instructions after registering.

Managing Registrations

The Registrations tab in tournament management shows all registered players in a table with name, email, location, status, payment status, and payment type.

What you can do:

Register a player manually — use the registration form at the top to add someone directly. You set their name, email, location, and optionally their payment type and notes.

Set payment type — for each registration, choose Transfer, PayPal, or Free from the dropdown. When you set "Free", payment is automatically marked as paid.

Mark payment — click "Mark Paid" once you've received a player's payment. This enables them to check in.

Handle cancellations — cancel a registration (status changes to cancelled) or drop a checked-in player (status changes to dropped). Cancelled and dropped registrations can be deleted permanently.

Process refunds — when a player requests a refund, it shows in the "Pending Refunds" section. Click "Mark Refunded" once processed.

Opening Registration & Check-in

Your tournament moves through these statuses:

  1. Draft — only you can see the tournament. Edit all settings freely.
  2. Registration Open — players can find and register for the tournament.
  3. Registration Closed — no new registrations. Use this when you want to stop signups before the event.
  4. Check-in — players who have paid can check in to confirm attendance. A QR code is generated that players can scan to check in on-site.

Change status from the dropdown at the top of the tournament management page.

Tip: Generate a check-in QR code and display it at the venue entrance so players can check in on their phones when they arrive.

Running Swiss Rounds

Once check-in is complete and you're ready to start:

  1. Change status to Swiss In Progress.
  2. Click Pair Next Round to generate pairings for round 1.

The system calculates the maximum number of Swiss rounds based on your checked-in player count (e.g., 5 rounds for 32 players).

For each round:

Publish — make pairings visible to players. Until published, only you can see them.

Timer — start, stop, or reset the round timer. Players see the countdown.

Wait for results — players report their own results. You can see reported results in real-time.

Edit results — override any match result manually if needed (player wins, opponent wins, draws).

Complete — mark the round as finished once all results are in. This locks the results and updates standings.

Pair next round — generate pairings for the next Swiss round based on updated standings.

If something goes wrong:

Redo pairing — regenerate pairings for an unpublished round.

Delete round — remove a non-completed round entirely and start over.

The system automatically detects rematches when pairing and attempts to repair them by swapping opponents. If rematches can't be avoided, you'll see a warning.

Bye handling

If there's an odd number of players, the lowest-ranked player who hasn't had a bye yet receives one automatically. A bye counts as a 2-0 win (3 match points), but the games don't count toward game win percentage.

Top 8

If you enabled Top 8 when creating the tournament:

  1. After all Swiss rounds are complete, click Generate Top 8.
  2. The system creates a single-elimination bracket from the top 8 players by standing.
  3. The tournament status changes to Top 8 In Progress.
  4. Run the Top 8 rounds the same way as Swiss: publish pairings, collect results, complete rounds.

If you configured a finals timer, it applies to Top 8 matches instead of the Swiss timer.

Completing the Tournament

When all rounds (Swiss and Top 8) are finished, click Complete Tournament. This:

  • Locks all results permanently.
  • Makes meta analysis available on the tournament's public page (archetype breakdown, card statistics).
  • Marks the tournament as finished for players.

Roles

You can invite others to help manage your tournament:

  • Organizer — full tournament management access.
  • Judge — tournament management access for rulings and result handling.
  • Caster — access to the TV/caster view for live coverage.

Go to the Roles section in tournament management, enter an email address, select a role, and send the invite. The invitee receives an email and can accept from their account. You can cancel pending invites at any time.

Editing & Deleting

Editing: All tournament details are editable while the tournament is in draft status. Once registration opens, some fields become locked to prevent confusion for registered players.

Deleting: Tournaments can only be deleted when in draft or cancelled status. Active tournaments with registrations must be cancelled first.

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