Crystal League Gym Challenge Rules (read before posting any challenges!)

[Phoenixsong]

Gym System Rules v 2.0 (6/26/10)​

[intro]

Welcome to the Crystal League Gym Challenge! Here you can challenge some of Dachét's toughest trainers in an attempt to wrest their official badges from their grip. Collect eight badges to complete the challenge; collect even more and there may be a few special surprises in store for you later...

This is the Crystal League, and battles in the Crystal League are expected to take place with casually-trained Pokémon. While there is no rule against challenging the gym leaders with Pokémon that have been IV-bred, EV-trained, etc., it is considered relatively unfair to those trainers who don't want to/know how to train competitively and so it is requested that you stick to more casual battles.

Before you begin the challenge, please read through all of the rules in this thread. The thread includes the rules that gym leaders must follow, rules the challengers must follow and other general information about the challenge. Even if you're not a gym leader or are a leader and don't intend to take the challenge yourself, it's a good idea to read everything here. This will be much easier on everyone as long as you follow the rules; failure to do so will result in varying degrees of punishment, lalalala.

Also, if you haven't done so already, please read the Wi-Fi League Rules here.


[gym leaders]

1. New leaders are chosen by the HC by whatever method they deem fit, usually by a tournament or some other battle. If a leader chooses to step down or is otherwise unable to continue with their work, the HC will handle the job of finding a replacement.

2. All leaders must remain active. If a gym leader has not accepted and/or completed any challenges within a month, he or she will be fired and a replacement will be found. Exceptions are made if the gym leader must be absent for a long period of time (provided they make an announcement in their topic beforehand) or if the leader simply has no challengers. Leaders may also be fired and face other consequences if they do not follow the guidelines in this topic or if they break any of the Wi-Fi League's other rules.

3. Every gym leader has a personal topic that represents their physical gym in their town or city. All matters pertaining to their gym and their challenges must be kept in that topic. That is where they can lay down their rules (single or double battle, best two out of three, tier, banned Pokémon, preferred times and methods of contact, etc.) and where challengers will post about making official challenges.

3a. Rules such as "lv100 double battle only", "No pokémon in the OU tier or above" and "best two out of three" are permitted, within reason. Rules that discriminate against other players ("male challengers only", "straight challengers only") are not permitted. You are also not allowed to have a rule such as "PBR battles only". If you have PBR and would like to battle challengers with it, you may offer that as an option, but not enough people have PBR for that to be an actual requirement for battles in your gym. If you have a rule such as "No OU pokémon", provide a link to the tier list you are using so you and your battlers are on the same page as far as what you are allowing and what you are not. And while you may ban specific pokémon (by tier or such as "No shaymin, tyranitar or dragonite allowed"), you may not circumvent the league ban list. Any bans you impose in your gym are in addition to the existing league ban list.

3b. Gym leaders are NOT exempt from their own rules. If you ban tyranitar in your gym then that means that neither you nor your opponent is permitted to use tyranitar, not "I can use tyranitar but you can't".

3c. Be sure to include the best times to battle you, preferred methods of contact and possibly an announcements section (for example, to let people know you'll be on vacation with no Wi-Fi for a month). If you don't tell challengers that you aren't available to battle on weekdays and they continually annoy you with posts saying "Hey, let's fight this Monday!" then you have no one to blame but yourself. You can also set down a minimum wait time for unsuccessful challengers (i.e. "If you lose, you must wait one week before challenging me again"). The wait time may NOT exceed thirty days, although there shouldn't be any reason for the wait time to be more than a week.

3d. Gym leaders can decide for themselves what other information they would like to keep in their gym topics. This may include victorious challengers, a bit of a backstory about the city or gym leader, even a list of the leader's pokémon if they so desire. So long as it is appropriate under the forum and league rules, it's fair game. You may also include a sprite or other graphic of your badge if you'd like. Certain fictional information about your city, gym or "leader character", if that information exists, may be used in future league storylines/events.

3e. It is expected that challengers will follow the rules, battle times, etc. that you set down unless they come directly to you asking for a special exception; if their reasoning behind needing the exception is a good one (and not something they should really just suck up, like lv50 instead of lv100), it should probably be granted. Challengers will also be granted one "skip" per league, so if they really disagree with your rules and you don't see a valid reason to bend they can skip over your gym. If, however, the HC receives repeated complaints about your rules being a bit too restrictive, we will probably contact you and ask you to revise them.

4. Gym leaders are permitted to use whatever team they like so long as it falls under the league rules and the rules of their own gym. Changes to this team are also permitted.

5. Gym leaders are still allowed to participate in other league activities and can still challenge other members for casual matches so long as those matches are not conducted using the gym topic; only official gym challenges can be made there. Use the Battle Tower or another method for arranging unofficial battles with gym leaders.

5a. This includes gym challenges: gym leaders can challenge one another for their badges (they can decide for themselves whether they both wish to ante up a badge or only the challenged leader has to). Gym leaders are considered to have earned their own badge already, so they only need to defeat seven other leaders (still following the tier guidelines given in the "Challengers" section) to gain the eight requisite badges.

6. Gym leaders are grouped into three tiers, named Tier 1, Tier 2 and Tier 3, respectively. Challengers must challenge the tiers in order and must defeat every leader in a tier to advance to the next tier. This system is used instead of the linear system in the video games in order to lessen the load on the leaders. If challengers have three leaders to choose from at once instead of just one, no one leader should be swamped with challenges while the others sit around twiddling their thumbs.

7. If a challenger agrees to a gym leader's rules (before or after any special accommodations have been made), the gym leader must then accept that challenge. Gym leaders may not refuse legitimate challenges (legitimate challenges being made by challengers who have agreed to their rules) unless they contact the HC about it with a very good reason, such as claims of dishonesty that they can at least attempt to substantiate. "I just don't like this person" is not a good reason.

8. When a gym leader is challenged for his or her badge and is defeated, he or she must confirm this in the Crystal League Records thread so that it is easier to keep track of what is going on and update records properly. Victorious challengers will have their names added to a list of members who hold that leader's badge.


[challengers]

1. Gym leaders must be challenged in tier order. If a challenger does not have proof that he or she has defeated all of the gym leaders in a tier, they may not challenge a leader in the tier above that. Challenging a leader in a higher tier without proof of clearing the lower tier(s) will result in deletion of the challenge post and any other punishment the HC deems appropriate.

2. If a challenger wishes to challenge a leader for his or her badge, he or she must post a challenge in the leader's official gym topic and must agree to abide by that leader's rules. If the challenger thinks the rules are fair but does not agree with them, he or she can discuss making an exception with the gym leader. If the gym leader can provide a good reason to refuse, then the challenger should simply withdraw his/her challenge. If, however, the challenger finds the rules unfair, please mention this to a member of the HC. Once the gym leader accepts the challenge, the battle can be planned via whatever method the battlers prefer.

2a. If a challenger wishes to challenge a leader but sees that that leader has a large number of battle requests at that time, it is polite to wait before challenging. Challenge another leader in the same tier instead, or simply wait for challenges to open up again.

2b. Gym threads are for making gym challenges only. They are not for starting conversations, challenging players other than the leader in whose gym you are posting, challenging that leader to an unofficial match, discussing strategy, telling other people about what pokémon the gym leader used, etc. Irrelevant posts will be deleted and, if the posts seem to be goading/harassing/anything else the HC deems inappropriate, the user who made them will be warned. (If you wish to challenge a gym leader but do not want to compete for a badge, arrange it over PM or use the Battle Tower.)

3. If the challenger defeats the gym leader in battle, the gym leader will post in the Crystal League Records thread to confirm this. The HC will record the results in that thread and the player will officially have that leader's badge. Note that you do NOT have the badge until the records thread has been updated.

4. If the challenger loses the match, he or she is welcome to try again; the gym leader may have set down guidelines as to how soon a challenger can challenge them again. If they have, don't repost asking for a challenge unless that period of time has already passed.

5. Challengers may have any number of open challenges at any one point, so long as those challenges are in tiers they are allowed to battle in. So, for example, a beginning trainer can post a challenge in all three Tier 1 gyms at the same time, although he obviously cannot challenge a Tier 2 gym at that point. It is possible to have existing challenges in both the Chrome and Crystal leagues, again, provided you are not overstepping your tier boundary in each league.

6. If you already have a gym leader's badge, you may not challenge them to an official match for that badge again. You are still welcome to battle the gym leader casually or in other league functions.

7. A minimum of eight badges are needed for a trainer to "complete" the league challenge. All trainers are welcome to challenge all of the gym leaders for all of the badges if they so desire, and in the future trainers with more than eight badges may be accorded special opportunities or benefits in league events. Because there are more than eight leaders, challengers are permitted one "skip"; they may challenge only two gym leaders in any given tier instead of three or more. This skip must be declared in the Crystal League Records thread before moving on to the next tier, and you MUST battle at least three leaders in the two tiers you do not skip; otherwise, you will end up with fewer than eight badges. If there are more than three leaders in a tier, only three of them may be used to count towards your league completion (though you can challenge the other leaders for their badges for the heck of it and for the extra bonuses later).

So, for example, Trainer A decides that he doesn't agree to Leader B's rules and would like to skip his gym. Leader B is a Tier 1 leader. Trainer A declares in the Crystal League Records topic that he would like to use his skip for Tier 1; he can declare the skip before he has beaten the other two leaders, after he has beaten them both or in between battles. He MUST, however, declare the skip before moving on to Tier 2. Once Trainer A has used his skip on Tier 1 he may not skip another gym. He must battle at least two other Tier 1 leaders, at least three Tier 2 leaders and at least three Tier 3 leaders. He also cannot battle only two Tier 2 leaders and then battle four Tier 3 leaders to make up the loss in Tier 2. (This example assumes more than three leaders in each tier; this is not currently the case but may be in the future.)

If there is a dispute about the outcome of a match, the match will simply be discounted and may be replayed if both parties agree. There is nothing that the HC can do to catch or prevent cheating, so no action can be taken at this point. That said, if trouble seems to arise around one particular member very frequently, action may still be taken. This applies to all members of the league, gym leader or no.


[on disconnects]

As a general rule, disconnecting during a match is forbidden and, if it is done when a player is clearly losing or after a certain number of turns have passed with no apparent connection problems, the match will be counted as a loss for the challenger. Of course, not everyone has a reliable connection and the match may be interrupted simply because someone's internet goes down or something similar. In an effort not to penalize players with poor/shaky connections, a turn limit is generally placed on matches before a disconnect is counted as deliberate. The average disconnect grace period is about 10-12 turns into the match, although different gym leaders may have different grace periods; if your connection fails before that approximate number of turns has passed, as long as you contact the leader via PM/IM/whatever to let them know and/or restart the match immediately you will not be penalized. Disconnecting after that grace period is considered a deliberate disconnect and counts as a loss for the challenger.

Gym leaders are not exempt from this rule. If the disconnect appears to be on the gym leader's end the usual way to handle it will be to replay/rearrange the match. If you notice that the leader repeatedly seems to disconnect while they are clearly losing (say, if it's happened three or more times with the same leader and no apparent connection problems), please contact the HC about it. Exceptions are generally made if the gym leader disconnects because you are not following the rules. You know if you brought a tyranitar into battle when the leader said that tyranitar is banned, so in such a case you should not complain. If this happens the gym leader should PM the challenger to remind them of the rules; if the leader is convinced that it was a genuine mistake they can decide how to handle it.

If either player has experienced repeated problems with a bad connection on their end, mention this before the battle starts (gym leaders should mention it in their gym thread if it is a regular problem for them).