KotS XVI [Global]

King of the Sea is the pinnacle of World of Warships competition. Originally founded on the EU server, King of the Sea (or KotS) has grown to become a bi-annual event held on all four Warships servers. Thanks to its grassroots support, the tournament has grown from its humble beginnings to become the official main event of World of Warships competitive gameplay.

October and November 2023 will play host to the sixteenth iteration of the tournament, with various new content additions, website improvements, press accounts, new restrictions and maps to shake up the meta. This KotS has a chance to be the greatest one yet!

Thanks to our ever-growing community awareness and growing volunteer pools, we are doing everything in our power to ensure that the tournament goes as smoothly as possible for all teams involved.

Good luck! And may the best cherish their crowns as true Kings of the Sea.

General Information

King of the Sea XVI is divided into two segments: the regional tournament, played on the EU, NA, ASIA and CN server, and the international tournament, where the best teams from each region face off against each other. For the tournament structures, please see the Appendices.

Schedule

While the stage being played at any date may vary based on region, the following dates will be used for the event:

Stage	Date
Regional Tournament Day 1	14 October 2023
Regional Tournament Day 2	15 October 2023
Regional Tournament Day 3	21 October 2023
Regional Tournament Day 4	22 October 2023
Regional Tournament Day 5	28 October 2023
Regional Tournament Day 6	29 October 2023
International Finals Day 1	04 November 2023
International Finals Day 2	05 November 2023

All times are given for a single time zone for each tournament:

Primary Timezones
INT	UTC	Coordinated Universal Time
EU Day 1 - Day 5	UTC +2	CEST (Central European Summer Time)
EU Day 6	UTC +1	CET (Central European Time)
NA	UTC -4	EDT (Eastern Daylight Time)
ASIA	UTC +8	SGT (Singapore Time)
CN	UTC +8	CST (China Standard Time)

Format

All games are played in a 9v9 format with Tier X ships only.
Teams may field up to 2 battleships.
The use of carriers and submarines is prohibited.
Following restrictions apply:

Banned: Brisbane, Nevsky, Louisiana
Combined ≤ 1: Moskva, Petropavlovsk, St. Vincent
Combined ≤ 3: Gdansk, Kleber, Marceau, Ragnar, Des Moines, Napoli, Stalingrad, Kremlin, Ohio

Combined ≤ 1: Gdansk, Marceau, Ragnar
Napoli ≤ 1

Test ships, ships in Early Access, not obtainable without purchases or no longer readily available are also banned from use. See Appendix B for a comprehensive list.
Any ships banned during the tournament (see paragraph 4.4) are not allowed to be used.
Teams are composed of at least 9 players and a maximum of 15 players.
One or two of these players are designated team representatives, and must join and be available on the KotS discord.
The total number of teams allowed to register varies by region and can be found in the regional appendices.

Website and Public Information

Team registration and management will be handled by the WoWs Tournaments website.
All tournaments will be using Toornament as a supportive tool for live bracket updates:

Through Toornament, the public will be able to see:

Team Name
Team Logo
Team Players
Team Standings

Game Modifications

All mods from Aslain’s Mod Pack, the official Wargaming ModStation, or the mod-download-corner on the official WoWs discord are allowed.
All players must have replays enabled. Replays are enabled by default and should be preserved by teams for all tournament battles for at least 48 hours.

Note: Replays are overwritten by default, make sure to copy them to a separate folder following your games.

Map Pool

Following maps will be played in the tournament:

Map	Battle mode
Estuary	Tournament. Domination - Four Areas - Alternative
Loop	Tournament. Domination - Four Areas
Northern Waters	Tournament. Domination.
Shatter	Tournament. Domination - Alternative
Sleeping Giant	Tournament. Domination - Alternative
The Faroe Islands	Tournament. Domination - Four Areas
Warrior’s Path	Tournament. Domination - Alternative

Map images can be found under the following link: KotS XVI [Global] - Maps

Prizes

Prizes are awarded per player, regardless of roster size.
For a team to be eligible for prizes, they must complete all matches in which they are scheduled. Failure to play all scheduled matches or other misconduct may result in a reduction or full withholding of prizes.
A team with players from only one clan may choose to have the doubloons and steel sent to the clan treasury. The amount will be in line with the amount of players on the roster.
Tournament prizes can be found in the respective Appendix.

Team Setup and Communications

Registration

All teams must register on the WoWs Tournaments website.
Registration period:

EU Registration opens: 22 September 2023 16:00 CEST

Registration closes: 8 October 2023 23:59 CEST

NA Registration opens: 22 September 2023 10:00 EDT

Registration closes: 8 October 2023 23:59 EDT

ASIA Registration opens: 22 September 22:00 SGT

Registration closes: 8 October 2023 23:59 SGT

Additional instructions on how to register are available on the King of the Sea discord server, in the respective regional signup channel:

Players need to have at least 1,000 recorded Random or Ranked battles on their account, or participated in an official WG, or WG sponsored tournament in the past 6 months.
Players can only be a member of one team and may only participate in one regional tournament.
Players can only participate in the international tournament with the same team they participated with in the regional tournament.
All participating players will receive a press account prior to the tournament start for mandatory use. The use of this press account is exclusively granted to the player it was handed out to. Distribution of this press account to other players, or the facilitated use of this press account for any other individual is prohibited and may result in tournament or game sanctions.
For further information regarding the press account rules and how to set them up, please refer to the following guide: KotS XVI [Global] - Press Account Guide
Teams may modify their roster after the registration phase with permission of a regional adjudicator or organizer and only if there are still outstanding games for that team to play.
Team Names and Team Tags should be substantially related to each other.
Registration is by team, not by clan. Teams can be made up of members of multiple clans.
Teams are expected to play all matches. Failure to complete assigned games may result in the loss of prizes or other sanctions, including a ban from future tournaments. Should a team need to withdraw they should contact their assigned referee or adjudicator.
Places in the tournament are allocated by date and time on a first-come, first-served basis. In case the maximum capacity of teams is exceeded, remaining teams will be placed on a waiting list and admitted in case already registered teams withdraw from the tournament prior to the start of the first game day.

Team Logos

Team Logos are not required, but are highly recommended to aid a team’s visual brand.
Logos are to be uploaded to the registration portal.
Logos should be 200x200 pixels with a transparent background in PNG format.
For best results, logo elements should be recognizable even when scaled to 80x80. It is also preferable that the logo is easily visible against both light and dark backgrounds by design.
Team Logos should be considered age-appropriate. This is PG-13 or PEGI 12.
Logos should not contain inappropriate symbols, logos, or images.
The KotS team reserves the right to reject any and all logos as needed.
Team logos will be edited as necessary to fit above rules if a solution is not found.
Team logos should not contain content that is copyrighted or belongs to another game’s IP.

Communications

The team captain and team co-captain must join the KotS discord.
Team registration is not possible until a team representative is available in the KotS discord.
All teams must have one of their representatives available on the KotS discord on match days.
All team representatives must be able to communicate in English (All other servers and international events).
One team representative must attend the pre-tournament reps meeting.
Team members are encouraged to join the KotS discord.
Members of the KotS discord are not allowed to ping WG Staff and should only contact WG Staff if directed to by a tournament staff member.

Tournament

General

The tournament is conducted using Training Rooms.
Unless specifically stated otherwise, each match is hosted by a “Home Team”

The Home Team occupies the top slot in the respective matchup in Toornament.
The Host/Home Team is responsible for opening the room and inviting their opponent and any streamers.

Each room should be named using the format:

Team 1 vs Team 2

Teams are allowed to change their lineup between games, but cannot change them during a restart.
Teams should not be readied up until both teams are fully sorted onto their sides.
If teams are short a player, they can bring a maximum of 2 bot players. The bot players must be set to high intelligence.
Teams cannot play with less than 7 players and will be considered as no-show if they cannot field a team within the allowed time.
Spectator mode should be enabled, but only official streamers, tournament staff, or designated WG staff may occupy spectator places.

Room Settings

The battle must be set for twenty (20) minutes.
The battle mode must be set according to paragraph 2.6.1..
Each team must be placed in their correct side and lineups must be hidden from the opponent.
It is up to both teams to ensure the settings are chosen correctly.
If a mistake is found, notify your opponent as soon as possible. After two minutes have elapsed on the game clock, the game must be played to completion and the result will be valid.
Repeated errors by a team in this regard may result in disqualification.

Map Bans and Picks

All matches designated in the regional structure appendices below will choose maps via pick/bans on the website.
Pick/ban process is as follows for a best-of-two:

Team 1 bans a map.
Team 2 bans a map. It can be the same map as Team 1.
Team 1 chooses an unbanned map to play for game 1.
Team 2 chooses their spawn for game 1.
Team 2 chooses the map to play for game 2.
Team 1 chooses their spawn for game 2.

Pick/ban process is as follows for a best-of-three:

Map bans and picks for maps 1&2 as for a best-of-two series
The website will assign an unplayed and unbanned map for game 3.
The website will assign random spawns.

Pick/ban process is as follows for a best-of-five:

Map bans and picks for maps 1&2 as for a best-of-two series.
Team 1 chooses the map to play for game 3.
Team 2 chooses their spawn for game 3.
Team 2 chooses the map to play for game 4.
Team 1 chooses their spawn for game 4.
The website will assign an unplayed and unbanned map for game 5.
The website will assign random spawns.

Ship Bans

Ship Bans will be used in stages of the tournament listed in the tournament appendices. The following procedures will apply to all tournaments.
At a stage of the event listed within each tournament’s format, an additional ban per team, per map will come into effect.
The additional ban per team will be a blind ban from each team, and apply for a specific map. These bans will be conducted right after each map and spawn pick process.
There are no class bans, so each ship is an individual ban.
Bringing a banned ship automatically results in a game forfeit.

If one team brings a banned ship, that team will forfeit the game.
If both teams bring a banned ship, both teams forfeit the game.

General Rules

Score Reporting

Both teams will upload a replay of their game to the tournament website for score reporting.
Specific or additional requirements for score reporting can be found in each regional appendix.

Disputes and Restarts

Teams should not be readied up until they are fully sorted onto their sides. This is to prevent lineup leaks in case somebody is moved to the wrong side.
After 10 minutes passed from the scheduled start times, if teams are not fully readied up in the training room lobby, both of them forfeit the game. If one team is available but the other is not, the present team will receive a game win. Reporting teams are required to provide a screenshot with visible client time.

The same 10 minute timer applies to the allowed waiting time between games within a match.
For restarts, the timer is reduced to 5 minutes, starting at the time of the restart call.

A restart may be requested if:

A player fails to load/disconnects.
The spawns/room settings are incorrect.
There are bugged spawns.

Only 1 restart is allowed per team for best of 1, best of 2 and best of 3 series. Teams are allowed 2 restarts during a best of 5 series. Further restarts can occur at organizer discretion in the event of training room issues.
In the event of a restart, please notify your assigned referee as soon as possible by pinging in discord.
An additional restart can be granted on a case-by-case basis.
Restarts requested by regional organizers, Battle Faults, do not count against a team’s limit.
During a restart, teams may not change their ship lineup or a ship’s settings. These include signals, consumables, captains and all other modifications to the ship. They can change players if someone cannot reconnect, or move players between ships.
Restarts cannot be requested after two minutes have passed of game-time. After this time, both teams are considered to have agreed to the game rules and the game should be played to completion.

Broadcasts

All official streams will be coordinated by the KotS Organizers.
All streamers will load into the battle in spectator mode.
The start of some battles may be held to allow streamers to finish a prior battle. Teams will be informed by a Referee if this is the case. In this case the start time will be delayed by a Referee.
Teams which begin their games without waiting for a previously announced streamer will receive a warning after the first violation. Further violations may lead to prize reductions.
We trust streamers not to pass along information that may skew results. If irrefutable evidence of this is found, said streamer will be banned permanently from all tournament-related events and a temporary ban will be issued for any player who acted on any such information.
Teams may not refuse or attempt to refuse having their matches broadcast, violations may lead to disqualification.

Rules for Official Streamers

Streamers wanting to broadcast any regional tournament are required to register on the WoWs tournaments website and for each gameday they are planning to broadcast.
Streamers wanting to broadcast the international part of the tournament are required to have streamed at least two days of any regional tournament.
All official streams will have a minimum five-minute delay.
Streamers are required to report on their streaming stats and to link the respective VOD and/or other video upload (ex. YouTube).
Streamers are required to make their VODs of each streamed tournament day publicly available.
Streamers are required to use the official tournament stream overlays. Overlays should be installed as soon as possible once they are made available and all technical issues should be addressed before the start of the event.
Streamers are required to use the official tournament mod settings.
Streamers are required to use a non-rotating minimap with ship names enabled.
Streamers are not to have facecams during games themselves. Facecams in intermissions are preferred.
Streamers should maintain appropriate respect for all participants, tournament staff, and viewers while streaming the event. Part of this is being on time, others are waiting for you, respect their time.
Streamers should maintain neutrality in their coverage of the game and not overtly support one team or another and should broadcast both teams’ perspective in the battle.
While on stream, Streamers must maintain a professional image and should not directly criticize participants, tournament staff, or tournament sponsors. Gameplay commentary is fine, but should maintain a professional tone.
Streamers shall avoid any conduct that would violate the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) or any similar laws in other jurisdictions.
Streamers may not stream battles involving a team containing members of a clan or community they are a member of or were a member of in the 3 months preceding the tournament, unless they received approval from the enemy team or direct approval from their regional Coordinators.
Individuals or accounts that are barred from playing in King of the Sea are similarly barred from being official streamers.
Streamers may not at any time during a King of the Sea broadcast promote or advertise any third-party games or products without prior approval from the tournament owner.

Sportsmanship

Treat your opponents with respect. We expect all teams to play seriously, no matter the opponent. Obvious trolling or throwing will be treated as unsportsmanlike play and sanctioned if necessary.
We have no desire to punish or disqualify teams unless absolutely necessary. If it is possible to settle disputes without resorting to a formal complaint, we encourage all teams to do so. Those that insist on applying the strict letter of the rules to their opponent will be held to the same standard.
Delaying games unnecessarily is a rules violation and can be punished with a default loss. If you are having technical issues, let your referee and opponent know in good time.
All World of Warships Game Rules apply to any battles played in the tournament.
All participants of the tournament are subject to the Global Tournament Participant guidelines.
Players or clans sanctioned under rules in this document or that have been sanctioned by the tournament owner for rule violations in game may be excluded from future KotS iterations at the discretion of the tournament owner.

Rules for Tournament Staff

Definitions

For purposes of this section, “tournament staff” or “staff” includes all Coordinators, Adjudicators and Referees.
For purposes of this section, “adjudication” means the act of ruling on a dispute between parties and/or the enforcement of a tournament rule. It does not include purely administrative tasks such as score entry or streamer management.

Staff may not engage in adjudication in any matches involving a team representing their own clan or community OR a team made up of more than 3 members from their clan or community. Similarly, staff may not be assigned to referee a match or group in which such a team is participating.
Staff who are rostered on a team shall not engage in adjudication of any match while their team is actively playing.
In the event a procedural rule needs to be changed, staff who are rostered on teams that are still participating in the event shall defer to non competing staff when making such decisions.

Rule Changes

The tournament organizer reserves the right to change and update the tournament rules at any time.
Participants will be notified of any rule changes after the start of the tournament on the tournament discord server. They will also be listed in Appendix K.
By continuing to participate in the tournament after the changes have been announced, participants agree to follow any changed rules.

Glossary

Term	Explanation
Regional Coordinators	Tournament administrators, the individuals who make KotS happen.
Adjudicator	Tournament staff that handle administrative tasks and supervise referees.
Referee	Coordinates game day activities and assists organizers as needed.
Scorekeeper	Tournament staff member specifically charged with the entry of results.
Captain	Team leader, a representative who manages his or her team registration.
Game	A part of a match, played on one map.
KotS	Short for “King of the Sea”.
Lineup	A list of players and the ships they are bringing into a game.
Match	A number of games between two opponents in a given round.
Matchup	A pairing of two opponents.
Battle Fault	A restart ordered by a tournament official.
Representative	A designated member of a team who handles communication on Discord.
Round	A group of matches played simultaneously.
Stage	A group of rounds played as a continuous structure.
Streamer	A person who broadcasts matches on behalf of the organizers.
Structure	Rules defining the advancement of teams and future matchups.

Appendices

Appendix A: Useful Links

KotS Discord

WoWs Tournaments website

Appendix B: List of Banned Ships

Unobtainable

Tournament Ban

Early Access / Dockyard

Test Ships

ARP Yamato

Kleber CLR

Napoli B

Puerto Rico

R. Lauria

Thunderer

Smaland

Smolensk

Smolensk B

Somers

Yoshino B

A. Nevsky

Brisbane

Louisiana

Bungo

Lüshun

Defence

Kitakami

Komissar

Appendix C: List of Playable Ships

Nation	Battleship	Cruiser	Destroyer
Commonwealth	-	-	Vampire II
France	Bourgogne Republique	Colbert Henri IV Marseille	Kleber Marceau
Germany	Großer Kurfürst Mecklenburg Preussen Schlieffen	Hindenburg	Elbing Z-42 Z-52
Italy	C. Colombo	Napoli Venezia	A. Regolo
Japan	Shikishima Yamato	Yodo Yoshino Zao	Harugumo Hayate Shimakaze
Netherlands	-	Gouden Leeuw	Tromp
Pan-America	-	San Martin	-
Pan-Asia	-	Jinan	Yueyang
Pan-Europe	-	-	Gdansk Halland Ragnar
Soviet Union	Kremlin Slava	Moskva Petropavlovsk Sevastopol Stalingrad	Delny Grozovoi Khabarovsk
Spain	-	Castilla	Alvaro de Bazan
United Kingdom	Conqueror Incomparable St. Vincent	Gibraltar Goliath Minotaur Plymouth	Daring Druid
United States	Montana Ohio Vermont	Austin Des Moines Salem Worcester	F. Sherman Gearing

Appendix D: INT Format

The International Tournament is the final stage of King of the Sea, and includes teams from each (EU, NA, ASIA and CN) region.

Important links:

KotS XVI [INT] - Link Collection

KotS XVI [INT] - Bracket

KotS XVI [INT] - Toornament Page

A total of 10 teams will compete in the International Tournament.

Each region is awarded 2 slots per default.
The remaining slots will be awarded to the 2 best performing regions of King of the Sea XV.

1 extra slot will be awarded to the EU region.
1 extra slot will be awarded to the ASIA region.

The International Tournament will start with a Round Robin Group Stage, followed by a Double Elimination Playoffs bracket.
Teams will be placed in 2 groups of 5 teams by a random draw with pots based on their regional ranking.
Matches in the Group Stage are best-of-two with map bans and picks and ship bans. Teams are required to finish the ban and pick process for all Group Stage matches until 03.11. 18:00 UTC.

The ban and pick process for all Group Stage matches will start on 01.11. 18:00 UTC.
Teams will be allotted 24h to complete the ban and pick processes for all Group Stage matches.
Any attempts to artificially draw out the pick/ban timer may result in potential consequences for the team in question.

Following procedure will determine the final standing of teams in case of ties:

Should teams be tied for a placement, the head to head record among the tied teams will first be applied to break the tie.
Should exactly 2 teams still be tied, a Bo1 decider match between those teams will be played directly after the stage ended on the same day. The team with the better point differential will be Team 1.
Ban/pick procedure for the Bo1 decider match:

Both teams alternately ban a map until only one map remains.
Team 1 picks the spawn.
Both teams ban a ship.

Should 3 or more teams still be tied, the next tiebreaker will be the sum of the point differential for each team in the matches between the tied teams. The top 2 ranked teams in this system will play a decider match according to 7.4.6.2. and 7.4.6.3.

The top 2 teams of each group advance to the Playoffs bracket.
The full bracket including details, seeding and progression can be viewed under following link: KotS XVI [INT] - Bracket
Participants in the International Tournament need to agree to the legal rules and restrictions set out here: Official Contest Rules - King of the Sea XVI.
Eligible winners will receive the following prize payout based on their team’s final standing, divided by the amount of team members in the International Roster.

Final Standing	Team Prize Pool
1st Place	17.500 USD
2nd Place	10.000 USD
3rd Place	7.500 USD
4th Place	5.000 USD
5th & 6th Place	3.000 USD
7th & 8th Place	2.000 USD

In the case that one or more players in a team are not eligible to receive a cash prize based on the legal rules and restrictions, their prize will be divided equally among all other members of the team.
Following procedure will clarify possible roster changes between the Regional an the International Tournament:

A maximum of 3 swaps will be allowed.
Teams may swap out any player, regardless of their participation in the Regional tournament.
Requesting roster changes will be possible from 30.10. 12:00 UTC until 03.11. 12:00 UTC.

Appendix E: EU Format

King of the Sea (EU) is a four-stage tournament. Up to 88 teams will be fighting for the regional King of the Sea title as well as the right to represent the EU region in the international event.

Important links:

KotS XVI [EU] - Link Collection

KotS XVI [EU] - Bracket

KotS XVI [EU] - Performance Rating

KotS XVI [EU] - Toornament Page

Registration and Performance Ranking

Teams will enter the tournament on a first come, first served basis based on the order of registration. Registrations that exceed the minimum capacity of 72 teams will be placed on a waitlist.

Waitlisted teams can enter the tournament for every team that cancels their registration, or for every 8 teams on that list, until the maximum capacity of 88 teams is reached.
Once tournament spots become available, waitlisted teams have 24h to confirm their participation via the KotS discord.

All registered teams must confirm their participation until 09.10.2023 20:00 CEST. Detailed instructions on how teams can do so will be available on the KotS discord.
Teams will be placed into seeding pots with 8 teams per pot based on their Performance Ranking.
Progression of teams in stages after Q1 is predetermined. Please refer to the Bracket sheet for details.

Qualifier Stage 1 (Q1) - Day 1

Q1 will see 8 Round-Robin groups of up to 10 teams playing in a best-of-one format.
The groups will be determined by a random draw with pots based on a team’s Performance Rating.
Map Rotation is fixed in Q1:

Round 1 - Estuary
Round 2 - Loop
Round 3 - Northern Waters
Round 4 - Shatter
Round 5 - Sleeping Giant
Round 6 - The Faroe Islands
Round 7 - Warrior’s Path
Round 8 - Estuary*
Round 9 - Loop*

*Only played in the case of more than 8 teams per group.

The first mentioned team of a match will always play alpha spawn.
A game win during a Bo1 match will result in 1 point for the group standings.
Progression out of Q1 will be the following:

The 1st to 3rd placed teams advance to Q2.
Remaining teams are eliminated.

Qualifier Stage 2 (Q2) - Day 2

Q2 will see 4 double elimination bracket groups of 8 teams playing in a best-of-three format.
The 8 seeded teams will meet the advancing teams from Q1.

Seeded team meets 3rd place in round 1.
1st place meets 2nd place round 1.

Progression out of Q2 is the following:

Winner teams (2-0) and Runner-Ups (2-1) advance to the Groups (G).
Remaining teams are eliminated.

This stage and all subsequent stages will utilize both the map bans and picks and ship bans systems detailed in section 4.3. and 4.4.

Groups - Day 3 & 4

Groups will see 2 round-robin groups of 8 teams playing in a Bo2 format.
A game win during a Bo2 match will result in 1 point for the group standings.

A 2-0 results in 2 points for the winning team.
A 1-1 results in 1 point for each team.

Progression out of Groups is the following:

1st and 2nd placed teams will advance to the Winner’s Bracket of Playoffs.
3rd and 4th placed teams will advance to the Loser’s Bracket of Playoffs.
Remaining teams are eliminated.

Playoffs - Day 5 & 6

The Playoffs will be played in a double elimination bracket of 8 teams playing in different formats based on the respective round.

The WB Final, LB Round 3, LB Final and Grand Final are a best-of-five.
Remaining matches are best-of-three.

Every team is required to nominate at least 1 team representative for post match interviews on the official broadcast.
The top three teams will advance to the international event.

Player Replacements after Registration phase

Replacements according to rule 3.1.8. can only be requested in a designated channel on the KotS discord.
Request Deadlines per tournament week:

Weekend 1 (Day 1 & 2) - 13.10.23 18:00 CEST.
Weekend 2 (Day 3 & 4) - 20.10.23 18:00 CEST.
Weekend 3 (Day 5 & 6) - no changes permitted.

Forfeits

Should a team forfeit the tournament prior to its start, a team from the waitlist will take their place.
Should a team forfeit the tournament after it started, following actions based on the format of the at that moment ongoing stage will take place:

In round-robin groups, all finished and outstanding matches of that team will be forfeited.
In DE brackets, the ongoing round featuring the forfeiting team will be forfeited. Their opponent will advance instead.

Tiebreaker

Should teams be tied for a placement, the head to head record among the tied teams will first be applied to break the tie.
Should exactly 2 teams still be tied, a Bo1 decider match between those teams will be played directly after the stage ended on the same day. The team with the better point differential will be Team 1.
Should three or more teams be tied for a placement, they will play decider matches in a King of the Hill format. The seeding will be based on the sum of the point differential for each team in the matches between the tied teams.
The format of decider matches is the following:

Each team bans a map in turn until one map is left. The higher seed bans the first map.
The higher seed picks the spawn.
Both teams ban a ship blind.

Prize Pool

Appendix F: NA Format

King of the Sea (North America) is a four-stage tournament where up to 64 teams will compete to show their skills and strategies against fellow American teams. The sixteenth iteration of KotS features some format changes to increase placement accuracy as well as increase game count for nearly all participating teams. May the best team emerge, as King of the Sea.

KotS XVI [NA] - Link Collection

KotS XVI [NA] - Toornament Page

A Note from the Orgs:
King of the Seas 16 NA will include many familiar stages and rules, but there have been some name alterations to unify terminology further between regions. This has been done so we can analyze data and information with greater ease. The stages are the following: Qualifiers, Bracket Groups, and Playoffs. Furthermore, KotS 16 NA will not utilize any seeding going into the tournament, only distribution within the format. This means that all teams registered will be participating in Qualifiers 1, including the best competitors from the previous tournaments.

The coordinator team feels like the value gained from seeding on NA has lessened over time, resulting in a format without seeding, even going so far as to not mimic other servers seeding rating systems. The overall goal of this is to bring the battle count for all teams up to greater parity, increasing experience, and thus the overall competitiveness within the regional tournament. If you have further inquiries or opinions about this matter, please feel free to ask in the #need-help-na channel within the discord and we will do our best to explain further.

Registration and Seeding.

Registration will be handled the website as referenced in 3.1
Registrations that exceed the maximum capacity of 64 teams will be placed on a wait list.

Qualifier Stage 1 - Day 1 – Saturday, October 14th

The qualifiers stage will bring all 64 registered teams to competition on October 14th, beginning at 3pm EDT. Teams will compete in one of 8 round robin groups with 7 or 8 teams per group.

Teams are randomly shuffled into these groups.
The top three teams from KotS 15 NA can not share a qualifier group.

Each team will play 6-7 matches, one against each opponent
Map rotation is fixed in the Qualifiers Stage 1:

Round 1 - Warrior’s Path
Round 2 - Northern Waters
Round 3 - Estuary
Round 4 - The Faroe Islands
Round 5 - Shatter
Round 6 - Sleeping Giant
Round 7 - Loop

The top team from each group will skip the Qualifiers Stage 2 and go into Bracket Groups on October 21st
Tiebreaks will be decided by Head-to-head record, and in the event of a three way tie, the total points earned in each match between the three teams will be used to calculate the victor.
Due to signups being slightly below target, Qualifier Stage 1 has been slightly tweaked to have flexibility for varied team counts.

Qualifier Stage 2 - Day 2 – Sunday, October 15th

This stage will host the remaining 49 teams in 8 groups of 6-7 teams playing in a round robin. Starting at 3pm EDT.
Each team will play 5-6 matches, one against each opponent.
Teams will be randomly distributed from Qualifier Stage 1 Placement, each Stage 2 group will have a team that was 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, and 8th in their Stage 1 group.
Map rotation is fixed in the Qualifiers Stage 2:

Round 1 - The Faroe Islands
Round 2 - Sleeping Giant
Round 3 - Shatter
Round 4 - Estuary
Round 5 - Warrior’s Path
Round 6 - Loop

Tiebreaks will be decided by Head-to-head record, and in the event of a three way tie, the total points earned in each match between the three teams will be used to calculate the victor.

If a further H2H tiebreaker is needed it will be played on Loop

The top three teams from each group will move on to bracket Groups on October 21st.
This stage will utilize ship bans as described in 4.4.

Groups - Day 3 – Saturday, October 21st

The Groups Stage will include the top two of each group from Qualifiers Day 1, and Qualifiers Day 2. This stage starts at 3pm EDT.

Each group will have a First Place team from Qualifiers Stage 1, and a First, Second, and Third Place team from Qualifiers Stage 2. They shall be seeded as follows:

Qualifier Stage 1 First - #1 Seed
Qualifier Stage 2 First - #2 Seed
Qualifier Stage 2 Second - #3 Seed
Qualifier Stage 2 Third - #4 Seed

#1 will play #4, and #2 will play #3 in the initial bracket.

This stage will utilize ship bans as described in 4.4. As well as Map picks as described in 4.3.
Groups will utilize a 4 team bracket as pictured below:

Playoff Stage - Days 4, 5 & 6 – October 22nd, 28th, and 29th.

Playoffs will be divided into a Winners Bracket (WB) and a Losers Bracket (LB) which will then lead to a Grand Final between the winner of the WB and the winner of the LB with a one game advantage.
All games played in Playoff will be best of 3 with the following exceptions which will be played in best of 5: WB Semifinals, WB Final, LB Final and Grand Final.

The Grand final will start with a 1 game advantage for the Winner’s Bracket victor.

Teams will be distributed accordingly:

Teams will be assigned seed positions as shown: here.
The Playoff stage will utilize both the map pick/ban and ship ban systems detailed in section 4.3. and 4.4.
The top 2 finishing teams will participate in KotS Internationals during the first weekend of November.

NA Prize Pool

Here

Appendix G: ASIA Format

King of the Sea (Asia) is a three-stage tournament. Teams will begin in the qualifier. Eight teams will be seeded to the group stage, splitting into eight different groups based on KotS XV and Clan Battles Season “Anaconda” ranking. The remaining teams will be divided amongst the groups. From this, the top two teams in each group move on to the Regional Playoffs. In the Playoffs, they fight to be the top three teams from the region.

Registration

Teams will enter the tournament on a first come, first served basis based on the order of registration, with seed teams taking the priority.
Registrations that exceed the minimum capacity of 48 teams will be placed on a waitlist and can enter the tournament for every 8 teams on that list.

Qualifier

Teams will be split up into 8 round-robin groups based on their Performance Ranking. The calculation can be viewed under following link: TBD
Each team will play Best of two (BO2) round-robin games within their group. Top 4 of each group advance to the group stage.
In case of a tie, first the head to head record among the tied teams will first be applied to break the tie. If this is impossible, decider matches will be played directly after the stage ends on the same day.
The decider matches will use the next map after the last map played in the map rotation. With team that has higher standing on toornament website playing on Alpha.
Map rotation:

Round 1 - Estuary
Round 2 - The Faroe Islands
Round 3 - Loop
Round 4 - Northern Waters
Round 5 - Shatter
Round 6 - Sleeping Giant
Round 7 - Warrior’s Path

Groups

Seeded teams will play in the Groups Stage, but will not face each other in this stage. There are eight seeded teams on the ASIA server.
In this stage we will begin using the team ship bans.
All teams will compete using a Best of 3 round-robin format. Top 2 of the group advance.
Map rotation for every round:
Map 1 - The Faroe Islands
Map 2 - Warrior’s Path
Map 3 - Sleeping Giant
If teams are tied in the final standing, the following factors will be used for tiebreaker in order.

Head to head results.
If unable to tiebreak with head to head results, teams will play an additional tie breaking game on map “Northern Waters” with team that has higher standing on toornament website playing on Alpha, for this map ship ban, the instruction will be provided by coordinator.

Playoffs

This stage is played in double elimination format. The first round is RO16. In this round, sixteen teams compete.
Placement within the playoffs bracket is dependent on initial seed. Group winners will play against group runner-ups in a best-of-3 matchup.
The loser from this match onward will continue playing in the lower bracket, the winner from lower bracket will meet the winner from the winner bracket in the Grand Final.
All matches will be played in best of three (BO3) format, except lower bracket final and Grand final, which will be played in best of five (BO5) format. From this stage onward, we will use a map pick/ban system specified in rule 4.3.

ASIA Prize Pool

Seed teams, Kots XVI

Top 4 from Kots XV and team based on Clan Battles Season “Anaconda” ranking. Half of the team members must be from the seeded clans/teams.

Top 4 from Kots XV:

VOR
STCN
TSUKI
HEAL
Top 4 from CB Season “Anaconda:
TBD
TBD
TBD
TBD

Schedule

Qualifiers: 14 October 2023
Groups: 15 October 2023
RO16 + LB round 1 + RO8: 21 October 2023
LB round 2 + WB Semifinal + LB round 3: 22 October 2023
LB round 4 + Winner Bracket Final + LB round 5: 28 October 2023
Lower Bracket Final + Grand Final: 29 October 2023

Appendix H: CN Format

The format for King of the Sea XVI (CN) can be found in the translated rules document here.

Appendix I: Map Spawn Locations

Map Name	Alpha Spawn	Bravo Spawn
Estuary	North	South
Faroe Islands	North-East	South-West
Loop	North	South
Northern Waters	North	South
Sleeping Giant	North	South
Shatter	North	South
Warrior’s Path	North	South

Appendix J: List of Players banned from KotS

A list of banned players can be found under the following link: KotS [Global] - Ban List.
If a banned player owns multiple accounts, all other accounts are considered banned as well.
Ban appeals can be submitted to the tournament owner.

Appendix K: Rule Amendments

Updated 7.4. - Added details for the International Tournament.
Updated 7.6.25.1 - Added 7.6.25.1.1 and 7.6.25.1.2
Updated NA Format Section.
Tweaked 7.6.26.3 to be accurate given map assignments.
Updated 7.2. - Added Smolensk B to the list of banned ships.
Added 7.5.8.1 (EU) to clarify tiebreakers.
Updated 7.4.4. and 7.4.4.1. - The pick/ban votes will start 24h later.
Updated 7.4.11.2. to clarify roster changes.