Nami's TI 2022 Pick'em game

Welcome to Nami's pick'em game! This is a game of predictions for The International 2022. There's small monetary prizes available too!

Please read Rules thoroughly as I hope to make this game fair for everyone involved. If it is too much text for you to read, read the TLDR at the bottom of this page!

Entries for Group Stage proper are now closed!

Current score

Predictor	LCQ Groups	LCQ Playoffs	TOTAL
42P	28	42	70
Chris	26	37	63
Sorg	34	29	63
Wing	28	31	59
Fjara	26	32	58
Alan One	26	28	54
Aluerie	32	12	44
fll	26	16	42
antie	22	13	39
Nami	31	6	36
plaguuuu	22	14	36
MOswagHAWK	35		35
mimilander	25	10	35
arry#2731	27		27
Jake3	23		23
aru		18	18
gandolph		18	18
Seiggra	16		16

MOswagHAWK includes 3 bonus points for LCQ Groups hiscore.
42P includes 4 bonus points for LCQ Playoffs hiscore.
antie includes 1 consolidation point for LCQ Playoffs Top 2.
Chris includes 1 consolidation point for LCQ Playoffs Top 2.
Sorg includes 1 consolidation point for LCQ Playoffs Top 2.
Wing includes 1 consolidation point for LCQ Playoffs Top 2.
Nami includes -1 point for being annoying.

Scoring

Last Chance Qualifier Group Stage

Last Chance Qualifier Playoff Stage

Now open! See link above. Note that you will need a Challonge account or an email address to submit your prediction. All predictions are private until the deadline.

Playoff stages use Challonge scoring, but points for this stage are doubled.
1 point for each team correctly picked into lower bracket slots
1 point for each team correctly picked into upper bracket semi final slots
2 points for each team correctly picked into upper bracket final slots
3 points for picking upper bracket final winner
1 point for picking lower bracket final winner
Then your score is doubled.
New point added! If you predict both teams that qualify, but in the wrong order, you get 1 point as consolation.
Total Score Possible: 57.
Bonus 4 points for the highest scorer at this phase
    If 2 people tie, 2 bonus points to both instead.
    If 3-4 people tie, 1 bonus point to all instead.
    If 5 people tie, 0 bonus points.

Group Stage Proper

1 point for each team correctly positioned under a team that finishes above them.
1 point for picking 1st correctly
1 point for top 2 (regardless of order)
1 point for top 3 (regardless of order)
2 points for top 4 (regardless of order)
1 point for top 5 (regardless of order)
1 point for top 6 (regardless of order)
1 point for top 7 (regardless of order)
1 point for top 8 (regardless of order)
1 point for top 9 (regardless of order)
1 point for picking 5th-8th teams
1 point for picking 9th-10th teams
Total Score Possible: 114; 57 per group.
Bonus 5 points for the highest scorer at this phase
    If 2 people tie, 2 bonus points to each instead.
    If 3-5 people tie, 1 bonus point to all instead.
    If 6+ people tie, 0 bonus points.

New rule added! If random chance tiebreakers are used, those teams will be considered the same and will ALWAYS favor the predictor.

Main Event

Playoff stages use Challonge scoring, but points for this stage are quadrupled.
1 point for each team correctly picked into lower bracket slots
1 point for each team correctly picked into upper bracket semi final slots
2 points for each team correctly picked into upper bracket final slots
3 points for each team correctly picked into Grand Final slots
4 points for picking Grand Final Winner
Then your score is quadrupled.
Total Score Possible: 152.
Bonus 6 points for the highest scorer at this phase
    If 2 people tie, 3 bonus points to both instead.
    If 3 people tie, 2 bonus points to all instead.
    If 4-6 people tie, 1 bonus point to all instead.

What do you mean by "a team that finishes below another team" and "top X (regardless of order)"?

I understand this can be confusing so this will explain it. Imagine the table on the left is the result, and on the right is your prediction for a similar prediction game.

An image showing the results of Group A from ESL1 Malaysia, and a prediction as an example.

For each team in your prediction, they are compared pairwise to each team above them. If the pairwise in your prediction matches the one in the final result, then you score a point.
So for Alliance, you score 5 points, since they are bottom and you placed them lower than each other team.
This is also true for Talon, 4 points for that.
For Entity, you would be correct for them finishing under Secret and Aster, but incorrect for finishing under Thunder Awaken. So 2 points for that.
Similarly for Thunder Awaken, you get 2 points.
Secret also scores a point.

Then for top X, you score a point for each Top X (in this case until Top 5) that is correct.
Top 1 is correct, Top 2 is correct, Top 3 is not, Top 4 is correct, and Top 5 is correct; as such you'll get 4 points.

This is done specifically to benefit most predictions, since swapping a couple of teams - compared to the ending result - would not punish you as hard compared to most pick'em systems, which usually only care about placement.

However if you do pick the group perfectly you will always score the full number of points, while picking the complete reverse order of them finishing scores you nothing.

It sounds more confusing than it actually is, the important thing is to think about where teams will place in comparison to others, rather than just finishing place in the group.

Prizes

$50 US Prize pool, paid via PayPal

$15 For 1st place
$9 For 2nd place
$7 For 3rd place
$5 For 4th place
$4 For 5th place
$1 each for 6th-15th if they outscore Nami (that's me!)

If Nami finishes in Top 5, he claims that prize. So nobody wins it.
You must outscore Nami to claim the $1 prize, tieing is not good enough.
Tieing for places shares the total prize for all shared.

For example 2 people sharing top 2 places get $12 each instead.

Any players who are prize ineligible will not be counted towards prizes.

Rules

There is no entry fee.

Entries for LCQ Group Stage and Group Stage Proper will be done by survey. LCQ Playoffs and Main Event entries will be done through Challonge. In order to claim a prize you must be the following:

Have a Steam account that has not been Dota 2 Game Banned or have any VAC bans. (You don't have to play Dota 2, you just have to be not banned from it.)
Must have a verified PayPal account.
Must not be a Dota 2 professional player, talent or Valve employee in the past 2 years.

Anyone is welcome to play otherwise, but you need at least two of (to keep track of your score):

A Discord Username
A Steam ID
A Challonge Account
An email address

Dispensations for the above IDs may be given if I know you, none of these IDs will be shared with any entity/person/company. Main Event predictions do not have to match your in game Battle Pass predictions.

Entries are valid right up until the deadline. After deadline times will not be accepted. After the deadline all predictions are made public for everyone to see, but will remain private until the deadline. You can make more than one entry, but only your last entry will be the counted. If you miss a phase you can still enter for later phases, you just wont score for the phases you missed.

I, Nami, will be playing along too.

If you have any other questions, or any suggestions, don't hesitate to contact me on twitter @tsunamishadow or Discord tsunamishadow#2791.

TLDR

At each Phase of TI you can enter a prediction. For a group pick the order the teams will finish. For a bracket, predict the full bracket.
The group predictions will be done by survey, the bracket predictions will be done via Challonge.
Prizes will be awarded to the best predictors.
There's no entry fee. Good luck and have fun!