Hello,
With the arrival of the new format, I would like to bring a major update concerning next season, which should clarify some things for many teams that are still thinking about participating in the next MKU season.
First of all, MKU Staff would like to thank every team for voting in our survey that was done a few weeks ago about which times would they prefer to play their matches, as well as everyone who gave their advice and concerns as leader or member of their respective team. It definitely helped us coming with that update that should be appreciated by many people, by the way.
As posted on Confirmation thread, results have shown that around 60% of the teams prefer playing their matches at 3/4pm ET, while around 40% of the teams prefer playing their matches at 2/3pm EDT. But, after talking with most players involved in the discussion, we noticed that teams who preferred playing at 2/3pm ET had issues with playing at 4pm, because it would involve players finishing playing at 11pm on Sunday (in Europe). This could cause problems with school, work, parents or whatever for some people, which is perfectly understandable. Also, since it affects around 40% of the teams, which is far from negligible, we decided to modify our system for these people so they aren't penalized.
We are proud to announce that we’ve we created a new schedule system for the new format! We are abolishing the traditional MKU default time, which means neither 2/3pm nor 3/4pm will be the default time. Instead, teams who prefer playing at 2/3pm will be able to play all of their matches at 2/3pm without being penalized to finish a match late in the evening. In a similar fashion, for teams who prefer playing their matches at 3/4pm, the algorithm is done so these teams will play almost all their matches at 3/4pm, with only a few times where these teams will have to play at 2pm. Detailing the algorithm would not provide any additional information for the public, as it will be implemented on our new Excel sheet that we’ll use to build seedings and schedule.
In short, we guarantee that:
- Teams that cannot play late on Sunday won't be penalized and will play all their matches at 2 or 3pm;
- Teams that prefer playing at 3/4pm will almost always play at least 13 out of 16 matches at their preferred time, but most teams will be scheduled to play 14 or 15 matches out of the 16 at 3/4pm, so only a small portion of matches will be played at 2pm for these teams.
Next, we noticed that newer teams in the scene were less comfortable in playing two consecutive matches for this format. Instead of forcing these teams to play with the new format, we’ve decided to apply our new format to the Top 48 only (The first 4 Divisions in our new format). For teams that will be seeded lower than the Top 48, we will do a vote on Seedings' Day to decide if we apply the new format (2 matches/week + playoffs, 10 weeks) or the old one (1 match/week, 10 weeks) to your season.
______________________________________________
Finally, we are proud to announce that our very first Asian team, Zten, signed up this season for MKU!
As the usual times don't fit for this team, please note that these match times that will be used for every match Zten will play (considering new format):
If Zten plays one NA and one EU team in the week: Saturday 9pm EDT / Sunday 10am JST and Sunday 12pm CST / Sunday 7pm JST;
If Zten plays two NA teams: Saturday 8pm EDT / Sunday 9am JST and Saturday 9pm EDT / Sunday 10am JST;
If Zten plays two EU teams: Sunday 12pm CST / Sunday 7pm JST and Sunday 1pm CST / Sunday 8pm JST.
I hope this update will clarify everything you need to know for next season. If you have any questions regarding all of these changes, please let us know as soon as possible!
__________
Edited 5 minutes after posting: some times were messed up^
With the arrival of the new format, I would like to bring a major update concerning next season, which should clarify some things for many teams that are still thinking about participating in the next MKU season.
First of all, MKU Staff would like to thank every team for voting in our survey that was done a few weeks ago about which times would they prefer to play their matches, as well as everyone who gave their advice and concerns as leader or member of their respective team. It definitely helped us coming with that update that should be appreciated by many people, by the way.
As posted on Confirmation thread, results have shown that around 60% of the teams prefer playing their matches at 3/4pm ET, while around 40% of the teams prefer playing their matches at 2/3pm EDT. But, after talking with most players involved in the discussion, we noticed that teams who preferred playing at 2/3pm ET had issues with playing at 4pm, because it would involve players finishing playing at 11pm on Sunday (in Europe). This could cause problems with school, work, parents or whatever for some people, which is perfectly understandable. Also, since it affects around 40% of the teams, which is far from negligible, we decided to modify our system for these people so they aren't penalized.
We are proud to announce that we’ve we created a new schedule system for the new format! We are abolishing the traditional MKU default time, which means neither 2/3pm nor 3/4pm will be the default time. Instead, teams who prefer playing at 2/3pm will be able to play all of their matches at 2/3pm without being penalized to finish a match late in the evening. In a similar fashion, for teams who prefer playing their matches at 3/4pm, the algorithm is done so these teams will play almost all their matches at 3/4pm, with only a few times where these teams will have to play at 2pm. Detailing the algorithm would not provide any additional information for the public, as it will be implemented on our new Excel sheet that we’ll use to build seedings and schedule.
In short, we guarantee that:
- Teams that cannot play late on Sunday won't be penalized and will play all their matches at 2 or 3pm;
- Teams that prefer playing at 3/4pm will almost always play at least 13 out of 16 matches at their preferred time, but most teams will be scheduled to play 14 or 15 matches out of the 16 at 3/4pm, so only a small portion of matches will be played at 2pm for these teams.
Next, we noticed that newer teams in the scene were less comfortable in playing two consecutive matches for this format. Instead of forcing these teams to play with the new format, we’ve decided to apply our new format to the Top 48 only (The first 4 Divisions in our new format). For teams that will be seeded lower than the Top 48, we will do a vote on Seedings' Day to decide if we apply the new format (2 matches/week + playoffs, 10 weeks) or the old one (1 match/week, 10 weeks) to your season.
______________________________________________
Finally, we are proud to announce that our very first Asian team, Zten, signed up this season for MKU!
As the usual times don't fit for this team, please note that these match times that will be used for every match Zten will play (considering new format):
If Zten plays one NA and one EU team in the week: Saturday 9pm EDT / Sunday 10am JST and Sunday 12pm CST / Sunday 7pm JST;
If Zten plays two NA teams: Saturday 8pm EDT / Sunday 9am JST and Saturday 9pm EDT / Sunday 10am JST;
If Zten plays two EU teams: Sunday 12pm CST / Sunday 7pm JST and Sunday 1pm CST / Sunday 8pm JST.
I hope this update will clarify everything you need to know for next season. If you have any questions regarding all of these changes, please let us know as soon as possible!
__________
Edited 5 minutes after posting: some times were messed up^
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