Recommended turn order based on play times:

Well. if it´s about starting this one soon - 3 vs 3 is the way to go and then force one of the veterans into the beginner group. This forcing could then be based on ranking or gut feeling by the most experienced players and we could consider making a mid-tier/second beginner runner-up group (by splitting the then 12 players into two tiers of 6 players) for further balancing purposes.

The perfect balance is not easily achievable in this game where luck will and should be a factor (though not major) as well as day-to-day variation in performances of players (thus I occasionally also still make beginners mistakes and am not regarding myself as elite despite my ranking and humongous playtime recorded).

yes, I really would suggest to do a 1 Vet 2 Begs as intented and start soon, otherwise some new players might loose interest. I would be a back up then (unlikely to happen because the veterans shouldn't leave the tournament )
maybe 2 groups of 3 teams each would make sense? then you need 12 beginners 

Yeah, I'd rathern ot do a 4v4, because quitters and turns take very long

It's interesting idea to change the tourney from 3vs3 into 4vs4. More experince for the beginners, more fun for all. But I'm afraid that each match will continue too long. I'm not sure that all beginners are ready for 6 months match for each of phases. And we will have no any chance to restart match from quitters this time. Also we need one more vet))
It's all my concerns. But I'm ready to try, if the others will be agree too

P.S. Instead, we could try to organize 3vs3 tourney with 6 teams into 2 groups of 3 matches as Marcus proposed. But we still have not enough number for beginners without any replacements.

Hi all. I'm still waiting more than 1-2 opinions about teams structure which you prefer for this tourney: (1 Veteran + 2 Beginners) OR (1 Elite + 1 Veteran + 1 Beginner).
It looks like I need a few more days for organizing things than I suggested ealier, sorry for this.   It turned out that I have real life circumstances too  

@Ezekiel  I'm glad to see you here. And no, you are not too late, you joined in a right time. You are welcome  

@Badok  I'm glad that I could convince you to give us a try, to show you how team game with the full teammates support is amazing.   But you need to read some earlier messages in this topic to be in the know. I hope you will find it not so complicated to understand.   I'm still thinking on rephrasing it to make it easier.

@IIaanor  Thanks for your statistics work.  I hope it will make the discussion easier and more constructive.   

@Zytozid  I understand and partially share your concerns, but I urge you to remember that any tournament - a kind of competitive events. All I want with my "difficulties" - to help the beginners to be a good/significant part of their team. Otherwise it may happen that beginners will be left out, only by spectators in their own team game.   Though to observe how elite players are playing, and teaching from them - sometimes useful, but not fun. I agree that to play for only fun is a very good incentive. But in my opinion, my "difficult" variant may help the beginners to be more involving into session's fights than only as observers, and so have more fun.  I'm not insist, you and others may think by another way.

but then there are at least 10 beginners for only 4 teams? I can be one reservist for a veteran and maybe we stick to the 1 vet 2 beginners mode? or make it 2 vets + 2 begs? So teams of 4.. maybe it would take too long

If yo uask me, Lobo is experienced and should not be a beginner but he is not elite either. So he can well be a veteran. But we should make sure, that none of the other "beginner players" is stronger than him, I only know a few but they are all far weaker than Lobo is.

Updated list:

Veterans (7):
DreadReapr
Jean_de_Metz
AIXStormrage
Skuns453Lirik902
gladis
marcuspers
Ezekiel

Beginners (11):
Santil
RedChameleon
Fluksen
Nub nub
IIaanor
Zytozid
DiaEmperador
Akinos
Longinus
Badok
El-Lobo

Missing one Veteran to split them into Elite and Veteran, but maybe somebody from Beginners could be potentialy Veteran in the new system?

Hey! After a friendly nudge from @Skuns, I decided to give it a try - if there's still space, that is. Can't say that I'm much more than an amateur, but hopefully I'd do well in a team

Badok joined !!

I do agree with a lot of what Zytozid wrote, especially about making it as easy as possible to follow the rules.
I think having it too complicated will also make it difficult for the host/judge to ensure all rules are followed.
And if you are able to use same class/race after 2 matches it wont limit the combos for the "best" classes/races anyway, in my opinion.

@Skuns, can you make a televised draw for the teams/groups, that would be fun

1. Don't lose the beginners because of complex discussions

For beginners, the rules are already quite complex. I'll leave the discussions about rules to you and hope that at the end, when everything is solid, someone will shortly give a good overview about what is allowed and what isn't. Until then, I just want to remind noobs to not get annoyed and leave, just wait until the rules are set and you are fine! Stay and play, people!


2. Advanced matching rules
We can let people create teams freely, but we could also try to make sure (at least for vet/elite) that the strongest two do not play together.

As soon as the lists are finished (who is elite, who is vet), it would be nice if those players can work on a ranking of their (probably strength) like this:

Elite players:
Elite 1
Elite 2
Elite 3
Elite 4

Vet players:
Vet 1
Vet 2
Vet 3
Vet 4

then let the "weakest" vet player play with the strongest elite player to balance at least a bit (Elite 1 + Vet 4, Elite 2 + Vet 3, ...)
It doesn't need to be super precise but it would just make things more fair. We do not need it for noobs, because they won't impact the game strongly balance-wise.
Of course, i set my trust into these players to honestly rate their strength compared to others. Age of Wonders doesn't work well without honesty anyways.


3. Class/race
I'd allow noobs to play any race combo they like, as long as they did not use the exact same before. (Only noobs!)
Game 1: Dwarf Sorcerer
Game 2: Dwarf Archdruid
is perfectly fine and different enough for a noob. A noob might learn more when playing other races/classes but this is not an academy game.

Still, the noobs need to change the class each game.

4.
Emphasize fun

You wrote yo uwant to show noobs how great team work in AoW 3 is. Here is an idea/a concern:

If you only make this tournament serious and about winning, then noobs won't have much impact. I'd remind every elite player that this game is for everyone and with their playstyle they can either only focus on pure winning and grind themselves to victory (oh, what fun we had! NOT), or they can also try to include the noobs and actually play WITH them, which I think is much more interesting.

Don't get me wrong, the elites should not play bad... but the elite players are like team leaders/parents here and they should be concerned also that everyone is having a good time and not ignore or exploit the noobs.
But this is just my opinion and the decision is up to the organization.

5. Thanks
for the idea and the work to create this tournament and for everyone's contributions. Keep up the good work!

Any feedback is welcome, Thanks for reading!

Ezekiel joined !

Actually seems like I was too late for this?

WARNING! I must draw your attention to the rule №4. You should be prepared to play almost all time of each match with turning on the turn timer. Of course, if you will have a holidays or something like that you should let to know the host of the current match beforehand and the host must to turn off the timer on the period of your unavailabity to play. 
If this period of time will be more than 2 weeks (without playing even 1 turn) then the judges will decide a match result or possibility to replace such unavailable player. 

P.S. If you will be in the odd list and don't want to wait your moment to replace (which may or may not happen), so you can say about it to the judges and then to leave this discussion. But I hope that you will stay with us  - real life circumstances may happen for each of us in any moment

Hi.
I'll try to answer on your questions.

You asked: "how will we know what our team mates are playing will they tell us ?" Yes, before the match will start you must contact your teammates to define what combos they and you will use for the current match. Combo includes: class/race. Also you'll need to choose your specializations for your leader. And you may try to choose your specializations in addition to specs of your teammates (PBEM++ mod helps with it). All of this may be controlled by your team's veteran, but you can choose your own combo and specs (not thats which were recommended by a veteran). And don't forget - the match can't be started before all teammates from each team send their class/race choices to the judges. Do not send your combos to the judge if he's playing in the opponent team at the current match. After the judges compare combos for both teams and approve its, the match can be started finally. 

You asked: "how do you figure out what team your on ? " As I already said earlier, on the first stage there will be a lottery/roulette to define what players will be in the main participants list and in the odd (supplementary) list. Players from the main list will create 4 teams and start to play. Players from the odd list must wait (and not play in the tourney) until the moment if someone from any team (a veteran or a beginner) can not continue to play for any reason. So one player from the odd list with the same skills (a veteran or a beginner) will replace quitted player. If you are the newcomer on the site and you have troubles to choose preferable veteran to create a team then I may create preliminary list of each team, but you can join another team if you want. All veterans create their teams and send the teammates lists to the judges. 

Also I had one additional difficulty concerning a choice of Specializations (Air Master etc.). But it may be used only for Marcus's variant of the tournement.  I see no point of describing it completely yet, so I may say only that the players could not use the same specializations for the second match (except maybe beginners, though with using PBEM++ mod this will already be something like using the game's exploits   ).

I'm sorry that this rule is too complicated to understand for you.  All I want with this rule - not let to use good strong combos again and again for smartest generals like Jean. Since this tourney is supposed to be very short (but not quick) - only 4 matches - so we must make the participating conditions extremely difficult, for veterans in the first place, to force the players to be more circumspect. And let to win not by strong combos only but mostly thanks to the player strategy and skills. 

P.S. How do you think, is it fair (in relation to all participants) to start a new tournament when the winner is known in advance?! 

Don't get me wrong but if you say this tournament is for the players, then it should not be that comlicated to choose race and class. I tried to read your post but had to start again and again. I think it would help to make it a bit easier.

I'll try to explain the rule â„– 6.

Suppose, the team combos for the first match are: Beg1 - Elves/Dreadnought, Beg2 - Halflings/Druid, Vet - Goblins/Sorcerer. Of course, there have not to be the same class or race for more than 1 player in a team. So if Beg1 chose his combo, then Beg2 (or Vet) can't use in this match Elves race or Dreadnought class.

And for the second match: Vet - can choose any race (named it as Vet race) from all races except Elves, Halflings, Goblins, Beg1 race, Beg2 race, and any class (named it as Vet class) from all classes except Dreadnought, Druid, Sorcerer, Beg1 class, Beg2 class; Beg1 - can choose any race (named it as Beg1 class) from all races except Elves, Vet race, Beg2 race, and any class (named it as Beg1 class) from all classes except Dreadnought, Vet class, Beg2 class; Beg2 - can choose any race (named it as Beg2 race) from all races except Halflings, Vet race, Beg1 race, and any class (named it as Beg2 class) from all classes except Dreadnought, Vet class, Beg1 class. As additional difficulty (it's not yet in the rule № 6, but I'll correct it soon), for the second match Beg1 and Beg2 can choose only class or race (not both) which was used by their teammates in the first match. For our example in the second match Beg1 can choose one of this parameters: Halflings or Goblins or Druid or Sorcerer. Similarly, Beg2 can choose one of other parameters: Elves or Goblins or Dreadnought or Sorcerer. So if Beg1 will choose Druid class, he can't choose Elves, Halflings, Goblins,  Vet and Beg2 races too. If Beg2 will choose Goblins race, he can't choose Dreadnought, Druid, Sorcerer, Vet and Beg1 classes.

I hope this example illustrates all possible exceptions  for both matches. If it's not let me know