ADV Draft Database Circuit Points
Written 12-01-2025
What Are Circuit Points?
Circuit Points are a points system that I came up with for the 2025 Hoenn Draft Invitational, the first culminating tournament within the ADV Draft Circuit series. The points system wound up being surprisingly balanced and struck exactly what I was looking for: it rewards deep runs in tournaments heavily while also still rewarding consistency by virtue of joining multiple tournaments. Players from all walks of the circuit have qualified for the invitational, whether they are big tournament winners or consistent playoff participants. Due to the balanced nature of the points system, I've decided to implement it on my site to highlight players that have done well in major ADV Draft tournaments.
It's very important to me that there is a clear line between "serious" tournaments and for-fun tournaments. After all, at the bottom of the glass is the fact that Pokemon Emerald is a video game first and foremost and I want players to have fun while playing ADV Draft. Therefore, Circuit Points are only tracked for individual tournaments with 48 or more players. Anything smaller, such as a draft league amongst friends, would cause both the totals to be inflated and these leagues to potentially become more competitive than intended. The exception to this is Hoenn Draft Invitationals, which are weighted and applied to totals separately.
The Circuit Point System
The circuit point system, at its core, is pretty simple -- you win a match, you get one point. The system is balanced around a "perfect" run where a player wins every possible game in a 128-player tournament rewarding 23 points. If a tournament has more players that result in extra matches, such as 256-player tournaments, extra points are possible to earn. These points are awarded in the following fashion:
| Event | Points | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Win A Game | +1 | |
| Win A Game (Top 8 or Later) | +2 | Matches are worth more to balance the common practice of a Top 16 double-elimination bracket -- the lower bracket plays double the matches of the upper bracket. This also has the consequence of rewarding deep runs even further. |
| Make Playoffs (Bracket) | +3 | For tournaments with play-in/preliminary games, this is worth +2 points, with byes or winning that game providing the additional point. |
| Make Playoffs (Swiss) | +1 | Due to the volume of Swiss games, this bonus is awarded as an extra point once a player earns X wins, where X ensures the total amount of points in the tournament are balanced (in the 128-player case: 3 wins). |
| Top-Cut A Tournament | +2 | For purposes of this system, "top-cut"ting a tournament means placing within the top 6.25% of participants, rounding down to the next elimination. For example, Revival Draft had 206 players, 6.25% of this is 13, which rounds down to Top 12. |
| Win A Tournament | +4 | These are awarded in addition to the points for winning match point. This often means that the clinching match is worth 6 points. |
| Activity Win | x0.5 | This multiplier is applied when players win due to their opponent not showing up, or forfeiting prior to the match beginning. This does not apply if a player has a bye, or if a player wins by forfeit mid-match. |
| Win A Game (Lower Bracket) | x0.5 | As mentioned earlier, since the lower bracket plays double the matches of the upper bracket, their games are worth half in order to balance the points awarded. Usually, this split happens in Top 8 and therefore matches are still worth one point. However, for larger double-elimination brackets, winning matches are worth 0.5 points earlier on. |