Smash World Tour – everything you need to know
Smash World Tour, has been announced earlier this Sunday, March 1, as a series of more than 25 community events for both Smash Ultimate and Melee, created in collaboration between VGBootCamp and several prominent figures in Super Smash Bros. community. The circuit is billed as the biggest event with the largest prize pool in Smash's history (US $250,000), marking a new era of Smash esports scene.
As revealed, the Smash World Tour will be a blend of international tournaments from both Melee and Ultimate scene, combining the two into an actual tournament circuit. Similarly to how Dragon Ball FighterZ, Tekken and Street Fighter have their own tournament circuits, which culminate in a final event, Smash will try to emulate that with a tournament circuit of its own – something Smash scene has never had before. Smash World Tour is slated to run from March until December, featuring a leaderboard which will keep track of players' performance at each event.
Here is all you need to know about Smash World Tour.
Tournament tiers and Smash World Tour leaderboard
All of Smash World Tour events will be run by Smash veterans and other prominent names in collaboration with event organisers and sponsors. Each tournament will be given an "Event Tier", similarly to how the PGR ranks its tournaments based on the number of attendants. Smash World Tour will rank its tournaments as either Silver, Gold or Platinum, each with its own points distribution, which will count towards the World Tour rankings.
Not every event will count towards the players’ total, however, meaning each participant can play in several tournaments and even though he could have a couple of bad performances, the said player might still finish at the top of the leaderboard.
As revealed, only three of the players' top placements from Gold and Platinum events will count towards the standings, while six Silver tournament results will be added to the total points tally. To put it into a perspective, a player can attend four Platinum or Gold events and only his top three placements will be counted, while only top-six placements from Silver tournaments will contribute to the player's rankings.
Although there will be only one Platinum and one Gold category of events, Silver will be divided into four based on the number of participants, ranging from 32, 64, 96 and 128, each with its own score distribution table.
Here is the points breakdown for all tiers of Smash World Tour events.
| Place | Platinum | Gold | Silver (128 entrants) | Silver (96 entrants) | Silver (64 entrants) | Silver (32 entrants) |
| 1st | 800 | 400 | 100 | 70 | 45 | 25 |
| 2nd | 675 | 300 | 70 | 45 | 25 | 10 |
| 3rd | 525 | 220 | 45 | 25 | 10 | 5 |
| 4th | 400 | 150 | 25 | 10 | 5 | 1 |
| 5th | 300 | 100 | 10 | 5 | 1 | |
| 7th | 220 | 70 | 5 | 1 | ||
| 9th | 150 | 45 | 1 | |||
| 13th | 100 | 25 | ||||
| 17th | 70 | 10 | ||||
| 25th | 45 | 5 | ||||
| 33rd | 25 | 1 | ||||
| 49th | 10 | |||||
| 65th | 5 | |||||
| 97th | 1 |
Smash World Tour Championships format
Between the opening event on March 13 and the final tournament of Smash World Tour Championship, on November 22, the players will compete to gather enough World Tour Points to make it into the top 31 on the Smash World Tour Championship rankings, which will award them a direct pass into the World Tour Championship. The 32nd spot will be awarded to the champion of the "Last Chance Qualifier" tournament that will be held right before the culminating event.
The World Tour Championship will be held between December 17-20, featuring top 32 competitors; top 31 from the rankings plus the champion of the Last Chance Qualifier. All 32 attendees will be split into four groups of eight, where a double-elimination best-of-five (Bo5) format will be in place.
Top four players from each group will advance into the playoffs, where they will duke it out for the largest slice of the $250,000 prize pool, which will be split evenly among both Ultimate and Melee players. The organisers also revealed that the prize pool could increase through various means as the World Tour goes on. Besides the fixed prize pool for each of the Smash World Tour events, the Tour Producer will also award a particular percentage of the relevant Variable Prize Pool.
The official Smash World Tour schedule can be found here.
Prize pool distribution
| Standings | FIxed Prize Pool | Variable Prize Pool |
| 1st | $40,000 | 32% |
| 2nd | $20,000 | 16% |
| 3rd | $12,000 | 9.6% |
| 4th | $9,000 | 7.2% |
| 5th (2 players) | $6,000 | 4.8% |
| 7th (2 players) | $4,000 | 3.2% |
| 9th (4 players) | $2,000 | 1.6% |
| 13th (4 players) | $1,400 | 1.12% |
| 17th (8 players) | $800 | 0.64% |
| 25th (8 players) | $500 | 0.4% |
Match procedure
The Smash World Tour will use the standard match procedure, which has been used in the majority of other Smash tournaments. The full tournament rules can be found here, which also include the official rules for the match procedure. Those rules include:
- Players select their characters. Either player may elect to do double-blind character selection
- Use stage striking to determine the first stage.
- The players play the first game of the set.
- Winning player of the preceding game bans a stage/stages.
- The losing player of the preceding game picks a stage for the next game.
- The winning player of the preceding game may choose to change characters.
- The losing Player of the preceding game may choose to change characters.
- The next game is played.
- Repeat steps 4 through 8 for all subsequent matches until the set is complete.
The players can also select any permitted stage if they both agree on it. Players, however, may not play on unpermitted stages or change the length of the match itself.
As stated in section two of the Match Procedure rules, either player may request that a double-blind section occurs. In this situation, a designated referee or TO will be told, in secret, each of player's choices for the first round. Both players are to select their first round characters, with the referee validating the characters selections.
Complete rules for Super Smash Bros. Ultimate
Game Settings
- Stock: 3
- Timer: 7:00
- Handicap: Off
- Team Attack: On
- Launch Rate: 1.0x
- Items: Off and None
- FS Meter: Off
- Damage Handicap: Off
- Custom Balance: Off
- Spirits: Off
- Pause: Off
- Stage Selection: Loser’s Pick
- Stage Hazards: Off
- Stage Morph: Off
- Underdog Boost: Off
- Score Display: Off
- Show Damage: Yes
- Options
- Radar: Small
- Echo Fighters: Separate
- Custom Balance: Off
- Mii Fighters are permitted with any combination of specials.
- Language: To be specified by the TO based on the local region of the Tournament.
Stage List
Starter Stages
- Battlefield
- Final Destination
- The Battlefield version of Final Destination may be requested by either Player.
- Smashville
- Pokemon Stadium 2
- Town & City
Counterpick Stages
- Kalos Pokemon League
- Lylat Cruise
- Yoshi’s Story
The Battlefield version of Final Destination may be requested by either Player.
Complete rules for Super Smash Bros. Melee
Game Version
- The official game version is NTSC 1.02 or PAL for the Nintendo Gamecube,
- using the Tournament Organizer’s choice of memory card data with all characters
- and relevant stages unlocked.
Game Settings
- Stocks: 4
- Timer: 8 minutes
- Handicap: Off
- Damage ratio: 1.0
- Items: Off
- Pause: Off
- Team Attack: On
Stage List
Starter Stages
- Yoshi’s Story
- Fountain of Dreams
- Battlefield
- Final Destination
- DreamLand
Counterpick Stages
- Pokémon Stadium
Additionally, players are not allowed to "Wobble" with ice climbers. A player will be considered to be Wobbling if the following conditions are met:
- The player grabs his/her opponent with the player-controlled Ice Climber.
- The CPU-controlled Ice Climber has not been KO’d.
- During the grab, the opponent is locked in continuous "hitstun" by a series of at least 5 attacks, with at least 3 of those attacks being from the CPU-controlled Ice Climber. For avoidance of doubt,multi-hit moves such as Blizzard count as 1 attack.
Smash World Tour will begin on March 13 – CEO DreamLand Orlando, Florida, which will be the first Gold event, followed by a Platinum event – HFLAN Melee Edition in Paris, France on March 28-29.
Players can also opt-in their own Melee or Ultimate events as a part of the tour if they meet the requirements, which include:
Super Smash Bros. Melee must be played on GameCube, while Ultimate has to be played on Switch. The event must be a singles event, with a minimum of 32 entrants. Either event must be played in-person and has to take place between March 16 and November 2, 2020. More information can be found on Smash.gg website or the official Smash World Tour website.
