Hosting a Tournament
The Tournaments tool allows you to run your own Battlesnake bracket event tournament for your friends, colleagues, or students.
When you create a tournament, you’ll be provided with your own URL for your to share with your participants so they can easily join your tournament with just a click. This tool will also handle all of the bracketing and keep track of wins and losses. You don’t need any technical expertise to use it. Check out the video below for a full walk-through of the Tournament tool.
How many battlesnakes does a Tournament support?
Tournaments can support anywhere from 4 - 32 Battlesnakes.
Ideally, you want at least 4 or more players in a tournament. 16 Battlesnakes is the sweet spot, but you can have as many as 32 in a single tournament.
If you want to run an event with more than 32 battlesnakes, you can simply create two separate tournaments and run them both indivudally!
How long do tournaments take to run?
That depends on the number of Battlesnakes in your tournament and how much time you give developers to build their Battlesnakes. That said, a typical tournaments with 16 Battlesnakes takes about 60-90 minutes to run.
What are the popular tournament formats? How do these events normally run?
Most people find it easiest to run a Standard Game Mode (4 Battlesnake per match) on a Standard 11x11 map. This is plenty challenging for folks who have been newly introduced to Battlesnake.
Typically, it takes people about half a day to figure out how to get their snakes running, and another half to work on the strategy and implementation. We find giving people at least one full day to work on their snakes generates the best results.
Alternatively, some people have run week-long events where developers work on their snakes throughout the week and then gather to watch one final tournament.
I want to use Battlesnake as a team-building exercise for my colleagues. Is it a good fit?
Definitely! This tool was created due to popular demand for uses exactly like this! It works for both large and small teams looking to do something different and even learn something new. It’s challenging to describe the singular thrill you get when you watch your Battlesnake fight your peers and win.
I want to use Battlesnake to teach my students how to code. Is it a good fit?
It definitely can be! There have been many educators who have loved using Battlesnake to teach at both the high school and university level.
That said, your must already know how to code to find success with Battlesnake. It will not teach you how to code, but if you already know the basics, you can use it to learn new tech and test your creativity with the skills you already have under your belt.