Player Guide - Swiss Unity League Season 2024
In the following we explain everything you need to know as a player to participate in Switzerland's premier Magic: the Gathering tournament series, Swiss Unity League.
Abstract
The Swiss Unity League (SUL) is a collaborative tournament series between various Magic: the Gathering event organizers in Switzerland. Only the best players will qualify for the end-of-year 2-day Championship tournament with 2.5k prizes.
Any organizer can register their tournament for the league to make it award League Points. Players need to collect these points in order to qualify for the Championship.
SUL Invitational Nov 30 - Dec 1, 2024
2.5K Prize Pool
- 1st: 700 CHF
- 2nd: 400 CHF
- 3rd/4th: 250 CHF
- 5th-8th: 150 CHF
- 9th-12th 75 CHF
Additionally, there will be a 200 CHF reward for the "SUL Player of the Year 2024", the player with the most SUL Points in the season.
Prizes are awarded as store credit, allowing each player to select their preferred participating store to redeem it.
How to Qualify
The 2024 season of the SUL will run from the 1st of November 2023 to the 31th of October 2024. During that time, all participating Magic: the Gathering tournaments in and around Switzerland will award SUL Points.
In total, 40 players will qualify for the SUL Invitational tournament. Players can qualify in the following ways:
- The winner* of each SUL Premier event with 40 or more participants receives a direct invite for the Invitational.
- The Top 2* of the SUL Trial receive a direct invite for the Invitational.
- At the end of the season, the remaining invites will be awarded to the top-performing players on the leaderboard.
*If a player already has a direct invite from a previous tournament, it will be passed on to the next player in the standings of the tournament.
Example: Let's say there are 9 SUL Premier events with 40 or more participants during the 2024 season, then the 9 winners of these events will already be qualified irrespective of how many SUL Points they earn. Additionally the top 2 of the SUL Trial will be qualified. The remaining invites will be awarded to the 29 players with the most SUL Points that don't have a direct invite. If a player can't attend the Invitational, the invite will not be passed to the next players.
Tournament Structure
Location: Two Moons, Zürichstrasse 137a, 8600 Dübendorf, Zürich
Entry: Free, but only qualified players can participate.
REL: Competitive
Decklists: Open decklist for Modern and Legacy, closed decklist for Draft
Draft set: MTG Foundations
Timed draft: According to MTR, with 25 minutes for deck registration and construction.
Schedule
- Day 1, Sat 30.11.24:
- Start: 10:00
- 1 Round of Modern / Bye
- 3 Rounds of Draft (Foundations)
- 4 Rounds of Legacy
- Day 2, Sun 01.12.24:
- Start: 10:00
- 5 Rounds of Modern
- Top8 Modern
- Finals Modern (Best of 5)
How to Participate
Tell your local tournament organizer (TO) about our league and show them the Guide for Organizers page! Your TO will then register their local events for the league, so you can start collecting SUL Points at those events.
SUL Points
Players can earn SUL Points at all tournaments participating in the league. Points are awarded in the following three ways:
- Match Points: A player receives SUL Points equal to the match points they earned during the Swiss rounds of the tournament. (E.g., a record of 3-1-1 in Swiss rounds awards 10 SUL Points).
- Participation: A player receives 3 SUL Points just for participating in the event.
- Playoffs: If the event has playoffs (top 4/8), then the best-performing players receive extra SUL Points.
Tournament Types
There are 3 types of tournaments (SUL Regular, Regional, and Premier). Your local tournament organizer will assign one of these 3 types to each tournament they organize. Depending on the type of tournament, more or less SUL Points will be awarded to the participants.
SUL Regular
All normal events (weekly, FNM, Prerelease) at your local store or association are SUL Regular events.
SUL Regional
SUL Regional events are medium-sized events for which people travel
all around your canton to attend them.
For each format, your local
tournament organizers can organize one of these events per month.
Additionally, for weekly tournaments your organizer can turn one of these events
per month into SUL Regional.
SUL Premier
SUL Premier events are meant to be huge tournaments, for which people travel all around Switzerland. To make those events feel special and exciting, your local tournament organizer can only host 1-2 of these events per year. Premier events require at least 24 participants, otherwise they will be downgraded to SUL Regional.
SUL Multiplier
Each of the 3 tournament types has a different multiplier that increases the number of SUL Points the players earn. SUL Regular events have a multiplier of 1x, SUL Regional 4x, and SUL Premier 6x. The SUL Points earned for match points and participation (but not for playoffs) are multiplied by the given multiplier for the tournament.
| Tournament Type | Multiplier | Events per organizer |
|---|---|---|
| Regular | 1x | Unlimited |
| Regional | 4x | For each format 1 per month (+1 for each league) |
| Premier | 6x | 1-2x per year |
In the 2023 season we had a limit of 500 SUL Points for Regular events. This limit is removed for 2024.
SUL Points for Playoffs
Events with playoffs award additional SUL Points according to the schema below. For SUL Premier events, running a top 8 is mandatory. For SUL Regional events, the tournament organizer can decide if they wish to run their event with playoffs or not (top 4 or top 8 depends on the number of players).
| Place | SUL Points | |
|---|---|---|
| Regional | Premier | |
| 1st | 100 | 400 |
| 2nd | 60 | 240 |
| 3rd/4th | 40 | 160 |
| 5th-8th* | 30 | 120 |
| 70% match point rate** | 20 | 60 |
| 65% match point rate** | 10 | 30 |
*The SUL Points for 5th-8th won't be awarded if the event just has a top 4.
**The match point rate is calculated based on the number of match points the player earned during the Swiss rounds of the event divided by the maximum possible match points (3x the number of Swiss rounds). SUL Points for match point rate are awarded to all players that reach at least the given percentage and don't make it to the playoffs.
Example: Chandra plays a SUL Premier event (multiplier 6x) at her local gaming store with 51 participants. During the 5 Swiss rounds, she manages to get 4 wins, 1 loss, and 1 draw (13 match points). She places 9th in the overall ranking. Therefore, she receives 78 points (6x13) for the match points, 18 points (6x3) just for participating. Additionally, she receives 60 points for reaching a greater match point rate than 70% (13/18 = 72%). With this event, she earns a grand total of 156 SUL Points.
SUL Trial
The Swiss Unity League Trial is a tournament where:
- Players can prove they have the skills needed to play at the Invitational.
- New tournament structures can be tested.
How to qualify
To play in the SUL Trial a qualification is needed. The top 80 players of the leaderboard at the end of April 2024 will qualify for the SUL Trial.
Rewards
- The top 2 players receive a direct invite and a bye for the SUL Invitational later this year.
Tournament details
- Date: Sun, 19th May 2024
- Formats: 3 rounds of Modern, 3 rounds of Legacy, top 8 Modern
View tournament description for more info
Byes
The best performing players at the league are awarded byes (free wins in the first rounds) for the invitational tournament at the end of the year. A player can have at maximum 1 bye. Players can earn byes in the following ways:
- The top 2 players of the SUL Trial will receive 1 bye.
- The top 4 players on the leaderboard (with the most SUL Points) will be awarded 1 bye.
- If there's an additional bye in the first round of the Invitational, then it will be awarded to the player ranked 5th on the leaderboard.
Responsibility of Players
Players are responsible to verify that their results were uploaded correctly. If you notice that your SUL Points are incorrect, please contact your local tournament organizer or the SUL admins.
How do we finance this?
In addition to sponsorships, tournament organizers will pay a small fee for each participant in the Regional and Premier events they organize. For detailed information, see Guide for Organizers!