The Swiss system in a team event: how many rounds and how to pair

The mechanics are the same: after each round opponents are matched by the points they have, and the strong gradually meet the strong. There are three differences, and all of them affect the pairing.

• The team is paired, not the player. The software pairs two line-ups, and inside the match the boards meet by number: first against first, second against second.
• There are two kinds of points. Match points (2 for winning the match, 1 for a draw) and board points. Pairings are usually made on whichever has been declared primary.
• The colour goes to the whole team. Not to each player separately: the team gets a colour on board one, and it alternates down the board numbers from there.

Because of that a team event with the same number of participants runs longer: a round is a whole match, not a single game.

A guide by number of teams. It is noticeably higher than for an individual event with the same number of participants, and the reason is below.

Why more than in an individual event. In an individual Swiss, roughly the binary logarithm of the number of players plus a spare round is enough - the table by number of players. For teams the scale is coarser: a match is worth 2, 1 or 0, with nothing in between. In a short event several teams easily finish on the same number of match points, and the winner is decided not by the play but by a tie-break.

The practical conclusion: in a team event, allow one round more than seems enough. And if there are few teams - up to six - you do not need a Swiss at all; play a round-robin. Everybody meets everybody, and nobody argues with the result.

The order is the same as in an individual Swiss, only with teams instead of players:

• Round one- from the starting list. Teams are sorted by average rating or by the organizer's seeding, the list is cut in half, and the top half plays the bottom: team 1 against team 9, team 2 against team 10 and so on.
• After that - by points scored. Teams on equal match points form a group, and inside it the same half-against-half rule applies.
• No repeats. Two teams do not meet twice in the event, even if their scores put them side by side again.
• Colours are balanced. If a team has started with White on board one twice in a row, its next match starts with Black.

Doing this by hand stops being realistic at eight teams: holding the history of encounters, the point differences and the colour balance in your head at the same time does not work. What to pair with - a survey of the software.

The commonest point of confusion for new organizers. The colour is drawn once - for the team, not for each player.

In other words, the team that draws White plays White on the odd boards and Black on the even ones. With an even number of boards both teams get an equal share of White and Black inside the match - which is exactly why the number of boards is usually even.

A familiar situation: eleven teams have entered, and matches are played two by two. One team is left without an opponent every round.

• The bye goes to a team from the bottom of the table - one that has not had a bye yet. The same team should not sit out twice in a row.
• What the bye is worth goes into the regulations in advance. Usually match points as for a win; on board points the options differ - award nothing, or award half the boards. Do not decide this in the middle of the event.
• Easier to avoid.With an odd number of teams, organizers often add a scratch team of spare players or an arbiters' team - and then there are no byes at all.

How the same thing works in an individual event - the bye in a Swiss tournament, and an odd number of players.

The pairing is about teams, but the result of a match depends on who sits on which board. The rules are simple and are announced before round one.

• The board order is fixed in advance. The team submits a list in strength order, and it cannot be shuffled during the event: otherwise the strongest player would meet the weakest opponent every time.
• A reserve comes in at their place. If the board-two player does not turn up, the reserve comes in and the third and fourth boards move up - the order is preserved.
• An incomplete line-up is not a forfeit of the match. The empty board is scored as a loss and the other games are played.

• Not announcing which points are primary. Match points or board points - that is settled before the start. Announce it afterwards and there will always be a team for whom the choice turned out badly.
• Too few rounds. Five rounds for twenty teams leaves several contenders on the same score, and the winner is decided by a tie-break rather than by the chess.
• Shuffling the line-up during the event. The commonest breach at amateur events and the commonest grounds for an appeal.
• Pairing by hand, by eye. From eight teams on, people start making mistakes: a repeated pairing here, a colour imbalance there.
• An odd number of boards. Formally allowed, but then one team gets an extra White inside the match, and that has to be compensated across the rounds at the very least.