1.1 Qualifying Participants

Tournament participants must be an active and current member of Florida State University, Florida Agricultural & Mechanical University, or Tallahassee State College in some capacity. This includes students, staff, or faculty members. This does not include alumni.

1.2 Account Requirements

1.2.1 Eligible Rocket League Account

Players must have a Rocket League account in good standing and eligible for competitive games in order to compete. This same account must be used for all matches during official competition. Players may not have more than one account each listed on the roster.

1.2.2 Account Bans

If a player receives a ban due to in-game behavior or Terms of Service violations, that player is not eligible to participate in the season until the ban is lifted. If a player receives a permanent ban during the season, they are no longer eligible for the rest of the season. This rule applies to all accounts owned by a player, not just their registered account.

1.2.3 Team Inactivity

Inactive teams or teams not in communication with the Intramural Host, League Staff, and their opponent will forfeit their matches and be eliminated from the tournament.

2.1 Roster Size

Teams will register with exactly two (2) members; this is due to a limitation with the GGLeap software. After a team registers, up until the end of the second week of competition, teams may add up to one (1) substitute player. These players must also fit the eligibility criteria from Section 1 of this rulebook.

2.2 Roster Listing

The active roster will be displayed on the competition website, Garnet Gaming Lounge , as well as on the competition Excel spreadsheet in the intramural Discord channel. The active roster on these forums will be updated upon appropriate requests by team captains.

2.3 Team Positions

All teams must be composed of at least two (2) eligible players and one (1) designated team captain.

2.4 Team Captain

Each team must designate a Team Captain, who must be a player on the Active Roster. The Team Captain will be the primary point of contact for the team and must be present in any official communications channels, such as GGLeap and Discord.

The captain must be identified before the start of the season, and a successor must be immediately identified if the captain leaves the team for any reason. The captain must be fully eligible in accordance with the rules outlined in Section 1.

2.5 Roster Changes

A team may change the players on their roster at any point during the Round Robin phase of the intramural. Any new players must be fully eligible per Section 1.

Any changes to rosters must be announced, approved, and finalized at least 24 hours before the next scheduled match time. Intramural Hosts and GGL Staff reserve the right to approve or deny any such request based upon the eligibility of the players involved, the request's compliance with the Rules, and any extenuating circumstances.

2.6 Account Name Restrictions

Account Names and Team Names may not contain vulgarities, obscenities, or anything that could not be displayed under the FSU image. These restrictions will be applied solely at the discretion of the Intramural Hosts and GGL Staff.

2.7 Name Approval

Intramural Hosts and GGL Staff reserve the right to modify Team Names or Player Names if they do not reflect the standards expressed in Section 2.6 or required by university administration.

A team or player will be notified by the Intramural Host or GGL Staff if their name must be changed and will be permitted to change to an acceptable name. Team Members are permitted to change their in-game name during the season for any reason.

2.8 Team Name

Teams may choose any name so long as it abides by Sections 2.6 and 2.7. Teams will submit their name in the registration form.

Teams may not change their team name after competition begins, unless otherwise required by Sections 2.6 and 2.7, or by the Intramural Hosts or GGL Staff.

3.1 Definition of Key Terms

Game

A single competition played between two teams. One game of Rocket League.

Match

Tournament play between two teams that may consist of multiple games.

Best-of-X

A type of match consisting of multiple games wherein teams play until one team wins a majority share of X games.

Double Elimination Bracket

A bracket where a team plays other teams. A team will be eliminated from the Double Elimination Bracket if the team loses two (2) matches.

Bracket Reset

A scenario in which a team that has not lost a match in a Double Elimination Bracket loses a match in the Grand Finals.

3.2 Tournament Structure

The Intramural League will be a single Double Elimination bracket. Teams will play in a traditional tournament bracket, with the winning team advancing to the next round of play and the losing team ending their play in the Intramural League.

All Double Elimination Bracket matches are Best-of-Three (Bo3) series.

3.3 Competition Structure

The Intramural Host and competition staff are free to change the structure of the Intramural League before the start of competition play, in accordance with the goal of making the Intramural League sufficiently competitive and fun.

This includes, but is not limited to, altering the number of groups in the Round Robin stage, altering the number of advancing teams from the Round Robin stage, or adding or removing stages in their entirety.

3.4 Competitive Patch and Server

The Intramural League will be played on the North America live server. As such, the current live patch will be used for all competitive play.

3.5 Setup and Player Responsibilities for Matches

All players will be expected to be ready to join the game lobby at the time agreed upon in advance as described in Section 3.6.

Readiness includes, but is not limited to, all rostered players having joined the game lobby, completed client patching, and configured in-game settings.

3.6 Schedule Adjustments by Hosts

Intramural Hosts and GGL Staff, in their sole discretion, have the right to adjust the match schedule at any time to preserve the pacing of the tournament or to remedy circumstances that may detract from the viewer experience.

3.7 Match Scheduling

Matches occur in specific date ranges (rounds) according to their location on the bracket. The first round begins the day the tournament begins, November 2.

Teams may agree to schedule matches at any point in time during that round. Scheduling matches will occur through written messages between team captains.

Once completed, teams will send a screenshot of the agreed-upon time and date in the appropriate channel of the Intramural Discord. This agreed-upon time is considered the official match time for the purpose of lateness or forfeits.

If teams cannot agree upon a time within the round, the match must be played at the default time specified below. Teams may not schedule matches outside of the specified round because doing so would negatively impact the bracket's ability to proceed.

3.8 Final Match

The final match, Round 10, must occur during the specified date and time. This is to guarantee production staff can be present for the match to be streamed on the GGL social media channels.

3.9 Match Reschedules

Teams may agree to reschedule their matches to a different time, provided that the match begins before the round deadline.

Rescheduling will occur through written messages between team captains. Once completed, teams will send a screenshot of the agreed-upon reschedule in the appropriate channel of the Intramural Discord.

If teams agree on a reschedule, the agreed-upon time is considered the official match time for the purpose of lateness or forfeits.

If teams cannot agree on a different time, the match must be played at the original scheduled time.

Intramural Hosts and GGL Staff reserve the right to uphold or reject reschedule requests at their sole discretion.

To avoid misuse of the reschedule process, any reschedule requests accepted with less than 24 hours before the proposed reschedule time must be confirmed a second time by the rescheduling team before becoming official. Otherwise, Intramural Hosts and GGL Staff may invalidate the reschedule request.

3.10 Lateness Penalties

A team will automatically forfeit its match if it has zero team members in the Garnet Gaming Lounge within five (5) minutes of its official match start time.

Teams that have at least one team member in the lounge for the first game of their match will have an additional five (5) minutes, for a total of ten (10) minutes.

Intentionally delaying the lobby or game start will still subject the team to penalties.

3.11 Pause Process

Teams or players may pause the game for technical issues. The Lobby Host is the only player capable of pausing.

The Lobby Host must honor any request to pause from teammates or the opposing team until the limit expressed in Section 3.12 is reached.

After a pause, the pausing team must use match chat to share the reason for the pause.

When a team is ready to unpause, at least one player from both teams must declare their readiness in match chat, such as "ready" or "r," before the pausing team is allowed to unpause the game.

3.12 Pause Allowance

Teams may pause the game for a maximum of three (3) minutes or two (2) independent pauses, whichever is reached first.

Pausing beyond the allowance will be considered unfair play, and penalties will be applied at the discretion of tournament officials.

3.13 Abuse of Pause Requests

If a team is considered to be attempting to abuse the pause mechanic to unfairly gain an advantage over its opponent, it will be subject to penalties in accordance with Section 5.7.

Examples include, but are not limited to, false calls for pausing and repeated calls for pausing for the same issue.

3.14 1v2 Play

Teams are required to field a full team of two players to be considered ready to start any match.

If a player disconnects from the lobby or game, the team is no longer ready to play, and lateness time begins.

If a player disconnects from the game, the game may continue as 1v2 or be paused according to Section 3.11.

3.15 Match Location

Players are required to play their intramural matches in the Garnet Gaming Lounge.

3.16 Player Equipment Responsibility

Players are not responsible for problems occurring with GGL-provided equipment. Pauses and reschedules resulting from equipment malfunction will not be held against the affected team.

Players are responsible for ensuring the performance of their own peripherals. A problem with a player's equipment is not an acceptable reason for lateness or pausing beyond a team's allowance, regardless of the root cause of the problem.

3.17 Streaming Matches

Players are permitted to stream intramural matches if they provide all players in the lobby with advance notice of the stream and no other player objects.

These streams must include a minimum five (5) minute delay.

Players who are found streaming an intramural match against the wishes of other participants will be considered in violation of the rules and will be subject to punishment accordingly.

3.18 Final Match Streaming

The final match of the intramural will be streamed by the Garnet Gaming Lounge staff and the Esports at FSU Productions Team.

Players may still livestream from their own perspective in accordance with Section 3.17 and with permission from the Intramural Host.

4.1 Game Lobby Creation

The team captain from the higher-seeded team of the matchup must add the team captain from the lower-seeded team to their in-game friends list.

The higher-seeded captain will then create a Custom Game lobby and invite the other team captain. Each team captain is responsible for inviting the remaining members of their team to the lobby.

4.2 Lobby Setup

4.2.1 Mode

Standard.

4.2.2 Team Size

2v2.

4.2.3 Bot Difficulty

No bots.

4.2.4 Team Settings

• Team Names should be set in accordance with the sides chosen by the Excel spreadsheet bracket schedule.
• Primary and Accent colors should be set to default.
• Mutator Settings must be set to default.

4.2.5 Region

All games must be played on the US East server unless both teams agree otherwise.

4.2.6 Arenas

The following arenas are permitted:

• Aquadome
• Champions Field (Standard, Day)
• Deadeye Canyon
• DFH Stadium (Standard, Day, Stormy)
• Forbidden Temple (Standard, Day)
• Mannfield (Standard, Night, Stormy, Snow)
• Neo Tokyo
• Salty Shores (Day, Night)
• Starbase ARC (Standard, Dawn, Night)
• Utopia Coliseum (Standard, Dusk, Snowy)
• Wasteland (Standard, Night)

4.3 Score Reporting

After each match, the winning team is responsible for reporting the score on the tournament platform (GGLeap and Microsoft Discord) and providing a screenshot of the post-match scoreboard with the report.

4.4 Arena Selection Process

Once both teams are in the lobby and confirm they are ready to begin play, the arena selection process will begin.

Under no circumstances may an arena be played twice in one match unless all other available maps have been played.

Arena selection for the first game of the match will be given to the higher-seeded team. Arena selection for all subsequent games will go to the loser of the previous game.

4.5 Restrictions on Gameplay Elements

Restrictions may be added at any time before or during a match if there are known bugs with any Rocket League gameplay elements, skins, maps, or for any other reason as determined at the discretion of the Intramural Host.

4.6 Game of Record

A game of record (GOR) refers to a game where all four players have loaded and which has progressed to a point of meaningful interaction between opposing teams.

Once a game attains GOR status, the period ends in which incidental restarts may be permitted, and the game will be considered official from that point onward. After the establishment of GOR, game restarts will be allowed only under limited conditions.

A game is considered to have achieved GOR status once any of the following conditions are met in the first round of play:

• Score: Either team scores a point.
• Destruction: Any player vehicle has been destroyed.
• Time Elapsed: One minute (01:00) has passed from game start.

4.7 Directed Pause

The Intramural Host or GGL Staff may order the pause of a match or execute a pause command at any time for any reason, at their sole discretion.

4.8 Game Restart

If a game experiences a critical bug at any point during the match that significantly alters game statistics or gameplay mechanics, or if external environmental conditions at a live event become untenable, a restart may occur.

Certain circumstances must be met before a restart may occur. The Intramural Host must determine that the bug is critical and verifiable.

For the bug to be considered critical, the bug must significantly damage a team's ability to compete in the game situation. The determination of whether a bug has damaged a team's ability to compete is at the sole discretion of the Intramural Host.

For a bug to be considered verifiable, the bug must be conclusively present and not possibly attributable to player error. A spectator must then be able to replay the instance in question and verify the bug.

If a player believes they have experienced a critical bug, they must pause the game and alert a referee in a timely fashion. If it is believed that a player is attempting to delay reporting of a bug to wait for a possible restart at a more advantageous time, a restart will no longer be granted.

If the Intramural Host determines that the bug is critical and verifiable and that the team followed the pause protocol, the disadvantaged team will be presented with the option for a restart. If the team accepts, the game will immediately be restarted.

If the restart occurred due to a Rocket League gameplay bug, settings will no longer be retained regardless of Game of Record status, and the affected gameplay element may be made ineligible for at least the remainder of the day's matches unless the bug can be conclusively tied to a specific game element that can be fully removed.

If a team is offered a restart and declines, the team will be ineligible to request a restart on the bug that caused the potential restart for the remainder of the match.

However, the Intramural Host and GGL Staff reserve the right at all times to force a game restart if the game environment reaches a level of instability that compromises the competitive integrity of the game.

4.9 Awarded Game Victory

In the event of a technical difficulty that would lead to a partial or full restart, but significant constraints make it impossible to restart the game, in the sole discretion of the Intramural Host, the host may instead award a game victory to a team.

4.10 Mid-Match Break

Teams are entitled to a break of at least five (5) minutes between games of a match.

Teams can agree to a longer or shorter break. If no agreement can be reached, lateness time will begin counting at five (5) minutes exactly.

Teams are subject to lateness penalties per Section 3.10 if they are not ready to begin after the break time ends.

4.11 Results of Forfeiture

Matches won by forfeit will be reported by the minimum score it would take for one team to win the match. For example:

• 1–0 for a best-of-one match.
• 2–0 for a best-of-three match.
• 3–0 for a best-of-five match.

5.1 Code of Conduct

All team members must read and accept the official Florida State University Student Conduct Code.

Failure to abide by this conduct code may warrant punishments in this Intramural League at the discretion of the Intramural Host or GGL Staff.

5.2 Reporting Violations

Conduct violations of any kind may be reported to any Intramural Host or GGL Staff member by Microsoft Discord, email, or in-person discussion at the Garnet Gaming Lounge.

6.1 Unfair Play

The following actions will be considered unfair play and will be subject to penalties at the discretion of the Intramural Host or GGL Staff.

6.2 Profanity and Hate Speech

A Team Member may not use language that is obscene, foul, vulgar, insulting, threatening, abusive, libelous, slanderous, defamatory, or otherwise offensive or objectionable; or promote or incite hatred or discriminatory conduct in or near the match area at any time.

This rule additionally applies to public social media, live streaming, or player communications during live events.

6.3 Disruptive Behavior and Insults

A Team Member may not take any action or perform any gesture directed at an opposing Team Member, fan, or official, or incite any other individual to do the same, which is insulting, mocking, disruptive, or antagonistic.

6.4 Abusive Behavior

Abuse of the Intramural Host, GGL Staff, opposing Team Members, or audience members will not be tolerated.

Repeated etiquette violations, including but not limited to touching another player's computer, body, or property, will result in penalties.

Team Members and their guests, if any, must treat all individuals attending a match with respect.

6.5 Unprofessional Behavior

6.6 Subjection to Penalty

Any person found to have engaged in or attempted to engage in any act that the Intramural Host or GGL Staff believe, in their sole and absolute discretion, constitutes unfair play will be subject to penalty.

The nature and extent of the penalties imposed due to such acts shall be in the sole and absolute discretion of the Intramural Host and GGL Staff.

7.1 Cross-League Penalties

The Intramural Host and GGL Staff reserve the right to honor penalties incurred in other intramural leagues, and vice versa.

7.2 Right to Publish

The Garnet Gaming Lounge shall have the right to publish a declaration stating that a Team Member has been penalized.

8.1 Finality of Decisions

All decisions regarding the interpretation of these rules, player eligibility, scheduling and staging of the Intramural League, and penalties for misconduct lie solely with the Intramural Host and GGL Staff. Their decisions are final.

Intramural League decisions with respect to these Rules cannot be appealed.

8.2 Rule Changes

These Rules may be amended, modified, or supplemented by the Intramural Host or GGL Staff from time to time in order to ensure fair play and the integrity of the Intramural League.

8.3 Best Interests of the Intramural League

The Intramural Host and GGL Staff at all times may act with the necessary authority to preserve the best interests of the Intramural League.

This power is not constrained by a lack of specific language in this document. The Intramural Host and GGL Staff may use any form of punitive action at their disposal against any entity whose conduct is not within the confines of the best interests of the Intramural League.