***Rules Update***

I have some very important rules updates and clarifications here. Please make sure to read this full post carefully.

1) Players may have multiple decks ready for a single class. Once one of those decks is played, it is locked in. For example, if one of my selected classes is mage, I could have both a mech mage and freeze mage ready to go. After losing my first game with a different hero, I could choose whichever mage deck gives me the best match-up. Once I pick a mage deck, I have to stick with it for the remainder of the match. This isn't the way it's normally done, but since we aren't submitting deck lists there's no way to prevent it, so we might as well officially sanction it and allow everyone to benefit from this tactic.

2) All decks must be fully constructed before a match begins. No teching out a deck after you've seen what your opponent has. This is pretty easy to enforce - just don't cancel the challenge after it has started and definitely don't go into your collection after the match. If you need a break during the match, just stay in the hero selection screen. If you go into your collection after the beginning of a match and your opponent catches you, the penalty will be a DQ and the REMAINING points in the match will go to your opponent.

3) This one is really important - NO GETTING HELP DURING A MATCH. All players must disable spectator mode before a match. Getting help during a competitive event is completely unfair and blatant cheating. Anyone found to be sharing their screen during a match, either through Hearthstone spectator mode or any other software will be permanently banned from the league. This is super important and we will have a zero tolerance for any violations.

4) Streaming a league match is allowed but all streamed league matches must be on at least a 15 minute delay. (As an aside, I think it would be fun to cast the matches of the final week that will determine the winner of the season. Anyone who's interested in casting, please contact me).

5) Our official match time for week one is 9:00 PM EST on Wednesday 2/11. If you can't make that time you can coordinate with your opponent (find you opponent on the "week 1" tab of the Season Alpha Spreadsheet) to set a different time to play. That time must be BEFORE the official match time for that week. All matches need to be complete before the end of Wednesday night.

If you can think of any rules that need to be addressed, please let me know! Unfortunately, this first week is almost sure to be a bit bumpy and chaotic but we have to start somewhere. We're having this alpha season so we can identify the problems and correct them.

Thanks!

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