Kongo game - rules

Arranging the team

You select 10 rikishi in the following composition:

1. According to the actual banzuke, you have to pick one rikishi from each group, nine in total.

2. All the 9 selected rikishi must be put in one of the three possible score groups:

Hoshitori group: the rikishi are collecting scores during the tournament by their wins

Kimarite group: the winning rikishi are collecting scores during the tournament by the winning technique they use

„Make-kumi” group: the rikishi are collecting scores during the tournament by their losses

3. You have to select a tenth rikishi (who must not be among the nine previously selected) from the Makunouchi (not Juryo!) division; he will be your extra rikishi. This rikishi will be collecting scores for you in all the three groups during the tournament. (For example if one day he wins, he will get scores in the „hoshitori” and the „kimarite” group as well. If he loses, he gets scores in the „make-kumi” group. Result of the extra rikishi is the first determinating factor in case of tie-break. The winner is who gets more points.

4. For case of an undecided victory at the end of the game, you also have to send your tie-breaking tip. It will be the number of total losses of all yokozuna and sanyaku ranked rikishi (ozeki, sekiwake, komusubi). The winner is whose tip is the closest to the real result (from either direction). 

Announcement of the game and the Application Form

The Application Form can be found here. After pressing the Send button, your entry will be accepted by the system (you will get error messages if you forget something or make error in the selection). You also will receive a confirmation message by e-mail. The deadline is 14:00 JST on Saturday preceding the first day (shonichi) of the actual tournament. You can modify your team as many times as you want until the deadline.

Please remember that you have to fill in the on-line form and no e-mail entries are accepted.

Missing the game, retiring

Players have right to leave out a tournament without any penalty. For the following tournament, player will keep his rank achieved on the previous tournament.

The player has this right only in case he participated on the previous tournament, so he may not leave out two or more consecutive basho. If the player will not participate on the following tournament, then his result will be 0-15 and will slide down on the banzuke.

If you wish to miss a tournament, you must send a notice about it to the address info@szumo.hu as soon as possible, but not later of expiring of the deadline.  In case of the first absence every player gets the kosho status automatically, e.g. even if you miss the deadline accidentally, and forget to notify us, you won't slide down the banzuke anyway. Naturally we can not give you the kosho status on your second or further missed basho.

Those players, who miss three consecutive tournaments, will be removed from the banzuke. Naturally they can return to the game later, whenever they want, but they have to remember that in this case they have to begin at the bottom of the banzuke, in the lowest division.

We ask all those players who got bored of the game or have any other reason to leave it, to send us a notice to the e-mail address above, to make our work easier.

Course of the game

You can follow the daily state of the game at these places:

1. On the Hungarian-language sumo mailing list
2. In Sumo games subforum of Sumoforum.net, in topic of the actual basho
3. Here, on the website of the game

Scoring

A rikishi will get scores depending on which group he was selected to.

„Hoshitori” group: If the opponent was higher ranked - 7 points, if the opponent was in the same rank – 6 points, if the opponent was lower ranked – 5 points after each win.

In addition, a Maegashira ranked rikishi gets 5 points for defeating a Yokozuna (kinboshi), 3 points for defeating an Ozeki (ginboshi) and 2 points for defeating a Sekiwake or Komusubi (douboshi).

In case of fusensho (when the opponent does not appear on the dohyo) you will get the score only after the win but no kinboshi, etc..

„Kimarite” group: Techniques have their own score values, based on their frequency of appearance in a certain period of the past. You can find the actual kimarite score values on this page. (Grouping the kimarite by their characters is not important in this game!).

In case of fusensho (when the opponent does not appear on the dohyo) you will get 0 points.

„Make-kumi” group: If the opponent was higher ranked - 5 points, if the opponent was in the same rank – 6 points, if the opponent was lower ranked – 7 points after each loss.

In case of fusensho (when the opponent does not appear on the dohyo) you will get 6 points.

If the rikishi was selected to the “make-kumi” group, and quits the basho, he will get 6 points after each day being absent from the tournament.

If you have in your team a rikishi, who does not participate in the tournament at all (=kyujo), and you can not replace him until the deadline, then your team will get after him 1 “make-kumi” point every day, independently from everything.

Converting scores to "sumo-like" results (kekka)

a. Each player participating in a basho will have their final position converted into "win-loss equivalent" score. This makes the highest and lowest possible scores 15-0 and 0-15, as in real sumo. This means, for example, that for the equivalent of kachi-koshi (8-7), you need to be in the top 46.7% of the table.  A player can get a 15-0 score if he reaches at least 90% of the most acquireable scores (DT) or 14-1 if he gets the 80% of it. "DT" is the totalized score of the Dream Team, the ten-member team of real rikishi who made the most points during the basho.

Method of calculation:

Step 1: determining value of DT - this is unambiguously the score of the Dream Team (DT)

Step 2: determining winning order of the players by the final scores.

Step 3: determining kachi-koshi boundary: to get kachi-koshi, a player must finish the game in the upper 46.7% of the result table. Score of the player in the lowest kachi-koshi position will be the kachi-koshi point (K).

Step 4: determining of the winning result - this is unambiguously the score of player in the first place (Max)

Step 5: determining of the kachi-koshi step:  L1 = (DT * 0,8 – K) / 6.

Step 6: determining of the lowest score – this is unambiguously the score of player in the first place (Min).

Step 7: determining of the make-koshi step: L2 = (K – Min) / 8.

Step 8: determining of the score boundaries by the followings:

   DT*0,9 -            15 -  0
   DT*0,8 – DT*0,9-1   14 -  1
   K+5*L1 - K+6*L1-1   13 -  2
   K+4*L1 - K+5*L1-1   12 -  3
   K+3*L1 - K+4*L1-1   11 -  4
   K+2*L1 - K+3*L1-1   10 -  5
   K+1*L1 - K+2*L1-1    9 -  6
   K      - K+1*L1-1    8 -  7
   K-1*L2 - K-1         7 -  8
   K-2*L2 - K-1*L2-1    6 -  9
   K-3*L2 - K-2*L2-1    5 - 10
   K-4*L2 - K-3*L2-1    4 - 11
   K-5*L2 - K-4*L2-1    3 - 12
   K-6*L2 - K-5*L2-1    2 – 13
   K-7*L2 - K-6*L2-1    1 - 14
          - K-7*L2-1    0 - 15

Makushita

   DT*0,9 -            7 - 0
   DT*0,8 - DT*0,9-1   6 - 1
   K+1*L1 - K+2*L1-1   5 - 2
   K      - K+1*L1-1   4 - 3
   K-1*L1 - K-1        3 - 4
   K-2*L1 - K-1*L1-1   2 - 5
   K-3*L1 - K-2*L1-1   1 - 6
          - K-3*L1-1   0 - 7

In case of equal points the following method is used to determine the order:

1. Total score
2. Number of wins of the rikishi
3. Scores got on the given day
4. Lower rank on the banzuke

If after all of these there is still a tie situation, the determining factor will be the date and time of sending in the entry. Naturally, if a player sent in more entries, for example corrections, we will take date and time of the last entry.

Winner of the tournament is that player who collects the most points by the end of the game. In case there are more such players, we determine the winner with the method described above. All divisions have their own tournament winners. If there are few players in a division, they are playing together with players of the next division and naturally they can win the yusho of that division, too. In this case Banzuke Council will make an announcement in the places described in section "Course of the game".

In case of equal score, this is the order of determining the winner:

1. Total score
2. Score collected by the extra rikishi
3. Guess of the tie-breaking question
4. Time of sending of the entry

Special prizes (sansho)

• Player is in Makuuchi division and his rank must be under Ozeki
• Player gets kachi-koshi on the basho
• If more players are qualified for the prize, tha player with better result will get it

Definition of the prizes

Kanto-sho             That player gets it whose team collects the most “hoshitori” points

Shukun-sho           That player gets it who wins the most days in the game

Gino-sho                That player gets it whose team collects the most “kimarite” points

Make-sho             That player gets it whose team collects the most “make-kumi” points

Number of players in the divisions

Players are playing in divisions, there number is the same as in divisions in real sumo: Makunouchi - 42, Juryo - 28, Makushita - 120.

New players joining the game will be added to the first available place on the bottom of the banzuke (currently this is the Makushita division), in order of time of sending in their entries.

Totalizing the scores

We totalize the scores after each tournament, and at the end of the year, after November basho we announce the winners of the year. The winner gets a precious prize of high value from the winner of the previous year. "High value" does not mean it must be an expensive gift, it is always the winner of the previous year who defines what does it mean for him/her. In January we always begin with zero.

The Banzuke Council

The Banzuke Council is the board of referee who supervise the game, it makes decisions in disputed situations, determines the final result of the game, as well as announces tournament and special prize winners, and releases the banzuke of the following tournament.

Current members of the Banzuke Council: Kachitakai, Nekonishiki and Andrasoyamawaka.

Conditions of promoting to Ozeki

• sekiwake rank on the recent two tournaments
• kachi-koshi result on the recent four tournaments
• at least one yusho or jun-yusho (by kekka, not points) on the recent four tournaments
• at least 33 kekka points on the recent three basho

Conditions of promotion are examined only by results of active tournaments, so the player will not lose his chances for the promotion if he has to leave out a basho because of any reason, but only if he previously sent a note about his absence.

If an ozeki gets a make-koshi result on a tournament, he will receive kadoban status for the following basho. If he finishes this basho with make-koshi, too, then he will lose his rank. Nevertheless, if he can get at least 10 wins on the third tournament, he will get his ozeki rank back.

Conditions of promoting to Yokozuna

• ozeki rank on the recent two tournaments
• kachi-koshi result on the recent four tournaments
• at least two yusho or jun-yusho (by kekka, not points) on the recent four tournaments
• at least 36 kekka points on the recent three basho

Conditions of promotion are examined only by results of active tournaments, so the player will not lose his chances for the promotion if he has to leave out a basho because of any reason, but only if he previously sent a note about his absence.

Although it is not too elegant if a yokozuna has continuously weak performance, there is no pressure on them at all, it is entirely depends on their own decision if they continue playing or retire, and everybody has to respect this decision.