The Amazing Sanction Race

The Amazing Sanction Race is a thread on the forums which contains an almost daily record of the scores of various alliances to see which are close to and could become sanctioned. The first thread began in the middle of 2007 and has continued on since in various incarnations and has been updated nearly daily.

Sanction Races

 * April 11, 2007 &mdash; April 12, 2007
 * May 30, 2007 &mdash; June 4, 2007
 * June 12, 2007 &mdash; September 2, 2007
 * September 17, 2007 &mdash; October 15, 2007
 * October 17, 2007 &mdash; November 5, 2007
 * November 9, 2007 &mdash; December 2, 2007
 * December 5, 2007 &mdash; December 31, 2007
 * January 1, 2008 &mdash; Present

How to update the Sanction Race
While many of the earlier Sanction Race threads had one main person who updated statistics, the recent trend has been to share this duty between many people. The following guide is meant to help inexperienced posters complete Sanction Race updates quickly, efficiently, and properly.

Starting Instructions
When updating the Sanction Race, do not start from scratch. Not only will it take you a long time, but you'll mess up all the colours and the formatting and Gopherbashi will get mad at you. Instead, quote the post of whoever updated the Sanction Race the night before you, and simply edit in the appropriate numbers. Not only will this prevent you from wasting time and altering the style, but you'll also have yesterday's numbers already as part of your own update.

Every update should ideally take place around the same time. While update times have normally been anywhere between seven hours before update and one hour after update, the most common time is between two and three hours before update. When beginning an update, ensure that the date is accurate at the top of your post. If you wish, you may also place a Sanction Race themed picture at the beginning as well.

When updating an alliance's score, do not use the Display All Alliances page, as this information can be as much as 12 hours out of date. Instead, you should be checking the Detailed Alliance Statistics page, as this information is up-to-date and in realtime.

The Sanction Race is not a place to advance your own politics. It is neutral ground, and updates should not be used to promote the cause of your alliance or to demean that of another. There are more than enough other threads for political bickering on CN forums - don't bring it into the Sanction Race and risk a lock from the Moderation staff.

Formatting Instructions
Every alliance is different - and depending on their statistics, alliances may be displayed in different ways.
 * The Top 14 Alliances meeting all sanction requirements are preceeded by their numerical rank
 * The Top 12 Alliances meeting all sanction requirements are bolded
 * All alliances who have a flag displayed in their Detailed Alliance Statistics also have a 30-pixel wide flag preceeding their name
 * All alliances who do not meet all sanction requirements are italicized, and have their number of nations listed in curly brackets preceeding their name
 * Alliances who fall below the Drop Line are striked out for their final update, and are eliminated in the ensuing update

Challenge Lines
Challenge Lines are introduced occasionally by Sanction Race updaters, to challenge alliances in a very close race to achieve a certain score. While prizes are often handed out to the first alliance to meet the achievement, these prizes must be declared and paid by whoever introduced the specific Challenge Line into the Sanction Race.

Add and Drop Lines
The Add and Drop Lines were introduced to provide an absolute score at which alliances are either added or dropped from the Sanction Race. Based on precedent, an alliance is added to the Sanction Race when it meets or exceeds the score of the Add Line, and an alliance is dropped from the Sanction Race when it falls below the Drop Line.

The Add Line is equal to half of the score of the 12th place alliance which meets all sanction requirements, while the Drop Line is exactly 0.30 below the Add Line. In the event that the 12th place alliance has an odd-numbered score, the Sanction Race updater has the choice to round the Add and Drop Lines either up or down.

During times when the Add and Drop Lines may transfer between alliances in rapid succession (ie. due to large-scale war or a mass ghosting wave), the Add and Drop Lines may be frozen indefinitely so that alliances are not added or dropped repeatedly. This decision should only be made by senior updaters or when a general consensus exists.

Statistics and Discussion
Following all alliances and their scores are the statistics. These include the Biggest Gainer Award: awarded to the alliance(s) who gained the most score that day, the Biggest Loser Award: awarded to the alliance(s) who lost the most score that day, and the Passes of the Day: listing all alliances who passed, tied, or fell below other alliances, the Add or Drop Lines, or sanction requirements. In situations where no alliances gain score (such as after the score formula is altered), the Biggest Gainer Award is replaced by the Least Loser Award.

The discussion is written by the Sanction Race updater, and as such, is very subjective. A good discussion should mention any notable passes, score changes, races that are either tightening or widening, anything else that is worthy enough to have attention brought to it, and a bit of humour as well. The discussion is the most important part of the Sanction Race - without it, all that would be included are numbers and statistics, for which many other sources exist. A decent discussion should include two paragraphs with 4-5 lines each, although some of the more ambitious updaters frequently exceed this.

Some updates also contain a shoutout to a certain person, alliance, group, inanimate object, or the Flying Spaghetti Monster. This is completely optional and up to the discretion of the updater.

Conclusion
Every Sanction Race update must end with [/update]. It's tradition, and Gopher will gnaw out your jugular vein if you don't do it.

Also, there is often a series of links to similarly-themed threads and pages. If it's in the update before yours, you should ideally include this as well.