This page shows you how to create a simple tourney and define the player list. It also discusses accessibility requirements for specific table numbers.
Decide on a name for your tourney and enter it into the "Tourney name" box. This name is used as the filename for the tourney's database file, and it may only contain letters, numbers, underscores and hyphens - no spaces. So cotrodmore2020 is okay, but Countdown In Trodmore 2020 is not. When you've entered the name, click Create Tourney. When that succeeds, click the "click here to continue" link and you will land on the Tourney Setup page.
The Tourney Setup page allows you to load the list of players and specify the rules of the tournament. To get back to this page at any time, you can click the General Setup link in the sidebar.
A tourney isn't much of a tourney without players. The text area under the heading Player List is where your list of players goes. Put each player name on a separate line, starting with the highest-rated player and finishing with the lowest-rated player. If your tournament is split into divisions, put a hyphen (-) on a line by itself to indicate where the splits are.
N.B. If you need to add a prune (an imaginary player who always scores zero) to take the number of players up to a multiple of two or three, give them a rating of zero by adding a comma and a zero after their name. This is important because some of the fixture generators treat prunes specially to avoid drawing prunes against each other, and to avoid players playing two different prunes twice.
Here's an example list of players you can copy and paste into the player list box.
Cymbelina Spatchcock
Lord Hoppleton
Compton Pauncefoot
Vampira Smithersby
Tinned Peaches
Infumbula Trousers
Jacquard Hookflash
Trilby Battenberg
Blancmange McTaggart
Sincerity Sandwich
Salzburg Pound-Quedgeley
Apterous Prune,0
Then click Save Player List.
The General Setup stage is also where you can specify other attributes like how many rounds are expected (so it can automatically work out if someone's qualified for the final) and which tables are the designated Acccessible Tables, if any.
You may want to ensure that certain players are always assigned to a specific table number (or one of a set of numbers) if possible. Usually this is to take account of accessibility requirements for wheelchair users at the venue. Atropine provides a mechanism to help with this. The decisions made by fixture generators of who plays whom are not affected by these accessibility requirements - the only thing affected is which table number the player and their opponents are assigned to.
In the Accessibility section of the General Setup page you can define which are the "accessible" tables by putting a list of table numbers in the box, separated by commas.
On the setup page for a player, you can tick a box to mark them as requiring an accessible table. You can reach this page using the Players... link in the sidebar under General Setup. Click the name of the player, tick the Requires accessible table box, and Save Changes. You can also set a "preferred table number" for that player if necessary.
Players who require an accessible table will be placed on one if possible. Once again, accessibility requirements will not affect who plays whom, only the number of the table that player and their opponents play on.
If there are more players than accessible tables, the fixture generator page will warn you.
When you've entered the player list, the next step is to Generate Fixtures.