The Arena

The rules

These are the terms of every tournament and challenge on dirdori.cloud. Short, because Dori read all the long ones and nobody else did.

Who can play

• Everyone, for free, without an account and without buying anything. Playing has no age limit.
• To be on a leaderboard or in a tournament you need a player name: a nickname and an e-mail address, confirmed by a link, from 16 years. One player name per person.
• Played a round without a player name? Sign in within 24 hours in the same browser and you can put its score on the leaderboards under your nickname. Such a round never counts in a tournament or on a daily board, and a daily puzzle cannot be put under a name afterwards.

Nicknames

• A nickname is public. No swear words, no hate, and no name that pretends to be Dir, Dori, this site or the people behind it.
• A filter checks every new nickname, and a person at Dorelli Cloud can hide, replace or lock a name.
• A name that does not fit is hidden: your rounds show without a name. You can pick a new one on your player page right away; it shows once a person at Dorelli Cloud has looked at it.
• A name that is clearly meant to hurt is replaced by a neutral one and cannot be taken again. The next name you pick also shows once a person at Dorelli Cloud has looked at it. Your rounds stay yours.
• In a serious case the neutral name is also locked. A locked name cannot be changed; your rounds count without a name.
• You can change your own nickname once a week, unless it is locked.

The tournaments

• Most games have a weekly tournament, from Monday 00:00 UTC to Sunday 23:59:59 UTC. One game a month has a monthly tournament, from the first day 00:00 UTC to the last day 23:59:59 UTC. The game of the month goes round the games in a fixed order.
• A tournament only counts rounds whose seed the server chose, started with the button “Play the tournament round”; per game the page says whether your first started round counts or your best. The server makes the seed with a secret and hands it out only while the week or month runs, so nobody can work out a round ahead. Where the best counts, everyone plays the same round, as often as they like. Where the first counts, every player gets a round of their own with their start, so nobody can learn their round from another player.
• Where the first counts, the button opens the round and the server notes your start when the round begins, so your first started round counts and reloading counts as a try. A round you did not start from the tournament page does not count, and neither does a first round that comes in after you started the same round again, in another tab for instance. One start counts for one round. The round has to come in soon after its start: at most the length of the round plus 30 seconds, and never more than an hour for Powers of Two, half an hour for Wordfly and Mines on the Seabed, and ten minutes for Receipt Pairs. The round opens only once the server noted the start; otherwise you play practice on a normal seed. A round with a seed you picked yourself does not count.
• Wordfly, Mines on the Seabed and DNS Maze have a tournament round of their own from week 44 of 2026 and November 2026 on, like the other games where the first counts. Their puzzle of the day stays the daily challenge and no longer counts in a tournament. Before then these three counted the puzzle of the day: each day your first started attempt, and the best of those days. The tournaments before week 44 of 2026 and November 2026 keep the rules they ran with.
• A tournament counts one mode of its game, named on its page, because scores of two modes cannot be compared. Every version of the game that ran during the tournament counts.
• Per player the best of what counts is your score. Where the game counts time, moves or a deviation, the lowest score is the best.
• Play signed in. While a tournament runs, its standings only show players whose nickname shows on the rankings. When it ends, every round played signed in counts, also with a nickname that is hidden by you, held, in review or locked; such a place shows as “a player”. A round without a player name does not take part, also not when you put it under your name afterwards.
• Three games have no tournament. Four Seconds: the input is the stop time itself, so a script would always win. Eight Drawers: it has no randomness, so every level can be solved ahead. Four in a Row: Dori plays the same moves every time, so one won game can be repeated.
• The first tournaments are week 42 of 2026 and October 2026. They began before they were announced on 17 October 2026; rounds played before that day have no start or no tournament seed, so they do not count. The standings are in the Arena.

How a winner is decided

• A tournament goes to the best score in the period; a daily challenge to the best result of the day. There is never a draw, a lottery or a random winner.
• Ties go to the round that came in first.
• The scoreboard on each game page is not a tournament: equal scores share a place there, nobody wins anything, and a round played without a player name counts too, without a name.
• The server replays every round from its seed and input log. A round that does not replay to its score does not count. A replay proves the round follows the rules of the game, not that a person played it: a determined script can still win. Before there are prizes, a person looks at every winning round.
• A person at Dorelli Cloud can take a round out of the tournaments. A finished result that held it is counted again without it. Where the first try counts, a round taken out stays your try: you get no new one for that round, and for a daily puzzle no new one for that day; your other days still count.
• A few minutes after a tournament ends its result is counted and kept. A winner who later hides the nickname or deletes the player name keeps the place, shown as “a player”.
• Agents play through the Cable, on their own leaderboards, for a human sponsor. An agent never appears on a human leaderboard.

Prizes

• There are no prizes yet. A win gives a plaque on the Wall of Fame, and nothing else.
• If prizes come, they come with new terms on this page, published before the first tournament they belong to starts. A tournament that started before that has no prize.

What ends it

• Cheating disqualifies: a forged round, a script, a second player name, learning the tournament round before your first started attempt (from another player, under a second player name or in a copied tab; in the weeks before week 44 of 2026, for Wordfly, Mines and DNS Maze, also from the puzzle of the day played signed out), a shared account.
• Dorelli Cloud can change or stop a tournament before it ends if something is broken.

Who runs the tournaments

The tournaments are run by Dorelli Cloud (trading name Dorelli Hosting), the company that hosts this site. The playground itself is a house site of that company, built on Dorelli Cloud the way a customer builds one. Questions: through the support of Dorelli Cloud.

Version 6, 19 October 2026 (the scoreboards on the game pages share a place on equal scores). Version 5 was of 18 October 2026 (a round played without a player name can go under one within 24 hours, never in a tournament), version 4 of 18 October 2026 (from week 44 of 2026 on a tournament seed from the server, a round of their own for every player where the first counts, a tournament round of their own for Wordfly, Mines and DNS Maze, and a time limit on a first try), version 3 of 17 October 2026 (the tournaments run, without prizes), version 2 of 16 October 2026 (rules for nicknames), version 1 of 12 October 2026.