Board Conflict Dialog

In multi-section tournaments, “board conflicts” can occur when two or more sections are assigned overlapping board number ranges. This dialog alerts you to those conflicts and offers options to resolve them.

The Board Conflict Window

The window gives you a brief explanation of the conflicts that were found and a scrollable text area listing exactly which sections overlap and on which boards.

“Stop showing this warning (this session only)” – if checked, SwissSys will not show this dialog again until you restart the program (useful if you choose to ignore and don’t want repeated prompts).

There is a help button (”?”) in the top right corner.

• Options:
  • Auto-Adjust Boards – automatically fix the board overlaps (described below).
  • Open Board Manager – open the Board Manager for manual adjustments.
  • Ignore – proceed without fixing (not recommended unless you will handle it yourself).

How the Board Conflict Tool Works

When the Dialog Appears

• The Board Conflict check runs right before pairing a round (after you click “Pair Next Round”).
• It only runs for multi-section tournaments (two or more sections).
• If any overlap is detected, the Board Conflict Dialog will appear before the pairing is actually done.

When Board Conflicts Occur

Example Conflict:

• Section “Open” uses boards 1–25
• Section “Reserve” uses boards 20–40
• Conflict: Boards 20–25 are assigned in both sections (overlap)

Common Scenarios Leading to Conflicts:

• Adding players mid-tournament: If a section grows and needs more boards than originally planned, it might encroach on another section’s range.
• Multi-section events with fixed board allocations: Simply having multiple sections in one tournament can lead to overlaps if ranges aren’t planned carefully.
• Board spacing enabled: Using the “Space boards by 2” setting doubles the board count needed for a given number of players, which can cause overlaps if not accounted for.
• Manual board assignments: If you manually set starting board numbers (FirstBoard) for sections and choose values that collide.

Auto-Adjust Boards

When you click Auto-Adjust Boards, SwissSys automatically reassigns the starting board numbers for each section to eliminate all overlaps. It processes sections in order and sets each section’s starting board to immediately follow the last board of the previous section.

For example, if Section “Open” has 25 players (boards 1–25) and Section “Reserve” was incorrectly starting at board 20, Auto-Adjust will move “Reserve” to start at board 26 instead.

After the adjustment, the Board Conflict Dialog closes and pairing proceeds automatically. You can verify the new board ranges in the section panels at the top of the main window (if Show board ranges is enabled in Display settings).

Related Topics

• Pairings Setup Dialog - Configure pairing options and board settings for each section
• Team Match Tournaments - Multi-section team formats where board conflicts commonly occur