The Official Movie Melee Rule Book

The Official Movie Melee Rule Book

(SUBJECT TO CHANGE)

Any questions on the rules that were not addressed here, you can message Payson Johnson directly. Thank you.

Standard Matches

• A standard match in movie melee is three rounds. This consists of a whiteboard round, a wheel round, and a pick your poison round.

• In a title match, there are two additional rounds. A deep cut round and an opponent's choice round.

• Throughout the duration of a standard match, competitors get three repeats to be used for more time to think. In a title match, they are given four repeats.

• Throughout the duration of the match, a competitor is given one challenge. They can challenge anything under the sun. If they win the challenge, they get it back. If they lose the challenge, it is gone for the match.

• Competitors must keep their hands on screen throughout the duration of the match. Failure to do so will get you a reminder from the hosts. Repeated occurrences during a match could lead to harsher consequences.

Round One

• The whiteboard round.

• Competitors receive eight questions from eight different general categories.

• Competitors have fifteen seconds to write their answer on their board after hearing the question, afterwards they will hear pens down.

• Answer all eight questions correct, a competitor will receive a bonus question asked only to them or anyone else that went perfect.

• In a teams match, competitors will work individually to answer questions. No conferring.

Round Two

• The Wheel Round

• Competitors are asked five questions from whatever category they land on with the wheel.

• The wheel consists of ten slices. Four or six general categories, two strengths (one from each player)

• In the event of a multi person match, spinner and opponents choice will not be on the wheel.

• In the event of a title match, the champion decides if Spinners and Opponents are on the wheel.

• The player in the lead out of round one has the option to spin first or differ.

• Your opponent can steal any question you get wrong.

• NEW RULE:  When sending in their strengths to the show runners, players will state if they want spinners and opponents choice on the wheel.  If one player says YES, then spinners and opponents choice WILL be on the wheel.  If both players or teams say NO then spinners and opponents choice WILL NOT be on the wheel.

• NEW RULE:  In title matches for a vacant title, Spinners and Opponents choice WILL NOT be on the wheel.

Round Two Strengths

• When a match is set up, the first thing you will be asked to do is send your strength and general category directly to Payson Johnson.

• Your general category can be anything from the general category list on the Facebook page. That list can also be accessed here: 

  • Multiplex Movie Melee - General Categories

• In regards to strengths, a strength can be anything as long as it has six eligible films included.

• A film is eligible if it played in New York and LA (on IMDB if it says limited release, we count that as eligible) and must be available to rent or stream on our six recognized streaming platforms.

• Melee’s recognized streaming platforms are:

• • Netflix

• • Prime Video

• • Hulu

• • Disney Plus

• • HBO Max

• • Apple TV+

• • And any other free service that isn’t illegal

• A strengths can be broken down by genre, year, decade, actor, director, composer, writer, producer, Oscar nominated, or Oscar winning.

• If you are breaking your strength down via Oscar winning or nominated, you can only break down via decade or era, not year.

• NEW RULE:  Strengths can be anything you can think of as long as there is a list you can point to.  No player generated lists can be used.  For example you can select 1992 to 2002 MTV Best Kiss nominees if you want. 

• NEW RULE: The Show Runners can VETO any strength they feel is too random.

• If your strength is less than 100 films, you must provide a list upon a request from your opposing player. Failure to do so will result in you being asked to pick another strength

• Even if your opponent does not request a list for some reason, we still recommend you provide a list not for their sake, but for the writers. If you do not, you are not allowed to challenge if an ineligible film via release or streaming issues is asked in your strength as you did not provide the writers with that knowledge.

• Questions in any player’s strengths can not be asked about in any other questions in the match unless your opponent picks a strength that is simply a genre or has one or less qualifiers.

• The general categories you select are not written at strength level.

• NEW RULE: In the event of a title match, players are asked to submit ONE STRENGTH and TWO GENERAL CATEGORIES.

• NEW RULE: If it is a player’s prerogative, you do not have to send in a strength. However you will not be able to chose a general category either.  Two random general categories will be added to the wheel instead.

Round 2 Wheel (Regular Match)

• Aside from the categories chosen by the players, there will be 4 additional categories randomly selected to be on the wheel. Or 6 if Spinners and Opponents choice is not on the wheel.

• The remaining four categories are chosen by a randomizer.   The randomizer will not include any categories drafted by players in round 3.  So if a player chooses "Drama" in round 3, "Drama" will not be eligible to be randomly added to the wheel.

• NEW RULE: The wheel will only include Spinner's and Opponent's Choice if one of the players or teams decides to include them.

Round 2 Wheel (Title Match) - NEW RULES

• Each player or team will select ONE strength category and TWO general categories

• Four additional random categories will be put on the wheel.  The categories chosen by the players for the Pick Your Poison round will not be on the randomizer when these four categories are chosen.

• The inclusion of  spinners and opponents choice will not affect how many categories are on the wheel.  There will alway be 2 strength categories, and 8 general categories on the wheel

• Any general categories on the wheel will not appear in Round 4. 

Round 3 (Round 5 in Title Matches)

• The “Pick your Poison” round.

• In a normal match, before the match is set up, players will go back and forth drafting categories they wish to appear in round 3. They each draft four.

• The player who is higher ranked decides if they want to draft first or second .

• The player in the lead drafts the first category, they then go back and forth.

• You are drafting categories to be taken at a one, two, three, and four point level.

• The order you draft does not need to match the order you answer your questions.

• In a teams match, teams confer on every question.

• In a title match, this is round 5.

• A category chosen for this round cannot be randomly selected by the show runners to be on the wheel in round 2.

Sudden Death

• In the event of a tie at the end of the match, sudden death is played.

• Players answer questions on their white board with no categories.

• They continue answering until one player takes the lead.

• Repeats are carried over into sudden death.

Title Match Rounds

Round Three (5 Round Match)

• In a title match, round 3 is the deep cut round.

• Before a title match, players or teams each submit one film and two deep cut questions (very deep plot questions) are asked for both movies.

• Questions can be any plot related detail about the movie.

• In teams, teams confer on all questions with the teams being in separate skype calls.
  
  

•  NEW RULE:  A player can only use their deep cut film or their opponents deep cut film once.  A player cannot use that film in any future title matches across all divisions.  (singles, teams, trios)

Round Four (5 Round Match)

• The Betting Round.

• Players are asked five questions from five random categories, each worth one point.

• Players can bet anywhere between 0-2 points on every question. 

• If the players answer the question correctly, they will recieve the number of points they bet.

• If the players answer the question incorrectly, they will lose the number of points they bet.

• The categories that can be randomized in this round are any categories that were not chosen for either rounds 2 or 5 by the players.

• In a teams match, the team goes back and forth deciding who answers the first four questions. When one player decides to answer the first question, the other player must take the second. This resets for questions 3 and 4 with the same rules. Players can confer on the 5th question in their skype call

Other Notes

Challenges

• Players are given one challenge throughout the match.

• If they win their challenge, they keep it. If they lose their challenge, they lose it for the rest of the match.

• Anything can be challenged.

• Once a challenge is thrown, the opposing player/team has the right to make a counter argument.

• Challenges are decided by the hosts rulings and past precedents. Please note, Past precedents are not always law.

• Challenges are ended when the hosts and showrunners come to an agreement.

• I will not go into every precedent we have set but one I do think is important is the multiple answers precedent.

• If a question has multiple answers and a player gets a correct one, the opposing player can’t challenge to get the question thrown out.

• That being said, if a player gets a question wrong that has multiple answers, they also can’t throw that question out.

Spelling

• Spelling does not count, but you must answer phonetically correct.

• Same goes for pronunciation.

Genres/Eras

• The classification of a film is determined by either what is stated on IMDB or Letterboxd.  The classification only needs to match one and not both sites.

• If we ask a question that is falsely classified, you can challenge to get a new question for yourself. That being said, you cannot screw other players out of points due to false classification.

• We go off the American release date for years on films. 

New Rule for Team and Trio Title Matches

• Conference calls will no longer be used in Round 2.  

• Conference calls will still be used for Round 3 and 4.