The time has come

Since its founding in 2021, the Alpha Cup has been a flagship community event, known for its incredible spectacle and for bringing together the biggest names in BAR.

Now, in 2026, Alpha Cup returns for its sixth chapter and it’s bigger, sharper, and more competitive than ever. Riding the continued surge of the BAR community, Alpha Cup 6 brings together the top commanders in a high-stakes 1v1 showdown.

With a $1500 prize pool, featuring a map pool with some of the latest and hottest battlefields made by the dev team, this weekend promises top-tier gameplay from start to finish.

🔥 Tune in live on Twitch and YouTube and witness the next champion claim their place in Alpha Cup history.

When and where:

Day 1: Sat, April 25th, 16:00 UTC - Open bracket to the Quarter Finals

Day 2: Sun, April 26th, 16:00 UTC - Round of 4 and Grand Finals

Watch on Twitch

Watch on Youtube

The tournament stream will feature an epic line-up of your favourite casters changing seats between the matches to offer variety and dynamic coverage.

Time to make history again!

Think you’ve got what it takes to become the next BAR champion?
There’s still time - last-minute signups are open until Saturday, April 24th at 21:00 UTC!

With no player cap, this fully open tournament is your shot to step into the arena. Test yourself against the very best, and maybe even walk away with the crown...

Sign up and make history now!

Information for participants

Please make sure you understand the format and the rules, if you have any questions, ask them in #👑｜alpha-cup-announcements Discord channel.

Find your opponents in #👑｜find-opponent
Report your results in #👑｜alpha-cup-results
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Important! Please check-in at least 15 minutes before the start time in APM Alpha Cup page. ‍

Format:

Double Elimination - In a double elimination tournament, each player or team must lose twice to be eliminated. The bracket is divided into an upper bracket (winners) and a lower bracket (losers). Players who lose in the upper bracket drop to the lower bracket for a second chance. The grand finals are usually between the winners of both brackets, with the lower bracket finalist needing to win twice to claim the championship.

• All matchups untill Round of 32 (included) are played as best of 1.
• Round of 16, 8 and 4 are played as best of 3
• Finals are played as best of 5 with player of the loser bracket having a penalty of 1 loss

Prize pool

Alpha Cup V winners will be rewarded from a $1,500 prize pool, courtesy of Brightworks ($500), OPMan ($500), and the BAR Org tournament fund ($500). The BAR tournament fund comes directly from revenue generated by our official YouTube and Twitch channels, giving back to the audience of these events.

Prize will be split between:

• $750 + Commander Crown cosmetic for 1st
• $500 for 2nd
• $125 for each 3rd and 4th

Sign up and make history now!

Map Pool and map ban rules:

Mariposa Island ◆ Digsite ◆ Boreal Falls ◆ Faster Than Light ◆ Devil's Postpiles ◆ Pools of Ilys ◆ Theta Crystals ◆ Argent Strata ◆ Eternal Consequences

‍Banning/ Picking maps for Bo3 rounds

Before each series the players agree on the map pool by banning and picking maps in the following order (A=higher seed B=lower seed):

A bans ➝ B bans ➝ A picks ➝ B picks ➝ B bans ➝ A bans ➝ B bans ➝ A bans ➝ remaining map is the 3rd map

Maps for Bo1 rounds:

The tournament will be seeded using the Leaderboard OS once signups close. For first bo1 rounds use:

• Upper Bracket - Round 1 & 2: Best-of-1, played on Faster Than Light‍
• Upper Bracket - Round 3: Best-of-1, played on Digsite

• Lower Bracket - Round 1: Best-of-1, played on Devil's Postpiles
• Lower Bracket - Round 2: Best-of-1, played on Pools of Ilys‍
• Lower Bracket - Round 3 & 4: Best-of-1, played on Theta Crystals

But wait there is more!

This edition special spin is - to spice things up in the final rounds, the first map of each round will be a fixed special pick - then the remaining maps are decided through bans. The special starting maps for each round are:

• Quarterfinals winner bracket (bo3): Baryon Tar Lake
• Quarterfinals losers bracket (bo3): High Noon
• Semifinals winner bracket (bo3): Tabula (flooded, waterlevel +60)
• Semifinals losers bracket (bo3): Pawn Retreat
• Finals (bo5): Sand Crowns

‍Banning/ Picking remaining 4 maps for Bo5 rounds (Finals)

A bans ➝ B bans ➝ A picks ➝ B picks ➝ A bans ➝ B bans ➝ A bans ➝ B bans ➝ remaining map is the 5th pick

Tournament rules:

To ensure fair play and fun experience for everyone involved, we prepared a couple of rules for this event:

• Use !preset tourney
• Use passworded rooms and share your password with opponents in #alphacup-find-opponent
• No spectators allowed other than casters and organizers
• Every match has 15 minutes of grace period for being late
• Banter is allowed unless breaking the Code of Coduct
• One Pause per player allowed, no commands during pause
• The stream will have 5 minute delay
• Stream delay applies to self-streaming your matches
• Breaking any rules disqualifies a player from this and future tournaments for 1 year

Let's make history, Commanders!

Sign up now!

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We have worked hard to prepare all this delicious stuff for you guys, don't miss it! We hope you enjoy the event! ‍

Watch on Twitch

Watch on Youtube

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