Vanguard world championship regionals reverting to best-of-one, no national championships, top 3 go to World Finals

This just in: shop tournaments are more competitive than the regional championships.

The rules and regulations for the 2018 Cardfight!! Vanguard world championship series are now live on Bushiroad's official portal, and the news is bleak.

There will be two tournament formats for Vanguard in 2018, Standard and Premium Standard. In Standard format the official regulation is that cards from V-VGE-Trial Deck 01: Aichi Sendou and later can be used; this is slightly different from the official cf-vanguard portal's definition of the Standard format, which is that cards with the V-series icon are legal and cards from V-Start Decks 01 and 02 are treated as cards with the icon. In Premium Standard, all cards may be used.

There will not be any national championships for worlds 2018. Instead there will be shop challenges and regional qualifiers. The winners of each shop challenge will win a certificate and a BYE card which players can exchange for byes (free wins) during the Swiss rounds at regional championships. (One bye will be given if the regional championship lasts 6 rounds or less, and 2 byes if it is instead a 7~9 round tournament.) The winner of each regional championship will get a sponsored invitation to the 2018 World Finals, while second and third place will have an unsponsored invitation to the same.

The regional championships will be held in a best-of-one Swiss tournament format with 25 minute rounds, in which fighters are paired with opponents of similar scores until one undefeated remains, up to a maximum of 9 rounds. After this, the regionals will cut to a single elimination top 8 tournament bracket. Unlike all world championship tournaments since 2016, there will be no two-day split with day 2 being best-of-three, and top 8 will be best-of-one games. Top 8 has not been best-of-one since 2016.

Shop challenges prior to the top cut will use a best-of-one, Swiss format with 25-minute rounds in which fighters continue to be paired until there is only one undefeated remaining. After the cut to top 4 or top 8, the format will switch to best-of-one or best-of-three single elimination depending on shop preference.

Of note is that Imaginary Gift Markers must be in different sleeves from the main deck. Moreover, if there are more than 350 cardfighters competing at the beginning of round 1, a second tournament will begin with all fighters split evenly between the two using a "random method." Additional prizes will be given out for the top cut of the second tournament.

The Deck Registration form for Cardfight!! Vanguard can be found here, and the rest of the rules and regulations can be found here.

Tournament locations have not yet been announced, but the page mentions "more than 20." It was previously announced that the Japanese World Grand Prix--the champion of which is invited to the World Championship--will be held in October. Typically the world championships are held between August and November or August and January.