ISML 2021

ISML 2021 was the 14th edition of the International Saimoe League. The tournament's nomination round began in 2021 July 01 at 00:30 UTC and ended with the final results revealed on 2022 February 12. The returning champions were 2012 Main Tournament winner Kanade Tachibana, and 2012 Male Exhibitions winner Kirito.

Like the previous year, the main tournament used the three splits regular season format, but the number of contestants for this year were reduced to 72. An additional wildcard round was also added at the end of Split 3. However, the most significant change in this edition is the re-introduction of the Stella and Nova names; but they will no longer carry the same definition as they originally were used from 2012 to 2015: "Stella" will now refer to the actual main tournament, while "Nova" will be used for the seasonal contests. ''' Despite this name change, this wiki will keep using the "main tournament" and "seasonal contest" terms instead of Stella and Nova. '''

While ISML has a history of dominant contestants who have completed perfect seasons, this year was the first in its history to have both champions be undefeated, as newcomer Elaina and two-time runner-up Sakuta Azusagawa topped the regular season with a 35-0 record over three splits, and later won the Tiara and Scepter over Mikoto Misaka (in her 4th finals appearance) and Yuuta Togashi (first-time finalist) respectively.

The latter stages of the playoffs were characterized with fervent attention and drama mostly coming from Chinese netizens. The semi-finals in particular had several incidents, such as a member of Elaina's fan group shit-talking Mashiro Shiina after winning against her, and an appeal being sent by an Ai Haibara fan group which resulted in a vote increase that directly switched the result of the seasonal playoffs in her favor. These incidents culminated in a large vote spike in the final match - going from ~7k votes to ~23k - as thousands of netizens from multiple fan groups canvassed to their families, friends, colleagues, and associates in order to help their favorite character win. Likewise, the results of the final were met with violent and chaotic reactions in the ISML Tieba forum and in the official Discord server, particularly from frustrated fans who blamed multiple parties for the loss of their preferred candidate.

The seasonal playoffs, which were named "Divine Circlet" and "Divine Crown", were won by Keke Tang, a Love Live! idol character hailing from Shanghai, and Tanjiro Kamado, protagonist of a mainstream shonen anime who was put into seasonals because he appeared in a series of Valentines Day-themed web shorts.

External links
 * Moegirlpedia link (Chinese)
 * Namuwiki (Korean, section)
 * Starryrainynight's ISML results spreadsheet for 2021 (Primary source, Chinese)

English sources (Derived from the Chinese spreadsheet)


 * ISML 2021 schedule (Google Sheets)
 * Preliminary Round Results (Excel, download link)
 * Regular Season Results (all three splits) (Google Sheets)

Announcement of Rules
Here is the former rules according to Maglor's post on January 2021 in ISML Discord.

The official ISML charter for 2021, which provides details on all the rules and formats on this tournament, was released in May 31.

Schedule


All voting rounds begin and end at 10:00 UTC (18:00 Beijing, 06:00 New York). Results are displayed ~18 hours after voting ends. Assuming there's no delays, each round will last 3 days: one for voting and the other 2 for releasing results and downtime. There will be a 7-day gap between each period, starting from the last gem round to the next period's first round.

Displayed dates are initially taken from the charter. If something goes out of schedule (due to delays, mistakes, etc.) the wiki will change its date accordingly.


 * 2021 July 01 - 08: Nominations (Results released on July 19, around 14:00 UTC)
 * July 22 - Aug 06: Preliminaries
 * Aug 12 - 27: Aquamarine / Split 1
 * Sep 03 - 18: Topaz / Split 2
 * Sep 25 - Oct 10: Amethyst
 * Oct 17 - Nov 01:  Sapphire
 * Nov 11 - Nov 26: Emerald / Split 3 (all matches from here pushed back 3 days)
 * Dec 03 - Dec 18: Ruby
 * Dec 25 - 2022 Jan 09: Diamond
 * 2022 Jan 23 - Feb 09: Playoffs
 * delayed by ONE week due to busy schedules of the staff in real life, according to this post on tieba posted Jan 13
 * delayed again by 3 more days, according to Maglor (contest runner)
 * The finals (PO 5) were delayed by 2 days because of adverse weather conditions in the Northeastern United States, where several ISML staff members live.

Nomination Round
The nomination round is where voters enter names that they want to participate in ISML. Each nomination counts as one vote. After nominations end, a certain number of characters with the highest votes will qualify to the preliminary rounds. Direct invites will skip this stage entirely.

Rules
For more details regarding the seasonal tournament (aka nova) nominations, click here.

How to Nominate
For those unfamiliar with isml's nomination system:
 * nominations will last from July 1 to July 8
 * Each voter is given a ballot with 32 entries. To nominate a character, simply type its name AND its series. Name order / spelling / language / aliases don't matter as long as it's clear who you're referring to.
 * Each nomination counts as one vote. Duplicates are obviously not counted.
 * All characters must make their animated debut on June 30, 2021 or earlier.
 * Ballots must fulfill several important conditions in order for their nominations to be counted; failure to meet all of them will result in a voided ballot, i.e. Not counted.
 * Must represent at least eight (8) anime series (spin-offs and crossovers do NOT count as separate series)
 * Must nominate at least two (2) males and females each
 * Four (4) characters maximum per series/franchise. Don't exceed this limit, otherwise the staff will discard them all because they can't choose.
 * Invalid entries are discarded independently and will NOT void your entire ballot unless it fails to meet the minimum requirements above.
 * ISML champions from 2013-2020 CANNOT be nominated because of the champions ban rule; they will be placed in a separate tournament of champions instead. They are as follows:
 * Female: Ruri Gokou,  Kotori Itsuka,  Eru Chitanda,  Shana,  Megumi Katou,  Rem,  Violet Evergarden, and  Yukino Yukinoshita.
 * Male: Houtarou Oreki*,  Hideyoshi Kinoshita*,  Accelerator,  Sora,  Koro-sensei,  Hachiman Hikigaya,  Rimuru Tempest, and  Miyuki Shirogane.
 * Some contestants can only be nominated for the main tournament if they achieved any of the following within the last 3 editions:
 * Last 3 returning ISML champions (2010-2012)
 * All necklace and pendant winners from 2018-2020 (regardless if the made the playoffs or not), as well as seasonal diadem winners from the same timeframe
 * All contestants who have appeared in the playoffs at least once from 2018-2020

Direct invites
A total of 19 females and 16 males will automatically qualify for the preliminary rounds, thus they do NOT need to be nominated.

Results
For full Winter and Spring nomination results, see its relevant page. To view nomination results by anime, go to the results page.

The main tournament, which is renamed to "Stella" for this edition, will consist of at least 120 contestants per gender.
 * Subtracting the number of directly qualified contestants (19 female and 16 male), this means that only the top 101 females and 104 males will advance.
 * If multiple contestants are tied for last place, they will all advance together.

Selection process
This year's nomination round will use only one list per gender for selection of its main tournament, Winter, and Spring seasonal contests. Because of this, characters will be selected in the following strict order:
 * Top 30 females and top 6 males who appeared in Winter 2021 anime (including OVAs and long-runners) will be assigned to Winter seasonal first; and likewise for Spring 2021. This includes eligible characters who have appeared in past ISML editions.
 * After all seasonal slots are filled, the remaining contestants will be assigned to the main tournament.
 * Because of the increased character debut limit to June 1, it's technically possible for a 2021 debutant (example: Nagatoro-san) to qualify to the the main tournament instead of 2021 seasonals.
 * Unlike ISML 2020, all qualified contestants (including direct invites) will play in the preliminary rounds to decide who gets in the regular season.

Qualified
This table will display the nomination results for the Main Tournament. In addition, nominees who have enough votes to qualify here but were re-assigned for Winter and Spring are also shown, with reasons outlined below.

New qualified nominees are labeled in bold.

Preliminary Rounds
For more details, see ISML 2021/Preliminary Rounds.

The preliminaries' format is completely changed compared to last year's as expected. This time, 120+ qualified contestants, including direct invites, will play two stages of differing formats to determine the 72 characters who will compete in the regular season:
 * Round 1: Each gender is split into 3 groups of 41-42 players. Approval vote (choose any number per group)
 * Round 2: Split into 12 groups of 10-11 players. Each group is limited to a maximum of 3 choices only.

After this period, contestants will be ranked based on the following criteria:
 * Lower average rank points (ARP)
 * [(Rank in R1) + (Rank in R2 x 4)] divided by 2
 * Higher Nomination votes (Direct invites ranked higher)
 * Higher cumulative vote points (CVP) earned in the preliminary round

Top 72 characters will qualify for the main tournament and will also double as seeds for the first split, and the rest are eliminated. In this page, this section will only display the names of eliminated characters; the qualified characters are shown in the next section below.

Regular Season
To view the group draw, detailed tables, and the results of all regular season matches from each gender, see ISML 2021/RS Female and ISML 2021/Male''

The regular season's format is similar to the previous edition --- divided into 3 splits, but the number of contestants were reduced to 72 for this year. Each split is subdivided into one or more periods. In each split, contestants will be divided into several groups that will play a single round-robin tournament. All periods will last for 6 match days (5 regular season + 1 gem round).

Tiebreakers:
 * 1) Wins (if tied, draws will be counted)
 * 2) Head-to-head record
 * 3) Split CVPD
 * 4) Split CVP
 * 5) Staff selection

Necklace & Pendant
After each period, the eight best performing characters will play each other in a special Instant Runoff voting round that will decide who wins that period's necklace (for females) or pendant (for males). Once a contestant wins a necklace / pendant round, they will be banned from future main gem rounds for the rest of the year. Gem winners will also qualify for next year's main tournament provided they don't win the tiara / scepter beforehand.

Qualifying Criteria:
 * 1) Period wins
 * 2) Period CVPD
 * 3) Period CVP
 * 4) Staff selection

Exhibition Gems
Exhibition gems, officially known as "Jewelry Exhibitions" are secondary gem awards which are held alongside the main gem rounds under the Exhibition title. The awards are purely cosmetic; they have no effect on a contestant's season standings or future qualifications. Exhibition gems will be contested between eight next-best performers of each period who have never won any ISML award before - or in the case of later periods - those with fewer awards. Voting format will be the same as the main gem awards (Instant runoff vote).

Qualification Criteria:


 * 1) Fewer ISML awards
 * 2) Older year of first ISML award win
 * 3) Period wins
 * 4) Older ISML debut appearance (preliminaries or regular season; male exhibitions do NOT count)
 * 5) Necklace / pendant ranking (PCVPD then PCVP)
 * Contestants who are already eligible for a period's necklace / pendant round CANNOT participate in that period's exhibition gem round.

Playoffs
It's the same old standard single-elimination bracket, winner gets Tiara / Scepter, blah blah blah, you should know this shit already

Seedings
Unlike last year, playoff contestants will be seeded 1-16 based on overall regular season performance, sorted by Wins, then CVP. Whether the round of 16 is fought between characters from the same Split 3 group doesn't matter.

Final Rankings (1-20)
Consolation matches are serious fucking business. It's also very complicated and a mess to write on the main page, so if you want details on how 3rd 5th and below are ranked, go to this page.

Final rankings from each gender will only display 1st-20th. For full rankings and statistics, click the above link.

Main Tournament

 * Because of the new method of determining who qualifies from the nomination rounds, five males ( Rudeus Greyrat, Shinei Nouzen,  Lu Bu (Walkure),  Yomogi Asanaka, and  Hiroshi Odokawa) who first appeared in 2021 Winter and Spring anime were entered into the Main Tournament's preliminary rounds; out of them only Rudeus qualified for the regular season stage.
 * This year marks the first time Haruhi Suzumiya failed to qualify in ISML's regular season, breaking a 13-year streak of appearances since 2008. Because of this,  Saber becomes the last remaining girl to have appeared in all ISML main tournaments.
 * Mashiro Shiina extends the record for the most number of necklace wins with 9, after she won the Amethyst gem round. On the other hand, Mikoto Misaka re-takes the lead for the highest amount of ISML awards with 10 by winning the Sapphire necklace.
 * The Kaguya-sama series     produced yet another successful gallery of posters this year, having won five awards (2 main gems, 2 exhibition gems, and 1 seasonal).
 * Meanwhile, Sakurasou    managed to have all of its members win at least one ISML award for this year (4 awards in total), with Nanami and Ryunosuke winning their first posters and Sorata winning his first pendant.
 * The 2021 regular season produced two tied matches so far, a rare occurence in ISML post-league format. This may be attributed to the year's consistently low vote turnout comparable to ISML 2017.
 * Sapphire 5: Azusa Nakano vs  Aqua, 1832-1832
 * Emerald 5: Nasa Yuzaki vs  Kyojuro Rengoku, 973-973
 * Only 3 characters will appear in the playoffs for the first time this year: Elaina (a newcomer and potential royal roader),  Tsukasa Tsukuyomi (a wildcard escapee), and  Kirito (winner of ISML 2012's male exhibition).
 * Mikoto Misaka reached her 4th finals appearance after ISML 2010, ISML 2011, and ISML 2020, overtaking Shana as the contestant with the most finals appearances in the main tournament.

Statistics
Vote totals in Regular Season

Amethyst 2:


 * ToC Male Round 2: Rimuru Tempest breaks Miyuki Shirogane's 40 win streak, which started from ISML 2020's regular season until the first round of ToC 2021. (44 if including the 2019 shipping exhibition)

Amethyst 3:


 * Rikka Takanashi 200th RS (Regular season) win
 * Nao Tomori 100th RS win

Amethyst 5


 * Riku Dola 100th RS win

Sapphire 1


 * Edward Elric 100th RS win

Sapphire 3


 * Gintoki Sakata 100th 1v1 win (including exhibitions)

Emerald 2


 * Kurumi Tokisaki 200th RS win

Ruby 5


 * Sorata Kanda 100th 1v1 win (including exhibitions)

Diamond 1
 * Subaru Natsuki 100th RS win

Diamond 3
 * Kiyotaka Ayanokouji 100th RS win
 * Rin Tohsaka overtakes Shana as the female with the 2nd most wins in the regular season, having scored her 331st victory against Tohru.

Diamond 5


 * Sorata Kanda 100th RS win

Minor

 * A Bahasa Indonesia version is added to the ISML website, with translations provided by Kurogaga, an Indonesian user and ISML Forum member through the official ISML Discord server.
 * Aquamarine 2 Recount: the votes were recounted after the staff received appeals from members of the Index voting block, telling them to check if their votes are valid, which is proven true. This resulted in the votes being increased by a small amount, around 100+ votes at most. However, no results were overturned.
 * The Chinese names of Fate/stay night 's Servant characters will now display their true names:
 * Saber is now displayed as Artoria Pendragon: 阿尔托莉雅·潘德拉贡 (simplified) / 阿爾托莉雅·潘德拉貢 (traditional)
 * Archer is now displayed as Emiya: 卫宫 / 衛宮
 * Lancer is now displayed as Cu Chulainn: 库·丘林 / 庫·丘林

The February 2021 War: Recounts, Vote Spikes, and Warnings
Ran Mouri fans' Defiant Defeat
 * After the results of Playoffs Day 2 (January 1), a supporter claimed to be a Ran Mouri fan sent an appeal to the staff.

Ai Haibara fan group appeal
 * After the initial results of Playoffs Day 4 (semi-finals) were released, which showed Miko Iino winning against Ai Haibara in the seasonal semi-final 3635 - 3438, members of the Chinese Ai Haibara fan group submitted an appeal 【公告/2021#35】淘汰赛第4轮重新计票 - Statement from starryrainynight (ISML Tieba, 2022-02-09) requesting a recount to check if their votes were properly counted, as they felt that anti-voters (especially salty Ran Mouri fans after they failed their appeal against their loss to Nezuko two rounds prior) manipulated the results in order to snipe Haibara out. They gave their hundred-ish omitted vote IDs to the ISML staff as evidence.[citation needed]
 * However, one impatient user, who was unable to accept the late and inconsistent results, went too far and sent a threatening hate mail to staff member / organizer Maglor,[citation needed] prompting a warning from the ISML staff which was opined by several Chinese users in ISML Tieba.
 * Nevertheless, the appeal proved successful as it overturned the initial results of Haibara's match in their favor; the recount showed Haibara winning against Iino by a score of 3787 - 3721.
 * The addition of votes resulting from this appeal also affected the result in the male consolation matches, when Kiyotaka Ayanokouji replaced Shidou Itsuka as the 4th male that advanced to the match that will decide 5th-12th place, meaning Shidou will be relegated to playing for 13th-20th instead.

A Witch's Tirade, A Thunderous Threat
 * On February 8, according to a post by Chinese staff member and spokesman starryrainynight, the ISML staff have "received reports that some supporters claiming to be Elaina fans made comments attacking other characters, while other supporters threatened to conduct 'human flesh' searches and personal attacks on users who reposted their comments". Because of this, the staff issued a warning to stop these actions or else Elaina is disqualified. Starry later amended this statement on February 11, as the staff decided to invalidate some 200+ votes from Elaina supporters instead "on the grounds of supporting unethical behavior" to prevent the situation from worsening.
 * On February 9, a member of Elaina's fan group complained about Mikoto and Mashiro's rising vote percentages while Elaina's numbers decreased (even though she won against Mashiro anyway). So he did shit-talking about Mashiro, Mikoto, Kuroneko, Katou and Kaguya fans in public, giving off the impression of a "sore winner". This led into a huge argument in ISML Tieba Forum that lasted until Feb 11. Most of the posts involving this incident were later deleted.

The Tiara Blame Game
 * After the final match was decided, several threads in ISML Tieba questioned the result of Elaina > Mikoto. Some users pinned the blame on Korean voters because the color representing Elaina in the vote distribution map was shaded dark blue on South Korea, indicating that a large majority of Korean voters chose her. These numbers were also attributed to the witch's victory in Aketo 2020, a notable Korean saimoe tournament.
 * There were also reports of the Korean online portal Naver canvassing their votes for Elaina.[citation needed] Some comments also accused Maglor, who is a Korean-American, of influencing the match because of his nationality.[citation needed]
 * On the other hand, some people cited that Elaina campaigning videos posted on Bilibili, and screenshots from the Elaina voting groups in QQ and Tieba, were among the key factors in her victory since it proved that there was large support for Elaina in China - thus explaining the very light orange color in the Mainland which indicates that Mikoto only won there by a slight margin.
 * Maglor released this statement in the end:

Main Tournament
Necklace & Tiara

Exhibition Gems
Jewelry Exhibitions (Female)

Seasonal & Exhibition
Female Seasonals

Navigation
References