This thread is intended to serve as a library of alternate formats and gimmick formats for Beyblade tournaments. If you have a format that you would like to share please post the details of it here.

So the purpose of this thread as a library can be preserved, please do not post anything other than the details of a format. If you wish to discuss a format please create a thread for that format and link it here.

I really enjoy gimmick/alt format tournaments, which is why until recently they were half the events I hosted (now they are 3 quarters). I think having a spot to share them and get ideas would be great.

Discussion threads
Beyblade X Limited (BXL)

RatioX



In RatioX each blade is assigned a point value based on their strength and you are given a 10 point budget to build your deck. This encourages diverse deck compositions and allows for the use of blades that are otherwise not competitive enough.

The first instance of this gimmick I've found was done by BeyJaxel back in July 2024 who called it Tier Bey Grand Battle. But we developed it independently in SEQ a couple months later based on the Ratio format used in the fighting game community. It has since been adopted by the Inazuma cup who have been running it fairly regularly.

There's no set list for this gimmick and TOs modify the list depending on the current releases and the meta in their area.

It can also be modified to change gameplay, for example Northside Beyblades ran the same list used for a RatioX event but increased the cap to 15 points, increasing the overall power available in the format.

The site BeyBrew features a similar gimmick to RatioX which assigns each part their own points value including ratchets and bits.

Video of matches in this format

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Xchange

In Xchange you swap decks with your opponent at the start of the battle, so you have to build the worst deck you can to sabotage their chance of winning. You'll end up using parts you've never used before and thinking about the game in a totally different way.

Some examples of "winning" decks:
October 2024
Steel Samurai 4-80GP
Knife Shinobi 2-60GB
Talon Ptera 2-80DB

August 2025
Shinobi Shadow 4-55M
Savage Bear 3-85Q
Perseus Dark AM-85RA

Video of matches in this format

First To 15 Points

My friends and I in Louisiana have been playing Beyblade X with First to 15 points since Summer 2024. I think playing to a higher point total allows more time for strategies and increased usage of your other Beys if you are playing in a format where you are using more than 1 Bey. Beyblade X has 4 win conditions (Spin Finish, Burst Finish, Over Finish, and Xtreme Finish) and 3 of the 4 can give you 2 points or more. So if you're playing to a lower point total, your room for error is much smaller. One screw up and that could be the difference between a win and a loss.

I have hosted 4 Unranked Beyblade X Tournaments on the WBO so far with First to 15 points, soon to be 7 tournaments after the end of this month.

• https://worldbeyblade.org/Thread-Lafayet...irst-To-15
  
• https://worldbeyblade.org/Thread-Lafayet...irst-To-15
  
• https://worldbeyblade.org/Thread-Lafayet...irst-To-15
  
• https://worldbeyblade.org/Thread-Lafayet...irst-To-15
  

My friends and I have also played in numerous battles with First to 15 points that were recorded and I've been uploading them to YouTube slowly but surely. I also have some battle footage from some of those aforementioned tournaments that will be up soon as well.

My Channel Featuring First To 15 Beyblade X Meetup Battles (And Tournament Battles Soon™️): Beyblade Lafayette Louisiana

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My Stuff (Click to View)

MyAnimeList | Trakt

Thanks and have a good one!

CounterVeto

CounterVeto is a combination of the Counter battle type and Veto (similar to bring 5 ban 2).

In Veto you build a deck of 5 beys with no repeating parts. At the start of the match you present your beys to your opponent, then at the same time as your opponent you choose a bey from their deck to veto (typically by holding up a number of fingers where only the judge can see). You then do this a second time. Unlike bring 5 ban 2 you don't choose beys to keep.

Counter battle rules can be found in the WBO rulebook.

CounterVeto is intended to make the Counter battle type more viable in a format where some beys are very easy to spam.

I like how the counter battle type reduces some of the random chance of the game and introduces more opportunities for strategy, so I was disappointed when the introduction of Wizard Rod essentially made it unplayable (yes there are ways to counter Wizard Rod but they are difficult and inaccessible for new/casual players).

But by combining it with the Veto gimmick, you introduce the opportunity for players to simply veto any beys that their opponent might use to spam them into the ground, essentially nullifying the problem that made counter battle unplayable (Ofc there are limits to this e.g. more than two spammable beys in the format, but then you're just running into the same problem with 3on3 anyway).

Video of matches in this format

Dual Deck System

In the Dual Deck System, you build two decks of three beys with no repeating parts between all six beys. Then at the start of the battle, your opponent decides which of the two decks you use, and you decide which of their two decks they use.

This format was created by versusENDEV to promote variety, deck building, and a more balanced play. It was introduced in this video on their channel.

By having your opponent choose which deck you use it forces you to spread your best parts across both decks, requiring you to be creative in your combo building and to develop your skillset to use many different kinds of beys.

I like this format as it creates variety in the meta in a simple way that doesn't require banning any parts. It creates new opportunities for strategic play without diverging too far from normal 3on3, making it a viable candidate to be a standard tournament format. It does have accessibility issues, as doubling the number of beys you need doubles the cost of a competitive deck for new players, but for highly competitive communities where most players already have a wide variety of parts it's a great way to shake things up.

Video of matches in this format

Frootloops

By far our most cursed and unpopular gimmick, Frootloops was devised by OzzieOCE, one of the SEQ TOs. It has two aspects, first is deck building, where instead of not being allowed multiples of the same part, you aren't allowed parts with the same colour. The second is scoring, which changes the points scored for each finish type, and introduces scoring 5 points for 3 wins in a row, which in the group stage would be an instant win.

Gimmick Rules

Deck Building
Build a deck of 3 beys with no repeating colours. Repeating parts are allowed as long as they aren't the same colour.
Painted parts are considered the original colour of the part.

Colour Categories
To keep things simple, colours are grouped into the following categories. You may only have one part from each category in your deck.

Red
Orange
Yellow
Purple
Blue
Green
Pink
Brown
Teal
Black
Grey
White

Part Colours Considered
Many parts have multiple colours, as such only one of the colours are considered for the no repeating colours rule. For each part these are:

Blade - Inner plastic colour (the colour on the bottom of the blade)
Ratchet - Outer section colour
Bit - Bottom section colour
Assist blades and lock chips aren't counted.

Matches
Spin finishes are 0 points
Over finishes are 1 point
Xtreme finishes are 1 point
Burst finishes are 2 points
Winning 3 battles in a row scores you a "Sugar Rush", scoring you 5 points

Spin finishes count toward a Sugar Rush.

Group stage matches are First to 5. However, points scored over 5 are counted, as they affect seeding in the finals bracket. For example, if you get 3 over finishes in a row, your score is recorded as 8 (1+1+1+5).

The finals are a gauntlet style bracket with seeding determined by points scored. Finals matches are first to 9 points.

My thoughts
This gimmick was quite unpopular with a lot of players, due to the unnecessary combination of multiple gimmicks, the vagueness of the colour rule, and since spin finishes are 0 points, you can often have periods of no progress in a match.
However personally I found the gimmick quite enjoyable, not so much the deck building aspect, which while it was a fun restriction it didn't add much competitively. But the way the match type shifted your focus and goals towards scoring chains of wins, or trying to disrupt your opponent's chain before they could take the match, was something I found to be fresh and interesting. It turned what is normally an inevitable march towards the end of the match into a back and forth, similar to the feeling of exchanging points at a deuce in Wii Sports tennis.

Video of matches in this format

Knockout
In Knockout your goal is to knock out all three of your opponent's beys, by scoring three points against each of them. You can also switch between your beys however you want.

Rules

• Build a deck of three beys with no repeating parts.
  
• You can choose any bey from your deck that hasn't been knocked out for each battle.
  
• A bey is knocked out when it has three points scored against it in total.
  
• The player who knocks out all their opponent's beys wins the match.
  

Knockout was my first experimental match type gimmick. Taking some inspiration from pokemon battles it gives each bey three HP. Of course as with any format that lets you spam the same bey over and over it had some issues with beys like Rod and Wolf. I don't think there was much strategically interesting in this format, but being able to choose any bey to battle coupled with the HP system lets beys stand more on their own, or work together better as a team than regular 3on3. Your last bey could clutch up the match for you, or you could aim for KOs and spins to strategically knockout out your opponents.

I think if I was to run it again I might try tiering the blades so stronger blades have less lives, to balance out the issues that occured the first time.

Video of matches in this format

Blitz
In Blitz, you use your normal deck of three beys, but each match is only three battles, the blader with the highest score at the end wins. This match type is short but intense, as each battle matters that match more and the opportunities to counter your opponent are limited.

The idea for this battle type came from impulsefw. As our tournaments usually run first to 7, this was designed to be a fast-paced alternative that encourages the use of attack types to take the match in a single battle. In practice a stamina focused approach turned out to be effective as well. This format creates opportunities for new kinds of strategies and works well for those looking to run a quicker event.

Rules

• Build a deck of three beys with no repeating parts.
  
• Put your beys in order from first to third.
  
• Play three battles using your beys in order.
  
• The player with the most points at the end of the three battles wins the match.
  
• If the points are tied at the end of the match, a tiebreaker battle is played using any bey from your deck.
  

Video of matches in this format

1-2-3 Deck
In this format you can use a deck of either:

1 Blade - 2 Ratchets - 3 Bits

OR

3 Blades - 2 Ratchets - 1 Bit

At the start of a match you will show your opponent the parts you're using, and build your first combo.

After the first game, the loser of the battle will decide whether they would like to change their own Beyblade or force their opponent to change their Beyblade.

When changing your Beyblade you must always change your ratchet and you must always change to a Blade/Bit that you have not previously used that match.

If a player has exhausted all their Blade/Bit options and still needs to change Beys, all their parts refresh and become available again (similar to reshuffling Beys at the end of 3on3 format).

CX main blade/assist blade combos will be considered the same as regular blades. Assist blades cannot be swapped between main blades.

The blades Wizard Rod, Silver Wolf, and Blast W must be used alongside 2 other blades.

This format came from this event in the UK and we adapted it for CX. If it were to be played again I expect some more blades would need to be added to the '2 other blades' list.

I like this format as it lets you explore and exploit the full potential of a blade or bit.

Video of matches in this format

Tag team
Despite the insistence of the anime, Beyblade isn't really a team game, so finding a way to introduce teamwork aspects into the game can be a challenge for TOs. For a while I ran a teams league alongside my tournaments in which I tested various team formats and found this format to be what I believe is the best format for introducing aspects of teamwork into the game. It is, as it turns out, pretty much just the default WBO team battle format, but I've added in a tag in mechanic.

Tag Team Rules

• Teams can have 2 or 3 players.
  
• Each player uses a deck of 3 Beyblades. There can be no repeating parts in an entire team.
  
• Sets played are 3on3.
  
• Each team decides their order, then plays their sets one after the other.
  
• Once all players have played a set, the team that scored the most cumulative points wins the match.
  
• In the event of a tie, each team will select a player to play a tiebreaker set.
  
• Once per set, a player can tag in their teammate for one battle. Tags occur after the beys for a battle are revealed. The teammate can use any bey from their deck.
  
• Teams of 2 cannot tag in when against a team of 3.
  

The cumulative points win condition of the WBO teams battle type I think is the best option for teams battles as it maximises the contribution of each team member, it also requires each team member to play, unlike set based or elimination win conditions, where it's possible for only one or two bladers from a team to play.
Requiring no repeating parts in a team isn't necessary for this format, but it's a good for giving players an opportunity to exercise their creativity.
The tag in mechanic creates new opportunities for strategic decision making and team cooperation, and I think is the main thing that makes this team format its own. It also works as a balancing aspect to address the imbalance between 2 and 3 player teams due to 3 player teams being required to stretch their parts across 3 decks.

I attempted to create a way to hold battles between 2 and 3 player teams to avoid the issue of leftover players without a full team, but I heard from 2 player teams that the lack of tagging in felt like a greater disadvantage than the advantage gained by only needing 6 beys. This could be fixed by allowing repeating parts between team members and removing the tag in restriction, but I think it may be better just to keep teams to a fixed size and find a way to cope with an uneven number of players.
If running a tournament with 3 player teams you could also modify the tag in rule so that each teammate can tag in once per set, giving tags more presence in the game.

Video of matches in this format

CX Only
This one's a pretty simple gimmick, you're only allowed to use CX blades in your deck.

Its unfortunate that CX doesn't really make the cut for use in the meta, as its a fun system to play with. When given the opportunity to play on their own field, you're given much more freedom to experiment with different combinations of main and assist blades, and you can feel the impact that your choice of assist blade has. Obviously there are still choice parts in this format, blast, might, heavy, wheel, etc. But they don't overpower the other parts in the format, leaving parts like brave and arc to still be viable.

Video of matches in this format

Rewind
In Rewind you can only use parts released before a certain point in time.

The Beyblade meta changes a lot over time as new parts release and old parts become outclassed, which means the Beyblade X we're playing today is a very different game to the Beyblade X of a year ago. For bladers who have a fondness for the game at a certain point in time, or who wish to try out a version of the game that they missed out on, this gimmick allows you to go back and enjoy them.

When I ran this gimmick, I made it so you could only use parts from before UX, in order to revisit the days of our first tournaments.

Video of matches in this format

Aerial Assault
In Aerial Assault you can only use blades with creatures that can fly. This is a gimmick inspired by The Bladerverse's Animal Kingdom. For CX blades only the motif associated with the initial release of the main blade/metal blade is considered. Any lock chips, over blades, or assist blades are allowed.



When I saw the Animal Kingdom gimmick I really liked the idea, especially when it came to creating a theme for a tournament. However, I thought that the list of allowed beys for land animals left a couple obvious options at the top and would lead to predictable decks. So I thought through a couple different ideas and realised that flying creatures seemed pretty interesting, as it leaves quite a few meta options on the table while removing the big threats of Rod and Scale. It also takes almost all the stamina/defense options off the table, leaving behind a very attack focused meta.

It does have the issue of very limited options, which can make the gimmick inaccessible to players without those parts, we had a fairly low turnout to this event as a result.

Video of matches in this format

3on3+
Just read about this modified version on 3on3 used by Blue Phoenix BBX in France. I thought it sounded interesting. The full rulebook including the rules for 3on3+ (in French) can be found here.

Shoutout to NeroAction for the info on this format.

Rules

• The two bladers have three combos and must place them in order to determine which combos will be played at which time.
  
• The order is chosen in two steps:
  • Choice of the "Main Combo": Each player chooses one of their three combos and gives it to the referee.
    The referee reveals the two combos and places the one from player B's side in first position and the one from player X's side in second position.
    
  • Choice of the Counter: After seeing the opponent's Main Combo, each player chooses one of their two remaining combos to face it (so the one from player B's side goes in second position and the one from player X's side goes in first position).
    
• Each player's remaining Beyblade is placed in third position, and the set can begin by pitting the Beyblades in first position against each other, then the second and third if necessary.
  
• After the three matches, if neither player has reached four points, each player can place their remaining combos in any order they want, in the style of classic 3on3
  

Explanatory Example
Séraphine vs. Mysterious Blader

1. Séraphine plays: Phoenix Wing 1-60 E, Cobalt Dragoon 7-60 L, and Shark Scale 3-60 LR
   
2. Mysterious Blader plays: Dran Buster 1-60 UF, Mummy Curse 1-70 H, and Clock Mirage 7-55 UN
   
3. Both Bladers choose their main bey. Séraphine on the B side chooses Phoenix Wing, and Mysterious Blader chooses Clock Mirage.
   
4. Phoenix Wing is ​​placed in the first position, and Clock Mirage in the second.
   
5. Then, after reviewing their opponent's main bey, Séraphine places Shark Scale in the second position to counter Clock Mirage by attempting a burst.
   
6. Mysterious Blader opts for Mummy Curse in the first position to counter Blue Phoenix, using the defense of his combo to aim for a spin finish.
   
7. Then the third Beyblade is placed
   

Reasoning

The 3on3+ format arose from the frustration felt with classic 3on3 due to the lack of control over matchups.

Players place 3 Beyblades without knowing where their opponent's are, creating 2 main problems: the near absence of strategy + the randomness of matchups. With 3on3+, an important strategic element is added by allowing players to choose the most effective Beyblade from their 2 remaining Beyblades against their opponent's hand. This obviously gives an advantage to players who know the matchups and which combos their Beyblades are strong against. This knowledge becomes essential for effective play and is also important from the deck-building stage. It's no longer about finding 3 powerful combos individually, but about considering which combos can counter specific threats and, ideally, balancing your deck to be able to respond to any hand your opponent plays. The most versatile combos remain very effective, as the main combo should ideally be able to handle any opponent, but this format likely allows for more flexibility. This opens the door to more specialized combos that are difficult to play when you don't know what your top will land on, but which can be interesting thanks to the matchup control offered by 3on3+.

Regarding the randomness of matchups, here, normally every player, if their deck is reasonably well-constructed, will be able to counter one of the opponent's tops, and therefore the matches are more balanced. Generally, if a player gains an advantage in a matchup, it's either slight or due to a difference in strategy between the players. In contrast, in classic 3on3, you can end up with either three favorable or three unfavorable matchups depending on how the tops are positioned. With 3on3+, the balance depends on hand selection, but such an extreme case of disadvantage cannot exist.