Source: http://wsl.81dojo.com/index.php?mid=4&smid=10
Timestamp: 2019-04-20 10:39:42+00:00

Document:
The World Shogi League is organized by the "WSL" and recognized by 81dojo.com.
National teams of all countries can participate.
The WSL is a tournament in different leagues played on the internet.
The season starts in January, and ends in December.
National teams — must be built at the beginning of a season (old teams and new ones). Details see §4 .
Team captain — each team has to nominate a team-captain and a proxy for the captain.
Appeals commission — a team of three experienced players form the appeals commission.
All games must exclusively be played on the 81dojo.com server.
Fair play is the base of the whole competition. While playing it is, for example, forbidden to use tools like programs with stored games and literature as well as shogi-playing engines.
In case of differences during or after a game, first of all the captains should try to solve the problem. If no solution is found the arbiter should be consulted who will decide. Against this decision it is possible for a team captain to escalate the case by involving the appeals commission. The decision of the appeals commission is final.
Teams are national teams. Their name is the name of the country they represent.
A team must be formed at the beginning of the season with at least 3 players and an upper limit of 12 players.
Teams are open for all players.
All players must be citizens of the country they represent, or be residents in the country.
Players can be added during the season, as long as they fulfill the criteria of 4.4.
The players of a team must be ordered (from 1 to 12) according to rating, either 81dojo or FESA. The strongest player gets number one.
The order keeps unchanged for the whole season, new players added during the season, is placed according to their rating.
The team nominates the team captain.
The team captain represents the team in all cases. The captain need not to be a member of the team, but must be citizen of the country he represents.
The team captain keeps contact with to the arbiter/organizers.
The team captain is responsible for all communications with the opposing teams.
The size of a league can vary between 5 and 12 teams.
The desired size for a league is 10-12 teams. The league lasts at one game per month from January to December.
The leagues are ordered hierarchically (A, B, C ...) — the A League is the top league.
The exact structure of the leagues is published by WSL at the beginning of the year.
The schedule for the whole season is published by the WSL at the beginning of the season.
For leagues with a size between 7 and 12 the system to play is round robin.
For leagues with 5 or 6 teams round robin is played twice.
The schedule for the rounds in the leagues lasts from January to December.
Play-off matches (see §12) are scheduled for December.
The champion of a league (except the A League) gets the right to start in the next season in the upper league.
The last placed team of a league (except the bottom league) has to start the next season one league lower.
The second placed team of a league (except the top league) and next to the last placed of the adjacent upper league play a play-off match. The winner starts the next season in the upper league whilst the loser starts in the lower league. See also §12.
If a team quits the WSL after a season the affected league will be filled up (except the bottom league). (1) and (2) keep valid. If the deciding match has been played before the message of the withdrawal of the team has been sent to the project leaders the loser of this match will play in the upper league as well. But if the withdrawal message is published before December the deciding match (3) is cancelled, the second placed team starts in the upper league in the next season and the next to last placed team of the upper league keeps in this league for the next season.
Both team captains get in contact latest the last day of the previous month before the planned month, published at the beginning of the season, to confirm negotiate about fixing a playing date and time.
If a captain is prevented from looking for the team by the deadline (as defined in (1)) then a proxy must be nominated.
The results of (1) and maybe (2) must be sent to the WSL organizers as soon as possible, latest 3 days before the start of the match.The WSL will publish time and date in an appropriate way to address interested observers who want to follow the games.
The match will have to be played within the designated month. In leagues with less than 12 teams, if necessary a match can be postponed to next month designated for postponed matches.All Postponed matches has to be playerd, before the last round of the tournament.
The individual games of the match, ideally should be played at the same time. Exceptions can be made, if the 2 team captains agree, especially in cases with big differences in Time-zones between the opposing teams.
With the email about the agreed time and date (as in (3)) the team captains have to tell each other and WSL organizers the names (with 81dojo UserIDs) of the players they plan for the match ordered by boards. Last minute changes in the team on the scheduled date are still possible.
The match starts with contact of the team captains confirming the names of the players. The captains have the right to change their announced team composition in case of force majeure.
The match is played on three boards.
All games should start at the announced or separately agreed time and day. If a game cannot be started within 30 minutes of the planned schedule the team who is responsible for the delay loses the game on this board, unless the captains agree to the game bieng replayed at a later date.
All games are played without handicap on 81dojo.com.
The thinking time is 30 minutes per player with byoyomi of 60 seconds.
The "home-team" (first team in the announced match) gets black on boards one and three, white on boards two.
The team who has won more boards gets one match points (MP); the losing team gets no match points If neither team shows up at the agreed schedule, no MPs are given.
Each team gets for a won game one board point (BP) and for a lost game zero board points. This is also valid if a game is won without playing (see (3) for example). If both teams leave the same board free, no BPs are given, for additional penalties see §15.
The players for the three boards must be nominated according to the ordered list of players fixed at the start of the season (stronger players play on higher boards than weaker players of the team). A violation of this rule results in losing the game on that board.
It is possible to play a match with less than 3 players. Besides losing the non- played games, empty boards force additional penalties, see §15.
After the match the team-leader of the winning team has to report the result as soon as possible (latest after 48 hours) to the WSL organizers, including the names of the players of both teams.
The WSL organizers generates the table after each round.
However for defining the winners, as well for the rights to promotion/relegation a playoff between teams on equal number of match points is organized.
Penalties might reduce MPs and/or BPs (see §15).
The WSL organizers have to prepare a deciding match by contacting the relevant captains in the different leagues.
The deciding games are played on three boards.
Players allowed to play in the play-off, has to have played at least 1 game during the regular season.
Part of the announced schedule for the season will be a date for deciding matches as well.
Penalties normally reduce the match points and board points in the table.
If a board is left empty (or no show within the 30 minutes after defined start) the penalty is one board point (BP).
Leaving board 1 empty (see (2)) results in an additional one BP-penalty.
BP-penalties are cumulated. 3 BP-penalties force an additional match point (MP) penalty.
If a team does not start at all two times in a season, the team is set on the last place of the table, losing all games. No more games for the team in the current season are possible. Additional penalty: No start in the next season and restart afterwards in the lowest league.
Not announcing the planned date of the match and/or the team composition in time forces a yellow card. Each two yellow cards result in a one BP-penalty.
Any cheating results in losing the complete match on all three boards with an additional four MP-penalty.
Second cheating disqualifies the team for the running season and the next two seasons.
This rule set is coming into force on January 4th 2016.
GMT (Western European Time): United Kingdom, Ivory Coast.
GMT+1 (Central European Time): Sweden, Denmark, Germany, Netherlands, Poland, Slovakia, Czech, Hungary, Austria, France, Spain, Italy.
GMT+2 (Eastern European Time): Finland, Ukraine.
GMT+4 (Moscow Time): Russia, United Arab Emirates.
All European countries except Russia and Belarus observe Daylight savings time starting on the last Sunday in March and ending on the last Sunday in October.

References: §4
 §12
 §12
 §15
 §15
 §15