create-playoffs

Generates a Playoffs Only bracket: a direct single-elimination tree with no pool phase.

bracket-creator create-playoffs [flags]

Flags

Flag	Short	Default	Description
`--file`	`-f`	(none)	CSV file with participants (required)
`--output`	`-o`	(none)	Output `.xlsx` path (required)
`--courts`	`-c`	`2`	Number of shiai-jo (courts) to split the tree across. Must be 1, 2, 4, 8 or 16, see Shiai-jo count
`--team-matches`	`-t`	`0`	Players per team (0 = individual tournament)
`--with-zekken-name`	`-z`	`false`	Use second CSV column as zekken display name
`--seeds`	(none)	(none)	CSV file with seed rankings
`--determined`	`-d`	`false`	Do not shuffle input order
`--single-tree`	(none)	`false`	Produce one tree sheet instead of one per court
`--number-prefix`	`-n`	`""`	Assign consecutive numbers with this letter prefix (for example, `K` produces K1, K2, …)
`--title-prefix`	(none)	`""`	Prefix added to sheet titles

Examples

Simple two-court bracket:

bracket-creator create-playoffs -f participants.csv -o tournament.xlsx

Single court, seeded:

bracket-creator create-playoffs \
  -f participants.csv -o tournament.xlsx \
  -c 1 --seeds seeds.csv

Team tournament across two courts with zekken names:

bracket-creator create-playoffs \
  -f participants.csv -o tournament.xlsx \
  -t 3 -c 2 -z

Shiai-jo count

--courts takes 1, 2, 4, 8 or 16. The tree is split into one block per shiai-jo and those blocks merge in pairs, so the count has to halve cleanly all the way down. Any other value stops the command with an error naming the counts to use instead, and the error always offers 1.

Being even is not enough on its own. With -c 6 the six blocks pair off into three, and three cannot pair off again, so one of them would reach the final having fought a round fewer than the other two. -c 6 and -c 10 are therefore refused, just as -c 3, -c 5 and -c 7 are.

A single shiai-jo is always allowed: -c 1 prints the whole bracket as one shiai-jo's pages. A playoffs bracket has no pool finishers to cross between shiai-jo, so it is seeded first and then cut into shiai-jo blocks; the partner-shiai-jo crossing described for create-pools does not apply here. 16 is the highest, and it is also the most shiai-jo a tournament can have, which puts 32 out of reach.

This is a per-tournament-file rule, not a rule about your venue. A hall with three shiai-jo generates one file for two shiai-jo and another for one, and runs both at the same time. See create-pools for the same rule on the pools command, and How many shiai-jo a competition can use for the full explanation.

Seeding

Works the same as create-pools; top seeds are placed on opposite sides of the bracket so they can only meet in the final. See the input format for the seeds CSV layout.

Output sheets

Sheet	Contents
Data	Raw participant list
Time Estimator	Expected duration per phase
Elimination Matches	Match schedule
Names to Print	A3-ready name labels
Tree (one per court)	Visual bracket tree