Terms of Service

1. What PatchDuel is

PatchDuel is a charity fundraiser built around a free-entry cash-prize video-game tournament, operated by Itgetsit LLC (“we,” “us,” or the “operator”). These terms cover patchduel.com, the game, player accounts, patch requests, charity voting, and tournaments. Contact us at [email protected].

By participating in the game or submitting a request, you agree to these terms. If you do not agree, do not participate. Reading this page does not require an account, a payment, or agreement to the terms.

Eligibility follows your local laws

You may participate and receive a cash prize only if permitted by the laws of your state, country, and any other jurisdiction that applies to you. You must meet all applicable minimum-age, residency, consent, and other eligibility requirements. If local law requires a parent or legal guardian’s consent or involvement, obtain it before participating. Parental consent does not override a law prohibiting participation or receipt of a prize.

Prizes are void where prohibited. Access to the website does not establish eligibility. Do not misrepresent your age, identity, or location, or evade restrictions. We may require reasonable verification and restrict participation or payment where needed to comply with law.

One real person may use only one player identity to compete for prizes in a season. You may use that identity on different devices through your key or linked Discord account. Account sharing, trading accounts, and entering through multiple identities to obtain an advantage are prohibited.

2. Free entry, seasons & cash prizes

No purchase or donation is necessary to enter, qualify, win, or claim a prize. Open the game, choose a display name, and play through Find Match. Complete at least five rated matches in the season to qualify for the leaderboard. Private friend matches do not count toward tournament standings.

Seasons are calendar months in UTC, from midnight on the first day until midnight at the start of the next month. See Season in the game for dates and the countdown. Ratings reset each season. Final standings use the server’s recorded rating; exact ties favor the earlier-created player identity. Rounded ratings displayed in the interface may appear equal even when underlying ratings differ.

The top five qualifying players receive the player portion of the pool, subject to eligibility and integrity review. The allocation of the total season pool is:

Amounts are in US dollars. Player awards round down to whole cents; remainders and unfilled prize places go to charity. The pool varies with qualifying payments, may be zero, and has no guaranteed minimum. A displayed standing or pending award is not final confirmation of eligibility or payment.

Claiming an award

Contact [email protected] with your season and private claim code by the deadline shown with your award, normally 60 days after the award is created. Do not post claim codes or player keys publicly. Payouts are processed manually after review. Contact support promptly if verification or payment is delayed.

We may request reasonable proof of account ownership, age, residence, human participation, and information needed for lawful payment or tax reporting. We never require a purchase or advance fee to release a prize. Winners are responsible for applicable taxes, subject to any withholding or reporting we must perform. Unclaimed awards may be forfeited and added to the selected charity’s allocation after the claim deadline, subject to applicable law.

3. Where the money goes

Itgetsit LLC receives payments for optional Patch the game requests through Stripe. After Stripe’s processing fees, 80% of each charged request contributes to the season pool. Half of the pool is allocated to charity and half to player prizes. The remaining net revenue is retained by the operator for running and developing the service. Before cent rounding, this is approximately 40% of net request revenue for charity, 40% for player prizes, and 20% for the operator.

A payment to PatchDuel purchases request processing; it is not a direct donation to a charity. We do not represent PatchDuel as a registered charity or tax-exempt organization, and do not promise tax deductibility. Pool figures are allocations, not confirmation that a charity has already received funds.

Charity selection & transfers

Players with at least five rated matches in a season may cast one charity vote and change it before the season closes. Everyone may browse the charity view. The options, in their tie-break order, are:

• Against Malaria Foundation
• Doctors Without Borders
• St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital
• Feeding America

The charity with the most votes at season end receives the charity allocation. For a tie, we compare each tied charity’s most recent currently recorded vote; the earlier timestamp wins. Any remaining tie follows the list order above. If nobody votes, Against Malaria Foundation is selected. Votes select the season’s recipient; they do not direct an individual purchase to a separate charity.

Transfers are made manually after season reconciliation, not instantly, and no fixed transfer date is promised. Unclaimed awards may generate a later transfer. Ask support for a season’s payment status. If the selected organization cannot lawfully accept the funds, we may select another listed charity and explain the substitution; funds designated for charity will remain designated for charity.

Listing a charity does not imply that it sponsors, endorses, administers, or is affiliated with PatchDuel. Charities do not control the game, tournament decisions, or prize payments.

4. No guarantee of fair competitive play

PatchDuel does not guarantee fair, balanced, consistent, bug-free, or cheat-free competitive play. This experimental game changes through player suggestions and AI-generated patches. Mechanics, arenas, controls, balance, and strategies may change during a season. Patches can create unintended advantages, disadvantages, errors, or outcomes.

Latency, device performance, disconnections, matchmaking, software faults, and others’ conduct may affect results. We may reject, modify, remove, or revert patches, including through automatic safeguards, and pause play to address incidents. Paying for a patch does not buy ratings, votes, a prize, or a guaranteed advantage, but a resulting gameplay change can affect competitive outcomes for everyone.

This risk disclosure does not authorize cheating or excuse our fraud, deliberate misconduct, or any responsibility that cannot lawfully be excluded. Participants must still follow the rules below.

5. Abuse, prize denial & bans

Prohibited conduct includes bots or automated play; scripts that aim, react, or make gameplay decisions for you; tampering with software or match data; intentionally exploiting security or game defects; match fixing, collusion, win trading, rating manipulation, or deliberate draw campaigns; account theft or impersonation; evading verification or bans; spamming room-code guesses, reports, votes, payments, or requests; payment fraud; and unauthorized access attempts.

Do not submit malicious code, try to override the AI’s security boundaries, harass or threaten others, publish private personal information, or use hateful, obscene, or impersonating names. Report suspected vulnerabilities privately to support rather than exploiting them in rated play.

If PatchDuel’s operators reasonably suspect abuse, cheating, automated participation, fraud, or ineligibility, they may withhold or deny prize payment, disqualify participants, invalidate affected results, restrict features, and temporarily or permanently ban participants. Protective action may occur before an investigation is complete. A criminal conviction or proof beyond reasonable doubt is not required for a tournament administrative decision.

Decisions will be made in good faith using reasonably available information, including replays, inputs, reports, account activity, and verification results. An unusual performance, report, or automated flag may prompt review; it is not by itself conclusive proof. Measures should be proportionate to the concern and remain subject to applicable law.

Requesting a review

Email [email protected] with your player name, season or match details, and relevant evidence if you believe a restriction or prize decision is mistaken. We will consider good-faith requests and explain the outcome where reasonably possible, without compromising security or another person’s privacy. These terms do not remove rights or remedies available under applicable law.

6. Optional paid patch requests

Patch requests are optional and separate from tournament entry. The price is shown before checkout and may rise as paid requests are submitted in a season. Payment is for consideration and processing, not a promise to implement a request, meet a deadline, improve the game, or keep a patch permanently.

Requests may be rejected, combined, altered, fail testing, produce no change, or later be reverted. Once payment is captured, those outcomes do not by themselves entitle you to a refund. This does not limit refunds, cancellation rights, or protections required by law. Contact support about duplicate, unauthorized, or incorrectly processed charges.

A temporary card authorization is not necessarily a completed charge. If a quoted price becomes unavailable before capture, the hold may be released; the request will not proceed at a higher price without a new checkout. Use only payment information you are authorized to use.

7. Accounts, history & recordings

Keep player keys, claim codes, and linked Discord accounts secure. Anyone with your player key may act as you. Discord linking connects to an existing player; it does not merge players. Tell support promptly about compromised accounts. We cannot guarantee recovery when ownership cannot be verified.

Display names, ratings, results, and player match histories are visible to others. After setting a first name, you may change it once per season; previous names remain visible for up to one year. Operators may reject or moderate names that breach these terms.

Matches are recorded for replays, integrity checks, reports, and prize review, including game state, the game version and active patches, player inputs, and match events. Full recordings are retained for one year under the current retention policy. Authorized reviewers may inspect them; public match history is separate from access to full review recordings. Player reports identify the reporting and reported players and are sent to support.

Cloudflare provides verification, Stripe processes payments, Discord provides optional sign-in, and AWS hosts service data. Their services have their own applicable terms and data practices. Contact support about personal-data access or deletion requests; records may need to be retained for legal obligations, unresolved claims, or abuse investigations.

8. Submissions & intellectual property

Submit only material you have the right to share. Do not include secrets, private personal information, or infringing content. You retain rights you already have in submissions and grant the operator a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free license to use, reproduce, adapt, publish, and incorporate them as needed to operate, develop, and improve PatchDuel. Requests may be processed by AI service providers and described in public patch notes.

A suggestion or payment does not confer ownership of the service, exclusive rights to a mechanic, or royalties. Software, branding, and other content remain subject to their respective owners’ rights and applicable licenses.

9. Availability, incidents & liability

The service is offered “as is” and “as available” to the extent permitted by law. We do not promise uninterrupted access, compatibility with every device, error-free records, a particular result, or detection of every abusive participant.

We may suspend, repair, reschedule, or cancel affected play or a season because of serious bugs, security incidents, fraud, outages, or legal requirements, and correct demonstrably erroneous results. If prizes or charity allocations are affected, we will communicate the treatment of those funds and honor obligations required by law. Cancellation does not authorize retaining money already designated for charity.

To the extent permitted by law, operators are not responsible for indirect or consequential losses, lost profits or opportunities, or losses caused by another participant’s misconduct or events beyond reasonable control. Nothing excludes liability for fraud, willful misconduct, gross negligence, or liability that cannot lawfully be excluded. Mandatory consumer rights are preserved.

10. Updates & contact

We may update these terms and publish a revised version and effective date here. Material changes to ordinary prize eligibility, allocation, or ranking rules apply prospectively, normally from a future season. Immediate protective changes may be necessary for abuse, security, or legal reasons. Updates will not retroactively remove valid accrued rights where prohibited by law.

Specific season rules announced before participation supplement these terms. Mandatory law controls if it conflicts with a provision. If a provision is unenforceable, the remainder continues to apply to the extent permitted by law. This page does not guarantee that participation is lawful in every jurisdiction.