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Vanta Preseason Guide - How do I prepare for the preseason?
The Vanta preseason is the two week span that kicks off the start of our Spring and Fall seasons. Match pairings will begin in these weeks, but matches in these weeks will not count for or against your playoff qualifications. This is an excellent time for your school to prepare and make adjustments for the regular season, which normally lasts 6-8 weeks after the preseason. To help schools make the best of the preseason, we've prepared a checklist to help schools and orgs take full advantage of the preseason:
1. Team Composition
Teams can take advantage of the fact that losses will not count against their regular season standings and use the time to experiment with team composition. Once the two week preseason is over, teams will only be able to remove players from their roster - they will not be able to add new players. It is highly recommended that you add members up to the maximum team size if possible, as you can always remove inactive players after the preseason but you will not be able to add them once the regular season has started.
It will also be important to gauge the commitment of your players throughout the preseason - once the regular season starts, forfeitures will count against your team's standings, which means every absence can lead to a potential loss if your team does not have enough players. This is a good time to review the importance of showing up for match days with your team and working out your player's schedules.
Here are some articles related to making adjustments to your teams:
Can I have substitutes for my team?
2. Tech Setup
Preseason is the best time to test your tech setup and troubleshoot potential hardware and network issues. As there is no risk of teams losing their standings, forfeitures due to disconnects or unforeseen tech issues will not count against them.
An important part of this is testing the way your facilities technology and networking solutions work with our platform and games. Are your microphones, speakers and cameras being properly recognized by your browser? Are the domains that our chat and email systems use properly whitelisted by your network? Is your hardware able to run our games without unexpected crashes and stutters? Are all of our games properly downloaded and updated to the latest version? These are all crucial benchmarks that should be tested and adjusted by the end of the preseason - once the regular season starts, any of these kinds of issues can lead to a potential loss of standings.
Here are some articles that can help you review all the tech considerations for the season:
Games aren't working on our school's network.
Camera/Microphone isn't working on the video chat.
What do I need to authorize on my school's network for Vanta's games?
3. Platform Functions
Preseason is also an excellent time to get familiar with our platform before the start of the regular season. Once the season starts, admins and teams will be expected to have a basic understanding of how to communicate with opposing coaches, how to submit scores, and how their arena's populate on the dashboard.
Here are some articles that will help you understand or troubleshoot our basic platform functions:
How does my team enter their match/practice room?
How do I communicate with the opposing coach?
Don't see matches on my schedule.
How do I report my match scores?
Where do I enter my match day lobby information for Vanta's games?