.....It's an exciting day today on ATRL.

From the same place that brought you the Singles Rate, we've got a new kind of rate. This one means war. It's all been cleared with Ace Reject for the go-ahead, and now we're going live.

It's a far more strategic, intensive type of rate that's going to need all your stanning, all your deal-breaking. You really need to do the most to make sure your fave song wins. With Britney's HUGE and exceptional discography, this will be interesting. There's no clear winner.

The war will involve Britney's entire discography. It will be done in rounds. As to not overcomplicate things, we're only going to involve songs that have a form of official release.

HOW IT'S PLAYED

So, it's going to be done in rounds. Here's the structure:

- Round 1: 120 songs (there's 117, but I'm counting S&M, What's Going On? and Till The World Ends Femme Fatale Remix to make up numbers). 30x groups of 4.

It's your duty to RANK songs within the group from 1st (best) to 4th (worst). 1st will give the song 4 points going into the next round, 2nd 3 points, and so on. You'll post your rankings on this thread, NOT through PM.

With everyone's rankings added up, the 60 songs with the highest points go through; the rest are eliminated. If there's ever a tie, it'll be based on who ranked in 1st place more throughout people's rankings.

- Round 2: 60 songs. 15 groups of 4. Same process as last round, 1st to 4th. Points from last round are added to this round. The 32 with the highest points from all the rounds collectively will go through here.

- Round 3: 32 songs. 8 groups of 4. Same process. 16 will go through.

- Round 4: 16 songs. Same process. 8 go through.

- Round 5: Quarter finals. Here's where it gets interesting. Instead of me creating groups semi-randomly, it's up to you to decide on 2 groups- 4 you want to keep, 4 you want to eliminate. Campaign, shout, scream, make deals with everyone and anyone to ensure your favourite song progresses.

- Round 6: Semi-finals. You're choosing the 2 songs you'd like in the final, and the two songs you're eliminating.

- Round 7: The Final. This will be done via PM, sent to me. You're all on your own here, choosing who you'd like to win. When all is said and done, the war will be over and one song will be left standing.

HOW DO I PLAY?

Groups will be based on how many points they've gotten throughout previous rounds. If you feel a certain song is running away with too many 1st places and posing a threat to your favourites, then it's up to you to mark it down and get others to help you mark it down too.

To give you an example of how this plays out:

Toxic
How I Roll
Email My Heart
Heaven On Earth

Imagine that as a group. Say you're a person with a sane mind, and you therefore stan for Email My Heart:

Email My Heart
How I Roll
-----------------------------------------
Heaven On Earth
Toxic

You've just increased the likelihood of Email getting through because it's 1st, and getting Toxic's sorry ass is getting punched out the game because it's in 4th.

It's up to you how you mark songs within a war. Be a stan, be a fair-headed person. Just get involved.

WHAT DOES WAR ACHIEVE?

- Less chance for 'trolling' from people giving out really low scores with intentional bias in a regular rate.
- There's always a way to 'save' your fave song. When you send your scores in a rate, you've done all the work you can do. Here you can keep your fave in the game through each round.
- It involves ALL the artist's songs, not just the singles. Heaven for all you Blackout stans, no?
- It's more fun! The eliminations at the end of each round will either make your life or they will destroy it. As more and more songs get eliminated, your fave songs are going to be more and more at threat.

So before I kick it off, I understand this could all sound really complex and confusing. It's really not, it's very simple.

I'll be starting Round 1 in a couple of days time- but for now, there's time for some Q&A to make sure you're totally aware of all the rules. So, any questions?

(Oh, and don't let this flop. It's an experimental twist which will hopefully be used a lot more in the future if this one has lots of interest!)

LEADERBOARD

Okay!

when does it start?

A few days time- I'd say Monday or Tuesday. Just thought I'd introduce the concept to ya'll first before we kick everything off!

This sounds fun

This sounds extremely interesting, I'll be playing!

This sounds great

Im def playing

Email my heart? You trippin...

I will make sure it wins.

Seems that people seem to understand the game a lot better than I thought anyway...we could always start tomorrow if people like?

I'll play.

Will the points from the previous rounds be added to this round, too?

Nope! That's just one-on-one. Whoever gets the highest % of votes based on PMs sent to me in that round is the winner. I'll probably try and get you guys to keep your final votes a secret- that way we have a bit of mystery when we unveil the winner!

Interesting, I'll be doing this.

Can't wait

Excellent.

I'll do this, but I'm a little confused on how this works. Can someone give me another example?

Okay, in a little more detail, I'll run a little play-out for you. So here's the 1st round:

Toxic
Criminal
Overprotected
Email My Heart

Dear Diary
Mmm Papi
Gimme More
Everytime

You rank all the songs (in Round 1 there will be 120, here we're just using 8 as an example), 1st to 4th in your order of preference:

Email My Heart
Criminal
Overprotected
Toxic

Everytime
Mmm Papi
Gimme More
Dear Diary

Here, Overprotected, Toxic, Gimme More and Dear Diary would be the four songs eliminated, as they finished 3rd and 4th in their group. The other 4 would go through to the next round, having gotten enough points.

Those are just your points though. Even though you might put Toxic in 4th, other people may have put it in 1st, and so overall it may still go through.

Hope that clears things up a bit more for you? It can be difficult to explain, but it's really easy when it's played out properly.

Thanks, I get it. This is how I thought it would be before; the "groups" concept just threw me off a little.