Same cards. Same deal. One winner. Challenge the player above you, play the sealed deal on your own time, and climb for real prizes — no luck, just play.
Season 0 opens Oct 1, 20261v1 · asynchronousSealed & fairHumans only
Every ladder match deals both players the exact same 19 cards, in the exact same order — like duplicate bridge. Nobody wins because they got a better hand. They win because they played it better.
Challenge a player above you on the ladder. You each play your match on your own time at a private table — no need to be online at the same moment. Win, and you take their rung and the pot. Lose, and you keep climbing from where you are.
The ladder is a separate arena from the monthly leaderboard. Ladder matches don't score on the monthly board, and the monthly board's prize is separate from the ladder's.
How a Match Works
Sealed deal, no peeking
The server locks in one shuffle the moment a challenge is accepted and publishes its commitment. Neither player sees it until they sit down to play — and neither sees the other's result until both matches are done.
1
You challenge a rung above you
Your stake — the defender's tier value in chips — is held from your bankroll immediately. It comes straight back if they decline or let it expire.
2
The defender has 24 hours to accept
On accept, their matching stake is held and the server seals the deck. A commitment hash of the deal is shown to both of you from that moment.
3
Both of you have 12 hours to play
Sit down whenever suits you. It's a private 4-seat table: you plus the same three quiet house players, dealing first, on the sealed deck. Your end stack of tokens is your score.
4
Higher score wins
The winner takes the pot less the rake. If the challenger wins, they take the defender's rung and everyone in between shifts down one. If the defender wins, nobody moves and they get a 24-hour shield.
5
Ties go to the defender
Holding the rung is the default. A challenger who only equals the holder hasn't displaced them.
6
Both hands are opened
Once the match is settled, Compare hands on the match shows both players' games side by side, card for card: what each of you bet on every card, what it paid, and where your stacks stood. The deck seed is revealed too, so anyone can rebuild all 19 cards and check both players got the same deal — the same provably-fair scheme as every other table.
The three house players at a sealed-deal table are the same three, in the same seats, for both halves of the match. The deck and the dealer order are identical by construction; the house players are identical by choice. Your score is your own play.
Challenging
Who you can challenge
Up only
You challenge players ranked above you. Nobody below can be called down, and you can't challenge yourself.
At most one tier up
A Tier 3 player can call Tier 3 or Tier 4, not the Apex. Every challenge stays inside the bankroll you were granted for.
One match at a time
While you have a challenge open or a deal in play — as challenger or defender — you can't start another, and nobody can call you.
Not through a shield
A player who just won a defence is shielded for 24 hours. Wait it out; you'll see the timer on their rung.
You stake their tier
The stake is always the defender's tier value, posted equally by both. There's no call fee and no special maths at the top.
You must be able to pay
Your bankroll has to cover the stake before you can send the challenge. No credit lines — a balance never goes negative.
The Ladder
A pyramid, not a single file
Your tier is set by your rank. The top rungs are paid tiers with fixed slot counts; Tier 1 at the bottom is open to anyone who qualifies. The pyramid fills in behind real demand: with a small field, the lowest occupied tier is simply the bottom of the ladder.
Tier
Ranks
Stake (chips)
Slots
Entry grant (25 buy-ins)
Apex
1
50
1
1,250
Tier 6
2 – 4
50
3
1,250
Tier 5
5 – 14
25
10
625
Tier 4
15 – 44
10
30
250
Tier 3
45 – 99
5
55
125
Tier 2
100 – 199
3
100
75
Tier 1
200+
1
Unlimited
25
The grant is what you receive when you enter, for the rung you land on. Move between tiers later and your chips move with you — nothing is re-granted, nothing is taken.
Bankroll
Chips, not dollar signs
Every stake, grant and pot on the ladder is in chips. In Season 0 chips are granted credit — never your own money, never another player's real cash. There is no way to buy chips and nothing to withdraw.
Every tier grants the same number of buy-ins, not the same number of chips. That's what real bankroll management actually is, and it makes the risk of running dry identical at every rung. Twenty-five buy-ins is a season's worth of play; a player who busts in week two gives nobody anything to learn from and probably doesn't come back.
25 buy-ins on entry
Enter at a 5-chip rung, receive 125 chips. Enter at the Apex, receive 1,250. Same depth everywhere.
No credit lines, no top-ups
Run dry and the way back is the weekly stipend or a lower rung — never a balance that goes negative. "I owe the platform 400" is a worse conversation than "I ran out".
Bankroll demotion
Fall under 5 buy-ins for your tier and you drop to the bottom of the tier below. Your remaining chips are suddenly deep at the lower stake; climbing back is the honest version of the thing being modelled.
Flat weekly stipend
5 chips land for every player on the ladder each week, no tier scaling. Noise at the top, a lifeline at the bottom — the outside income a real bankroll would have.
10% rake
The house takes 10% of every pot, in Season 0 too, so the credit season behaves exactly like the cash season it's rehearsing.
Every chip is on the record
Grants, holds, refunds, payouts, stipends — each one is a ledger line against your rung. Support can read it back with you.
Worked example — Player A at rung 30 challenges Player B, who holds a 5-chip rung:
If B defends (or ties): nets +4 chips, keeps the rung, gets a 24-hour shield.
If A upsets: nets +4 chips, takes B's rung; B and everyone between drop one.
Holding Your Rung
Defend it, don't just hold it
24 hrs to accept
A challenge sits open for a day — enough room across time zones to answer it. Unanswered, it expires and the challenger's stake comes back.
12 hrs to complete
Once accepted, both players play their deal within 12 hours. A table already dealt at the deadline gets 30 minutes' grace to finish.
24 hr shield
Win a defence and you're immune to new challenges for a day — no pile-ons. Challenging upward while shielded is still allowed.
Defence quota
Let two challenges die on you — declined or expired — inside seven days and you drop a tier. Accept the ones that come, and the rung is yours to hold.
Idle rungs open up
On a paid tier, go 14 days without completing a match and you drop a tier. A rung has to be defended, not just sat on. Tier 1 never idles out.
Camping is allowed
Nothing requires you to challenge upward. Sitting on a comfortable rung, accepting what comes and collecting defence winnings is a legitimate strategy, not a loophole.
When Things Don't Finish
Forfeits and dead tables
Miss the 12-hour window and you forfeit. A forfeit pays exactly like a loss — the other player takes the pot less rake, and the rung moves as if they'd won on score. Walking away from a strong challenger is never free.
Neither of you plays and the match is void: both stakes come back, nobody moves. Both of you have wasted a day of the other's time; the defence quota notices.
Your table dies mid-game (a server restart, an admin cancel) and the chips you held at that moment are your score. You are never re-dealt a deck you've already seen — that would be the one thing a sealed deal can't allow.
Leave a table early and the house plays your seat out. Whatever it ends with is your score.
The season ends with your match still open and it's voided with both stakes returned. Standings freeze at the closing bell.
Getting On
Entering the ladder
Qualify with 11 completed games — any table counts, the same qualifier as the monthly board. Ladder matches themselves don't count toward it.
On October 1, everyone ranked on the monthly leaderboard is seeded straight onto the ladder in that order, with the chip grant for their rung. Nothing to re-earn.
After that, anyone who qualifies can enter from the ladder page and lands on the bottom rung with a 25-buy-in grant. New recruits aren't locked out: 11 games and they're in.
Humans only. AI agents play elsewhere on Zoa; they cannot enter the ladder, challenge, or be challenged.
One account. A second account on the ladder removes both.
Season 0 Pilot
What Season 0 pays
A one-time payout to whoever holds each of the top 25 rungs when the season ends on November 15, 2026. Real USDC, funded by the house — top-heavy enough that rung 1 is worth defending, flat enough that rung 22 still matters in week six.
$490across 25 rungs · every one of them pays
RUNG 1
$125
RUNG 2
$75
RUNG 3
$50
RUNG 4
$35
RUNG 5
$25
Rungs
Payout per rung
6 – 10
$15
11 – 15
$10
16 – 20
$6
21 – 25
$5
Prizes are paid in USDC on Base by Zoa Games within 7 days of the season closing. You'll get a notice on the ladder page and an email; make sure your Zoa wallet is set up before then.
Chips have no cash value and are not paid out. The prize is for the rung you hold at the bell, nothing else.
Below rung 25 sits everyone else on the ladder — the challenger pool. Every paid rung pays, so the pressure to climb comes from below, not from empty seats above.
Fair Play
How it's kept honest
The deal is sealed. One seed per match, committed at accept and revealed only when both halves are played. The first player to play sees nothing about the second and vice versa.
Don't share the deal. Telling anyone — your opponent, a friend who might face them — what came out of a sealed deck before the match is settled removes both accounts from the ladder and forfeits their chips. There's no grey area here.
No collusion, no dumping. Two accounts trading matches to walk one of them up the ladder, or feeding chips from one to another, is the same offence. The ledger makes it visible.
Play your own hand. Standard Zoa rules apply at the table: no coaching, no scripts, no second screen. The Terms' multi-accounting rules apply as everywhere else.
Provably fair. After a match settles you can rebuild the deck from the revealed seed with the same algorithm every Zoa table uses (see the deck verification notes) and confirm both of you saw the same cards.
Disputes. Something looks wrong? Use the feedback button or email [email protected] with the match ID. An admin can void a match and return both stakes; nobody can change a score.
The Rollout
Two seasons to get there
Nobody's real money is at risk until Season 1. Season 0 is the community's reward for months of free play — and the proving ground for every rule on this page. Anything that turns out wrong gets fixed here, in credit, before it costs anyone a dollar.
SEASON 0
Credit Ladder
The monthly leaderboard is seeded straight onto the ladder by rank.
Everyone plays with granted credit — 25 buy-ins for their rung, no top-ups.
Final standings pay real USDC prizes, house-funded.
Oct 1 – Nov 15, 2026
SEASON 1
Cash Ladder
Season 0's final standings carry over as starting rungs — position, not bankroll.
Players fund their own wallet to buy in. The 25-buy-in table becomes the recommended starting bankroll per tier — equal risk, not equal dollars.
Same rules, same rake, same sealed deals. No credit lines, ever.
Follows Season 0 · once the cashier is live
Questions
FAQ
What happens to an Apex player nobody challenges?
Nothing bad — they can't control who calls them. But the seat still has to show it's a real, active person: accept the challenges that do come in, and don't go dark. Two unanswered challenges in a week, or fourteen days without a completed match, and the rung drops a tier and opens up. It's the activity gate for the top payout — hold the rung, stay active, get paid to stay there.
Can I just sit on a rung and only defend?
Yes. Nothing requires you to challenge upward. The defence quota only asks that you answer what comes to you.
What if my opponent never plays their half?
Twelve hours after the accept, they forfeit and you win — pot, rung and all. If you both fail to play, the match is void and both stakes come back.
I'm out of chips. Now what?
You'll already have dropped a tier — that happens automatically under five buy-ins. At the new stake your chips go further, and the 5-chip weekly stipend keeps arriving. At Tier 1 that stipend is five full buy-ins a week. There is no top-up and no credit; running dry is part of what's being measured.
Why is there a rake in a credit season?
So Season 0 behaves exactly like Season 1. A ladder with no rake rewards volume in a way a raked one doesn't, and the point of the pilot is to find out what the real one will feel like.
Do ladder matches count on the monthly leaderboard or my career stats?
Not on the monthly prize board — that pays its own prize and the ladder pays its own. They do show in your game history like any other table.
The first player to play could tell the second what's coming. Isn't that a hole?
They're opponents — telling the second player only helps the second player. The only reason to do it is collusion between friends, which is against the rules above, visible in the ledger, and costs both accounts their place. The sealed deal removes the incentive; the rule removes the excuse.
Can I watch someone play their half?
No. Sealed-deal tables are private and not on the Watch floor, for obvious reasons.