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Lesson 3.1Duel, squad and gauntlet
Three formats, up to eight sides, and one rule that decides which of them you are actually in.
Prefer to listen? This is the same lesson, word for word. The text below is the transcript.
This lesson prepares you to: Pick the right battle format and explain how a side differs from a team.
Three formats, not three names for one thing
A battle on Helm is a timed gift race between live streams. There are three formats and they are genuinely different, which has not always been true. Until recently duel, squad and gauntlet were three labels on the same two sided race, and this track was held back rather than published because of it.
- Duel. Two sides, one against one. The classic.
- Squad. Sides grouped into teams. Your score and your team mates' scores are added together, and the team total is what wins.
- Gauntlet. Three or more sides, every one of them for themselves. No teams, no alliances, highest score takes it.
Helm caps a battle at eight sides. That is our number and not a copy of anyone else's: TikTok publishes no maximum at all, and the figures that circulate on third party sites are describing the co-host window rather than a battle.
A side is not a team
This is the distinction that confuses people, so it is worth being precise. A side is one live stream. A team is one or more sides whose scores are summed.
In a duel and in a gauntlet, every side is its own team, so the two words collapse into each other and you can safely ignore the difference. In a squad they come apart: four sides might be two teams of two, and the scoreboard shows you the team totals because that is what decides the result.
| Format | Sides | Teams | Who wins |
|---|---|---|---|
| Duel | 2 | 2 | Higher side score |
| Squad | Up to 8 | Fewer than sides | Higher team total |
| Gauntlet | 3 to 8 | Same as sides | Highest single side |
A team total is worked out fresh every time the scoreboard is drawn rather than stored anywhere. That sounds like an implementation detail and it is not: it means the running scoreboard and the final result read the same numbers, so they can never disagree with each other. There is no moment where the board says one thing and the result says another.
A battle that was already running when we deployed keeps running
Helm changed how sides are stored partway through this feature. Battles created before that change do not have the new rows and are read from the two columns they already had, which describe exactly the duel they are. No migration, no backfill, and a duel that was live at the moment of deploy carried on scoring without noticing anything had happened.
After the result
When a battle ends, the result overlay sits on screen for 5 seconds, and a rematch cannot be started for 30 seconds. The cooldown is there so the room gets a moment. A rematch offered half a second after a loss is not an invitation, it is a demand, and the pause is deliberate.
A drawn battle tells nobody they lost. Both sides see a draw, and neither one takes a loss on their record.
Next: which gifts move the scoreboard, and the ones a host can leave out of it.