Quoted from Blakesell:Typically, you can enter 15 times and cherry pick what your best scores were and throw out the rest, you can enter in all ranks unless you've already been established. A ranking being I think $20 an entry makes this rather expensive, but I promise you the heavy hitters do this to make certain they move forward as far as they possibly can.
If you are referring to PAPA's format, this is incorrect. Each entry is actually a "run" across 5 games. It rewards consistant play.
The format you are describing is "Herb Style" which a high percentage of tournaments run, like Expo, Ohio, Louisville, Gameworks, etc.
Quoted from Blakesell:You could enter in a, b, c and classics this same way, but A rank is where the serious points are. I'm not financially well off to enter 15 times for every rank, but I'm for sure going to take a crack at them all and hope for the best. After it's all said and done competition wise, you still have hundreds of games to play.
PAPA requires you to pick a division -- so if you play C, you can't play A unless you tell them and they void everything you've done in C. Everyone is eligible to play in the classics touranments.
Quoted from Blakesell:I've never been to Pinburgh, but I'm going to try and make it my goal to do that next year, MPE got in the way of it this year.
For the novice tournament player, I highly -- HIGHLY -- suggest going to Pinburgh given the opportunity. It's a very social experience and you get to play with so many awesome people from all different skill levels.