If a challenge is regarded as clashing with someone's personal freedoms, then IMO the challenge is being taken waaaay too seriously.

True! Very true! It has grown ever more competitive now.

It was a fantastic read of all the stats and records compiled for the previous global challenges by you Wesley. I appreciate and thank your effort in compiling all this information and presenting it all here.
However, I was confused as to what the medals stats in terms of individual players, teams and countries i.e what do those medals signify or mean?

It's the same thing as in the Olympics: Placing in the top three of a full Global Challenge season, e.g. in season 26, Normal, DeepHistory was awarded gold, jon541 took home the silver and genoveva nabbed the bronze.

Except that whereas an Olympic medalist gets a lump of metal for his/her pains, those of us in Wesley's table are left with a virtual medal and an ache where we used to gnash our teeth while the relevant GCs were underway.

Well, we could always make a "Get the GC champs their deserved medals" crowdfunding campaign

Do your stats exclude de-activated accounts?

I'm not quite sure what this question aims at, but I made no adjustments for deactivated accounts, they've been treated like any other (none of the ones I saw had been deactivated for foul play so there was certainly no reason to exclude them from their deserved honors). Of course they're listed as teamless.

By the way, the GC is well monitored for possible unfair play. I usually run a check on accounts that look "possibly too good" long before we get near Division 10 and do a routine check on the top few players each round before announcing the results as final.

*BUMP* for GC 28 update.

Thanks, Wes. This read was especially sweet for me, since I made HC and HC Immortal Badges this time around.

Sadly (or maybe happily) I won't be able to add to those plus (+) numbers anymore for adding to the number of badge winners. I got the last two badges, the two all arounders, this challenge. Just curious if others have earned both the HC All Arounder and the Normal All Arounder in the same GC? I managed it 4.5 days apart (the advantage of playing level 3 when everyone else is on 9 or 10).

That's what I did in GC 27. I actually wasn't even deliberately trying for the Normal Mode All-Rounder when I got it. When I realized I had received it, I decided to try for the other one, switched to Hardcore, and as luck would have it, I got the other All-Rounder on my first eligible set, 4 or 5 days after the Normal one.

I did them both just after they first came out - wasn't interested in a full run those days, so I switched once I had the first (don't remember in which order I did them, I think I went HC first)

I know I did them both in the same GC. I can't remember which one, but it would have been HC first, then switching to normal. And I'm also sure I waited until most people were in round 9 or 10, and I was 5 or 6.

Posting to bump this up. Wes, is it possible to make this a sticky?

Stats updated for GC 29.

Bump for GC 30 update.

Thanks for the updates, Wes. Congratulations to JMElston for the fantastic achievement.

Updated for GC31. Highlights include a new largest Immortal count, pagea getting a Hardcore win that would have placed 2nd in normal and rossian becoming the first player to post 4 gold medals in a row (3 normal, 1 hardcore). Germany inches into 3rd past Australia for the national rankings and Costa Rica becomes the 16th country to have at least one GC medalist.

Thanks again for keeping us all informed, Wes.

Thanks as always Wes, time for a cuppa I think...

No need to be so modest Wesley. We know Germany means you

I wonder what the new updated stats would look like