Each team entering MWC99 will be assigned a seed value for placement into the qualifying round pools. Teams that participated in the Myth World Cup '98 will receive seed values based on their final standing in that tournament. All newcomers to the MWC will be assigned a seed value according to the order in which they sign up for the tournament.

Teams will be placed into pools using their seed values. For example, if there are 10 pools of 6 teams each, seeds 1, 11, 21, 31, 41, and 51 will be in one pool; seeds 2, 12, 22, 32, 42, and 52 will be in the next pool, and so on.

Each team plays one match against every other team in their pool. They have two weeks to do so; two matches in the first week, three in the second week.

Each QR match will consist of 3 games. The winner of each game in the QR is determined by which team scores the most points in that game. If both teams score the same number of points in a game, the game is a tie. The winner of a QR match is the team that scores the most wins in the match. If the number of wins is equal, the match is scored as a tie.

Each team has their average points calculated over all matches in the QR except those which they won by forfeit (matches lost by forfeit are included in the average). This average points value is used for resolving ties in DE advancement and seeding.