Gharib: You know me as The Stranger.
Gharib: I come to you today to tell of what some believe to be the very first formal challenge made to Egypt, many generations ago.
Gharib: My next challenge involves one of the oldest art forms known to this land.
Gharib: In my day, artesians crafted delicate and beautiful displays of fire in the skys above. Each point of light, the result of careful work, and the choreography was as if the stars themselves were dancing.
Gharib: Can this generation create subtle beauty, or will their competition be to see who can ignite the largest pile of wealth?
Gharib: I give you, The Test of Pyrotechnics!
The Test of Pyrotechnics involves designing and displaying beautiful fireworks at a contest, where your fellow citizens will vote on their favorites. These contests are held at Pyro Arenas which are located throughout Egypt.
To start a contest, visit a Pyrotechnics Stadium and sign up as an exhibitor. That will start a 10 minute timer, during which enough additional contestants need to sign up to reach a legitimacy of 70 (see below). If legitimacy isn't reached, the contest is cancelled. After the 10 minutes are up, a call for judges is started. The call for judges is another 10 minute timer. Some of the players who have previously signed up to judge at this stadium will be asked if they wish to judge this contest. If there are not enough positive responses (15? 20?) received in the 10 minutes, the contest is cancelled (you should request that the players watching the contest sign up as judges and then have exhibitors signing up again). After the 10 minute call for judges is over, there is a 10 minute travel window for the judges to arrive at the stadium before the contest starts. If the judges don't arrive in time, the contest will start without them.
Because of the 3 timers, there is a minimum of 30 minutes between the first signup and the contest starting. Quite often one of the first two steps fails and we must start over, so you should allow at least 1 hour to get a competition started. The competition itself will typically last 20 to 60 minutes, depending mostly on the number of participants.
Legitimacy is determined by the amount of contestants that have not yet competed against each other before. When a contestant signs up, they add 2 legitimacy for each opponent they've never (See Note below) competed against. This means that the smallest group that can compete is 9 people who have never competed before, with a legitimacy of 72. (Need information on legitimacy from people have competed against each other). It seems that somewhere around 8-10 contestants are required, although more may be required if many of them have competed against each other before.
Note: that at the VoK Pyro competition on April 24th, Pharaoh mentioned that he was adding "legitimacy decay," so that after six weeks, it would be as if two contestants had never faced each other. Before the contest started, he ran three weeks of decay.
Once the contest has started, the first exhibitor to arm their mortar will be given the chance to fire it. If you aren't the first to arm your mortar, you can click arm again at then next opportunity (you do not need to disarm your mortar).
When you do manage to be the first to arm, you will get a popup window clearing you for launch. Fire your mortar (which will require that you type in the word 'LAUNCH'). Judges get 20 seconds of time to get into a proper camera view and then the shell is fired. After it is complete, the judges can judge it (within a time limit). Directly after judging, the score for that particular mortar is shown. Please note that the name of the exhibitor who launched the mortar is anonymous and the judges will only know the name of your mortar.
After all the contestants have fired their mortars all scores are shown in order from the highest to the lowest along with their rating. There are 3 possible ratings: 1/4, 1/3, and 1/2. You will earn the highest rating you are eligible for that you haven't already been awarded. For example, if you have already earned the top 1/4 rating and place in the top 1/4 a second time, you'll earn the top 1/3 rating instead. You need to earn all three ratings to pass the test.
See Also: Pyrotechnics Guide, Pyrotechnics Stadium Locations, Pyrotechnics Contest Schedule, Star details