Will the group 1 winner go against anyone else?

They're essentially three separate brackets; the only reason for this is because 300 contestants was too many for me to run in a single bracket. I could not find an online template or tournament site that allowed that many, so I had to split them up.

The group they are competing in is determined by their rank. Before the tournament began, each contestant was assigned a rank 1-300 based on a) how many submissions they received and b) how early they received submissions (i.e. if two characters both only received 1 submission, but Character A was submitted BEFORE Character B, then Character A would be ranked above Character B). So, Group One is comprised of the top 100 submitted characters, Group Two is the next hundred, and Group Three is the final hundred.

It also helps to give some of the less popular characters who may have only gotten 1 submission more of a fighting chance, by pitting them against others in their 'weight category' first, so to speak.