I signed up for my second auto-speed tournament scheduled to begin at midnight.
At midnight, it only had 21/32 players and didn't start on time. 25 minutes later and it's still not full, but only a few players to go. I think it would do well to have more clarification in the Tournament Help as to what happens with wait times in this situation. Current, it says:
"An automated may have a scheduled start time, which will be indicated in Conquer Club Time (CCT). The tournament will not start before this time. If the tournament is full at the scheduled time, it will start. If it is not full, it will revert to being an unscheduled Auto Tournament. If the tournament is a Speed Auto Tournament you should plan to be online at the scheduled time or your games will start without you."
What sucks though is for a speed tournament, you could be sitting around waiting for hours for that tournament to fill up if it doesn't start at the scheduled time. The tournament does not start on schedule if it's not full. While I know from my first auto-speed that you should budget at least a 90 minute time window to complete them (yay second place!), it sucks to have to wait 30 extra minutes to start, plus the possible 90 budgeted for the completion.
It would be nice if there was either:
1) a warning about this on the tournament help page, or
2) an exception which gets you an entry fee refund if an auto-speed does not start on time