How will World Cup play-offs be determined?

The draw for the World Cup play-offs takes place on Thursday and we now know all 16 participants, and who will get a home semi-final.

Wales will have a home semi, while Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland will be away.

Here's how the draw is shaping up, the pots, fixture dates and potential routes.

There are four places to be won, through four play-off paths each containing four teams with one-legged semi-finals and finals.

The draw takes place at 12:00 GMT on Thursday, which will create the individual paths.

In the semi-finals, the seeded teams will be at home:

Pot 1 v Pot 4

Pot 2 v Pot 3

Each of the four paths will have one team from each pot, feeding into a final.

The home advantage in the finals will be determined by the draw on Thursday.

The draw starts with Pot 1 and ends with Pot 4.

The semi-finals will take place on Thursday, 26 March at 17:00 GMT or 19:45 GMT, and the finals on Tuesday, 31 March with kick-off times of 17:00 BST or 19:45 BST.

So is being in Pot 1 more favourable than Pot 2? It does not make too much difference apart from being kept away from the other Pot 1 teams in the paths.

While Pot 4 has teams who failed to make the top two of their World Cup groups, there are nations within it who will have a higher world ranking than some in Pot 3.

The other argument is the teams in Pot 3 have better recent form, so should be seen as stronger opponents.

What's most important is being in Pot 1 or Pot 2, and guaranteeing a home semi-final.

The 12 teams who finished runners-up in their group are seeded into three pots by their world ranking.

The fourth pot contains the four teams who were awarded a play-off through performance in the Uefa Nations League.

These are the play-offs in March which set out the final two places and don't involve any countries from Europe. The draw also takes place on Thursday at the same time.

Six nations will take part, in two paths with a semi-final and a final.

However, world ranking is even more important as the two countries with the best ranking go direct to the final.

Asia: Iraq

Africa: DR Congo

Concacaf: Two places TBC

Conmebol: Bolivia

OFC: New Caledonia

All we know for certain is that Bolivia and New Caledonia will be in the semi-finals.

The range of world rankings which could take up the two Concacaf slots is from 31 to 126 and who slots into those (the final matches are overnight into Wednesday) will determine the two top seeds.

For the draw, the highest-ranked country will automatically be in final one, and the second-highest in final two. There will then be an open draw of the four remaining teams into each semi-final position.

The only constraint is that there must be one Concacaf team in each path.

This article is the latest from BBC Sport's Ask Me Anything team.

Ask Me Anything is a service dedicated to answering your questions.

We want to reward your time by telling you things you do not know and reminding you of things you do.

The team will find out everything you need to know and be able to call upon a network of contacts including our experts and pundits.

We will be answering your questions from the heart of the BBC Sport newsroom, and going behind the scenes at some of the world's biggest sporting events.

Our coverage will span the BBC Sport website, app, social media and YouTube accounts, plus BBC TV and radio.