How are tourney players eliminated with better records?

I do not understand at all how these tournaments work. Not to be annoying, but this is the 2^nd time I have started a thread on this subject. I am just not getting any answers and it is actually more confusing that ever. Someone please take a look at this tournament:

http://www.chess.com/tournaments/players?sortby=standings&id=94420

We all played 18 games in the first round. Please explain in plain English how numerous players with strong winning records like 12-4-2 and 13-5 are ELIMINATED already while other players with losing records like 2-15-1 and 1-17 are still ACTIVE. I am trying really hard to wrap my mind around how this could be remotely possible but my mind just cannot go there. It is like asking me to understand how a baseball team can score fewer runs than the opponent and still be ahead in the game. Please don't send me a link to the chess tournament info because this information is not there. Thanks.

There are still several games unplayed in group #1 and group #3, so everybody in those groups is still listed as active.  In the other groups, only the top two players survive.  The current top two from groups 1 and 3 could lose their spots if they lose the games they haven't played yet, so somebody else could take their spot.  

There are several players in groups 1 and 3 who are, mathematically speaking, already eliminated, but it's not official until the round is over, and besides, most of them still have games to play.

http://www.chess.com/tournaments/pairings?id=94420&round=1 

I get all of that. Do you understand how numerous players with  records like 12-4-2 and 13-5 are ELIMINATED already while other players with losing records like 2-15-1 and 1-17 are still ACTIVE.

Understand that in the first round, everyone played 18 simultaneous games. Therefore, all of the players I just mentioned are done with the first round. Some with winning records are out and some with terrible, losing records are still in. I fail to see how that makes any sense.

"in the first round, everyone played 18 simultaneous games"

No, not everyone did (yet).

Look at amueller, steven1975, madeinkorea, painter41966, ...  How many games did they play?

That means nobody in their groups can be eliminated yet.

(Your spot is safe: you can't do worse than second in your group.)

I am not referring to players like amueller, steven1975, madeinkorea, painter41966 who have not completed all of their first round games. I am talking about the ones that have. Players with worse records are still in but players with much better records are out.

You can't be eliminated if there is a game in your group still going on

Ok, I think I got it. I guess the top 2 players in each group advance. Some of the groups are not finished but when they are, all the players not in the top 2 will show as eliminated. I was not clear on what the criteria was for advancing.

(edit: yes, you got it.)

The tournament eliminates players based on their standing within their group, it doesn't try to compare standing across groups.

Nobody in group 1 or group 3 has been eliminated, because there are unplayed games in those groups. 

Some of the players in groups 1 and 3 have losing records, as you would expect.  They still won't be officially eliminated until their whole group has finished playing.

 The other groups *have* played all their games.  All but 2 of the players in each of those other groups have been eliminated.  Some of those eliminated players had winning records, but they're eliminated since they were not in the top 2 in their group.  

Yeah, it just so happened that a couple of people got put into really tough groups.

They're the unfortunate souls who find themselves in a group awash with engine users.

Exactly why i quit playing online tournaments, and withdrew from the last couple.