So, here goes the tournament report. We had 10 people show up today;
no one for demos but we tried out the demo decks anyway (thanks Ray, Victor,
Mike, Tim, and Caroline!) and I think they were fairly well balanced. I
didn't have a chance to quiz anyone, but if you have some specific comments
about the decks you played/played against, please let me know so I can
tweak them for next time. I'll go ahead and add 1 more feng shui site to
each; is there anything else?
With 10 folks we did rounds of 3, 3, and 4 player games; 3 rounds each
scored using the point system we tried out at the 'con in September (4
pts. for 1st, 3 pts. for 2nd, etc. + 1 pt. for each feng shui site you
control/have burned for victory). First round was random seating, with
a little adjustment to try to break up folks who play together a lot, then
we sat by score. Here's what everybody had, as I recall. Mike was writing
everything down so he can fill you in if you're really interested:
Mike - Hand/Jammers Red Monk + Homemade Tank + etc. Caroline - her usual straight Ascended Lissa - the no-rares "I'm Huge" straight Ascended Matt - the straight Lotus "I Hate Tim Deck" (anti-Ascended) Corey - straight Ascended Tim - Dragons/Architects Vivisector+Golden Comback Stefan - Architects Helix Chewer/increased hand size recycler Victor - big huge fat deck with lots of stuff in it (Queen of Ice Pagoda, of course) Frank - straight Lotus, new to the game, whatever he had available deck Ray - Peacock Summit? (Hand, Dragons, Architects, anything else?)Round 1
Round 2
Round two had the three winners (9 points each) playing together; the
two Ascended kept my Architects down and Lissa managed to slip in for the
win after Caroline & I exchanged fire over Caroline's Cave Network.
Said Cave promptly went to Lissa's faction of the Lodge, and our game was
over in some absurdly short time. The four middle scorers (4-6 points each;
Ray, Mike, Victor, and Corey) came out with Ray on top and Corey second.
The low scores (2-4 points each; Tim, Matt, and Frank) duked it out and
Tim's Dragon/Architect came out on top.
Round 3
Round three again sat the high scores together (now Caroline, Tim,
Lissa, and Ray) with Caroline's Ascended coming out on top and Tim's Dragon/Architects
second. Quite the fun battle with Ting Ting, involving no less than an
Operation Killdeer, an Imprison, a Confucian Stability, a Kinoshita House,
3 Whirpools of Blood, and a Sacred Heart Hospital. Wow. Ting Ting was still
alive and on the table at the end of that, too. Middle scores (now Mike,
Corey, and me) went ridiculously fast. Corey had total resource stall,
so Mike just pounded on me so I couldn't get my recycler running. Got it
started a bit in spite of that, but without help from Corey to keep the
pressure off, Mike just kept picking off my sites for an early win. Low
scores (now Matt, Frank, and Victor) fought it out, scores such that either
Frank or Victor had a shot at semi-finals if they won. Matt won. Oh well.
Theirs was the only game we had to call time on. So, at the end of three
rounds, we had Lissa and Caroline tied at 23 points, Mike at 20 points,
Tim at 18 points, Ray and Corey at 17 points, and everyone else at 14 or
less points. After consulting the players, we decided to run a semi-final
between Tim, Ray, and Corey for no real reason other than they were kinda
close on scoring. (of course, I realize afterward that we were violating
our own rules that said any semi-final or final must be a four-player game.
Oh well. We'll remember next time). So Tim got the win in the semi-final,
and advanced. The rest of us played a big 6-player game while the four
winners duked it out.
Final
Final round was Mike, Lissa, Caroline, and Tim. Since we were all playing
the losers game, we didn't actually watch, but it took nearly 2 hours for
the game to finish. Lots of back-and-forth for the Ascended players, of
course, but Tim managed to get the win, with Mike second, and Caroline
third. And to our surprise, Brian volunteered the prizes I mentioned earlier
($30, $15, and $10 of merchandise, respectively). Yay Brian! Go buy stuff
at his store!
Just thinking about how the scoring system is working, if we had played the games as standard double-elimination format, Victor, Frank, Matt, Corey and Mike would have been eliminated after two games; Tim, Ray, Caroline, Lissa, and I would have played a 5-player semi-final, with Lissa the only one with a guaranteed berth in the finals (she won her first two games). So either Lissa would have won then, giving the rest of us our second elimination, or she would have played a one-on-one final with the winner of that game. Quite a different outcome, seeing that Mike ended up 2nd, instead of eliminated, and Lissa, who would have been assured at least 2nd place, was worked in the finals. Better, or worse? (obviously better for Mike and worse for Lissa, but any other opinions?) The new format was a benefit to Mike and Tim both, who only won 1 game each but did reasonably well when they lost (according to the tiebreaker/point scoring rules we're using).
Last modified: March 11, 1998.
Please send comments to nickolof@scf.usc.edu.
Send server comments to durrell@innocence.com.