Championship Tournament Feb. 18-19 2012 (Cambridge, MA) > $1200 in cash prizes!

[BubblePig]

Congratulations, Seth!
Also, thank you for enabling me to say that I got knocked out of the finals tree by the guy who beat just about everybody. 

[Kevin]

By the way, I want to do a tribute to Niko here, without whom the tournament would not have happened.

Niko obviously made the space available to play.  He also promoted the tournament locally, which brought the turnout up to a couple more people than I was expecting.

Also, now the story can be told...were it not for Niko, things came close to going very off the rails!  

Shortly before the tournament I felt really ill.  It turned out to be either a nasty 24-hour stomach bug, or something really bad that I ate, and I was feeling fine (if a bit sensitive about food) by Saturday, but for a while it was looking like I might not be well enough to judge the tournament at all!  I contacted Niko, who nobly offered to step in and judge if needed.  Things were touch and go for a while, and even Saturday morning Niko was ready to drop all shot at glory and put on the judge hat if need be.

The lack of stress from knowing that the tournament was in good hands doubtlessly sped my recovery.  Niko's offer quite possibly made itself unnecessary.  

[Kevin]

In other debriefing news, something that I noticed about the Sunday Speed Swiss tournament.

% of the 6 eligible players from out of state who played:  100

% of 5* eligible players from Massachusetts who played:  0  

* I'm counting the 5 locals who came for Championship but didn't make the final 4.  There were a few other local Battleground players who didn't come to either.  I'm not counting Rachel, who played one game in the last round after Mike had to leave to catch his flight.


The first number makes sense.  Folks who travel a long distance want to get their money's worth.  And of course since the Jersey Boys all travel together they doubtlessly planned to all stick around for Sunday, as one or more of them could have been in the finals tree.

The fact that no locals played was a bit of a surprise, to me at least.  I mean, if I'd just promoted the thing locally as a "1-day tournament, 3-4 short games, over $200 in cash prizes & medals and 4 of the best Battleground sharks who could otherwise play won't be there" one would think that the turnout would've been higher than zero.  Local folks who don't breathe battleground (as opposed to the ones to do) had a much better shot at winning some glory & lucre in the Speed Swiss, but everyone was determined to go for the Big Enchilada, then bailed.

I'm glad to have done the Sunday Speed Swiss Tournament, and it feels right to have provided a full 2 days of gaming to folks who traveled so far to be there!   Though had I known that it was the de facto out-of-town-folks tournament, I'd have adjusted the schedule accordingly (earlier start & end).  Something to keep in mind for next year.

[Niko White]

I'd be a bit skeptical of that being true next year - if I'd been knocked out before the round of 8, I'd probably have played in the Speed Swiss.  For me, having not traveled so far to play, it was demoralizing enough to lose in the round of 8 that by the time I felt like playing again, the ship had sailed.

Meanwhile, there was a Magic $1k event that Sunday (which I didn't know about when we finalized the date) at a local convention, which I'm pretty confident diluted the player base.  Playing for $200 of your money is quite attractive, but less attractive compared to playing for $1000 in a game that most of the players know better.

[RushAss]

I'm glad to have done the Sunday Speed Swiss Tournament, and it feels right to have provided a full 2 days of gaming to folks who traveled so far to be there!   Though had I known that it was the de facto out-of-town-folks tournament, I'd have adjusted the schedule accordingly (earlier start & end).  Something to keep in mind for next year.

Amen brother, amen!  Sorry we made it down a tad bit late on Sunday, but we had a bit of a mapping issue.  See, I had printed up maps both to and from the hotel we stayed at in Salem (for a ridiculously cheap price).  There where like 20 steps to these directions.  I didn't realize until we where on the road that there WAS NO TEXT FOR EVERY 4TH STEP!!!!!  So we had to guess by looking at the tiny black and white pictures.  We decided to resort to Brook's GPS on his iphone by the time we found ourselves smack dab in the middle of Harvard University.  Why didn't we just use the GPS from the start you ask?  Well, we did use it on Saturday night.  It had us use local roads the entire way up with the exception of 1 1/2 miles on the highway.  The directions I had printed up had us spend about 17 miles on routes 93 and 95.  So Sunday morning we where in no mood to use the GPS.  And for those that have never been there, the roads in the Cambridge area are beyond f*cked up and well into their own form of alternate reality...

[Niko White]

Yeah, I suggest next time you get me to make up directions, I'm glad to do it.  I bet you didn't realize that when Lovecraft wrote about nightmarish non-euclidean spaces he was actually writing about his local transit system.

[Kevin]

Overall, I consider the tournament a real success.  But there are a few things I plan to tweak for next time.  Time to put it down before I forget.


- I think Breaking Point is a sub-optimal tournament game format.  Too good for stand & shoot, and too frustrating when an army which is "winning" breaks.  It works well in the speed games, but the round 1 game next time will be either Total Warfare or a Ticking Clock Coin Game.

- As noted above, schedule the Sunday Speed Swiss tournament as though only folks from out of town will be playing, and if local folks want to play too, bonus.

- Have a pre-set policy for putting in an alternate player (Someone with a 2-2 record who lost their tiebreaker) if a player is more than X minutes late for their quarterfinals game.  (Really didn't think, with $975 of prizes staring folks in that face, that it would be necessary.  Boy was I wrong!   )

[RushAss]

It was great to see the Jersey crowd as usual, and thanks for the book!  See you all at the next event!

You're quite welcome, it's the least we could have done!  I read my copy of that over the holidays and it was a very interesting read.  Hope you like it!

[rog5]

Just wanted to thank Kevin, Rachel, and the players for the pictures and commentary.  Since I don't get to play as often as I'd like, this is an opportunity for me to see how others play and learn from it.

[Kevin]

You're welcome!  I'm glad to know, after all those tedious hours spent posting them, that they're being read and appreciated!