Worlds 2007 - Running Tournament Report(s)

[zarathustra]

Day 1 of worlds 2007:

Joe Bisz's Arda Shared Deck (formerly known as the boxed game):

1st: Jonathan Yost -- 22 MP
2nd: Kris van Beurden -- 21 MP
3rd: Joe Bisz: 20 MP

Unsung Heroes

Assignments:
Krista Donnelly -- Vygravil with Men hazards
Heiner Viefhues -- Merry with Nazgul/Animal hazards
Birk Pfeiffer -- Elrohir with Undead hazards
Mark Alfano -- Eomer with Troll hazards

Round 1: Mark defeats Krista 4-2, Heiner defeats Birk 6-0
Round 2: Heiner defeats Mark 5-1, Krista defeats Birk 6-0
Round 3: Mark defeats Birk 6-0, Heiner defeats Krista 6-0

Rankings:

1st: Heiner Viefhues -- 17 TP
2nd: Mark Alfano -- 11 TP
3rd: Krista Donnelly -- 8 TP
4th: Birk Pfeiffer -- 0 TP

Challenge Deck Tournament

1st Round: Mark Alfano defeats Heiner Viefhues 6-0, Krista Donnelly defeats Joe Bisz 4-2, Jonathan Yost defeats Kris van Beurden 4-2, Birk Pfeiffer 6 TP bye
2nd Round: Birk defeats Mark 4-2, Krista defeats Jon 4-2, Joe defeats Kris 4-2, Heiner 5 TP bye
3rd Round: Mark defeats Jon 5-1, Krista defeats Birk 4-2, Kris defeats Heiner 6-0, Joe 4 TP bye (note: Joe and Kris traded off playing turns against Heiner)

Rankings:

1st: Mark Alfano -- 13 TP
2nd: Krista Donnelly -- 12 TP
3rd: Birk Pfeiffer -- 12 TP
4th: Joe Bisz -- 10 TP
5th: Kris van Beurden -- 10 TP
6th: Jonathan Yost -- 7 TP
7th: Heiner Viefhues -- 5 TP





Tomorrow is the virtual card tournament!

[zarathustra]

More details to come... for now the big news is that the One Ring belongs to Agustin. Congratulations Agus!

[Manuel]

Go Spain go!!!

Seems like all that training and playtesting worked Agus is THE man!!

[marcos]

congrats! Agus!!!

[zarathustra]

Hero One-deck:

Round 1: Heiner defeats Krista 5-1, Mikko defeats Jon Freitag 6-0, Agustin defeats Charles 6-0
Round 2: Agustin defeats Mikko 4-2, Heiner defeats Jon 6-0, Charles defeats Krista 4-2
Round 3: Agustin defeats Heiner 6-0, Krista defeats Jon 5-1, Mikko defeats Charles 6-0

Rankings:

1st: Agustin -- 17 TP
2nd: Mikko -- 14 TP
3rd: Heiner -- 11 TP
4th: Krista -- 8 TP
5th: Charles -- 5 TP
6th Jon -- 0 TP

[zarathustra]

Semi-Finals:

First Round: Agustin defeats Bill 6-0, Jon Yost defeats Birk 6-0, Brian defeats Alicia 7-0, Kris defeats Ris 6-0, Joel defeats Wolfgang 4-2, Heiner defeats Spencer 6-0, Joe defeats Nate 5-1, Charles defeats Jon F 6-0, Mikko 6 TP bye

Second Round: Agustin defeats Charles 4-2, Spencer defeats Birk 4-2, Jon Yost defeats Brian 6-0, Alicia defeats Ris 7-0, Kris defeats Heiner 5-1, Wolfgang defeats Jon F 6-0, Joel defeats Nate 6-0, Mikko defeats Joe 6-0, Bill 5 TP bye

Third Round: Agustin defeats Kris 6-0, Joe defeats Bill 5-1, Birk defeats Ris 5-1, Jon F defeats Mikko 4-2, Wolfgang defeats Brian 7-0, Heiner defeats Alicia 6-0, Charles defeats Joel 4-2, Spencer defeats Nate 4-2, Jon F 4 TP bye

Fourth Round: Agustin defeats Jon F 4-2, Bill defeats Alicia 6-0, Brian defeats Birk 7-0, Kris defeats Joel 4-2, Wolfgang defeats Mikko 4-2, Heiner defeats Charles 4-2, Joe defeats Spencer 6-0, Nate defeats Jon F 6-0, Ris 3 TP bye

Fifth Round: Agustin defeats Wolfgang 6-0, Bill defeats Nate 5-1, Charles defeats Jon Y 6-0, Brian defeats Joel 7-0, Spencer defeats Alicia 6-0, Ris defeats Jon F 6-0, Mikko defeats Kris 6-0, Heiner defeats Joe 6-0, Birk 2 TP bye

Rankings:

1st: Agustin -- 26 TP
2nd: Charles -- 22 TP
3rd: Mikko -- 22 TP
4th: Heiner -- 21 TP
-----------------------
5th: Brian -- 21 TP
6th: Jon Yost -- 18 TP
7th: Wolfgang -- 18 TP
8th: Bill -- 17 TP
9th: Joe -- 16 TP
10th: Kris -- 15 TP
11th: Joel -- 14 TP
12th: Spencer -- 14 TP
13th: Nate -- 10 TP
14th: Ris -- 10 TP
15th: Birk -- 9 TP
16th: Alicia -- 7 TP
17th: Jon Freitag -- 4 TP

[zarathustra]

Finals:

1st Round: Agustin ties Mikko 3-3, Heiner defeats Charles 6-0
2nd Round: Agustin defeats Charles 6-0, Heiner defeats Mikko 4-2
3rd Round: Agustin defeats Heiner 4-2, Charles defeats Mikko 4-2

Results:

1st: Agustin -- 13 TP
2nd: Heiner -- 12 TP
3rd: Mikko -- 7 TP
4th: Charles -- 4 TP

[zarathustra]

Also...

Belgium won the Country Cup

Heiner won the Drinking Game (I think...)

Agustin won the Virtual Card Tournament

[Manuel]

Allignments? Decks? Reports?

I wanna know everything!!

[Sauron]

I have to say thanks for holding such a great tournament.

Some reporting from Brian "Sauron" Min.

I had come to worlds thinking to play my minion decks. I like these decks, these are solid decks, and I'm good with them. Mark and I talked the night before and we went over some strategies and I was worried about bouncing my balrog against other minions. So in the end I played Dwarven Hero Dunk, I think I surprised most people by playing hero and I even surprised myself.

Game 1 vs Alicia Hero Dunk

Out of all the people to be matched with I faced another dunk 1st round. So the race began. I managed to get Pallando before her and the scroll. We both went around getting some rings and brooches and stuff. I go from Lorien to Minas Morgul on my way to make my attempt. Radagast finally shows up for her and her company of hobbits meets Radagast at the Dead Marshes and she tests with 2 wizard's tests and gets the One Ring. I was like CRAP!!?!?!!? I'm thinking what to do and notice she has alot of used up GI. My turn my dwarves collapse on her and I try to influence the Ring away. With about 12 dwarves or so, Pallando's full DI and 2 a friend or 3 I manage to influence the Ring away from Sam. Next turn for me is uneventful as I go dunk.

Game 2 vs Jonathan Yost

This was my worst game, he basically wounded and corrupted almost my entire company, nothing was coming together right, and he exhausted in just 5 turns. I didn't manage to make the run, even though I had pallando, the scroll and everything else.

Game 3 vs Wolfgang

This was an interesting game. Wolfgang was playing a lucky search deck. He managed got the enruned shield 1st turn, and I was worried he'd get the scroll because I didn't have it yet. 1st turn I picked up a ring and pallando. He has another lucky search and I think he's getting my scroll, upon entering the site Bilbo dies!!!! and he gets a sapling. My 2nd turn I pickup the scroll! He's down a sage and tries to move arwen to join Aragorn. He has forwarned out in play so I have 1 shot to kill her, my efficent assassin killed her! It's so satisfying to see your opponent throw out the white tree. On my run to dunk the One Ring I get his with adunaphel. I test in response get it, and Thrain kills Adunaphel without tapping, but I get stopped by 3 rivers.

Game 4 vs Birk

This was my only minion match up of the weekend. He was playing a faithless stewards deck. He didn't do much to me and I didn't do much to him in the way of hazards, a couple of heedless was about all I did. He did manage to wound some people 1st turn with some big drakes, but I still managed to get my scroll. In the end I made it and dunked. I needed that dunk to have any shot of making finals after my 1st three rounds.

Game 5 vs Joel P.

This was a very important match up for me. I had 14 TPs at this point and figured I needed to dunk to have any shot of making finals. This was a tough game. I was getting very frazzled at this point because of how important this game was and I made some mistakes. He beat me to Pallando, I beat him to the scroll. I had to sideboard over Radagast and kept trying to drawn him, my second to last turn I moved my company to Rhosgobel hoping I'd draw him. On my last turn I drop Radagast down onto the company I play master of esgaroth and bounce off of the easterling camp to Mt Doom. I manage to dunk and end up with 21 TPs.

Now I played the waiting game, figuring out who had to win / lose and by how much for me to make finals. In the end Heiner and I both had 21 TPs and 3 Wins without playing each other. So it was decided by total TPs of opponents and he beat me something like 66 to 74 or something like that. So by the narrowest of margins I didn't make finals. Perhaps next year.

[Kabuto]

Agustin is THE MACHINE, Congrats!

[ordagnir]

congratulations Agustin!

More info please.

[charles jenkins]

Here’s my overview of Worlds 2007:

Thursday-

I arrived in the afternoon, checked out the venue and headed back to the hotel to learn the Lord of the Rings (Fantasy Flight) boardgame.

Friday-

Played Lord of the Rings Boardgame and played in the hero-only one deck. I tried a dunk deck and was narrowly thwarted each time but did manage to win one game on points. Each game I was in position for a win on turn 4. Twice I was at Mt. Doom-one time I failed to roll high enough (with 4 rolls) to bring out the one, the next time I corrupted (all three Halfling Strength were still buried in the deck). The other game I was ready to dunk but my opponent rolled 11 and A Chance of Being Lost sent Bilbo to Urlurtsu Nurn!

Saturday-Semis qualifier, Balrog Burn Deck, balanced hazards vs. Hero, dwarves + maia vs minions

Round 1-played Jonathan Freitag. Everything went perfectly for me as my pumped up trolls burned and pillaged for a 6-0 win.

Round 2-played Agustin. This was a fairly tight game but Agustin won 31-28 mps (4-2 loss for me).

Round 3-played Joel Pecchioli. Joel and I had playtested our decks a number of times so no surprises here. Fairly tight game again resulting in a 4-2 win for me.

Round 4-played Heiner. Heiner and I both were playing Balrog. I won the toss and drew the Balrog as my first card. Things went pretty well for me, including a couple of trophy orc lt’s and a Memories of Old Tortured lt. Heiner made the game very interesting for me as he came to CVCC last turn and had a chance for a comeback. My guys survived (phew). I also foolishly allowed him points at the Underleas his last turn because I forgot (doh!) to tap the WK to make the Underleas a Darkhold. Fun game and a 4-2 win.

Round 5-played Jonathan Yost. Jonathan moved to Carn Dum his first turn and I was lucky to have Doors, Nameless Thing and Mouth. His hobbits got beat up, leaving a dwarf to carry the load. His FW Radagast meanwhile did his thing and another company was scoring points as well. It looked like I would lose this game but at the end his lonely dwarf was carrying Orcrist and the Mithril Coat when he became Alone & Unadvised. Jonathan didn’t have a MT or Voices handy (and I was holding a Many Sorrows, too) and watched in dismay as the dwarf corrupted. So, at the end I got to double item points to give me a 6-0 win and a trip to the finals.

Drinking Game-my highlights were drawing Khamul, morgul horse and the One Ring. My deck looked pretty sloppy so I decided to focus on just getting the One no matter what. First game vs. Mark Alfano he managed to shrug off an Ice Drake and Khamul + Morgul Horse on the same turn (his wizzy need an 11 to push and he did, grr!). My test for the One failed. 2nd game vs. Bill Kenyon I did get out the One with Celeborn (Yeah!) on his way to Lorien. He promptly corrupted to a Lure of Senses during the untap phase next turn (boo!).

Sunday-Finals

Well, everything went to hell with the mistake of bringing the same resource deck. My only lame excuse was I was too tired to slap together a new one.

Game 1 vs. Heiner-Heiner bitch slapped me hard with Elflords, Arthedain Rangers + Saruman. It went downhill when he played Chill which I cancelled with Voices, then he played Chill again + Rangers plus Elflord x2. Although my big trolls had I’ll Report You x2 plus 2 bold thrusts and a Diversion, it was not enough and they shattered. Meanwhile, his dwarfies collected lots of pets at Weathertop and Radagast Black birded allies left and right. Last turn he had Way is Shut x2 to stop my run to the Underleas (I had one Voices). 6-0 for Heiner.

Game 2 vs. Agustin-Agustin’s deck was very efficient, allowing him to sidestep my big drakes. Things went bad for me when Ulkaur needed a 3 to push and I snaked the roll (just hate when that happens). Of course, tongueless dolt was discarded, eliminating him and his item. With only one troll leader in the company, burning was difficult, and my dice had pooped out on me to boot. The Hog flubbed his Orcs of Moria attempt. I decided to try for everything near the end of the game and went to cvcc him. I got 2 BC’s on characters but failed the rolls and on my last turn his FW played Vanishment (aww!). 6-0 win for Agustin.

Game 3 vs. Mikko-Mikko was cruising the Darkhold Underdeeps with Shagrat + whip keeping some men in line. Ren was there to get the Helm + creature and an orc chieftain trekked to Urlurtsu Nurn to get some more stuff. Lots of small mp’s for Mikko which started to add up despite repeated Heedless Revelries. My trolls did ok this time and I managed to score points although I did blunder right into range of Baduila once for a wasted turn. A decent last turn secured a 4-2 win for me. Mikko displayed a generous dose of sportsmanship during the game and it was fun to watch Shagrat lash some men into action with Where There’s a Whip There’s a Way.

Although I did get to the Finals, I had hoped to perform better. The venue was very nice and Mark, et al did a good job of organizing the events.

I’d like to close with many well wishes to all the attendees.

[Tythis]

Here's my tournament report of the World's semi-finals. But first off... thank you Mark for an amazing event and for putting so much time and effort into it. Also, thank you to all the people in attendance... everyone was very nice and had great sportsmanship.

My first game was against Birk, who was playing a red hills type Balrog deck. I had never faced a deck like that before and was very worried as the game began. I got very luckly however and got my wizard in my opening hand. All the cards that game seemed to come up just right. On my 1st hazard turn, I drew my precious for example. Birk had stinker in hand on turn 1, but unfortunately couldn't play it. My hobbits went to the under deeps and Birk came after me with the Balrog, tuma, wulag, burat, and a scrub troll. Again, the cards came up just right and I had just enough concealments to not get slaughtered. At one point, I drew up an Orc Mail at the very end of my turn and was able to play it right before I would have been otherwise slaughtered. In following my hobbits, I was also able to play 3 or so Nameless Things on his Balrogs company, which finally ended up killing 2 of the trolls. On the last turn, I tossed a futile heedless on his 8 and 9 mind trolls and with amazingly lucky rolls, tapped them both. This blocked either an item or ally and I ended up having one of my categories double, which put it at a 6-0.

My second game was againt Brian Min and is briefly outlined above. As he mentioned, he had massive corruption and several woundings by turn 3. I also wasted one of his turns with a skin-changer as he was trying to get back to a haven with half his characters wounded. It's amazing the scrolls were still on table by the end after several corruption checks in the 4-6 range on Thorin. That game was probably the fastest I've ever exhasted and I was able to call the council on turn 5. I went first, so Brian started his 5th and last turn in Lorien, still with several corruption cards scattered around. He didn't draw the cards that would get him to Mount Doom and thus concieded, but I had a final hand stacked full of hazards anyway.

Game 3 was against a Mordor faction type deck played by Mikko. Again, a deck I've heard alot about, but never faced. I had a lucky first hazard turn against him and was able to kill Shagrat with Landroval (2-strike 12/6 eagle hazard creature). Turn 1 is the only time that deck walks through a shadow land, so it was the only time that or the elf lords would be any good. With an Uvatha, I ended up playing it twice, but the second character got lucky with a push on a roll of 8. He started laying down alot of agents, so I naturally sideboarded in a withdrawn to Mordor. I ended up getting it into hand right before the pilfers began, but it was futile anyway since he had a blind to the west ready for it. Thus, Bilbo was pilfered and I was down to 3 in that company. Next turn, another was pilfered and I was down to 2 character. The next turn, I got some great luck and he rolled a 3 on the pilfer of my 3 mind hobbit and I was spared from having to consider stacking 2-3 items on Fatty. He was also playing snowstorm, but both my companies eventually made it through the woods. Although the pilfers were painful, I was still able to rack up around 12 points in items and probably 10 points in allies. My hazards slowed him down a bit with Foolish Words and Nazgul detainments attacks. It was enough to give me a slight point lead and I ended up winning 4-2.

At that point, I had 16 Points and figured the competition would get pretty rough. My next 2 games were against those who eventually took 1st and 3rd place in the end.

Game 4 was againt Agustin. My first mistake was not killing Adunaphel on turn 1 when he dropped him against me. I wanted an extra card by killing it later when I was at 8 or less cards, but it ended up tapping my only ranger and stopping me for a turn at a river. Later, was 2 rivers against that company, again stopping them. Those little stoppages chocked my hand and I was going through my deck very slowly. Meanwhile on the hazard side, I was throwing tons of corruption checks his way, but he was rolling though them all. Eventually I corrupted 1 or 2 guys on multiple checks of 6 or 7 with the balance of things out, but it wasn't enough to slow him down significantly. Toward the end, he went to play a Mischief for 2 points and call the council with 26 points, but he was 1 stage point shy of mischief and thus 1 MP shy of the council. That was great luck for me because I hadn't gotten my Legacy of Smiths out yet and my 3-4 items were worth 8-9 less than they should have been, plus I had several allies and a faction to play. Just missing the council gave me 2 more turns since he went first and I barely got legacy down. Even with that effort, I was quite a bit shy of his MP total and it was squarely in a 2-4 loss territory. without that though, I think it would have been a 0-6 loss.

Game 5 was against Charles playing a Balrog deck. Turn 1 was horrible and he tossed back to back Nameless Things on my poor hobbits. I can handle 1 no problem and 2 fairly easily late game when I have some items and stage cards out, but 2 on first turn is not good. The second one ended up killing Bilbo and Fatty. Your first thoughts while reading this is probably "oh no, -2 points for Bilbo dying". fortunatly for me however, the current interpretation of dead characters for fallen wizards is that they are a source of MPs and thus worth 1 point for fallen wizards. This is a bit too literal of an interpretation for my tastes, but my Bilbo was none-the-less worth 1 point for being eliminated.

I decided to risk 1 more body check as I entered the site. If no 9+ was rolled (a 72% chance), then I could have healed my hobbit with paste and gotten him a 10 body with the mithril coat. Unfortuantly, luck was against me and he was eliminated too, leaving just poor Gulla. He grabbed the coat and later Orcrist, but unfortunately fatefully corrupted from an alone an unadvised. I should have known better than to move him and I should have waited to get protection. I had 2 Marvals/Voices remaining in my thin deck and should have side-boarded in a 3rd, but failed to consider that option. I tried to move him to my wizard for help at the council, but it ended up costing me the game. Had Gulla lived, it would have been a tie due to wellinghall and my wizard grabbing plenty of allies and a few faction. A tiw would have put me in the finals. With him gone however, went 9 points and doubled Charles' item points, which made it a solid 0-6 loss.

And with that, I placed 6th, but I beat Bill so it was all good Apparently I also ended up having the highest "strength of opponent" total. My opponents went on to take 5th, 4th, 2nd, and 1st in the semi-finals if I remember right. It was some rough competition for me in that one.

Again, thanks everyone who was there. Thank you Birk, Birk's lovely wife Uli (not sure how to spell that), Wolfgang, Heiner, Chris and all the other German speakers who helped me work on my German. Thank you Joe and Carrie for letting Alicia and I stay with you. Thanks everyone for great sportsmanship and some very fun games. And most of all, thank you Mark for the great weekend.

[zarathustra]

Great reports Jon! By the way, I think Ulli and Birk are not married...