Lion in Winter

2017 Tournament Summary

The 2017 Lion in Winter tournament may go down in history as “The Year of the Sharks”. It was the first year that players who I met from the World Board Game championships made the trip to come play in the tournament. Because of this the field of players this year went from 24 to 32. While I was a bit worried about how all these changes would impact the tournament, I was also excited to see how a few things would go. I wanted to know how all the top local and non-local veteran LIW players would match up in their best games to some of the WBC players.  Also I wanted to see how the wildness of the tournament format would shake out with 17 players playing for the first time, and a sight modification to the bidding format from previous years.

The tournament was every bit as exciting as I had hoped and it seemed to run smoothly enough despite all the unknowns.

Round One

Round one began smoothly enough. A top gamer from Seattle named Randy Buehler was the sole player that didn’t get into a game he bid on in the first round. He got stuck in Kingsburg and had to learn it on the fly. This meant that he didn’t loose any bidding points and thus would have plenty enough to make sure for the rest of the tournament he was playing a game he knew well. This turned out to be critical in the outcome of the tournament.

After the bids were settled, round 1 opened with a Ra game that featured 2-time tournament Champion Keith Dent, and 3 other formidable Ra players in Heather Dent, Austin Rathbone, and WBC shark Rob Murray. In 2016 Keith randomly got stuck in Ra and pulled out the victory anyway, but this year he was up against a much tougher table. Heather Dent ended up snagging the victory right at the end in probably the biggest upset in the first round. Rob, Keith and Austin came in behind her in that order. This marked the 1st time in Keith’s 5-year tournament history that he didn’t start the tournament off with a win. 

At the Kingsburg table, Dan Adams a first time LIW player figured out pretty quickly that he had the best character in that game and how to take advantage of it. He pushed that all the way to a 55 point win which ended up being the most points ever scored in Kingsburg at LIW. Randy escaped with a 2nd place despite learning the game on the fly. Another top WBC player Cary Morris was in the game and had played years ago, but had to be refreshed on it. Perhaps he was a bit rusty, as he escaped in third. Jason Lambert was in 4th a good ways behind the leaders. Jason hasn’t played in the tournament in 3 years but made his return this year. I was curious how far the rest of the LIW field had come since the days when Jason played often. He too would need to shake some rust off to make a run at this title.

In Orleans Adam Blum put up a whooping 167 points and started this year off with a win. Last years Orleans champion, Greg Smith was behind that with 131, and further back were Stafford Easterling and Patrick McGavisk with 101 and 100 respectively.

Former high-level tournament Catan player Leah Adams won a grueling Settlers of Catan game to open things up. Joe Mecham, Michael Mecham, and Brooke Hullings were all close but Leah grabbed the 6 tournament points. With her win it meant there had already been 2 wins by ladies in the tournament. This was interesting because players had filled out a prediction sheet before the tournament and one of the questions asked if between all five ladies there would be 5 or more round wins in the tournament. After just 1 round it wasn’t looking good for anyone that picked the under.

Stone Age also got played in the first round, which always seems to be the case. This game featured 3 Ohio State players and Veteran Neil the Grey. Chad Walker the 2015 Tournament Champion won in what appeared from the scores to be a very close game. 25 points separated 4th from 1st. Neil outlasted the other 2 OSU players to grab second and Nick Vilagi, and Jeff Turner were just behind that.

Concordia was the most popular round 1 game and it saw Angela McGavisk from Greensboro pull out the victory. This was the 3rd win for the ladies already and that prediction seemed to be over before it started. The lone Louisville player Josh Corbalis playing in the tournament for the first time came in second followed by Adam Swejk and Nate Landry (two more of the Ohio State group).

El Grande saw “The Dragon” Eduardo Ballestro make his tournament return after missing last year. Eduardo did what not too many players including those at WBC have done. He took down Chris McCurry in El Grande. It was only by 3 points 124 to 121, but a win is a win. Chris’s success in El Grande speaks for itself and this result was possibly the most surprising of the first round. Eduardo was proving once again how he is a solid gamer and on the games he knows, he knows well. Following Chris were Arianna McCurry playing for the first time and tournament Legend Ben Ibershoff. Arianna learned to play from the master, her uncle Chris McCurry and though she was new to competitive play seemed like she could hold her own with the older and more experienced players. Ben has had lots of success in the tournament over the years but this 4th in El Grande was the first hit along the path to a rough finish this year.

The last game of the first round to me was the most interesting. Not because the game itself was particularly close, but because of the players and the outcome. Sceadeau D’tela was one of the WBC players competing in LIW for the first time. He wasn’t just a WBC player but perhaps some would say a legend. His sharp wit and sharper game play combined with confidence in his skills can either push people away or draw them closer. You can always expect to see him either playing a game or in the center of a crowd talking. If he’s talking, most people around are usually listing for the knowledge he can impart. I first noticed him because of a unique skill he has to give a quick debrief to friends who ask him about how to play a particular game and how to play it at a high level. In two minuets or less he can unload his knowledge of top strategy and tactics of almost any game to even someone who has barely played the game and help them be successful. Anyway Sceadeau was here, and he came out swinging! Defending champion Neil Mecham was also in the game, and though formidable, I wasn’t sure how much he knew Vegas Showdown.  Let me go off track again to say that I knew that inviting in some WBC folks might discourage local/veteran players who haven’t had nearly the experience in games. But in others cases like Neil’s I knew it would only inspire, fuel, and teach. I looked over at this game about halfway through and Sceadeau was winning in a run away. I could see the gears turning in Neil’s head as he noticed how Sceadeau played and how he came to the dominating position he was in. Sometimes in game you don’t even know that a strategy exist until you see someone pull it off. More on that later as we get to Tzolkain. Anyway Sceadeau won in dominating fashion. Ian another Greensboro player nipped Neil by 1 for second and Bryan Tysl the last of the OSU group came in fourth.

Round 1 came to a close and there were 3 Berea Players with wins, 2 Ohio State players with wins, 2 Greensboro players with wins, and Eduardo with a win for Lexington. The group I deemed “Distant Lands” missed a 1st round win.

Round Two

Round 2 saw Randy Buehler throw his points around (since he didn’t loose any the first round) and claim a spot at the Castles of Mad King Ludwig table. Joining him were Joe Mecham, and Chris & Arianna McCurry. As a typical world champion (of this game) would he ran away with it and won by 24. Chris snagged 2nd to add 4 more tournament points to his 4 in the first round, and Joe was 3rd. Arianna finished 4th. This is another case where I think local and veteran players were able to see how Randy played and learn from it to improve their games for down the road. This left Randy with 10 tournament points after the first night of the tournament.

Also in round 2 Stone Age was once again on the table. This time the story line was pretty interesting. Cary and Patrick were WBC players from Greensboro, Ben Ibershoff from Berea, and Adam Swejk from Ohio. I knew Ben was a very solid Stone Age player and can pull off the starvation strategy as well as anyone. However, I knew he also hadn’t played against top-level Stone Age players who are well versed in the ways to beat starvation. Cary is a top level Stone Age Veteran. I’m guessing he’s had 100s of games under his belt. He stops starvation like it’s his job in this game. I had no idea what Adam’s skill level was but he knew enough that when he had a chance to take a tool, he took a tool, and then he saw a card that rewarded tools he took it. While Adam was busy tooling up, Cary and Patrick attempted to block Ben and his starvation strategy as best they could. Ben still pulled it off relatively well, but Cary closed the game in points towards the end. Cary knew his threat would be Adam the tool guy though. When the scores came in, it was indeed Adam Swejk, claiming his first LIW victory. Cary was 4 points behind, but his blocking skills kept Ben a few points behind that, and Patrick on block duty as well was further back. This would mean that Adam would join Chris with 8 points and so far they were only trailing Randy.

The next result came in and it was Rob Murray a WBC Power Grid powerhouse claiming the LIW title.  He took down two tough veteran Ohio State players. Adam Blum and Nasty Nick Vicious were both former LIW champions in Power Grid, but Rob was a level of player that they weren’t used to facing. Josh Corbalis was also at the table playing for only the second time, and it didn’t take long before he realized he was swimming with sharks. I overheard Rob mid game say that he had played this at the WBC finals in the past and this game was almost as tough as that. Adam and Nick were indeed tough players, but nevertheless Rob pulled it out. Adam claimed 2nd and Nick 3rd, while Josh was 3 powered cities behind in 4th. With Rob’s 2nd in round 1, and Adam’s 1st, this would mean that they both would Join Randy at the top of the leader boards with 10 points.

The 2nd round game of Concordia had Neil the Grey claiming the victory which would also give him 10 tournament points, and put him in what was growing to be a large group at the top. Austin Rathbone claimed 2nd edging out Greg Smith in a reversal of positions from the game they had just played at game night a week prior to the tournament. Michael Mecham got randomly stuck in the came due to a die roll, but he later said he would gladly take last in this game rather than to have gotten stuck in LeHarve, which was the other option for the die roll. Michael knew that one of his strongest games was Castles of Mad King Ludwig and though he didn’t get to play this round it did get enough votes to carry over and now he would have plenty enough points to bid on it in round 3.

Keith Dent shook off the first round 3rd place, and flexed his muscles in Trajan. To this day he as only once lost a live game and this would turn out to be no different. He cruised to a wide margin victory scoring 164, which somehow is still not the LIW record for this game. Preston Tucker back in 2015 put up 170, but Keith’s win was nonetheless impressive. Dan Adams eked out a 5-point margin over Heather for 2nd, which was no small feat since she herself is a solid Trajan player. Leah Adams was 4th playing the game for only the 2nd time. This would mean that Keith and Heather would join Chris McCurry and Adam Swejk with 8 points just behind the growing group of 10 point players at the top. It still remained to be seen though if anyone would escape the wildness of the first night a double winner.

Upstairs Nate Landry took down a first round winner and won Terra Mystica. This was a worst to first situation for Nate and he would escape the first night with 6 points. Angela though not being a double winner would get 2nd and join the group at the top of the standings with 10 points. Brooke grabbed her first tournament points claiming 3rd and Ian Streeb was 4th. This turned out to be the only round Ian wouldn’t score tournament points at all which would hurt him down the stretch.

Old wily veteran Jason Lambert polished off his first round last place with a win in LeHarve. Bryan Tysl was 2nd and Jeff Turner and Stafford Easterling were behind them in that order.

The last game of round 2 and thus the night was Caverna. Once again this would feature Defending Champion Neil Mecham against WBC Legend Sceadeau D’tela. Joining them this time was another former LIW champion Chad Walker. This was looking to be a good match already, but to make it even more interesting it had 3 first round winners. Joining this group of top players was The Dragon Eduardo Ballestro fresh of his huge round 1 win in El Grande. With 3 round 1 winners seated the chances of the first (and only) double winner of the first night were strong. When the dust settled it was the WBC player on top. Sceadeau finished in the lead with Chad only 20 points behind. Neil was in third again and Eduardo finished 4th.

At the end of the night is was Sceadeau alone with 2 wins and 12 tournament points, and then an 8-way tie in 2nd with 10. 4 players behind that had 8, and with 4 rounds to go nearly all players still had a shot.

Round Three

I stayed up late setting up the tables for round 3 in the morning and thinking about the matchups. After breakfast and a group picture, players settled into round 3.  At this point everything started to be a bit of a blur for me and I don’t remember the details of the rounds quite as well.

St. Petersburg saw Randy Buehler top Greg Smith by 3 points while Brooke snagged another 3rd and Stafford learning the game for the first time finished 4th. Randy with 2nd, 1st, 1st, would be in prime position to take the lead should Sceadeau slip up.

Speaking of Sceadeau, he had no fear of anyone in Agricola and settled in against all comers with the tournament lead and the target on his back. Another WBC player Rob Murray was formidable in Agricola himself and put Sceadeau’s World Champion title to the test in LIW. Rob and Sceadeau both finished in a dead heat with 50 points, but Sceadeau was in seat 4 and had the tiebreaker. Chris McCurry a 2-time LIW champion in Agricola watched as the masters of the game surpassed him and a third title eluded him. Josh Corbalis would prove himself enough in this tournament but this was not the round or the game for that. He had a few games under his belt, and considered himself to be good at the game but he had no idea the buzz saw he was about to run into. Like Power Grid he quickly learned the other players had much more experience, and wound up in 4th with 29 points. With 3 straight wins to open the tournament Sceadeau looked unstoppable.

Cary had a dominating win in Amun-Re and seemed to be gaining steam. He started with a 3rd, then 2nd, and now 1st. Keith Dent took second and Jeff Turner and Heather were behind in that order.

In Navegador Ian redeemed his 2nd round last place with a win. Angela would be just 6 points back in 2nd. Joe Mecham was 3rd and Patrick 4th. This would leave Ian with 10 tournament points after 3 rounds in 12th place. Angela now with two 2nd’s and a win would be in 4th with 14 tournament points. Both Greensboro players combined with Sceadeau’s triple wins, and Cary’s rising tide had Greensboro far out in front of the location standings.

Another of the 10-point players from the pack of 8 in second claimed a win to join Randy with 16 tournament points. This time it was Adam Blum who won Istanbul for the 2nd time in LIW history.  Dan, Leah, and Austin were behind him in that order. This would leave Dan in 6th place after 3 rounds with 14 points and still in contention.

Castles of Mad King Ludwig rolled over to round 3 and Michael Mecham won the title for the 2nd straight year. Nasty Nick Vicious would grab second and Adam S, and Nate was behind. Of these 4 players Adam lead the way in 11th overall, while Nate, Nick and Michael were all in the mix at the middle of the pack. If either of them were going to make a move they probably needed to 3-0 and hope some of the folks at the top lost.

Trajan was also popular enough this year to make it into round 3 and get played for the 2nd time. This time it was defending tournament champion Neil Mecham getting the win. As soon as he got away from facing Sceadeau he started heating up. This was no easy game though as I consider all 4 players solid Trajan players. When I saw the matchups I had no idea who would prevail. Chad Walker, Neil the Grey and Ben Ibershoff were all solid, but someone had to win. Chad ended up in second barely nipping Ben by 4 points and Neil the Grey (the only player ever to beat Keith in this game) was in 4th. Emerging out of this game Chad Walker was still in striking distance with 14 points in 7th place. Both Neil’s had 10 points and would need some other players to loose to have a shot.

The last round 3 game was 7 wonders and it ended up that the 4 players switched positions exactly between the 2 games. This would mean that only the 1st /4th players would have a chance to get the 6 tournament points. As we added up the tiebreakers for position it was revealed that a single victory point in the second game was the entire difference between positions. Had Jason Lambert had one more point in the second game he would have finished the round 1st. Instead he was 4th. It would be Arianna McCurry capturing her first ever LIW title. Eduardo would be second, Bryan 3rd and Jason was 4th.  This would mark the 4th round win for the ladies in the tournament and they would only need 1 more to snag the 5 win prediction.

After round 3 I think Randy was starting to realize that to win this tournament just winning every game from here out might not be enough. “Win out” only works if you are in the lead, and that was Sceadeau. When the fog cleared it was Sceadeau on top with 18 points, Adam Blum and Randy just behind with 16, and then a 4-way tie of players with 14 points. Angela, Rob, Dan, and Chad were all there ready to strike should the leaders slip. Two other dangerous contenders Keith Dent and Cary Morris sat just behind them with 12.

Round Four

Round 4 would have Eduardo winning in Dominion for the 2nd time in his LIW career. This would leave Eduardo as the top Lexington player with 16 tournament points and in 9th place. Dan Adams claimed 2nd in the round and stayed close on the leaders heels with 18 tournament points and in 6th place. Leah and Stafford finished 3rd and 4th in that order.

In round 4 Sceadeau would be playing Agricola of a different kind. The two player Agricola all creatures big and small would make a tournament appearance for the first time since 2014. Sceadeau cruised to a 3-0 record and thus won the round easily. Brooke took down 2rd and Adam S, and Arianna would be in 3rd and 4th. With 4 straight wins Sceadeau sat with 24 tournament points looking down the standings at everyone else. The LIW tournament has never had a 6-0 winner but at this point it seemed it might have it’s first.

Heather Dent and Chris McCurry both out dueled opponents in 7-Wonders duel to be 2-0. They had a showdown for 1st and 2nd in the round and Heather came out on top by a single point. She would win the round and thus would be the 5th win for the ladies which would mean the under was over. This left her with 14 tournament points just outside the top 10 in 11th. With the 2nd place Chris would also have 14 tournament points in 14th place still searching for a LIW win this year. He consistently grabbed tournament points each round finishing 2nd/2nd/3rd/2nd but this year to win, you needed wins. Nate finished in 3rd and Angela would take a 4th, which would move her from 4th overall to 12th still with 14 tournament points.

Just behind the leader Adam and Randy were seated at different tables. Adam kept up the pace defeating Josh, Bryan, and Joe in Francis Drake. This would leave him with 22 tournament points just behind Sceadeau. Josh taking second was a surprise as he just learned the game. This marked the 2nd year in a row that Adam won this in LIW, and it was becoming clear he was a real threat to be the 3rd consecutive Ohio State player to claim the LIW crown. It also became clear that the games Adam knew, he knew well, as this and Istanbul last round were both games he had previously won in the tournament.

Randy would miss out on the 2nd Agricola game as bids were through the roof. He made it to the Amun-Re table though a game he knew at least. I’d never seen Randy play this at WBC so I wasn’t sure how well he knew it and wondered if this could be another defeat in his pursuit of Sceadeau and the title. I thought this might happen even more when I saw defending tournament champion Neil Mecham and Nasty Nick Vicious at the table. Jason Lambert would be learning the first time but those other two were solid. Randy won over Neil by 4 and Nick was 3rd. Neil would finish behind a top level WBC player again, and it would seem that the back-to-back title was now out of reach. I’m sure having to play so many top players (5th highest strength of schedule) and seeing how they play, the strategies the use, and the game at a very competitive level will only fuel Neil in his return next year. I’m already informed that bringing back the Rooster Shootout mini tournament in the LIW offseason to sharpen up the Ohio player base in in the works.

Cary Morris would obtain another win and move even closer to the leaders. This time it was the old Stefan Feld game Notre Dame. He was far out in front of the other players with 67, and Austin, Greg and Jeff were all bunched close in the 40s, but they would finish in that order. Cary would now have 18 points and be in 5th with two rounds to go.

The other game in the round featured what looked to be a murderers row of Thurn and Taxis players. Neil the Grey had won the title twice and once defeated Ben Ibershoff along the way, and Ben had his own title. Chad Wakler was also there lurking near the top of the standings and who was barely nipped by Neil last year in this same game. But there was another player at the table. A WBC world Champion at this game and he came for the crown. Rob Murray I consider to the one of the top 5 Thurn & Taxis players in the world. Chad, Ben, and Neil all solid on their own, were about to see the game at a different level. Rob finished 10 points ahead of 2nd place with 29 points. Chad claimed 2nd and Neil and Ben were behind in that order. Ben ran into problems with getting the dark green city of Sigmaringen, and it put him far behind. Neil weather he knew it or not was being blocked by Rob the whole game. Rob knew he was a 2-time champion and made it a point to shut him down. As the game usually does they finished early and I noticed after the game Rob spent some time imparting Thurn strategy on the rest of the table. I thought this was generous and hopefully educational for the other players. I’m not sure how it came across to them, but if they learned from it they will be better players because of it. The game can seem simple and straight forward but until you have seen in played by some of the masters you don’t know that there is a bit more depth than upon first impression. This win left Rob with 20 tournament points, just behind the 3 leaders in 4th place. He had two wins, and 2 seconds.

With only two rounds to go Sceadeau was still at the top with 24, and Adam and Randy were below him with 22 in that order. Rob had 20, and then Cary, Dan, and Chad were below that with 18. Rounding out the top 10 were Ian, Eduardo, and Keith. As far as teams, Greensboro had 3 of the top 8 and seemed ready to take the team title. Adam and Chad were both in top 7, but the third scorer for that team Neil (after 4 rounds) was in 13th. For team “Distant Lands” Rob and Randy were 3 and 4, but they would need one of the other players to make a move. The next team scorer at the time was Josh Corbalis in 25th position. Dan Adams surprisingly led team Berea, and Keith Joined him in the top 10 and Heather was just behind him in 11th. Lexington had fallen but Eduardo kept them in it in 9th, while Chris, Greg, and Arianna lurked in the middle of the pack in that order.

After 4 rounds the players just below Sceadeau were realizing that if winning the overall tournament was the goal, then waiting for Sceadeau to lose might not work. They knew they would have to take him down themselves. This is easier said than done though. Adam had no idea what games Sceadeau knew or was good at, but Randy, Rob, and Cary have played with him for years and knew the games he knew. However they also knew that he happened to be pretty amazing at some of them. Randy said prior to the tournament that he didn’t want to face Rob and Sceadeau in Agricola. I’m not saying he was scared but he knew that in a tournament of this style it didn’t pay to play the toughest opponents at their best games. The players that knew Sceadeau were also aware that he was likely the best Puerto Rico player in the tournament and that was not the game to try and take him down in. It was in round 5 and that was coming up. The players picked their spots and the final two rounds began.

Round Five

The greatest what if in the tournament happened in round 5. Despite probably being the best Puerto Rico player in the tournament and likely top 20 in the world, the tournament leader did not bid on it as one of his top 3 choices. I didn’t even realize this until later when studying the bid sheets. Sceadeau’s top choice was Castles of Burgundy. Only he knows why. It’s not hard to believe he may be really good at that game too, but perhaps he was trying to dodge other players in the tournament. He had mostly dodged other WBC this far and in his one encounter Rob almost took him down in Agricola. The reason this is the biggest what if of the tournament is because Castles is one the games in the tournament where I think the local and veteran tournament players can actually compete with top WBC players. Maybe Sceadeau knew that so far he hadn’t been met with much competition from the players he didn’t already know and so he thought he could take them out in any game he knew well enough, but I sure would have liked to see what would have happened if he got in that game with Neil. Neil is a very strong Castles player as are a few others in the tournament field, and though the defending champion got bested in his two matches with Sceadeau; I think this one may have had a different outcome. Alas though it wasn’t meant to be this year. The bids for Castles were too high and the tournament leader didn’t get in. Neil was there, and he took down the game. He bested rookie Jeff Turner who appears to be a solid Castles player on his on. Behind Jeff was 2nd, while Neil the Grey trailed followed by Patrick.

Upstairs, Keith was giving a demonstration of how to properly play Tzolkain. He thrashed the other three players and won by a wide margin. One of those 3 was Chad Walker who sent me a message after the tournament to let me know that Keith broke the game. If you haven’t played this game with someone who really knows it well it could appear that way the first time you see it. Bryan took 2nd place and Chad was 3rd, while Eduardo was last.

Josh went 3-0 in Carcassonne to win the round and capture his first LIW title. Brooke, Adam S, and Leah finished behind him in that order.

In Lost cities, players saw Greg Smith go 3-0 and take the LIW title for the second straight year. Nick, Adam and Rob fished in that order after tiebreakers had to be determined. This was Rob’s first real chink in the armor in the tournament. Because of some surprisingly high bids on Carcassonne he didn’t get to play the game he would have likely dominated.

Round 5 also had Joe Mecham winning Dominion for the 2nd straight year. Last year it was a step towards his eventual 4th place finish, but this year based on his points a top 5 finish seemed tough, but at this point he was just trying to climb the standings. He won in pretty dominating fashion finishing with a 1st and 2nd by 1 pt. in the two games. Chris McCurry snagged yet another second while Ben was 3rd and Michael 4th.

Ian Streeb stopped Austin’s 3-year win streak in Egizia, and claimed the 6 points to move even closer to the tournament leaders. Austin was not too far behind in 2nd, while Dan and Arianna followed.

Nate Landry grabbed a big win in Puerto Rico and gave Adam his second and last non-win in the tournament. Jason and Stafford would be behind them. This would put Adam a bit back from the leaders but still in range should the leaders slip up.

Speaking of the leaders, Sceadeau not getting into Castles meant that he made it to his second choice of Thurn & Taxis that had carried over from the last round. Sceadeau is a pretty solid Thurn player but I wasn’t sure how good. The only time I’d ever seen him play was at last WBC when we played and tied but he had the tiebreaker. He seemed like a strong player then, but Randy and Rob were both world champions of the game and I’d say either would be capable of delivering his first loss. Rob was stuck upstairs in Lost cites, but Randy would have a chance. The last match in round 5 featured 3 of the top 5 players in the field. Randy, Sceadeau, and Cary would all be competing, and depending on the outcome either could come away the tournament leader. When the dust settled it was a close finish, but Randy had came out on top. Cary was just behind that and Sceadeau finished 3rd. This was a game changer. With Adam’s loss Randy would vault to the top of the standings a place he was used to being, while Sceadeau would fall to 2nd and Adam 3rd. Ian and Cary would both be right outside the top 3 looking in to give the Greenville group 3 of the top 5 spots. Keith moved to 6th, and with Rob’s loss he moved to 7th. Trailing them was Neil Mecham the defending champion. After a brutal two first rounds at the hands of Sceadeau he had fought his way back up through the standings. Rookie Dan Adams was surprisingly still hanging in 9th while Chad Walker was in 10th. Greg Smith was in 11th, looking in on the top 10 and leading the team of Lexington players, with Chris McCurry right behind.

Round Six

With one round to go all Randy had to do was win to take the LIW title. Bids came in and the tables were set.  Round 6 was a blur as I scrambled around to prepare for the tournament finale and help teach the games that needed to be taught.

Russian Railroads saw Josh Corbalis pull off his second straight victory. This put him finishing 11th overall, in his first year in the tournament. Not to bad for someone that agreed to play so late, and didn’t know anyone, or even many games in the field. This proved to me he is a solid player and is capable of finishing even higher in future years. Patrick took 2nd and grabbed his first tournament points to end on a high note. Jason Lambert and Leah followed behind as they were learning for the first time.

In the 2nd play of Castles of Burgundy Austin Rathbone grabbed his lone tournament win this year defeating two time Champion Heather Dent along the way. Heather was 2nd, and Dan and Mike followed.

Adam got back to his winning ways by taking down Bryan, Chad and Joe in Village. This would mean if Sceadeau or Randy slipped up he could be the LIW champion, and claim the crown for Columbus for the 3rd consecutive year. Chad Walker finished a respectable 8th overall in the toughest year of the tournament so far. Joe had a long fall from his 4th last year ending in 25th.  He should be one to watch next year for most improved player. Bryan was 19th in his tournament debut but showed some flashes of skill that with some additional experience could be dangerous in years to come.

Jeff Turner won Race for the Galaxy, in a close battle over Adam Swejk. These two players both looked solid and seeing them battle it out gave me hope that this great game will get played for years to come in the tournament. Adam finished just inside the top half of the tournament in his rookie debut, but both he and Jeff represented Ohio well and should be solid members of this group for years to come.

Upstairs Sceadeau won in Hansa Teatonica and put himself in position to win it all, but he would need Randy to falter. Brooke grabbed 2nd and Nate and Eduardo followed.

Keith and Ian would compete for the 2nd time in the tournament and this time Keith would get the better of him. With Keith’s win he would finish 5th overall to represent Berea. This would push Ian to 6th. Both players battled just under the leaders waiting for a chance, but the 3 players at the top never gave them the chance to crack back into the top 3.

Cary Morris won In the Year of the Dragon, beating a former champion of the game Chris McCurry. McCurry was 2nd yet again and would finish 9th overall in the tournament. Nick was 3rd and Neil was 4th, falling back to finish 12th overall.

Randy won Princes of Florence by 1 point, but that’s all it would take. He would become the champion. Once he knocked Sceadeau off the top of the standings he wasn’t about the let up. Neil the Gray put up a respectable 2nd losing to a two-time world champion by just a point. Angela was 3rd and Rob took 4th. Rob didn’t pick up a single point in the last two rounds but his start was so amazing he still finished in 10th overall. With a couple differences in the way the bids went he would have been a threat at the top, but sometimes that’s how it goes in the wildness of The Lion in Winter.

The wildness of the tournament was indeed on display this year with lots of great matchups and new players with a variety of skills. I want to again say thanks to everyone that helped teach a game to someone. Having some WBC players in the mix hopefully just makes everyone better players and makes the competition more fun. I enjoyed a lot of the great matchups that happened this year and the tournament seems to be going strong. This is one of my favorite times of the year and I was happy to host the largest LIW tournament so far. Because of the tournament format we may be approaching the upper limit of players the tournament can host. The Lion in Winter tournament will have some more changes before next year and I’ll look forward to having players impact the game field with votes over the next few months. Additionally I’ll be trying to start back up the Rooster Shootout mini tournaments to prep for the 2018 LIW so look for details about that. Long live the Lion in Winter!

Congratulations to Randy Buehler the champion of the 6th Lion in Winter Tournament. You can check out his tournament report belo

Lion in Winter Tournament Report

By Randy Buehler

I wasn’t quite sure what to expect from my first trip to LiW, but I knew the worst-case scenario would still involve playing lots of board games so it was sure to be a fun weekend. The format sounded cool, though the correct way to navigate the bidding process was not at all obvious to me.

In round 1 I knew a lot of the games so I figured this would be a good time to try to save some points, especially since I had a very strong preference in round 2. OOPS! I wound up failing to get into any of the 6 games I bid on and my first-ever LiW game was a learning game of Kingsburg. In retrospect Concordia was way too popular for me to get into it with a below-average bid, but my real mistake was only bidding 11 on the other game I would have been happy to play. 13 would have been enough to get me into Vegas Showdown.

At least I wasn’t the only one who was unfamiliar with Kingsburg, as Cary hadn’t played it in years and the two players I hadn’t met before seemed to be listening intently to the rules explanation and puzzling out each decision too. This resulted in a slow game, and I got kind of frustrated with my bad dice rolls by the end, but the basic mechanics were fairly straight-forward: acquire resources efficiently and build stuff efficiently. I listened to Derek’s advice to build military and then I zero’ed in on a building that gave me a one gold discount on all level 3 or 4 buildings. Optimizing that path worked out well enough that I was able to finish a few points ahead of Cary for 2nd when my dice just barely worked out on the final turn. Meanwhile the guy who won the game did it thanks mostly to drafting a leader that turned out to be great. It gave him a point whenever anyone (including him) declined to build a building and that must have triggered close to 10 times during the game. We all got to bid on draft order at the beginning but none of us knew enough to bid to get that guy. Oh, well.

I was delighted to escape from my bidding catastrophe with a 2nd place in a game I had never played before. Also, this did at least mean I would have plenty of points to make sure I got to play Castles of Mad King Ludwig in round 2. I’m pretty sure I over-compensated by bidding 31, but I was still kind of reeling from Kingsburg. By Saturday, with a couple of successful bids under my belt, I felt like 25 would have been enough to safely get me in and now that I’ve seen the spreadsheet I know that anything over 20 would have been safe. (Glancing through things now it looks like there were only a couple of games all weekend where a 20 bid would not get you in: Castles of Burgundy (both times) and the 2nd round of Agricola.)

I wound up winning Castles of MKL 127-103-98-78, so I guess my confidence in wanting to play it was warranted. I won the shield for 1st place in this game at the World Boardgaming Championship last summer and it has been in pretty heavy rotation in my local game group for the last two years. I usually like to focus on getting a good purple building and then maximizing it, and I did close a couple of purples in this game, but I also bought stairs down on turn 1. I don’t normally like the downstairs strategy (as people tend to over-value the downstairs rooms, which typically aren’t nearly as exciting as they look), but there was a public goal for area of downstairs rooms and another for number of corridors. I thought I could get the first downstairs room cheaply, and I was right. My final castle didn’t have a ton of synergy or a ton of bonus points, but I was able to buy a lot of high-point rooms relatively cheaply and build up my lead before we even got to final scoring.

There was only one double-winner on Friday night (Sceadeau d’Tela) so I was in a tie for 2nd through 10th as I went to bed. For the first round Saturday morning I wasn’t interested in swimming with the sharks who were likely to wind up in Agricola, so I bid 20 on Saint Petersburg and 15 on Navegador – two more games that I have won at WBC in previous years. Greg Smith was the only other person with St Pete as their top choice, but a bunch of Greenspielers threw enough points at it that it did get played ... and wound up as the teaching game, with two players who had not bid on it all.

St Pete wound up rather close, with me eking out a win over Greg thanks to buying two late Observatories and using them to stay just competitive enough on orange nobles: 88-85-64-51. Meanwhile, Sceadeau beat Rob Murray in Agricola *on tiebreakers* to continue to pace the field with his undefeated record.

Agricola carried over and with Sceadeau and Rob now ineligible to play I made it my second choice for the round. With my first choice – Last Will – not getting played at all you’d think I would have been in, but no, I was not the only one who wanted to play the “easier” game of it and the bids for Agricola game 2 were quite high. This was another round where I knew a bunch of games and figured I could save some points for bidding on the last two rounds. I wound up with my 4th choice: Amun Re.

Amun Re is not one of my best games, but I knew the Amun Re specialists had all played it last round so the table might be a little bit easier. This was actually my general strategy for the whole weekend: avoid the top gamers and try to wind up on tables that are easier to win. It’s not that I’m afraid to play with Keith, Sceadeau, et al. On the contrary, I quite enjoy the challenge of trying to beat the best. However, beating them isn’t worth any more points than beating anyone else so the tournament format seemed to me to reward ducking them and trying to select easier tables as much as possible.

I wound up saving a lot of my money in the first half of the game so I could win the auctions on the juicy territories in the second half. I almost won most pyramids on both sides, but winning just one side was enough to win the overall game when my juicy territory purchases also enabled me to have 3 sets of 3. The bad news, however, was that Sceadeau won his game of Agricola: All Creatures Big and Small. Thus my 3 wins and a 2nd was still trailing his 4 wins (and in fact I was also trailing Adam Blum’s 3 wins and a 2nd with better tiebreakers than me).

Round 5 turned out to be the key round of the whole weekend. Rob was encouraging me to stop avoiding Sceadeau and in fact to try to seek him out. He kind of had a point as with just two rounds to go and him ahead of me, it looked like just winning my own games might not be enough for me. At the same time, I wasn’t willing to go play games I’m not particularly good at (like Puerto Rico) just because I thought Sceadeau might. Instead my top 4 bids were all on games that I knew well and also knew that Sceadeau liked to play too (Thurn & Taxis, Tzolkin, Egizia, and Castles of Burgundy in that order). Sceadeau’s Top 4 turned out to include 3 of those games plus Puerto Rico, so I feel pretty good about the way I read the situation and the way I allocated my bids. It turned out Castles was Sceadeau’s #1 choice, but his 17-point bid was not good enough to get in so he wound up on his second choice, which was my first choice: Thurn and Taxis. We were joined there by another Greenspieler – Cary Morris – and Heather Dent. Interestingly, we were almost joined there by 2nd place Adam Blum, who bid more points on it than either Sceadeau or I, but he got into his first choice of Puerto Rico.

I wound up in the 1st seat and played to grab carriages and end the game as quickly as possible. As usual, I did my best to grab the “around the world” bonus chit along the way and wound up being the second player to claim it. My 3rd train went to 7 and then it was Cartwright – Cartwright to end it before anyone could pick up too many bonus chits. I knew it would be close and I was right. I had 21 (plus the tiebreaker from being the guy to end it) while Sceadeau thought he had 20, but actually had 19 when we re-added it all. That turned out to matter as Cary had 20, minus half a point which he bid on seat position, for 19.5. Huzzah! Not only had Sceadeau been beaten, finally, but I didn’t even need to rely on the head-to-head tiebreaker to be ahead of him.

Meanwhile Adam finished 2nd in his Puerto Rico game, so he slipped into the second-place tie with Sceadeau and I went into the final round in control of my own destiny. All I needed to do was win my game and I would clinch the overall title. I had actually chosen not to bid highly on Princes of Florence in round 1 because I knew it would also be an option in round 6 and I didn’t have a lot of other great options in round 6. Princes was the only game contested at LiW that I have won more than once at the World Boardgaming Championship so I was feeling pretty good when I got it.

The game was really close and really fun. I thought I was in good shape when I was able to get two early Jesters and two cheap recruiting cards, all of which I used to complete 8 works, but Neil the Grey ran a really good version of the Builder strategy. He hit three different prestige cards and fell just 1 point short of catching me once they were revealed.

But fall short he did, and I held onto my lead thanks to a 5th win. Sceadeau also won his game (Hansa Teutonica) so I needed it too!

What a great tournament, and what a great time. Major props to Derek Glenn not just for inviting me, but also for being the best host I can imagine for something like this. His kindness and dedication are really a testament to what kind of guy he is, and I’m just glad to be part of the same community.

See you all next time!