The Road to Worlds, Week 14

by James Hoskin, Director of Organized Play

1st July 2010

Regular readers should know that this is a weekly series that aims to preview upcoming Regional tournaments, review Regional tournaments that have just taken place, highlight winning decks, interview players, and more. Last week's article was The Road to Worlds, Week 13.

How can you contribute to this series? First and foremost, I am relying on results and deck lists being promptly entered into this site. I can't write about them otherwise. Other ways you can help include: taking photos, interviewing players, writing previews, and providing background information. Any other way to help the community be a part of your Regional tournament would be appreciated, too. Contact details are at the end of this article.

Week 13 Review

Saturday 26th June		Sunday 27th June
First Edition (Revised) Paradox Comics & Cards 26 Roberts St Fargo, ND, 58102 United States [Results]	Second Edition (Standard) Münchner TradingCard Treffen Grafinger Straße 6 81671 München Germany [Results]	First Edition (Sealed) Wahoos of Cupertino 19626 Stevens Creek Boulevard Cupertino, CA 95014 United States [Results]

Paradox Comics & Cards: This was the first constructed First Edition Regional tournament in the Continuing Committee era to be held in Fargo, North Dakota. Five players fought it out over three rounds, and Matthew Hayes (karonofborg13) was undefeated with his Starfleet Neutral Zone deck. Second place was taken by Chris Volk (volkerii), playing a Non-Aligned / Federation / Vidiian deck; ahead of Ian Parmenter (Peers), playing a Klingon deck in third place. Ben Johnson (mindmage), playing Romulan, was fourth; and John Tomaszewski came in fifth, playing a Non-Aligned / Federation deck. As the First Edition deck builder isn't available yet, Matthew has posted his deck list on the discussion page. The only thing missing from the deck list is a new entry in the world's longest deck title competition. Looking over Matthew's public decks, you can see that he has the competition sewn up already. I believe his current record is 140 characters. Will he, or anyone for that matter, ever beat that?

Münchner TradingCard Treffen: Not only did this Second Edition regional tournament in Munich attract players from Germany and Austria, but there was a surprise appearance by four players from the Czech Republic. Johannes Klarhauser (Kaiser) has written a tournament report on the discussion page. During the five round tournament, Vladimir Vrbata (vlasopes), playing Original Series, lost his first sanctioned game in the Continuing Committee era. That was not enough for anyone else to overtake him though, and Vlad kept up his 100% tournament win rate. Second place went to an undefeated Stefan Slaby (Winner of Borg), playing a Voyager deck titled "Tampering with Bayern". While Stefan did manage to win all five of his games, three of them were only modified wins. Despite being the first player to beat Vlad, this meant that he didn't win the tournament. Jirka Paska (Taurnil), playing a Mirror Starfleet deck titled "True way", finished third; and Johannes Klarhauser (Kaiser), playing a Next Generation deck titled "Wein, Weib und Gesang" (that translates as "Wine, Women and Song"), was fourth. Other decks being played included Klingon, Cardassian, Maquis, a second Starfleet deck, and another Voyager/Equinox deck.

Wahoos of Cupertino: Sadly, the results for this tournament have yet to be entered. One can only assume that the players had so many booster packs to open that they are still constructing their decks.

Byes

This week, three players won a Day One Round One bye into the Continental Championships:

• Matthew Hayes (karonofborg13), winner at Paradox Comics & Cards
• Vladimir Vrbata (vlasopes), winner at Münchner TradingCard Treffen
• unknown player, winner at Wahoos of Cupertino

Congratulations to these players, and I wish better luck to anyone who didn't make it. These bye winners have been added to the list of current bye winners for the Continental Championships and the World Championships here. The only way to make this list now is to place in the top two at a National Championship.

Deck Statistics

First Edition: Results from eight Regional tournaments have been entered, with a total of 52 players participating. That is an average of 6.5 players per tournament. The win for Starfleet in Fargo sees it become the affiliation with the most wins. Federation was played the most without any wins, but this can probably be excused because the Federation category encompasses several different sub-affiliations. This means the affiliation with the most losses is probably Hirogen. Unfortunately, the largest category is still "unknown."

The most popular First Edition affiliations were:
1.	Unknown	Used by 15 (29%) players	2 Regional wins
2.	Federation	Used by 7 (13%) players
3.	Multiple Affiliations	Used by 5 (11%) players	1 Regional win
4.	Dominion	Used by 4 (8%) players	1 Regional win
4.	Hirogen	Used by 4 (8%) players
4.	Klingon	Used by 4 (8%) players	1 Regional win
7.	Romulan	Used by 3 (6%) players
7.	Starfleet	Used by 3 (6%) players	2 Regional wins
9.	Borg	Used by 2 (4%) players	1 Regional win
10.	Bajoran	Used by 1 (2%) players
10.	Cardassian	Used by 1 (2%) players
10.	Kazon	Used by 1 (2%) players

Second Edition: Results from 34 Regional tournaments have been entered, with a total of 288 players participating. That is an average of 8.5 players per tournament. Voyager / Equinox decks scored the most victories, while Earth (Home of Starfleet Command) and Terok Nor were the only two affiliations without a win. The most popular affiliation was Next Generation by a margin, although only three of the 36 players using it actually managed to win. Perhaps Next Generation is not quite the powerhouse everyone thinks it is? Or did everyone tech their decks out against the Federation? It can't have been Moral Choice alone, because Voyager / Equinox managed so many wins. Of course, they have the ability to prevent stops and kills, so perhaps they were just better suited to beat the anti-Federation tech.

The most popular Second Edition affiliations were:
1.	Next Generation	Used by 36 (12.5%) players	3 Regional wins
2.	Klingon	Used by 28 (9.7%) players	3 Regional wins
2.	Borg	Used by 28 (9.7%) players	4 Regional wins
4.	Original Series	Used by 24 (8.3%) players	2 Regional wins
4.	Starfleet	Used by 24 (8.3%) players	2 Regional wins
6.	Cardassian	Used by 22 (7.6%) players	1 Regional win
7.	Multiple Affiliations	Used by 21 (7.3%) players	4 Regional wins
8.	Romulan	Used by 18 (6.3%) players	2 Regional wins
9.	Voyager/Equinox	Used by 16 (5.6%) players	6 Regional wins
10.	Dominion	Used by 12 (4.2%) players	1 Regional win
10.	Maquis	Used by 12 (4.2%) players	1 Regional win
12.	Bajoran	Used by 11 (3.8%) players	1 Regional win
13.	Ferengi	Used by 9 (3.1%) players	1 Regional win
13.	Deep Space 9	Used by 9 (3.1%) players	2 Regional wins
15.	Earth (Home of Starfleet Command)	Used by 8 (2.8%) players
16.	Unknown	Used by 5 (1.7%) players	1 Regional win
17.	Non-Aligned	Used by 3 (1.0%) players
18.	Terok Nor	Used by 2 (0.7%) players

Week 14 Preview

While the Regional Championships may have finished, the Road to Worlds continues on. Today sees the start of a four-day extravaganza of gaming in Australia, that will see the First Edition Continental Champion, the Second Edition National Champion and the Second Edition Continental Champion all crowned.

Thursday 1st July	Friday 2nd July	Saturday 3rd July	Sunday 4th July
6pm: Australian National Championships Second Edition (Infinite Diversity Draft) The ArtHouse Hotel 275 Pitt St Sydney, NSW 2000 Australia [Pre-register]	3pm: Australian Continental Championships (day one) First Edition (OTF) Good Games Burwood 195A Burwood Rd Burwood, NSW 2134 Australia [Pre-register]	10am: Australian Continental Championships (day one) Second Edition (Standard) Good Games Burwood 195A Burwood Rd Burwood, NSW 2134 Australia [Pre-register]	10am: Australian Continental Championships (day two) Second Edition (Standard) Good Games Burwood 195A Burwood Rd Burwood, NSW 2134 Australia
	6pm: Side Event Second Edition (Standard) Good Games Burwood 195A Burwood Rd Burwood, NSW 2134 Australia [Pre-register]	6pm: Australian Continental Championships (day two) First Edition (OTF) Good Games Burwood 195A Burwood Rd Burwood, NSW 2134 Australia	1pm: Side Event Second Edition (Race to the Alpha Quadrant) Good Games Burwood 195A Burwood Rd Burwood, NSW 2134 Australia [Pre-register]

The 2010 Australian Continental Championships Weekend thread in the forums has all the details. Kieren Otton (Honest) has previewed the players, Matthyas Kiraly (stoovie) has begun posting live commentaries in the Continental Championships forum, and there is a Dream Team competition. What more could you need?

Next Week

A review all the action from the Australian Continental Championships weekend.

Have an opinion about this article? Post it here, or contact the author!

-djl-

Back to Archive index