British Rail Mogul Repeats as Champ
of Yank Railroads
A total of 28 participants played
three different railroad games over three days. The tourney featured
the same three games as last year, 1830, 1856, and 1870.
The format was changed, however, with all the preliminary round
winners, and enough second place finishers advancing to form
a sixteen-player semi-final.
The first preliminary heat featured a five-player 1856
and three four-player 1830s. Player bankruptcies ended
three of the games, but one ran out of time and had to be stopped
early. The second day featured two 1830 and three 1870
games, all of them with four players, save one 1870 game
with five. Again, several of these games ended early with player
bankruptcies engineered by the winners. Among the many interesting
strategies employed in some of the preliminary round games was
the passing of the Canadian Pacific railroad (in 1830)
back and forth between two players, and the passing of the KATY
railroad (of 1870) among four of the five players in another
game. The table below gives the results of the preliminary heats.
Thursday - 1830
1st Place & Score |
2nd Place & Score |
3rd Place & Score |
4th Place & Score |
Robin Barbehem -- $3639 |
Johnny Hasay -- $2001 |
John Chung -- $1777 |
John Wetherell -- $?? |
Paul Hakken -- $2875 |
Paul Koenig -- $2505 |
Barrington Beavis -- $2117 |
Mark Smith -- $236 |
Jeff Simmons -- $9336 |
Nicholas Anner -- $8112 |
Pierre LeBoeuf -- $7806 |
Anthony Daw -- $5376 |
Thursday - 1856
1st Place & Score |
2nd Place & Score |
3rd Place & Score |
4th Place & Score |
5th Place & Score |
D. Matheny -- $1892 |
E. Segal -- $1314 |
R. Santagato -- $1229 |
D. Fritsh -- $1116 |
B. Besler -- $280 |
Friday - 1830
1st Place & Score |
2nd Place & Score |
3rd Place & Score |
4th Place & Score |
Gerald Dudley -- $11753 |
Anthony Daw -- $8939 |
Chris Hancock -- $8838 |
Johnny Hasay -- $8207 |
Barrington Beavis -- $7924 |
Ron Dietz -- $7919 |
Robert Sacks -- $5887 |
David Streamo -- $5480 |
Friday - 1870
1st Place & Score |
2nd Place & Score |
3rd Place & Score |
4th Place & Score |
5th Place & Score |
H. Henning -- $4558 |
P. LeBoeuf -- $3590 |
P. Hakken -- $3574 |
N. Anner -- $3361 |
R. Zelano -- $2522 |
R. Barbehem -- $8993 |
R. Santago -- $7163 |
J. Chung -- $6592 |
R. Atwater -- $5682 |
B. Besler -- $4630 |
M. Frueh -- $5131 |
D. Fritsch -- $4789 |
D. Hooten -- $2361 |
J. Weber -- $1851 |
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The players were seeded into the semi-finals based on the
results of preliminary round play. As a two-time winner, Robin
Barbehem advanced as the number 1 seed. The other seven winners
also advanced, and were ranked according to the percentage of
the runnerup's score to their own in their preliminary round.
The nine runnerups (there were no repeaters or second place finishers
who won their other preliminary round game) were also ranked
by the percentage of their score with the winning score. All
others were ranked in the same way, with all third place finishers
ranked next, followed by players who finished no better than
fourth in the preliminary round. This produced the following
table, with players listed by ranking with their score, and their
seeding in the semi-finals. If a ranked player did not show up
for the semifinals, this is shown with dashes in the seeding
column. Unfortunately, there were so many no-shows, the alternate
list was exhausted, leaving only fourteen players to play in
four semifinal games. Because of this, the semis had two four-player
and two three-player games. The seedings for the semifinals are
given below.
Ranking, Player |
Preliminaries Score |
Semi-Final Seeding |
1. Robin Barbehem |
Two Wins |
1 |
2. David Methany |
One Win, 130% |
2 |
3. Gerald Dudley |
123% |
3 |
4. Harald Henning |
121% |
4 |
5. Jeff Simmons |
113% |
- |
6. Paul Haaken |
113% |
5 |
7. Mark Frueh |
107% |
6 |
8. Barrington Beavis |
100% |
7 |
9. Ron Dietz |
2nd, 100% |
- |
10. David Fritsh |
93% |
8 |
11. Paul Koenig |
87% |
- |
12. Nicholas Anner |
87% |
9 |
13. Roger Santagato |
80% |
10 |
14. Pierre LeBoeuf |
79% |
11 |
15. Anthony Daw |
76% |
12 |
16. Elliott Segal |
70% |
- |
17. Johnny Hasay |
55% |
13 |
18. Chris Hancock |
3rd, 75% |
- |
19. Robert Sacks |
74% |
14 |
20. John Chung |
73% |
- |
21. John Wetherell |
49% |
- |
22. David Hooten |
46% |
- |
23. David Streamo |
4th, 69% |
- |
24. Rich Atwater |
63% |
- |
25. John Weber |
36% |
- |
26. Mark Smith |
8% |
- |
27. Richard Zelano |
5th, 55% |
- |
28. Brent Besler |
52% |
- |
Placement in the semifinal round used the formula 1st
8th 9th 16th seeds in game 1, 2nd 7th
10th 15th in game 2, 3rd 6th 11th 14th
in game 3, and 4th 5th 12th 13th in game 4.
Since only 14 players were present, games 1 and 2 had only three
players. Results from the semifinal round are given in the table
below.
1st Place & Score |
2nd Place & Score |
3rd Place & Score |
4th Place & Score |
Robin Barbehem -- $1673 |
Nicholas Anner -- $1319 |
David Fritsh -- $209 |
|
Barrington Beavis -- $1644 |
David Methany -- $962 |
Roger Santagato -- $485 |
|
Mark Frueh -- $8762 |
Gerald Dudley -- $7244 |
Robert Sacks -- $6977 |
Pierre LeBoeuf -- $6109 |
Harald Henning -- $8605 |
Paul Hakken -- $8092 |
Johnny Hasay -- $7631 |
Anthony Daw -- $7614 |
The 8xx final consisted of the winners of the four 1830
semi-final games meeting in a four-player 1830 game. Each
of these finalists had also won a preliminary heat, with assistant
GM Robin Barbehem riding a three-game win streak going into the
final. Three public railroads (popular as starting railroads
in 1830) were initially purchased, with Barrington Beavis
starting the New York New Haven, Harald Henning taking the Baltimore
and Ohio, and Mark Frueh climbing aboard the Pennsylvania railroad.
With his large private company investment (the Delaware and Hudson
and the Camden and Amboy), Robin was an interested minority B
& O investor. Unfortunately for him, the minority position
became a majority one when Harald dumped his B & O stock
on him (after buying four "2" trains), to start the
Boston and Maine. Amazingly, the "2" trains lived for
two turns, enabling Robin to earn enough money to get another
railroad and keep up with the train technology. In other stock
manipulations, Harald took over Mark's opening of the New York
Central, but when Harald sold an NYC share to get the Canadian
Pacific started, Barry snatched the share up and took over the
NYC for himself.
Each of the four players acquired two railroads (each with
one permanent train), and all survived the train transitions
through to the purchase of the diesels. Finally, at 2:30 AM,
the bank was exhausted, and it was Barrington repeating last
year's win, successfully defending his title. Robin came in second,
with 92% of the winning total. Harold (81%) and Mark (65%) finished
third and fourth.
A survey asking about alternate starting times and optional
rules for next year was circulated among the participants. Feedback
from the seven respondents was inconclusive or negative to most
of the suggested changes. For next year, I would like to keep
the rules as they were, except reversing the optional 6 train
option in 1830 we had this year (no optional 6 train unless
all in the game want it). As to starting times, I would like
to add another preliminary round (earlier than Thursday afternoon),
if the overall tourney schedule permits it.
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