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The key to new events is a successful demo. |
Brian Conlon and Rick Kirchner
try out the new Euroish wargame. |
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Michael Hyland points out his
move to Eric Tolentino while Bill Place consideres his options. |
Frank Cunliffe and Walter MacEachern
were two of the 35 players giving Academy Games new game a try. |
1775 A conflict of blocks....
1775, a Euro-like block game that represents the conflict
that shaped our nation debuted as a new event at WBC this year.
This Academy Games product allows players to strategize together
in order to coordinate their campaigns. Each side attempts to
control colonies on the map. Players may then place Reinforcements
into any City Area(s) within colonies that their side controls.
The game ends when a truce is called and the side controlling
the most colonies wins the game. Although the game has added
suspense when played as a 4-player game, in tournament format
- the 2-player version still provides much in the way of surprise
to each side as each faction (militia, regular), moves from a
random draw bag each turn.
Te debut had the added excitement of the first demo and mulligan
round taking place during the weekend before WBC. Having a Pre-Con
mulligan had some worried about low turnout. To some surprise,
the only real issue was finding enough space for all the folks
appearing for the Demo and Mulligan round. So, Sunday's mulligan
saw ten games played - mostly by first time players. Nine out
of the 10 contests resulted in a British win, although all but
two of them were by a score of 5-4.
Twenty players appeared again for Round 1, again most inexperienced,
but this time helped by their previous mulligan play. The Americans
won six of these contests, the British three. A tie was decided
in favor of a fourth British win by virtue of better faction
dice.
The Round 1 survivors joined the mulligan winners to trade
volleys with the British winning four of seven battles by scores
7-1, 5-4, 8-2, and 6-5. The three American victories came by
scores of 7-3, 5-4, and 6-4. That left seven players remaining
for Round 3. Larry Lingle enjoyed the random bye. The Americans
won two of the three contests by identical 5-3 acores, while
the British prevailed in the other contest 9-5.
John Faella, opposed Larry Lingle's redcoats in the first
semifinal. Larry enjoyed clam chowder for the whole war as Boston
never fell to the continentals with the British having great
success in the mid-Atlantic states of New Jersey, Maryland and
Pennsylvania. The French arrived to assist ithe Americans n taking
the deep south, with loyalist forces fleeing in great numbers.
Facing great despair, the patriots invaded Quebec along with
Native American units. The state of Maine see sawed back and
forth, until the Brits wiped out the French Ratnest in Rhode
Island. In the end the Continentals came back with a vengeance
and eked out a 5-4 victory.
In the other semifinal, Ted Lange's Americans opposed Greg
Hultgren. Lange attempted to use boats to break British control
of Quebec on Turn 1, but this gambit failed as his generals failed
him. With Quebec firmly in the hands of the King at turn's end,
the Brits then used their superior naval power to crush the rebellion
with a 9-3 thrashing.
So the Final pit John Faella's Redcoats vs Greg Hultgren.
The british took the early lead. Indeed, at one point, it looked
like the British had scored a knockout blow as the rebels had
no colonies under their control from which to draw fresh recruits.
Fortunately, for the Americans, the French arrived just in time
to liberate Rhode Island. After that the outcome became less
clear as the Americans fought back to parity. The war ended in
Savannah where turncoat Benedict Arnold was captured by Americans
patriots. With his capture, the Americans controlled Georgia
giving Greg a 5-4 victory. A close and well fought game worthy
of a Final.
Academy games will be listing the top two finishers on their
website, and presented the winner with a free copy of the game,
and will be listing the two in future editions of the game rules
to honor their accomplishment.
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