Martin Becomes Sixth Orleans Champion!

2024 was the sixth running of Orleans at WBC. Player numbers continued to decline, with the event hitting new lows in attendance and total games played. However, those that do show up are often dedicated, attending multiple Heats, and the skill level continues to improve. This year we had 40 unique players participate in 18 Heat games. We had a handful of three player tables to make the numbers work in some Heats. Heat one saw 28 players show up, with Heat two pulling in 17, and Heat three had 22.

I’d like to thank everyone who helped me with GMing. It makes a big difference, even the small stuff of helping to move the kiosk around. Chris Katz, Luke McKinnes, Chad Martin, Allan Jiang, and several others assisted me in various ways this year, and it’s always helpful. I really appreciate it, and it makes running this and other events so much smoother when a little aid is given here and there.

Orleans is scheduled in a two hour block, and for another year in a row we did have all games complete….although it’s still a bit of a dash sometimes. I appreciate all of the players that make this happen. Slower players would result in some adjudications which nobody wants, and I’m thankful that we once again collectively avoided that. I continue to stand by the fact that Orleans does work as a two hour block, and if we went to three, I think it would plummet attendance, but I understand the pace of play can be tough on some players. Orleans did try running as an A class even this year, meaning there was no demo, and indicating we expected players to understand rules. I’m not sure this was needed as we’ve not had a lot of new players from the demo, but our numbers did drop a bit again. We are welcoming to other players, provided they can play at a reasonable pace.

2024 saw no other updates to the Orleans tournament rules. We continued to not use the bathhouse tile, and like 2023 we were using unlimited money. This still is a somewhat new change though for the WBC crowd, and I think the players have taken some time to adapt to it. Original fears were that the Hospital, one of the easiest ways to get money, would become too powerful when the money was unlimited. Those fears have proven unwarranted, the building is strong but it’s not overpowering. The new finding from this year was the rise of the Laboratory. We’ll get into it more with the rest of this report, but suspicions were rising throughout the week that the Laboratory was now the most powerful building.

Between players continue to hone their skills in this unlimited money setting, and the field continuing to shrink down a bit to the most dedicated players, the average winning score once again rose. In 2023 the average Heat winner had 165, in 2024 this rose to 177. The breakdown of the winning score (vs 2023) looked like the following: An average of 6.4 (5.9) guild halls and 3.2 (3.6) citizens with a development level of 5.5 (5.2) for 53 (49) VP, with 91 (87) coins, and 33 (29) VP in goods, for a total of 177 (165) victory points.

Scores in Orleans with unlimited money are a little hard to compare to each other, since the order the events come out in can have a large impact on the overall scores. When things like Trading Day and Income events come early, players have had less time to set up to score big off of them, while when they come late everyone gets a lot of points. Regardless, there were some interesting results overall due to this unlimited money and increasing skill level of the players.

Heat 2 saw two players break 200 VP, last year’s 2nd and 3rd place father/son duo of Chad and Andrew Martin. Andrew set a new high score for a 4-player Heat game with 207 VP. Chad was at a 3-player table but set a new tournament record with a whopping 222 VP. Andrew Emerick was unlucky in Heat 1 when his 189 VP was only good enough for 2nd place. In that same Heat, Michael Swinson’s 176 VP only got him 3rd place. The best 4th place was Luke McKinnes’s 140 VP in Heat 2.

During the Heats, two players achieved getting down all 10 of their guild halls, and it was once again the Martin’s, in their 200+ VP efforts. The most citizens was 6, belonging to Eric Wrobel and Loc Nguyen. For VP from Guild Halls + Citizens both Chad Martin and Eric Wroble got 90 VP. Each had development level 6, Chad had 10 halls + 5 citizens, while Eric had 9 halls and 6 citizens. Chad Martin earned the most VP in gold with 124 (and it was in his other Heat game, not the high scoring effort!) The most VP in goods belonged to Aaron Blair with 76 VP.

This year we once again tracked all the buildings that were built and by whom. We managed to get this data for 15 of the 18 games played during the heats (three games had the rest of the VP stats, but not the building data). Once again, several players attempted a no building strategy, but once again every winner had at least one building. The following is a list of buildings ordered by popularity (how many times it was built), and of those how many times it was by the winner:

• Windmill was built 15 times, 4 times by winners
• Laboratory was built 14 times, 7 times by winners
• Hospital was built 13 times, 8 times by winners
• Office was built 13 times, 5 times by winners
• School was built 13 times, 1 times by winners
• Horse Wagon was built 12 times, 6 times by winners
• Library was built 11 times, 3 times by winners
• Pharmacy was built 11 times, 5 times by winners
• Cellar was built 9 times, 4 times by winners
• Tailor Shop was built 8 times, 0 time by a winner
• Herb Garden was built 6 times, 0 time by a winner
• Wool Manufacturer was built 6 times, 4 times by a winner
• Brewery was built 4 times, 1 time by a winner
• Shipping Lane was built 3 times, 1 times by a winner
• Gunpowder Tower was built 3 times, 0 times by a winner
• Sacristy was built 1 time, 0 times by a winner
• Hayrick was built 1 time, 0 times by a winner
• Winery was built 0 times
• Cheese Factory was built 0 times

Overall, this is remarkably similar to past years. There was no real noticeable jump, and the top buildings are getting built in almost every game. I do think there was some talk of the Laboratory being too strong while the overall winning percentage here does not seem to indicate it, it was fairly consistently dominating in certain situations. While it does look like the Tailor Shop is being built and not leading to wins, it did have numerous 2nd place finishes. I don’t think there’s any reason to think the Wool Manufacturer is actually better. I do think the data continues to point to the fact that the School and Herb Garden are rather popular builds, they continue and historically do not help lead to wins. The best players find other ways to help make sure they get consistent draws.

As for how to win, once again winners took a variety of paths. When players seek advice in how to do well in Orleans, there are a few basics that hold. Basically, every winner gets up the knight track to increase their draws, generally early and at least by the halfway point of the game. More draws from the bag allow players to take more actions.

Similarly, players tend to fight hard for the craftsman and those cogs, as cogs also help you take more actions. The other thing most winners do is grab some buildings as most buildings can give you ways to make your actions better. Another trend from the best players is they figure out a way to make sure they are not getting bad draws. The methods vary, but it can involve getting a lot of wild monks, aggressively thinning out your bag via beneficial deeds, and sometimes getting buildings like the School or Pharmacy. Finally, winners are finding a way to get their development level to at least 4, this can involve taking scholars or building things like the Pharmacy, Library, or Shipping Line.

Beyond that, a lot can work. In 2024 during the Heats, we had winners ranging from all 10 guilds halls built to only 4 guild halls built. Winners ranged from 6 citizens to 0 citizens. All winners had at least a 4 multiplier for their development level, although most got to 5 or 6. Winners had up to 90 VP for their guild halls and citizens, down to a low of only 40 VP. For gold coins they ranged from 124 to 52, while for VP in goods they ranged from 76 down to a meager 15.

Semifinal

After the three heats, the field for the Semifinal was set. This year saw several winners opt not to advance, due to conflicting Semifinals and Finals. Every winner then advanced, plus several individuals with just 2nd places, including last year’s champion Ryan Feathers, who had failed to get a win during the Heats. Casey Moquin and Jonathon Mattanah also managed to get in, setting the cutoff for advancement this year at multiple 2nd places.

The rules for seating the Semifinal that were posted were that we would separate double winners as much as possible. For the first time in the event's history though, we had only a single double winner, Chad Martin! Nobody else was able to nab two wins during the Heats, instead we had many people with a win and a second or third, along with those alternates that had multiple 2nds/3rds. I think this continues to show the field is getting very tough overall, and even the best players can no longer consistently win in the Heats.

We also saw a few more new faces in the Orleans Semifinal than recent years. 6 players made it to their first Orleans Semifinal: Chris Wildes, Jonathan Mattanah, Allyson Mattanah, Christian Wen, Casey Moquin, and David Stufflet. On the other end of the spectrum, Ricky Boyes and Ryan Feathers extended their streak of consecutive Orleans Semifinal appearances to 5, while Lyman Moquin and Aaron Blair joined them in tying for their record fifth Semifinal appearance. Chad Martin was close, now with four consecutive appearances. All players were randomized, and the Semifinal was underway. For the first time in the events history, we also bid victory points for starting seat position as players have continued to improve, some have opinions about certain seats being likely to win certain races, such as the Castle track citizen.

At semifinal number one Chad Martin was looking to return to the Final. He was up against former champion and three time Orleans laurelist Ricky Boyes. They were joined by newcomers to the Orleans Semifinal, David Stufflet and Casey Moquin. Ricky secured the Laboratory along with a lot of other key buildings in the Horse Wagon, Office, and Windmill. However, this left him with somewhat too much to do, and he also failed to get enough development level, which left him with an underwhelming finish. David got a good number of citizens and gold coins, but was a bit light on goods, as his Cellar and Library at least got him good money and development level.

Casey did similarly with a Hospital and School. Chad managed to nab the Tailor Shop, Brewery, and Pharmacy, and got down the most guild halls for that bonus citizen. His balanced game got him a strong win on the back of a healthy number of coins and goods, and a strong score in citizens and guild halls:

1. Chad (8 halls + 5 citizens) * 6 = 78 + 60 cash + 46 goods - 1 bid = 183 VP
2. Casey (5 halls + 4 citizens) * 6 = 54 + 74 cash + 16 goods - 1 bid = 143 VP
3. Ricky (7 halls + 1 citizens) * 4 = 32 + 63 cash + 48 goods - 0 bid = 143 VP
4. David (4 halls + 4 citizens) * 6 = 48 + 67 cash + 21 goods - 0 bid = 136 VP

Semifinal number two saw 2022 champion Allan Jiang seated with former finalists Andrew Emerick and Lyman Moquin. Christian Wen was making his first Orleans Senifinal appearance. This game saw Allan get down a tie for the most guild halls and he was able to use his Office to make money off of those halls, and he got a lot of goods for moving around and using his Tailor Shop. He unfortunately did not find enough time to up his development level, even with a Library, to make all those halls pay off enough. Christian used his Horse Wagon to move about and pick up goods, and that easy movement helped him tie for the guild hall lead, plus the Wool Manufacturer gave him even more goods. He had a solid game. Lyman ran the classic trilogy of the Hospital, Pharmacy, and School. This enabled him to nab citizens on the development track, make his scholars act as wilds, and he got plenty of money from the hospital. This did not give him much time though to get goods or guild halls down. Andrew on the other hand got off to a strong start and set up the Laboratory in that way where it feels unstoppable. He had tons of extra actions and was able to use them with his Windmill to make a lot of money, plus do a bit of everything else as basically his entire board had cogs. This led him to a comfortable win:

1. Andrew (6 halls + 4 citizens) * 6 = 60 + 88 cash + 36 goods - 0 bid = 184 VP
2. Christian (7 halls + 2 citizens) * 5 = 45 + 64 cash + 41 goods - 2 bid = 148 VP
3. Lyman (5 halls + 4 citizens) * 6 = 54 + 75 cash + 14 goods - 5 bid = 138 VP
4. AJ (7 halls + 2 citizens) * 3 = 27 + 65 cash + 47 goods - 2 bid = 137 VP

Semifinal number three featured Chris Katz and Andrew Martin looking to return to the Final that they had last made in 2022 and 2023 respectively. They were joined by newcomers to the Orleans Semifinal in Chris Wildes and Allyson Mattanah. Allyson got an early windmill and put a cog on it, making it a very good source of money and books. She also managed to get 7 guild halls down, enough for a three way tie for the most at this table. Her wool manufacturer helped to give a nice amount of goods, but sadly it led to fourth place at such a tough table. Andrew Martin and Chris Katz got in each other’s way, as both advanced to step four of the Castle track. Only one got the citizen, but this way neither got the extra draw per round as there were no more knights for either to advance to the final spot, and the plague events were not cooperative in providing another. Katz decided to try to win the game without any buildings, something no one had done during the Heats. He instead focused his efforts on moving around the board that had a lot of high value goods and hitting guilds halls and citizens. Andrew meanwhile was using his Library and Horse Wagon to do similar things, but he got forced to take much less valuable goods with the direction he went. In the end, this left the door open for Chris Wildes to secure the Laboratory and four other buildings–Pharmacy, Hospital, Office, and Tailor Shop. Wildes was largely blocked from getting too many guild halls down, but the combination of the Hospital and the Office with the Laboratory providing so many cogs on buildings and other actions led to a close win:

1. Wildes (4 halls + 2 citizens) * 6 = 36 + 109 cash + 32 goods - 2 bid = 175 VP
2. Katz (7 halls + 4 citizens) * 5 = 55 + 63 cash + 51 goods - 0 bid = 169 VP
4. Andrew (7 halls + 6 citizens) * 6 = 78 + 68 cash + 21 goods - 3 bid = 164 VP
6. Allyson (7 halls + 2 citizens) * 5 = 45 + 53 cash + 41 goods - 0 bid = 139 VP

For his close 2nd place, Chris Katz was awarded 5th place laurels.

Semifinal number four featured defending Orleans champion Ryan Feathers against former Orleans laurelist Aaron Blair. Michael Swinson was at his second Orleans Semifianl, while Jonathon Mattanah was at his first. Ryan had been losing in the Heats to the lab, and so bid for second seat and used his first two actions to secure it. This left Aaron in fourth seat to exclaim that he didn’t know what to do, as he only knew how to play the Lab. This did not prove true, as Aaron played a great game focused on winning the race on the knight track to get to 8 draw and a lot of actions, and then played great on the deeds board and boatsman track to nab more citizens, and end in a balanced game with points in all categories, with the goods fueled by the Tailor Shop.

Ryan managed to pair a Library and Cellar with his lab and got a lot of guild halls and coins down, but didn’t get many citizens. At a key point in the game Michael decided to send two monks right in front of Ryan, but later struggled to take the actions he wanted to. His combination of the Hospital and Pharmacy gave him good coins, and his Horse Wagon helped him move around. Jonathan built his game around a Windmill and Office but found himself unable to make as much use of the later as he wanted to due to a struggle to get enough actions to do everything he needed to.

1. Aaron (5 halls + 6 citizens) * 6 = 66 + 60 cash + 47 goods - 1 bid = 172 VP
2. Ryan (8 halls + 3 citizens) * 5 = 55 + 79 cash + 29 goods - 1 bid = 162 VP
3. Michael (5 halls + 5 citizens) * 6 = 60 + 69 cash + 21 goods - 0 bid = 150 VP
4. Jonathon (6 halls + 0 citizens) * 5 = 30 + 70 cash + 13 goods - 0 bid = 113 VP

Ryan’s second place wound up being close enough that he was able to nab 6th place laurels.

Final

Thus, the Final was set. Chad Martin was returning to the Final, trying to prove that it was his time. He was on a run of placing 6th, 6th, and 2nd overall in the Orleans event, and was the only double Heat winner this year. Andrew Emerick was also getting back to the Final, having taken fourth place in the first two tournaments back in 2017 and 2018. Aaron Blair was making his first Final in Orleans, but he had twice nabbed 5th place laurels in the past (2017 + 2019). Chirs Wildes was the lone player without any prior Orleans laurels but was looking to prove he belonged.

For the final, Chris bid fourth seat up to 6vp. After the game, he explained that he was hoping he would be allowed to open for two craftsmen, then use his next two rounds to take builders. By being fourth seat, he’d be the first player in round four and would nab the Lab. Chad however decided to bid 1 VP for second seat, and promptly opened the game with two builder actions, locking up the lab at the start of round 2. Aaron got 3rd seat for free, and Andrew slid into first seat for free.

The rest of the game started out rather normally. Andrew, Aaron, and Chris opened with two craftsmen, cogging the village farmer, and the castle boatsman. This set up allows players to begin taking village + castle actions on round 3, which are the key actions players want to be taking early. This game would be the showdown between the laboratory player trying to set up for the long game, while the other players rapidly set up their engines by getting their draws and as many of the builders and craftsman as they could.

In a bad break for the lab, an early plague event returned two craftsman to the supply, meaning two more cogs would get taken by the players, leaving less for the lab itself. This is not a huge problem, but it does mean you really have to plan where you want your gears to wind up.

This game saw one other very interesting thing in the opening. Orleans has just enough knights such that everyone can get to draw 7, but only one player can take the citizen and get to draw 8. However, because Aaron, Andrew, and Chris were running a fast set up, they all were at draw 7 while Chad was at draw 5. Chris had just seen in his Semifinal game someone take a knight to deny another draw. While it didn’t quite work for Chris Katz, it nearly had. Sensing his opportunity, Wildes manages to nab two “extra” knights to get himself to draw 8 along with Aaron, depleting the knights available to Chad, and keeping Chad stuck on five draw all game. Surely that would be enough to kill off the silly lab player–sure cogs are powerful in helping to get more actions but drawing only five guys a round seemed like a sure death knell for Chad.

After the first eight rounds everyone’s positions were already kind of set. Andrew had put a cog on the village farmer, castle boatsman and the guild hall farmer. He had acquired the Pharmacy and Tailor Shop. He was at 7 draw and had also already placed a guild hall in Orleans and was the first to move, via the south road. From here he was poised to use the Pharmacy for his books, get lots of goods and guild halls down, and hope to win the bonus citizen from guild halls.

Chad had acquired the Hospital and the Laboratory. He had put a cog on the village farmer, monastery scholar, hospital scholar, and laboratory scholar. He was stuck at 5 draw, but had the powerful lab set up to aid his actions. He was going to focus on racing up the development track via scholars, to make his hospital great, and then find what else he could.

Aaron had acquired the Shipping Line, Library, and Horse Wagon. He had placed cogs on the village farmer, castle boatsman, and library scholar. He had won the race to the castle citizen and had got to 8 draw. From here he would use his buildings to get books and seek some citizens off the deeds board while moving and placing guild halls.

Chris emerged from the opening with a trio of money producing buildings in the Windmill, Office, and Cellar. He had cogs on the castle farmer, village boatsman, monastery scholar, and windmill craftsman. He was set up to make a lot of money and books from his windmill, get a lot of monks, and ideally get some guild halls down and find time to use the cellar and/or office for big money.

The rest of the game largely saw players playing out their positions. There were of course some tactical skirmishes on the deeds board with players vying for the ability to snag some citizens. All players found their way up the development track, Chad reaching level 5 with maxing Scholars, Andrew reaching 6 largely via the Pharmacy, Aaron getting to 6 with the Library and Shipping Line, and Chris getting to 6 with scholars and the Windmill. Chad’s limited draw saw him focus on using his Hospital every round, along with winning the boatsman track, earning several monks, and thereby having the best control over the beneficial deeds board. Andrew’s early movement advantage did lead him to get down the most guild halls and the bonus citizen, while the others mostly split the remaining spots on the map.

Andrew’s Tailor Shop and plenty of movement made him lead in goods, Aaron’s Horse Wagon kept him close. Chris’s trio of money making buildings got him over 100 coins, but Chad’s focus on the Hospital, boatsman track, and deeds board gave him even more money, coupled with good timing on the income and trading day events. After the bids were subtracted, it was a tight and well played final, but Chad was able to finally nab that win:

1. Chad (4 halls + 5 citizens) * 5 = 45 + 120 cash + 15 goods - 1 bid = 179 VP
2. Andrew (9 halls + 3 citizens) * 6 = 72 + 46 cash + 49 goods - 0 bid = 167 VP
3. Aaron (6 halls + 3 citizens) * 6 = 54 + 61 cash + 47 goods - 0 bid = 162 VP
4. Chris (5 halls + 3 citizens) * 6 = 48 + 101 cash + 18 goods - 6 bid = 161 VP

Congrats to Chad on becoming the 6th Orleans champion in 6 years! For Chad, this was the culmination of a several years run of excellence. He was now a Laurelist for his fourth year in a row, going from 6th, 6th, and 2nd, to taking down the shield. Between being the only double heat winner, setting the high score in the heats in 2023 and 2024, and the high score in the Semifinal in 2023, Chad has been on a tear in Orleans, and I think has proven himself the rightful champion.