Thanks, Brian. I’ll leave the decision on whether to start to @Greatatlantic in that case.
My recommendation is to go ahead and start the game. We can wait a couple of days past the initial deadline if necessary. (My mistake in dropping GA from the participant list after all – which I still feel bad about!) Or if it seems the game won’t finish for a while past Feb 22 we can revert to the original plan of seeding with Thraeg’s forfeit.
Your playdek IDs are "greatatlantic"and “Cattlesquat”.
Good game @Syzygy. Plays Wargames to end the game on turn 8 with a margin of 2 points.
Here’s where never having gone past turn 7/8 hurt me. That and a bad mistake turn 6(?) when I had Africa and South America. Should have just scored South America early and spotted you 3 points. Instead scoring Africa gave you one action round to make it +8 points.
I’m going to be kicking myself for that one a good long while.
Lots of back and forth, but ultimately I made a few too many mistakes along the way. I had a plan, but it didn’t account for Wargames just straight up ending things. Well played sir!
Good game. You played very very well for a new player and someone who has never seen the late war. So much so that I was surprised you didn’t know all regions are scored again at the end.
The US has a big advantage at the end of T10 as they can break control on their last play.
Infested_terran vs buzznaut has ended in a infested_terran U.S. victory via timeout.
We made it to turn 4. Soviets were up by 3 points and dominated the middle east, but Europe was dominated by the U.S. and I was about to score an unopposed South America for +6 VP. I really lucked out drawing Bear Trap AND Quagmire the very first turn of mid war. Buzznaut was still frozen by Bear Trap after failing two rolls to get out of it.
I feel bad for bum luck like that. I feel like more than anything else this game really needs a Blood Bowl style reroll system. There’s just too much riding on single die rolls sometimes, like the first coup attempt, Bear Trap/Quagmire, and wars. That and some kind of first turn draw mulligan where you can forfeit a modest amount of vp to redraw your starting hand. That was another area I lucked out in this game, I don’t think buzznaut got any 4 cards to start.
Other luckouts I got: drawing pretty much every major Soviet early war event: De Gaulle, Blockade, Korean War (he did win the roll though), Arab-Israeli war, and destalinization. I was able to avoid any devastation and blunt the effects of those potentially deadly cards.
Anyway, thanks for the game and sorry the weekend coordination efforts didn’t pan out.
So, as my match with Mr. Reynolds leaves the Early War, I’m pretty sure I’m going to have to concede the match. I’m leaving tomorrow on vacation and won’t be back until the 27th. I know you were willing to give this game some extension, but I can hardly ask for that much of a delay. While I think I’m entering the middle war with a slight advantage in points and position, randomness and powerful US events can quickly shift the sands making this one a toss up except for Brians considerable more experience playing the game.
@TwilightStruggleTournament particpants-- the final result for round 2 has been entered. Thank you for finishing your games on time.
Round 3 has been automatically seeded and you can check for your opponent in the Challonge bracket:
http://challonge.com/qt3ts2017jan
Please finish Round 3 by March 16 at the latest.
Challenge to SadleyBradley issued.
Hi Syzygy - on my phone I can’t tell who my opponent is - is it you? Feel free to send challenge. I’m happy to play with any variants except space race, though obviously US should get 0 handicap if the alternate card sets are in play.
Brian
*Sent from the wild frontier of mobile games :-)
@Berbatov would you like to try Turn Zero? I’ve only played it once in the physical game (vs. @tcgamer) but found the way it varies the initial positions very interesting.
@Syzygy happy to try out turn zero! I’ll admit I don’t know much about what other cards to use with T0/how it affects initial influence balance, but I’m happy to roll with it.
Quick Summary:
Almost everything else… Not all that important to worry about. And any turn zero effects will be self-explanatory at the time (and you can review them later by clicking on the T0 button in upper left)
But those two cards be sure to know the text deep in your heart :)
Would love to play T0 and variant cards with anyone in any around, just please god not the “alternate space race” – step 4 I find ridiculously swingy and having an effect that abrogates essentially the central mechanic of the game be something that can essentially last forever in some cases I don’t approve of. I’d have had a card that did that for one turn analogous nuclear subs, or a space effect of once per TURN, or a card that gave you 4 ops all of which could ignore the control role. But not “often for the rest of the game, every single action round”. Even less fun to play against than being in a Bear Trap for 5 rounds.
Brian
ForzaA (USA) defeats Left_Empty (USSR) - Headline of turn 5 saw Cuban Missile Crisis (USA) and CIA Created (USSR) at Defcon 5.
One failed coup in Argentina later, everyone blamed the Soviets when the nukes started flying.
Ah - I’ve dabbled with T0 pre-game mechanics, but I’ve never played with the additional cards. Should be interesting! Did you play with or without the original game’s optional cards?
The alternative space track does look odd at first glance. The fourth space is incredibly strong, which appears to be strength that they shifted away from the later parts of the track…