battleline [updated August 2001]

BAT  3 prizes Beginners Swiss Elim Continuous 
 
     
  Demo 12    16  Round 2 18  Round 3 20  Final     

  Valley  

Peter Staab, PA

2001 Champion

2nd: John Leggat, CA

3rd: Andrew Cummins. UK

4th: Cliff Ackman, PA

5th: Kaarin Engelmann, VA

6th: Gordon Elgart, CA
Event History
1991    None      -
1992    None      -
1993    None      -
1994    None      -
1995    None      -
1996    None      -
1997    None      -
1998    None      -
1999    None     -
2000    None     -
2001    Peter Staab     54

AREA Ratings:

GM: Andy Maly

And the Winner almost was ....

54 players showed for a couple hours of mass melee in the Battle Line tournament. Using an open format, players could play as many games as they could without playing the same opponent twice. The signal given, play started quietly in the EF Salon. Soon the volume of the room began to rise, as the action intensified.

Jeremy Billones worked faster than a quisinart, playing a record seven games, and chalking up five victories. Bruce Monnin must have thought this was the War at Sea preliminaries, going 5-0 in the opening round. John Leggat got off to a rocky 0-3 start, but rebounded and won his next three games to advance. Mike Nagel went Down in Flames with five losses, yet still managed to keep trying and was rewarded with a victory in his sixth and final game. After two hours of fever pitched action 23 players had won at least three games. 21 decided to continue, and Gordon Elgart benefited with the best showing with two victories, to provide an even number.

A commander knows that his plan has to be flexible. The troops had been pushed too hard and too long in the opening stage of the campaign. The players continued to the second round with the knowledge the round was to be shortened to 90 minutes. This proved to be a sufficient time based on the average time most players were taking to complete games.

The second round played in stark contrast to the first, with players playing with a reduced volume level, preferring to save their strength for concentrating on the games. The increased intensity resulted in many close games.

John Leggat quickly established himself as an irresistible force, cranking out five victories in 90 minutes. Peter Staab in his lucky chair, Michael Johnsen, Kaarin Engelmann, and Cliff Ackman also went undefeated in the second round to advance. Andrew Fedin lost two, but still managed to rack up the needed three victories. Gordon Elgart continued to benefit on strength of performance as one of two qualifiers for the third round. Andrew Cummins was disappointed when the second round was called, and he was only a few cards away from delivering a coup de grace. However, his disappointment was soon overcome as his performance was sufficient to allow him to advance as well.

The third round began single elimination play, with three victories needed to claim the title. In the quarterfinals Andrew Cummins defeated Andrew Fedin by breakthrough. Peter Staab inflicted the same result on Michael Johnsen. Cliff Ackman defeated Gordon 5-3, ending Gordon's lucky streak and relegating him to 6th. John Leggat took out Kaarin Engelmann 5-4 in the closest quarterfinal match.

The semifinals pitted John Leggat against Andrew Cummins while Peter Staab faced Cliff Ackman. Both games were tight matches and went deep into the troop decks, with John taking his game 5-4 and Peter claiming his 5-3.

Thus, the final game was the irresistible force, John Leggat, riding a 10 game winning streak, against the immovable object, Peter Staab, who earned that moniker by keeping himself in one "lucky" chair throughout the tournament. The final game moved quickly. John was up four flags to three, and each player had just three card plays left. One flag for John would be a phalanx of 5's, facing the purple 5-6 of Peter. John could complete the second unclaimed flag with a phalanx of 7's or a battalion of Yellow. Such a decision would be easy with perfect card knowledge

However, the kicker for John was that he held the Purple 7 that both he and Peter needed, but Peter held the only Tactics card drawn during the game. The fog of war led John away from playing for a phalanx of 7, and instead going for the Wedge. The cards fell quickly, with John seemingly claiming his fifth flag, when Peter played the sole tactics card. The fog of war revealed the Fog. With this dramatic turn of events, the flag went from John to Peter, giving Peter a breakthrough and the championship!

 GM      Andy Maly  [1st Year]  521 Inglewood Rd, Bel Air, MD 21015
    battleline@home.com   NA

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