carcassonne [Updated October 2005]  

 2005 WBC Report  

 2006 Status: pending 2006 GM commitment

Jennifer Drozd, IL

2005 Champion


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Event History
2002    Debbie Gutermuth

  
150
2003    Richard Jones     132
2004     Dan Hoffman     130
2005     Jennifer Drozd     123

Euro Quest Event History
2003    Scott Buckwalter     37
2004    Ted Mullally     22
2005      

 Laurels

Rank  Name              From  Last  Total
  1.  Richard Jones      UK    03     50
  2.  Scott Buckwalter   MD    04     42
  3.  Debbie Gutermuth   TX    03     33
  4.  Jennifer Drozd     IL    05     30
  5.  Legend Dan Hoffman MD    04     30
  6.  Jay Fox            NJ    03     30
  7.  Ted Mullally       NJ    04     20
  8.  Ray Stakenas II    MI    03     20
  9.  Olin Hentz         CT    05     18
 10.  Rebecca Hebner     CO    04     18
 11.  Michelle Hymowitz  MD    03     18
 12.  Bob Stibula        PA    02     18
 13.  Laurel Stokes      NJ    03     15
 14.  Sean Vessey        VA    05     12
 15.  Tom McCorry        VA    04     12
 16.  Eric Hymowitz      MD    03     12
 17.  Ken Dunn           MD    02     12
 18.  Verity Hitchings   DE    03     10
 19.  Andres Dunn        MD    05      9
 20.  Doug Williamson    VA    04      9
 21.  Robbue Mitchell    VA    03      9
 22.  Matt Miller        NJ    02      9
 23.  Ilan Tadmor        NY    04      8
 24.  Tim Packwood       MN    05      6
 25.  Lee Sensabaugh     VA    04      6
 26.  Gwen Alvian        MD    03      6
 27.  Thomas Robinson    NC    02      6
 28.  Lisa Gutermuth     TX    03      5
 29.  Hal Haag           MD    04      4
 30.  Derek Landel       NJ    05      3
 31.  Luke Kratz         ID    04      3
 32.  Ewan McNay         CT    02      3
 33.  Mark Guttag        VA    02      2
          

2005 Laurelists

Olin Hentz, CT
2nd

Sean Vessey, VA
3rd

Andres Dunn, MD
4th

Tim Packwood, MN
5th

Derek Landel, NJ
6th


Past Winners

Debbie Gutermuth, TX
2002

Richard Jones, UK
2003

Legend Dan Hoffman, MD
2004


Carcassonne Adventures ...

This was my first year GMing Carcassonne. I took over the duties from Michelle Goldstein who was unable to attend this year. I knew I had some big shoes to fill as she always ran a good tournament. I decided to run the basic game with no expansions, just like previous years. The expansions can really add some time to the game and I really wantied to keep it at one-hour rounds.

I had never run an event with more than 60 players before, so I was a little concerned since Carcassonne always draws over 100 players. I decided to talk with GM of the Year, John Coussis and adopt the "Coussis Method" (TM) for seating players. In previous years, there were four heats, but I elected to go with only three. I had a heat Tuesday night and one Thursday morning. Neither one had a huge turnout and between the two, I had less than 60 unique players. Since my Tuesday night heat was at 11:00 pm, I was not too worried about my one hour time limit. No games were starting at midnight, so I didn't push really hard to get done quickly. And on my Thursday morning heat, there were also no games starting the next hour, so there was really no pressure to get finished quickly then either. But almost every game was done within an hour in both heats anyway. I was a little disappointed in the turnout and I was afraid that my decision to drop to three heats had hurt the game's Century status.

My fears were unfounded as the Friday night heat drew over 80 players, many of them playing in their first heat. This is where the "Coussis Method" really saved me. Many players expressed their desire to play in something the next hour. I won't go into how it works, but I was able to have everyone seated and playing in barely over five minutes. I highly recommend talking to John if you are GMing next year. It also helped having "Little" Lisa Gutermuth helping out with the sign-up sheet. Everyone was done within the hour and I once again had over a hundred different competitors with one less heat.

Double winners included Jon Fox, David Nicholson and Sean Vessey. The semifinals were rounded out with single game winners Patrick Shea, Josh Cooper, Jennifer Drozd, Robbie Mitchell, Erica Kirchner, John Quarto, Bob Menzel, Rob Drozd, Chris Greenfield, Trevor Bender, Bob Stribula, Pete Stein, Tim Packwood, Cliff Ackman, James Parauda, Tom McCorry, Mark Guttag, Rob Kircher, Dave Bohnenberger, David Fox, Derek Landel, Olin Hentz, Chris Terrell, Rebecca Hebner, Charlie Faella, Steve Koleszar, Kathrine McCorry, Adam Dunn, Nick Evinger and Rob Flowers.

Olin Hentz, Andres Dunn, Sean Vessey, Tim Packwood and Jennifer Drozd worked their Meeple magic and battled their way into the Final; although Jennifer needed a tie-breaker.

If you blinked, you missed the Fnal. It was one of the fastest games I'd ever seen. There was hardly any table talk and the game was over in a mere 18 minutes! This for a game that originally was schduled for two-hour rounds by the previous GM. Jennifer came away with her first WBC championship. Afterward, she told me her father and brothers, were giving her a hard time for picking Carcassonne as her team game. They told her she had no chance at team points because there were so many players every year. As it was, Jennifer tripled the score of the rest of her entire team!

Thanks to all who played and made the experience a good one for me.


 Carolyn Strock proved to be the best of 21 little Carcassonne players. The other finalists were:

2nd: Mary Beth Mitchell of VA

3rd: Pamela Gutermuth of FL

4th: Tim Keating of IL

5th: Thomas Strock of PA

6th: Conal Jaeger of VA

 GM      Jeff Mullet  [1st Year]   NA 
    Mullet1695@frognet.net   NA

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