tikal [Updated October 2006]  

 2006 WBC Report  

 2007 Status: pending 2007 GM commitment

Davyd Field, CA

2005-06 Champion

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Event History
2000    Jason O'Donnell     95
2001    Kevin Garber     80
2002    Brian Jones     72
2003     Barbara Flaxington     53
2004    Harald Henning     77
2005    Davyd Field     75
2006    Davyd Field     45

Euro Quest Event History
2003     Arthur Field     23
2004     Phil Rennert     16

 Laurels

Rank  Name              From  Last  Total
  1.  Arthur Field       SC    06    107
  2.  Davyd Field        CA    06     88
  3.  Kevin Garber       VA    02     52
  4.  Barbara Flaxington NJ    06     50
  5.  Jack Jaeger        VA    05     44
  6.  Brian Jones        MD    02     40
  7.  Harald Henning     CT    04     30
  8.  Jason O'Donnell    OH    00     30
  9.  James Hopkin       CA    02     24
 10.  Daniel Broh-Kahn   MD    06     22
 11.  Eric Freeman       PA    05     21
 12.  Phil Rennert       MD    04     20
 13.  Rob Kilroy         PA    00     18
 14.  Valerie Stanton    OH    05     12
 15.  David Wenstrup     SC    03     12
 16.  Eric Haas          MD    03     12
 17.  Marvin Birnbaum    NJ    00     12
 18.  Chris Terrel       VA    05     10
 19.  Robert Flowers     MD    06      9
 20.  John Kerr          VA    03      9
 21.  Steve Cameron      PA    00      9
 22.  William Duke       MD    03      8
 23.  Rodney Davidson    MD    04      6
 24.  Jonathan Fox       IL    04      6
 25.  David Fair         MD    03      6
 26.  John Wetherell     PA    00      6
 27.  James Carvin       PA    03      4
 28.  Craig Moffit       NJ    06      3
 29.  Tim Kelley         SC    04      3
 30.  Mario Lanza        PA    03      3
 31.  Mike Backstrom     MN    00      3
 32.  Don Bone         AUSTRAL 03      2

2006 Laurelists

Daniel Broh-Kahn, MD
2nd

Barbara Flaxington, NJ
3rd

Robert Flowers, MD
4th

Arthur Field, SC
5th

Craig Moffit, NJ
6th


Past Winners

Jason O'Donnell, OH
2000

Kevin Garber, VA
2001

Brian Jones, MD
2002

Barb Flaxington, NJ
2003

Harald Henning, CT
2004

Davyd Field, CA
2005-06
       

 GM Daniel Broh-Kahn (right) oversees a preliminary game.

This yar's field was the smallest yet recorded for Tikal at WBC. 

Deep in the Deepest Jungles ...

Tikal celebrated its seventh anniversary as a Century event at WBC 2006, and based on the enthusiasm of the turnout, it shows no signs of abating. Read on to discover if perennial finalists Barbara Flaxington, Arthur Field, or Davyd Field won the tournament, or was it a relative newcomer Daniel Broh-Kahn?

Tikal, like most Euros, is easy to learn, and sometimes difficult to master. The Tikal game itself comes with a player cheat sheet, which shows everything a player can do on a simple 3 by 4.5 inch card. No language skills are required, as there are no words whatsoever on the player card or the map. In a nutshell, a player places a tile, and then allocates 10 action points in his or her turn as he or she sees fit on the map board. Scoring is also simple: In a scoring round, and there are four of them in the game, each player receives the usual 10 action points, without the tile placement, and then they score. The last scoring round is done in reverse score order, meaning whoever is in last place at the final scoring round gets to go first in the last scoring round, often an advantage.

Since 2004 at WBC the bidding rules have been used in Tikal, in which players bid on the tile they choose to place, some tiles having more perceived value to one player than another. Bidding provides a bit more strategy to the game, and also prevents the ubiquitous whining about poor tile selection. Bidding also allows a player to go last in one round, and then first in the next, allowing them, in effect, 20 action points in a row.

Initial Heats and Scheduling: There were three heats scheduled for the game, set for different times and different days. With this flexible scheduling format, anyone who truly wanted to play a game could get in a heat at some point during the very busy WBC week. Social Tikal should be a 90-minute game, and the GM allowed two hours for tournament play of each of the heats and the Semis. With very few exceptions, all games were finished in less than two hours. The Tuesday evening heat had five games, the Wednesday heat seven, and the Saturday afternoon heat three games. All were scored in the GMs notebook with each individual disclosing his or her finish place, and total points. This information was entered into a computer, with the ratio to the winner used as for a tiebreaker for runner-ups to move on in the semis.

The Semi Finals: With 13 individual heat winners, 14 including the GM, the potential arose for a slight scheduling problem in the semi-finals on Saturday night. As before, the Gods of Tikal were clearly smiling, as miraculously, the problem resolved itself, when exactly 12 qualifiers showed for the semis on time. Since Tikal works best as a four-player game, it was easily agreed that the three semi-final winners would advance, as well
as the best runner-up to a single, four-player Final.

The Final: The GM paid particular attention to the Final, as he was a participant for the first time, matched against former champions Barbara Flaxington and Davyd Field. The fourth seat, reserved for Arthur Field remained empty at the appointed start time due to scheduling conflicts.

For the first couple of moves, all went well for the three finalists. Very little was bid during the auction for turn order, but the treasure hunt proved interesting. Davyd matched two treasures out of his first three picks, and Barbara snagged two pair on her first four picks. Poor Daniel grabbed five treasures before the first scoring volcano, with no matches.

As can be seen from the tables below, the Final was very close. Before the first volcano was scored, the three finalists had bid only one or two points, and were very close after scoring. At the second and third volcano, they were still close, within three points. By the fourth volcano, however, Daniel had pulled to what seemed an insurmountable lead, with almost 30 points off the board in treasures (to make up for the deficit of the first volcano.) But on the last scoring round, Davyd sneaked in and grabbed an uncapped monument, for seven points. That was, as he said, a 14 point swing, enough to make a difference in the outcome. So congratulations to Davyd for his back to back championships!

All in all, Tikal 2006 can be judged a success, without any of the controversies of the 2005 event: Thank goodness. Next year, by scheduling the demonstrations before the initial heats, and by scheduling in conjunction with other similar games, the tournament easily has the potential to attract over 60 participants. So we'll see you at Tikal 2007!

Summary of Final Game
                           Davyd, Daniel, Barbara
Score Before First Volcano 18     19      19
Before Second Volcano      24     22      25
Before Third Volcano       54     55      52
Before Fourth Scoring      95     98      90
First Volcano Scoring Rd   08     10      10
Second Volcano             33     34      31
Third Volcano              43     43      38
Fourth Scoring             53     48      46
Scoring ALL Volcano       129    125     115
Score after 1st Volcano    26     29      29
Score Second Volcano       57     56      56
Score Third Volcano        97     98      90
Final Score with winner   148    146     136
Summary of Bids in Final Game
Bids BEFORE First Volcano   2      1       1
Bids BEFORE Second Volcano  2      7       4
Bids BEFORE Third Volcano   3      1       4
Bids BEFORE Fourth Scoring  2      0       0
Total Bids in the Game      9      9       9
 GM      Daniel Broh-Kahn [3rd Year]   NA
    Daribuck1@comcast.net   NA

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