Beth Raphael seems enamored by Keith's new chapeau.	Jeff Billings and Henry Richardson against the next generation.

We had 137 unique players this year; 77 participated in only one heat, 44 played in two heats, and 16 die-hards were on hand for all three!

Heat 1 drew 64 players yielding 13 games with a map choice of either Germany or France. 11 tables opted for the Germany board and only two for France. All but one of the contests were 5-player games.

Heat 2 attracted 85 players playing 17 games with a map choice of either USA or Central Europe. 11 of 17 tables opted for the USA board.

Heat 3 again drew 64 players for 13 games with a map choice between Italy and Benelux. Seven tables opted for the Italy board and six for Benelux.

Player Comments (written on the event form for that game):

Heat 1:

Auction plant #34 went for 41, won by Dan. Had Chris bid him up 2 elecktro more it would have been a different outcome.

*Dan won and Chris came in second.

Heat 2:

Pete bought the 13 coal on the last turn for $61 to stop Mary from being able to power all her plants.

*Pete came in second due to this, losing by one city build and $83+ (no way for him to win with those numbers). Mary had 17 power, but only $91 left so would have had to buy three more coal and five more cities to win (not possible to win but was possible to beat Pete) ­ Synopsis = good move Pete!

There was no Stage 3!

*Yeah it happens

Bidding war between Matt & Hans in the last round, plant 34 went for $68 to Hans. Norman and John drove plant 38 to $85 which was bought by Norman. Hans had three nuke plants in play for several turns.

*Matt won and Hans came in second. Norman came in last. Sounds like Hans had lots of money but Matt got a good plant for much cheaper.

Tim bid high for plant 26 and plant 30 after getting the 29 to drop in Round 2 when he was last in Turn Order. Daniel could have stopped Tim from winning but chose not to.

*29 second turn was very nice. Tim bid high for good plants, nothing wrong with that. The comment about Daniel may have been about buying out the resources. (Daniel came in fourth)

Semis:

Grabbed an early lead & expanded exponentially - bought the 4 plant and one city on Turn 1 and waited until the 26 dropped. Game only lasted six turns. My # cities per turn: 1 = 1; 2 = 3; 3 = 6; 4 = 7; 5 = 12; 6 = 15

*Wonder how much the 26 went for. Doubt they had to 'wait' for the 26 to drop for long, sitting at one city for too long is not worthwhile.

GM Comments:

There was a distinct lack of comments written by players; unusually the second heat, which ran the longest and started the latest, had the most comments. Write down something people! Share your experience with everyone else.

Want to thank everyone for their patience on the start of Heat 2. We ended up having to split between two rooms due to lack of space. This was not a scheduling problem (i.e. don't blame the BPA or the GM). This was a problem of Pirate's Cove unpredictably showing a huge increase this year, and that isn't a problem in my mind - the hobby growing is always a good thing (wish PGD had that type of increase). It did mean some scrambling by Don and myself; and again thank you all for being patient while we worked out the kinks.

Several people commented about wanting to use the alternate plant deck in the past so we used it on several heats. I bought a whole bunch of these (15) to make sure we had enough (have spent lots of money on this and other GM supplies, maybe I can give some of these out as prizes as we only used a few of them as more people have them than I expected). I want to apologize for not being more familiar with this plant deck - different optional setups, different distribution which means may not work well on other boards, etc. Next year will run the alternate plant deck as an option again but after studying and matching up this deck's cards and options for each board.

Totals for the Final were as follows:

Turn 1 Raphael purchased the 4 plant for $8 and built four cities in and around the four spot of free connection cities, while Blair acquired the 3 plant for $5 and built one city to take turn position next turn. Lexi paid $5 for the 5 and built two cities, Jeff picked up the 10 for cost and two cities, Kevin's first turn he got the 9 for $9 and the last $3 oil and built one city.

Turn 2 Raphael, and then Jeff, picked up the 7 and 8 plants at cost respectively and then the 20 plant was in the market. Jeff having the 10 and picking up the 8 was unusual but did not stop him from making the declaration of 'whoever gets the 20 plant wins the game'.. it went to Kevin for $27. Lexi picked up the 17 and Blair the 22, both at cost.

Jeff sat at two cities, making the 8 plant $8 spent on 'moving the market'. Kevin started in the only other two free connection cities and built one city for 10 to go to two cities, Blair also built one more powering his two for free via the 22 plant; so now everyone was sitting on two cities built.

Turn 3 saw Raphael pick up the 24 for $24, Lexi the 13 for $13 and Jeff the 25 for $25! Lexi and Blair powered three to everyone else's four ($10 difference).

Turn 4 Blair picked up the 26 for $29 (spending only $4 on resources making his average spent on resources to this point $4.25! which was under half of what every other person was currently spending). Jeff and Raphael powered 5, while Lexi and Blair continued to dig deeper into the 'I am not making as much money as everyone else hole' and powered only four (another $10 difference) while Kevin powered six and took home +9 and +19 more than everyone else. Kevin was also the only person to have two plants at this point to everyone else's three.

Turn 5 saw Raphael pick up the 27 for $27, Kevin gained the 29 for $29, and Lexi bought the 21 for $25 (she passed on the 29 hoping for something better). While Jeff and Blair sat on their efficient plants (Blair with the 26 and 22 being the most efficient). Kevin thought about building to seven but claimed he did not have enough money to do so (he did, but did not want to jump too far nor was there any reason to as he could power what he had easily enough). Blair and Jeff powered six while everyone else powered five (why Kevin did not use a single resource to power the 29 plant (or an oil on the 9 plant) to make $9 more was puzzling. At this point Lexi is $30+ in the hole to everyone else just from earnings (Blair has made up most of this with efficiency and as of this turn is earning the most along with Jeff)

Turn 6 dawned on a market stall as everyone passed. Jeff gobbled up lots of coal paying $36 which pushed the prices up on Kevin but more importantly on himself every turn thereafter as he was sitting on three coal plants - he had a $16 average for materials overall in the game and Turns 6/8/9 spent $36/$29/$29 respectively. Lexi was in the birdseat this turn and as first builder decided to build to seven+ to open Stage 2 up; after watching her build all other players passed on building. She was currently sitting on the worst plants and the worst bank account.

Turn 7 found Lexi picking up the 23 for $23, Raphael the 30 for $77!, and Jeff the 31 (more coal) plant for $31!!! Then Blair 'mentioned' about more great plants not dropping and acquired the 19 for $19. Kevin already having 10 power, sat on his only three bought plants. After building Kevin and Raphael earned $90, Lexi $98, Blair $105, and Jeff $112.

Turn 8 began with Lexi picking up the 28 for $29 and Kevin the 18 for $18. After resources were bought it was decided by all parties that Jeff was easily the winner - Jeff stayed at 11 cities however. (he only had $102, constantly making coal pricey wasn't helping his cash flow, and could have built to and powered 13 easily but getting to 15 to end it would have been very tight due to location and not being in Stage 3 yet)

Raphael forgot to buy two garbage and thus could only power nine cities this turn. Most people built up to or just under 11 to take Turn Order on what was expected to be the last turn; except Blair who built to 14, destroying the 14 plant that was in the market. This put a smile on my face as I knew Stage 3 was two cards away and him doing this meant that in Bureaucracy we would hit Stage 3 and therefore next turn would not be an auto win for Jeff but a more interesting, albeit longer, turn.

Turn 9 found Jeff and Raphael both sitting on their plants, Lexi bought the 32 for $32, Blair the 38 for $49 and Kevin snagged the 36 for $36. After builds this was to be the last turn and in the table above you can see the results. Jeff's prediction came true and Kevin (the Turn 2 winner of plant 20 indeed won).

Constructive comments are of course welcome.

Jake can't seem to find the chariots.	Jim Castonguay with his finalists.

2010 Euro Quest Laurelists
Doug Galullo, MD 1st Bill Crenshaw, VA 2nd Henry Dove, MD 3rd Lexi Shea, MA 4th Joseph Jaskiewicz 5th