1991: Steve Rareshide, VA
1992: Kevin Quirk, PA

Brian Sutton, MD
1993

Chuck Kaplan, IL
1994

Steve Koleszar, VA
1995, 2001

Ben Foy, VA
1996

Dave Finberg, MA
1997, 2003, 2009, 2011

Jung Yeah, MA
1998

David des Jardins, CA
1999, 2005

Rich Atwater, WA
2000

Ed Rothenheber, MD
2002

Pete Gathman, John Rinko, Craig Melton and Rich Atwater	Akihisa Tabei, Ed Rothenheber and Dan Strock

There were 16 4-player and ten 3-player games in the preliminary rounds. This is down from last year when we recorded 32 preliminary games. Only six games were played on Friday -- perhaps a consequence of the prevailing weather conditions.

I favor a scheduling change in 2013. Since a lot of crazy stuff happens in the Final due to people being tired after playing the semis and Final back to back, I want to split them between Friday and Saturday. In order to help attract players, I want to have games on Tuesday evening (overlapping the demos). So the preliminary part of the event would run Tuesday evening through Thursday night. The semis would be Friday morning and the Final Saturday morning. This is subject to approval by the powers that be, but is what I plan to submit for the event for 2013.

Akihisa Tabei again gave old style counter sheets to the four finalists.

I'd like to thank David des Jardins for recording the Final and a rough copy of that data will be available on the web.

In Semifinal 1, Steve Koleszar was leading with good brush legions and a legion with two minotaurs, but withdrew because of the heat in Lampeter. (For those of you not there, the AC had issues for most of the week.) That left Brian Sutton in the lead. Then Brian's titan legion with two warbears and two angels was forced into the mountains and attacked by Akihisa Tabei with angel, two minotaurs and two trolls with an angel to summon. Aki took the angel from his other legion but forgot to enter it on the turn it could come in (and hence was returned to the original legion), allowing Brian to survive with his titan and two angels. Then, one of Dan Strock's legions was attacked by Aki and he was able to get an archangel. Dan had just two legions at that point (two rangers, angel and archangel and titan, two warbears, warlock, giant and unicorn). At this point Brian's titan was in a tower with two warlocks and an angel (and multiple serpent legions) when Aki moved next to that tower with titan, warlock and five rangers. Brian needed to roll a 5 or 6 to reach Aki's titan with a serpent legion, but only rolled a four. Brian fled the tower, to a marsh. Aki needed a 5 or 6 to reach Brian, but only rolled a 2. Then Dan rolled a 6 and teleported on Brian's titan with titan, archangel, unicorn, warlock and two warbears. Aki made a desperate attack the next turn, but didn't get the miracle he needed.

In Semifinal 2, Jonathan Barnes got his five-high titan legion trapped between two six-high brush legions belonging to Aaron Fuegi and Bruce Rae. Bruce attacked Jonathan's titan on Turn 3, and with some good rolls, won handily. For a while the game proceeded with few points being earned, but with the remaining players all mustering well, especially Aaron. Then Bruce was able to win a few battles and get teleportation. Bruce attacked Aaron's titan in the hills with his first 6. Again Bruce got good rolls, but still was stripped of recruiters. Bruce had titan and two angels after the battle, but was able to get into towers to gain some warlocks, while Kevin Hillock was mustering serpents. Bruce was able to muster well with his other legions, getting some hydras, serpents and unicorns. He used these other legions to pin down Kevin's few legions. Bruce was then able to attack Kevin's titan (with three serpents) with his own serpent legion, summoning an archangel and won a close battle. Bruce remarked that this was the best Titan game of his life.

In Semifinal 3, Tom Johnston was able to recruit all ten colossus, which is very rare. Perhaps even rarer, is that David Finberg was able to defeat Tom after a long game despite facing ten colossus. Micheal Pustilnik and Jason Ley had each withdrawn after their positions became hopeless.

Pete Gathmann was eliminated in Semifinal 4 when David des Jardins attacked his titan legion with his own titan legion containing rangers and gorgons. David got lucky to win the battle and survived with a 12-point titan and two angels. Sean McCulloch attacked him the next turn. At a key point in the battle, David played for a win rather than a mutual (since he would not advance even if he won the roll off) and Sean emerged with a 12-point titan and two angels. Shortly afterwards Sean got his titan into a tower, at which point Justin Childs resigned.

For the Final we moved to a cooler location to escape Lampeter's anticipated lava flow. It was a good thing too because all four players were in the game for a long time! On Turn 33, Sean McCulloch resigned as his titan legion had been stripped and his only other legion was outmatched. Immediately after this, David Finberg attacked guardian, warlock and five rangers belonging to Dan Strock, with his titan, a serpent, two behemoths and three gorgons. David's titan was still only a 6 despite the length of the game. Despite David's advantage, the battle went south and became a mutual. Several turns later Dan was able to catch Bruce's 12-point titan, an ang, two behemoths and a gorgon with two giants, two warbears and two rangers to win his first Titan title.

Brian Sutton, Akihisa Tabei, Dan Strock and Steve Koleszar	Dave des Jardins oversees the finalists.