TWS: Twilight Struggle

twilight struggle

Updated Nov. 23, 2012

2012 WBC Report
2013 Status: pending 2013 GM commitment

Riku Riekkinen, fn

2012 Champion

Event History

2006    Stefan Mecay     70

2007    Stefan Mecay     66

2008    Stefan Mecay     54

2009    Chris Withers     66

2010    Stefan Mecay     57

2011    Stefan Mecay     55

2012    Riku Riekkinen    64

WAM Event History

2007    Keith Wixson     30

2008    Marvin Birnbaum     35

2009    Stefan MeCay     28

2010    Chris Byrd     21

2011    Stefan MeCay     27

2012    Chris Byrd     30

PBeM Event History

2008 Stefan Mecay 86

Laurels

Rank  Name              From  Last  Total
  1.  Stefan Mecay       TX    11    413
  2.  Chris Withers      CA    12    161
  3.  Keith Wixson       NJ    12    134
  4.  Rick Young         NC    09    100
  5.  Chris Byrd         CT    12     82
  6.  Marvin Birnbaum    NY    12     78
  7.  Riku Riekkinen     fn    12     60
  8.  Bill Edwards       VA    10     54
  9.  Bruce Monnin       OH    11     46
 10.  Paul Sampson       OH    12     43
 11.  Randy Pippus       on    12     42
 12.  James Terry        NJ    11     37
 13.  Rob Hassard        NJ    10     32
 14.  Stuart Tucker      MD    08     31
 15.  John Emery         SC    06     30
 16.  Steven Brooks      FL    10     29
 17.  George Seary       NY    08     28
 18.  Sean McCulloch     OH    09     25
 19.  Roderick Lee       CA    11     24
 20.  Darren Kilfara     uk    08     24
 21.  George Young       VT    10     21
 22.  Phil Rennert       MD    08     20
 23.  Michael Mitchell   GA    12     19
 24.  M. Pare-Paquin     qc    12     18
 25.  Kevin Hammond      WA    11     16
 26.  Tim Bina           CA    11     16
 27.  Mike Wallschlaeger WI    09     15
 28.  John Buse          IL    06     15
 29.  Larry Fryer        MD    12     12
 30.  Bruce DuBoff       NJ    08     10
 31.  Derek Landel       NJ    11      8
 32.  Doug Austin        VA    07      8
 33.  David Amidon       PA    12      6
 34.  Suzanne Tuch       NY    08      6
 35.  Dave Gerson        CA    09      5
 36.  John Wetherell     PA    09      5
 37.  Michael Sosa       FL    08      5
 38.  Kevin Earle        VA    12      4
 39.  C. Georgantzas     NY    11      4
 40.  Charles Hickok     PA    07      4

2012 Laurelists Repeating Laurelists: 0

Chris Withers, CA
2nd

Paul Sampson, OH
3rd

Mathieu Pare-Paquin, qc
4th

Randy Pippus, on
5th

David Amidon, PA
6th

Past Winners

Stefan Mecay, TX
2006-08, 2010-11

Chris Withers, CA
2009

Riku Riekkinen, fn
2012


Eli Persky draws the Finnish POG champ.	Keith Wixson vs Randy Pippus

Anthony Raimo escapes the Showroom.	Chris Byrd vs Derek Landel

Riku Wargames the Field ...

Notwithstanding the heat and humidity of Lampeter, Twilight Struggle posted a nice attendance increase. In addition, more total games (78) were played than in recent years as many took advantage of the new swiss format to play more rounds, including the 4th place finisher, Matthieu Pare-Paquin, who missed the first round but won his next four games. Cold Warriors appear to be heartier than other wargamers as we did not see the attendance falloff suffered by most tournaments in Lampeter.

The tournament used two adjustments to dampen the early war VP swings that often favor the Russians. The main option was the use of the Chinese Civil War variant, which prevents early Russian play of Red Scare and has other balancing effects. In addition, players bid for sides; typical bids gave the US 2-3 additional influence at start.

After four rounds of play, only three unbeatens remained: Riku Riekkinen, Chris Withers, and Paul Sampson. Philip Burgin-Young was randomly selected among those with one loss to complete the final four. Riku was paired with Paul, and accepted the Americans for a bid of 3. The USSR took an early edge with some good coup rolls and early play of Destalinization. Riku nonetheless controlled the tempo for significant periods, neutralizing areas immediately prior to scoring and using final action rounds to disrupt the position at the end of the turn. The game ended on Turn 10 when Riku played Wargames. In the other match, the Russians got off to a poor start and Chris's Americans never let Philip recoup.

Riku took the Soviets in the Final with a bid of 3. Early Destalinization enabled the Russians to gain a favorable position in Asia, which the Americans partially offset by taking Europe. Still, Early War ended with the Russians up 7 VPs. In Mid War, the battle shifted to Central America, then South America; by the end of Turn 5, the Americans had pulled back to -1 VPs, but the Russians gained a more favorable board position. This produced a -6 lead at the end of Mid War, with a strong Russian position in the Mideast giving the Russians an edge. Riku increased the VPs by one more, then dropped Wargames for the win on Turn 9.

Game play, as usual, favored the Russians, even with the Chinese Civil War and bidding. The Russians won 49 games; US 29. This is a fairly large edge so balance provisions will be reexamined before next year's tournament.