Ten Newcomers despite decline in Attendance

This year’s field of forty-three players, participating in 3 preliminary heats, was one of the smallest ever for Brass, but still included ten newcomers.

A new Brass game has been developed using Kickstarter funding. If it is released by the WBC deadline for new games of March 15, 2018, this new game, Brass: Birmingham, will be introduced at next year’s WBC as part of the Brass tournament. Using the same format as the 18xx tournament, either game (Brass or Brass: Birmingham) can be played in the heats with the agreement of all the players at the table. The semi-final and final will still use Brass.

Nineteen preliminary games in this year’s Brass tournament produced two double winners, of which only Cary Morris survived the semifinals to advance to the final. A total of 16 qualifiers played in the semifinals to thin the herd. When the survivors emerged from the four semifinal matches, no finalist from the previous year moved on. Advancing to the final was former champ Greg Thatcher, assistant GM Jack Jung, Ben Scholl and Cary Morris.

The Canal period proceeded with Jack playing an efficient mills strategy to build and flip three level 3 Mills, with Cary close behind flipping two level 3 mills. Ben balanced Iron and coal production with port building and Greg focused on Iron Mills in the Canal phase. At the beginning of the Rail Era no real leader had emerged with victory points ranging from 26 to 39 and the highest income level a modest four. Jack and Cary continued with mills and Ben changed to shipyards, building both ships. Meanwhile, Greg was hindered by a miss-fitting card draw which forced him into ports and mills. After some overbuilding and a last gasp shipyard, Greg maintained his small lead to claim victory in Brass. Ben finished second, followed by Jack then Cary.

I would like to thank Paul Sampson, Kevin Snider and my assistant GM Jack Jung for their help in this years’ Brass tournament.