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Kremlin (KRM) WBC 2022 Event Report
Updated December 20, 2023
43 Players Scott Beall Event History
2022 Champion & Laurels
 

Beall Wins On Turn 4

Kremlin is a game that most of us do not play outside of WBC (no, my group won't play with me either), so I guess it's not too surprising that our player numbers were not very different from what we saw in 2019. We had a few unusual games during the heats, which I'm going to blame on the players all being a bit rusty. In one game, Victor Wasolin was assigned to Defense at the start of the game and no one assigned any Influence to him – Sean McCulloch added two points after turn 3, and claimed victory with him as Party Chief on turn 9 when the Politburo couldn't be filled. In another game, the initial Politburo draw remained in place until turn 4, when a combination of card play, purges, and the health die took out seven of the eight members.

The setup for the Final was weighted towards young Politburo members, with Nestor and Krakemheds (as Foreign Minister) the only members over 70. To start things off, Nick put a point on Nestor to put him in the cure, but an immediate bidding war forced him to show a full nine points to get it done. Roy purged Nikotin from Sport with help from a First Purge card, and also got one candidate before Ludmilla failed on the third try. Defense Minister Natasha was claimed by Scott; he condemned a candidate and opened an investigation on Nestor. In the Health phase, Nick played the Specialist card on Nestor, so despite a low die roll he survived; Goferbrok moved up to the Sport ministry by age. With Nestor still in the Sanitarium, Nick got a failed wave in the Parade phase. (This was enough to secure second place in the tournament.)

Nestor came out of the Cure at the start of Turn 2 as a preventative measure. As Nick feared, the Party Chief was put on trial in the Spy Investigation phase. Despite promises to do whatever a second innocent voter wanted, Nestor was sent to Siberia. In the Funeral Commission, Ludmilla was automatically nominated as the older of the two possibilities, and the nomination succeeded, leaving Roy (temporarily) in control of a healthy 67-year-old Party Chief. He swapped Foreign and Defense (Krakemheds & Natasha) and let Goferbrok become KGB head by age. However, in the Parade phase, Scott claimed the position with 9 Influence and waved automatically.

With no points showing on Goferbrok, Turn 3's Purge phase was passed. A point on Krakemheds let Roy condemn Doberman, open investigations on Ludmilla and Goferbrok, and close the one on Krakemheds. In the Replacement phase, Scott swapped Krakemheds and Natasha back to their original posts, and he got another automatic wave in the Parade phase.

In the subsequent Add Influence phase, some of the other players tried to conspire to deny Scott votes, while others just took additional Intrigue cards. Krakemheds was sent to the Sanitarium at the start of Turn 4, making it possible for him to be nominated in a hoped-for Funeral Commission. In the Purge phase, Nick put a point on Goferbrok, but after Roy's play of the card which allows the KGB head to reveal a dossier, Scott showed enough Influence to control the position and revealed all Influence on Ideology minister Bungaloff (where he had none). A first purge card played against the Industry minister succeeded, after which Scott purged Bungaloff; a third purge attempt failed.The Party Chief was put on trial despite Scott's control of both the Party Chief and KGB Head, just in case; both voted innocent to quickly end the trial. A flu epidemic in the Health phase succeeded in making Ludmilla sick, giving some hope to the other players. However, a successful Intrigue card die roll to put Ludmilla in the Sanitarium was cancelled by Scott's Intrigue card play, and a final die roll gave Scott the third wave and the win.

2022 Laurelists Repeating Laurelists: 0
Nick Benedict Jason Arvey Roy Pettis Peter Stein Chris Troope
2nd 3rd 4th 5th 6th
McCulloch happy with his politician! Not sure who to trust in this crowd.
Photographer can only distract one from this table. Looks like the original Politburo, Stein, Corrado
and Cucarro.
 
GM  Steve Cuccaro [15th Year]