In 2024 a total of 53 art collectors gathered at Seven Springs, PA in a bid to be the most notorious. Following all three Heats five contenders scored a perfect 10 (first place in both games played in a single Heat); Adele Gibbens, Nate Peterson, Haakon Monsen, Samanatha Raszewski, and Maverick Morris. The 20 player Semifinal had 4 tables of 4, all winners advancing to the Final along with the highest second place for a full table of 5 collectors.
Victors Adele Gibbens, Haakon Monsen, John Pack, and David Meyaard advanced, as well as Nate Peterson squeaking out a better second place than Karl Henning (both one space over the finish line, but Nate finishing with an 11 card set to Karl’s eight) who had to settle for 6th overall in this year's competition.
The Final started out a tight race as these experienced art enthusiasts hastily began the usual business of thieving their way to a better exhibit. The second turn of the game saw only David and Nate’s thieves in the castle and the auction house was no exception, both the largest checks ($24k & $23k) were stolen by the third turn. The detectives began to show by turn 5 but that didn’t result in much more than a quick rotation thru jail for everyone's busy burglars.
By turn 9 the collectors reached the first corner on the board and thieving was still present in both auction house and castle. It wasn’t until halfway through the game that we saw the first ‘detective convention’ of the Final (as everyone went to the castle and played detective). By turn 16 the auction house was mostly abandoned as scoring points via detectives and exhibits became the priority - David managed a solo exhibit that round as everyone else detected and surprisingly caught no thieves.
Turn 17 saw exhibits by David and John, and turn 18 saw a third exhibit in a row by David, taking a strong lead, but this time two thieves (sent by Haakon and John) showed up as well. Then David and John exhibited again, suffering losses to Adele and Nate's thieves. Next, Adele managed a solo trip to the castle while David spent $17k to piece together another set. By turn 21 David managed one space shy of the finish line thanks to exhibiting solo, again while John thieved. Turn 22 wrapped things up while Haakon exhibited, Adele and David sent detectives and Nate stole art. David's one detective point sent him over the finish line.
Final exhibit points were awarded to Nate with a nine card set and 1650 oldest, and Adele also with 9 cards,1660 oldest.
David won without moving during the final showing (having ended the game with no set) - one space over the finish line. Nate was one space behind, followed by Adele, Haakon and John respectively, no tie breakers needed.
|
|
|
GM Angela Bender and Marc Houde in Heat action. |
A serious game of Adel including David-John Pack. |
|
|
Bronwyn Woods studying the board. |
Finalists for Adel Verpflichtet. |
|