Perennial Laurelist Secunda Wins 1st Boxcar Championship

Attendance for the tournament was unfortunately slightly down this year. Several people missed the first two heats due to not arriving at the convention in time. For next year I think we will move the tournament heats to Sunday, Monday and Tuesday and move away from the first Saturday. Sixteen players made it to the Semifinal with the four emerging victoriously and advancing to the Final were: Jef Halberstadt, Ron Secunda, Mark Kennel, and Sam Packwood.

The games were generally running just a bit more than 4 hours long with an average time for the games being 4 hours and 20 minutes. In the Heats 3 games were called on time but in the Semifinal all games finished in less than 4 hours and 20 minutes.

There were several very interesting finishes in the Semifinal. At Ron Secunda’s table, Winton declared for home and was 12 away from Atlanta which was his home. He rolled his alternate destination which was Atlanta. If he had waited to go home, he probably would have won. As it was, he rolled a 10 on three dice leaving him with 200K and on a hostile railroad. He wasn’t going to be able to win when he arrived since he had to pay an additional 10K next turn. Unfortunately, he was not under 200 so he couldn’t undeclare and Ron as able to rover him and take 50K from him. Ron was then going to Pittsburg with a home in Chicago. He was about 5-9 away from Pittsburg. If he had rolled big enough, he would have had to go for home with only one die which would have been risky since Trella was there to rover him. Fortunately, he rolled a 4 on his first two dice and was guaranteed in on his third die. The next turn he didn’t even make it exciting since he only need a 6 on three dice and rolled a 10 on 2 dice.

At Sam Packwood’s table, Luke declared and needed a roll of 11 to reach his home. He unfortunately only rolled an 8 on his three dice. Sam was able to rover Luke and then head to his destination in Jacksonville. He was able to declare for his home of Atlanta which was only 5 away and was able to win.

At Mark Kennel’s table it was a battle between the Marks. Maria was able to rover Mark McCandless, setting it up for Mark Kennel to win.

On Wednesday morning, the finals game started about 10 minutes early since everyone showed up early.

Mark bought the following properties, in this order:

• B&O, L&N, CBQ, NP, TP, MP, RF&P

Sam bought the following properties, in this order:

• WP, SAL, AT&SF, C&NW, GN, SLSF, C&O, IC

Ron bought the following properties, in this order:

• NYC, NYNH&H, ACL, UP, CMStP&P, GM&O, NW

Jef bought the following properties, in this order:

Some of the exciting points of the Final included:

1. Jef was headed to Boston and Ron bought the NYNH&H while he was en route. Luckily Jef rolled Boxcars and was safe
2. Ron then rolled Miami right after Sam bought the SAL
3. Mark had to go to NYC, which was hostile but he rolled doubles and made it out ok
4. Mark bought the CB&Q and make Casper hostile for Jef. As payback Mark then rolled San Francisco which was hostile
5. Mark bought the B&O and then his Northeast destination included NYC, NYC, Boston and Portland. He finally rolled Philadelphia but then the game ended before he could arrive
6. The last three properties bought were N&W, IC and B&M (in that order)
7. Ron bought the 1st Superchief. Jef bought a Superchief shortly after Ron. It took Mark and Sam another 45 minutes before they both bought a superchief within 1 turn of each other

As Sam was riding NYC out of Boston (which was hostile), Ron commented “You know, the NYC has the best observation cars on the rear end of the train.” Sam replied, “You can observe my rear end.” Everyone found this extremely hilarious.

The winners in 18 games played held deeds that were worth an average 149K. There are 28 deeds available that total 514K. In a 4 player game if each player held an equal amount of deeds, they would have 128.5K worth of deed so the winners clearly held above average amounts of properties. There was only one game where the winner held less than 128.5K in property. There were five 3-player games in the Heats so the averages were a bit higher in those games.

Here is a list of the number of times a specific railroad was held by the winner:

• Seaboard Air Line 2
• Missouri Pacific 2
• Chicago, Rock Island, & Pacific 2
• Louisville & Nashville 3
• Southern Pacific 3
• Chesapeake & Ohio 3
• Baltimore & Ohio 2
• Union Pacific 3
• Southern Pacific 3
• New York, New Haven, & Hartford 4
• Denver & Rio Grande Western 4
• Gulf, Mobile, & Ohio 4
• Illinois Central 4
• Great Northern 4
• Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul & Pacific 4
• New York Central 49
• Richmond, Fredericksburg, & Potomac 5
• Boston & Maine 5
• Norfolk & Western 5
• Chicago, Burlington, & Quincy 5
• Texas & Pacific 6
• Northern Pacific 7
• Chicago & Northwestern 8
• Pennsylvania 8
• St. Louis & San Francisco 9
• Western Pacific 10
• Atlantic Coast Line 10
• Atchinson, Topeka, & Sante Fe 11