pursuit of glory  

Updated 11/30/2009

2009 WBC Report  

  2010 Status: pending December Membership Trial Vote

Chris Byrd

2009 Champion

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Event History
2009    Chris Byrd     15
 Laurels

 Rank  Name              From  Last  Total
   1.  Chris Byrd         CT    09     30
   2.  Jeromey Martin     GA    09     18
   3.  Steven Brooks      FL    09     12
   4.  Andy Friedmann     MA    09      9
   5.  Bob Heinzmann      FL    09      6
   6.  Rick Byrens        CA    09      3

2009 Laurelists                                             

Jeromey Martin, GA
2nd

Steven Brooks, FL
3rd

Andy Friedmann, MA
4th

Bob Heinzmann, FL
5th

Rick Byrens, CA
6th


Rick Byrens and Steve Brooks in a Mulligan Round dress rehearsal.

Andy Friedmann warms up against Chris Byrd.

Camel Territory ...

Pursuit of Glory made its debut at WBC having garnered enough votes to be eligible. As a new event, and new game, the decision was made early on to stick with something within the system of the game that could be playable within a relatively short amount of time - hence the Total War scenario, which begins the game in 1916 with the action in full swing, would be played for the first several heats while the "whole hog" of the campaign game would be reserved for the last two rounds. This format was meant not only to shorten the time necessary, to avoid conflicting with vital players of the Paths of Glory (its "parent" game) tournament, but also to test the players' full knowledge of the game in both its incarnations.

Armed with a brief introduction and some spare sheets of information for the errata that had been made specifically for WBC's tournament and the latest rulings from designer Brad Stock, the tournament started with 15-odd players and a mulligan round to test the waters.

Predictably, with a new game and many players not yet having the plethora of experience of the Paths of Glory sharks, the opening bids were all over the place, but the majority stuck with a "0" bid for whatever side the player winning the bid-off die roll felt they would do the best as - or just whichever side they wanted to play.

As expected, and no doubt thanks to the modifications made to the basic, Total War scenario, the end results of the opening, mulligan heat turned out to be fairly balanced, with the Allied Powers/Central Powers wins being 4/3, respectively, with auto-victories being seen on both sides of the coin, but also some armistices.

With a bit of "training" under the participants' belts thanks to the mulligan round, the tournament then proceeded to the more cutthroat, single-elimination rounds. When the last barrage had lifted, the final tally of bids and victories tended to indicate a preference for and slight edge towards the CP, as was expected, but the bid, with the limited player base available, did seem to counterbalance that.

Nonetheless, with the opening rounds completed, four participants met in the semi-finals: Andy Friedmann, GM Jeromey Martin, Chris Byrd and Steve Brooks.

The bids were much the same as the rest of the tournament - Jeromey bidding 1 to play the CP in his round while the game between Steve and Chris saw a 0 bid for the CP by Chris. The game between Jeromey and Andy saw an eventual concession/auto-victory for Jeromey when the Russian forces simply weren't able to hang on, despite a 7th-turn Parvus to Berlin play--in part due to a refusal to give up any ground on the CP/Turk's part in the Caucasian theater. Chris and Steve's game, however, went to the wire, with Chris eventually winning an armistice victory over Steve's Allies.

The Final was staged similarly to Jeromey's previous game with Andy, seeing Jeromey bid and win the CP for 1 VP. Though the game started sluggishly for the Allies (seeing, particularly, a Turn 3 Parvus play), they were able to start making early traction in both Persia and Mesopotamia thanks to invasion forces being sent to the latter as reinforcements. Though the Russians never were able to garner enough VPs to push back the Revolution, they were able to inflict a decent amount of losses on the Turkish manpower pool, which proved to be the final straw. Though the CP was ahead on VPs for much of the game, many factors began to pile up in the Allies' favor. With Greece going to the Allies, the Balkans became a further drain on Central Powers' manpower as the Turks were forced to garrison Adrianople with vital corps while, further south, the Mesopotamian and Egyptian fronts heated up substantially. A non-stop, relentless grind of elite British corps against the best the Turkish forces had to offer saw an eventual snapping of the Turkish line in the former theater as manpower simply ran out and the trickle of German replacements couldn't keep up with the hemorrhaging.

By the time things were said and done, Baghdad had fallen, Mosul was threatened, all of Persia was British and the Egyptian Front saw the fall of all VPs to the Allied forces save for Jerusalem and Damascus - the Arab revolters proving particularly useful in bagging Mecca and Medina, as well as Maan, albeit with additional Indian forces landing. The game did, however, go down to the last turn, seeing a last-second breach of the Turkish-German alliance to capture Baku as well as an abrupt landing by Kitchener's Invasion at Smyrna, cementing another VP in Chris' favor. Thanks to the bid and the aggressive offensives--and despite the CP capture of the entirety of the Caucasus - the game ended in the Allies' favor at 8 VPs - a narrow victory, but victory nonetheless, and a well-deserved one on Chris Byrd's part.

Rick Byrens pays the piper vs Jeromey Martin.

Chris Byrd and Jeromey Martin settle the wood in the Final.
 GM      Jeromey Martin  [1st Year]   NA
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