TotalCon 2017 Report

Total Confusion 31 was held in Marlborough Massachusetts on February 23rd to the 26th of 2017. The convention moved to a new venue, the Best Western Royal Plaza. With more space and better lighting the board game space was great to play in and the tournaments were held in separate spaces with less noise and no crowding.

New England Regional Championships are a highlight of the convention. Listed below are the first 3 finishes in each of the 9 New England Championships.

GameChampion2nd3rd
ConcordiaWill WarrenKara MorseAndrew Harris
SplendorAndrew MenardIan DembskyMarvin Birmbaum
Ticket to RideNicholas CheungSteve CostaDean Scungio
St PetersburgAndrew HarrisIan DembskyShelly Thomas
AgricolaRichard J ShayRichard M ShayShelly Thomas
DominionJared RushananAndrew MenardThomas Jarrett
Castles of BurgundyIan DembskyWill WarrenKara Morse
Puerto RicoRichard MeyerAdam ShersonRichard M Shay
Power GridSteve CostaThomas JarrettBill Todd
Stone AgeShelly ThomasMongoJustin Roark

Chairman of the Board: Ian Dembsky

Chairman of the Board is awarded for accumulating the best record in different tournament games. Winning and placing in tournament games earns points, but you can only score for your best game in each tournament. Bonus points are awarded for placing overall in tournaments. Ian won Castles of Burgundy and finished 2nd in Saint Petersburg and Splendor. He also played well in other tournaments. Congratulations Ian.
Catan Regional Qualifier: Ian Dembsky


The Puffing Billy group spends the convention playing railroad themed games and has their own tournament format, giving prizes in the following categories:

Overall Champion: Roger Jarrett

1830: Bruce Beard

Empire Builder: Roger Jarrett

18XX: Bruce Beard

Empire Builder International: Roger Jarrett

There is also a Diplomacy tournament held over the course of convention.
Diplomacy Champ (& Best Italy): Brad Blitstein.

BEST GERMANY: Alan Levin

BEST ENGLAND: Rob Premus

BEST TURKEY: Andrew Katcher

BEST FRANCE: Randy Lawrence-Hurt

BEST AUSTRIA: Jay Aloia

BEST RUSSIA: Steve Cooley

Thurn & Taxis Online Season 1

by Randy Buehler, Meeple League Director of Online Events

This page allows you to follow Season 1 of the Thurn & Taxis online league. Everyone starts at zero points, of course. As results come in the standings will be updated, with players scoring 10 points for winning a game, 6 points for second, 3 points for third, and 1 point for fourth.

The first season has 5 total leagues spread across 3 divisions. Each league has 7 players and each player will be in 4 games, facing each opponent in 2 of them. (The full schedule of games is available HERE.)

Players should use THIS FORM to report results whenever a game ends. (Please do not expect the standings to update instantaneously as we are still working on automating that process. For now it’s still being done by hand.)

Once this season is over, league winners will be promoted to the next division up the ladder while 6th and 7th place finishers will drop to the next division down the ladder. (Full rules can be seen HERE.) New players are also welcome to join when the next season starts – if you aren’t already in the league but would like to be notified when the next one starts taking sign-ups, please click here: Online Thurn & Taxis event announcement.

Standings

Here are the 5 divisions for season 1:

T&T Season 1 Division 1 League A

Player NameGame Site NameWinsCompleted games (of 4)Points
Sceadeau d’TelaSceadeau2432
Alex BoveMontu2426
Kyle SmithEmanon1423
Rob MurrayZenvedev1420
Rob Kircherrkircher418
Randy Buehlerrbuehler1415
Andy Lattoandylatto46

T&T Season 1 Division 2 League A

Player NameGame Site NameWinsCompleted games (of 4)Points
Gilbert Quinonezligtreb1425
Haim Hoichboimhaimke2424
Cary MorrisDagKees1422
Volker Kleinschmidtvolkerk2422
Dominic ReberezDefdamesdompi1420
Mats WikstromZegol416
Bjorn JansonDermerlin411

T&T Season 1 Division 2 League B

Player NameGame Site NamePointsCompleted games (of 4)
Steven LeWinterslewinter314
Hilary Smithhilaryd10294
Devan Maggidevan20.54
Marcy MorelliMarcy184
Nick PageZiggyny14.54
Hermann Reschasamat144
Matt Killianmagakill134

T&T Season 1 Division 3 League A

Player NameGame Site NamePointsCompleted games (of 4)
Andrew MenardDragonWargamer364
John Fordbyrdalumnus234
Greg Crowegregcrowe204
Norman HuebnerNormanH163
Christian EschNebresh123
Andrew Drummondardrummo103
Max Jamellilefty33

T&T Season 1 Division 3 League B

Player NameGame Site NameWinsCompleted games (of 4)Points
Richard M. Shaylabratz2432
Chris Wildeswildes2429
John Corradojmc0032424
Lexi Sheasccrymsc58131417
Erik Lankselanks416
David LutesGelatinousGoo414
Dave Blizzarddavebliz48

Questions?

Feel free to email the GM (online_league at meepleleague dot com) with any questions you might have.

Online Agricola Announcement

Agricola Season 1 Sign-ups Closed

Reserve a Spot in Season 2 Below

The Meeple League recently announced our first online event – a league for Thurn & Taxis players – but we’re not done there. We’re also starting up an online Agricola league for those who like their Eurogames a little heavier. Agricola Cover

The format for all our leagues will be identical: players get grouped with 6 other players and put into 4 games (2 with each other player). Games will then be played asynchronously over the course of several weeks and a point system will be used to determine who wins the league (10 points for 1st, 6 for 2nd, 3 for 3rd, and 1 point for finishing last). Winning your league gets you promoted to a higher division for the next season, while finishing in the bottom 2 gets you demoted to an easier one. You can read the full rules for our league format HERE .

For folks who like a complex challenge, Agricola has proven to be one of the best board games ever made. It may not draw the biggest crowds on the tournament circuit, but it is legendary for its consistently shark-infested fields. When it was first published back in 2007 it led the Spiel des Jahres committee to invent a new category (for “complex games”) so it could award a special prize, and as of this writing in early 2017 it is still the #11 overall ranked game of BoardGameGeek.

We’ll be using the online implementation of Agricola on www.boiteajeux.net. Games will be created with the Tournament mode setting (which just means the banned list used in most tournaments is implemented) and “Draft 7” will be used to distribute occupations and minor improvements from all 3 of the implemented decks: E, I, and K, though there are a few cards from the printed version of the game that have not been implemented  (see the article about online Agricola). For season 1, we’ll be using BPA laurels in Agricola (see the Agricola Event History Page) to seed people into the initial divisions.

                If you want to Sign up for Season 2 Agricola, please fill out this form (this will also put you in as an alternate for season 1 in case someone fails to join their games):

[wpforms id = “967”]

 

Online Thurn & Taxis Tournament

Sign-ups closed for Meeple League's 1st Online Event!

Reserve a spot for the next Season Below

Here at the Meeple League our primary mission is to improve the quality of board game tournament offerings. We are delighted to announce that one of the ways we will do that is by offering our own online events! Just like “live” events, we will use a standardized format so you’ll know what to expect whenever you sign up, but the details for online events will be different from the typical tournaments you might have experienced at a convention.

This article will walk you through everything you can expect from our League format, plus – most importantly – tell you how you can sign up for our first  supported game: Thurn & Taxis!

Our online events will be structured as ongoing leagues, and not as one-shot tournaments. When you sign up you will be placed in a league along with 6 other gamers, and you will be placed into 4 total games (with each other member of your division appearing in 2 of them). All the games will be played “asynchronously” through a specified website, which means players will each check in to see if it’s their turn several times a day at their convenience, and the games will play out over the course of several weeks.

Once all the games are done, we use a point system to see who won each league (10 points for 1st, 6 for 2nd, 3 for 3rd, and 1 point for finishing last). The leagues themselves are divided into divisions and whenever you win a league, you get promoted up to a tougher (but more prestigious) division. Meanwhile, if you finish in the bottom 2 of your league, you get demoted into an easier division for the next season. We’ll keep track of lifetime standings so everyone can see how they measure up, and we’ll also be prominently displaying the names of everyone who wins division one. Click to see detailed rules.

Fans of Terra Mystica may recognize this as the same basic format being used on http://tmtour.org/#/ to govern tournaments run using the online implementation at http://terra.snellman.net.

We think this system will work well for lots of other games, too. Note that in order to seed players for the very first season, we’ll be using the lifetime laurel counts from the Boardgame Players Association – aka, the folks who run the World Boardgaming Championship . You can check your laurels for the game on the T&T Event History Page.

Thurn & Taxis is a nice light Euro-game that has been very popular on the tournament circuit ever since it won the Spiel des Jahres in 2006. It’s actually one of the few games at the World Boardgaming Championships that’s big enough to require a quarter-final round.

Our Thurn & Taxis League will use the online implementation at www.yucata.de. We will use the original version of the game – no expansion content, and no special options. Games are scheduled to start in late January and you’ll receive a schedule in your email once the pairings are ready. If you do sign up, you are committing to checking the website a couple of times on most days (it’s OK if something comes up every once in a while, or if you’re out of town for a weekend (for example), but in general we’re hoping game lengths will be measured in weeks not months.

If you want to play in future Thurn & Taxis tournament, please sign up here:

[wpforms id=”754″]