Origins `90 Tournament Report
Part 3

Saturday: Main Tournament Semifinals
Rounds One and Two

by J.D. Webster

Round One

As I mentioned last issue, Friday's grueling three rounds of play had failed to break out any clear winners so the tournament was continued into Saturday. Anyone who had scored an actual "Kill" during Friday's gaming was to be considered a semi-finalist. This ruling reduced the original group of seventeen who had finished all three rounds down to a field of eight players.

Anyone else that showed up on Saturday was allowed to play in either the Air Strike Tournament or, if enough new faces appeared, I planned to start a new minitourney. As it was, only about 14 people showed and only one was a new face who hadn't been there on Friday. I took the eight semifinalists aside and put the other six into the Air Strike Tournament.

The Semi-finalists were a bit concerned about how things had gone on Friday, so I took the time to clarify all rules that would be used in play. I also announced that while they would retain credit for the kills they made the day before, everyone would be starting with a clean slate as far as points went and that any serious rules bickering would be dealt with by disqualification from the tourney.

With this bunch, however that was never a problem. I told them to expect to play two or three games and that these were intended to allow me to break out some winners. To be honest, I really didn't have anything planned as far as scenarios went so I kind of was pulling the whole tournament set up out of my behind. My object was mainly to select a first through fourth place from these eight maniacs but the lack of structure to the day's events and to my scoring system which changed as we went along did cause some grumbling (right Tony?) (Oh, yes).

The Finalists at the start of the day were (in no particular order):

    1. Mike Phelps, "Cougar", 3 kills, North Carolina, USA.
    2. Ray Lament, "Mojo", 2 kills, Ontario, Canada.
    3. Steve Madjanovich, "Madman", 2 kills, Ont., Canada.
    4. Tony Valle, "Killjoy", 2 kills, Georgia, USA.
    5. Mark Bovankovich, "Top Wop", I kill, Calif., USA.
    6. Paul Procyck, "Wise Guy", I kill, Ontario, Canada.
    7. Bob Gross, "Grossman", I kill, New York, USA.
    8. John Vasilakos, "Greek", I kill, Virginia, USA.

Before I go any further, I'd like to point out that the finalists were all Air Power subscribers. They also included three Canadians out of the five that entered the tourney which is out of a total field of twenty some odd starters. Why they're also all from Ontario I can't say but and I might add that Paul was the 1988 Tournament winner. There's definately something odd about these guys: maybe its what they eat, or that Moose Head Canadian Lager they're always quaffing, but the fact is, they're good and they keep coming back. I didn't make up all that anti-Canadian hysteria for no reason!

Anyway, the first set up I threw at them was the "HORNET DANCE!" scenario which I had used in the 1988 Origins Tournament. As usual, the players were randomly matched and play commenced.

"Hornet Dance" was described in issue #2 of Air Power so I won't repeat it here. Basically it's two fully armed Hornets starting nose to nose in adjacent hexes at speed 7.0 and altitude 15. Each has full cannon, four AIM-9L and a DDS load of 8 chaff and 7 flare. The scenario lasts 8 turns.

Overview Of Play

The Hornet is such a lethal dogfighter and the players so talented that the first mistake generally decided the scenario. I didn't watch as I was busy helping with the Air Strike Tourney set up at the time so I can only give the results plus the following guest views.

Results

Grossman versus Greek: Bob wins by shootdown, 2nd kill. No battle notes available.

Killjoy versus Cougar: Tony cripples Mike and wins by points. No battle notes available.

Madman versus Mojo: Madman GLOC's himself on turn one and awakens with Ray rolling onto to his tail. A barrage of missiles and cannon fire follows over the next several turns resulting in Ray crippling Steve's wildly evading Hornet. Ray wins on points.

Top Wop versus Wiseguy, (as seen and told by Wise Guy): This one was intense. I would not hesitate to say that we are both good. I think my opening move was telling because I went to idle immediately to get a quicker comering speed which made a difference about two turns later. After that, Mark could never regain the initiative.

He used a brilliant move at one point which would have given him excellent position, but not as he mistakenly believed, a firing position. Unfortunately, he had to roll for GLOC and went sleepy time! He recovered on the next turn but by then I was around and on his tail. I fired two Limas, one failed and one was decoyed. On the next turn I fired two more, same results. I followed up with an 80% gun shot on the wildly maneuvering Californian but missed and time ran out. I was pissed but won on points.

Round Two

Paul called this one the "Evil Random Circus Of Death". I like that description. Basically, round two was a bring your own Air Force. Each player was allowed to choose up to 34 points of aircraft and missiles. The competition was again one on one with aircraft starting from opposite sides of a pair of maps in some mutually agreeable nuetral start set up. As before, I was busy with the Air Strike game, so I can only provide the results and some guest reports.

Overview of Play

Surprise was the order of the day in this one as neither player was supposed to know what the other had until visual I.D.s or certain game actions caused them to be revealed. The low point spread limited aircraft to the non-super fighter va- riety and the results were colorful. This one was so much fun, that I will probably use it again in the future. Of note, the Luftwaffe F4F+ upgraded Phantom proved to be a popular choice.

Results

Mojo QA-37 Viggen) versus Greek (F-4F+): Ray won on points. Starting abeam, both adversaries turned into each other but Ray got off two missiles first. John's F4F+ decoyed these and as he passed the Viggen, both used vertical rolling dives to reface toward each other. Another head-on pass resulted in no shots. The two continued their turning and diving death dance circling to pass head-on yet again with no shots. Game ended. Ray had points from his shots.

Cougar (F4F+) versus Grossman (Lightning F.6 + MG19S): A fine display of flying kept Bob's two vicious dogfighters from scoring but Mike was unable to score even though he stayed offensive more. End result was considered a draw although Bob conceded that Mike had played better and should be the winner based on points.

Killjoy (F4F+) versus Wise Guy (two A4H) as told by Paul: I had a pair of Israeli Skyhawks vs. Tony's West German Uber Phantom. I tried my usual high-low split but it didn't work. Tony caught my high guy right on the edge of his IR uncage envelope and let fly with a missile which shot it down (Tony's third kill). It was at this point I realized that if Tony got my number two guy that the tournament was his Needless to say personal and national honour was riding on this game. I did everything in my power to prevent a second kill. However, Tony did manage to secure one more missile shot which I decoyed. It came to be a close call but the bell rang in the knick of time.

Top Wop (F-104C + A4M) versus Madman (Sea Harrier + Harrier GR.3) as told by Mike: Steve and I were the only two versus two match so J.D. gave us an extra five turns to compensate for the increased distance of our set up. Our game began with both sides unspotted and this would weigh heavily on the outcome. By turn three his Harriers and my Scooter were closing at their max transonic speeds while my Star Fighter was accelerating through 900 mph. Both Harriers sighted my A4 at the same time that I saw his Sea Harrier He sent his GR.3 to hassle it while holding the Sea Harrier back to deter the F- 104. That was good for me as I spotted the GR.3 at the merge and felt that I could dazzle his VIFFing beasty with the A4's high rate of roll. The F-104 commenced high speed slashing attacks and remained unsighted most of the game.

Essentially, it went like this: both the A4 and the GR.3 yanked and banked with no result while the FRSA circled about wildly vying to sight the F-104 as it made repeated passes through the furball. The Star Fighter blew two gunshots (a 30% and 50%) and barely missed getting off a missile shot due to vertical limits. Neither of us had inflicted any damage by the end, though I held the initiative most of the game. The end result was a draw.

Well, at the end of round two, I decided to cull the field to just four finalists for the championship round. A quick look at the scoring showed that I had Mike and Tony in the lead with three kills each, followed by Bob, Ray and Steve still with two kills apiece. To further distinguish the finalists I then suddenly announced that anyone who had crippled an enemy would get credit for a half-kill. [Why I did that still confuses me. But I believe that I was suffering from some weird paranoic schizophrenia brought on by three days of little sleep, too much late night beer, and certainly a loss of situational awareness along with a Fruedian need to see some clear ranking of players].

To wit, I now had Tony with 3.5 kills, Mike with 3, Ray with 2.5 and Steve and Bob with 2 each. I decided Bob was out as he had not played in round one on Friday, having entered the tournament late by substituting in for a player who dropped out after round one. It wasn't a fair way to pick finalists but it was time to get this marathon tournament ended and I was not thinking well.

Origins `90 Tournament Report Part 3

Origins `90 Tournament Report Part 2

Origins `90 Tournament Report Part 1

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