FLASH AIR POWER STAFF REPEATS STOP ABUSE OF CALIFORNIANS RESULTS IN VICTORY AT BALTIMORE STOP NORTH CAROLINIANS VIE FOR ABUSE IN 1992
We may be cold-hearted, wicked, and amoral here at AIR POWER, but we sure can pick a winner! You'll recall that the official whipping boys of the magazine in 1990 were the Canadians. Their successes at ORIGINS tournaments were chronicled in these pages and we hung our heads, chagrined that our attempts to produce some fighting spirit in the American attendees were for naught.
Nevertheless, this year we pressed on, giving our fine Brothers of the Frozen North a break and picking, instead, on those masters of sun and surf, the Californians. It may be too early to make a statistical statement but given our track record, your best hope for winning an ORIGINS tourney is to be singled out for abuse by AIR POWER.
The Californians blew the top off, winning both the Air Strike and Air Superiority tournaments and placing several finishers in the top five for both. Noting this, the contingent from North Carolina practically demanded that we soundly trash them throughout the coming year and given their penchant for massive inbreeding, that shouldn't prove too difficult.
All kidding aside, the tournaments this year were flat- out fantastic. Participation was great with a full billet of twentyfour for the Strike tourney and thirty-five for the Air Sup game. The scoring system seemed to work very well, and was certainly better than in years gone by. The tournament directors got plenty of crew rest and came prepared with all the materials needed for the day. The players had a load of fun, everybody seemed to be in good spirits, and there was none of the bad feeling that reared its ugly head in Atlanta last year.
The Strike tournament was held on Friday, July 5th, and was structured in a very interesting way. You'll read more about it in the next issue but I will point out that personal obligations on J.D.'s part prevented me from playing in the tourney since I had to fill in as director for several hours. I think that next year I'll be able to get into the Strike tourney and give this year's winner some real competition (are you reading this, Mark?). The game was limited to twenty-four pilots and it was filled up with two or three on the waiting list for most of the day. I wont say anymore but to point out that it resulted in some of the strangest flying I have ever seen.
The Air Superiority tournament started at 0800 on Saturday the 6th. Our fearless Designer, J.D., came in late and since we had a even number of players already, he got to fly me in the first round. This may have been his undoing (or possibly it was the partying the night before-we may never know). The tournament was designed with three preliminary rounds and an "invitational" final round open only to players who had built up sufficiently high scores in the previous rounds. I now believe that the final round was too much-even though it did decide the overall winner--and that three rounds may be the standard in the future.
Some have suggested that the problem wasn't a fourth round but that it was a 4 v 4 scenario and they are usually quite complex and time consuming. I think that's true too and I debated whether to include a 4 v 4 when I was designing the tourney. I still think there's a lot to be said in terms of measuring team flying skills by using a 4 v 4 engagement and maybe if the tournament could be split over two or three days, that last round wouldn't seem so oppressive.
Taking some of my own advice from last year's tourney, I decided that this year's would be based on some of the scoring ideas I put forth in AIR POWER. The basic idea was to give people points for doing what they're supposed to do in this kind of game: kill planes. The rankings of the players were to be based on how well they performed relative to the other pilots with the same plane (match pointing). This would prevent problems associated with unbalanced scenarios.
And though I thought the scenarios were quite well- balanced when I designed them, I see now that there are some subtleties that make balanced scenario design a difficult task. I was very surprised by some of the results and fortunately the day was saved by the match point scoring. The scoring system is outlined here. All the participants received a copy of the following guidelines as they signed up for the tourney, so everyone knew how points were to be awarded.
Tournament Scoring
Match Point Scoring
Players will be ranked using a "match point" scoring system in a variety of scenarios against several opponents. Match points will be assigned at the conclusion of around based on the order of finish of all players who played that scenario using the same aircraft. Players will receive one match point for each such opponent with a lower scenario point total, and half a match point for each such opponent with the same scenario point total.
Three preliminary rounds will be conducted with opponents randomly selected and match points accumulated for all three rounds. The top ranking finishers will be selected to play a fourth and final round. Match points for this round will be adjusted depending on the number of tables in play. Players who do not finish with a high enough score to play the fourth round will not be eligible for awards (except special awards).
Scenario Point Scoring
During the course of a single scenario, players will accumulate scenario points according to the following schedule:
- Each damage roll : 2 + Damage Table,
Each * result : 12 points
Each C result : 8 points
Each H result : 4 points
Each L result : 2 points
Go from Disadvantaged to Advantaged : 2 points
Go from Neutral to Advantaged : 1 point
Jettison no external stores : 1 point
Fuel or A/B allowance remaining : fraction*
* The fraction of fuel left above bingo or the ratio of A/B allowance to A/B turns remaining at end of scenario
No player may score more than 12 total points for damage results against a single aircraft, however, they may score any number of points for damage rolls, regardless of the result. Note that points are scored when an aircraft changes state to Advantaged, not for each turn it maintains such an Advantage.
Participants
As folks gathered for the game, they were handed tickets with a number to be used as their ID throughout the day. I have presented the list of pilots below with their ID number and their call sign. In some cases, I misplaced a pilot's name or never received it- this account for the blanks in the table. Let me apologize in advance for failing to name these players. Hopefully things wont be so chaotic next year and I wont let anyone slip through the cracks.
Every participant played with considerable skill and determination and I am delighted to see that the overall results captured the elevated skill level of everyone present. Air Superiority has been around long enough now that you just don't find too many patsies in the ORIGINS crowd anymore.
| Michael Daniel | 1 | Mad Dog |
| Tony Stanf | 2 | Tiger |
| Curtis Maki | 3 | Slather |
| Paul Procyk | 4 | Wiseguy |
| Gary Bear | 5 | Gunner |
| Karl Mueller | 6 | Hollywood |
| Uel McAdorey | 7 | Hoser |
| Rick Noetzel | 8 | Redneck |
| Roger Taylor | 10 | Woof |
| Mark Bovankovich | 11 | Top Wop |
| John Lang | 12 | Astro |
| Fred_Gray | 13 | Target |
| - | 14 | Slash |
| John Caraher | 15 | Quickdraw |
| Steve Madianovich | 16 | Madman |
| Jack Thomas | 17 | Poacher |
| Mark Burkley | 18 | Mother |
| Jay Davis | 19 | Snake |
| J. D. Webster | 20 | Pluto |
| - | 21 | Wahoo |
| Bruce Merz | 22 | Iceman II |
| - | 23 | Popcorn |
| Dave Larstone | 24 | Colt |
| Bob Gross | 25 | Grossman |
| - | 27 | Iceman Sanz |
| Scott Kreiser | 28 | Slick |
| Rich Silk | 32 | Punch |
| Tim Tynan | 34 | Wildman |
| - | 35 | Lancelot |
| Fran Kiger | 36 | Bald Eagle |
| Eliot Kiang | 37 | Wired |
| Daniel Foxman | 38 | Dragon |
| Doug Smith | 41 | Sled Dog |
| Mike Vanleeuwen | 42 | Zee |
| Mike Phelps | 50 | Cougar |
The Canadians were well represented by Wiseguy, Hoser, Madman, Colt, and Tiger; the surfer crowd by Top Wop, Slather, and Wired; the North Carolina gang included Wildman, Slick, and Cougar; and several renowned independent pilots like Woof, Hollywood, Grossman, and Dragon made for a pretty tough field. I took my usual Killjoy call sign for the first two rounds and J.D. signed up as Pluto again. Pretty much a field of serious gamers.
The first scenario was intended as a nice, little warm-up for the action to follow. I expected a lot of tough flying and gore on both sides, but I didn't get it.
Tournament Summary Key
The chart gives the complete tournament pairings and results if you know how to read it, and I do. You'd probably like to know how to read it too, so here goes.
Pilots are listed in their order of finish overall. The "CALL" column contains the pilot's Call Sign for the tournament. Successive columns are grouped by rounds. Within each round the player's draw (who he flew against), scenario points total, and ranking points are shown. The column labeled "D1" is therefore the draw (or seating) for round one for that pilot.
For instance, Top Wop has "A8" in the D1 column. This means he flew at Table 8 on the "A" scenario side (Tomcat). Players who flew against each other will obviously have the same table number so you can see that Snake and Wildman flew against each other at Table 16 with Snake in the Flanker and Wildman in the Tomcat.
Let's look at that fight in more detail. Wildman earned 35.8 points for the scenario while Snake managed only 1. Obviously Snake faired poorly. On the other hand, we can see in the "R1" column that Snake managed to get 11 ranking points for his performance since he scored better than 10 other Flanker pilots. Wildman managed 16 ranking points, doing better than all other Tomcat pilots.
The columns corresponding to round two are similar but those for round three may be a little confusing at first. If you look at the draw column (D3) for Top Wop's round three, you'll see "MA". This means that Top Wop flew on the A side of the scenario at Table 3 in the "A", or lead, aircraft. His wingman would have been the pilot listed as "A3B" - Redneck. Their opponents would have been B3A and B3B: Wildman and Iceman H.
Round Three also contains an "R3T" column: this is the team ranking point score. For instance note that Gunner got 13.5 ranking points for his personal score of 20 points at Table 4. In addition his team did very well, enough to beat all other MiG teams and earn 7 more ranking points, giving Gunner 20.5 for his round three total.
The "TOT" column contains the total ranking points for all four rounds and the "OVR" is the overall order of finish. The top four players received awards including Gift certificates for GDW products, aircraft pins fashioned in the image of Hornets and Eagles, and, of course, the undying devotion and love of a multitude of fans and Air Superiority groupies (tanned feet, right Mark?)
Gaps and missing information in the Table signify pilots who dropped out of the tourney or who joined in late.
Thanks again to everyone who participated and made for the most enjoyable Air Sup tourney so far! See you guys again in Milwaukee next year. And you'd better brush up 'cause I'll be there!
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© Copyright 1991 by J.D. Webster
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