WTC24 Conclusion

[angusosborne]

Thank you to everyone who has played in the World Team Championship. I hope you enjoyed it.

The winning team is Zhu Que from China. They out-scored their opponents in every round and beat the 2nd, 3rd and 4th placed teams, so a completely deserved win.

Second place is Furor Gallico by a clear margin from all the teams below.

Third is The Charming Champians who submarined their way into the top three.


You might have noticed that Eric Doman did not finish his last game, and that triarii and I have been running this competition for the last round. Eric has serious health issues and was unable to play. Please send him your love and best wishes, and if you're a believer your prayers. This tournament would not have taken place without him, and he has made a huge contribution to our little community.

My thanks to triarii also for diligently looking after the scoring of a competition he's not playing in.

[wzfcns]

Thanks to all the players, and I'll briefly give my thoughts as the ZhuQue team.
I am very proud of my teammates for this excellent result. Objectively speaking, my recruitment didn't go as well this time as last year - this was due to a number of reasons, but my teammates achieved a very bright performance that touched me tenfold.It's been 6 years since the release of FOG2, and players from all over the world continue to have a high level of enthusiasm for the game, not only for participating in the WTC, but also for the TDC and the HMOL and other competitions.I'm glad to be a part of it, and I'm looking forward to seeing what Byzantium will brings to FOG.
Like last time, here a true ancient Chinese military aphorism:

As you have ten points of military ability on normal day, if you can use five points in battles, you will be successful; if you can use eight points, you will be invincible; I have never heard of anyone who can show all his normal ability in real battles.
-Qi Jiguang,Left Governor of the Central Military Command ,Commander-in-Chief of Jizhou, Changping, Liaodong and Baoding,Ming Dynasty.
平日十分武艺，临时如用得五分出，亦可成功；用得八分，天下无敌；未有临阵用尽平日十分本事，而能从容活泼者也。
-戚继光，明朝中军都督府左都督，总理蓟州、昌平、保定、辽东四镇练兵事务

Next up a bit of my personal words about Eric:
Eric was the one who reached out to me when I was making my Silk Road mod .He gave me a lot of help and got me involved in TDC. I am grateful to him and look forward to his healthy recovery.

[SimonLancaster]

I really enjoyed the tournament. Well run with up-to-date tables.

Let’s hope Eric gets better. He has done a great job over the years and inspired a lot of players with his top level performances.

[alexhstandish]

On behalf of the Bastards, a big thank you to all of the organisers for what has been a tremendous fun competition, and thank you to all our opponents.
Well done to the winners, you were a very tough team to play against !!

With very best wishes and thoughts to Eric

Boudicca's Bastards

[MrCrow]

I would also like to take this opportunity to thank the organizers for the time and dedication they put into this community initiative and to congratulate the three teams sharing the podium, especially the winners. I would also like to join in expressing my heartfelt wishes for a speedy recovery to Eric, whom I unfortunately have not yet had the pleasure of playing with. I am a relatively new player when it comes to competitions and tournaments, and those who know me are aware that I generally hesitate to play in competitive settings (I much prefer friendly matches for a variety of reasons). The aspect of the WTC that I enjoyed the most was the team dynamic: sharing tactics, ideas, or even simple opinions with my teammates was incredibly fun, to the point where I sincerely hope to see a co-op mode in this wonderful game in the future.

However, to be honest, there were some aspects I liked less. These are my very personal opinions, but I’d like to share them in case they could serve as inspiration for future editions. First of all, I didn’t particularly like having multiple teams from the same nation. I would have preferred one team per nation, perhaps with more than four players per team. Additionally, I wasn’t a fan of the time frame management, which I found too extended; some matchups felt markedly anachronistic and, at times, tedious. Often, the factions available at the end of a time period were more advanced than those at the beginning, which caused balance issues and led players to repeatedly choose the same factions (Period 2, for instance, felt like the Roman Civil War).

If I may suggest a few ideas for the future, I personally would really enjoy a tournament based on the Swiss system but with this format:
1. One team per nation, with a minimum of 10 nations and a maximum of 14. Each nation would have at least 4 players and up to 8.
2. Four time periods, but much more restricted in terms of duration, and drawn randomly from a pool of available periods (for example, 8 periods could be created, of which 4 are drawn for each edition).
3. Teams with more than 4 players could rotate their players across periods as they see fit (similar to how reserves are currently used).
4. A total of 3 to 5 rounds, depending on the total number of teams, with paired matches, and each round lasting 3 weeks.

This way, much like in the HOML tournament, there would likely be far more variety in terms of factions and probably much more fun and unpredictability as well.

[SimonLancaster]

I did think we had too many Roman armies in Classical/Period 2. However, it would add more admin to proceedings with players having to submit at least two army choices, etc. 8 out of 14 armies were Roman in Period 2.

[Captainwaltersavage]

On behalf of the Charming Champians I would like to add our thanks to the organisers. This has been a thoroughly engaging competition that has brought great despair and joy - as any good competition should.

"Submarined their way in" How very dare you!

If you were watching carefully you would have noticed we were following the typical Disney sports team storyline.

The initially reluctant Coach (Eric convinced me to join the competition) joins a team of misfits and has-beens (we were not good enough for the A team) who then endure a series of disastrous games - we spent more time in last place then any other team for the first two rounds.

Then we started to win - we moved up to 11th place, then 7th,In the 4th round I lost my match, but everyone else stepped up and gained all the points, then somehow we made it to 3rd, and then against all the odds we managed to hang in there till the end.

We did not submarine our way to success, we storylined it!

I am talking to my agent about the film rights. The soundtrack is obviously by Queen - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FP808MiJUcM If you sing along its pronounced champIANs

We are wishing Eric well. Personally I think I have played more games against Eric than any other player. He is an exceptionally gifted player and has been a fabulous coach. If not for him I would have missed out on this competition and playing with, and against, such fabulous people. He convinced me by saying that I would only have to play somewhere between 3 and 7 matches, using the group and knockout approach. It was 15 matches, Eric, 15... I am glad he conned me (It was all the practice matches that did the damage!).

Captain Ian.

[angusosborne]

I would also like to take this opportunity to thank the organizers for the time and dedication they put into this community initiative and to congratulate the three teams sharing the podium, especially the winners. I would also like to join in expressing my heartfelt wishes for a speedy recovery to Eric, whom I unfortunately have not yet had the pleasure of playing with. I am a relatively new player when it comes to competitions and tournaments, and those who know me are aware that I generally hesitate to play in competitive settings (I much prefer friendly matches for a variety of reasons). The aspect of the WTC that I enjoyed the most was the team dynamic: sharing tactics, ideas, or even simple opinions with my teammates was incredibly fun, to the point where I sincerely hope to see a co-op mode in this wonderful game in the future.

However, to be honest, there were some aspects I liked less. These are my very personal opinions, but I’d like to share them in case they could serve as inspiration for future editions. First of all, I didn’t particularly like having multiple teams from the same nation. I would have preferred one team per nation, perhaps with more than four players per team. Additionally, I wasn’t a fan of the time frame management, which I found too extended; some matchups felt markedly anachronistic and, at times, tedious. Often, the factions available at the end of a time period were more advanced than those at the beginning, which caused balance issues and led players to repeatedly choose the same factions (Period 2, for instance, felt like the Roman Civil War).

If I may suggest a few ideas for the future, I personally would really enjoy a tournament based on the Swiss system but with this format:
1. One team per nation, with a minimum of 10 nations and a maximum of 14. Each nation would have at least 4 players and up to 8.
2. Four time periods, but much more restricted in terms of duration, and drawn randomly from a pool of available periods (for example, 8 periods could be created, of which 4 are drawn for each edition).
3. Teams with more than 4 players could rotate their players across periods as they see fit (similar to how reserves are currently used).
4. A total of 3 to 5 rounds, depending on the total number of teams, with paired matches, and each round lasting 3 weeks.

This way, much like in the HOML tournament, there would likely be far more variety in terms of factions and probably much more fun and unpredictability as well.

Thanks for your feedback. We will look at changes before the next one. I agree with you that there were too many similar armies.

[angusosborne]

On behalf of the Charming Champians I would like to add our thanks to the organisers. This has been a thoroughly engaging competition that has brought great despair and joy - as any good competition should.

"Submarined their way in" How very dare you!

If you were watching carefully you would have noticed we were following the typical Disney sports team storyline.

The initially reluctant Coach (Eric convinced me to join the competition) joins a team of misfits and has-beens (we were not good enough for the A team) who then endure a series of disastrous games - we spent more time in last place then any other team for the first two rounds.

Then we started to win - we moved up to 11th place, then 7th,In the 4th round I lost my match, but everyone else stepped up and gained all the points, then somehow we made it to 3rd, and then against all the odds we managed to hang in there till the end.

We did not submarine our way to success, we storylined it!

I am talking to my agent about the film rights. The soundtrack is obviously by Queen - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FP808MiJUcM If you sing along its pronounced champIANs

We are wishing Eric well. Personally I think I have played more games against Eric than any other player. He is an exceptionally gifted player and has been a fabulous coach. If not for him I would have missed out on this competition and playing with, and against, such fabulous people. He convinced me by saying that I would only have to play somewhere between 3 and 7 matches, using the group and knockout approach. It was 15 matches, Eric, 15... I am glad he conned me (It was all the practice matches that did the damage!).

Captain Ian.

Sorry I missed the narrative element of your scrappy band of misfits. I'd watch that Disney movie

[Karvon]

Thanks to all the organizers for their hard work in putting this together and managing things over the season.

Congrat's to the medal winners; well done!

Some feedback

1. I'm not really in favor of limiting 1 team per nation. Some countries simply have a lot more players and even some of them can't get on to a national team and end up playing on a Rest of the World team instead.

2. I wouldn't be adverse to larger teams and more periods, say the same as TDC for example, which would give six periods/players per team.

3. I liked this season's Swiss structured approach as it allowed everyone to continue playing through the season.

4. I think it'd be difficult to implement a fair way to limit how many people/teams can use the same lists. I think the only reasonable limit is to say a player can't use the same list in consecutive seasons.

5. I personally would prefer 3 weeks per round, as data I've compiled from TDC shows the average game can be completed within that time frame. My experience with WTC and Slitherine, is a 2 week limit results in a fair number of incomplete games.

Regards,

Karvon

[oscarius]

Big thank you from the rest of the New Zealanders and Eric will be in my prayers.

- I agree with keeping the present structure but a time limit of three weeks (or at least no shorter than it is presently). I was quite lucky in this tournament that with the year winding down I had more free time (and my opponents seemed to be in compatible time zones). It is not uncommon however for time zone differences to mean we only play one round per 24 hours.

Part of the reason for my aggressive playstyle is that I know it is unlikely I will have time to complete a full term match! If I have a cautious (or back of the map hugging) opponent in a opposing timezone it can definitely be a struggle to complete the match.

- Adopting TDC style army selection rules could help (but is also more admin I understand). Perhaps even a simple strict 'no repeating armies from last season' clause (including allies)

But a stellar job from the organisers and fellow players.