@MarineIguana:
Hi Dave,
This is Andrew, and I participated in last year’s Kublacon tournament.
I agree that the tournament plays very differently, and that Axis has a major edge. 15+ to allies seems like a reasonable range. By far the most important VC is Karelia because it’s the most contestable. France, Phillipines, and India are also considerations.
I’m having a hard time thinking of a tie breaker that i’d feel satisfied with. It seems undesirable to establish tie breakers that alter the immediate game. How about just giving out two prizes without a winner? Short of that, i suggest just rolling a die.
My specific issue with your 4 suggested options is that all favor either the allies or axis.
#1 if both players are strong, the allies will seek to preserve 7 VCs while the axis seeks to capture 1 VC to go from 6 to 7. If one person wins as allies and the other wins as axis, the axis player will come out ahead per this rule.
#2 IPC totals favors Allies heavily, net captured favors Axis heavily
#3 same as #2
#4 heavily favors allies
Even in a single elimination, when you have two strong players against each other, somebody loses and probably too early in the tournament.
For #1, this is how standard tournament rules work. 7+ VCs and you win.
In a timed format, one side or the other will have an advantage. A bid is there to even out those chances. In this format, bids to play the Allies might need to be very high.
I think I’m going to go with:
First tie breaker: total VCs
Second tie breaker: captured territories (not your starting territories)
Third tie breaker: coin toss
I’m also going with 2 finals matches: a game for 1st/2nd and game for 3rd/4th. Anybody left over will be invited to play for fun. Maybe top 4 get prizes? 1 picks before 2 picks before 3 picks before 4.
