As a big fan of Command Colors Ancients game five years ago I joined fantastic online community of similarly driven players, willing to play more of that game thanks to the efficient and easy-to-learn Vassal module. As the latest Mini-Tournaments (61 & 62) are just being finalized and a new Open Tournament (for year 2019) is being launched, I thought it it a good time to write a post about it.
First of all, you may ask where is that great community, how do you communicate and cooperate? I advise you to visit definitely best CCA webpage in whole internet – https://www.commandsandcolors.net/ancients/ – meticulously run by Alessandro Crespi for many years. All our tournaments are being organized that way. You may also find there a lot of interesting materials like rules clarifications, fan-made battles or statistics about particular scenarios if you would like to know which are more balanced and which less.
Secondly, you may ask – what kind of technology you use for online playing? Well, the best possible so far and the closes to real board game – Vassal. What I really like about that software is that this is purely boardgame moved to digital platform, not some application enforcing the rules. And the latest CCA module (CCAncientsV41.vmod) is gorgeous as far as improved mechanics and graphics are concerned.
So, let us jump now to the tournaments.
Mini-Tournament 61
That type of tournament is played in two groups (let us say A and B) with 5-6 players in each. The assumption is we play some thematically connected stream of scenarios, where each person in group A will play each person in group B, always being the same side. So if this is Spartacus Uprising tournament – as it was in that case – group A was playing Slaves, and Group B Romans.
Then comparison of results withing groups is done, and based on number of banners won in all scenarios, two best players in each group are being identified. Comment here: I find that rule – that every banner counts – really important. There are no scenarios where people just think – I am losing, what is the difference how much I will lose. But there is!
The semifinals are not piece of cake… You play the game and revers with your opponent and the summary number of banners decides the winner. I had a really hard nut to crack:
Well, after semifinals were playe only two were left. I was lucky to be there and my opponent was long-term CCA player, Travis. We played huge Silarus scenario where the Slave Revolt was unavoidably crushed:
That was fun playing and for sure I will join future such events!
The whole tournament was run through commandscolors.net page, HERE.
Mini-Tournament 62
Still not finalized but we are already in finals phase. I will describe it soon, once finals are played. Details can be found HERE.
Open Tournament 2019
It just started March 1st. In comparison to MT (mini-Tournament) it has slightly different rules as it follows Swiss-Tournament principles. In essence, the number of players is almost unlimited. We play first round in random draw and then follow the principle that 1st player faces 2nd, 3rd vs 4th, etc. The idea is that we play 1 scenario – game and reverse – per month. It can run for from four to six rounds and then eight best player are moved to play-offs. In that knock-out phase the best player is being decided.
I will keep you posted on developments from MT61 and OT 2019!
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