7th Friedrich World Championship 2012

The Qualification Round

A: In the Qualification Round, 16 games were played. Remarkable results were: Game 1: Andrew Brown's Prussia is defeated after 10 rounds. The early Subsidy-reduction in turn 6 made Andrew's life not easier, and so Steffen Schröder finally pulled off the victory with Austria. Game 2: Rodrigo Witzel did not better. He made a lot of beginner's mistakes and so his Prussia was defeated in turn 10, too. And again Austria was the winner (Manfred Wichmann). Game 3: Richard Sivél succeeded with Prussia. Favoured by a good fate (no subsidy-reduction and only 15 turns to play) the Prussian ship was never in real danger. Only when Christian Blattner Russians appeared in Saxony, Richard became VERY nervous. Game 4: Klaus Blum's Prussia was successful, too. After the dropout of France in turn 13, Hanover engaged against the Russians and eliminated a supply train in Poland! The game ended after 21 turns.		Game 3: Andreas Buschhaus and Mark Luta try to break Richard Sivél's defense. (In the background you can see Steffen Schröder's head shining). Game 4: Klaus Blum moves his Prussians, anxiously watched by Arnold de Wijs.
Game 5: Mark Luta and Guy Atkinson. In this game, Mark will finally win with Sweden. Game 8: Manfred Wichmann in big trouble. The Austrian keep marauding the Magdeburg area!		Game 5: When Russia dropped out in turn 16, Mark Luta suddenly won with Sweden! Steffen Schröder's Prussia even had to fight Austrians (Guy Atkinson) in the Neumark. Game 6: Anton Telle (Russia) and Christian Blattner (France) managed a double victory against Maurice de Wijs' Prussians. In some way, Christian profited from the giant hearts battle Anton fought for his win (with only 2 points in hearts left). After that battle, Christian had an easy walk to victory by conquering Magdeburg in hearts. Game 7: Andreas Zölitz (Prussia) misinterpreted the Austrian recruitments: After a big loss, Andrew Brown recruited 10 new troops all with clubs. Andreas set up a clubs defense against Austria, and was suddenly wiped out in turn 13. The ironic thing: The game would have ended after turn 13 anyway with the dropout of the last attacker (France). Game 8: Manfred Wichmann tried a new strategy with Prussia by sending Ferdinand against the Russians (Peter Hannappel) right from the start. He defeated Saltikow's 8 troops. Maybe this inspired Jose Luis Bonilla Rau (Austria) in sending Karl v. Lothringen to the Magdeburg area, where he slaughtered all Prussians for 5 turns? It was a hard struggle for Manni, later he even ran out of time and was on the stop clock (2.5 min. for each Prussian turn, 30 sec. for each Hanover turn)... but finally he won after 17 rounds.
Game 9: Arnold de Wijs wins with Prussia after 23 turns of struggle. Profiting from an early exit of Russia (turn 6), Arnold had to fight hard against the excellent positional play of his opponents, and so finally, there was the epic diamonds-hearts-battle of Torgau: Winterfeldt against Lacy, playing 101 points in diamonds and 101 points in hearts plus 1 Reserve which was needed by Lacy for his retreat. Game 10: Peter Hannappel's Prussia was shocked when attacking the Imperial Army in turn 4: Hildi had 31 points in hearts! Only few turns later, Peter's defense in Saxony scrumbled, and finally Richard Sivél won with Austria in turn 14 -- just 1 turn before the saving death of the Tsarina. Game 11: Anton Telle won with Prussia after 22 turns, and this despite the first subsidy reduction in turn 6! The second reduction occurred in turn 12, while Sweden dropped out in turn 18, Russia in turn 20 and France in turn 22. This comes down to a TC-coefficient of 0,55 (average is 0,68). It was the worst TC-coefficient of all FWCs so far. The more astonishing is that Austria (Mark Luta) made only 5 points. This under-average result costed Mark the participation in the final. Game 12: Andreas Buschhaus gave his Prussian debut at the FWC. After some big blunders at the beginning he consolidated and did very well. But finally he was defeated by Austria (Klaus Blum) and France (Steffen Schröder) in turn 13.		Game 11: Jose Luis Bonilla Rau is pointing towards Hanover. Game 11: The same game. The draw deck consists of only 4 cards, one from each TC-deck!! -- You can also see the Prussian (left) and French (right) stack. Note that the French stack is thicker.
Game 14: Arnold de Wijs and Rodrigo Witzel. Arnold is moving his Austrians. He almost won this game after 19 turns, but in the end Jose Luis Bonilla Rau succeeded with Prussia. Game 16: Andreas Zölitz is moving his Austrians, while Christian Blattner analyzes the situation in East Prussia and Peter Hannappel the French positions; and Steffen Schröder seems somehow happy.		Game 13: After 19 turns, Guy Atkinson wins with Prussia withstanding the concerted attacks of Andreas Buschhaus (Russia), Anton Telle (Austria), and Andrew Brown (France). Game 14: Jose Luis Bonilla Rau makes another Prussian victory perfect. Retreating very successfully with -1 for a long time, the allies find it almost impossible to nail his defense down. There was one combined Russian-Swedish offensive (about turn 10) by Richard Sivél which costed Jose about 130 points in diamonds, but Austria (Arnold de Wijs) failed to immediately exploit that situation. When Arnold was finally in a winning position, the game was over – and this had costed Arnold not only the participation of the final, but also the win of the qualification round! Game 15: Mark Luta's Prussians have to struggle for 23 turns, and still they lose. In the last moment Maurice de Wijs is the winner with Austria. In a very tight game which saw subsidy reduction after turn 8 and Elisabeth's death after turn 10, Mark was on the stop clock for the last 2 moves. Maybe this additional time pressure costed him the victory? Game 16: Christian Blattner won with Prussia after 22 turns. Steffen Schröder's Russians dropped out after turn 10 (just 1 turn after the the first subsidy reduction). After that it was impossible for Andreas Zölitz (Austria) and Peter Hannappel to break the Prussian defense.
B: Ranking after the qualification round player Fred. Elis. M.Ther. Pomp. Total TB ooC Richard Sivél 12,0 9,0 12,0 8,0 41,0 1 Manfred Wichmann 12,0 6,0 12,0 8,0 38,0 2 Christian Blattner 12,0 6,0 8,3 11,5 37,8 12 3 Anton Telle 12,0 11,5 8,3 6,0 37,8 10 4 Steffen Schröder 8,0 6,0 12,0 11,5 37,5 14 5 Klaus Blum 12,0 6,0 11,5 8,0 37,5 11 6 Mark Luta 11,5 12,0 5,0 8,0 36,5 7 Arnold de Wijs 12,0 8,0 8,3 8,0 36,3 8 Jose Luis Bonilla Rau 12,0 7,0 9,2 8,0 36,2 9 Peter Hannappel 7,0 8,0 9,2 9,0 33,2 10 Guy Atkinson 12,0 7,0 6,9 7,0 32,9 11 Andrew Brown 5,0 8,0 12,0 7,0 32,0 12 Andreas Buschhaus 6,5 8,0 8,3 9,0 31,8 13 Maurice de Wijs 5,0 5,0 12,0 9,0 31,0 14 Andreas Zölitz 6,5 7,0 9,2 8,0 30,7 15 Rodrigo Witzel 5,0 9,0 7,5 9,0 30,5 TB = Tiebreaker No.1 ooC = out of competition		Game 15: Mark Luta is arranging his defense against Manfred Wichmann, Maurice de Wijs and Klaus Blum.
Klaus Blum and Steffen Schröder join in winning the Fair Ehrensvärd, the trophy for the fairest player.		Since Richard Sivél was playing out of competition, Manfred Wichmann, Christian Blattner, Anton Telle and Steffen Schröder entered the final. The final started at 6 p.m. Titleholder Manfred Wichmann as highest-ranked player had first choice of the role (like last year when he became World Champion). Christian Blattner had second choice, and so on. For Christian it was the first final, while for Anton it was the 6th final, for Steffen the 4th, and for Manni the 3rd. This year, it was a very tight race for the final. Twice the first tie-breaker had to be used. Steffen Schröder slipped into the final by beating Klaus Blum by 2 points in the tie-breaker. However, Steffen and Klaus Schröder not only shared the points, they also shared their win for the trophy for the fairest player: the Fair Ehrensvärd 2012.