[JohnGalt2341]

I hope I can at least win one game!

Well, if you want you can take a look at the game I lost against Ryan, so I dont repeat the mistakes when we play again in the finals.

Let's take a look. Ryan is Green and Daniel is Purple.

#10
This is nitpicking a bit but I would have taken the lone Green straight above the Center Piece. Right now that Green piece is a Key Piece(KP5) for Green because it has 5 Purples surrounding it.

#11
Same as #10

#12
Same as #10

#13
Same as #10

#14
Nice move!

#16
If you look straight down from the Center Piece, I would have taken that move taking those 3 Greens pointing up to the left. That would have also taken out a KP4 of Greens.

#21 for Purple
Nice!

#22
You didn't have a lot of great options here but I wanted to point out something to make you aware of it. Right now on that lower wall you have 4 different places you could move. And exactly ZERO of them are good moves. Stuff like this happens in SO many of my games. Almost all of them in fact. I give my opponents terrible moves on a wall/side and I just wait for them to move there. And once they do I turn the side into an UE and now they are slightly worse off and the fuller the board gets the more opportunities I will have to expose their Unbalanced Edge.

#26
I would have moved in the spot straight up from the CP taking 1 Green piece.

#27
Same as #26

#28
Nice

#29
I would have moved in the spot just up and left of the bottom left corner, taking 6 Greens in a straight line.

#30
Nice


After that it was pretty tough.

If you have any questions feel free to ask.

[Daniel Espinosa]

So no big mistakes? It was a combination of him making slightly better moves overall?

[JohnGalt2341]

So no big mistakes? It was a combination of him making slightly better moves overall?

Yeah, I would say so. Ryan is a good player but he's fairly sloppy after move #24 or so and sometimes his openings are weak. He get's away with a lot of subtle mistakes against most players. But I would say he's the 3rd best player in the Ladder but i think he would have a tough time with players like The Burglar or FGYTPeti and Toptal of course, but I could be wrong about the first two. I thought blanko would pull a win against him but maybe next time. I think Ryan is the perfect type of player for you guys right now because I feel that he's just slightly better than you guys but I think you guys are still learning and you could definitely pull a win against him even now.

[Daniel Espinosa]

Nice to know. I felt that game was very close, and I thought I had him for a moment.

[JohnGalt2341]

Section Prediction Point Standings after Round 1:

1. Daniel 7
1. blanko 7
3. JohnGalt 6
4. Housemoney 5

If anybody goes undefeated in this round I will be seriously impressed!

Round 2 is finally almost over. Barring a Toptal timeout the prediction point standings will be as follows:

1. Daniel 13
1. blanko 13
3. JohnGalt 10

The next round will be worth 3 points. Hopefully the next round will start in the next couple of days. This should be fun. I'm expecting a lot of close games.

[JohnGalt2341]

I was looking over the Hexversi tournament history and I noticed that both Ryan and myself were in the very first tournament finals back in 2007. For the first year Hexversi was new I played in lots of tournaments and since then Toptal has played in several Hexversi tournaments as well and somehow we never crossed paths until the last tournament simply because we played at different years.

Although, we have played several regular and ladder games but this is only the 2nd time we've played each other in a tourney and this is the first time we've played each other in the finals.
If you look at the Hexversi tournament history you can see that depending on the year, either Toptal or myself were winning most of the tournaments we were in. Most of them were very small, many with less than 15 people or so.

https://www.itsyourturn.com/pp?tourn_champ


This tournament finals is 13 years in the making and Ryan and Daniel are very good as well. This will definitely be one of the strongest Sections I've ever played in. I can almost guarantee some really close and interesting games.

Daniel's really got his hands full in this round. If you ever have a tougher Section than this I will be surprised. I'm hoping you can outplay these guys on the sides. If you can, I think you'll have a decent chance. But if you don't pick up at least one win there's no shame considering our experience and considering yours.

This should be fun!

[Daniel Espinosa]

Yep, I just need to survive the first rounds somehow (and then tons of luck!).

[JohnGalt2341]

Round 3 has finally started!

Section #1
Player's Name	Score	Games com pleted	Avg score per game cmpltd
DanielEspinosa	0	0	0.00
§Holden2341	0	0	0.00
§Ryan	0	0	0.00
Toptal	0	0	0.00

Both blanko and Daniel can still win 500 points for most points for Section predictions. This round is worth 3 points and a tie goes to you guys but you still have to make your predictions before me. The standing are as follows:

1. Daniel 13
1. blanko 13
3. JohnGalt 10

Daniel can still win 500 points for his Tournament Champion prediction with Toptal. AND, Daniel can win 500 points if he should beat me in at least 1 game, because in 2012 or so, I promised I would give 500 points to the first SBR member to beat me in a game. This is still valid.

This round should be a lot of fun!

[Daniel Espinosa]

Finally!

My predictions:

Holden2341
Toptal
Ryan
Daniel

[JohnGalt2341]

Finally!

My predictions:

Holden2341
Toptal
Ryan
Daniel

I was thinking since you guys are tied we could figure out a way to break the tie breaker. Perhaps if you get first place correct you get 4 points and 3 for 2nd and so on. If it's still a tie we could have a guess for biggest blowout. Just guess the biggest number of pieces that somebody wins buy and closest could win the tie-breaker.

I'm just throwing out some ideas. Let me know what you guys want to do in case of a tie.

[Daniel Espinosa]

Yeah, a tie-breaker is fine by me.

[blankoblanco]

Yeah, my predictions for the group would be the same as Daniel's, so maybe a tie-breaker is in order

Just for posterity:

Holden
Toptal
Ryan
Daniel

Daniel himself is the biggest x-factor here for sure, these players just have so much experience. But seems to me that Holden beats Toptal & Ryan and Toptal beats Ryan. Give 'em hell Danny, GL

[JohnGalt2341]

Since I am behind 3 points in my prediction points I will predict the following.

1. Toptal
2. Holden
3. Ryan
4. Daniel

I promise that I am not going to throw a game or games in order to try to achieve this. Plus, a tie goes to you guys. My only chance of staying in the section prediction picks is if I tie with Toptal for first here, and it goes to a 4th round and I pick the opposite of your picks because the 4th round would be worth 4 points. Again, I promise that I will not be throwing any games.


What do you guys have in mind for a tie-breaker between the two of you? I was thinking... since Ryan and Toptal are the only ones that are completely independent from SBR... I was thinking that you could pick the total number of pieces that either Toptal beats Ryan or Ryan beats Toptal in both games.

For instance, if Toptal beats Ryan in both games 60-30 then Toptal's total would be +60. But if Toptal beats Ryan in one game 50-40 and Ryan beats Toptal 46-44, then Toptals number would be +8. Whoever is closest to the actual + number wins. What do you guys think?

[Daniel Espinosa]

If you throw the games against Toptal, I have him as champion, so fine by me

Good idea. Tie-Break: Toptal +38

[blankoblanco]

So if it's just between Daniel and myself, he's basically set the over/under line by going first and it's not unsporting if I guess 37 or 39, right? Just making sure that's seen as fair and square. We could've PM'd our guesses to John but I think this way is fine?

If so I'll go with over (Toptal by 39 or more)

[JohnGalt2341]

Sounds good to me.

This is what happened in Round 2:

Toptal Purple 54
Ryan Green 36

Toptal Green 61
Ryan Purple 29

In the 13 games they have played each other Toptal has won 10 and Ryan has won 3. That feels about right to me. I'd definitely give the edge to Toptal but it wouldn't surprise me to see Ryan pull a win against him or me.

[JohnGalt2341]

I was just thinking, I think this final Section is stronger than the last tourney even though there were 53 people in the last tourney and only 33 in this one. But my nephew Eddie timed-out all of his games so it bumped Aragon up to 2nd place. And with the exception of Daniel who is 1-1 vs Aragon the rest of us all have winning records vs Aragon. I just looked up Ryan's overall record vs Aragon. He's 18-2. That's higher than I expected.

This is a really tough bracket. Daniel is playing well.

[Daniel Espinosa]

So if it's just between Daniel and myself, he's basically set the over/under line by going first and it's not unsporting if I guess 37 or 39, right? Just making sure that's seen as fair and square. We could've PM'd our guesses to John but I think this way is fine?

If so I'll go with over (Toptal by 39 or more)

Yeah I actually thought about it, so thats fine (maybe I set the line kinda low? Its ok though)

Im happy because Im still alive against you John, although I know I am slowly dying

[JohnGalt2341]

Yeah I actually thought about it, so thats fine (maybe I set the line kinda low? Its ok though)

Im happy because Im still alive against you John, although I know I am slowly dying

Congrats on the win!!

[Daniel Espinosa]

Thanks! I was hoping for a win in the finals, but certainly not against you!

[JohnGalt2341]

This could really shake things up in the finals now because now I have to go 4-0 against 2 of the best players to win the tourney. Toptal almost always gives me really tough games and I usually have to outplay him in the end to beat him.

I'm hoping that Daniels win against me was a big boost of confidence to know that he deserved to be here. He played really well in both of our games. I'd love to see Daniel pull at least a win or two against these guys.

And Ryan has the potential to play great and could beat either me or Toptal in any given game. This is going to be fun to watch!

[Daniel Espinosa]

I think I am getting my a** kicked so far but that is expected. I hope they make some mistakes in the sides now, so at least I can get one more win.

[blankoblanco]

Whoa, I've been a bit out of the loop but congrats Daniel on beating John!! That's a hell of an accomplishment in itself

[Daniel Espinosa]

Yeah indeed. Im not quite sure how it happened though.

[blankoblanco]

Haha, I know that feeling. Maybe John would be willing to break down the game and some of the key moves a bit?

[JohnGalt2341]

Haha, I know that feeling. Maybe John would be willing to break down the game and some of the key moves a bit?

I was looking this game over trying to find some key moves but I didn't really find any besides my terrible move #36. I should have moved to the spot below that spot instead. I'm pretty sure that would have won me the game but it would have been close. Move #32 is another I would have changed. I should have taken that lower left corner instead, but I think it was #36 that really cost me the game.

This game reminded me of the game I lost to my nephew in the last tourney. I played well early but I got too cocky and figured I could coast to victory. But by the time I realized I was going to finish with less than 46 pieces it was too late.

Daniel played really well in the 2nd half of this game and he did a fantastic job of blocking many of the moves I was trying to get. Very interesting game for sure. Daniel played great and it's certainly a great reminder for me to not get too cocky because I might be just one mistake away from losing the game.

Daniel's on my hit list in the Ladder now . I look forward to many more great battles!

[JohnGalt2341]

Some great games going on in this tourney! Four wins might be enough to take it.

[JohnGalt2341]

I'm beating up Toptal pretty bad in this game:

https://www.itsyourturn.com/pp?gm&g=...&u=0&t=0&gn=97



This is a really interesting game I have going vs Ryan

https://www.itsyourturn.com/pp?gm&g=...&u=0&t=0&gn=97

Move #18 was a bit of a risk for me but now I'm pretty sure it's going to turn out even better than what I thought it would.

I don't think I've ever talked about positions like this before but sometimes it's worth it and sometimes it's not. My rule of thumb is usually if I can gain a move then it's probably worth it. Especially if I can get multiple corners. I should get 3 corners out of this position minimum.

My other 2 games with these guys are good ones!

There will be no undefeated players in this section. I guarantee it. 4-2 might be enough to take it.

[JohnGalt2341]

I'm beating up Toptal pretty bad in this game:

https://www.itsyourturn.com/pp?gm&g=...&u=0&t=0&gn=97

I think I might have a shot at 90 in this game. I'm going for at least 84 or 85. I'm nearly certain this will be my largest victory vs Toptal.

I'll give you guys Toptal +75.5 as a Live Line as of move #23 in the game above, if you want to wager some points for fun. I think the hardest part is going to be filling up the entire board. He's not a member so he only gets 15 moves per day so I feel like kind of a dick to make him waste a turn just to pass but I think I might have to do that several times in order to try to get 90. This should be fun!

Let me know if you want to wager some points for fun. I'll give you Toptal +75.5.

I'll give you this Line as well.

Holden2341 gets 90. +500

Maximum wager 100 points.

I only see one piece that I might have a problem with.

[Daniel Espinosa]

Nah I pass. He only plays once a day no matter what so I dont think he would care about that.

[JohnGalt2341]

I noticed Toptal timed out some games. Hopefully he asks to get them reinstated.

[Daniel Espinosa]

Is that possible? I didnt know that.

Now I just have to wait for Ryan to time out too to become the new champion

[JohnGalt2341]

Is that possible? I didnt know that.

Now I just have to wait for Ryan to time out too to become the new champion

Yeah, I think they give the player 24 to 48 hours to request reinstatement from their opponents. IYT will send you a message if they do. You don't have accept it but I always do.

This could get really interesting. This tourney could come down to the final game!

[Daniel Espinosa]

I had not checked my messages, and there was one requesting reinstatement. Obv I accepted.

[JohnGalt2341]

Daniel's got some great games going vs Toptal. Ryan is going to pull a win vs me. I will end up 4-2 I think... will it be enough?

This is a great finals!