A total of 80 games were played by 49 participants over the course of three rounds during the 2021 Saint Petersburg PBEM tournament. In each round, players completed four simultaneous games and were ranked according to their cumulative results using a 10-6-3-1 scoring system.
In the first round, six players won three out of their four games: AJ Jiang, Ray Wolff, Chris Gnech, Rod Davidson, Lumin Sperling, and Andy Latto. Another six players won two games, and a total of twenty-four players advanced to the semifinal.
Ray Wolff continued his strong performance in the semifinal round by winning all four of his games. Ray won seven of his first eight games in the tournament. He was joined in the final round by Michael Swinson, Eugene Yee, AJ Jiang, Andy Latto, Marc Gibbens, and Chris Gnech.
For the final round, Eugene and Chris both earned two victories. Chris’s remaining two games were 4th place finishes, which due to the scoring system in place dropped him down to third in the standings. Eugene on the other hand complimented his victories with 2nd and 3rd place finishes, propelling him to the top of the standings and victory in this year’s tournament. The top six finishers were:
- Eugene Yee
- Ray Wolff
- Chris Gnech
- Marc Gibbens
- Michael Swinson
- AJ Jiang
Over the course of the tournament, Lumin Sperling had the highest winning score with 132, while Andy Latto earned the lowest winning score of 37 in a game that featured a three-way tie for first. Francois de Bellefeuille had the highest non-winning score with 112. In arguably the closest game of the tournament, AJ Jiang won with 48 points while his three opponents tied on 47 points. The average winning score across all games was 79.
Throughout the tournament, statistics were gathered related to seat and phase order. Players starting the game with the Aristocrat phase were the most likely to win, at a rate of 40%, and correspondingly had the highest average finish (2.05) and highest average score (71). Conversely, players buying Workers first managed only a 10% win rate, with the lowest average finish (2.89) and score (63). Starting with the Building or Upgrade phase placed in between those two, with Upgrades favored in terms of win rate (28.75% vs 21.25%) and average finish (2.375 vs 2.69).
Additionally, I examined how these statistics were affected by the order in which players gained priority for the given phases. As mentioned above, starting the Worker phase in the first round produced the worst results, but leading that phase in the 2nd or 3rd round resulted in a greatly improved win rate (35%, 33% respectively), average finish (2.25, 2.15), and average score (69, 70).
For the Building phase, having phase priority in the 4th round produced the highest win rate (35%), average finish (2.15), and average score (70). On the other hand, having first selection of Buildings in the 2nd round led to the worst results: 17.5% win percentage, 2.79 average finish, and 64 average score.
As described above, leading the Aristocrat phrase in the first round resulted in the best performance. The win rate decreased steadily from there, with 4th round Aristocrat priority having the lowest win rate at 13.75%. However, choosing first on this phase in the 3rd round produced the lowest average finish (2.9) and average score (64).
Lastly, Upgrade phase priority produced the most even results, with win percentages all ranging from 20-30%, average finishes from 2.38 – 2.59, and average scores from 66-67 for all positions. However, there does appear to be a slight advantage to choosing Upgrades first in the 1st and 4th rounds.
Once again congratulations to Eugene and to all of the laurelists, and thank you to everyone who participated in the event.
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