Posts from Siberian qualifier.

I’ll be there around 3 PM, where is the meeting point?

Okay, guys, we need to decide on the accommodation situation today. Here are two options: 1. Rent rooms in a hotel. Alessandro calculated that for 3 days, accommodating 6 people in double rooms would cost 800 x 3 x 3 = 7200. Pros: guaranteed bedding and a place to sleep. Cons: expensive, no opportunity to gather all together and have a good time (and they probably don't allow guests). And, of course, the noise level. 2. Rent a 2 or 3-room apartment. Again, my realtor offered me 3 options: 2.1. On Partizanskaya Street - a 3-room apartment. 5000 for 3 days. Cons: no bedding or kitchenware, as the apartment is not rented out on a daily basis. We can try to arrange for bedding, but it's not guaranteed. 2.2. On Soyuza Respublik Street, 23 - supposedly a 3-room apartment, 4 sleeping places, 5000. I can provide a couple of mattresses. Cons: again, it's unclear what the situation is with bedding and kitchenware. 2.3. On Krasnoarmeyskiy Street, 59 - a 2-room apartment, 6800 for 3 days. There are 6 sleeping places, bedding, and kitchenware. The apartment is rented out on a daily basis, so everything necessary is available. Cons: a bit expensive, and it's not far from the center, but it's a 20-minute walk. If it's cold, we'll need to figure out transportation. I need your thoughts on this right now. Let me know who is arriving when, how, and at what time, and where they want to stay. As for me, I won't be participating, as I have a lot of work. I'll help with the arrangements as much as I can. I'll meet those who are unfamiliar with the city. ====================== In short, either call me at 89130907901 or write to me at 371824854 if you don't want to sleep on the street. I repeat, we need to decide on this today!!! ====================== The apartment is canceled. You will be staying at a hotel. Thanks, Alessandro

The first to arrive were Deep Mike and Valenok, by car. Zergovsky couldn't negotiate the apartment, so the hotel option remained. They decided to find a rental for 3 days through the newspaper, and it worked out quickly. They went to see it. The apartment was luxuriously furnished, with bedding, 4 beds, and a combined kitchen and living room. They stayed there. It cost 4800 rubles for 3 days. Then they got in touch with Van (he was traveling with Dirty Player, Dust, and Logistic), and they arrived. Then they celebrated the occasion. They sorted out organizational issues and held the draw for the 1st round:
Van-Alessandro
Deep Mike-Dirty Player
Logistic-Valenok
Dust-Nikolay
http://slil.ru/28434886
03/01/09, left to right: Dust, Deep Mike, Valenok, Dirty Player, Nikolay, Logistic, Van. Today the 1st round took place. They played TE-light 1800+300:
Van-Alessandro 1:0. They played on Panic. They finished ahead of everyone else on the 4th week.
Deep Mike-Dirty Player 1:0. I was sitting next to Deep Mike. The players used all the restarts. Then Mike had a block of 20-49 Evil Eye on the road, and on 114 Mike broke through it. Then Mike took his native secondary skill and got a Wyvern there, on the 1st week he had Wyverns and Hydras in the Castle!!! Then Mike headed to the Treasury. The game ended on 224, when Mike took the town where Dirty's main hero was.
Logistic and Valenok didn't finish (227) and went to finish playing in the evening on a laptop. During the finishing process, Logistic bought Nagash and started shrouding the entire territory with him.
IMHO: Nagash should be banned in TE-light :).
Although Nikolay drew the lot, he didn't come to the club, and Dust was left without an opponent. During the day, Dreamcatcher showed up and started playing with Dust. After playing until about 127, they agreed to a draw. The issue under discussion: playing at home in hot-seat or at the club.
January 5. They decided not to go to the club. They decided to play Olympic format. In the semi-finals, Van beat Dust, and Mike beat Logistic. They had time to play chess and poker. Poker defeated Heroes, although there was no one from the Baia :). Around 10 PM, Mike started playing with Van. On the second week, Mike won and became the champion.
January 6. They started starting their cars. Minus 30 degrees made a difference. An automatic transmission means it won't start with a push start :) They had to have it towed to a car wash. Dust's car started there, but Valenok's didn't. Dust gave him a jump start, and Valenok's car started too. Then they drove to the "Altai" hotel, where they took souvenir photos.
Everyone made a very good impression on me and were great. Logistic came all the way from the Urals (Chelyabinsk)!!! I'll try to come to Novosibirsk for football this year.

Yeah, they played well with a smaller team)))
At least now we know each other, fellow warriors!

The logistics player bought Nagash and started using him to darken the entire territory.
IMHO: Nagash should be banned in the TE-lite mode.

A long time ago, I played War of the Gods, and I remember there was such an option. Isn't Nagash a money-maker in the lite mode?

More reports and photos, please :)
I remembered the qualifier in Kyiv; we had a great time.

Hello everyone! After returning from Barnaul, I decided to describe my impressions. On the 3rd, we set off. Lyokha picked me up in a car full of people. These were Logistic and Van with his wife. We started our journey. Along the way, we got to know each other and talked about various topics. Around 6 PM local time, we arrived in Barnaul. It turned out that we had been scammed with the apartments, so we looked at a hotel and decided it wasn't an option. We quickly called Alessandro, who met the second group (Valenok and Deep Mike) and was already looking for apartments. Soon, we found a place, and we just needed to find the right address. We all met near the house, where we also got to know each other and decided not to waste time and go straight to the store. We bought supplies and went to the apartment. The apartment made a good impression, although in some places it was clear that it had been rented out very often and not very carefully :D. We set up and immediately started talking. During the gathering, we discussed the rules and drew lots. I ended up playing against Mike in the first round. :smile54: After sitting for a while (until about 4 AM), we went to sleep. In the morning, we woke up and went to a club, where Alessandro was already waiting for us, setting up TE-light. We took our computers, chatted, and started. I was against Mike, Van against Alessandro, and Valenok against Logistic. Dust was waiting for Nikolai, who, after drinking some vodka in the evening, left and, as it turned out later, for a long time... :D The atmosphere in the club was calm, but then some CS fans started showing up, and it became a bit crowded. About the game: Deep_Mike (Fortress, Tazar, Tazar) def Dirty_Player (Tower, Neela, Neela) 2sm4d(3) 216 We started with a swamp against a castle. We used all the restarts. In one case, we even had to cancel a great generation due to a TE bug (0 skeletons appeared in Mike's stack, and the game kept crashing when hovering over that hero :mad:). The next round was acceptable. A small respawn point. There are 2 clues and a hidden den of gremlins. But there is really little money. I gathered 40 gems (I'm thinking about titans :smile41:). Also, in the first week, I made it to the Inferno secondary mine, where I found two life rings next to each other, and the scouting taken at the respawn point showed a treasure chest where a health potion was located :eek:!! Towards the end of the week, I spoiled the situation by ambushing a group of war dogs and losing 49 gremlins. :mad: In the second week, I bought some nagas and golems and went to capture the clues. Neela got ranged attack and repelled arrows from angelic feathers. I took the second clue and went to the Inferno to replenish mana. At the beginning of the third week, I went to the treasure chest with the goal of reaching the health potion. I repelled a unicorn detachment of 30 efreets, and interesting thoughts appeared when I got 20 snipers in the Pandora. :smile51: In general, the treasure chest was of a fantastic size. About 1/3 of the size of the above-ground part of the map! There were many clues there, and I decided to hang out there for a looooong time!! :cool: But there were many clues, but not much use... 4-6 wyverns :( In the tavern, Tazar appears with parameters that say, "I took a utopia and will tear everything up here now." But I couldn't be torn away from the treasure chest. In the fourth week, Tazar beats 50-99 wizards in the Grand Order and, for experience, took 20-49 chaos hydras, stopping two squares away from my capital... Understanding that it is already in the past, I decided to go to the bubble to the bitter end!! In addition, a book of air was spotted! I lost count of how many minimum hives I passed along the way. :smile11: My army already consisted of wyverns, snipers, hobbits, gremlins, and mages. Suddenly, I unexpectedly find a bow that was missing for assembling the LS!!!!!! :cool: I take a hidden den of snipers and a couple more Pandora boxes for snipers, totaling 50 of them (with LS, the damage there is deadly). I see 2 utopias, but I can't decide whether to take them with arrows :mad: In the refugee camp, I find an Archangel, who helps to speed things up. At the beginning of the 5th week, I finally reach the life flask and collect the Elixir. Neela, as soon as she entered the treasure chest, collected 24 levels + expert log + spagois there. Meanwhile, Tazar, with indecent parameters, didn't sleep and ate all my castles. And I took the book of air and found a well!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Everything would be great, but there is not much time left to live. I had to take the secondary mine and sit there, hoping that mega-Tazar wouldn't reach it. He didn't reach it. Neela flew away and took 2 utopias, one even at maximum level. There are no castles again, and I have to repeat the same maneuver. But this time, Tazar had gloves and reached a little further and, just as he attacked Neela... In the final battle, with approximately equal combat parameters, something like 26-28 for Tazar and 18-36 for Neela, 79 upgraded wyverns left no chance for anyone!!!! Even 44 wyverns of Neela with 91 HP. In general, Tazar unexpectedly got the better of me, otherwise, I would have been running and running there. Thank you, Mikhail, for the game! It was very interesting to play with a living legend! The continuation will follow!!!!;)

P.S.: There will be a LOT of photos!!!!!!

I'll try to write reports on my games from memory. In the first round, the draw was blind and matched me against Dirty Player. I hadn't played with Kostya before; after all, we play on different resources, I didn't know his strength, but according to other participants, I immediately got the main competitor in the tournament.
Deep Mike (blue, swamp, Tazar) def Dirty Player (red, tower, Nella), 2sm4d(3), 2-2-4
The color choice immediately surprised me; I had previously encountered few people wanting to play Tower against Swamp. The first round was played at the club on TE-light with chess clocks on a 1800+300 limit. It was my first time playing at a club, somewhat unusual. We chose restarts. A difficult layout was generated. On the road less than a day's travel from the castle, a scout hero scouted a block of 20 Evil Eyes. I didn't want to attack them right away without Wyverns, and gathering the necessary sum to build and buy them in the available free corner was unrealistic. It was lucky that at least both mines were generated in that accessible corner of my respawn. Also, near my castle in the swamp, there were 2 crypts; I decided to take them first, and then with Wyverns, attack the block. I entered the first crypt on the second day, and it turned out to be the maximum one, Tazar only level 1. Good thing the second hero was a specialist in shooters, so I had over 20 Lizardmen. I barely took the crypt, left with only 18 Lizardmen from the entire army. But I was able to build a Wyvern Nest and, having bought them, entered the second crypt; it had 5 Vampires and gave an artifact +1 to morale. On 1-1-4, I bought more Lizardmen and a couple of unupgraded Dragonflies and finally killed the Evil Eyes and broke out into open space. And there everything turned out to be much more fun than the start had promised. In the remaining days, I managed to collect a lot of money and find Sulfur, and on 1-1-6, I took a completely unexpected nearby native secondary town. Moreover, I had enough money not only for Hydras in the castle at home but also for Wyverns in the secondary town. Additionally, due to the tough battles and difficult situation at the start, I fell into time trouble and later failed to finish a turn properly a couple of times. Later, I didn't really develop it much; later I built Dragonflies there and built a Citadel, but had no funds for more. On the second week, behind the secondary town, I took the only single Griffin Conservatory. Tazar leveled up well, quickly becoming an expert in Logistics and Earth Magic. I had to return to the native respawn to learn Slow in the mage guild; in the secondary town where I bought him a spell book, there was no Slow. At the same time, I transferred an army to a scout hero to take the Naga Bank, losing as many as 3 Wyverns in the process. But I managed to buy out the main army and on the third week go into the underground treasure zone behind the secondary town. There, I took 2 hives with 12 and 8 Wyverns using Hydras, a library, and some other minor things, and scouted a Dragon Utopia. I attacked it on 1-4-1, since there were still things to visit nearby, no need to rush with it. In particular, I took another 8 Wyverns from a hive. Bringing up troops almost without losses, I took the minimal Dragon Utopia, which gave a Chalice of Life +6 all. Then I split into the secondary town, went to a Griffin Conservatory of 100+ Azure Dragons. I broke through them with the loss of some Lizardmen, and at the same time, for experience, a second Griffin Conservatory of Chaos Hydras. Around 1-4-5, I took the opponent's capital without resistance; Nella was in the treasure zone. Moreover, the treasure zone was a Guinness Book of Records one, in the surface about a third of the map, which my expert View Earth was showing. So Nella went there in earnest and for a long time. Since there was no control at all, there was no point in searching for her who knows where, and I went to capture the 2 Inferno secondary towns of the red player; one was taken for free by a scout hero in the underground, and for the second I had to fight personally with Tazar. From there, he went into an unexplored underground area, which the opponent hadn't gotten around to due to the vast expanses on the surface. And there was plenty to take there, and quite compactly. Right behind the entrance was a Dragon Utopia Triad, which gave a Spell Book of Earth, and I finally got Town Portal; nearby, I captured a Titan's Gladius and a Shield +5 Armor; previously I had neither a shield nor a sword, not even weak ones. A day later, I took another 2 hives, mini and maxi; another one was visible, but running into a corner for it alone with a day lost wasn't appealing, as I already had a lot. Nella, with Flight from the blackness in the underground, recaptured one Inferno, so I got another 7 days to continue clearing the surface. In the farthest corner of the secondary respawn, I had long ago spotted the Gauntlets behind Hell Hounds; I finally got around to sending a scout hero for them, who, after fighting, gave them to Tazar. Nella, significantly inferior in army (though she had as many as 50 Snipers), flew back into the surface, and through View Earth, I saw her visiting another Dragon Utopia there. Tazar, not catching her again, returned to the underground treasure zone near the Inferno, hoping that one of the 3 Pandora's Boxes there would give Flight, but they gave 20 Minotaurs, with which a scout hero went to another exit from the underground, behind which was the respawn of the 6th, previously inaccessible, secondary Swamp town. Tazar again sat in the Tower, since not far from it, beyond the mountain, Nella was visible. She, of course, didn't attack, and a day later, after descending into the underground somewhere, she captured Inferno and sat there. But this time, with the Gauntlets, Tazar could reach her, and the final battle took place. Tazar had Expert Attack, Defense, Earth Magic, Resistance, a Cloak of Magic Restriction to level 2, and a Lightning Bolt dealing 650 damage. Attack, Defense, and Spell Power were all around 25-27. Nella had the same total of primary stats, Defense at 36 to the detriment of Attack, but Magic only around 16. Tazar had more meat, a main stack of 78 upgraded Wyverns, 11 Chaos Hydras, and the rest. Nella had 43 Wyverns, 50 Snipers, about 30 Mages, 1 Archangel, and the rest, but with as many as two combined artifacts: Elixir of Life (Wyverns with 91 HP each) and Bow of the Sharpshooter. Despite having only basic Ballistics, it gave me the first turn; Tazar killed 30 Snipers with Lightning Bolt, received Mass Slow in return, but Resistance didn't work on anyone. Still, the advantage in meat told, and I won the final battle. It turned out to be a fairly tense and interesting game. But it took a long time to play, and it became clear that the initial plans for everyone to play 5 games were unrealistic.
Later, we continued at an apartment on laptops. Van played with Dust, and I got the one from the pair Logistics and Valenok who was next in the color rotation. They couldn't finish immediately due to a save bug; we had to go for another save to the club the next day. As a result, when they finished their extremely drawn-out game on month 3, Valenok won. But at that time, this was unknown, and I sat down to play my second game with Logistics.
Deep Mike (red, swamp, Tazar) def Logistics (blue, dungeon, Shakti, Gunnar), 2sm4d(3), 1-3-7
I made a completely non-standard and highly dubious color choice for myself, for which I almost paid the price. We played on TE-light 1800+300. This time, there was no block, but the layout was significantly poorer, and the secondary town was very far away; I didn't even take it on the first week. I had to spend a lot of time gathering resources and money, which were clearly insufficient. I still wanted to try building Hydras in the castle, but at the end of the first week, to my not-so-good layout, problems I hadn't even imagined were added. On 1-1-6, from a heavily guarded passage into the underground, a leveled-up Gunnar burst out; although he had few Troglodytes, he had an upgraded Bear in his army. Bursting out, he immediately killed 2 of my scout heroes from the chain, thus cutting Tazar off from home, and on the next day, another one, after which I had only 2 heroes left, and there was no talk of any Hydras; instead, I built Beholders in the castle. Incidentally, we had agreed that restarts due to meeting would be taken no later than 1-1-5, so the opponent deliberately waited until day 6 to come out to me. I placed single Lizardmen and Beholders with castle towers in the capital for defense, but Gunnar didn't even attack it and soon disappeared back into the underground. Tazar took a poor secondary Castle town on 1-2-1. It was scary to go back on foot past the entrance directly on the road to the underground with the Logistics hero Gunnar wandering somewhere there, so Tazar spent several days gathering resources, hoping that Gunnar would go deep into his own underground. With the money gathered by him and a scout hero, I managed to hire a hero and buy him 3 Wyverns, with which he broke through weak neutral blocks on his respawn and collected a fairly decent sum, and on the second week built Hydras. To complete the picture, Tazar got a terrible skill tree; after Armorer, under the threat of Navigation, he had to train Expert Mysticism. Luckily, he still managed to slip past the underground entrance and get home, and at home he took a Naga Bank and, after buying Hydras and Wyverns, attacked a large Griffin Conservatory without a spell book; it turned out to be the maximum variant, which noticeably battered him, but it was worth it. Moreover, Tazar immediately got and trained Logistics to Expert. But there was absolutely nowhere to go; the only secondary town was far away, and from there, only one passage in the treasure zone was visible, leading into sand, and nothing special was observed from the edge. Therefore, there was no choice but to go into the opponent's underground; he had been combing the treasure zone for a long time, so staying home and waiting for him made no sense. A scout hero also took an external dwelling of Beholders, though losing 2 of his own in the guard, and, boldly rushing Tazar on Angels, went into the underground. There, he took the opponent's Necropolis secondary town and ran further towards his capital. By the end of the week, he reached it, but Gunnar was already there. The generator gifted him several wonders; not only had the refugee camp given him the aforementioned Gray Bear on the second day, with which he immediately started crushing everything and leveling up quickly, but in the treasure zone, he also took 2 external dwellings of Conflux Fire Birds, and another 2 of the same birds were given to him the following week in the same refugee camp as the Bear! And the Summoning Portal was built; I don't know what it gave there, I didn't see the saves. But from such extreme luck, the opponent seems to have lost some sense of measure and started engaging in completely unnecessary, very difficult battles in the treasure zone, where he not only lost the lion's share of his free army but also spent all his time, causing him to stop meeting the turn limits. In my case, due to practically skipping with a couple of heroes at the beginning of the second week, the accumulated time, on the contrary, exceeded 2000. When Tazar arrived, he had stats of 3-10-2-2 against Gunnar's 11-12-8-8, but Gunnar turned out to have surprisingly few troops—besides shooters, only 5 Manticores, 4 Minotaurs, and some small fry. Tazar's main stack was 4 Angels and 6 Wyverns. But I had no Ballistics, and the walls immediately started shooting not at the Lizardmen, but at the Angels, which was very unpleasant, as was the Mass Slow. Still, with healing, the Angels and Wyverns managed to significantly soften the army in the castle, killing almost all the shooters before they died. And then I just stood in place for many rounds and waited for the catapult to breach the gates. I was saved by the miracle that the opponent had no combat magic at all, not even basic spells. So my Beholders and Hydras survived until the walls fell, and in the end, the remains of the Beholders and 1 surviving Hydra finished off the enemy. Thus, I miraculously won a completely hopeless game. I'll write about the final later.

Let's continue!
After losing, I wasn't upset because it's better to lose early than in the finals. Besides, we could now take a break from Heroes and just chat normally. We went home and started playing. Two pairs: Logistics and Mike, and Van with Dust. Both games were very interesting. I especially liked Logistics' gray bear, which could make the game worth 116. But as they say, luck favors the strong, and Mike won the game. Vanya also won against Lyosha. The next day, we decided that we'd had enough of Heroes, we needed more interaction, and we bought poker chips :D Some played poker, others played Heroes. On the day of the finals, the first-round game between Logistics and Valentok finally ended :D And then the finals themselves ended, which the participants will probably tell you about better. We watched it. It was very interesting. A great tradition was upheld: whoever won in Heroes also won in poker. We even played chess, but I don't think anyone would be interested in that :D
On the third day, we decided to get together, but the cars stubbornly wouldn't start. Oh, how many moves we made there! :smile01: After all those attempts, the cars finally started, and we got home. After taking a lot of group photos, we said goodbye and headed our separate ways. It was very nice to chat and meet up. Thank you to all the participants!

The cast:
Van, also known as Pivaser, also known as Vanya! A fun guy. It was nice to chat with him. He always knows what to say and how to convince. He can give good advice. He plays well!
Deep_Mike, also known as Mikhail. A very serious person who came with a serious intention to play and win, and he did. It was nice to chat with a legend. He played like a pro. I don't think anyone would doubt that. Maybe I'll take a rematch online sometime :)
BA/IEHOK, also known as Tyoma. A cool guy. Very funny. You can tell he's a KVN participant! He plays, even though he doesn't play very often, but he plays quite well. I think that after this trip, his strength will increase tenfold.
Logistik, also known as Vlad. This is what you call a real tough guy from Chelyabinsk! He wasn't afraid to come from the Urals to Siberia. For that, he deserves special RESPECT! Well done!
Alessandro or just Sasha. A simple Siberian guy. He organized everything well and helped everyone. We're waiting for you in Novosibirsk ;)
Dust, also known as Lyokha. My fellow countryman from Novosibirsk. We finally met. It was nice to chat. We got him hooked on random maps, but he still showed his skills there. Respect.
Dreamcatcher, also known as Yura. I was already familiar with him, but it was no less pleasant to see him. Don't forget about Heroes!!

Thanks to everyone! I'm waiting for photos from those who had cameras. There were a lot of photos, and there will be a lot to look at ;)

Now about the finale. On the second day, in the first half during the replay, Van finally managed to finish off Dust, who, like me, carelessly gave him a dungeon. We agreed to play the final in the evening, as both needed rest — after all, the night before we had played second games and slept little. We started around 8 PM, playing on SoD with 6-minute timer, using a program for quick troop and artifact exchange between heroes. This time, the draft pleased me — Van unexpectedly didn't ban Conflux and instead of the expected Castle-Barbarian pair, we got Conflux-Castle. And I never refuse to play Conflux.
Deep Mike (blue, Conflux, random, Grindan) def Van (red, Castle, Valeska), 2sm4d(3), 1-2-5
We used 3 restarts, I still had 1-1-3 left. An incredible number of shooter guards were generated — on the very first steps, 74 upgraded gremlins killed many of my butterflies; on the first day, I also broke through a block of Castle shooters on the road up and halfings guarding an artifact +4 attack. There were few elementals, they weren't built, but with Lacus came 2 stacks of water elementals. The road up turned out to be completely blocked by crossbowmen, down was a ГО, of course also shooter-guarded — liches, and to the right was a fork to a dungeon secondary through medusae. On day 3, I decided to take a crypt along the way (also guarded by shooters) and break through the medusae, then decide whether to take the rest or play. The crypt was small, without losses; I also broke through the medusae without critical losses despite the upgraded stack. On the same day, after killing some upgraded gremlins behind them, I scouted an area that showed the dungeon had enough resources to build phoenixes in the first week — I decided to play. Especially since I visited the dungeon's stable and a +1 magic boost on the respawn. After taking the dungeon, I had an army of 12 water elementals and 5 elementals. I picked up 2 harpies and troglodytes there, then went into a crypt on muddy terrain — it turned out to be maximum. I had little mana; first I slowed everyone, then had enough for a 70-damage shot on the vampires, but I took it successfully, losing only 1 or 2 water elementals from my own. At the very end of the week, I still had money problems — the chest gave me an artifact +1+1 to magic instead of gold, and above the castle, a block of 20 upgraded gargoyles prevented passage to gold. But I broke through them with the secondary hero, transferring artifacts and water elementals from Grindan, and gathered the missing gold — as a result, phoenixes were built in the fort in the first week. On the second week, the plan was to build a mana vortex in the dungeon and, mid-week, go from the dungeon through the passage to the opponent's respawn, especially since his castle was quite close and visible through the scout. The ground view showed the red player had two grass secondaries from the first week — I feared one might be his native, so delaying wasn't an option. In case of an early castle assault, Grindan prudently took and leveled ballistics. Grindan was already preparing to attack when Valya entered my respawn through a side passage from the other side. A castle swap didn't suit me, so Grindan, having received troops brought in the day before, took a hive for 6 vives behind upgraded dendroids and headed home, stopped by an untaken medusa den. The secondary hero took the medusa den, used the gold to buy out Grindan, and returned his army through the chain. Valeska didn't flee but even moved closer to my castle — the opponent mistakenly thought that side of my territory was unexplored, but I saw everything perfectly. And on 1-2-5, having restored mana, Grindan, boosted on phoenixes, attacked Valya. I had an excellent artifact — the Spirit of Oppression, taken by the secondary hero behind the mentioned block of halberdiers, so all of Vale's morale was broken. Her power stats were significantly higher, but she had no spell book at all, and against mass slow, phoenix strikes on wait, and a 100-damage shot with 73 mana, she had no chance — her shooters only killed 1 phoenix before dying. Surrender followed. The draft was largely decisive in this game.
Finally, Dirty Player and Logistik got revenge on me in chess — my head was too fried after Heroes. But on the last night, quite unexpectedly for myself, I also won at poker, though it was clear several people had more experience than me ).
Overall, the event took place in the friendliest atmosphere — I think everyone was satisfied, shared experience, and each probably learned something new. I've been thinking about what allows me to win — after all, what was said above about a "living legend" and "papal level" is a strong exaggeration; I treat Heroes as relaxation and don't engage in any training to improve skill at all. The same Kostya is clearly more technically savvy than me. Probably Dust, who really understands Heroes, accurately characterized the main point of my style — I don't remember verbatim, but the gist is that I don't do anything unnecessary. Just reliable play with minimal risk and fast, economically sound development. Well, I'm certainly ready to offer an online rematch to any willing participants when free time allows ).

Unfortunately, I spent very little time with the Siberian group, but there's a reason for that: I recently became a family man:smile23:. And in such a wonderful company of like-minded people, united by common interests, my passion for the game has been rekindled :) I'm thinking about coming back.

It was great to play a friendly game with Dust, a living legend, and we agreed on a draw due to our roughly equal positions. At the beginning of the game, something funny happened that had never happened to me even online. I created a host for the blue team, the red team (Lеха) got their turn, and I was waiting. I looked, and I had a completely dark map with no castle or hero. I pressed "I" - the standard starting screen, but there was only one red player :confused:. Leha passed the turn, and I was defeated :D

P.S. I will be able to fix the bug with the year 2010 only on January 11th, when I go back to work and get access to the site.

Well, I'll share my impressions too :-)

I had to prove the theorem that global warming had no impact on the Siberian Federal District. :-) It started with the fact that, waking up on January 3rd, I was pleasantly surprised by the temperature outside. The promised -20 looked strange... -37 was what the thermometer showed outside the city. Driving on the highway in such weather is not a good idea; my brain wanted to choose the option of a warm bus for 330 rubles, but it wouldn't be very interesting, especially since I had to meet Ivan and his wife, and a stern Chelyabinsk resident at the train station. So, I raise my right hand, dismissively lower it, and say, "Oh well..." and set off. :-)

I meet the arrivals. We stop by Kostya's place. My poor car has never carried so many large, well-fed passengers in such numbers and over such a distance, so it whined, puffed, probably swore, and refused to go. Despite this, we made it to Barnaul quite easily, in good company. Pizeg is a good car, thanks to him! :-)

Barnaul greeted us with somewhat more cheerful weather; it was clear that we had arrived in the south! :-) The only thing was that the issue of our base of operations had not yet been resolved. The 7-star "Altai" hotel did not satisfy our aristocratic aspirations and evening plans, so we decided to look for a more suitable option. Soon, a 3-room apartment was found, which quite satisfied us with its interior.

A logical train of thought and well-thought-out evening plans suggested that the path to the doorstep should lead through a store like "Maria-Ra," with a mandatory visit to its wine and spirits department. :-) The evening was spent in lively discussions about the rules, tomorrow's games, and even a draw took place. Dust finally indulged in some spirits that evening, which he had denied himself during all the New Year holidays; in general, the evening smoothly transitioned into the morning. :-)

The morning started around 11. We played at the club. Of course, few people really believed in the Napoleonic plans of 2 games a day, but everyone diligently tried to bring them to life. However, the deadlines of 224 and 227 indicated a difficult situation in the tournament table after 5 rounds. ;-) My opponent, for some inexplicable reason, did not appear at the specified place at the specified time, which did not upset me much, because I could finally see what a CM (presumably, "Combat Mage") was like, and not just any CM, but one behind Dirty and Mike. It immediately became clear that there was nothing complicated or sophisticated in these templates, but it was somehow boring to play; I don't have any romantic feelings for randomness, not at all.

At that time, a signal arrived about the imminent arrival of Dreamcatcher at the club and his opportunity/desire to take up my time with a game. So, I didn't understand whether we were playing this as a fun game or whether it was counted as a tournament game instead of Nikolai; it doesn't matter. The point is that the game was interesting, the opponent moved the pieces quickly, and if it weren't for his affairs, the game could have been exciting. Because already in the second week, contact was made through an adjacent secondary town (oh my god, that's what I'm talking about)), near which stood a blue Valerka, who had just defeated a group of Unicorns, with the desire to grab Pandora and a Dweller. Kost.D., and from the darkness, Ivor attacked with all his might, and they had to run away. But Expert Logistics and boots, a hidden stash of angels, 3 dwellings on Archers, and 1 Swordsman gave good chances to continue the fight for the treasure. But Yura had to go, and as it turned out, after being unpleasantly bitten by Snipers, he offered a draw, which I agreed to with honor, because I had already received the desired pleasure from the game, and now I had the opportunity to watch the completion of large-scale battles on other boards, and Yura went home. :-)

The club itself, of course, did not leave the most pleasant impressions. Its visitors, as well as its manager, aka the administrator, did not surprise me much, but being in this island of computer life cannot be called a pleasant pastime. After finally finishing the games and recording one, we went home. Along the way, or not quite, we stopped by an Uzbek cafe, where their shurpa quite satisfied my unpretentious taste. The wine and spirits department was decided not to visit that evening, and upon arriving home, we tried to play two more games, because the poker chips found turned out to be unavailable for purchase due to the ongoing celebration of the Holy Russian New Year at the seller's department. ;-)

I played with Vanya, aka Vanya, and Pivaser. Well, there's nothing to say in my defense. I think I lost because of the Cherkess, and "my favorite" randomness helped, and the opponent didn't give me reason to hope for incorrect moves. Shakti is a nasty one. Especially when he takes a tier 3 consultant from an adjacent secondary town, from which it's not far to me. I still tried to fight. Even against a setup in which, in the very first week, Shakti got an air book, and in the next two, an earth book and all the good stuff in stats, it was possible to somehow fight, to beg. But begging was extremely bad that day. A huge number of hives were emptied, and only 2 of them had 6 geese, which resulted in 45 geese, I think. :-( I barely found a DD in the last of ten emptied Pandoras, and then a Utopia, oh my god, a minimal one with a relic for 1000 per day. With such a setup, all that remained was to hope for gross mistakes or inexperience from the opponent, but not from Ivan, so I had to stop dragging the cat by the tail, and the final game was pointless.

Then there was poker, blitz, spirits if desired, and watching the final.
In principle, the games showed skill, and the winners were clearly worthy of being selected. Kostya was unlucky that he immediately faced Tazar from Mike, but, I think, he wasn't too upset either, although I wouldn't refuse to bring a set of chips home. ;-)

The morning in the south of the Siberian Federal District greeted us with a real South Siberian frost, in which products of the Japanese auto industry refused to start (to my surprise). It wasn't that cold. Previously, Pizeg could handle -30 without preheating, but apparently, it was affected by the fact that it had been standing for two days, and the battery had frozen; it was enough to turn the starter normally only once, it started to catch, but to turn it normally the second time, there was clearly not enough charge, and in order to still get home that evening, we had to perform a lot of maneuvers of various kinds. During which, in addition to dad's maneuvers, a new heroic term was discovered - "women's maneuvers." :D
In the end, everything ended well; my horse was washed, at this time the battery was charged, after which it clearly perked up and started with half a turn. We went, jump-started the second masterpiece from the land of the rising sun, and headed home. We said goodbye, took pictures for history, which said that the First club tournament in Siberia can be considered a success. Hooray to the organizers and its participants!!! Hooray!
We got home normally. The only thing is that I regretted sitting behind the wheel with such a square head from lack of sleep, alcohol, and the computer - it's definitely a "women's maneuver." :D Yes, I lost my phone somewhere, and most importantly, the SIM card with all the contacts. But in general, this misunderstanding did not affect my mood; everything went great. The company gathered was friendly, no one stood out from it, everyone was cheerful and in a good mood! New friends and acquaintances appeared. The tournament took place, we talked, played Heroes, moved chips and figures! Everything was as it should be! :smile54:

P.S. I express special respect to the stern Chelyabinsk man who overcame a considerable distance and still attended this tournament!!! :smile20: : Now we know that they are not in vain praising their city throughout the country! ;-)

Guys, here are the photos - http://files.mail.ru/C28S1S, and there are even a couple of videos there; don't judge us too harshly; everyone was there to relax! :smile13:

Uploaded photos from Barnaul that Artem - Valenok sent me. Uncompressed, 220 Mb in size. otbor_sib.rar Individual photos: - at the club, first round. In the foreground is the infamous "redneck" club administrator, second is me, third is Alessandro. - with the main prize.

For the third time in my life, I'm encountering issues with Narod.ru, and for the third time, I'm convinced how terrible it is... I can't even start downloading a 200 MB archive with photos after trying all day... At the same time, I've already downloaded 8 GB from a torrent today. If anyone can re-upload it to a decent file-sharing service, please do...

Downloaded it in 20 minutes, and I'm sitting here laughing, even though it's 4 AM)))
We had a great time!

Wow, they installed decent monitors in the training ground! I'll be going there for the Dota championship in a week.