content: Chess Tournament #1 Recap and Reminder for #2 on (01/13/19) Well volks sorry for being a little late. I wanted to make this thread on Wednesday, but got a little busy. So here we go. Results Our first chess tournament went pretty well I would say. I didn't expect massive turnout and we got enough people to come out that we were able to do the tournament so I just want to say thank you for everyone that showed up. First off, WOW what a performance by charptype. Even though it was just our first tournament he put on quite a show. After losing his first match he went on to win his next SIX games! He handily won the tournament with a total of 24 points. If charptype continues to show up each week it currently looks like  he might remain on top for quite some time. He is currently the winner of the "MDE Chess Tournament #1 Winner" award. Lets see how many of these he can rack up this season and if someone will be able to take him out in the future. Even with charptype's impressive performance what was the talk of the town for many of the competitors was the battles between /u/Ted_Kool and /u/parapaparapa. Each match neck and neck, the back and forth, every turn each of them being on a knifes edge of losing it all. One mistake and it could cost them the match. The tournament ended with many of the players watching Ted and para battling it out in a game so fierce it ended in a draw with only kings remaining. I have to say it was a nail bitter and my heart was pounding the whole time! I officially award them the "Steel Sharpens Steel" award for best rivalry so far. Our next award is the "Iron Will" award. This one goes to diomedes889. Having only played a total of 5 games of chess his entire life before joining the tournament, he was not only the first person in the lobby (only minutes after it opened), but he stayed until the very end. While he was consistently matched up against the juggernaughts, such as charptype and Ted_Kool, he refused to leave early and played the best he could until the very end. Unfortunately he was unable to snag a single win, but he serves as an inspiration to us all and also proves that you don't have to be an experienced player to come out and have fun. I really hope to see him come out again tomorrow and earn his first W To all the other players that came out and stayed for a little bit, only playing a game or two, and the players that came out and played to whole tournament I just wanted to say thank you. I really mean that. I really hope that you come out and play tomorrow. I also hope other people see that this is legit and decide to throw their hat in the ring. You don't have to be the best. This is mainly just meant to be fun and an excuse to hang out with the boys. I had a great time talking with everyone in the chatroom and laughing. Seeing the highs and lows and play by play commentary during the games was truly enjoyable for me. I hope more people this week decide to come out and give it a go. Now I just wanted to quickly discuss changes for tomorrows tournament (and future tournaments). In order to speed up games a bit so we can get 1) more matches and 2) have people wait around in the lobby less I am thinking of changing the time per side from 10 minutes to 7 minutes. With the shortened amount of time this will hopefully force games to go faster so we are able to play more, and also put a little more pressure on the more experienced player with the hopes that they make a mistake. In order to keep it still beginner friendly I won't want to drop the time per side too low and turn it into a bullet chess tournament. Any thoughts from last weeks participants and any future players? Also for the people that played last week, the last tournament was a little too late for some of our brothers in Europe. It was well past their bed time and they couldn't join because they needed their beauty sleep. Would you be able to join a tournament earlier in the day so hopefully they could participate as well? Maybe around 11 am EST (I believe that would be evening time across the pond)? Also for our European brothers would that time work for you, and how many of you would hard commit to joining tomorrows tournament? My fear is that if we do the tournament too early for Americans not many will join, and a lot of you Europeans will not show up. Anyways that enough rambling so lets talk about it in the comments. Also feel free to leave any suggestions. I would be happy to hear some feed back.