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Jul
4

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2019 ToS Winners

Category: Awards, Competition, Events, Roleplay Systems, Roleplaying community Tags: , , 2 Comments

It’s time to announce the winners of the latest Tournament of Simulations (ToS). Finally! We asked for nominations back in February, and you responded by nominating 29 absolutely incredible games from across the community. After a few delays, here we are with this year’s champions. In case you were wondering, this is how we select the winners. This is an extra special ToS as it marks twenty years since that first tournament back in 1999.

As I say every year, evaluating sims is a subjective art, and this is certainly true with ToS.  We’re not here to identify the best games as this is impossible.  Instead, we’re here to identify what we think are outstanding role plays that exude excellence.  A different set of judges may very well chose a completely different set of winners.  And that’s okay!  With that on the record, here are your 2019 anniversary year tournament winners:

All entries this year were in the play-by-post category.

Congratulations to all of our winners! Well done! Believe me when I say that there were some really, really good entrants that didn’t make the above list. For that reason, I’d like to personally thank everyone who took the time to enter their games in the competition.  Thank you for providing a fantastic role play experience for your players–that was more than evident in all of the entries. The individual grade sheets have already been emailed to each sim’s respective representative.

I’d also like to acknowledge our amazing panel of judges: Amanda Rose, Aurther Winters, Avakhon Khinsharri, Beeman, Blondie, Geoffrey Teller, Greenfelt, Kim Godwin, Largehobbit, Nathalie Chapman, Nim & Nugra. I’ll call this year’s group the Terrific Twelve! They volunteered hours of their time to serve the simming and online role playing community. I can’t thank them enough for the wonderful job they did!

OWCH

While we’re on the subject of judging, Blondie of 22nd Fleet, Nugra of UFOP: StarBase 118 & Greenfelt of 22nd Fleet are hereby awarded the Ongoing Worlds Community Honor (OWCH) for serving as judges in three Tournament of Simulations.  They volunteered hours of their time to serve in this capacity.  Their selflessness and volunteer attitude are an example for us all to follow.  Without them, we simply wouldn’t be able to hold major events like the Tournament of Simulations. Thank you!

A few statistical notes

  • This is the 9th year in a row that a tournament was held (2011-2019). Six total tournaments were held 1999-2007. No tournaments were held 2008-2010.  Fifteen total tournaments have been held to date.
  • Fifteen awards were bestowed this year. The 2007 tournament saw the most awards presented (26). 182 total awards have now been conferred dating back to 1999.
  • Two clubs brought home multiple awards this year: 22nd Fleet (5) and UCIP (4).  The last time a club won four awards was in 2017 (UCIP). The last time club a won five awards was in 2012 (Independence Fleet and Phoenix Roleplaying). The record for most awards in a single tournament is 10 (Starfleet Legacy Alliance, 2005).
  • Star Army moves into second place by themselves for all-time awards (13).  Starfleet Legacy Alliance remains in the lead (31). UCIP moves into a tie for third place with Bravo Fleet and Federation Sim Fleet (12).
  • Star Army also extends its record of consecutive tournaments with at least one win to eight (2012-19).  UCIP is in second place with awards in six different tournaments (though non-consecutively).
  • Shattered Universe picked up its first tournament win this year.  Twelve of the 15 tournaments have now seen at least one club pick up their first award.  The three exceptions are 2001, 2013, and 2017.
  • Three independent sims won awards this year. At least one independent sim has been represented in every tournament since 2006.
  • USS Vindicator moves into first place all-time with awards in five consecutive tournaments (2015-19). Blue Dwarf is now in second place with four (2011-14).
  • Besides the USS Vindicator, there were six other repeat winners this year. All picked up their second award: USS Legacy, USS Black Hawk, Cold Station Theta, YSS Kaiyō II, Browncoats Unite: Back to the Black, and Memory Theta.

All results are final and are not subject to appeal.  Look for next year’s tournament to begin in late 2020 or early 2021.  Have a great year of role playing!

How Does the Tournament of Simulations (ToS) Work?

Past winners: 2011 | 2012 | 2013 | 2014 | 2015 | 2016 | 2017 | 2018