As part of the Regionals season 2011, the French Nationals are being held in Lyon. A lot of players joined from all over the country, as well as from nearby Switzerland. I will not announce here the definitive results, because they are still being processed, but I wanted to mention the fact that we had a huge turnover.

The Melee tournament took place on Friday, June 3rd. 64 players took part in the 4 rounds, 16 4-player tables each round. The final 4 competed for the first place, while players 5-8 played the little finals to fill in the top-8.

Yesterday, Saturday, June 4th saw 76 players engage in 7 preliminary rounds, before the top-16 players fought it out in the final phase.

The complete report will follow when the week-end is over (we are currently overseeing the Call of Cthulhu and Warhammer Invasion French Nationals), but I wanted to mention these first numbers as a good sign of the game's health on both sides of the Atlantic. The North American leg of the Regionals seems to have brought a lot of players in the different metas, with ever-increasing figures. The same is true in Europe, and the Italian (and, I think, Spanish) Nationals will probably see impressive numbers. I don't know about the nascent Chinese meta, but there is a lot of potential there as well.

The overall health of the game is a cause of enthusiasm for everybody concerned, and I wanted to share mine as one of the hosts (and players) of these French Nationals. I think these turnovers will get more and more frequent, and the Worlds could see a record attendance this summer.

Sounds like you guys had a blast! Do you have a house/agenda breakdown? I hope that someone other than Martell won the joust

I kind of wish we had the same sort of numbers across the channel here in the UK.

64 for Melee and 76 for Joust? That's Spectacular! Absolutely agree that the growth all over the world is good news for the game. Thanks for the preliminary info. Does any of the growth in Europe come from the HBO series, or is it just the game and the books? Congrats on the huge turnout!

The breakdown will come later, on monday, I think, the time for everyone to recover from the week-end.

The joust was won by a Stark/City of Shadows deck, who defeated a Martell/King of Summer (not sure about the agenda).

kpmccoy21 said:

dont think so, cause the series is not yet on TV here. no translations so far and also no legal way to watch it in english.

so chances are that AGOT will receive even more attention when the series is starting here as well.

The increase of players is the direct consequence of local communities, they tend to grow around motivated players who play weekly tournaments and stores where you can find players at any time of the day. The fallout of the series (which has not been broadcast in the local language yet in some countries, including France, but is being followed online by not a few people) will come later, right now it's being felt in bookshops where the novels are selling like hotcakes (I run one). I think a lot of people who used to play the CCG are getting on the LCG now that more cards are available than the core set. New players inspired by the HBO series will start coming in a few months, I think.

The turnout has been good, the Melee tournament is probably the biggest ever so far, whereas the Joust tournament is among the top 3 with Stahlek 2010 and Madrid 2011. And this is only the beginning, a lot of cornerstone players didn't show up because of prior engagements, and Italian and Spanish players were unable to come because the tournament took place during their university examinations.

kpmccoy21 said:

There's been a lot of interest in the UK, where the series is being broadcast on cable. The Core Set is sold out at pretty much every retailer here, and there's been a fair amount of interest amongst my local Magic and my local board games group. I'm in the middle of my exams right now, but when those are over, I'll be taking my cards over to those groups - I've already got a few people who have promised to try out the game

Here are the official results for Melee:

Final Table:

1- Hyunkel (Greyjoy)
2- Elwë (Lannister)
3- Nuggetz (Baratheon)
4- Astrobatordorak (Targaryen)

Little Final:

5- Katagena (Stark)
6- Groudaf (Baratheon)
7- Fishiste (Lannister)
8- Captainchris (Greyjoy)

Below are the results after the 4 preliminary rounds, before the final tables for the top 8 players:

1- Hyunkel (Greyjoy)
2- Elwë (Lannister)
3- Nuggetz (Baratheon)
4- Astrobatordorak (Targaryen)
5- Katagena (Stark)
6- Groudaf (Baratheon)
7- Fishiste (Lannister)
8- Captainchris (Greyjoy)

9- Jecki (Martell)
10- Sylvain63 (Martell)
11- Kramer (Targaryen)
12- Arbhast (Stark)
13- Mathaplo (Targaryen)
14- Maekar (Targaryen)
15- Solaufein (Baratheon)
16- Gudrimid (Stark)
17- Nànie (Greyjoy)
18- Paraph (Targaryen)
19- Ser Arthur Lannister (Lannister)
20- Jaelen (Martell)
21- Toldea (Baratheon)
22- Mando (Lannister)
23- Chgros (Martell)
24- Alekyne (Greyjoy)
25- Marduk (Stark)
26- Satanipoing (Stark)
27- Rapeass (Stark)
28- Ser Aran (Lannister)
29- Alostemar (Martell)
30- Kordovan (Martell)
31- Pekeumok (Greyjoy)
32- Samaëlle (Martell)
33- Katsandrya (Stark)
34- Ticondrihus (Greyjoy)
35- Jacen Solo (Targaryen)
36- Khren (Targaryen)
37- Bobdenar (Lannister)
38- Jujubinus (Targaryen)
39- Firefox (Baratheon)
40- Kysed (Greyjoy)
41- Bias (Stark)
42- Comm (Targaryen)
43- Golo (Baratheon)
44- Lord Lexander (Baratheon)
45- Direwolf (Targaryen)
46- Grumf (Baratheon)
47- Mog (Lannister)
48- Titi (Martell)
49- ChaOdiz-Padre (Neutral House)
50- Zorglub (Baratheon)
51- Theon (Targaryen)
52- Kroryn (Greyjoy)
53- Diana Olympos (Baratheon)
54- Poulcrust (Greyjoy)
55- Salarcus
56- Shamir (Greyjoy)
57- Prodigee (Stark)
58- Hugues (Greyjoy)
59- iGogol (Martell)
60- Gabi (Stark)
61- Tara (Stark)
62- Kane (Martell)
63- Lion de Lyon (Neutral House)
64- Elwhind (Greyjoy)

Agendas are still being processed, as well as restricted cards.

Paraph said:

Here are the results for the Joust.

The Top 16 players are as follow:

1- Maekar (Stark)
2- Jaelen (Martell)
3- Marduk (Stark)
4- Elwë (Lannister)
5- Ticondrihus (Greyjoy)
6- Kordovan (Martell)
7- Katagena (Stark)
8- Mathaplo (Targaryen)
9- Ser Arthur Lannister (Lannister)
10- Vince (Greyjoy)
11- Wolodia (Lannister)
12- Hyunkel (Greyjoy)
13- Arbhast (Lannister)
14- Kramer (Targaryen)
15- Nuggetz (Baratheon)
16- Chgros (Martell)

Round16 matches:

Elwë (Lannister) defeats Chgros (Martell)
Katagena (Stark) defeats Hyunkel (Greyjoy)
Jaelen (Martell) defeats Wolodia (Lannister)
Ticondrihus (Greyjoy) defeats Nuggetz (Baratheon)
Mathaplo (Targaryen) defeats Vince (Greyjoy)
Maekar (Targaryen) defeats Kramer (Targaryen)
Kordovan (Martell) defeats Arbhast (Lannister)
Marduk (Stark) defeats Ser Arthur Lannister (Lannister)

Quarterfinals:

Elwë (Lannister) defeats Katagena (Stark)
Jaelen (Martell)¨defeats Ticondrihus (Greyjoy)
Maekar (Stark) defeats Mathaplo (Targaryen)
Marduk (Stark) defeats Kordovan (Martell)

Semifinals:

Jaelen (Martell) defeats Elwë (Lannister)
Maekar (Stark) defeats Marduk (Stark)

Finals:

Maekar (Stark) defeats Jaelen (Martell)

House affiliations for all 76 players are still being processed, I will publish them once I know them all.

Great job guys! Will be very interesting to see the Stark deck - something I haven't played against yet.

Congrats on a great turnout!

A link for the Stark Shadows deck : letronedeferjce.forumactif.com/t2575-joute-1ere-place-cf-lyon-06-2011

If you searc on this french forum, you can see many decklists from the world... oups, the french championship. But it's in french...

Thanks for posting. Great to see such large tournaments in Europe and always interesting to see Stark at the top.

iGogol said:

A very interesting deck. Thanks for posting again! I was really suprised at the plots being used w/ Bran (I thought more Cities).

Glad I am starting to pack more location control

rings said:

Yeah, me too, but when you think of it, it makes a lot of sense. He has a good mixture of plots that have nice When Revealed effects and ones that you'd want active in the challenge phase. Flip A Time For Ravens with Bran to get a White Raven or a Carrion Bird, then flip Winds of Winter to use them to maximum effect in the same round. I think the combo of Feast or Famine and Valar is especially good. That way you got eight gold in Marshalling to bounce back from Valar, and the claim 0 doesn't hurt you because you're not declaring challenges anyway. Hell of a trade-off. It's kinda genius, really. Why don't I ever think of stuff like that? Or you do it the traditional way, use Bran to Valar and flip Winds of Winter then to have claim 2 post-Valar.

rings said:

In fact every body play lot of location control ther, but the next event will help a lot, and change lot of things.

you can find a video of the second part of the final here

letronedeferjce.forumactif.com/t2613p15-photos-videos

Sorry for low quality but they use phone, and it was not really prepared ^^

Maybe better on youtube in the associtaion which host the tourney

www.youtube.com/user/rhonedefer#p/u/3/DV1a_3kjYSM