The 3rd place player in the final game can either have more than 7 centers with a survive, or finish with a draw regardless of centers.

Per Butterhead on Sept 14:

"-For this tournament, Draw> Survive. so if you are in a draw with 6 centers, you still go over a survive with 6+, because you were able to help stop a solo, which obviously means you played a better game. "

There's debate about drawing the final game which would put that game's Turkey, England, and France into the final mix, since France will either end with 6 centers and the draw or 7 centers and the draw.

Definitely draw is more worth than survive, I would say that even one center draw is better than 14 center survive.

and game 2 is done!
tied for first in game two: mongoose998, dejan0707
3 place with 8 centers: SacredDigits

The list of player who are in final mix:

1. Drano019
2. Bozo
3. Alder
4. tobi1
5. mongoose998
6. dejan0707
7. SacredDigits

Drano, I put you in charge of starting the final...

Sounds good. Setting preferences people?

No preference, although 24 hour phases at minimum.

36h if possible.

24 is fine

Whoa Whoa. How did I get booted?

That's what you get for betraying me! Bwah hahahaha! ok, just kidding. You're right tho, ez. I thought the final was to be top 2 from each game and then the wild card would be top 3rd place player overall....

It is. tobi got second in the game that he and ez had the same number of SC's at the end because if you went back through each year tobi had more SC's the most recent year that their SC's were not the same. And I took the wild card spot because I'm a dick like that.

Yes, ez, I mis-counted the centers, and tobi had one more center than you the year prior...

Well perhaps starting with more SC's is worse?

shall we discuss this matter? tobi, ez, and anyone else who wants their opinion heard, I'm willing to hear it...

so ez is working the point that he got to 6 centers later than tobi. him being Turkey, that is expected. by the time ez had 6, tobi had 8. in autumn 1908, it was turkey 9, france 10.
according to the prestated rules, tie goes to the most centers, which is tobi

Are we going to start the final game soon? The games have ended long ago.

I'm wanting to see if anyone else has anything to add to the argument of who is the second place winner of the tobi-ez game... if nobody is going to add anything, tobi makes it in... if anyone can bring a valid argument, we will discuss...

I believe Turkey should advance based on this statement by butterhead previous to the beginning of the tourney:

"-If player C finished 3rd with 6, making it a tie with him and player B, then It will be decided by who had the best gameplay. Ex: if Player B got to 6 centers with little to no effort, say he is France and gets Spain and Port and Belgium due to a German support, and then he just helps Germany coast into an easy win, while Player C fights for the whole game to try to win it, he will go over B. it will be discussed more if that situation arises, and it will be open for discussion by all participants."

This exact situation practically happened. France gained 3 builds in the first year, whereas Turkey gained 1. Not only that, France had a CD England where he easily gained builds while Turkey had to fight both Austria and Italy. Having France advance is decidedly unfair as Turkey clearly had a harder time gaining the same amount of SCs than France did.

But France managed to get an alliance with Germany and this was the reason for it's success. Turkey only got it's SC's, because Germany stabbed France and France decided, it was the best way to ally with Turkey to have a little chance. If Germany had never stabbed France, there would have been a two-way-draw between France and Germany at the end (and Turkey were destroyed).
In addition to that: How could France played better, it didn't only support Germany to win like in the example.

Honestly I think it's difficult to decide about a better gameplay especially if you don't no anything about the diplomacy behind the moves. It's a problem now, that we have "two second places" and I preferred that both are in next round. But then there would be another player who should be in according to the rules but is pushed out. The best way is to strictly decide like it is said in the rules, even if it is bad for ezpickins.

Drano, hows about you start the final game, invite all but tobi and ez, so that once this gets settled we can get going

No, there is nothing in the rules about going back 2 years to see who has more SCs. The rules explcitly mention SCs at game's end ONLY. Other than that, the rules stipulate that butterhead picks whoever he thinks played better.

IMO, France had an easy time with a CD England. Of course he got an alliance with Germany. It makes sense. England CDs, F/G ally, and sweep the board. Not very hard. Turkey had to fight against 2 powers early to make gains. Quite a bit harder.

But Turkey get his SCs not because it played better than France but because Germany stabbed France. I don't know if Turkey invited Germany to this stab, then it would be fair for the Turk to be in next round. But otherwise it was just luck for Turkey. And it wasn't just luck for France to ally with Germany.
But as I said we can't decide about gameplay in this situation.

I disagree. Turkey DID play better because he didn't get stabbed by an ally.

In fact, I argue france played very poorly because he was foolish enough to leave himself open to a stab. Id not move France on for that very reason. He was too trusting and not careful enough - which is poor play in the game of Diplomacy.

Please understand my point:
You can't say Turkey played a better game, because he didn't get stabbed. There was no ally who could have stabbed Turkey. Russia as his only big ally always have to fight against the German. You don't know if the player of Turkey would have been stabbed by Germany, too, if he had played France.

For me, who played russia in that game, I would pick ez -- 1) diplomatically, he was a solid ally who only stabbed me when he had little other choice and, in fact, was able to cash in on my war with austria for some solid gains. 2) France was mostly diplomatically silent (at least from my POV). except for a brief duscussion early in the game about teaming up against the germans and the english (pre-CD), which never panned out, i heard nothing for him.

if we've voting, I vote ez

@AtlastheBarbarian: At one point I decided to work with Germany and you decided to concentrate on Austria. Maybe I'm a bad diplomat, but in may point of view there wasn't a good reason to contact you anymore.
You pointed out right, that I was mostly diplomatically silent in YOUR POV. In my POV you were diplomatically silent, too.

I would love to make a compromise, but the only compromise I see, is playing the final game on an eight-player-variant. But on the other hand this would be against the aims of this tournament and I'm sure, not every player will agree.