Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Discussion and announcements relating to unofficial Countdown competitions, held online or in real life. Observation, discussion, reflection, and other stuff ending in -ion.
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Ben Wilson
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Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Ben Wilson »

Getting in here early- the fourth annual COLIN is just days away and I do have spaces left for anyone who wants them.

Pit your wits against some of the best to have ever appeared on the screen, including no less than five series champions, compete for fun spot prizes, and watch exhibition play- with a twist- between some of the top players to ever have appeared on screen. All details can be found here- http://colin.nebagram.co.uk - and photos from previous events can be found here for 2005, here for 2006 and here for 2007.

Hope to see you there!
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Jon O'Neill
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Jon O'Neill »

Sounds shit to me.

Only joking.. Come on down!
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Joseph Bolas
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Joseph Bolas »

I must admit, I was looking forward to the Hold 'Em exhibition game, because it would've been interesting to see how that went.
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Charlie Reams
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Charlie Reams »

I'll be attending my first one since Cobris 2006. Hooray!
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by David O'Donnell »

Good luck to all involved. Is this to be played like a Swiss tourney? If it is then I would like to see some recaps as well as recaps of the exhibition games if anyone can manage it. Pity I can't go, would be nice to yell profanities to someone's face for beating me rather than doing it via msn. :twisted:
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Joseph Bolas »

Janowsky wrote:Good luck to all involved. Is this to be played like a Swiss tourney? If it is then I would like to see some recaps as well as recaps of the exhibition games if anyone can manage it.
What it is, is there are groups of 3 people and 2 will play against each other and the 3rd hosts:

Game 1: Player 1 v Player 2 (Player 3 hosts)
Game 2: Player 1 v Player 3 (Player 2 hosts)
Game 3: Player 2 v Player 3 (Player 1 hosts)

Overall this wil happen 3 times, so we will play 6 games and host 3 games. I am sure people will be able to post their games that they played here, to see how others would've faired.
Janowsky wrote:Pity I can't go, would be nice to yell profanities to someone's face for beating me rather than doing it via msn. :twisted:
Don't forget about COLIVER in August. Its only across the water from you, so you should be able to make that one :D.
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Kirk Bevins »

Ben, do you want me to bring my (heavy, so I'd rather not) dictionary to COLIN. It's ragged, dirty, missing covers and pages ripped, but all the words are in piece - or will you have enough?

Kirk
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Kevin Thurlow »

Good luck everybody - sorry I can't be there, a really annoying clash of events.....

Kevin
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Ben Wilson
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Ben Wilson »

Many thanks to all those who came for helping to make COLIN 2008 a huge success once again. :) Full results will be up on the website in short order, but a quick summary-

1st Conor Travers 5 wins 386 points
2nd Jon O'Neill 5 wins 375 points
3rd Chris Wills 5 wins 362 points
4th Mark Tournoff 4 wins 342 points
5th Dan Vanniasingham 4 wins 341 points (ouch!)

And here are the piccies- http://colin.nebagram.co.uk/images/COLIN%202008/ :) Will caption them all later.
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Julian Fell »

I recognize so few people on those photos - reminds me how much Countdown I've missed... yes captions will be useful, for me at least! Well done Conor for winning and for stopping Mr Wills from winning for once
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Ben Wilson »

Here's the final standings-

Name Wins Points Niners Numbers
Conor Travers 5 386 2 117
Jon O'Neill 5 375 1 101
Chris Wills 5 362 1 107
Mark Tournoff 4 342 2 90
Dan Vanniasingham 4 341 1 104
Stewart Holden 4 338 0 97
Charlie Reams 4 307 0 90
Mike Brown 4 298 0 64
Jeff Clayton 4 292 0 111
Kirk Bevins 3 341 1 104
Jim Bentley 3 319 0 101
Jerry Humphreys 3 315 2 74
Nick Wainwright 3 301 1 81
Stewart Gordon 3 293 0 81
Dave Coulthurst 3 262 0 94
Dinos Syfris 3 236 0 64
Christine Armstrong 2 279 0 87
Howard Somerset 2 244 0 67
Scott Kenyon 2 231 0 77
Matt Vickers 2 227 1 61
Joseph Bolas 2 218 0 58
Marc Vestey 1 219 0 51
George Stanhope 1 132 0 37
Emma* 0 125 0 47
*sorry, didn't catch your surname!

A few impressive performances in there- Dan Van in a prize-paying 5th and Charlie living up to expectations in 7th, taking away the 'best to have never been on the show' award. The only real shock is Kirk's 10th place- but you've got to believe he'll be back on form sooner rather than later.

Other prizes- Mark Tournoff was the only claimant of the 'scalp', beating Chris on a crucial conundrum in round 2. Conor picked up the numbers prize with an amazing 117/120, though once again that elusive 120/120 has remained, erm, elusive. Jerry, Conor and Mark all picked up a Scrabble desk calendar for spotting 2 niners each during the day, and Stewart Holden aptly got the prize for most valuable Scrabble word with QUEASY for 18 points.

And is it just me or were the points totals abnormally large this year? 11 people averaged over 50 points a game...

And needless to say my careful attempt to get the tabs all nicely lined up has been completely eaten by phpBB. Some things never change.
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Kirk Bevins
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Kirk Bevins »

ben_wilson wrote:Here's the final standings-

Name Wins Points Niners Numbers
Conor Travers 5 386 2 117
Jon O'Neill 5 375 1 101
Chris Wills 5 362 1 107
Mark Tournoff 4 342 2 90
Dan Vanniasingham 4 341 1 104
Stewart Holden 4 338 0 97
Charlie Reams 4 307 0 90
Mike Brown 4 298 0 64
Jeff Clayton 4 292 0 111
Kirk Bevins 3 341 1 104
Jim Bentley 3 319 0 101
Jerry Humphreys 3 315 2 74
Nick Wainwright 3 301 1 81
Stewart Gordon 3 293 0 81
Dave Coulthurst 3 262 0 94
Dinos Syfris 3 236 0 64
Christine Armstrong 2 279 0 87
Howard Somerset 2 244 0 67
Scott Kenyon 2 231 0 77
Matt Vickers 2 227 1 61
Joseph Bolas 2 218 0 58
Marc Vestey 1 219 0 51
George Stanhope 1 132 0 37
Emma* 0 125 0 47
*sorry, didn't catch your surname!

A few impressive performances in there- Dan Van in a prize-paying 5th and Charlie living up to expectations in 7th, taking away the 'best to have never been on the show' award. The only real shock is Kirk's 10th place- but you've got to believe he'll be back on form sooner rather than later.

Other prizes- Mark Tournoff was the only claimant of the 'scalp', beating Chris on a crucial conundrum in round 2. Conor picked up the numbers prize with an amazing 117/120, though once again that elusive 120/120 has remained, erm, elusive. Jerry, Conor and Mark all picked up a Scrabble desk calendar for spotting 2 niners each during the day, and Stewart Holden aptly got the prize for most valuable Scrabble word with QUEASY for 18 points.
Thanks for your kind words, but I played well. I lost 3 games (my worst to date) all on crucial conundrums that were solved in 1 second. That can not be helped in my opinion. I was just unlucky. I'll be back for sure! As for the numbers prize, I was doing so well with choosing 6 small and getting them right until the game against Tournoff which produced an impossible 6 small and so the 120 points was out of reach. It would be interesting to see if Conor chose 1 large all the time or if he chose some harder selections for tactics and still managed the 117!

Kirk
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Charlie Reams
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Charlie Reams »

The results table, and some other stuff, is now in the Wiki article.
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Paul Howe »

Good to hear news of another successful COLIN, and it looks like the standard was really high this year. I was gutted not to be there, and reading everyone's reports made me realise that I haven't played a proper game of Countdown for over a year now, so maybe I'll dip my toes into the online waters again if that side of the community is still active.
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Joseph Bolas »

Kirk Bevins wrote:It would be interesting to see if Conor chose 1 large all the time or if he chose some harder selections for tactics and still managed the 117!

Kirk
I can tell you Kirk, that when he played against me, the numbers was 1 large, 5 small: 100, 5, 7, 4, 7, 9, Target 132.

I actually liked this one, because it was one of the few number games I solved :D.

I did 100 + (9 x 4) - (5 - (7 / 7))
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Conor »

Kirk Bevins wrote: Thanks for your kind words, but I played well. I lost 3 games (my worst to date) all on crucial conundrums that were solved in 1 second. That can not be helped in my opinion. I was just unlucky. I'll be back for sure! As for the numbers prize, I was doing so well with choosing 6 small and getting them right until the game against Tournoff which produced an impossible 6 small and so the 120 points was out of reach. It would be interesting to see if Conor chose 1 large all the time or if he chose some harder selections for tactics and still managed the 117!

Kirk
I chose 1 large all but 1 times, where I chose 4 large on the other time.
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Ben Wilson »

Photo captions-

DSC00583- An eager crowd gathers. Scott is confused by the lack of pool table.
...584- mid-goatdown. Kirk and Conor are deeply engrossed in the round, while Jono appears to be... well... hmm. In his defence, it must've worked as he wound up winning the goat.
...585- the acclaimed sir Jim Bentley of dic watches as the goat proceeds.
...586- ...and sir Nick of Wainwright does the same. :)
...587- headaches ensue as goatdown enters the next round. Doesn't bode well for the day, eh?
...588- Marc Vestey and his cracking hat observe proceedings
...589- my mother, working tirelessly behind the scenes as always
...590- a quick snapshot before things get a little... hyper
...591- Stewart G, jono, Nick, Dan and Joseph
...592- author extraordinare Mark Tournoff signs copies of his book for the fans (Stewart H in this pic).
...593- things are getting hyper. Team Tilefish (Stewart, Conor, Jeff) take on Team Ginge (Jono, Mark, Dan)
...594- 12 letters bad, 9 letters good :)
...595- as my laptop blares out Crispy's 45 second remix of the clock music, the tension is almost insubstantial
...596- things are no longer hyper.
...597- lunch is served!
...598- Matt and Charlie going for the 'most embarrassing photo' award
...599- post-lunch deliberations
...600- Matt mid-dive
...601- Round 1 is underway
...602- Charlie, Joseph and George
...603- Round 1 table 1- Jerry, Marc, Chris
...604- Table 2- Conor, Nick, Matt
...605- Table 3- Jim, Jono, Stewart G
...606- viewtopic.php?f=6&t=33 :)
...607- Table 8- Mike, Dinos, Emma
...608- SK: POKERWORK!?!?!? WTF IS POKERWORK!?!?!?!?!? DV: Erm, what you do for a living, Scott.
...609- Tables 1 and 2 mid-game
...610- Tables 5 and 6
...611- Games all done
...612- Games still all done. Photo taken in-between manic spreadsheeting on my laptop.
...613- Round 2, table 1, and 39 on-screen wins between them. :)
...614- an abnormally strong table 7 mid-game- Nick, Charlie, and the pokerworker :)
...615- Table 4- Mike, Jerry, Stewart G
...616- Charlie, Nick and Scott again
...617- Lots of Countdowners :-)
...618- The eternal conflict, take 534785634786. Actually, the total number (so I am reliably informed) is 16.
...619- Nick vs. Scott
...620- Looking down the tables.
...621- A crowd gathers at table 4.
...622- Dan Van, unbeaten after 4 games. :)
...623- Conor, doing his best to avoid the camera at all costs.
...624- Pre-deciding round nerves
...625- Table 1- Conor, Chris and Dan
...626- Dave, Matt, Charlie
...627- Jeff, Jim, Mike
...628- That most crucial of conundrums
...629- Joseph, Dinos, Nick
...630- Dan vs. Conor
...631- Still Dan vs. Conor
...632- Tables 3 and 4
...633- Dave vs. Charlie
...634- It's all over. But who's done what?
...635- ditto
...636- nabbing a prize for both best numbers performance AND most niners, Conor!
...637- Best player never to have appeared on the show- Charlie!
...638- 5th place: Dan!
...639- 3rd place: Chris! (dunno what happened to '4th place: Mark!')
...640- 2nd place: Jono! Me: 'This is why I wear glasses, that way the moths don't hit me in the eyes'.
...641: And the winner- Conor!
...642: Putting away the tables after the event. I envisaged this pic as a sort-of 'Jonos in the mist' arrangement. Didn't work.
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Jeff Clayton »

Apologies for responding late on this (no jokes about buses please) - this is my first visit to the site since last Saturday.

Many thanks to all for a very enjoyable CoLin once again. You're a tough lot to play against and that's what makes it all the more worthwhile. It was nice aswell to let off steam and have a proper dinner in the pub afterwards, which takes away any rush or stress.

Had a good giggle looking through the photos and reading the captions. Good to see Neb has rid himself of the shakes that plagued his album last year ;)

Top stuff - worth every penny.

Jeff
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Ben Wilson
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Ben Wilson »

Well, after much procrastination, I'm finally able to award the final prize that wasn't announced at COLIN- the tuff luck award. This goes to the player who has the lowest total spread from three games in which they were beaten (obviously only the three closest games are considered for this prize). And the winner is...

Jerry Humphreys, with a combined spread of 24 points! Congratulations Jerry- free entry into COLIN 2009 is yours.
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Julian Fell »

Ah that's a surprise Ben - I thought it would be Kirk who won that, having lost three games on crucial conundrums? He must have been a close second I would imagine?
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Ben Wilson »

Actually Kirk was 3rd, on 28- Jim bentley was second with 26. Nick Wainwright was the only other one who came even close, with 29.

Have to admit I'm also surprised, I'd pretty much written Kirk's name down in the slot, but dropping 18 points to Dan Van in round 2 what was did him in.
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Julian Fell »

By the way Ben (or anyone), how do you decide who sits on which table for the first round at CoLIN? Is it just random or are there seedings etc?
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Ben Wilson
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Ben Wilson »

They're seeded according to the rankings on the Corral- most years I'm able to use a program especially designed for COLIN by Soo (which is also being rewritten for the 2009 event), sometimes (like this year) I make do with a spreadsheet.

2005 was randomly drawn, incidentally. Even at the time, a Holden/O'Neill/Travers first round draw seemed a little heavyweight!
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Joseph Bolas »

ben_wilson wrote:They're seeded according to the rankings on the Corral- most years I'm able to use a program especially designed for COLIN by Soo (which is also being rewritten for the 2009 event), sometimes (like this year) I make do with a spreadsheet.

2005 was randomly drawn, incidentally. Even at the time, a Holden/O'Neill/Travers first round draw seemed a little heavyweight!
So would I have to use the list on CC then for when working out who plays who in the first game at COLIVER?
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Ben Wilson »

You don't have to by any means, but it would make it consistent with the other tourneys (CoBris uses the list too).
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Jon O'Neill
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Jon O'Neill »

Er, it's your tournament mate.
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Joseph Bolas »

ben_wilson wrote:You don't have to by any means, but it would make it consistent with the other tourneys (CoBris uses the list too).
Sorry, but I'm not sure why there is emphasis on the "have" :?.

I do want to make sure that COLIVER is as consistent with the other CO-events as it can be. That way there will be no slip-ups (I'm worried I am going to slip-up on the day :|).
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Julian Fell »

ben_wilson wrote:They're seeded according to the rankings on the Corral- most years I'm able to use a program especially designed for COLIN by Soo (which is also being rewritten for the 2009 event), sometimes (like this year) I make do with a spreadsheet.

2005 was randomly drawn, incidentally. Even at the time, a Holden/O'Neill/Travers first round draw seemed a little heavyweight!
Hmmm... how do you compile those rankings on the Corral Charlie? Am just interested in your methodology...
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Charlie Reams
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Charlie Reams »

The ratings program is a hacky piece of code that's accumulated loads of junk over several years, but basically it started (some years ago) with everyone on 600 points, and each time you beat someone, you get some of their points and they lose some of theirs. The difficulty is in deciding the "some". The program is self-healing in the sense that it changes its parameters each time it runs so to maximise how many of the previous results it would have predicted correctly, with some fall-off for age (so that it doesn't care much about very old results) and various other fiddles. Finally it does some Bayesian tweaking so that people who haven't played many games don't get freaky scores of low statistical significance.

Given that the whole thing is mathematically bull, it's amazing that the ratings coincide so well with most people's opinions, at least at the top end. The middle range is much harder to decide with the sparsity of the data, but it seems to do an alright job.
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Julian Fell »

Ok Charlie - and do only online games count towards your ratings, not performances at e.g. CoLIN and CoBRIS?

Btw can I have another trophy-thing next to my name on the list, because I won the tourney at the Edinburgh Countdown Club in 2003? Go on pleeeaaase :)
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Re: Countdown in Lincoln 2008

Post by Charlie Reams »

All games count, including real-life ones. I've been meaning to improve it to give more weight to real-life games and games with more rounds, but I've not quite got round to it.
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