The Best UNational Players Today (Part 1)

An ongoing discussion is happening in the UNational Community. Who are the best players? Well I believe I have a certain end to the discussion - and a mighty answer. Let me explain.

UNational is everchanging in who is the best. Times are changing, and so is the podium. I mentioned changing rankings in a recent post, but I think those are going to change soon as well.

The following is a list of the top 15 UNational Players in my opinion, based on performance rating and Classical Rating (UNational Elo). So sit back, relax, and grab a snack while I go over the top 15 UNational Players today.

1) Rudy Tillmann

Rudy Tillmann isn't only the best by performance, but also by UNational Elo, with a staggering 2352. Tillmann is now crowned as the best UNational player, after having defeated the old king, Raimond Reece, many times over consecutively.

As the new king of UNational, he is expected to thrive. Rudy Tillmann is, by the end of his reign, to achieve 3000 UNational Elo, which is about 2500 FIDE (Grandmaster level).

Rudy also has the title of UGM, or UNational Grandmaster. Since he has easily achieved 2000 UNE, that is his title. The UNational directors are considering making a new title, even harder to achieve than the UGM title, since Rudy alone has grown beyond what was thought possible in UNational.

Ever since beating Raimond Reece for the first time, he has completely dominated, having a W/L record of 112-1. The only game he lost was to Hayden Morales, a UNM (UNational National Master), with an unlucky double fork where he lost his queen (discovery fork).

However unlucky that loss was though, he still stands at the top. His classical UNE is 2352, though he commonly performs with a UNE of nearly 3200. This is about 2700 FIDE performance. This is extremely close to the top, though he stays under UNational since he can miss tournaments without many repercussions. The only one is that he has a chance to be uncoronated.

As the top player, however, he will usually participate in all the tournaments that come to schedule. He is a frequent tournament player, more often than not. He takes down top players without a second thought, showing his superiority through sheer aggression over the board.

Below is Rudy Tillmann's Big 4 Round Robin Round 1 game against his own brother, Brody Tillmann. In this game he shows his pure aggression and absolute dominance, proving why he is number 1.

2) Selena Hartfeld

While no longer in the top 100 players of UNational, she still stands as a top player over the board, and one who does not hesitate when she gets momentum.

With a UNE of 1999 after the Big 4 Round Robin, she ranks #113 in all of UNational players, previously having been #4. The sudden drop was due to the annual Elo Set, where players can advance on levels of progressively harder human-like bots to set an Elo by performance.

She doubled back and participated in the Elo Set, achieving a new UNE of 2189, though they declined the UNE and regarded her as a 2000 rated player. After some thought, however, they put Selena at 2075 UNE.

While she has a high UNE compared to players such as Graysen Maxim (1673) and Hayden Morales (1902), her performance stands at a lower 1897 UNE. Players such as Hayden Morales, who have taken down top players, have higher performance UNE. Hayden's sits at a staggering 2109, which is nearly 350 UNE higher than Selena's performance UNE.

Despite her low performance rating, she is a tough opponent. Her performance rating is only lower than 1900 UNE due to a lack of great and brilliant moves. However, there is some controversy over her performance UNE at the moment.

Recently she took down Brody Tillmann in the 2025 Big 4 Round Robin, and in only 13 lines, nonetheless. During this short game, she played the top computer moves on all 13 of her turns.

In this game, you can see Brody played some poor moves. But more than that is that Selena played the engine's top moves every time. This should theoretically boost her performance UNE to about 2000, similar to her actual UNE rating.

3) Xander Kingman

Xander Kingman is a new player, though he is a prospect in UNational. He is currently ranked #6 by UNE, though his performance UNE says he should be rated higher, having a performance UNE of 2850.

Xander is only coming out of the shadows now since he had participated in the Elo Set, showing his strength as a player. During the entirety of this week and next, he is proving why his Elo Set is so high in a live, but private, tournament against all else who did the Elo Set.

Not only did Xander make a name for himself by shooting to the top in a short amount of time, he has also taken down Rudy Tillmann in only one ever game nearly 3 years ago. While 3 years ago Rudy was not number 1, he did rank #3 at that time, having a rough UNE of 1700, and Xander having a rough UNE of 1100.

Kingman has also earned himself the nickname of 'King of the Board', though he is not ranked number 1. So why has he earned this name? He is squirmy on the board. There was once he managed to avoid checkmate for nearly 50 moves against top player Mason Wright, who is currently number 2.

While he has shown he is a strong opponent, he has many losses compared to wins in the last year, a record of about 68-59. Despite this scam of a record, he is a very formidable opponent.

When he participated in the annual Elo Set for UNational, he set himself at 2282, which is significant compared to many people in UNational. He is 6 UNE behind #5 and 3 UNE ahead of #7, though his performance UNE is significantly higher than both #5 and #7. Again, his UNE is circa. 2850, whereas #5 and #7 have performance UNEs of 2650 and 2550 respectively.

Xander can also outperform #2, Mason Wright. In this game, you can see it was a long battle. In the end, however, Xander came out on top, delivering checkmate with a pawn.

4) Dristen Grouper

Grouper is also new to the UNational leaderboards of the top 10. He, like Xander Kingman, participated in the annual Elo Set. In this, he obtained himself a UNE of 2268, showing his pure strength on the board.

Dristen is more logistics than aggression. He does not play aggressive moves, though he performs formidably by making hidden but powerful attacks.

With his wits, he has managed to claim himself a performance UNE of nearly 3100, placing him #2 by performance. He hides his simple plans in plain sight, making them so stupid looking that his opponents overlook them constantly.

Recently he has also been coronated as the wisest UNational player. This is simply because he performs at a level above most players, with the exception of Rudy Tillmann, who he has yet to play. He is predicted to take down Rudy Tillmann in the December Snow Tournament this year, having the opportunity to take the crown for himself in that tournament.

Dristen is predicted to reach an astounding 3200 UNE before he leaves UNational, outrating Rudy Tillmann's predicted final UNE of 3000.

While comparing him to Rudy, many will see similarities and the closeness of their stats. For example (Dristen : Rudy):

2268 : 2352 UNE, 3098 : 3187 performance UNE, 109-3 : 112-1 last year record.

Their stats are not too far off, and many are proclaiming that Dristen Grouper is the next Rudy Tillmann.

Dristen, as stated earlier, outperforms many opponents by logic, not aggression. As seen in this game against Hayden Morales (November 2024), it's clear he's not being aggressive. Rather, he's being logical about his moves. The time control isn't recorded anymore, but he used all of his time (about 1 second by checkmate).

5) Mason Wright

Mason Wright has a right to brag, and for good reason. His UNE after the annual Elo Set is 2341, lagging only by 11 to Rudy, who ranks #1. While he is right behind Rudy, there are many things showing he should not.

First and foremost, Mason has a performance UNE of a lowly low 1934. This is significantly lower than his true UNE, by just over 400 UNE (407 exactly). His low performance UNE shows compared to someone such as Thomas Hayward, who has a performance UNE of 2198 (similar to his actual UNE of 2266).

Not only is his high UNE not shown in his performance, it's not shown on the clock either. The other month I played against Mason in a tournament (I did lose the match, but that's besides the point). We had an hour and a half time control, and by the end of the game he had an hour and 26 minutes on the clock. I had around 10 minutes left.

While he is simply one of the best of this time, there are others who best him. They are the four above and some of the ones following. The explanations will be with them.

Anyhow, Mason also does not take lightly to many things. If he loses a single pawn he throws a temper tantrum. While he is the youngest in the top 5 (at only 11 years of age), this kind of behavior is unacceptable, and he is often removed from tournaments, causing his UNE to fluctuate greatly compared to most other players.

While he is sometimes removed from tournaments, he has won a great number of games in the past year (98-14). Below is one of his many wins.

This game was really interesting, causing some spectators (from UNational) to question his true potential. Others speculate that he will pass Rudy Tillmann in UNE come the December Snow Tournament.

Thank you for taking your time to read The Best UNational Players Today (Part 1). Part 2 will come later in the week. Stay tuned for more!

Thank you all for supporting me! I wouldn't keep posting without your guys' support! Y'all are awesome!

Consider going back to read all my other posts too! All are fantastic stories!