Adepticon 2011 WFB Team Tourney

After a big night out in the hotel bar with a great group of Warhammer players Saturday night, my Teammate Jeff and I got up really early Sunday for the WFB Team Tournament. Team Tourneys are the staple of Adepticon, and its traditionally been the building block of the whole convention. Now personally, outside the rabid popularity of the 40K TT, I think the Fantasy TT, in its spirit and intent. (a fun team event in which people build there teams, in design and look and fluff) has apexed recently and with the advent of 8th edition, tradition has left the building. I saw very few "built for the event armies" and it seemed to have boiled down to two guys putting the hardest stuff they could on table from two different armies, with the caveat of no Lords. Knowing how the 8th edition meta game was, we followed suit throwing the most bang for the buck we could into Two 1000 points armies of Empire and Bretonnians. We ran the same thing last year, I think 7th edition was definitely more our element we lost the first game on a fluke, and won the next two readily. This year, we both had a black cloud over our heads from both our personal let downs in the Championship.


First round we played Dark Elves and Orcs and Goblins, a tough match. after taking a big lead. Things went sideways on us when Jeff's BSB failed his save from a killing blow, he lost a rank and a big unit of goblins became steadfast. This put us on a crash course for numerous stuff to go wrong, and we ended up losing. This was a great game no doubt.


Round 2 m we took on Empire and Warriors of Chaos, in a desperate alliance, very difficult to run a desperate alliance because of the way the magic works. Again we started out big but again, one of those combats you take for granted, is were things went horribly wrong and we ended up upside down. By turn 4 the Empire side of our army was totally wiped out, except for my wizard., Jeff had just his General and some Peg Knights remaining. a strong turn 6 got us back in it by finish off a unit of Chaos Warriors MoZ, that were plaguing us all game. In the end its was Draw almost to the point.

Our third match was against Lizardmen and High Elves..a fun game, I kept waiting for something to go wrong but it didn't. we had control of the whole game, and our opponents had some pretty bad luck and made a couple decisions, they probably shouldnt have, they were pretty tabled, and we didnt even take our last turn.
So there you go, it took me 7 games of Warhammer to finally win one this year. pretty brutal. I need to say once again we had awesome opponents in all three of team games and I'd go as far to say as my group of combined opponents this year, was the best I've had ever!. So while I might whine about my bad luck, its not really that bad, because I did get to play and meet some great people so cheers to them and at 1 win, 1 loss, and 1 draw we wrapped the 2011 Team tourney.

Where the Team Tourney falls behind for me is in the scoring, at a whopping 71 teams, there were more bodies than already mention Championships that were the largest to date I'm not quite sure how to properly sort out 71 teams with only 3 games and find a fair winner given the context of the what event is "supposed to be" and what it really "is". Scoring wise- points were awarded to the whole package, so despite no comp scoring you got big points for your fluff and display, so really need to win all three games, and have the big soft scores to win. However I didnt really see people meeting the challenge, Even we didnt bother to present any fluff and got tagged 15 points on our soft score (putting us at 23rd overall despite a respectable battlepoint score and max sports and 24 out of 25 for paint).


I had a really hard time finding that one team or display that put the stand alone work into their army and display and make this event their focus this year. The army one that won, "Players Choice", was the one, I and I am sure many others voted for and they did a great job, however it would not have even made the radar if you go back a couple years.



My point being is I see confusion here in what this event is supposed to be and whats it become. Events need to change along with game, and just like Adepticon has grown and changed so do these events. is the team tourney going to be a beer and pretzels sunday good time based on the hobby with tons of folk working on unique displays for the glory of Warhamer? or is going to be a standard competitive event?..I don't think you can it both ways...or at least it didnt play out that way. I'm not sure there is that even huge an audience there any more for the former.
Overall thou had a good time this day, hanging out with a friend and throwing some dice with some fun people, but as I look back on it I just kind of find myself ambivalent about the whole thing, "lackluster" is the word that keeps coming to mind as I try to describe the WFB TT. Me thinks Its time for a reboot.

Adepticon 2011- WFB Championships

Adepticon -2011 Warhammer Fantasy Championships



Well, no huge write up this year. Unfortunately this is just never my event for a variety of reasons, This year my crappy play it is 100% directed me being woefully unprepared for 8th edition at a competitive level such as this. While my army looked good on paper it wasn't so good in practice. That and some seriously comical luck brought me a whopping 0-3-1 finish playing my 4th game on the last table..that's a first for me.


all these pics are just things I liked. some amazing, some solid, just a fun random army sample.



On the good side, all 4 my opponents Derek, Lance, Brad and Mike were righteous dudes and using my usual personal scoring of Fun, Sports, and Comp all these guys were 5/5/5 (5 being Max). Sometimes the black cloud just follows you, after the ridiculous end of my second game..I just gave up started drinking and went along for ride and had a good time. I did find out later I was tied with 5 other guys for best sportsman and my soft scores were maxed so despite my miserable record..I still finished pretty good considering my record,



My Games broke down like this:

Game 1 Vs Lizards- Slann w/ huge temple guard Bunker, Scar Vet, huge Saurus Bunker, 4 Sallies in 2 units and a bunch of Skinks filling out the rest. I had the Flaggies in the front and Stank in the Flank of the Slann/ Tguard and couldn't bust them, if you cant do that, thats all Empires got, not being able to break either bunker left all the points on the table and I lost on points..fair enough. 0-1



Game 2 vs O&G - Well rounded list, 6 warmachines was only hard first turn, after that three were done, I was up most of this game until "boxcars" on an overrun after taking down a big unit of savage orcs put my General and Wizard's unit exposed flank to a horde unit of biguns with double choppers and a killy BSB. IF I had rolled a even an "11" I would have been ok, I had set up for a Front and Flank Charge with my Flaggies. the worst dice roll possible at the worst time started a chain reaction that caused my whole army to fold. bummer 0-2





Game 3 Vs High Elves- I started hitting the jack and cokes with my opponent and new buddy Brad, I killed his General and one of his Wizards early and thought it was an easy victory, however even shot up Swordmasters in 8th are filthy and hot dice streak had them and his White Lions rip me a proverbial new one..a big Searing Doom took the stank out. and I was basically tabled with only my Wizard on the table at the end of the game and he still had the Lions and Swordmasters. Pretty good for losing your General turn 2.
0-3



Game 4 Vs High Elves- A bit better prepared for 8th ed High Elves, The Empire came out angry, I took mike to the proverbial woodshed early on except this game I grossly under estimated the power of the Phoenix Guard..I thought the Steam Tank could take them down solo, but no way. I put it into them on my turn one, and by turn 5 its was dead and I had only killed about about half of them. This was the Banner/ Fortitude scenario. After I got two banners early, I only needed one and that left the Swordmasters or the Phoenix Guard, I brought my Knights back to give the PG another crack but they didnt budge there either after a ferocious charge. Mike wisely put his Swordmasters into the building on his last turn knowing on my last licks..I would have them in Front/Rear/ Flank sandwich if he stayed outside still no guarantee but a good chance. Knights had another chance at PG..couldn't do it..game ends.
DRAW.



Like I said thou, all these games where great fun, outside comical dice rolling and my opponents were all fantastic.



On the downside, I seriously hate all the book scenarios. The only one I like is the Banner/Fortitude one and that is the one you will inevitably hear the most griping about. For me, Pitched Battles with objectives is the only way to go for a tournament.

There weresome organizational /scoring issues this year, No slight on the man running things this year- Alex G, as he does and awesome job and I think this was the biggest Warhammer single day tourney to date with 140 players, so a huge challenge. There we some bad apples in extra staff department that caused some problems with the paint judging. I did paint scoring on Friday for the big brawl, so I know the system, it requires you examining a persons army set up on its display and closely looking at the models to in order to correctly go thru the checklist. There were two judges during round 1 trying to score peoples armies while their game was going on, which was complete idiocy. As a result the guy who won Player Appearance- Tourney Choice got a whopping "14" out 25 for his paint score..and my own army..which has never had gotten less than a max score here, got a "zero" for display base because..my base was under the table when they judged my army, go figure right? anyway this garbage got called out and these paint scores were corrected..and if this was the worst thing that went on a tourney this big...I'd call it a a success. I'm going to bone up on 8th ed with Empire and give it one more go at the local "Blood in the Sun" here in July and see if I can un-embarrass myself. In the end however, I'm not sure I'll back for the Championships next year because after 5 years...this is never a great day for me and there is just too much to do at Adepticon now and I'd rather do other stuff and its not like they need the players. My Empire needs a rest, "if" I have another army that can compete..I may change my mind. No commitments.





Next up, the Team Tourney.

Edit: In a bit of self congratulatory back slapping, in order to put a counterweight against my absolutely terrible game performance. I wanted to point out, was the only player out of 134 who had max sports and max paint..that's at least 4 events in the last 3 years I have maxed out as the "soft score whore"., If I could actually win some games, look out!

Adepticon 2011- Legends of the High Seas

Picking things up here from the last round of pictures, this Friday night at Adepticon 2011, my Legends of the High Seas event. I could not have asked for 8 better players to sign up, this thing was blast on numerous levels, from the Pirate hats, to the ton of different quality rums, to great variety of miniatures and fantastic paint jobs on all of them. I think this was definitely the highlight of weekend for most of us and It makes me look forward to the club campaign we are starting later this month and future LotHS events. I'll leave it there with some pictures from the event. Next Post, I'll pick things up Adepticon Saturday with my WFB coverage.



The Pirate Castle, for my "Raise the flag" scenario









Jungle Run- Interesting how others decided to play this, different from our test group
guys were literally battling it out, inside the Jolly boat on the beach!...LOL



This Mordheim table has made the rounds for various games at Adepticon for years now. I added The Dock cast the from Hirst molds and the tower and of course the Ship. and it became table Five, so we had a scenario we could swap in and out...Everyone want to play it thou. I'm going to build something similar with traditional buildings...sooner than later.


my use of a blind group mechanic or "space hulk" style blip system on the dungeon board has
gotten overwhelmingly positive reviews.








Tavern Fight, this crew of all pirate wenches, demanded the fight take place outside the bar.

Adepticon- Day One- Live Pics

lets start out with some Crystal Brush entries. this piece on a motorized rotating base pretty much says it all, if you cant hang with big dogs..you shouldn't bother. the best miniature painters in the world are here looking for 10K..



















Cool Mini or Not booth..its pretty over the top in quality stuff, not cheap either.



My man Rich doing his Hirst Art Seminar


Some guys set up the mini painting service in the hall, really great stuff
I'll make sure to catch their name later


I played the ringer in the LotR Championships rounds 1 and 2, just a couple pics




Some of my WFB TT tourney partners Jeff's epic Daemons, I love them
almost makes me want to play my DoC, almost.







WFB Ballroom- Two tourneys going Simultaneously, I did some paint judging for the big brawl


Tons going on, too much to go into here, so I will try to update later. Aparently Forge World is giving themselves a bad rap again..sigh..going to try to pick up the new Empire model in abit, my event starts in about an hour.