This
weekend gone was Desolation a Warhammer fantasy teams event in
Canberra.
It was the
first time the event had been run, and the first event of it's kind
i've ever been to. Not a tournament player I was excited to check
this one out.
I had
every intention on loading up on photos and doing detailed reports of
each of my games, but once we got to rolling dice I was having to
much fun and kept forgetting my notes. Instead I’ve decided to
break down my thoughts on the event into categories, then talk about
my games.
Venue:
The venue
was a Canberra local independent retail store called Good Games. I
got the feeling the store was quite new, it had an aura of still
being set up about it, but that didn't stop the place from being
great. The front area was all store as you would expect, then the
back was a huge wargame area that easily fit 16 (8'x4') tables in it
with room to move and not be rubbing backsides during games. I felt
the place could do with more posters, wall decorations or murals to
enhance the atmosphere but as I said, I think it was new. Also a
second toilet would have not gone amiss. The line over the weekend
sometimes was a bit on the long impatient side. Especially Sunday
after Saturday night drinking.
Over all I
give Good Games Canberra a solid 8/10. Great work guys.
Atmosphere:
As I was
told before the event, there were no rankings scores or masters or
ETC places up for grabs here. That really helped push that the event
was just for fun and laughs, and this was grasped by about 90% of the
people there. You can put in a little effort to try do well and have
fun doing it, but being over the top in competitiveness I don't think
has a place in an event like this. That's just my opinion. The whole
weekend was fantastic, and a really great introduction to the wider
warhammer community for me, a really nice change from gaming in the
garage. It was soured slightly for me though by two incidents.
Firstly there was one team out of the eight who seemed to go way
beyond what I felt was an acceptable level of competitiveness at an
event like this. Not realising who was around them they were
overheard attempting to plot with another team lower down to try and
rig the results. Essentially “you guys cant win, we can if you try
to minimise your losses against your next opponent and stop them
winning.”
The second
incident was during one of my games where I watched my opponent try
to 'sneakily' push a unit of his with his finger during my turn to
try and change it's charge angle to one of my units. I didn't make a
big deal out of it just casually mentioned that I think he bumped his
unit and could he move it back. He did, and the stupid thing was he
didn’t need to cheat, he had the charge angle anyway. Apparently
the guy is a regular in the top levels of the Warhammer tournament
scene. I guess I know why. It dumbfounds me the depths people will go
to to win at mandollies. It's not like there’s money on the line.
I didn't let it sour my weekend, I had 7 great opponents (one who
ended up being the guy trying to rig the results, but that wasn't
during our game) and the cheat.
To make
things even better a lunch was provided on the Saturday. That was a
really nice touch.
I give the
event another great 8/10 on this one.
Prizes:
The event
only cost $20 entry per person, which for six games over two days I
thought was a massive bargain. With such a low entry fee, and money
going to prizes, lunch and I assume some would have to go to the
store for hosting I wasn't expecting much.
The awards
given at the end were four large bronze medals for third, four silver
for second and four gold for first. First place also got their team
name engraved on a large sword that is going to hang in the shop.
The fact
that there was no vouchers or product didn't bother me. My opinion on
these things is that I have enough toys I still need to paint. I
really love how the tournament community over the last few years has
moved from just giving a box of models to a trophy etc. It means so
much more, it gives something to show off and I can remember what
it's from. Models tend to get lost in the mix.
It
deserves mentioning that the prize winners got their medals placed
around their neck by a very pretty young lady who also graced each of
them with a kiss on the cheek. They all seemed very happy and
appreciative of that.
I said I
was happy with what awards were presented, however at the same time I
felt the TO missed an opportunity to really emphasise the fun aspect
of the event over the competitiveness side.
There are
so many hilarious and crazy situations that arise in warhammer, and
in team environments I personally would have liked to see fun awards
given out. Things like first player to have his wizard 'sucked off'
in the cascade, player whose Lord dies the most, team with the best
round, classic wooden spoon, new comers awards, even team bingo. The
list is endless in what creative things a TO could come with (I know
ive done it in 40k tournaments). A simple certificate would have
sufficed, and I think it would have gone a long way to boosting the
laughs.
The awards
were nice and suited, but could have gone further to emphasize more of the whole hobby. For that I give it
a 6/10
TO:
This guy
was great. Easy to approach, didn't mind being bugged by stupid
questions from people like me who don’t play tournaments, and was
well organised. He fed us on day one as I said and was very clear and
consistent on his decisions when needed. I don't know how or if he
dealt with the issue of the unsportsmanlike plotting attempts, but it
didn't matter anyway. Well done that man.
10/10 no
doubt.
Scoring &
Scenarios:
All six
games were played using the battle line scenario. As I don't go to
tournaments or play this game in a competitive fashion I don't know
if that is because the other scenario's are unbalanced, but I know I
like to play them to mix things up. Just playing battle line each
game reminded me of 5th
& 6th edition
where that’s pretty much all you had. I would have enjoyed mixing
it up, but that may not have been good for the tournament. I don’t
know.
The games
were scored using the points difference of units killed by each
player and then comparing that to a table with scores from 20 – 0
through to a 10-10 draw. That's apparently standard and I liked how
it worked. Those scores from each of the four players on a team were
combined into the team score.
The nice
touch though was having a maximum cap of 70 (instead of 80) and a
minimum cap of 30 (instead of 0). This meant that even teams on the
losing side got a decent amount of points and always had a chance of
being there or there about. Come day two, everyone showed up because
everyone still had something to play for.
The aspect
of the scoring I did find disappointing was the lack of awards or
points for the non battle side of our hobby. I’m used to the 40k
scene of putting army’s out on display for a beauty pageant, points
being awarded for painting, conversions, theme etc. There was none of
this at Desolation. As a fun gamer and all round hobbyist, its every
aspect that draws me in, not just the playing of games. I know
there’s constantly arguments on should ‘soft’ scores be
included as a percentage of players tournament scores or not, and
there’s pro’s and con’s to both and no right answer. I do
believe all aspects of our hobby are equally important as the next,
and if not combined then I like a painting award to carry as much
weight as a battle award. But that’s just my preference.
I would
have liked different scenarios, and the lack of painting and hobby
recognition pulled this down a bit. But give this aspect a score of
9/10.
Army
Composition:
Being my
first tournament I’m not going to give this section a score as I
don’t know what else to compare it to. But I did want to mention
how army’s were made. For Desolation they used something called
Swedish comp. For those who don’t know this comp system it works
like this. Units and magic items have been given a comp score value.
You start with a set number of comp points, in this case 300. As you
make your list you take away a set amount based on the unit, how many
models it has or how many of the same unit you have in your list. You
end up with a final comp score at the end. For this event all armies
had to have a score of 13 or above.
My first
time using or seeing this system, I thought it was very confusing. At
the start I didn’t like the idea of building my army with point’s
costs, then having to work out a separate set of comp points. I
changed my opinion however. It didn’t take me long to get the hang
of it, and as my friends and I played some practice games using the
system I really started to enjoy it. I liked the army’s that I was
seeing fielded, units and combinations we never take were being seen
on the table and the games were all fun and quite level. It’s not
perfect, no system is but it felt good to use.
Overall
the event gets an 8/10, which is really high praise. The TO should be
really proud.
A really
nice touch was the TO provided each player with a notebook for the
event. It was nicely printed with the event Desolation and bound. It
was perfect for making those notes I planned to make and didn't.
Because there was no beauty pageant or painting awards, the armies were never put out for people to get good photos. I took what I could.
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