After a relatively last minute decision to make Gencon this year (mainly due to the awesome Trail of Champions prizes for the top of each faction) I found myself out of luck for Hardcore and trying to scramble together a good list for Nats. Due to the fact that the top of each faction would be walking away with the ToC I decided to try my hand at one of the lesser played and more disadvantaged factions in SR2 with the hope of trying to be the top of an under represented faction would be easier than being top Sorscha player. After a month of trying to put together a decent Mercs list and crying myself to sleep at night at how bad straight Mercs are I decided to go with Protectorate. Protectorate, while disadvantaged in the AD department and lacking Bokurs and Alexia still have Kreoss and the Drop ‘n Pop so I felt comfortable taking them to the Nats and having a good chance of coming top of faction. Five days before I leave I get a message warning me that ToC will now be for the top five players regardless of faction, *bigfrown* looks like I’ll be playing Sorscha after all.
After driving the sixteen hours to Gencon in previous years I decided to fly out with Ranz and LMBB this year so we show up at Albany International Airport 3:30AM Thursday morning ready for out 5:30 flight. This also happens to be the morning they arrested 18 terrorists in the UK so the airport is freaking out – our check in was delayed as all the staff had to be briefed on what was going down and the new security measures in place (which basically involved no liquid/gel/paste allowed in carry-on luggage). After connecting in Philly we got in to Indy at about 9:30AM picked up a rental and headed straight to the Con. It took us almost as long to find a parking space as it did to fly from Philly to Indy which sucked but we eventually got one for $10 and a 20 minute walk from the Centre.
We roll in and hit up the PP Booth to get our copies of Superiority, first stopping and chatting with Biggie who directs us over to the “Express Line” for people regged in Hardcore. The “Express Line” seems somewhat of a misnomer as we barely move 2 feet in 20 minutes but they eventually get it moving and I have LMBB pick me up a hardback copy.
We scrambled over to the Mini’s Hall because after being in line so long it was getting real close to the start time for Hardcore – it was all good though, it ended up kicking off an hour or so late so LMBB and Ranz had plenty of time to get their lists checked in and painting approved. I took time to go chat with people from Cold Soil, old friends like Mad Monkey and new ones like DC and Jess. DC was asked if he could help out with judging today so he won’t be playing which meant I got plenty of time to chat with him and his wife as we watched games. The first round is called out and I cringe, there has to be a better way to set up the tables than walking around and calling peoples names out one at a time (frequently the judges were unable to read/pronounce the last names which lead to more confusion). Once the tables did get setup however it was an impressive sight. To see PP’s tournaments go from the first Friday tournament at Origins ‘03 where there were a handful of people playing with mostly unpainted small forces on ghetto terrain to this, Hardcore 750 pts, all painted. It was beautiful to watch over the sea of players and fully painted armies, kudos to PP on an awesome idea for a tournament. One thing that I was worried about (along with a lot of others) was how they would handle the 7 minute turn thing – Well, they put a timer on each table and each table was timed separately and when the beep went off you stopped play (unless you had already begun resolving an attack then you saw that attack through to its completion before ending the turn). It worked really well from what I saw and the judges were on strict orders to wtfpwn anyone who appeared to be stalling their opponents turns.
Two minutes into the first round LMBB tells me he has no tape measure *doh* talk about not being Hardcore!! I run around the tourney asking the rest of my Komies if they have a spare, nope no one brought a second tape measure so I head over to the GF9 booth and buy him the best tape measure he ever owned (seriously, if you are in need of a new tape the GF9 one is sturdy and awesome and now LMBB approved). I wander around checking on Ranz, LMBB, Kel and Mad Monkey when I see Mad Monkey give up what ended up being the quickest caster kill of the tourney to the eventual winner Spout from St.Louis. He forgot Sorscha’s threat range was 11” not 12” and failed a charge that was to be followed up by a Wind Rush and Icy Gaze and Spout punished him with a 12m52s Stygian Abyss spam to the face!
Ranz and LMBB win their first games and I spend a good part of the second round trying to absorb all of Superiority, bugging Jason with rules questions and clarifications every few minutes. I also take some time to check out the dreaded sticker and find myself impressed, I had expected the stickers to be of good quality but this was better than expected. Now unlike some of the fanboys I’m not going to fellate PP for their wonderful job covering up their mistake but I try to give credit where credit is due, and while there is no excusing the poor proof-reading that has been evident in NQ and PP products and which led to this snafu they did make it so the error was almost unnoticeable and the page is barely thicker than a regular page. There were other proofreading issues such as the repeated spelling of “Mercernary” in the title sections of the Merc chapter but all in all it appears to be a sold and good looking book. LMBB and Ranz win their next two games to go into the 4th round 3-0, at which point LMBB loses to Pbear because he wasn’t aggressive enough with E-Caine (Yes he played with a fully painted and based E-Caine in Hardcore) and he didn’t try to gatecrash her for the win. Ranz loses to fellow Komie Viking when he decided to “hide” Denny behind a Bloat Thrall and Viking blasted the Bloat with Chain Lightning twice jumping to Denny both times and having the Bloat explode on her upon dying. After seeing them fall I head to the Dealer hall and pick up a full unit of I F YOOOOOOOOOUUUU for Nats tomorrow.
After the Tournament is over we head over to Houlihans with DC, Jess and their friend Ryan where we BS and try to pretend we aren’t gamers for a little while (ok we fail terribly at that but we try) and I try to get over the fact that the waiter brought me my beer with a slice of lemon in it – I mean seriously, doubleyoo-tee-eff!!
Morning comes and I wake up somewhere between our hotel and the Con as we circle looking for a parking space, eventually finding one at the same spot 20 mins from the centre as yesterday only this time parking went up to $20. When getting the crap out of my car I notice I don’t have my I F YOOOOOUUUUUU, which makes me sad. I put together my list and end up with:
- Sorscha
- Eiryss
- Alexia
- Manhunter
- Kovnik
- Kodiak
- Kodiak
- Widowmakers
- Mortar
- Mortar
- Doomreavers
- Gorman
- Bokur
- Bokur
I had another list that was -1 Gorman -1 Bokur +7 Kossites, but I never used it. In hindsight it may have been better to pick a fake 2nd list to throw people off but I don’t think that it would have actually affected anyone choosing what list to play.
Round – 1
Opponent: Justin from Montana – no forum name.Mood: Jovial
Soundtrack: DangerMouse and Jemini – Ghetto Pop Life
Scenario: Pendulum
Factjion: Cryx
Caster: E.Deneghra
List: 3 Boneacks, Stalker, Deathjack, Slayer, 2 Full Mechanithralls, 1 Banethralls, Tartarus, Bloat Thrall.
I go into this game fairly confident, it’s the first game and I’m pretty pumped up to play, E.Deneghra doesn’t strike a whole bunch of fear into my heart and seeing 2 full McThralls and a Slayer isn’t worrying me either. We play on half of the Protectorate Tour of Duty board which looks phenomenal but to be honest probably shouldn’t be used for tournament play. I roll and get first turn, which helps my confidence and mood even further, there is a river down the dead centre of the board and a bridge on each side, Doomies and Mortars are charged with the right flank, Alexia, and the Kodiaks with the left/centre. He sets up the DJ within charge of Manhunter and his Bokur so 1st turn Sorscha moves, Wind Rushes and Tempests the DJ then Manhunter and Bokur Charge, the Bokur finishes him with his shield, critting and sending the disabled wreck 6” back into his army just as Omega Supreme starts on my Ipod, I was so pumped I almost kicked my friend Sacco in the face. The rest of the fight was fairly uneventful, he fails to cross his 1st and I Time Walk on my 2nd to get a CP on my 2nd, 3rd and then 4th turn for the win. My opponent was awesome and I felt bad at the beating, he seemed pretty dejected when his DJ got housed and when I had to get Jason to come over to explain that stationary models couldn’t shoot/attack.
Round – 2
Opponent: Patrick from Chicago, is a PG'er forum name “Video”Mood: Irritated
Soundtrack: Hed [pe] – Only in Amerika
Scenario: Assassins
Faction: Cryx
Caster: E.Deneghra
List: 4 Bonejacks, 2 Full Bane Knights, 1 Full Bile Thralls, Tartarus, Bokur, 2 Pistol Wraiths, Skarlock.
So my friend Sacco has already Q’d for the final day of L5R so he brings me a sammich for lunch and sits watching this game. I’m again feeling pretty confident after spanking E.Deneghra once already but this guy has Bile Thralls which I hate and 2 huge units of Bane Knights. I haven’t got a chance to play vs. them yet as my 2 options for Cryx in my area are a guy who plays Terminus and Ranz who runs Denny Assassin so I take a look at the card and try to come up with a plan. Opponent rolls highest and elects to go first – which I am down with – and he comes straight at me. First turn he teaches me what Hellmouth can do to 3 Widowmakers which is cool, he even has a little chat with his friend playing the game next to us about how I’m retarded for putting them that close. My turn rolls around and I’m still in a quandary about the Bane Knights, I realize my Doomreavers wont do jack to them but I notice that I can get one in melee with Tartarus if I charge so I do so. The one Doomreaver gets to Tartarus, hits and then rolls 6,1,1,1 on damage *FROWN* falling 2 short of killing the bastard. The remaining ‘reavers kill a bonejack and a Baneknight. I then commence by brilliant plan of mortaring the Bane Knights to prevent direct hits and Shadow Shift, except POW 8 vs. ARM 16 means I need a 9 to kill and that doesn’t work well, these knights are a PITA. His turn he wipes out my doomreavers except the one in contact with Tartarus and then goes to work on that one and the game get’s a little douchey… Tartarus misses, he moves 2 more Bane Knights in to me crowding them around, and he misses again, Woot! He then slides his Bokur over behind the bane knights and goes to attack me over the base; I'm like “wet mate? You cant attack over the base even if you have reach!” he gets down real close and says he can see a sliver of green between the bases so its all good *frown* I’m like w/e if that’s how you want to play go for it and he kills the last ‘reaver. He advances with the rest of his stuff and doesn’t do much else. My turn I Time Walk and catch his entire army sans 3 Bane Knights, I let rip with everything and get pretty much all his Banes, Tartarus, Bokur, P.Wraiths and a couple of BoneJacks. He misses his turn and I mop up what’s left and win on VP’s. Those Knights were annoying as hell to play around and my friend watching who was sure I was losing and just kept looking at me with a “aww man that sucks you are getting pwnd” face was irritating me too – I kept wanting to yell at him “STOP IT, IMA WRECK FACE NEXT TURN!!” but I didn’t want to warn my opponent.
Round – 3
Opponent: Brian from St.Louis, Forum name “Spout”Mood: Concerned
Soundtrack: Mindless Self Indulgence – Tight
Scenario: KoTH
Faction: Cryx
Caster: E.Deneghra (AGAIN!)
List: 2-3 Bone Jacks, Pistol Wraith, Machine Wraith, DeathJack, Croes, Biles, Bane Knights
So I get paired down this round vs. someone who went 1-1, that’s cool right? Except it’s the winner from yesterdays Hardcore and a good player. He is the first opponent I’ve faced with 2 lists, E.Denny and Coven. I assume he is going Coven and make a joke about how I have seen 2 E.Denny so far and am positive he was playing Coven. Well turns out he played 6 rounds with Coven yesterday and since he was already out of the running for Day 2 he wanted to have some fun and figured since I was so disdainful of E.Deneghra he would show me how to play her. I get first turn and head toward the hill, half way through my turn we get a whole retro ruling thing as he notices that my ‘makers are setup too close to my ‘reavers and I “apparently” had to make a CMD check upon deployment per the judge (upon closer inspection of the rules I don’t think that should be the case as you test at the end of the “activation” of the model that caused me to be within 3”) well I fail and they run back off the hill. I pack the hill with stuff and get ahead 1-0. His turn he moves up and feats and I am very sad, he kills a lot of crap and has the hill contested and goes 1-0, not a good start. My turn I did very little and did not manage to put another unit on the hill to still 1-0. His turn he Machine Wraiths a Kodiak and kills yet more stuff then gets another CP 1-1. My turn I knock the wraith out of the Kodiak with my ‘makers. Alexia uses Command Undead on the Bane Knights which cover the centre of the hill and he rolls a 10 so they kill Tartarus, a bunch of Croes and a BoneJack or two. I Time Walk then Tempest the DeathJack and Kill a whole bunch more crap to go 2-1. He gets a Bile on the hill and kills something to go 2-2 on his turn. My turn I finish up everything he has in play except E.Deneghra and 2 Bane Knights going to 3-2 then 4-2 at the end of his turn and the game. Was a tough game, good opponent and about the 2nd turn I was really worried about losing.
Round – 3
Opponent: Adam from CaliforniaMood: Sad
Soundtrack: Mike Jones – Who is Mike Jones?
Scenario: Assassins
Faction: Sorscha
Caster: Sorscha (Rut Roh)
List: Kovnik, 2 Destroyers, I F YOUUUUUU (5), Manhunter, IFP+UA, Widowmakers, Greylords, Alexia, Eiryss.
I’m really unhappy with this game, it wasn’t fun for either of us and it’s all Sorscha's Fault. My opponent wins roll and elects to go first, he sets up his ‘makers on the central hill and cav on his right flank. I go to setup my ‘reavers and they are within about an inch of his ‘makers “huh?” he apologises and shuffles them back an inch or two then I move my Doomies to my right flank. He opens the game by Bayonet Charge Disruptor Bolting Sorscha which I guess he felt was a good play and so did Jason who commented on it later. IMO it was a terrible play, with no jacks on sorscha what did I lose? Nothing – what did he lose? Eiryss. If Eiryss had a clause “opponent may start the first turn of the game with no focus to destroy this model” I’d do it, he also neglected to roll damage. He starts killing the Mortar Crew with his ‘makers and runs the IFP onto the middle hill. On my turn my Mortars wreck 2/3 of his IFP and then on his turn his ‘makers finish them off. We spend the next hour and 4 turns going cat and mouse – he knew his threat ranges and estimated well, making no mistakes, neither of us could afford to move closer to the opponent as we would open ourselves up for a woosh and the game loss. Unfortunately for me while we were both being pussies it made me look like a bigger pussy as he was hanging around on the hill 25” away from my Sorscha and I was hanging around in my deployment zone 25” from his Sorscha. I also had to run my Doomreavers from his I F YOOOUUUU when he redeployed them from his right to his left flank. It was getting close to the end of the game and Jason asked me to play faster (apparently it had been over 4 minutes since my last activation but I wasn’t trying to stall, I was trying to figure a way to crack the nut that is Sorscha). Well I went and messed up, on what would have been my 2nd to last turn I try to advance to allow myself to pick up some VP since I go 2nd, however I apparently misjudged distances and moved too close and ate an Icy Gaze and 2 Destroyer Shells to lose. The irritating thing to me was the judges who came up to me after the fact and commented on his “loosey goosey” measuring, I’m pretty sure he crossed a good 14/15” with his move+WindRush and one of his destroyers that was a gnats cock away from being in range suddenly was a good inch and a half in range by the time the judge got over to check the measurement. Ah wells, I misplayed in any case – with us at 2vp a piece I shouldn’t have moves close to that far fwd, on my last turn I could have moved 6, WindRushed 6 Time Walked, Tempested 3 ‘Makers and then hand cannoned the 4th for either 1 or 2 VP (depending how many die). Even if that hadn’t worked since it ended up 7 4-0’s and 1 3-1 going through we would have tied and there would have been 6 4-0’s and 2 3-0-1 so both of us would have made it. Alas, would’ve could’ve, should’ve – but didn’t and my dreams of the Trail of Champions melted away. That night LMBB and I drowned our sorrows in the Wild Buffalo Wings bar and lamented over our respective losses.
Saturday morning and I don’t have much left to do at the Con other than hang out, but Ranz has a Wargods Tournament to win so we head out to get him there and provide some support for DC as sole Komie in the Top8. I missed DC’s first game but I caught most of his loss in the second round to Pbear. This was an extremely strange game, DC had apparently been pretty sick the night before and the morning of and didn’t seem very glad to be there. They are playing Killing Fields and DC gets first turn, Pbear took over 18 minutes to deploy his guys and in the end had to be asked by Jason to speed things up a bit. You can read Pbears in-depth account of the game over on the Big Boards so I won’t go over the whole thing, just the oddities. DC gets a good start and controls all 3 points early, Pbear gets some lucky rolls and DC rolls atrociously the key turn of the game and fails to kill Goreshade with his Bokur. Due to the inordinate amount of time PBear spent setting up and taking his turns this game goes to time in Pbears 3rd turn with them tied 5-5 in CP, he had already called for a VP count earlier that turn so knew he needed to kill just 3VP to win on VP’s and concentrated his fire to get the VP’s. Oh wells, such is life – perhaps the two most disconcerting things to us onlookers were the HUGE sopping wet pit-stains on PBears tight t-shirt, for a slim guy he seemed to sweat a lot, perhaps it was due to the constant pelvic gyrations and thrusting he did all throughout the game, one bystander remarked “get that man a seat belt”. His decisions seemed to waver from the bonehead to the brilliant – one minute he was making basic play mistakes, his DJ charged his caster on two separate occasions, next minute he was combo-ing units together like a pro and pulling of some nice tricks, truly bizarre. On to round three and DC beats a guy with an almost pure AD Khador army in Pendulum, it was a blood thirsty round 1 where DC went second and killed a lot of stuff, including Sorscha, the guy conceded and it never got to round 2.
The Komitatus had discussed getting together for a group dinner but an awesome lack of organization and direction left us with the plans of “lets do it Saturday after Nats” so we spend about 2 hours organizing Komies and their better-halves and have about 20 people, we wander to the Rock Bottom (via several stops on the way) and get there at about 7:30. Of course it’s prime time in downtown Indy on a Saturday night with a huge con in town – they say they can seat us at about 11:30. My heart plummets – I’ve just dragged Komies and their wives around Indy, stopping to wait for people every 10 minutes for the last 2 hours with the promise of a meal and due to my lack of planning it was going to crash and burn. Left with the choice of stay here and get seated separately or try going somewhere else and add more walking time on (with low chance of actually finding tables anywhere) I pick up 4 buzzers and ask that they try to seat us as close together as possible on 4 separate tables and we would stay at the bar. One guy suggests we go to the downstairs bar as its a lot less crowded so we head down there, commandeer a couple of tables, a pool table and commence the festivities. What had began as a nightmare ended up as a great time for all (I hope), the buzzers they gave us never buzzed but we took tables down there and ordered food direct from the bar and I think I got a chance to talk and chat with everyone there. People started filing out so that by the time the Barmaid came over with a “Komi-kaze” shot for us all (Nice one Ranz) there were only 8 or so left. We left and went back to the Mini’s hall drunk at around Midnight where we found an inebriated Jason Soles. Jason and I discussed past times and memories in that way you can only really do when you are both incoherent and somehow we end up playing WM, neither of us has an army so he borrows a Vlad list while I get stuck with JoeD from HQtheClub’s Darius list. When JoeD tells me he doesn’t run Eiryss because she is an “Evil Elf” Jason just looks at me and laughs. I would give you a blow by blow account of this game except I don’t remember any of it other than when I went to kill Vlad on turn 2 I noticed that I had forgotten to allocate focus to the Thunderhead so it didn’t work, Jason killed Darius with the Behemoth a few turns later, Good Game Neo!! At 2am LMBB drags me out of the hall and back to our hotel where I pass out.
Ranz has some Wargods Campaign game Sunday morning at 9am and we need to find out if he won the Nationals held on Saturday (for some reason they keep it a surprise and won’t tell anyone who won until the next day). I stumble to the car and LMBB and I hit up McD’s while Ranz prepares for his game as I try to clear the fog from my head. A little while later I’m feeling somewhat better and hit the dealer room again, stopping by BasicBob’s booth and chatting there for a while. Head back to pick up Ranz at about Noon and we find out he got the “Champion of Horus” award for Wargods which translates to Best General (highest Tournament Points). We chill in the dealer room for another few hours and then we decide we have had enough of gamers and go return our rental car and head to the airport at 3:30. Airport security has stepped up a ton since we flew out here and it’s like a scene from Total Recall or something, you have to take your shoes off and any sweatshirts/jackets and stand in this cubicle that shoots air at you and detects ions or explosive materials, it was crazy. We roll into Albany 9:30 local time and I get some well earned rest in my own bed.
In general was a great Gencon, Disappointed about my Nats performance, but the Komie gathering and meeting other people from Cold Soil more than made up for it, Gencon is primarily a social thing for me. Flying out was the best idea ever, and in future I will be staying in a hotel at the con, the extra $$ per night will be worth the hassle of finding a parking place, walking to and from the car and not having to pay for a rental or parking fees.
Tell me how much my report sucked right Here.
