Sizzle In the Summer was the second tournament organized by our Local Gaming Group, the Columbus Gaming Group and, as I'll get into shortly, a very well run and organized tournament. Some details before I go into the standard Roland Good, Bad, and Ugly review style for the tournament. It was a 2000point, 4 round tournament initially slated for only 12 players. There was such a great response that they expanded it to 14 and had to put several more on the waiting list due primarily on space constraints (you'll see in the photos). That's the long and short of it, more details will come shortly (missions, terrain, players, etc) as I get into the thick of it.
Oh and before I forget, yes I'll do a quick game summary for you all. And I'll have my list up at the end. And soooo, let us begin..
The Good: There's a LOT to say here as it was an extremely well run event, especially considering it's the only the second one the group has done. I'll start big and work my way to smaller things here.
- Venue: The local Hobby Town hooked us up and allowed us to basically take over the entire front of their store with 6 tables, and had a 7th table located in the back. The staff were super supportive and friendly, and they provided complimentary snacks, hotdogs, drinks, etc. for us during the entire day of gaming. That was a huge positive note in my book, having a store fully support the tournament and then some. The owners of that Hobby Town get a lot of respect for all they provided for us.
- Organization: Todd and the tourney organizational crew did an outstanding job. As soon as you checked in, you got a nice, organized players / rules packet outlining mission rules for all 4 games, score sheets, etc. He also ran a tight ship and kept time running smoothly, with regular announcements of how much time remained per game, and strict time management. Games started/ended right on time and there was always plenty of time between games to switch tables and get set up, grab a drink, etc. before moving on to the next round. But then again, I guess this is to be expected when a large portion of the gaming group are all current/ex-military types. Making hard times is what we do :)
- Players: Everyone was really fun to play, knowledgeable, and extremely relaxed and outgoing, which in turn led to few if any rules disputes. There was also a very nice spread of armies represented there. I believe the final tally was: 3X Chaos SM, 1X Orks, 1X 'Nids, 2X GKs, 1X 'Crons, 1X Pedro SM, 1X SWs (me!), 1X Chaos Daemons, 1X IG, 1X Deathwing, and I believe 1X DE.
- Tables/Terrain: A HUGE kudos to Todd for building ALL of the tables and doing so to a high degree. Plenty of terrain on every board, evenly distributed. But why use words, when I can use pictures.
I'll have some close-ups shortly when I go into my quick batreps. Needless to say, Todd has spent a LOT of time making these boards and they all came out beautifully.
- Missions: They were simple, easy to understand, and competitive (and NOVA-esque).Each round had a Primary, Secondary, and Tertiary Objectivevand they changed every round. The three Objectives were the same and just rotated: "Seek And Destroy" (VPs), "Vital Locations" (5X Objectives - 1 in the center of each table quarter, 1 in the center of the table), and "Dominate Territory" (Table Quarters). Deployment was all standard rulebook deployment, nothing special, trickery, or crazy which was good to see. So, for example, my first game was "Seek and Destroy" as Primary, "Vital Locations", as Secondary, and "Dominate Territory" as Tertiary, all with a Dawn of War Set Up. Winning conditions were simple - if you win the primary you win the round. If Primary was tied, went to secondary, and so on. You got 5 points for winning by the Primary, 3 if you won by the Secondary, and 1 if you won by the Tertiary. There were no draws, and if you tabled your opponent you were to keep playing until time ran out and tallied, and tallied points as if they were still on the table (so if you tabled your opponent turn 2 on a Table Quarters mission, you keep playing the last 4 rounds sans opponent and move to grab the remaining quarters. At the end of time/6 turns you tally up what you have at that point.) Also, VPs were tallied at the end of every game to be used as a tie-breaker in the event two people went on to both be the 1st place finisher.
- Results / Prize Support: Simple and straight forward, like the missions. You had a 1st place finisher based on BP, a Second place finisher based on BP, a winner for Best Painted Army (as judged and voted by the players), and a Best Sportsmen/Player/Nicest Guy/etc Award voted by the players at the end of the tourney.
The Bad: Nothing at all I can think of here.
The Ugly: My playing in game 2 and 4...but on that later.
Notes: This next point isn't so much a knock against the tourney or players, just an observation in general and the state of gaming/building an army. Army Lists varied from strong and really competitive, to whatever was available at the moment. Could lists have been better? Sure (mine in particular...but hey I had to make do w/o my TWC) but as a whole I don't think it detracted at all from the player skill and competitiveness of the tournament.
Game overviews to follow!
- Missions: They were simple, easy to understand, and competitive (and NOVA-esque).Each round had a Primary, Secondary, and Tertiary Objectivevand they changed every round. The three Objectives were the same and just rotated: "Seek And Destroy" (VPs), "Vital Locations" (5X Objectives - 1 in the center of each table quarter, 1 in the center of the table), and "Dominate Territory" (Table Quarters). Deployment was all standard rulebook deployment, nothing special, trickery, or crazy which was good to see. So, for example, my first game was "Seek and Destroy" as Primary, "Vital Locations", as Secondary, and "Dominate Territory" as Tertiary, all with a Dawn of War Set Up. Winning conditions were simple - if you win the primary you win the round. If Primary was tied, went to secondary, and so on. You got 5 points for winning by the Primary, 3 if you won by the Secondary, and 1 if you won by the Tertiary. There were no draws, and if you tabled your opponent you were to keep playing until time ran out and tallied, and tallied points as if they were still on the table (so if you tabled your opponent turn 2 on a Table Quarters mission, you keep playing the last 4 rounds sans opponent and move to grab the remaining quarters. At the end of time/6 turns you tally up what you have at that point.) Also, VPs were tallied at the end of every game to be used as a tie-breaker in the event two people went on to both be the 1st place finisher.
- Results / Prize Support: Simple and straight forward, like the missions. You had a 1st place finisher based on BP, a Second place finisher based on BP, a winner for Best Painted Army (as judged and voted by the players), and a Best Sportsmen/Player/Nicest Guy/etc Award voted by the players at the end of the tourney.
The Bad: Nothing at all I can think of here.
The Ugly: My playing in game 2 and 4...but on that later.
Notes: This next point isn't so much a knock against the tourney or players, just an observation in general and the state of gaming/building an army. Army Lists varied from strong and really competitive, to whatever was available at the moment. Could lists have been better? Sure (mine in particular...but hey I had to make do w/o my TWC) but as a whole I don't think it detracted at all from the player skill and competitiveness of the tournament.
Game overviews to follow!
