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| My 'Crons battling it out to see who wins the tourney!! |
This weekend was the Cally Uprising tournament, one of the largest and most hotly competed UK tournaments of the annual calendar.
This year the snow kept a few players away and the turn out was 84, but of those players, 11/16 of the top 16 Rankings players and basically every competitive UK tournament player.
The standard of player was immense.
Skipping straight to the juicy stuff - I finished 9th.
Last year I finished 11th from 110.
So a slight increase in placing, but more importantly a significant increase over the course of the year in performance.
I like to think of myself as a good player who loses very infrequently. I can count on ONE HAND the number of tournament games I have lost in the LAST YEAR.
That is something I am proud of and I only lost once over the weekend too - in the final game to see if I won the whole freakin' tournament or um... not.
"Not" it was I'm afraid to report. I played Josh Roberts in the final round and in case you are unaware, Josh is the current UK No1 Ranked player and has been there for a number of years - certainly as long as I've tracked these things - he is also the Captain of the UK ETC Team, the team that won the ETC last year (2012)... so he's OK at 40K... ;)
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| Finally a decent group shot! |
I also played and want to wish a massive "Thanks dudes" to Gaz Jones (2nd in the UK Rankings and potential ETC player), Bernard Lee (Scottish ETC), Chris Green (also potentially part of England ETC) and Rob Sims (Ranked 11th UK and I think also part of the current ETC England Team) .. and of course - Josh Roberts ...on a side note, I learnt that Josh has a Special Rule of his own which reads:
"At the start of the game, before table edges have been chosen Josh Roberts may roll a D6. On a score of 2+, Josh scores 20-0 in tournament points irrespective of TPs at the end of the game"...
Luckily for me, Josh rolled a "1" and he only won 17-3.. If I'd have managed to close the gap to a draw, I'd have still finished second!! I thought I had a narrow win up to end of Turn 3, but it swung back to Josh and then some... read all about it later in the week!
Throughout the week, I'll be throwing up battle reports with loads of beautiful pictures, which I took this year, turn by turn for every game.. Needless to say, I am proud to have gotten to top table and to have gotten there by facing a high calibre of opponents, facing the arguably the highest available (not dissing you Alex, you weren't there bud!) to decide who actually won one of the most prestigious events in the UK.
And yes, the pre-planning paid off for Game 1... :)
The Forum with results can be found here for some interesting reading..
very well done mate, tough opponents all the way it seems. looking forward to the reports later on in the week. i am slightly put off from re-entering the scene due to the stupid number of identical lists i must admit. particularly as guard really seem to have fallen from grace.
ReplyDeletealso, building a helldrake proxy for myself using a vendetta, so if you are still interested in chaos flyers when you see how it turns out i'll be happy to do one or two for you.
Ally in Azreal in a blob ... that'll be all the rage soon :P
DeleteI thought the meta was quite diverse, shame if its already fallen into "x amount of tier 1 identical lists and the rest" already.
DeleteThough just ally in Azreal for a big blob unit and go nuts! Alex assures me its awesome :P
i don't want to play like that though, i detest playing infantry hoards, i genuinely loved playing mech guard, and i wish it was still viable.
DeleteThanks Atreides... To be honest, whilst the top lists appear to be very similar, there are still a refreshing number of armies knocking about in the top end.. Nids, Demons, Necrons, Grey Knights and Chaos Space Marines are all in the top 10... Tau w allies were on table one game 4, just before me. I played Wolves (double jaws rune priests in pods) on table 5 at the end of the first day.. I played space marines game two and best of all, the cream of the crop... I played Seer Council eldar on game one (as you know)..
DeleteThat, to me, is pretty diverse. When you last both played, GK were the top dog and quite frankly...how many of them were identical?
As for the Azrael 4++ horde ... It is awesome yeah, and the DA codex is strong ... If a little dull... I am working on getting all 3 types in on mine, raven/death/green wing all in...plus allies, that'll create some interest for me..
Back on identical lists, the demons will change in a month or so when the book is strongly rumoured to make an appearance, that'll change that...and we all know wht happens as an edition moves on, the old top dog gets adjusted for and other lists rise to supremacy.
Mech guard can still very much work. Vendettas are still sick, more so even. Manticores are great, plus you used to bubble wrap anyway, so what has changed? No alpha strike, creating a more balanced approach, and mech is easier to kill in combat. It is more reliable to kill from shooting rather than glancing all game and doing no apparent damage .. Bt av12 is still tough mate.
Plus...when all the bolter spam dark angels appear on the scene, what will they kill av12 tanks with at range? Lol, they of course can handle it if we'll built and played...
Yeah GK's and just about Necrons were the top dogs just as I stopped playing - it was a very boring metagame truth be told.
DeleteIt seems more diverse, I thought by merit of allies that not only would it be more diverse, but take longer to "solve" like one week a dude could come along with some powerhouse abusing something people hadn't thought of then it moves on etc..
Whilst the pace of change at GW is glacial, it takes a lot of work to get a wide variety in the top armies.. It seems to be coming on though leaps and bounds.
DeleteAbsolutely.
DeleteI wrote a big thing out but realized it stepped on an article I am writing on competitive play!
But yeah, in short, take a game like Magic The Gathering, which while it has a pro scene, is not the most lucrative or popular "pro" game out there. Online they have 3 round tournaments that start every 30minutes 24 hours a day, and then on demand 8 man (3 round knockouts) + drafts etc. If all events "fire" thats 48 mini-tournaments a day ....
Then offline in the real world, they have FNM every friday, and about 80% of weekends have at least 1 major tournament, if not more.
Their meta-game is pretty lightning quick lol.
Congrats,
ReplyDeleteNot sure if the pre-planning comment was aimed at me. If it is I don't mean "dont pre-plan". I've never turned up to a competitive event with less than a few hundred hours of practice and planning with the team .... I meant I wondered how close to mark you'd be with your tactics, glad it was on point.
Just goes to show that actually thinking in advance pays off :) Shouldn't be creating tactics at deployment, should be adapting pre-established concepts according what they do (deployment, 1st turn moves etc..) like ... any other game ever played in the history of humanity! The most SUCCESSFUL players (not best/talented) are generally the ones with the BEST preparation; constantly you here professional gamers say "I didnt prepare enough, I under valued the level of the field of players, I mis-read the metagame" etc...
Though you should have come first, so disappointing truth be told Ven. DISAPPOINTED.
Bull.. You need to get back in the game and show us how the prepared gamer is a successful gamer..
DeleteAs for being disappointed, I have already identified several key mistakes I made.. You know, you finish a game and say "hmmm, I don't think I did anything glaringly wrong there.." And I stand by that, against almost all players I'd have gotten away with that level of play and won, but I personally think I got complacent and made poor choices in the mid-game.
Still, live and learn.
$Once again well done for your 4 victories and top 9 placement, full painting score too.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the transfer, your chimerra got through some difficult terrain on the way back.
by the way I am at work :-|
Haha, I'm not.
DeleteNot sure the little Kia counts as a chimera, it more a ramshackle trukk where the bad weather is concerned, but the economic little beast got us there and back safely..
Catch you Wednesday?
Yes, also have a look if you want to go to the fortheknowledge 40k event 2-3 of March.
DeleteWhere? Website or anything?
Deletehttps://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=4832544144478&set=t.1622881463&type=1&theater
DeleteIts from the https://www.facebook.com/4tkgaming
Congrats on the top ten result. Playing for the win too - not too shabby!
ReplyDeleteLooking forward to the battle reports. Looks like it was a great event all round!
Thanks dude, I was chuffed, it was a hard slog to get there, but worth it to try and topple the king lol...
DeleteNice job. Be looking for the batreps.
ReplyDeleteThanks dude..
DeleteFirst one is written and ready - scheduled for 5pm GMT Tuesday...
Vs Invisi-Council Eldar/DE
Nice job man 9th is a solid result. Will be intrested to read your battle reps. Seems you had a really hard draw with all of those players being very good.
ReplyDeleteCheers Rich, I was pleased.. Up from 11th last year and if it'd be a draw or even a narrow win for me I'd have grabbed second.. Going in I knew I had to beat josh by 8-10 points I think to get first place.. I'm pleased.
ReplyDeletePlayers were, I think, very good across the board.. Some games could have gone another way, double jaws in two games is a scary prospect for I2 armies!!
Oh, saw your fallenwing, looking sweet..