My experience with the BAO:

I was on board with FW being in events, and I still am. I agree that FW units redefined the meta as I expected Cron-Air and saw none. Is that a good thing? I am not sure, but it did allow for a greater diversity of opponents which I can say is good thing. Looking at the top 8 from Indy, the final 2 rounds were a lot of a Cron on Cron action, and that seems like it might be stale for a few people.

I was not surprised to see Demons win and it made even more sense considering the lower amount of flyers.

The venue was as expected. I think the event was about 4 tables over full, but it went smooth after the first morning.

I am a fan of the BAO, and I will probably attend each year until my wife kills me for going.

Here are my suggestions:

Scale up! I know that's the plan so big props there.

Reconsider the time / point level. None of my games came to a natural end besides the one I lost to Liz, because she tabled me in 4....

Stick to your guns: Aside from the timing thing which is a reasonable debate at this point, I agree with all the other calls you have made. You are very humble about your TO experience but your credibility has got to be near the top as one of the countries lead TO's putting on as many events as you guys do. I, as a player, have a lot of respect for the effort and enthusiasm you have for the game and it shows. Saturday Morning SNAFU aside, you guys ran a tight ship and it will get a little easier in a facility that is more conducive of the environment. The BAO was a bad ass event and you guys made playing 40k in a barn with 200+ people around enjoyable. That's tough to pull off.

Now to not sound like I am pure brown nosing, the other thing I want to bring up, and I know it wasn't your fault was the food. Pizza is not that awesome 2 days in a row, and running out of drinks on Saturday was just bunk. I was sooo thirsty on Saturday night and I can't drink beer so I was basically boned for hydration. Again, they hotel will fix this, but this is the only thing that I found less than awesome. If you don't get the hotel for whatever reason, please let me know and I will come up and volunteer for the event and I will bring my taco stand. TACOS FOR THE TACO GOD!

 Reecius wrote:
@Hulk

No worries dude, any and all input is welcome. And don't worry about hurting my feelings, I have thick skin. I write for BoLS after all! haha

Like I said, I am not saying 1500 is the ONLY way, I just find that it works great in a tournament.

One of the things I think a lot of people forget is that we have to plan for the average attendee, not the top 10% who often are those posting on the boards and very vocal. The average attendee doesn't know the rules as well, isn't as fast and doesn't practice as much. They are just a bit slower.

Also, we do have rounds and times between rounds locked down and in the schedule. The problem was that we started late day 1, and with the physical problems of crowding, trouble with acoustics and getting everyone seeing pairings quickly, it made the normally adequate 15 minutes between rounds, not adequate. We had a layering of small issues that turned into larger issues.

I am not saying it can't work at 1750 or even 1850, just that experience has shown me that 1500 works great and results in the highest number of games finishing on time.

Day 2 we started on time and allowed people to start the round early as pairings were up a half hour before the round started, and a ton of games STILL went long, haha. It's like a goldfish growing as big as its tank allows.

As people get better with 6th, and in a setting that would facilitate faster play and better logistics, I think 1750 would work, but logically I don't think anyone would disagree that in the time frame, smaller points values means more finished games and a more leisurely pace.

And no worries about not making it out, man. I understand all too well that we can't afford to go to every event. I never take it personally when someone can't make it.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
@Breng77 and Hulksmash

Thanks for the data, guys!

Now, before we jump to any conclusions about what FW did or did not do, we have to remember that this is 1 sample group, and that there are a million other variables in play. This is just an indicator of what may or may not have occurred, not a definitive answer in any way.

It would be difficult to draw any conclusions from 2 events about the actual impact of FW. As you noted, Missions have a large impact. As do players, if the better players chose to run FW (which you could argue is because it is powerful) then FW will do well, if they choose not to, then likely it will not show as well. What you would need to really show impact is 2 events run with the same missions one with FW one Without. The only statement you could really make (and you would need to see the army composition of all players at both events to do so) is one about the impact the inclusion of forgeworld had on what players percieved to be good army choices. (Did players on the whole take less flyers because of Sabers? Did more players run a certain codex because of FW units? etc.) Even then the difference in missions could explain a lot. Essentially the event would need to survey every attendee about that impact FW had in their games and had on what they chose to bring.

On FW, here is my main problem with your complaint Blackmoor;

If you know all the mainstream armies back to front like you suggest then you also know there are not any dual mounted hammerheads, so you should have said "hey buddy, whats the deal with that hammerhead?" this immediately solved your problem. I played at my first event with FW last month and my first question every round was, whats FW in your army and what does it do? I had no problems despite being annoyed by Vultures and placed 2nd (first place also ran no FW).

After all your falling on the sword that this event was WYSIWYG and so he misrepresented, but then you made assumption based on a model that did not fit that paradigm based on what you knew existed. So you can't really place all the blame on your opponent.

Had he explained every unit in his list and the game resulted in a turn 4 loss due to time then that would have been an easy cop out to blame conversions as well I am sure.

My point is if there was a major problem then it should have been vocalized at the event, I mean I have played in my fair share of tournament and the first thing you learn is to speak up rather then wait until you get home and regret.

@red Corsair

Or, since he know what a Rail Gun looks like he could have assumed a TL-Railgun (which it was modelled as) for a FW unit. That would be reasonable right? Then it turns out it's plasma. The point is that if it had been modeled correctly he wouldn't have made the assumption he did. As it was it fired a weapon that the model in no way represented.

Breng77 wrote:

 Reecius wrote:
@Hulk

No worries dude, any and all input is welcome. And don't worry about hurting my feelings, I have thick skin. I write for BoLS after all! haha

Like I said, I am not saying 1500 is the ONLY way, I just find that it works great in a tournament.

One of the things I think a lot of people forget is that we have to plan for the average attendee, not the top 10% who often are those posting on the boards and very vocal. The average attendee doesn't know the rules as well, isn't as fast and doesn't practice as much. They are just a bit slower.

Also, we do have rounds and times between rounds locked down and in the schedule. The problem was that we started late day 1, and with the physical problems of crowding, trouble with acoustics and getting everyone seeing pairings quickly, it made the normally adequate 15 minutes between rounds, not adequate. We had a layering of small issues that turned into larger issues.

I am not saying it can't work at 1750 or even 1850, just that experience has shown me that 1500 works great and results in the highest number of games finishing on time.

Day 2 we started on time and allowed people to start the round early as pairings were up a half hour before the round started, and a ton of games STILL went long, haha. It's like a goldfish growing as big as its tank allows.

As people get better with 6th, and in a setting that would facilitate faster play and better logistics, I think 1750 would work, but logically I don't think anyone would disagree that in the time frame, smaller points values means more finished games and a more leisurely pace.

And no worries about not making it out, man. I understand all too well that we can't afford to go to every event. I never take it personally when someone can't make it.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
@Breng77 and Hulksmash

Thanks for the data, guys!

Now, before we jump to any conclusions about what FW did or did not do, we have to remember that this is 1 sample group, and that there are a million other variables in play. This is just an indicator of what may or may not have occurred, not a definitive answer in any way.

It would be difficult to draw any conclusions from 2 events about the actual impact of FW. As you noted, Missions have a large impact. As do players, if the better players chose to run FW (which you could argue is because it is powerful) then FW will do well, if they choose not to, then likely it will not show as well. What you would need to really show impact is 2 events run with the same missions one with FW one Without. The only statement you could really make (and you would need to see the army composition of all players at both events to do so) is one about the impact the inclusion of forgeworld had on what players percieved to be good army choices. (Did players on the whole take less flyers because of Sabers? Did more players run a certain codex because of FW units? etc.) Even then the difference in missions could explain a lot. Essentially the event would need to survey every attendee about that impact FW had in their games and had on what they chose to bring.

5 out of the 7 players I went up against didn't field a flyer, but that's just me. How about the top tables?

I didn't see many flyers on the top tables. Most of the armies had 1 or 2. Lyzz had a single bloodthirster, Cody had a pair of voidravens, and I had a single vendetta. . 3 of the top 10 didn't have a flying vehicle. 6 out of the top 10 had a vendetta or hellturkey. It wasn't a flyer heavy meta.

 Red Corsair wrote:
On FW, here is my main problem with your complaint Blackmoor;

If you know all the mainstream armies back to front like you suggest then you also know there are not any dual mounted hammerheads, so you should have said "hey buddy, whats the deal with that hammerhead?" this immediately solved your problem. I played at my first event with FW last month and my first question every round was, whats FW in your army and what does it do? I had no problems despite being annoyed by Vultures and placed 2nd (first place also ran no FW).

To be honest, I have not seen a hammerhead in so long that I did not think anything about 2 railguns. I had no clue that it was anything other than what it was. There are many armies with many conversions for aesthetics and I am not going to go over every model to see if there is any forge world lurking in there. Everything has to be WYSIWYG and if it isn't, it needs to be explained.

After all your falling on the sword that this event was WYSIWYG and so he misrepresented, but then you made assumption based on a model that did not fit that paradigm based on what you knew existed. So you can't really place all the blame on your opponent.

The rules packet says that they have to be WYSIWYG and it details the procedure to follow if any models are not. There are clear rules of conduct regarding these cases and they fall on my opponent to follow them, not me. Might I suggest that you read them before commenting?

Had he explained every unit in his list and the game resulted in a turn 4 loss due to time then that would have been an easy cop out to blame conversions as well I am sure.

I have no idea what you are talking about. I was in no jeopardy of losing this game no matter what my opponent did. I was just noting a problem with the use of forge world. Also, my low-model count army plays very fast. If we do not get through turn #4 it is because of my opponent. There was only one game of mine out of 7 that did not finish by the dice roll and I stated all of the reasons why it didn't.

My point is if there was a major problem then it should have been vocalized at the event, I mean I have played in my fair share of tournament and the first thing you learn is to speak up rather than wait until you get home and regret.

As I stated, I had no idea that there was a problem until after I got home. There was no way of knowing what TL Plasma Guns look like, and I did not know that there was even a model for it.

My Experience at the BAO was less than stellar. I think i might be the first Fantasy player to post feedback which is suprising.

We really felt like the red-headed step child at the event, which is common and by no means upsetting, but it is frustrating getting shoved out of 40k players way to "make room" for the more important even. Unlike the back of the hall on day 2, our ears were bleeding with TOs screaming into the mic the timing on the rounds. Obviously a better venue will change all of that.

I know we started late and that has been expressed verbatum but it did goes enough grumbling between rounds by the fantasy players that i'd mention it once again. On day one we had 7 minutes between Game 1 and Game 2, and 15 minutes between 2 and 3. Pretty quick turn around to wait in long lines for the restroom, refill water bottles or even run out to the car to grab a snack.


What was most frustrating though was the judging on paint and comp. A dear friend of mine had a fully converted Orc and Goblin army with blending and extensive freehand on all of his army and banners and bsb. His savage orcs had extensive tattoos painted on each individual. He used many of the advanced techniques and went for the theme with spiders and chariots everywhere. These should have qualified him for full paint scores yet it did not.

Another was the comp hits. We were given the comp rubric, followed it and were still docked random numbers of points. I.E. we were told it'd be 15 point dock for each violation (double lvl 4s, 25% in one unit, 3+ warmachines and double rares) yet even with lists well within, I was docked 25pts and another of our group was docked 40. The only thing i could think of was that, as a High Elf player, i was being docked for having 2 eagles in my list. But a month prior to lists being due I had emailed the question of, since i only have 2 rare choices is it ok if i bring 2 eagles? WIll i still be docked? A timely reply said, "no you won't be, that is meant to discourage things like double hydra and hell pits."

Finally, was the vanishing of the Best of Army awards and the random squirrel prize. I understand that the squirrel prize probably didn't happen, but was quite disappointed that the aforementioned awards were not handed out. The Best Army Awards were promised with trophies. What ever happened to these? Can we still expect them?

Lyz was definitely the first female to win at such a large event! Back in 3rd edition I recall a woman winning a top score at kublacon with a pure slaanesh csm list awhile back with noise marines and daemonettes, but the strategies and rules are so different now with so much more people open on strategies they use. My kudos lyz, you are epic!

A girl also won Best General at the Seattle GT back in like 2003 or 2004 (not sure which). Back when eldar armored companies were impossible to kill

thelordcal wrote:


Another was the comp hits. We were given the comp rubric, followed it and were still docked random numbers of points. I.E. we were told it'd be 15 point dock for each violation (double lvl 4s, 25% in one unit, 3+ warmachines and double rares) yet even with lists well within, I was docked 25pts and another of our group was docked 40. The only thing i could think of was that, as a High Elf player, i was being docked for having 2 eagles in my list. But a month prior to lists being due I had emailed the question of, since i only have 2 rare choices is it ok if i bring 2 eagles? WIll i still be docked? A timely reply said, "no you won't be, that is meant to discourage things like double hydra and hell pits."

I noticed that too. I only should have been docked 15 points, yet I was docked 25.

I think Blackmoor has a valid point. Disregarding any concerns about how Forge World is balanced, there are many reasons Forge World is a pain to use; one of these is rules access. The TL plasma turret for Tau at this moment in time has no 6e rules - FW haven't released a Tau update for 6th ed and pulled the 5th ed one from their downloads page. People use the 5th ed ones by googling "Tau update forge world", but this is deliberately hidden and IMO unreasonable to expect all players in a tournament to do. IA3, the only IA with many of the Tau options is also out of print and rare, so unobtainable for the average player. So, which rules should be used - the latest ones with hidden rules which were pulled 5 months ago or the out of print ones? There's also the issue where some rules are in multiple books, so to know which to use you need to know which book is most recent - for IG players, Apocalypse 2e and Aeronautica are no longer useful, you will now require IA:2 2e to use your models as this is the latest set of rules. There's no indication of this and before purchase you have no way of knowing which rules have been updated, nor which are most recent unless you keep up to date with all FW activity.

Food for thought, if nothing else.

@TheLordCal and Grey Templar

Hey guys, thanks for voicing your opinion.

As for the Comp and Paint issue, I can't really add anything worth while as I didn't control that at all. I emailed Seth (the TO) and asked him to pop in and address those questions. Hopefully he is along shortly.

I can answer the questions about logistics though.

The reason I made the call to put the Fantasy tables in rows with no breaks was because Fantasy games tend to have players stay on their respective sides of the table. In 40K, particularly in 6th ed with Hammer and Anvil deployment (playing the table long ways), you are going around the table all the time.

We filled the hall to capacity and as you saw, literally couldn't put even one more table in there. As 40K required more space to play, and there were 3 times as many of them as Fantasy, I could see how it would feel like the spacing was unfair. However, as space was a limited resource, and one game requires more of it than the other, I had to make the call.

Timing between rounds was an issue. It is fair to bring it up again as it really did put a strain on things. It is something we are working on now here in this thread and the other BAO thread as well as at the store and among the TOs to fix going forward.

As for the prizes, I do not know what a Squirrel prize is? I have never heard that term before. The Best of Awards were going to be printed out during the event (they were going to be a certificate with the name of the player, the army the played, the event name and year, etc.) and presented to each played in recognition for performing the best with their army. I was never able to print them out unfortunately, as we were so insanely busy and I straight up forgot to do it during the event. Nothing I can say about that other than I fethed up and I am very sorry about it. We would be more than happy to mail them to the folks that earned them, though, as that is on us to fix.

If it makes you feel any better though, Fantasy gets a higher ratio of prize support dollars per person than 40K does. We are very generous with the prize support, and I hope that was conveyed accurately.

I hope that addresses your concerns, and like I said, thanks for speaking up. We definitely had some logistical issues which will be addressed and won't occur next year.

 Hulksmash wrote:
@red Corsair

Or, since he know what a Rail Gun looks like he could have assumed a TL-Railgun (which it was modelled as) for a FW unit. That would be reasonable right? Then it turns out it's plasma. The point is that if it had been modeled correctly he wouldn't have made the assumption he did. As it was it fired a weapon that the model in no way represented.

Right, and I didn't say the other guy had no fault but that simply put things happen at any tournament and it's ridiculous for a seasoned player (blackmoor) not knowing a basic tank that has remained unchanged for 12 years looks like and not even asking the player the very basic question: "whats FW here and what does it do?" Instead he waits until he loses, places bad and then tears down the event? Ridiculous. NO EVENT has ever had perfect rulings on WYSIWYG with regards to balancing conversions. Heck your adeptus mechanicus army on your own blog is all counts as and by that nature changes the way it plays. Every model has an changed silhouette in regards to TLOS hence making it illegal. Heck even Blackmoors bases could be argued that way.

If you say no conversions allowed well guess what? Your finalists in the BAO both had completely illegal armies or should one of them waited to lose to complain after that they had never seen flamers modeled as sirens of tentacles for screamers or lug nuts for griffins( ).

So either you suck it up and realize you as players have responsibility to sort this stuff out, or you can very unrealistically expect the event to cover all possible contingencies at no profit btw.

 Red Corsair wrote:
So either you suck it up and realize you as players have responsibility to sort this stuff out, or you can very unrealistically expect the event to cover all possible contingencies at no profit btw.

Or, you know, you take a reasonable position between the two, and require those who want to bring FW models to actually bring FW models.

At colonial first place was no flyer grey knights, and the top tables saw few flyers. Sean had his all foot eldar dark eldar that did well, nick had demons with a hell turkey added in, Andrew had 1 vendetta ig da, mike had no flyer BA and SW.

As for the representation of fw, I had figured that ig would be the main bringers of forge world units and it appears that was true. Regardless of balance issues and rules availability to players, fw definately favors ig in terms of number and quality of units. Since this is the case that alone is enough for me to shun fw at a tourney the same way I shun the burning skies dueling rules for flyers.

 Blood Lord Soldado wrote:

Now to not sound like I am pure brown nosing, the other thing I want to bring up, and I know it wasn't your fault was the food. Pizza is not that awesome 2 days in a row, and running out of drinks on Saturday was just bunk. I was sooo thirsty on Saturday night and I can't drink beer so I was basically boned for hydration. Again, they hotel will fix this, but this is the only thing that I found less than awesome. If you don't get the hotel for whatever reason, please let me know and I will come up and volunteer for the event and I will bring my taco stand. TACOS FOR THE TACO GOD!

That would be awesome! Providing food for the BAO has always been such a headache. On top of all the other responsibilities we have, ordering, picking up and selling the food is always such a PITA. We tried to get lunch trucks this year, but they all fell through. I seriously hate dealing with food and going to a hotel it will be such a relief to not deal with that crap again! if for whatever reason we do need help, I will be calling on the aid of the Taco Gods! haha

 Red Corsair wrote:

Instead he waits until he loses, places bad and then tears down the event? Ridiculous. .

Since you were there, what did you think of the event? And how did I tear down the event? Everything I said was true.

And as far as losing, his Plasma Guns did not cost me the game. I was going to win and there was nothing that he could do about it.

It was an objective based mission (5 objectives) and my opponent had 3 6-man fire warrior squads as troops, and 3 eldar jet bikes. On turn #2 my combat squaded paladins deep struck into the middle of his army. The last of my interceptors were going to kill one squad, and my paladins were going to kill a fire warrior squad and the eldar jetbikes. On the next turn I was going to kill his last troop. He had no way of killing paladins (ironically those TL plasma guns worked against him since the rail gun would have been much better). I also had 2 small troops that were going to be on objectives out of LOS to his army that he would not be able to get to.

The problem was that we were on the middle tables and were getting into a lot of arguments over every rule (The FW issue was just the tip of the iceberg) and it was just not worth the hassle. I was tired and I was not having fun, so if he wanted to win so badly I conceded the game to him and got an early start on my 6 hour drive home.

Sorry it had to go down like that Blackmoor... You deserve better. Hopefully this will be a lesson learned for TOs that allow Forge World. If you want to bring it then it should be the real thing... Not a confusing cheap substitution.

 Blackmoor wrote:

And as far as Forge World's effect of the meta?

You can compare it to the Indy Open that happened last weekend.

At the Indy open you had Necrons and Chaos doing very well.

At the BAO you have IG doing very well.

I will make the leap and say that this was because of Saber Platforms.

So is it better to have IG on top rather than Necrons?

First off, you've always made a habit of making meta declarations based on the result of each tournament, without considering the myriad of factors that go into an army placing at a certain spot in any event, not the least of which are the players who are actually playing the army at an event. On top of that you also have mission types used in different events, point levels, round length, terrain and of course the random way that pairings can occur throughout the event.

Making ANY kind of claim about the meta based on 1 event (or even a few) is completely ludicrous. The only way any declarations such as what you're making should be made would be after dozens of event data, and even then the data is heavily skewed by soooo many factors you really can't draw any hard conclusions.

For example, who knows how many of those Necron players might have finished in the top 10 at BAO, based on just them being good players. Or who knows if any of the players at the BAO that took Necrons would have finished in the top 10 at the Indy GT? We can never know.

On top of that, at the BAO, just the threat of anti-flyer Sabers might have persuaded top players who would have otherwise taken flyer armies to take something else instead. In other words, the results can end up getting skewed just by the perception players have rather than the actual reality.

This is the same problem that happens anytime a new codex comes out that is super-powerful and after 1 or 2 events people say how amazingly over-powered it is because like 4 of the top 10 finishers are using it. The problem is, this kind of analysis ignores that often the same players are finishing in the top 10 with a different army each year, so they are actually making a judgement call about what army type they think they can best win with and taking that army to the tournament. That kind of behavior completely skews results because you don't know how those players would have finished taking an army besides the FotM codex.


And at the end of the day, if using FW skews the power over from Necrons to IG, then so what? There continues to be some perception that Forgeworld is not a Games Workshop product, when it very clearly is. GW has absolutely no qualms about leaving certain codexes in a sad state for YEARS before they get back around to them, so I don't understand the mindset that if using Forgeworld gives certain armies a bonus somehow this is somehow 'changing' the game...the game is 40K and Forgeworld is part of that game.

I always like doing this, so here is the breakdown of armies played!

Chaos Space Marines x 17
Imperial Guard x 13
Space Marines x 12
Grey Knights x 10
Necron x 10
Dark Angels x 7
Tyranids x 7
Deamons x 6
Eldar x 6
Orks x 6
Tau x 6
Blood Angels x 5
Dark eldar/ Eldar x 5
Sisters of Battle x 5
Space Wolves/ Imperial Guard x 4
Chaos Space Marines/ Deamons x 3
Chaos Space Marines/ Guard x 3
Dark Eldar x 3
Dark Angels/ Blood Angels x 2
Dark Angels/ Imperial Guard x 2
Space Wolves x 2
Black Templar
Chaos/ Necron
Dark Angels/ Grey Knights
Grey Knights/ Necrons
Grey/ Imperial Guard
Orks/ Necrons
Sister Battle/ Grey Knights
Space Marines/ Blood Angels
Space Marines/ Space Wolves
Space Marines/ tau
Tau/Orks



Top 15

Deamons
Space Wolves/ Imperial Guard
Impeial Guard /Chaos Space Marines
Dark eldar/ Eldar
Deamons
Imperial Guard
Chaos Space Marines
Space Wolves
Tyranids
Chaos Space Marines
Tyranids
Imperial Guard
Dark Angels
Chaos Space Marines
Dark Angels/ Blood Angels

I like the spread of armies! Not what was expected, I bet. Frankie called it though, he said we'd see more Chaos than anything else.

 Janthkin wrote:

 Red Corsair wrote:
So either you suck it up and realize you as players have responsibility to sort this stuff out, or you can very unrealistically expect the event to cover all possible contingencies at no profit btw.

Or, you know, you take a reasonable position between the two, and require those who want to bring FW models to actually bring FW models.

Your not looking at the big picture. Maybe I wasn't clear here but what makes it not cool for someone to take his FW conversion (especial the guy who pulls best appearance so obviously fulfills the rule of cool) but then makes it fine for your tournament winner to have almost an entire counts as army? Excuse me but you can make a much more compelling argument that her army was more confusing then that guys one tank. Again a tank that doesnt exist in the current rules and should have at least been questioned.

All I am saying is that it was unfortunate that confusion occurred between these two. More importantly that this confusion or alleged problem could have been COMPLETELY avoided with one simple question that should have been asked all weekend.

Players need to own up to their responsibility impacting these events as well. Some of the complaints are just nit picking.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 yakface wrote:

 Blackmoor wrote:

And as far as Forge World's effect of the meta?

You can compare it to the Indy Open that happened last weekend.

At the Indy open you had Necrons and Chaos doing very well.

At the BAO you have IG doing very well.

I will make the leap and say that this was because of Saber Platforms.

So is it better to have IG on top rather than Necrons?

First off, you've always made a habit of making meta declarations based on the result of each tournament, without considering the myriad of factors that go into an army placing at a certain spot in any event, not the least of which are the players who are actually playing the army at an event. On top of that you also have mission types used in different events, point levels, round length, terrain and of course the random way that pairings can occur throughout the event.

Making ANY kind of claim about the meta based on 1 event (or even a few) is completely ludicrous. The only way any declarations such as what you're making should be made would be after dozens of event data, and even then the data is heavily skewed by soooo many factors you really can't draw any hard conclusions.

For example, who knows how many of those Necron players might have finished in the top 10 at BAO, based on just them being good players. Or who knows if any of the players at the BAO that took Necrons would have finished in the top 10 at the Indy GT? We can never know.

On top of that, at the BAO, just the threat of anti-flyer Sabers might have persuaded top players who would have otherwise taken flyer armies to take something else instead. In other words, the results can end up getting skewed just by the perception players have rather than the actual reality.

This is the same problem that happens anytime a new codex comes out that is super-powerful and after 1 or 2 events people say how amazingly over-powered it is because like 4 of the top 10 finishers are using it. The problem is, this kind of analysis ignores that often the same players are finishing in the top 10 with a different army each year, so they are actually making a judgement call about what army type they think they can best win with and taking that army to the tournament. That kind of behavior completely skews results because you don't know how those players would have finished taking an army besides the FotM codex.


And at the end of the day, if using FW skews the power over from Necrons to IG, then so what? There continues to be some perception that Forgeworld is not a Games Workshop product, when it very clearly is. GW has absolutely no qualms about leaving certain codexes in a sad state for YEARS before they get back around to them, so I don't understand the mindset that if using Forgeworld gives certain armies a bonus somehow this is somehow 'changing' the game...the game is 40K and Forgeworld is part of that game.

Exalted this for truth!

I could not put this into words better. Complaining about FW after one event and compairing it to the results from another tournament IS ludicrous. FW could be allowed for years without knowing its impact there are so many variable. Any one willing to run a control tournament then apply one variable to the same sample pool of players at another event the fallowing weekend?

And here is the top 15 breakdown:



Really good spread! Compare that to Adpeticon final 16 last year, which was half Grey Knights!

Surprised not to see any Necrons, though. A million reasons for that though. I don't think you need flyers to make a good Cron list, either.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
That should read Tyranids x 2 in the top 15, sorry!

 yakface wrote:


First off, you've always made a habit of making meta declarations based on the result of each tournament, without considering the myriad of factors that go into an army placing at a certain spot in any event, not the least of which are the players who are actually playing the army at an event. On top of that you also have mission types used in different events, point levels, round length, terrain and of course the random way that pairings can occur throughout the event.

Making ANY kind of claim about the meta based on 1 event (or even a few) is completely ludicrous. The only way any declarations such as what you're making should be made would be after dozens of event data, and even then the data is heavily skewed by soooo many factors you really can't draw any hard conclusions.

For example, who knows how many of those Necron players might have finished in the top 10 at BAO, based on just them being good players. Or who knows if any of the players at the BAO that took Necrons would have finished in the top 10 at the Indy GT? We can never know.

On top of that, at the BAO, just the threat of anti-flyer Sabers might have persuaded top players who would have otherwise taken flyer armies to take something else instead. In other words, the results can end up getting skewed just by the perception players have rather than the actual reality.

This is the same problem that happens anytime a new codex comes out that is super-powerful and after 1 or 2 events people say how amazingly over-powered it is because like 4 of the top 10 finishers are using it. The problem is, this kind of analysis ignores that often the same players are finishing in the top 10 with a different army each year, so they are actually making a judgement call about what army type they think they can best win with and taking that army to the tournament. That kind of behavior completely skews results because you don't know how those players would have finished taking an army besides the FotM codex.


And at the end of the day, if using FW skews the power over from Necrons to IG, then so what? There continues to be some perception that Forgeworld is not a Games Workshop product, when it very clearly is. GW has absolutely no qualms about leaving certain codexes in a sad state for YEARS before they get back around to them, so I don't understand the mindset that if using Forgeworld gives certain armies a bonus somehow this is somehow 'changing' the game...the game is 40K and Forgeworld is part of that game.

I told you that I was taking a leap(an educated guess) that we did not see necrons placing well because of saber platforms. IMHO sabers kept the necrons away not only by beating them on the table top, but also by keeping them away because the necron players did not want to play them because of the SDP, and because a lot of the top players switched to IG and did not take their Necrons. Does this not sound reasonable to you?

And I do not always make declarations about the meta after every tournament. I see a lot of tournaments won my gimmicky lists like seer councils, seraphem and dark eldar beast packs that I think are not very good long term, and only good when taking players by surprise. I will say that necrons are a very good army, and a top tier army, and seem to be standing the test of time. I found it odd that they were not anywhere near the top of the BAO.

To give you an example, Duel Con was run by Reese and it had a ton of Necron flyers and players and it followed the BAO missions. A necron player even won it. Now a few months later no necrons. There has to be a reason for that.

Yes, I have not had many tournaments to look at the data since this is really the first tournament with time to get your forge world ready, but I am not allowed to infer things by the results?

I can also guess and say that Forge World helps IG and it hurts flyer dependent lists (CSM, Necrons), and I think that is fairly obvious without seeing many tournament results. You seem to think I thought that was a bad thing, I was merely pointing it out.

Honestly just the general area play style changes lists. The top ork player here ran lots of battlewagons. I could have rana wagon heavy list but because of how poor that list has done in the SoCal area I didnt bring it. I brought a more fun list that had all my painted items in it, but had I had my two other battle wagons I see several of my games doing better for me.

I dont think forgeworld models really changed anything. Nor did the flyer rule change greatly impact anything that I saw. I got a few extra shots off, no game changer for me.

 Reecius wrote:


things like what you described are unfortunately not within our ability to control. e.

It appears most complaints can be be solved by things under your control. Quality over quantity. You got to big before you could handle it. That's fine. You shot for the moon and missed. Learn and regroup. Go for a little smaller next time with more quality.

As an aide do you really expect someone to travel a far distance and go through what Allan went through in game one? That's awful. If I didn't know any better I'd thought you were giving away free soup with every BAO entry just to pack the place.




Automatically Appended Next Post:
Alan from Chicago didn't expect to see many Necrons. He thought FW units would keep them away and IG FW were the best option to take. That's according to his blog on Feb. 25th. But what does he know. He doesn't play competitively across the country or win many games .... Uh wait.

 Blackmoor wrote:

I told you that I was taking a leap(an educated guess) that we did not see necrons placing well because of saber platforms. IMHO sabers kept the necrons away not only by beating them on the table top, but also by keeping them away because the necron players did not want to play them because of the SDP, and because a lot of the top players switched to IG and did not take their Necrons. Does this not sound reasonable to you?

And I do not always make declarations about the meta after every tournament. I see a lot of tournaments won my gimmicky lists like seer councils, seraphem and dark eldar beast packs that I think are not very good long term, and only good when taking players by surprise. I will say that necrons are a very good army, and a top tier army, and seem to be standing the test of time. I found it odd that they were not anywhere near the top of the BAO.

To give you an example, Duel Con was run by Reese and it had a ton of Necron flyers and players and it followed the BAO missions. A necron player even won it. Now a few months later no necrons. There has to be a reason for that.

Yes, I have not had many tournaments to look at the data since this is really the first tournament with time to get your forge world ready, but I am not allowed to infer things by the results?

I can also guess and say that Forge World helps IG and it hurts flyer dependent lists (CSM, Necrons), and I think that is fairly obvious without seeing many tournament results. You seem to think I thought that was a bad thing, I was merely pointing it out.

Of course you're able to infer whatever you'd like. I'm just trying to point out the futility of doing so because there are simply too many variables that you ignore to create whatever narrative you are wishing to see from the results...most importantly you typically ignore the players themselves and just look at the army types as though these things play themselves. A Necron army played by player X in one tournament is not the same thing as a totally different Necron army played by player Y in a different tournament.

Duelcon is located in Arizona and the BAO is in Northern California. That alone means there is going to be a totally different host of players involved. There will obviously be a few cross-overs between the two, but *any* change in players involved is going to have a huge impact on the event...arguably even more than army types.

And as I stated in my last post perception can have a major impact on the armies that players choose to bring. A top player that this afraid of Sabres, for example, may decide to cut his losses and go with a different army type instead of his Necrons, so the results of the tournament will end up showing one less Necron player who would have been in the top 10, but we don't know for sure that this player wouldn't have broken the top 10 with his Necron force if he had decided to bring it.

Hell, nor do we even know that if you ran the BAO a 2nd time with exactly the same players and exactly the same starting army draws that we wouldn't have ended up with 1 or 2 Necron armies in the top 15...such is the nature of the luck involved.

So my point to you has always been (even in our private conversations), that making generalizations based on tournament results is so flawed that its basically worthless. But worse, because you are a talented, smart player, people listen to your (and other many other players who do the same) inferences and start to believe these generalizations as being truth...so then before you know it the tagline of 'Necrons can't win when Forgeworld is involved' becomes a common theme and that myth actually helps to fuel people choosing not to bring their Necron armies to events that are using Forgeworld.

@Darth

Well, thanks for the input. I think you are grossly overestimating the ability of the TO to control what is going on. We of course want people to have fun and it is regrettable when things go badly, but come on here, we aren't purposefully trying to make things bad which is the implication you were making. Your tone suggests we intentionally slighted Blackmoor which is asinine. For one, he is my friend personally, for two, what would that gain us?

We gain nothing by packing the event on purpose to the point we can't manage it, that only hurts us long term. This is our profession, this is how we pay the bills. We are in this for the long haul. We want people to walk away form our events stoked, not bummed out.

And yeah, I did know Alan said that FW would keep flyers away, hahaha, he is on Team Zero Comp, and crashed at my house while he was here! We talk often, he is a good friend of mine. He did predict that Forgeworld would dominate Flyers but he also doesn't play FW, he will tell you so himself. That was his guess. 2 of the top 4 armies had fliers though, so what should we infer from that?

Necrons were the 5th most represented army there, so they hardly got scared away. The fact that they didn't make the top 10% could be due to any number of reasons. Saying it was only FW is silly as most of the top armies (7 of them) had flyers, and only 1/3 of them (IRRC) used FW.

So there you go, more flyers than FW in the top 10%. Necrons would have fared no differently.

 yakface wrote:


So my point to you has always been (even in our private conversations), that making generalizations based on tournament results is so flawed that its basically worthless. But worse, because you are a talented, smart player, people listen to your (and other many other players who do the same) inferences and start to believe these generalizations as being truth...so then before you know it the tagline of 'Necrons can't win when Forgeworld is involved' becomes a common theme and that myth actually helps to fuel people choosing not to bring their Necron armies to events that are using Forgeworld.

I do make generalization before all of the data is in, but a lot of people make educated guesses and try to forecast trends. I try to say that I am guessing and I try to avoid stating it as if they are facts. If you can do it for the stock market you should be able to do it for 40k. Here is my guess for Adepticon....you better have some way to deal with helldrakes.

I think necrons can win with forge world, but a lot of people are lazy and just want to play flyers. I think that wraithwing is a very viable army in a lot of different formats, and I do not know why it is not that popular in the US. I also think that there are a lot of good units in the necron codex that no one ever explores because of flyers. That might be one of the benefits of forge world at tournaments is that we might see a diversification of necron armies.

 Reecius wrote:

 Blood Lord Soldado wrote:

Now to not sound like I am pure brown nosing, the other thing I want to bring up, and I know it wasn't your fault was the food. Pizza is not that awesome 2 days in a row, and running out of drinks on Saturday was just bunk. I was sooo thirsty on Saturday night and I can't drink beer so I was basically boned for hydration. Again, they hotel will fix this, but this is the only thing that I found less than awesome. If you don't get the hotel for whatever reason, please let me know and I will come up and volunteer for the event and I will bring my taco stand. TACOS FOR THE TACO GOD!

That would be awesome! Providing food for the BAO has always been such a headache. On top of all the other responsibilities we have, ordering, picking up and selling the food is always such a PITA. We tried to get lunch trucks this year, but they all fell through. I seriously hate dealing with food and going to a hotel it will be such a relief to not deal with that crap again! if for whatever reason we do need help, I will be calling on the aid of the Taco Gods! haha

While I would much prefer to play I wouldn't be entirely opposed to hauling a nice sized charcoal BBQ up there to make some good BBQ. Then again, if you don't do the fairgrounds again I will just be playing.

//begin rambling

I played Chaos/Necrons and, scared about FW skyfire/interceptor units, decided going into the event that I was going to have to take less flyers in order to survive. It was definitely the right call.

I had two games where I would have lost had I not traded in my 3rd flyer, a Night Scythe, for a Veiltek. A third game (one of my two losses) would've been a complete massacre, but instead came down to the wire. That Night Scythe would've gone POOF the second it came into play, and gone with it would be the mobile scoring units which were the main reason I was allying in Necrons in the first place.

I highly doubt I'm the only player that realized taking more than a couple flyers in a competitive FW-inclusive environment would be a bad idea. It's impossible for those armies to place in the top 10 if nobody is playing them.

Yes, there were a lot of Necron armies there. It should also be noted that 90% of them were piloted by less than stellar generals.

Did the inclusion of FW change the environment? Absolutely, it did.

Was that a bad thing? I'm not sure I'd say it was good or bad. Just different.

//end rambling

 Hulksmash wrote:
@red Corsair

Or, since he know what a Rail Gun looks like he could have assumed a TL-Railgun (which it was modelled as) for a FW unit. That would be reasonable right? Then it turns out it's plasma. The point is that if it had been modeled correctly he wouldn't have made the assumption he did. As it was it fired a weapon that the model in no way represented.

Agreed. I actually saw this player's (beautiful) display board prior to the event, but I was very confused by it since it seemed to have several units that were not legal options (Hammerhead with twin-linked railgun and three burst cannons) or weren't on his army list. I actually assumed he was playing in the Narrative event for this reason-- the twin-linked railgun turret seems to clearly violate the WYSIWYG rules from the 40k championship tournament packet: "If you are using converted or scratch built models with Forge World rules, this is acceptable so long as your model is as close to the represented model as possible in terms of equipment, size and shape. We will not be lenient with this." Further it could be construed as modeling for advantage too because the railguns are much longer than the plasma cannons.

I obviously don't think this player was trying to model for advantage but rather for things that looked cool, but I was very confused at a glance and think models like that shouldn't be used in tournament play. I also actually think having units on your display board that aren't in your army shouldn't be allowed either, but that's a different story and IMO a more ambiguous one.

Necrons and msu were definitely popular. I played blood angels and actually had a nice variety of armies to go against. Ork, daemon with csm, grey knights, elder, 3 marine players.

15 armies with Space Marines, none in the top 15. They ain't that bad right now IMO?

 Reecius wrote:

 Blood Lord Soldado wrote:

Now to not sound like I am pure brown nosing, the other thing I want to bring up, and I know it wasn't your fault was the food. Pizza is not that awesome 2 days in a row, and running out of drinks on Saturday was just bunk. I was sooo thirsty on Saturday night and I can't drink beer so I was basically boned for hydration. Again, they hotel will fix this, but this is the only thing that I found less than awesome. If you don't get the hotel for whatever reason, please let me know and I will come up and volunteer for the event and I will bring my taco stand. TACOS FOR THE TACO GOD!

That would be awesome! Providing food for the BAO has always been such a headache. On top of all the other responsibilities we have, ordering, picking up and selling the food is always such a PITA. We tried to get lunch trucks this year, but they all fell through. I seriously hate dealing with food and going to a hotel it will be such a relief to not deal with that crap again! if for whatever reason we do need help, I will be calling on the aid of the Taco Gods! haha

Reece,

I dont want to seem like I am telling you guys how to do this but at The Indy Open we used a private caterer the first year telling him he could charge cash and the price point should be from $5 to $8 per meal. It worked very well. This year we had the event in a hotel and it made the logistics so much easier. I gave the same deal to the hotel instead of us paying a certain amount per person and they agreed. They made money, it was something I didn't have to worry about, and the players loved the options. Just a thought.

Spaguatyrine

Spaguatyrine


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 hippesthippo wrote:
//begin rambling

I played Chaos/Necrons and, scared about FW skyfire/interceptor units, decided going into the event that I was going to have to take less flyers in order to survive. It was definitely the right call.

I had two games where I would have lost had I not traded in my 3rd flyer, a Night Scythe, for a Veiltek. A third game (one of my two losses) would've been a complete massacre, but instead came down to the wire. That Night Scythe would've gone POOF the second it came into play, and gone with it would be the mobile scoring units which were the main reason I was allying in Necrons in the first place.

I highly doubt I'm the only player that realized taking more than a couple flyers in a competitive FW-inclusive environment would be a bad idea. It's impossible for those armies to place in the top 10 if nobody is playing them.

Yes, there were a lot of Necron armies there. It should also be noted that 90% of them were piloted by less than stellar generals.

Did the inclusion of FW change the environment? Absolutely, it did.

Was that a bad thing? I'm not sure I'd say it was good or bad. Just different.

//end rambling

I am positive if FW wasn't allowed you would see more Necron flyers in the top tables! Guaranteed

I almost brought my wraithwing scythe-crons. I ended up bringing my bugs not because I was concerned about FW or anything (I wasn't), but because both the dakka readers and I wanted to see what my bugs could do in the tournament.

@Darth

Sorry for coming at you a bit harsh, it just felt like you were implying that we chose to make things unfun for people, which irked me.

@Hippest

I agree FW did change the meta, no doubt. That was one of the main points! As for better or worse, that is up to each individual to decide. I am putting out the poll today, and I will post results, so we will be able to see how most folks felt about it.

We aren't married to FW, I personally feel lit makes the game more fun, but we will see what the majority of people felt about it.

And you said it, the caliber of the player playing Crons, their luck, match-ups, etc. are more indicative of how they finished than the armies themselves.

@Blackmoor and Kingsley

I will talk to Israel about his Tau army, he comes into the shop most days. I can tell you for 100% certain he modeled his army to look cool as he is a painter first, player second. I will tell him people were confused by his army and I will bet money he not only feels bad about (as it was unintended) but also changes it.

@niviglobina

Vanilla marines right now are excellent, and I think those big numbers prove it. I think it just wasn't their day this event. Plus with all the dang Hell Turkies flying around, MEQs were having a rough day.

@Overwatch

Thanks for the offer! We actually tried to get a group of guys to bar-b-que, but they chose not to, also. We seriously could not catch a flipping break on the stupid food. I had 3 people working on getting food sorted out and everyone came up empty, it was so annoying.

@spaguatyrine

No worries man, I am very open to any advice. You run a good event too, and any experiences you have can only serve as good advice for us.

We tried the lunch trucks but they all fell through last minute. A private caterer is not a bad idea and we actually did not explore that option, which in retrospect we should have.

Thanks for the tip, I will hold on to that one for next year.

@Jy2

I share your attitude. FW doesn't scare me at all, but then, we use it all the time and I have played with it for years. So to me it just feels normal and not something to even make a fuss about. But that comes largely as a result of exposure to it.

@Defeatmyarmy

Glad you had a fun time, Dan!

 Nivoglibina wrote:
15 armies with Space Marines, none in the top 15. They ain't that bad right now IMO?

A lot of marine players are very skilled. I wasn't one of them lol. Daniel Katz I placed 132. Due to work I originally thought I would have to drop out. I literally made my list after being drunk after bowling 1 hour before the tournament. Reece and I discussed viable competitive lists using most marine models I already owned. I'll definitely be ready next year knowing the rules. It can literally take on almost any list after I told him what I wanted to deal with and it took him less than 30 minutes to figure out what I needed to add! Frontline gaming is a great source to submit army lists to, with 2+ top players in the country working there. Even though I lost 5 games it was a lot of fun.

I am not as anti-forge world as I use to be, but I am still not pro-forge world.

I would not mind some limits to FW, like limiting the books that you can use. Something like only being about to use the IA Apocalypse books.

Or you can do what a lot of tournaments in the UK are doing and limit it to one FW unit.

Well, that is some progress!

Like I said, I personally love using FW and really believe it makes for a more enjoyable game, but ultimately we do what our attendees want. If when we get feedback folks say they would prefer an event without FW, then so be it. At worst it was a great experiment, at best we open minds and go forward with more cool toys to use.

We included it this year as we had an overwhelmingly positive reaction to using it. Like 90% of the people we asked said go for it. We had a few, very vocal opponents though, which everyone saw. I will be very curious to see the reaction now after the fact.

My take on my time at the BAO this year http://www.3forint.com/2013/03/doks-bao.html

I liked the inclusion of the forgeworld as it gave me any shot against the ubiquitous helldrake. I would be interested to see the actual breakdown of people who used forgeworld and what they used though. It might give a clearer picture of what that meta looks like.

 Reecius wrote:
We included it this year as we had an overwhelmingly positive reaction to using it. Like 90% of the people we asked said go for it. We had a few, very vocal opponents though, which everyone saw. I will be very curious to see the reaction now after the fact.

I was a big opponent of FW prior to this event. Having played in it, my opinion changed-- most of the FW stuff doesn't concern me too much. I will however say that on tables with inferior terrain I would not be very happy with it. The great terrain you guys provided mitigated many of the potential issues.

Yeah, each table had an amount of terrain. Most of the ones I played on were consistent, having ruins in each corner, a few area terrain equally distributed, and LOS blocking terrain in the middle. The LOS blocking terrain was a bit annoying for my Broadsides, but I guess it's fair against pure gunline armies.

I didn't play against a single FW model. I did however hear complaint about one player bringing 3 Quad-Launchers (IA5). A single quad-launcher shoots 4 Strt5 AP5 blasts with barrage. Resolving multiple blasts with barrage is very time consuming. Non-FW is also capable of spamming multiple barrage. Biovores and IG Heavy Weapons squad w/ Mortars is a great example. I thought it was an unspoken rule or unsporting to field heavy amounts of multiple barrage shooting. I guess a lot of players don't realize that.

Reecius' chess clock idea in another thread would deter army builds that threatens time limit. However, it costs $20 - $22 per a clock. Times that by half the total of players and the cost is enormous. Perhaps those who find chess clocks appealing and provides fairness to turn-based table top games wouldn't mind donating money to fund chess clocks for the next BAO.

I would say that is a very wrong assumption.

Yeah, multiple barrage is a pain. But there is no unspoken rule that you don't bring tons of it.

And its no more unsporting than bringing 5 Tervigons and putting 15D6 gants on the board each turn.

The idea of chess clocks is interesting, I suppose, but try it out. I assure you, beyond a shadow of doubt, that it would not work. There are too many changes of possession, if you will, and it will a) slow things down even more with people messing around with it and b) be grossly inaccurate with people just not using it right (or at all).

 Kingsley wrote:

 Hulksmash wrote:
@red Corsair

Or, since he know what a Rail Gun looks like he could have assumed a TL-Railgun (which it was modelled as) for a FW unit. That would be reasonable right? Then it turns out it's plasma. The point is that if it had been modeled correctly he wouldn't have made the assumption he did. As it was it fired a weapon that the model in no way represented.

Agreed. I actually saw this player's (beautiful) display board prior to the event, but I was very confused by it since it seemed to have several units that were not legal options (Hammerhead with twin-linked railgun and three burst cannons) or weren't on his army list. I actually assumed he was playing in the Narrative event for this reason-- the twin-linked railgun turret seems to clearly violate the WYSIWYG rules from the 40k championship tournament packet: "If you are using converted or scratch built models with Forge World rules, this is acceptable so long as your model is as close to the represented model as possible in terms of equipment, size and shape. We will not be lenient with this." Further it could be construed as modeling for advantage too because the railguns are much longer than the plasma cannons.

I obviously don't think this player was trying to model for advantage but rather for things that looked cool, but I was very confused at a glance and think models like that shouldn't be used in tournament play. I also actually think having units on your display board that aren't in your army shouldn't be allowed either, but that's a different story and IMO a more ambiguous one.

Again my point is missed. He never even asked the player anything about the model that apparently was strange so how can he bitch when he finds out during his shooting phase? Certainly is isn't plasma on the model, but what if it shot 2-3 times with the rail gun? He still would have been screwed. Here's a perfect example for you, at the recent event that included FW that I attended I faced an Avenger Fighter from Aeronautica. The model has two las canon barrels and two auto canon barrels mounted on its wings similar to a dakka jet. I assumed it was twin linked weaponry YET I STILL ASKED.... Low and behold the G-damm thing had 2 auto canons 2 las canons and an avenger bolt canon... Oh wait and a heavy stubber out the rear! It pays to ask when someth9ing doesn't ;look right and I bet you Allen will not make the same mistake ever again. This also would have given him an opportunity at the event to voice his opposition to his none WYSYWIG model before it was a major issue in game.

Conclusion: Both players share blame here.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 tomjoad wrote:
The idea of chess clocks is interesting, I suppose, but try it out. I assure you, beyond a shadow of doubt, that it would not work. There are too many changes of possession, if you will, and it will a) slow things down even more with people messing around with it and b) be grossly inaccurate with people just not using it right (or at all).

True, fortuned units for eldar get a reroll to saves. Tanking with a harley star requires lots of single rerolls on shadowfields to be done one at a time. Mind you this would drain the opponents clock as it was his turn.

 SabrX wrote:

Reecius' chess clock idea in another thread would deter army builds that threatens time limit. However, it costs $20 - $22 per a clock. Times that by half the total of players and the cost is enormous. Perhaps those who find chess clocks appealing and provides fairness to turn-based table top games wouldn't mind donating money to fund chess clocks for the next BAO.

You can also have players buy there own chess clocks if they want to use them.

As mentioned many times before, you have both players interacting at the same time that does not make chess clocks ideal.

 Reecius wrote:
@Darth

Well, thanks for the input. I think you are grossly overestimating the ability of the TO to control what is going on. We of course want people to have fun and it is regrettable when things go badly, but come on here, we aren't purposefully trying to make things bad which is the implication you were making. Your tone suggests we intentionally slighted Blackmoor which is asinine. For one, he is my friend personally, for two, what would that gain us?

We gain nothing by packing the event on purpose to the point we can't manage it, that only hurts us long term. This is our profession, this is how we pay the bills. We are in this for the long haul. We want people to walk away form our events stoked, not bummed out.

And yeah, I did know Alan said that FW would keep flyers away, hahaha, he is on Team Zero Comp, and crashed at my house while he was here! We talk often, he is a good friend of mine. He did predict that Forgeworld would dominate Flyers but he also doesn't play FW, he will tell you so himself. That was his guess. 2 of the top 4 armies had fliers though, so what should we infer from that?

Necrons were the 5th most represented army there, so they hardly got scared away. The fact that they didn't make the top 10% could be due to any number of reasons. Saying it was only FW is silly as most of the top armies (7 of them) had flyers, and only 1/3 of them (IRRC) used FW.

So there you go, more flyers than FW in the top 10%. Necrons would have fared no differently.

Reece my tone was somewhat playfull and not mean. What happened to Allan can happen to anybody, but is increased when you try and get to many people in a tourney. You advertised it as this big tourney. You boasted about the size. Or did I get that all wrong?

It is easier to manage less people. It is easier to control less people. It is easier to provide a better experince with less people. Try 64 instead of 144. Heck try two brackets of 48 for a total of 96 people. You;ll have more space, more control and more freedom. Quality over Quantity.

I've been having this debate with Adepticon on and off for years dating back to when I ran the Gladiator. It's just my pet peeve.

As for Alan, don't let him fool you. He might have hung out with you and stuff, but I play him every month here in Chicago for the last 3 years. He does indeed play FW and has tried to get it into our monthly event for a while. He loves the Ork Lifta Droppa and has used it for years. He wanted to bring bugs, but thought the Sabre Platforms would kill him. This was about a month ago.

No sense buttin' heads. You like your format and I like mine. Just agree to disagree.

 Red Corsair wrote:

Here's a perfect example for you, at the recent event that included FW that I attended I faced an Avenger Fighter from Aeronautica. The model has two las canon barrels and two auto canon barrels mounted on its wings similar to a dakka jet. I assumed it was twin linked weaponry YET I STILL ASKED.... Low and behold the G-damm thing had 2 auto canons 2 las canons and an avenger bolt canon... Oh wait and a heavy stubber out the rear! It pays to ask when someth9ing doesn't ;look right and I bet you Allen will not make the same mistake ever again. This also would have given him an opportunity at the event to voice his opposition to his none WYSYWIG model before it was a major issue in game.

Conclusion: Both players share blame here.
.

You mean your opponents model was WYSIWYG? It is a good thing you got to the bottom of that!

DarthDiggler wrote:
As for Alan, don't let him fool you. He might have hung out with you and stuff, but I play him every month here in Chicago for the last 3 years. He does indeed play FW and has tried to get it into our monthly event for a while. He loves the Ork Lifta Droppa and has used it for years. He wanted to bring bugs, but thought the Sabre Platforms would kill him. This was about a month ago.

Sabres did do unpleasant things to my bugs.

I havee to say, as my first GT i enjoyed it. You team made it easy enough to get in and play. There where some problems but they where minor.
You are definitly going to see me there again and at your store aswell.
You guys did a great job.

One interesting concept might be running a FW-legal event with a banned/restricted list. Not sure if people want to go that route, but it should stifle the issues with some FW units (Sabres, Sevrin Loth, all Heavy Artillery, perhaps the Hyperios Missile Battery) and provide an environment that's easier for people unfamiliar with FW to play in.

Reecius -- About the prizes, the confusion came from Frontline's sight where it list, "We're also working on a Super Secret Squirrel Prize..."

And the word "trophies" was used multiple times for the Best Of Armies.

No worries.

In a World of HellDrakes, Forgeworld is the list of my concern. Now with Spammable Flying Monstrous Creatures from Daemons, I reiterate the previous statement.

Most armies don't have access to enough anti flyer solutions and FW provides that need. Everytime I hear someone complain about lack of FW rules knowledge, I ask people to remember that the situation is the same when a new Codex comes out. This Fear of FW is based on an old environment and some stigma which are now finding their foundations eaten away.

I had a splendid time at BAO and will make the same monetary investment next year to return but this time I will be more in-line with some of the mentality of the players I have played over the weekend. I was taken aback over the weekend at the unwillingness of some players to even participate in playing certain rules properly but that is what happens when you drag so many new gaming regions into 1 event. Finally they are starting to communicate and perhaps slowly overtime rules understanding will be more homogeneous.

This BAO felt to me like a teenager moving out his college dorm to his first apartment in terms of logistic issues and space. I still think that Hammer and Anvil is the worse deployment ever written for large tournaments.

I was also taken aback at some of the amount of time people took during their turn when they were essentially playing static armies or just the inability to quick-roll but that is perhaps the crowd is not used to tournament play. I have timed some of my opponents and I was amazed we got to turn 5.

The Noise level was really high and was really hard to hear what my opponents were mumbling under their breath sometimes.

Now that I got done with that, let me talk about the highlights!!!

- Terrain was stellar!
- Once the scoring walk up was fixed, Round Turns around were super quick!
- Beer!
- Love the Missions Scenarios (Minus Hammer and Anvil).

Suggestion for next year, and I have already expressed those to Reece,

- Both Players need to turn in their scores, not 1.
- Sportsmanship needs to be turned in at the end of days not at end of rounds.


Looking forward to next year!

@the Lord Call

Ahhhhh, that is what you meant! Yeah, we were going to work on a prize like the Belt of Russ for Fantasy but we ran out of time. We were thinking another belt or a Sword with the winner's names on it, but the project got rolled over into next year. The Belt was expensive, cost us just shy of $400 to make.

@thread

Thanks for the ongoing constructive feedback, we really appreciate it.

 MikhailLenin wrote:
Most armies don't have access to enough anti flyer solutions and FW provides that need.

I hear that a lot, but if you think about it it really only helps out is IG who do not need any anti-flyer help. Maybe SM a little too.

Everyone else is SOL.

Only Tyranids are really lacking anti-flyer including FW. There are options for everyone else. Flyers are an excellent counter to flyers.

 Reecius wrote:
We seriously could not catch a flipping break on the stupid food. I had 3 people working on getting food sorted out and everyone came up empty, it was so annoying.

I honestly don't see the problem. Barley pop packs like 140 calories per, so you know, after 5 or 6, you've got your FDA recommended caloric intake for lunch. I got my fill.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 MikhailLenin wrote:

Now that I got done with that, let me talk about the highlights!!!

- Terrain was stellar!
- Once the scoring walk up was fixed, Round Turns around were super quick!
- Beer!
- Love the Missions Scenarios (Minus Hammer and Anvil).

The event is large enough a food truck can probably be talked into giving it a try.

HOWL Reece! Great Job! Wolfbrothers loved it all and want more!

 schadenfreude wrote:
The event is large enough a food truck can probably be talked into giving it a try.

You'd think so, wouldn't you! hahaha, we couldn't get one out there!

We got cancelled on by like, 4 companies. We should have gone to a caterer. That was a good idea that we didn't think of.

@Yenhoi

Thanks!

@Thread

The poll is out and the results so far are really interesting! I won't say anything as I don't want to skew the results, but check your email if you went to the BAO, you should have a feedback questionnaire. The data helps us out a LOT, so please take the quick second it takes to fill it out (multiple choice, super fast).

Some of the results are not what I expected.

Has there been any thought given to doing away with random game length for higher point tournaments? I don't have any clue what the results are looking like, but if people know that at 1750-2000 points you'll be stopping after 5 turns there will be less people getting screwed by an unnaturally stopped game.

I can think of plenty of reasons that might not work, or might not even help at all, but I'm curious if its been considered?

 tomjoad wrote:
Has there been any thought given to doing away with random game length for higher point tournaments? I don't have any clue what the results are looking like, but if people know that at 1750-2000 points you'll be stopping after 5 turns there will be less people getting screwed by an unnaturally stopped game.

I can think of plenty of reasons that might not work, or might not even help at all, but I'm curious if its been considered?

I don't like it because of 2 main reasons:

1) You can stall if you know exactly when the game is ending, especially if you are ahead.

2) Fixed game lengths favor the more mobile army who is going 2nd. Fast armies have a huge and unfair advantage in objectives-based games if they go 2nd. And people will be crying broken once again to Necron Air Force armies.

 tomjoad wrote:
Has there been any thought given to doing away with random game length for higher point tournaments? I don't have any clue what the results are looking like, but if people know that at 1750-2000 points you'll be stopping after 5 turns there will be less people getting screwed by an unnaturally stopped game.

I can think of plenty of reasons that might not work, or might not even help at all, but I'm curious if its been considered?

Good Players will adapt to anything but having a random game length is better for tournaments in my opinion. There is a lot of clock watching when you know it will end. Random also gives someone a chance who may be losing to go all out for that turn 5 win, draw, etc if they know they are going to lose if it goes to turn 6 or 7.

At the Indy Open we used 1750 points and 2:15 minute rounds. We had only 4 games go over and 2 that mattered for pairings. Be it we only ran a 64 man event. What we did to keep the time flowing though was a few things:

We posted pairings 15 minutes early and allowed players to do everything to begin the game except roll for seize and start the game. This does a few things. For players who really want to ensure they get all the time they always finished. We also had a 30 minute break or an hour break in between. If a game needed to go over they lost part of their break. After 30 minutes in each round I made announcements that if they aren't on turn 2 they are moving to slow. Gentle prodding helps and reminds people they should be playing at a particular speed. The problem with 6th ed in my opinion is starting late with all the pre-game warm ups we have to do. I.E. Roll for this power, this boon, this warlord trait, etc, etc. Giving players 10-15 minutes to get this done before your actual playing time was the key to staying on track every round. If games were going to slow I was advised of the situation and personally made an appearance to observe and coach accordingly in a positive manner.

If games were going over, my judges and I stood at the table watching and if a game was obviously one sided ensuring the game was completed quickly. We only really had to do this 4 times.

My $.02.

Spaguatyrine

How much time did you allow between rounds? We've always allowed 15 minutes and that has been fine, but this last time around it wasn't enough.

And no worries at all on putting in your two cents, don't be shy. Your experiences can only help us get better.

Y0ou could always allow for say 20 minutes before rounds but allow players to start early if they are read y to go. There really are only so many things you can do with so many people without taking the entire week to run the darn event.

Has anyone ever tried a single elimination event over one day? I know this i8sn't practical for travelers but it would be interesting ha ha


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Blackmoor wrote:

 Red Corsair wrote:

Here's a perfect example for you, at the recent event that included FW that I attended I faced an Avenger Fighter from Aeronautica. The model has two las canon barrels and two auto canon barrels mounted on its wings similar to a dakka jet. I assumed it was twin linked weaponry YET I STILL ASKED.... Low and behold the G-damm thing had 2 auto canons 2 las canons and an avenger bolt canon... Oh wait and a heavy stubber out the rear! It pays to ask when someth9ing doesn't ;look right and I bet you Allen will not make the same mistake ever again. This also would have given him an opportunity at the event to voice his opposition to his none WYSYWIG model before it was a major issue in game.

Conclusion: Both players share blame here.
.

You mean your opponents model was WYSIWYG? It is a good thing you got to the bottom of that!

Actually no I asked to read the unit entry in is book and saw the picture first, his model arrived in the mail that morning and wasn't fully assembled! Rather then make an assumption I then asked about it rather then read through the whole section as I figured it was faster. Guess what? He was more then helpful and gave me more then enough information about it including its weaknesses. Either way you are now dodging the main point which is you share responsibility for not asking questions and making assumptions about an unknown model at an event that you knew included FW. Like I said before, what if it had a lower AP sub munitions round? You would still have lost your squad do to a stupid error.

 Red Corsair wrote:


Actually no I asked to read the unit entry in is book and saw the picture first, his model arrived in the mail that morning and wasn't fully assembled! Rather then make an assumption I then asked about it rather then read through the whole section as I figured it was faster. Guess what? He was more then helpful and gave me more then enough information about it including its weaknesses. Either way you are now dodging the main point which is you share responsibility for not asking questions and making assumptions about an unknown model at an event that you knew included FW. Like I said before, what if it had a lower AP sub munitions round? You would still have lost your squad do to a stupid error.

Your opponent had a FW model and you asked him about the FW rules. My opponent had a GW model and thus I did not have to ask him about it's FW rules.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Reecius wrote:
How much time did you allow between rounds? We've always allowed 15 minutes and that has been fine, but this last time around it wasn't enough.

I think what you had was a perfect storm of little problems and they all added up to be a big problem

Because everything was packed in it took a while to make your way to the scores table to get your pairings, then back to your table to get your army and then find your new table. So you were short on time to start, and as we said, 6th edition takes a little longer to play. Because of that a lot of games ended due to time being called and so everyone wrapped up at the same time and then made their way to the scoring table. Frankie was overwhelmed and then it took a while to get the scores all in, and then the next round started late, etc.


What the Indy Open did was nice because there is so much you have to do in 6th even before you start the game that getting pairings up 15 minutes early meant that they really had 2.5 hour rounds which seems about right.

@Blackmoor

I agree. It was a layering of little things that became a bigger thing.

Lesson learned though, we wont make the same errors again.

The feedback though has been overwhelmingly positive, so people had a lot of fun. Even the people who said their experience was less than awesome, or even bad, gave really good feedback on why they felt that way that we can use to improve and grow.

I like the idea of building in an extra 10-15 min between/at the start of rounds for setup and deployment. They do this at Battlegrounds in MA, and it's always been nice. Having that extra time is especially helpful in a large event with a big hall where you need time to find your table and move your army over, while a huge crowd of other gamers carrying display boards are doing the same thing.

It reminds me of one of my pet peeves at GTs- folks who don't push their darn chairs in when they walk away from their table! The aisles are choked enough as they are, folks!

And one last thing on time...


I think "us" as players need to do more to be proactive as far as time management goes. That means keeping track of time like timers or cell phones, have an army that can play fast, and if not have a system that speeds play. And then if falling behind encouraging and motivating our opponents to hurry up.

 Reecius wrote:
How much time did you allow between rounds? We've always allowed 15 minutes and that has been fine, but this last time around it wasn't enough.

And no worries at all on putting in your two cents, don't be shy. Your experiences can only help us get better.

Two years ago we did 2:30 and I realized that people got finished at the 2:30 minute time most of the time. I then went to adepticon, and nova, and realized that people play to the time that they are given a majority of the time. I also went to a bunch of RTT's as well as ran some and played with different time frames. What I found is that whatever time I had whether is was 1:45 minutes in smaller point levels or longer time in larger ones, most of the players still finished within a few minutes of the time alloted. So I helped support a local tournament that I played in where they were given 2.5 hours for 1500 points. I finished all of my games in 1 hour and sat and was astounded that even strong players were taking over 2 hours. I then decided to try cutting the time down and building in that extra 15 minutes in the break to 30 minutes. The players got finished in 2:15 for the most part.

So out of testing I realized that most people will finish in the time you allow them if they have the time to set up first. I.E. the pre-warm ups I was talking about. Gamers never listen when you give an announcment when the next round starts so I asked my staff to tell everyone to be in the ballroom since pairings will be up 15 minutes before the round starts. Worked out failry well. I am also a little pushy with people who are late or who are playing so...in a kind of nice kind of not way.....

I also couldn't have done it without a great team tho. LOL.

I would love to make it out next year depending on the timing. I assume we run in the same month so that will be hard to do.

Spaguatyrine

 Blackmoor wrote:
And one last thing on time...

I think "us" as players need to do more to be proactive as far as time management goes. That means keeping track of time like timers or cell phones, have an army that can play fast, and if not have a system that speeds play. And then if falling behind encouraging and motivating our opponents to hurry up.

I tried, Allan, I tried. The cell phone just keeps ending back up in my pocket though.

My watch battery quit on Wed before the BAO. So, I took *two* different watches (a Timex and an Elgin)to Fry's because replacing that one last year was a pain ... and Fry's did not have any batteries in stock that matched 'em. WTF.

For the next few casual and even the next RTT games at G.E., I'm going to actually bring it out and try to consistently get turns done in 12 minutes. Since I'm not playing MSU DE, and using SW/IG, it ought to be do-able.

I agree with Blackmoor in regards to the Hammerhead with railguns proxied as plasma cannons. It's not his responbility to ask and I think a lot of people would overlook it - his opponent should have told him. To me the bottom line is conversions shouldn't be allowed to represent Forge World units or upgrades in general.

In regards to the event I think it is has provided many lessons for other TOs. Hopefully people will learn from it.

There were a ton of proxies there in all directions. Stormravens, whole demon armies. How was this hammerhead such a problem lol?

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=544282525592319&set=oa.430292797046560&type=1&theater




Automatically Appended Next Post:
Heated rules debate,

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=544266128927292&set=oa.430268767048963&type=1&theater

Well, the issue with the Hammerhead is that a Railgun is a different weapon entirely from a plasma gun.

Now, I would have immediatly guessed it was a Forge World upgrade, but that it was a Twin-linked Railgun.


Basically, if Forge World is allowed and I see something that isn't what normally comes on a GW kit I willl ask what that thing is.

Right, I asked about it in just a few seconds while looking at his army in between rounds. We all play 40k here and a lot of us were at the BAO, it seems entirely unreasonable for anyone to have not asked at some point before the game started.

Specially in the later rounds on day 1 or anytime day 2, it was evident that there was a ton of "leniency" for all things conversions, FW or just because.

Silly to throw a fit about the Hammerhead, but all the other count-as driving around or flying around was ok? I dont think there was a lot of staff around at the event but the packet and website seemed to hint that they had a plan to deal with count-as and modeling issues....

but if you can drive blackmoor off the table with complicated rules discussion and ambitious drive to win the game and the tournament, then more power to you!

yenhoi wrote:

Heated rules debate,

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=544266128927292&set=oa.430268767048963&type=1&theater

I didn't know Meat Loaf was there!

yenhoi wrote:
Right, I asked about it in just a few seconds while looking at his army in between rounds. We all play 40k here and a lot of us were at the BAO, it seems entirely unreasonable for anyone to have not asked at some point before the game started.

The responsibility falls to the player who is using a "Counts As" model to let their opponents know what the model represents. Counts As gets taken to too much extreme. I've seen an entire army including the list "modeled and labeled as" Dark Angels, but yet in the details of the list it was using Space Marine rules. The opponent never said a word about it until the game was well underway. Modeling cool stuff and having "fluff" built in is all great. However, it is one more item that the opponent must track. While Allan could have asked, it is not his responsibility.

Modeling cool stuff and having "fluff" built in is all great. However, it is one more item that the opponent must track. While Allan could have asked, it is not his responsibility.

Copied and pasted for truth. Exactly what Greg said. I expect my opponents to tell me during army list discussion whenever something is proxying for something else.

yenhoi wrote:


Right, I asked about it in just a few seconds while looking at his army in between rounds. We all play 40k here and a lot of us were at the BAO, it seems entirely unreasonable for anyone to have not asked at some point before the game started...

Silly to throw a fit about the Hammerhead, but all the other count-as driving around or flying around was ok? I dont think there was a lot of staff around at the event but the packet and website seemed to hint that they had a plan to deal with count-as and modeling issues....

Okay so you and your friends know due to familiarity with each other since you play together in a local setting. I fail to see how that translates to a large event with lots of players showing up from out of town. It takes all of a couple minutes to explain to your opponent what is your Forge World you brought to play. Is that asking too much? This would help to facilitate the Tourne packet you mentioned and make Forge World more acceptable to a greater number of players (IMO).

I think part of the problem was that this was the first big GT with Forge World and like a lot of other people am not in the habit of asking if they have any forge world. As the rules packet stated, they must go over all of their models that are not WYSIWUG.

For example:


Lyzz's army is mostly converted and you have no idea what most of her units are. At the begining of our game she went into great detail about each of her units and what they represented. That is why I had no problem with her proxies/models.

Its just as easy to ask and not be pissed lol.

Is that a picture frame used for a display/ carrying case?

Looks like, it's actually a relativlely cheap way to make a display board. I made a display board from a cork board from Target that cost $7.99. Just add some sand, flock, and paint and you're set!

Bummed I couldn't be there this year, hopefully I can make it next year!

Lyzz's army is easy to understand.

Screamer=screamer
Jellyfight/shroom=pink horror
Giant winged thingie=bloodthirster
Chariot=herald of Tzeentch on a chariot
Anything left=flamer

 schadenfreude wrote:
Lyzz's army is easy to understand.

Screamer=screamer
Jellyfight/shroom=pink horror
Giant winged thingie=bloodthirster
Chariot=herald of Tzeentch on a chariot
Anything left=flamer

The tentacles were screamers as well.

The point Blackmoor is making is that she explained it all very thoroughly.

Counts as with a clear explanation an done uniformly to make it not confusing:
Counts as with guns that look exactly like something that could be a viable choice from the codex (ia /fw book):

yenhoi wrote:


Its just as easy to ask and not be pissed lol.

Fail.

The modeler with the converted army bears the responsibility of full disclosure of his army and any count-as models.

However, with that said, if you factor in playing 6-7 games, people forget. It is very easy when you are fatigued to forget about mentioning one of your proxies/count-as units. In that case, it can lead to some nasty surprises in the middle of a game like it did in Blackmoor's game.

So while it is the responsibility of the party with the conversions to disclose, I'd say it's just as important for the other party to not assume and just ask if a model looks weird or out of the ordinary.

Not allowing Forge World proxies would solve everything. Twin linked railguns fails the rule of cool (IMO).

Or require everyone to submit a picture of their proxy/counts as for the judgement of the organizers. It would take a little extra time, but I think it would go a long way to helping solve some issues.

Of course you should also require everyone to explain what everything in their army is.

I think in addition to requiring a picture sent to the judge for approval, it may be a good idea to include a picture of what is what in your army list, and also to explain to your opponent what "counts as" what. That said I am opposed to ever using exisiting codex weapons to "count as" something else in the same codex. I.e. If say a razorback had a funk gun so you put a rail gun on top of it...that is ok, but doing the same on a tau vehicles is not. There is just an expectation that when you see a Rail gun (or melta gun etc) in an army that contains said weapon, that What you see is what it really is.

To take the plasma HH example, an appropriate conversion IMO would have been a pair of Railrifles on the turret. Not a pair of Railguns.

 Grey Templar wrote:
To take the plasma HH example, an appropriate conversion IMO would have been a pair of Railrifles on the turret. Not a pair of Railguns.

As I said, 2 Ion Cannons would be much closer to what they do if you were going for a conversion. Ion Cannons have 3 shots at strength 7 AP3. TL Plasma Guns have 4 TL shots at strength 7 AP3, so they are nearly identical. The problem is that Ion Cannons do not look as nice.

 Dozer Blades wrote:
Not allowing Forge World proxies would solve everything. Twin linked railguns fails the rule of cool (IMO).

I agree. It's hard enough to take in all the additional forgeworld models (which I agree, are a good thing for the hobby) without adding in not using the actual models. We all know the difference between someone who is using a "counts as" army as a plus and the opposite, those who are use proxies because they haven't put in the effort to convert or acquire the FW models.

I think it is pretty easy to model your own FW model without proxying.

I guess that comes down to the difference between scratchbuilding and proxying. Proxying is annoying, but scratchbuilding/conversion/counts-as meant to look like the original is fine with me.

 jy2 wrote:
So while it is the responsibility of the party with the conversions to disclose, I'd say it's just as important for the other party to not assume and just ask if a model looks weird or out of the ordinary.

All this does is push the burden then to someone that already has more of a burden in the game by having to keep track of their opponents counts as models. This in and of itself creates a competitive advantage for the player using the counts as models. Tournament organizers need to impress upon their attendees that while counts as may be acceptable, the responsibility is on the player using the counts as model(s). An opponent can ask, but it is not their responsibility.

As someone who likes to run some pretty heavily converted armies I have to agree with IM. I always strive to make it so the burden of my army impacts my opponent the least up to and including tiny labels if people feel like they need them.

Counts-AS armies need to be clearly modeled, and players need to be clear about explaining how they are modeled. There's really no way to put that burden on their opponents.

That said, while TO's need to make sure their rules put the onus on the counts-as, this doesn't change the fact that as a gamer, you can prevent suffering from even bad rulings by going through your opponent's army list / army, and confirming what's what.

A TO shouldn't be telling opponents 'on you to make sure you get it,' but they still SHOULD as players be trying to get it ... no matter what rule a TO has, if you don't proactively confirm everything, you are sill just as likely to get into a he-said she-said if your opponent is seedy to begin with. Someone willing to shuffle the boundaries and not mea-culpa on a poor conversion issue (or intentional one) is just as unwilling to mea culpa to a judge (and there are plenty who will argue they showed you their list and told you what was what, even if they didn't).

I think in the net that while a TO needs to put the onus on the converter/counts-as to be responsible, ALL players should proactively do things to protect themselves from getting into a game and having it in some way diminished or ruined by a confusion or deception, EVEN if there's a subsequent appropriate recourse for resolution w/in the tournament packet (aformentioned clear onus on the counts-as-owner).

 Inquisitor_Malice wrote:

 jy2 wrote:
So while it is the responsibility of the party with the conversions to disclose, I'd say it's just as important for the other party to not assume and just ask if a model looks weird or out of the ordinary.

All this does is push the burden then to someone that already has more of a burden in the game by having to keep track of their opponents counts as models. This in and of itself creates a competitive advantage for the player using the counts as models. Tournament organizers need to impress upon their attendees that while counts as may be acceptable, the responsibility is on the player using the counts as model(s). An opponent can ask, but it is not their responsibility.

Having seen the pictures I would not have questioned at all that it was going to be firing a rail gun of some sort at me.

 Inquisitor_Malice wrote:

 jy2 wrote:
So while it is the responsibility of the party with the conversions to disclose, I'd say it's just as important for the other party to not assume and just ask if a model looks weird or out of the ordinary.

All this does is push the burden then to someone that already has more of a burden in the game by having to keep track of their opponents counts as models. This in and of itself creates a competitive advantage for the player using the counts as models. Tournament organizers need to impress upon their attendees that while counts as may be acceptable, the responsibility is on the player using the counts as model(s). An opponent can ask, but it is not their responsibility.

I agree that the person with the converted model needs to tell his opponent. In a perfect world, he probably would. However, in a tournament environment where you've already played 5-6 games, people get tired and then people forget. Also, sometimes people are just so used to their models that they may just subconsciously think that other people will know what it is by looking at it. Even I've been guilty of this (forgot to tell my opponent about the grey knight brotherhood banner in 1 game that we played and he charged his Swarmlord into my unit). I doubt that the player was trying to deliberately mislead his opponent, not when you put so much care and hard work into making your army so pretty. He most likely just made a mistake and forgot to tell his opponent.

In any case, this type of problem can be avoided (or at least minimized) if both parties can put a little effort into it. If not, then you get into the situation that those 2 players got themselves into. One person runs the risk of getting screwed and the other person runs the risk of getting docked on Sportsmanship or maybe even disqualified for something that was most likely an honest mistake on his part.

 Inquisitor_Malice wrote:

 jy2 wrote:
So while it is the responsibility of the party with the conversions to disclose, I'd say it's just as important for the other party to not assume and just ask if a model looks weird or out of the ordinary.

All this does is push the burden then to someone that already has more of a burden in the game by having to keep track of their opponents counts as models. This in and of itself creates a competitive advantage for the player using the counts as models. Tournament organizers need to impress upon their attendees that while counts as may be acceptable, the responsibility is on the player using the counts as model(s). An opponent can ask, but it is not their responsibility.

AGREE. And just because you have explained it once doesn't mean I won't need to ask again especially if the 'counts as' is confusing or a flat out proxy in the example here where a railgun which has valid rules and can be mounted on that tank is being used as 'something else'. Thousands of decisions are made upon appearance in players heads every minute... I can *SAY* it is another weapon all day long but he still may confuse it if it is not clear. A player shouldn't be expecting to have to juggle unclear conversions as part of the tourney, especially when his opponent doesn't need to do the same.

I guarantee if I take a Battlewagon with a Supahkannon or Liftdroppa, and it is not FW official models, you won't be confusing it with a stock battlewagon with a kannon/zzap or killkannon. If I used a regular killkannon or Zzap gun to represent a supahkannon or Liftdroppa, then I have failed at 'counts as' and have burdened my opponent which is unfair in a competitive game.

BTW, the Tau army in question is here. The player won Best Appearance for his beautiful army.





And the vehicles in question in the 1st photogragh are the 2 "hammerheads" with what is converted to look like twin-linked railguns (I don't know the name of the Forge World vehicle). Now it isn't WYSIWYG, but it doesn't exactly look like a codex hammerhead either.


And for the record, I do agree it is the responsibility of the person with the conversions to explain clearly. Just posting the picture so you guys can decide for yourselves.

 jy2 wrote:
BTW, the Tau army in question is here. The player won Best Appearance for his beautiful army.

And the vehicles in question in the 1st photogragh are the 2 "hammerheads" with what is converted to look like twin-linked railguns (I don't know the name of the Forge World vehicle). Now it isn't WYSIWYG, but it doesn't exactly look like a codex hammerhead either.

And for the record, I do agree it is the responsibility of the person with the conversions to explain clearly. Just posting the picture so you guys can decide for yourselves.

So, it is pretty weird that this comes up after the event. Some random guy's half-painted army has an incorrect conversion for his FW? People probably don't notice. How many event staff and players looked at this army and nobody noticed that he had a non-existent setup for his turret. I think that is the real barrier to FW at events... I know pretty much what to expect from every codex army and can tell when something is obviously counts-as, not so much with FW. No one said that it looked like a codex Hammerhead, I believe Blackmoor said he just assumed it was some sort of TL-Railgun from FW thathe wasn't aware of.

It is beautiful, don't get me wrong. I think the guy did an amazing job. But with all the work he put into that army, was getting two FW turret sets or converting, scratchbuilding something that actually looks like them too much to ask? I actually hold him to a higher standard because he isn't half-thrown together, half-unpainted 'I need FW to compete' guy.

 jy2 wrote:


And the vehicles in question in the 1st photogragh are the 2 "hammerheads" with what is converted to look like twin-linked railguns (I don't know the name of the Forge World vehicle). Now it isn't WYSIWYG, but it doesn't exactly look like a codex hammerhead either.

But a railgun still looks exactly like a railgun. And when you put two of them, you expect them to become wither a dual shot, or Twin-linked RAILGUN... not combining two weapons which you are aware of into a different kind of weapon.

This is what it was supposed to be I assume:
http://www.forgeworld.co.uk/Warhammer-40000/Tau/TAU-VEHICLES/TAU-HAMMERHEAD-TWIN-LINKED-PLASMA-CANNON-TURRET.html
Sorry... Plasma cannons are weapons in the Tau armory... I do not think it is reasonable to use a railgun as a plasmacannon when you could just use a plasma cannon to represent a plasma cannon.

Some of the best armies I have ever seen fall under the category of abusive 'counts as' and become a nightmare to be paired against at a tourney. Worst game I have ever had at a GT was against a Squat Speed Freek army which was amazing to look at but didn't match the ork armageddon speedfreeks codex at all.

Especially when we have the internet and build threads... It is easy to get feedback on 'is this going to confuse people?' when building your models.

I would have never thought to ask if the railguns were a conversion. Having played against the actual model there is a huge difference. The player should have either made a much better conversion or have used the actual Forge World (IMO).

Its odd, I know the guy personally, He has quite a bit of forgeworld in his army, expensive ones too. I dont get why he doesnt have the actual turret.

Could be one of those situations where the local guys like him so much, and his army is so pretty, that no one wants to criticize.

http://www.frontlinegaming.org/2013/03/13/bay-area-open-2013-in-retrospect/

Metrics of the event and analysis, pictures and such.

Enjoy!

Wow, not a good pic of me, I should have kept the coat closed.

Nah, don't sweat it, dude! Your costume is way cool, I thought you guys had a great team!

Thanks, would you believe that that is the uncompleted version? it is still getting made. lol.

#1. I wonder what % of armies even brought forge world (I only played 1).

#2. It seemed like most of the forge world was concentrated on the top tables.

I want to break down the armies in the top 15 to the amount of armies represented in the field. This gives an interesting look as to what armies did well, and which ones struggled.

It is also interesting that 4 out of the top 6 armies had IG in them, and that Space Marines, Grey Knights and Necrons went 0-36 for the top 15.

Also, a big shout-out to the Crystal Brush winner, Caleb Wissenbeck! Enjoy that free plane ticket to Adepticon!

Reecius wrote:http://www.frontlinegaming.org/2013/03/13/bay-area-open-2013-in-retrospect/

Metrics of the event and analysis, pictures and such.

Enjoy!

Great Article!

Hey, who are those men in tuxedos? the one on the left is quite a piece of work.

Mannahnin wrote:Could be one of those situations where the local guys like him so much, and his army is so pretty, that no one wants to criticize.

^^^ yeaahhh that[s pretty much it. I play him regularly and am a pretty good friend of his. Yeah it was used mainly because of personal opinion of it looking cooler (though I suggested dual ion cannons). The local guys like the conversion and once we saw that he listed something other than a railgun, he explained what it was, and that was that.

 Blackmoor wrote:
#1. I wonder what % of armies even brought forge world (I only played 1).

#2. It seemed like most of the forge world was concentrated on the top tables.

I want to break down the armies in the top 15 to the amount of armies represented in the field. This gives an interesting look as to what armies did well, and which ones struggled.

It is also interesting that 4 out of the top 6 armies had IG in them, and that Space Marines, Grey Knights and Necrons went 0-36 for the top 15.

Lyzz was without forge world.

Not sure about Alan or Paul, my guess is yes for IG

Cody was without forge world

I brought 3 sabers and a unit of 3 HB tarantulas

Not sure about Jason, my guess is yes for IG

Not sure about Alan Matt Jim or Jay. My guess is no for the 2 csm and nid, maybe for the pure space wolf

With or without forge world expect a lot of IG in the top brackets of a GT. IG is the chicken of 40k, we go with everything. Battle brothers with every imperial but gk, and allies of convenience with gk, csm, chaos deamons, and all xenos except necrons, DE, and nids.

My guess is that very few armies took forge world. Unfortunately there is no way to know what % of armies took it., but look at the Bat Reps, JYS2 did not play anyone with it, and I only had 1 out of 7 use it.

Then when you look at the results, 2 out of the top 3 armies had forge world, and 4 out of the top 6. The BAO should have been won by an army with forge world if it were not for some hot dice rolls. It seems to me like they might have disproportionally placed at the top.