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So I was over on BellofLostSouls and I stumbled upon a curious article that was in the blogroll on the Blood of Kittens website. More often than not, I disregard the vitriol found there but this time it truly struck a nerve.

Apparently, Tasteytaste was intent on doing a review on the event and without missing a beat, painted the NOVA Open to look like nothing more than a group of downright liars and thieves. For those who want to read for themselves, the article is up here.

I feel it is necessary to bring out the truth and squelch this libel so that a fantastic event and group of people aren't tarnished by someone who is merely grasping for negativity. There are certain aspects that I do not have direct knowledge of but I will only speak from my own experience and hopefully those with more information can fill in the rest.

Then we have the magic disappearing players that seemed to grow with each day. Remember never seeing any pairings posted on the internet past the second round? Most of the emails I got about the NovaOpen was about the drops. With the single elimination really creating the excuse for many players to leave.
Don’t believe me… here is progression over a couple of days.

In this sentence, he blatantly makes it up as he goes a long as no one that I know of dropped on the first day, on Saturday, there were possibly a few drops around games 5 and 6 but nothing of note at that time. The single elimination of which he speaks doesn't come into play until the middle of day 2 but he makes it out to seem that the event as a whole was single elimination. Next, he posts what he describes as photographic evidence of the drops over time and anyone who was at the event or associated with it would be able to tell the progression of the images was in the order of the following: Images 1& 2 Friday Afternoon/Saturday, Images 3& 4 Sunday Late Morning/Afternoon. His mouseover for image 3 says "emptyday2" which is total bull because day 2 the area was flush with people up until the end as they moved players around due to AC issues. The final image is misleading as well as it was during the final rounds for the brackets. This was done intentionally so that people who weren't in the running didn't have to play more than they wanted and also so that those who wanted to "free game" or leave early for travel could do so.

Next, he goes on to say the following:

It got so miserable that by Sunday, all the large vendors were packed and ready to go by noon, with the Warstore rumored to be so upset, they vowed not to come back next year.

The major vendors started shutting down at noon on Sunday as they had been there since Thursday and wanted to pack up and hit the road before it got too late. Vendors being upset and underwhelmed was not an issue as far as I understand as the guys from the Warstore said they were closing up at noon to get a head start on tear down and travel.

And now for the one that made me just say "Really?"

So NovaOpen has this groovy old style raffle machine that the staff picks from for prizes. For the little prizes the machine was used, but then all of sudden (when large cash prizes were involved) they switched to the computer to “randomly” generate winners. Did I mention that only people present for the raffle could win? So with the same computer that had Dashofpepper win Best Sportsman the 2012 raffles winners ended up being either long distance travelers or staff buddies.

Whole bunch of garbage here as the "old style raffle machine" was used for the cash prizes and hotel stays as the names in the tumbler were those from the people who stayed in the hotel. Long distance travelers won some of the big awards but hell, most of the people were long distance travelers at the event. Buddies of the event was downright comical as no one that I know of who won the cash/hotel prizes was BFF's with the staff.

Now that would be it, but another jab comes in the form of this nugget:

Many of the winners also were not present to get their prizes (having left early like everyone else), but don’t worry Boss Tweed made sure they were going to get their prizes or at the very least it was put back in the into the kitty.

If you weren't present for the raffle, you didn't win anything and that was that...makes sense really when most of the prizes were fairly expensive and shipping would be out of the question. Adding more disillusionment to the mix by saying those people still got their prizes is a blatant lie and twisting of the truth at the least. The only raffle prizes that were suggested to be sent out were those from Stiff Neck Studios as they had done a cash raffle and their prizes were pretty big. Other prizes were held for individuals but that was for winners of GT/Invitational events in the sections of Best Overall for the GT and Invitational.

Overall, this article is founded on outright lies and fabrications and it leaves me wondering why anyone would write anything like this about an event. What's more, the individual took part in the event but not in the 40K aspect of which he is reporting but Infinity which had a small group. Add in the fact that he was working at a vendors booth for the rest of the time, it calls into question who he was talking to and when he had time to observe the travesty he described.

I hope I am not alone in my displeasure and that others will speak out, not only here, but in other mediums to keep such negativity from tarnishing such a great event.

i was at the nova until the very end. The accusations made over on BoK is horse gak.

After reading this cross site flame war, I'm starting to understand why GW doesn't do this anymore.

Honestly, I don't know who to believe and who not to, but the amount of vitriol represented here and after the link is enough to make me not want to attend the event at all. Being anywhere near D.C. doesn't help either.

The pictures are laughable. One is of the main hall, the next photo is of the back hall, The third was after the GT was over and all that was left was the narrative and invitational. And the 4th is a back corner during a break.

It by no means shows some mass exodus.

Players were not eliminated until Saturday night at 8pm. And most of us who were eliminated we're fine about it as we had other events Sunday like classes or the other gaming events. I was happy to sleep in and eat breakfast.

I don't know if the vendors were happy or not. I spent close to 200$ and half of that was at the warstore. Most of being at an event is getting your name out not raw sales. I got to speak to a bunch of new vendors who I will make purchases I the future. Not seen an issue.

Seems like a lot of these articles are flat out lies not confirmed by people who were there... But by calling anyone who was there a preemptive liar, they get away with it via plausible deniability.

I went to NOVA had a blast and stayed until the very end.

I won 3 raffles over the weekend and was very pleased with all the extras thrown in for attendees. Everyone I delt with staff wise was a pleasure including Mike who spends as much time as can talking to players and getting feedback and seeking for ways to improve his event.

The pictures tasty uses are VERY misleading. The Sunday games are optional for everyone other than invitational players and people contesting to win their bracket.

If tasty think he can do it better he should run a GT and see if he can pull off what NOVA does.

Allow me to predict the remainder of this thread before it gets locked:

"These are all lies"
"You're lying"
"You're just trying to get attention and clicks"
"You're part of the conspiracy"
(at least a dozen pics and memes relating to internet drama)
"lock"

We already had a BoK create lies and slander about DakkaDakka (DCMs in particular), and their grudge against Dash still holds true.

I have shown my distaste towards BoK (More specifically TastyTaste) previously, and will continue to show it in the future if their posts continue in this fashion.

BoK has some good stuff, but it's dragged down by things like this.

 Polonius wrote:
Allow me to predict the remainder of this thread before it gets locked:

"These are all lies"
"You're lying"
"You're just trying to get attention and clicks"
"You're part of the conspiracy"
(at least a dozen pics and memes relating to internet drama)
"lock"

That sounds EXACTLY like what someone in the conspiracy would say...

I saw it and was just going to leave it alone. I figured the less attention BoK got the better. But since it's up I'll leave it at this:

Tastey wasn't at the event and can't speak to the atmosphere or quality of the event. There are quite a few misleading and downright dishonest statements in the article.

That being said I had a great time even if Tony managed to duck me again (or as my buddies told me, I need to lose less ).

I'd highley recommend this event to anyone looking for an event to travel to. It's right up there with Adepticon for quality and in some ways better (the schedule made me far less a zombie by the end of the weekend even though I played 6 more games).

I'd hope something like this doesn't keep people from attending. It's a great event you'd be missing because you listen to someone who hasn't attended the event ever and seems to have a personal vendetta against the TO.

@ Hulksmash

Your feedback is the kind that I wanted from the start. This wasn't supposed to be about trash talking Blood of Kittens or anything of the sort, this was meant to be a thread where people could shed light on the truth and provide honest feedback.

Overall I have to say NOVA is probably the best run and most fun 40k event I have attended and has always put up an amazing display of talent, terrain, prizes and people. After all is said and done, I think it is safe to say I am not the only one who thinks this.

By starting a thread like this, linking to BoK and attempting to stir up a flame fest argument, you're validating BoK's existence. Just ignore it and let it go.

Like I said before...this isn't to start a flame fest, this is so people who really were there can let the truth out...the thing I am most concerned about is facts and honesty, not calling names or other petty behavior.

 Unholy_Martyr wrote:
Like I said before...this isn't to start a flame fest, this is so people who really were there can let the truth out...the thing I am most concerned about is facts and honesty, not calling names or other petty behavior.

Right, but it's not what you intend, but the outcome of the action that is the problem. Someone will catch wind of this, see that the above people are name-dropped, and then the internet drama machine starts up again.

Easier to just lump BoK in with Stelek as far as the unseemly parts of the community better left forgotten about.

Daedalus hit it on the head.

Thirded. Can we get a lock so as not to feed his clicks?

By popular demand !