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Hello Dakkanaughts of the tournament experienced!

I'm playing my first proper tournament on the 7th of July, a small 1500pts 1 day event, but I have no experience whatsoever in a tournament. 3 games will be played, and you will have to bring your own food/drinks. I'm also planning to take lots of pictures to put on local Facebook groups and here, of armies and games so that's probably another point to look at too...

Now, I know how to play, and how my army works etc. But my main problem is that I don't know the etiquette of tournament play, such as what's acceptable levels of talk between players, raising rules queries, how to spot dodgy moves or cheating behaviour and so on and so forth. Heck, even advice on what to eat and drink would be helpful, I'm that worried!

So, any sage advice you guys can bring, it will be helpful.

Some stuff I take to all events:

bottle of water, 2 sets of dice, 2 tape measures, bottle of pain reviler (if you get a headache) and a tray to carry you army on. Displayboards are nice but when you try to move from table to table they can be a bit cumbersome.

Its your first event, try to have fun. Best of luck.

If you don't have a display board absolutely bring some kind of flat surface or platter to transport your models (the lid to a storage container works well in a pinch). You'll save a ton of time by not having to pack and unpack your models multiple times.

Outright cheating is really rare regardless of the stories you hear on the internet. Some people will fudge movements and, occasionally, rules interpretations though so you will need to be your own advocate.

Also, make sure to bring all of the rules for your army including the rulebook, the Big FAQ, rulebook FAQ, codex FAQs, and the Chapter Approved update. Double-check to make sure your points values are correct too (sometimes Battlescribe bugs out so don't rely 100% on that).

I use a cart I bought from Home Depot for $27 to shuttle my army around. Tray's and display boards are nice but where you gonna put your army while you're playing? Some tournaments I've been to, like NOVA, have a 12" x 48" area at one end of the table for you to put your stuff. So if you go with the tray thing I'd try to keep it to 12"x24'. But I find the cart indispensable - the only thing that would make it better would be built in cup holders. Not only do I have room for all of my models (18"x27" shelf on top) but I also have a bottom shelf for all of my codexes, rules, dice, munchies, etc. Transporting it is the only drawback although some of my peeps who have followed suit have found collapsible carts for easy storage in the car.

Take an army you know rather than a more hard core list you are less familiar with - if you've played your list a number of times in practice games you know how to deploy, how it moves etc so more time to concentrate on other stuff ...

As others have mention. Take a board of some kind for ease of movement, if you do the cooking sheet, consider magnets in the bases of your models so they dont fall over.

Take water/drinks/snacks/ medice of choice for headaches

Have your codex, rulebook and all that. You may want to consider making a cheatsheet with just the units from your actual list on it with their stat line, it helps for quick reference.

If possible, look at what other people are playing. Right now the most popular meta is Drukhari, Chaos (various), Tau, Tyranids, AM, necrons.

If possible, look and see what the strong list of these are and know how they work.

Drukhari - venom spam
Chaos-poxwalker, plaguebearer, beserker list
Tau Gunline blob with Overwatch on 5's
Tyranids-genestealers, hiveguard, neuros, carnifexes, flyrants; maybe GSC soup with Ambush of GS units
Necrons- destroyers, immortals, doomsday arks
AM- shadowsword, infantry spam for screens, mortarts, Leman Russ, Tank Commanders, Vulture
Custodes soup-With Celistine, Ultramarine/Bobby G, Assassins

Just got back from a tourney and these were all the dominant list. There was actually an ork list with 180 boyz that did really well.

Know these armies, how to beat them if you come up against them, what units to priortize, and at least read up on them to have an idea of what they can do.

As stated above outright cheating is pretty rare. Lots of great advice in the above posts. The main issues I encounter are:

(a) Lack of understanding of 8th edition core rules, particularly with some of the nuance in the charge and fight phases. People not knowing how the pile in/fight/consolidate sequence works continues to be a frequent issue (i.e. wanting to consolidate after other units have fought with the first unit they selected to fight, so long after their opportunity do so passed), what units can be selected to fight (depending on what army I am playing I frequently have to reference the rule that I can always select a unit to fight if it charged even if there is nothing within an 1") and how pile-in/consolidation works (sometimes people get confused or upset at how I charged one squad and then consolidated into a bunch of vehicles in their gun line and I need to explain these rules in detail).

So, basically, know the Battle Primer/8th core rules well with a special focus on charge/fight mechanics if they are relevant to your army.

(b) People who are not up to date on their own errata. Unfortunate as it is you really need to know the FAQs for the competitive codices even if you do not play them. As an example, pre-nerf Death Guard poxwalker factory was getting used by a lot of players who were unaware of the restrictions around placing new poxwalkers in the Death Guard FAQ. Obviously playing with or without those restrictions can significantly change things.

(c) Most players do not play fast enough to finish a tournament game. I have started recording start times for player turns in my ITC games and it is a minority who can continually advance the game state while making decisions and taking actions in a way that allows you to finish a full game.

If you have 2 hours after deployment, placing objectives, revealing secondaries, etc., each player needs to average 10 minute turns (120/12 player turns total). When one player takes 40-60 minutes for the top of turn 1 (over the weekend I played in a GT where this describes 3 of 5 games, in case you were wondering if that is an exaggeration) you have no hope of getting a fair game in. So do not be afraid to get the TO/judges if available involved.

As a suggestion if it takes you more than 20 minutes to finish your complete turn 1 (dropping in time each turn after that down to 5 minutes or so for the last few turns) you need to improve your gameplay and be part of the solution. If your opponent takes over 20 minutes be watching for slow play and be willing to get a judge/TO involved.

(d) Related to the above, if you are playing ITC and many other mission formats it is possible to write lists or play in such a way that your opponent can only win over a full game. As an example, if your opponent can write a list that denies most ITC secondaries you may end up having to take Recon/Behind Enemy Lines/Old School which are generally going to require a longer game to max out. Being unable or unwilling to play a full game increases such a player's chance of winning. I will remark only that some of the players I see who are most guilty of (c) also happen to often be playing denial lists that benefit significantly from shorter games.

(e) Players not knowing the nuances or details of their stratagems, especially if they reference before the game that they are new to the army or 8th. This is somewhat related to (b) but it is not that unusual to still see things like players not knowing what stratagems do or do not work on vehicles/infantry in the IG codex which is pretty important. So in one game you might see someone try and Take Cover on a vehicle (infantry only) while attempting to Defensive Gunners an infantry squad (vehicles only).

(f) Further support for bring your own water/other desired hydration/snacks to get through the day. I generally do not count on having time to go for food especially if I do not know the venue/area.