I am back home safe, after a long exhausting weekend at the UK Nationals. First of all, congratulations to all the organisers and officials for a great weekend. Other than some technical issues, the whole event ran smoothly and with very few problems. I can’t say that it was all fun, there are parts of the event that were a disappointment for me personally; however the overall impression is that it is a great beginning.
I had written all my notes on the spare army list sheet; which I was using as my copy. After game 3, the ‘official’ sheet went missing and I was forced to hand in my copy (with notes); after each round. As it turned out, I forgot to ask for it back at the end; most likely due to tiredness. So please forgive me, if I don’t remember the full details of each game.
Round 1 – This was not the match up I had wanted at all. I travelled all the way from Scotland, only to face one of our local players in the first round. Credit to Steve McConnachie, his Rask list murdered my Coven list; bringing the game to a final brutal end. Loss via Assassination, with no CP claimed; ???? Scenario
Round 2 – On reading my lists, my opponent thought I would take pDenny; given that facing Retribution would be a default to Stealth. Thing about that, is that I don’t play like others; I play what I like not what others think is best. So Ravyn v Morty was the match up, which was a seesaw affair with the heavy jacks causing my opponent a few problems. Eiryss got held up by a Stalker, but it was the Mage Hunter Strike Force with Shadow Hunter that came closest to killing Morty in turn 2. It took Hyperion to eventually take that last point off Morty, who had held on long enough for DJ to be within range of an assassination on Ravyn. Loss via Assassination, with 2 CP claimed; ????? scenario
Round 3 – With 25 Cryx players there, it was a tale of woe for many; that they faced the faction multiple times. Portal from France was my first Cryxian opponent, but also a really nice guy as well. It was also a Kraken face off, with Portal running pGaspy with his Kraken; against my pDenny list. One thing I will say, is that I appreciated the fact that Portal played the same way as I believe “You declare it, you did it”. None of this “Oh it’s not going to work that way, so I’ll try something slightly different”. Even though it cost me the game in the end, I admire that about him to stick to that view. Loss via Assassination, with no CP claimed; ???? scenario
Round 4 – This is perhaps the most close game I have ever played in 3 years of WM/H. Scenario was Incursion (at least I remember that), with pDenny and the Kraken taking on pKruger with Pureblood and 2 Stalkers. With the right hand flag disappearing, this left the board open on the left. I struggled to clear out the Druids, with the Kraken’s unicorn gun; so decided to change tact; to one of salvaging as many CP’s as possible. Shielding Denny with the Kraken, as much as possible; took out the Stalker contesting the flag on the left. Claiming 3 CP, with my opponent needing to assassinate Denny to stop me winning. In hindsight, I was silly for not asking for a judge to check the LOS to Denny, after Kruger had Telekenisis himself to what he thought was viable LoS. It was a 50/50 call as to whether he had LoS, at a crucial point in the game; so lesson learned is to not be so easy going. Loss via Assassination, with 3 CP claimed; Incursion scenario
By my reckoning, it was nearly 12 hours straight of gaming on the Saturday; with little break between rounds to recover. I didn’t get back into my hotel room till about 10:30pm, which had made this one hell of a long day with little food or rest. Not sure about UK Masters, but by Sunday morning I felt like I’d run the Iron Gauntlet.
Part 2 – 2nd day with some pics from the event.
The Hairy Caber 