Challenging.
Ok, so some more detail. A big reason for this blog was to try new game systems, expand my tournament attendance and paint more stuff. So far I’ve finished my 30K army (you can find that here) and finished my Necromunda gang (here). But I haven’t played any games with them. I’ve also finished my 40K army (you can find that here) and, despite not having played any games of 8th, I decided to rock them out at the 4th GT heat at WHW.
Some context…WHW runs lots of events to engage the community, to forge narrative, to get people playing the game and to generally build and foster goodwill among their customers. The GT isn’t one of those events. The GT is about players kicking each other in the dick over a series of qualifiers to play in a final. Top 30 (or 40, it doesn’t matter, I finished 112th) in each heat make the final. There’s no expectation of narrative or, to be honest, humanity. This is balls out 40K on hard mode. And it was my first series of games (five games over two days).
So why start my 40K journey at a GT? Hmm, good question but basically as a result of a big lesson I learned from WHFB 8th:
You get better by losing (and understanding why you lost). Tournaments (and losing in them) made me a better WHFB 100%. I definitely lost a lot at the GT but, to be honest, I’m not sure I understand the game well enough to understand fully why that’s the case.
So what happened? I’m not going to go hour by hour through the weekend (or even game by game) as I’m still coming to terms with the game so my insight won’t be very useful but here are my learnings for anyone thinking of getting into competitive 40K:
Ok, so having lost four out of my five games, what have I learned?
The Game itself:
- I came to the game with a fairly solid understanding of the core mechanics (as in moving, psychic, shooting, charging and fighting). I consciously ignored Strategems so I could retain the core knowledge. That made everybody laugh at me. Now that I have this experience I will go back and ensure I have a strategem game because they’re MASSIVE
- It’s not enough to understand your own army – you really need a superficial (at least) understanding of everyone else’s. That could be tough for me as I have a life and a job but if I didn’t then owning every codex and writing lists from them to mine the gold and know what you might face would 100% improve your game.
Five Game Grand Tournaments
- My favourite games were the early ones. Weird one this. The tournament was swiss and it really wasn’t until the 4th game that I found my level. However, the early games where I’d been getting smashed up were my favourites. Why? Because good players could see a max win from me early, got it done and then were generous with their time and their opinions (safe in the knowledge that by the time I improve to their level they will be even better still I guess). Actually when I was bottom feeding I found a group of, frankly, stressed out, frustrated gamers all desperate not to go home on six losses. The games were slower, more rules ‘arguments,’ and just more bad tempered (I don’t think that was me, because I don’t actually care enough but it takes two to tango, right?)
- Absolutely no disrespect to the excellent armies that made it into the cabinet (mine didn’t, I didn’t expect it to but I did get two fave army votes so I’m not coming entirely from a position of weakness with this bit…) but the general standard of hobby was much lower than I expected. This is probably a result of a fast changing meta but I feel like with some more love, the Craftworld I took could make it into the cabinet. These could be a way to ‘hack,’ a best army certificate
My 40K game
- No. I need more game time, I need strategems and I need to review the list asap. At the absolute minimum, I’ll be changing to an Alaitoc craftworld (no body identified mine as Iyanden as they look very gold rather than yellow). New list incoming. However, even with the list I have, a good player would do better. I’m not going to change too radically in the first instance
- I’m up for another event (prolly not a GT right now!)
So, sorry that’s not a detailed event report but I’m sure no one cares for a roll by roll review. Thanks to my opponents and onwards and upwards!
Comments more than welcome.
That’s interesting to hear. I’m not a tournament player because I enjoy the game, recognise it’s only a game and I want to continue to enjoy it.i only play casually with my close group of friends and even THEN there would occasionally be disagreements about the rules.
I have been listening to the Sprues and Brews podcast though and hearing them talk about their experience in an Age of Sigmar Tournament made me a little jealous. That wasn’t a GT though and from your description that is the exact opposite of what I would like to do. All crunch, super meta, no fun.
I was thinking of starting an AoS army and playing at a Tournament, but taking a really fun looking, terribly designed army. No hope to win, just to play.
What’s your end goal? You sound like you would like to do a GT again at some point… But you don’t sound like the kinds of players who thrive on that environment. 😄
Hey thanks for commenting! So I live somewhere weird (Tbilisi) so I don’t get back to the UK very often and use tournaments as a way to meet up with my friends. My end goal is a best army nomination / certificate. I think the softer events will be harder to achieve that in so the GT’s may be an ‘easier,’ hack. Also, even when I don’t really love something, I want to get better at it if I know I’ll be doing it. I’ve played golf since I was 17 (I’m 41 now) and hated every round but keep trying at it for some reason!
My understanding of the UK AoS meta right now is that turns take a long time to play but that games don’t last many turns. Also, anecdotally, the hobby standard in AoS is the highest of all the systems. What army are you thinking of?