Spocon 2010

SpoCon

So I'm headed over to Spokane Washington this weekend, I'll be helping judge the Neophyte Tournament, and Participating in the Warhammer 40k GT Event. I'll also be looking for some gaming for my new excursion, Hordes (and for some of my opponent's War Machine).

It starts on Friday, so I'll be headed out on Friday morning and arriving at roughly 1pm. Which means I'll have roughly an hour and a half to get my affairs in order to start judging the Neophyte 40k tournament.

First off I'll offer my expectations:
The Neophyte:
This event is meant to be a "Teaching Tournament" an event to bring new people into the Hobby and expose them to the Competitive side of the game. I love the idea of this. Being a firm believer in the greatness of a competitive environment, I think that this could be the perfect way to draw people in.
it has:
-1,000 point limit
-No Painting Requirement
-Each Table (or group of tables, depending on the number of Judges that help out) has a judge. I'm thinking that it will likely be 1 judge per 4 tables as this seems like the correct ratio to me.
-3 Rounds
-1.5 hour rounds. While a normal 40k tournament I would recommend 45minutes for a round in a 1k tournament, The fact that this is aimed at a "Newer" audience, I believe that this is the correct time frame to be playing at. A lot of the games will finish beforehand, but the newest of the new may need the whole time to complete thier games, which is good.

I think this will do 2 things (for me at least)
-First off, I need the practice Judging. It's been a while since I've judged a tourney and doing this will get me back into the habit of answering questions for people during their games. I need the practice for My tournament in September.
-Secondly, I believe that it will bring more people into the hobby. which is IMO always a good thing. Support your local community!


The GT:
-This is a Primere event. 2,000 points, 2.5 hour rounds, 4 games over 2 days, With a lot of stipulations on how your army must Look to win.
-Minimum painting/basing required. I love this. While I had to bust my ass to get my army in playing condition, I am a firm believer that an army MUST be painted to a 3 color minimum to WIN an event.
   - While I am apparently in my own field as far as how this rule is implemented, as you are Allowed to play an unpainted army but not win, the Organizer knows me and told me that I am not under the "not painted may play" theory as he says he knows I will be on the top tables and he can't have me knocking the top players with painted armies out of the running so I have to bring a painted army. Dead Stop. I Have to have a painted army to participate. Thanks Chris. :D no animosity though, where I was thinking I'd relax a bit and bring an un-finished army and just play, I think his requirement on me is a good thing. As a result, I've finished off painting of 3 Drop Pods, 2 Land Speeders and a Dreadnought for it. Which is always a bonus. The models needed painting anyhow. And while I wont be winning any painting awards, I believe that I'll be running a fairly hard list which is 7 Drop Pods (5 of which have dreadnoughts) Vulkan, MoF, 3 Tac Squads and 3 Land Speeders. for a grand total of 8 Multi-Meltas, 10 Heavy Flamers, 3 Flamers, and some support. My only real bad match-up would be against an Avatar Eldar list, but well, you can't win em all, and I have 2 ML to knock that guy down. as well as a whole lot of Power Weapon/Power Fist attacks to help me out.
-Also included in this tournament are 2 Tickets to the Vegas Finals. While I don't expect that I'll be taking either of them, I do get the feeling that I will have the opportunity to at least take A prize.

These events are an amazing addition to the hobby. Competition is what makes us better players. While Sportsmanship is a scored section of the tourney, which I disagree whith, Since I believe that Sportsmanship should be required not scored. If you can't be civil to the other players and think you can browbeat your opponent into giving you the win, you should just be thrown out of the tournament completely.

I also plan on trying to find a game or two of Hordes, I need the experience in that game.

Other than that I am planning on 3 days of little sleep, lots of gaming, and lots of fun.

Guess it's a good thing that I'm staying on location to get more gaming in then eh?


Anyhow, if you have the opportunity, I hope you stop by and see both me and the event.
It should be a blast.

-Stephen