E's GT Review

Right, well, I did make it... just.

Es' Review of the UK 2010 LotR GT 24th of Feb

My First Tournament

(Warning: It’s pretty long)

On the Friday afternoon when I left on the train, I
a) hadn't finished assembling Gulavhar -no wings, (that's what I get for trying to give him balrog wings),
b)hadn't painted the evil army,
c) hadn't got over my cold (which turned out to be surprisingly nasty),
d) hadn't played any practice games,
e)and, worst of all, I'd forgotten the train tickets.

As you can see, a good start.

Having sorted the ticket problem (and lightening my wallet by £70 in the process) I got to the hotel to be told that one of the Nottingham electric transformers had blown and that there was no hot water in the hotel. Declining the offer to change hotels, I was given a free upgrade from a single to a double room and, being completely knackered from a months worth of far, far too much painting, I slept (the evil army still being bare metal at this point).

Saturday morning: woke at half seven, skipped breakfast and painted the evil army, bar Gulavhar whom I still had not managed to get the wings to stay on. Got all the stuff together and got there at 11am, two hours late.

I was half expecting to be kicked out of the tournament, but the event staff being exceedingly helpful and friendly blokes allowed me to still enter the tournament; despite there not being an opponent for me to play. According to one of the refs they normally get quite a few drop outs from the tournaments but this year there were only two and then only one once I'd turned up.

So, my game 1 (3rd of the 8): against one of the event staff, a guy called Matt if I remember correctly, who had never played a game of LotR before; a good combination for my not having played in four years. He hastily assembled 700pts of Khand versus my 700pts of Dwarfs, it proved a good reintroduction to the rules for me and I managed a minor win.

Game 2 (4th of 8): Wood Elves against my 500pts of Monsters. You cant help but feel sorry for someone when they've only got defence 3 elves against a defence 9 dragon, they bounce. The game ended with him charging the Dragon with Galadriel (his last model), which promptly got squished, he did take it well though and I tried not to gloat. Major victory to me and the end of the first day.

Sunday morning: overslept and only had time to get the wings to stay on Gulavhar before leaving and got there only 5 minutes late. But wasn't allowed to use him by the ref due to no paint; he was surprisingly decent about it though and wrangled some black spray paint and even sprayed it for me.

Game 3 (5th of 8): Dwarfs and Elves against my 500 pts of Monsters (Kill the King), a guy called Jamie I'd been talking to in the bar the previous night. He broke my army but couldn't kill the dragon, a draw seemed a good result for me, having only killed a couple of his models.

Game 4 (6 of 8): Evil versus my dwarfs, cant remember the details I'm afraid (the problem with leaving stuff for this long) the result was a draw though.

Lunchtime: didn't get chance to eat anything due to painting Gulavhar and got talking to one of the best painted army nominees.

Game 5 (7 of 8): My Dwarfs versus Uruks and Wargs. Dwarfs won an archery contest! It happened to be my opponents first tournament as well and he was enjoying it as much as I was, both of us saying it wouldn't be our last. He happened to mention that he was glad he wasn't playing my monsters army; surprising really the psychological effect of a dragon. I had control of three of the four objectives when the game ended and got a minor win.

Game 6 (8 of 8): My finally complete monsters army versus the Wood Elves of the best painted army nominee that I’d been talking to at lunch, a very friendly guy called James Braum. Shiny model syndrome is alive and well, with Gulavhar promptly dying having killed nothing. I got a major loss and the opinion of a nominee that my dwarfs would have got me nominated if the evil army had been done to the same standard, a fair trade off imho.

So the tournament was over and this is how I’d done:
one major victory,
two minor victories,
two draws,
one major loss.

I finished 53rd out of 90 entrants, I think I acquitted myself pretty well (if I do say so myself); I don’t half feel sorry for the guy that came 92 though, behind the two refs that had to stand in, poor guy.


So my conclusions on my first tournament:Remember the train tickets, the refs were a lot friendlier than I’d expected, as were the competitors with much less rules-mongery than I’d expected. I enjoyed it more than I thought I would, it cost more than I thought it would, I found out that my self applied painting standards are way too high (for example: James Braums’ nominated armies were one layer of paint followed by a wash and a good base, apart from the heroes), what else, um... ah yes, must play more games before I go to another tourney. And finally, I will be going to another tourney when I can afford it.


Thanks for reading this, well done for getting to the end.

I will put some pics up of the armies I took, but right now I need to walk the dog.

Cheers
E