Are Tournaments Even Playing 40K Anymore?

I run two invitational Warhammer 40K tournaments a year for my local players. I'm always looking at ways to make the events better and more appealing. After all, at some point I want to open up the events to more players at some point and make these events something good for the local region.

I run the rules as written. If it is legal in a regular 40K game then it is legal for the tournament. Forge World units and rules equally suitable. But then these events are designed to be competitive. I want players to bring their best lists and their A game.

And that is where I find my current level of confusion and surprise. I keep looking online at other event's tournament rules and scenarios for inspiration. What I find surprises me. It looks like so many tweak the rules, changing rules, disallowing perfectly fine units and options, and using bland looking home-brew scenarios. It looks to me as though tournaments are not playing 40K but some strange hybrid of their own making.

A tournament should be fun but competitive. I don't think players should not be penalized in army selection and the rule book missions are perfectly suitable for tournament play. Now I do prefer those missions which use the tactical objective cards and I can understand the point of view which says they are too random for tournament use but in the couple of occasions that they have been used for our tournaments they worked fine.

It's hard to balance these things and I guess I'll just keep looking and pondering ways to make our invitational events fun.

Chaos is Coming part 2

This morning I ordered myself a copy of Traitor Legions, a plastic daemon prince and some havocs as my personal christmas present. From what I have seen I am looking forward to trying out the new Death Guard rules. They sound just what I need to secure an end to my current losing streak.

Anyone getting some nice 40K goodness for the holidays?

Chaos is coming

With all the new Tzeentch CSM stuff on the horizon I am really hoping that Nurgle will get some 40K love. A nice Mortarion daemon prince would be nice and some new Nurgle toys.

Narrative Play part 2

It isn't always possible to get a group of players together on a regular basis to play a narrative campaign. This means that sometimes you have to find a single opponent and challenge them to a narrative game. With a single regular opponent things become much more simpler if a less impressive. Such games can still be fun though and you don't have to worry about players not meeting up often enough. You and your opponent can take your time and enjoy the details.

The layout below (taken from a rather nice blog entitled Going On Campaign) is a great example of how to play a one on one narrative. The idea is that one player plays the attacking force and the other, obviously, the defender. You play a scout battle and the outcome determines which way the war goes. If the attacker wins then things become a sabotage attempt and so forth. You could just play a game for each one or you could come up with your own scenarios or special rules to match what is written below.

The only problem with this sort of set up is that once you have played the third round, it is obvious which player has won over all. You are simply playing to see whether it is a major or minor victory. This could lead to one player just dropping the whole thing because they can't win. The problem with narrative games in general. You need an opponent who is just as dedicated to the outcome, good or bad, as you are. It is still a good but basic start to narrative play.

For the Emperor!

I've recently purchased a friend's Grey Knights army. So much for my loyalty to Nurgle but now I can surprise my opponent's when I bring them out. Just wanting a new Sisters of Battle codex so I can have a combined force. I also want an Avenger Strike Fighter to give better aerial support.

Midas Crusade 2016

Over the weekend we held the third Midas Crusade tournament. The last one was end of April but due to real world issues I forgot to cover it. But the third one went rather well with little in the way of hiccups. Once again Jon offered the use of his sizeable garage and we spent a day playing some 40K.

As usual it was 2000 points, fixed list, with three rounds of three hours each and tactical objectives missions. The VP's scored totalled over the day to determine the winner. Anything 40K is legal but not HH stuff.

Unfortunately we had two players drop out at separate times in the weeks running up so i had to jump in and play, and the eighth player, Gary D,  could not make it until the second round started. I set it up so I effectively played Gary D and we drew. Neither of us were playing to win anyway so it wasn't a big issue.

Armies played were:

Colin - Chaos Marines (Death Guard) with Chaos Knight ally.
Chris - Craftworld Eldar.
Jon - Necrons.
Ash - Astra Militarum with Genestealer Cult allies.
Benjo - Dark Angels.
Mike - Craftworld Eldar.
Dan - Eldar Corsairs with Craftworld Eldar allies.
Gary - Space Marines (Imperial Fists).

It was a hard fought day for the top spot but Chris' Eldar successfully spent the day claiming objectives and stole first place.

Broodlord and genestealers outflank into the Dark Angels. 

Mike brought some interesting Eldar toys with him. 

Astra Militarum gun line. 

The Death Guard prepare to surge forward. The Knight did a great job of stomping genestealer hybrids! 

 Lots of conscripts being pushed forwards!

The Eldar battle lines.

 Necrons and Eldar face off across no man's land.

The unexpected genestealer cult allies shortly before being trodden on.

Narrative Play part 1

I cannot just sit down and play a board game or card game without immersing myself into the world of that game. It doesn't matter that the game is Magic the Gathering or something like the Serenity/Firefly board game. I have to immerse myself and know why I am doing what I am doing or what a given action would entail in the real world. With Warhammer 40,000 I take that even further. Unlike everyone else I know I cannot just turn up to a game and play. I have to know why I am fighting Dark Angels and what relevance the mission has. Without that I may as well be playing chess against a computer. Sure it is fun but ultimately it is missing something. I am a narrative gamer and I'm proud to admit it.

The problem is that being a narrative gamer when no one else is can be a real pain. I have tried with my local club to introduce a narrative element with the Midas Crusade. The MC was based upon the Crusade of Fire campaign book from Games Workshop. I did it as an open-ended campaign where players could challenge other players for control of planets. I envisioned players colluding together or seeking to build that perfect list to drive the Orks from Volistad. But it never happened. There were a few attempts but no one was interested enough. It ended up with me making posts and basically running the fluff for three years. I recently decided to drop it entirely.

So how do you run narrative games? Well, I have realised that you can't do with a games club. It needs a handful of dedicated players willing to immerse themselves. Willing to go beyond just turning up with some dice and an army. It needs someone, an organiser, to come up with the overall story line, the missions and be able to alter things as wins and losses mount up. It needs structure but not too much detail.

What I plan to do with this short series of posts is to put forward some ideas for narrative campaigns that hopefully might work for you. But first, do any of you have thoughts on this? Have you played a dedicated campaign and see it through as more than just another game of 40K or whatever your game of choice is? If you don't enjoy them, I'd be very interested to see why not.

The floor is all yours.