Going to first Tourney

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innerdemon
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Re: Going to first Tourney

Post by innerdemon »

James and I are attending Spike! 2012 and am so looking forward to the sheer awesomeness of being in this enviorment. Just being able to see other coaches who are far better than me play will be a totally great learning experience.

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Re: Going to first Tourney

Post by nonumber »

For the first couple of years I played Blood Bowl I only attended the GT in Nottingham, eventually I branched out and now I try and get to 4 or 5 tourneys a year. They're typically a really great laid back atmosphere where everyone gets on.

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Re: Going to first Tourney

Post by shaniepoo »

nonumber wrote:For the first couple of years I played Blood Bowl I only attended the GT in Nottingham, eventually I branched out and now I try and get to 4 or 5 tourneys a year. They're typically a really great laid back atmosphere where everyone gets on.
And he is still a moaning little girl :lol:

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Re: Going to first Tourney

Post by DixonCider »

2012 Spike Trip from Calgary:

We all met at my house, had supper and hit the road at about 7pm. We listened to Three Die Block podcasts, chatted about people builds people in our league thought we should bring and our salary cap rules. Arrived in Salmon arm about 1am, crashed out for the night. I woke up about 5:30am, ate breakfast(mmmm froot loops with no milk is so YUM!!!), and played a half of Skaven VS Skaven. Chris said "watch this, I am going into your three tackle zones and taking the ball for a TD" then proceeded to roll 6-6-5-2 and score. I was a little worried at this point that taking a team I wasn't used to and playing a style I wasn't used to may have been a bad idea. The rest of the trip to Surrey was fairly uneventful, more podcasts and talking strategy.

Arrival at the Compass Point Inn:

We pulled up, checked in, dropped our stuff in the room, went to the bottle shop for a case of beer, found one of the other Calgary guys who flew out to BC and went to the pub. We found Kaare Foged (Kfoged) and a bunch of the Seattle guys and proceeded to maybe have a little too much fun, there was a lot of joking that Kaare was just a guy living in Surrey that was getting free drinks and wasn't even playing in the tournament. Midnight(ish) we had some last minute things to take care of and went to our rooms. A practice game between Chaos Dwarfs by Mike G and Lair (innerdemon), but with the heat of the room I fell asleep and did not see the outcome.

Spike Tournament Day One:

I had told myself I was taking Skaven to learn them and focus on having fun and meeting people. I am Typically a bash chaos coach, but after a full season and half of this current season I wanted to try something else.

First game, played against Mike L from Surry at table 19. Mike was playing humans and said he had been playing about 20 years, fear set in. I have only played table top for about a year, nervously laughed it off and set up. It was a fun game, he definitely knew his stuff and beat me. I learned a lot that game, and if you are reading this thank you again Mike.

Second game, played against Damion Gilzean (Tremere) from Edmonton at table 26. Damion was playing dwarfs, this was one of the two match ups I was most worried about. Damion is a friendly coach, and we talked after every round from then on, I just took it as another chance to learn. We set up our figs, Damion kicked to me, Blitz... I have notes on what was said here, but I am guessing there is a filter to block that level of profanity. The dwarfs hammered into my figs, but I managed to get two gutter runners into scoring position and still score. This was how the entire game went, he would bash, I would get the ball and score. We ended 3-0 with the Skaven getting the victory although I felt I shouldn't have won.

Third game, played against Mike G from the BC area, table 17(I think). Mike had chaos dwarfs, wow.. ugh. Into the blender I sent my skaven, while Mike was breaking armor a lot it was mostly stuns and KO's. I used a lot of the run and only let my opponent hit me in one spot that Mike L had taught me in the first game in this game to great success. Final score 3-1

Two and one? I looked back on the day and thought that can't be right. I am just a coach on his first tournament. Ah well, there are some amazing coaches here, balance will return to the world shortly. That night a few of us decided on having a quiet night, pizza and Lord of the Rings, then beer started flowing. Went back down to the games room for boardgames night, more beer, things get a little fuzzy, but I made it up to the room without anymore excitement.

Day Two Hangover day :-?

Walked to get breakfast in the restaurant, had a coffee and hash browns, chewing was way too loud, but I managed to get them all down and keep everything where it should be. Talked with the two Rat City guys, sorry I have forgotten your names, and went down thinking today was the day I would be put back into the high numbered tables.

Fourth game against Ryan S. from BC at table 9(I think). Ryan had Humans, oh no not this again, and had been playing 5+ years. Ryan is quite a cautious coach, we had extra time so we didn't use the turn timers. I don't recall how I scored, but I went ahead by 1-0 and was able to KO a few of Ryan's catchers. He was unable to recover and this was the most fun 3 hour game I have played.

Went for lunch at the mall. We were walking from the car to BP's to get some lunch and I was talking about my screen in the last game and how amazed I was to be going to the single digit tables when a car nearly hit me. It didn't phase me at all, and I kept talking about the games so far. After the last game I think it hit me and mentioned to Chris that "OMG I nearly died!!"

Fifth game against Daniel at table 6(WHA?!?!). Daniel was playing khemri and was just as bewildered as I was to be at table 6. We talked briefly about our leagues and started the game. We rolled Rain. Ag 2 khemri do not enjoy the rain. At all. Won 3-1. After winning this I was green. Lair (innerdemon) took me away from the results and match up screen because I looked like I was going to pass out/be sick. Went up to the room sat down, had a beer. Talked about our league and the trip so far, not about games or results, and I felt much better.

Sixth game against Travis C from Seattle at table 3(nearly passed out when I saw this, Chris had a close eye on me when he was where I was playing). Travis had an amazingly painted custom Underworld team, he was my vote for best painted. We started off, I think he got that I was a newer coach, and I am thinking he took it easy on me. I nearly made an error on a go for it handoff played and he pointed it out so I was able to score. He came back and scored on turn 8. I kicked to him, we scrummed for 4 or 5 turns and he scored on turn 8.

I finished 12th overall, did MUCH better than I thought I would, met a lot of great people, and was able to play Blood Bowl all weekend. I think I may be hooked on tournaments :D

Thank you again to the organizers and other coaches, we all felt welcome all weekend. I think it would be tough to keep me away from future Spike events.

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Blammaham
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Re: Going to first Tourney

Post by Blammaham »

Glad that you guys who made the trip had a good time! S.

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Outstanding painting. Spike 2009!
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Re: Going to first Tourney

Post by besters »

only just got around to reading this again, great write up of a tournament that sounded like a lot of fun.

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