Lessons Learned at the LVO - A Call for Common Sense Within Our Community

[SnakeChisler]

We're not in Kansas anymore.

One year previous, there was very little consensus over the inclusion of forgeworld, stronghold, escalation, dataslates, formations, etc. Now, it's pretty much all kosher, though there are certainly exceptions.

That's just accepted by a certain faction in the Tournament scene

Most of us used to enter the local 40k event but the numbers dwindled that much due to the allies shenanigans and forge world escalation units being included to the point its been canned for this year which just leaves the national ones.

Social play is picking up though 7th if treated as a set of tools rather than everything in its an excellent edition to craft the game experience you want with your friends and most of us still treat Super Heavies & large fortifications as something more suited to Apoc or Mini-Apoc rather than smaller 1500/1750 games.

[lantzkev]

That's just accepted by a certain faction in the Tournament scene

Most of us used to enter the local 40k event but the numbers dwindled that much due to the allies shenanigans and forge world escalation units being included to the point its been canned for this year which just leaves the national ones.

Social play is picking up though 7th if treated as a set of tools rather than everything in its an excellent edition to craft the game experience you want with your friends and most of us still treat Super Heavies & large fortifications as something more suited to Apoc or Mini-Apoc rather than smaller 1500/1750 games.

Your experience may vary, our local hobby town has seen way more 40k players than I can recall playing in the past 8 years.... and some new faces and quite a few old faces.

[Erik Setzer]

I love how of the top armies you list, none of them won the LVO, and at least 2 didn't break the top 8, and Eldar only had one list in top 8. LVO, along with the other tournaments have proven that eldar and tau are not busted the way bad players keep saying they are. Good, yes, but not a level above everything else.

They are if you limit people to a CAD and maybe one Allied Detachment. Open things up with allies of any kind, formations, stuff like that, and it gets insane. Heard about someone playing a Tyranid army at Crucible with four Flying Hive Tyrants, four Hive Crones, a Malanthrope, and some Gaunts (though likely other stuff, but that's what he remembered most). In a group discussion on Facebook, people had to figure out how the heck you could even build such an army with detachments and formations, and it took a Tyranid player who works for GW to crack how it *might* have been done. That's how confusing the mess of stuff can get, and with all those digital dataslates and all, I can't imagine the expense of being a tournament organizer, because you need pretty much every book and dataslate to know all these possible permutations of armies and how they might be built, especially if you want to verify an army's legality on the spot.

And everyone agreed that would be a horrible army to use in a game that isn't some "beat your opponent in the face and who cares if they like it" kind of tournament setting.

[lantzkev]

That's how confusing the mess of stuff can get, and with all those digital dataslates and all, I can't imagine the expense of being a tournament organizer, because you need pretty much every book and dataslate to know all these possible permutations of armies and how they might be built, especially if you want to verify an army's legality on the spot.

If you want to restrict and insist that somethings GW has published is legal and something aren't. If you let it all go and play with the rules as they are.... you don't have to know anything but the rules.

[Houghten]

Read it again. What Erik's saying is there are so many rules you can either spend a bucketload on knowing them all, or restrict them.

[lantzkev]

Read it again. What Erik's saying is there are so many rules you can either spend a bucketload on knowing them all, or restrict them.

read what I said again... you as a TO don't have to own jack but a core rule book. You put the onus on the players to bring the source material for what they are bringing, and just state anything GW is good to go.

Every dataslate/supplement/etc is pretty easy to understand.

[Houghten]

What, and just trust the players to bring legal lists? Pfft.

[Popsical]

What, and just trust the players to bring legal lists? Pfft.

Lmfao! I just envisioned a few nerds putting their hands up and saying "sir, he's cheating", before later getting together and spitting internet venom with their keyboards.

[lantzkev]

What, and just trust the players to bring legal lists? Pfft.

it's amazing how just requiring them to submit their lists in advance and running it through army builder can do for you... in half an hour I could crunch about 15-20 lists.

Then there's the whole factor of their opponents looking at their lists etc... any cheating and you're DQ and your opponent gets full points... pretty straight forward and easy.

[Mr Mystery]

This is what puts me off tournament play entirely.

99.9% of attendees will likely be looking for the same as I - a weekend of gaming against new and interesting opponents, with a chance to secure extra bragging rights by placing highly when all is done and dusted.

But then.....then comes the 0/1%. Those who take it all far, far too seriously. Those who have set out to win, and don't really care about anything else.

Beardy armies are one thing - some folk just have a knack for not only writing really hard armies, but knowing how to use them (I am one of these). But when you face a Beardy army fielded by someone who tries to bend the rules and other wise goon their way to victory - what's the point? If your opponent cares not one iota about whether or not you enjoy the game as well, what is the point in playing against them? Why not save both sides the bother, award them a total victory, and nip off for a quiet pint or cup of tea.

I've only been to a few tournament type things, and in all instances the goon squad were there. First one I was actually working for GW, and was there in a professional capacity, taking in the scores. As that left me with a fair amount of time to wander the hall whilst the results were being determined by the clatter of those uncaring dice, I came across a god awful player. He was playing Nids, and had maxed out on his monstrous creatures, with compulsory troops as Ripper Swarms, minimum sized. Can't remember when this was precisely, but I can tell you the Mumak was just coming out for LotR, so probably...erm....2002, 2003? Worst part of that player was he gloated at his opponents, and would not leave me alone. I'd be there at my wee desk, collecting in the slips of around 400 eager players, checking to make sure each one tallied against it's counterpart, and that they had been filled out fully. And I all I got from that goon was 'where am I placed, am I winning, where am I placed, am I winning'. All. Day. If I had my way, he'd have been disqualified for bringing the hobby into disreputre, and for using horribly painted diecast Minis as Rippers 'because it's funny'.

Another one? Local stores headed up to Warhammer World for a Tournament between us. Must have been the tail end of 5th Ed, as I was fielding my spangly new Necrons. I won all my games by a comfortable margin, thanks to a certain amount of sheer luck (besting 5 Terminators with 10 Necron Warriors for no losses kind of luck!). But one of the gamers from my store was fielding his Sisters of Battle. He knew what he was doing, but still lost his last game. Not because he was out played, but because his opponent, who went first, spun out what would end up being his final game to the point where poor old Andy never got his half of the turn, preventing him from contesting the objectives his opponent has seized.

Had Goon not played like a Richard, Andy would have won the game - having secured his 'home' objective early on, and successfully cleansed his opponent's home objective (the one in your deployment zone) of all scoring units, and placing his units in such a way as he could contest all the others. But no. Mr Goon just had to cheat his way to victory by denying an entire turn of stuff to Andy.

Worst bit of that whole affair? Our store should have won the whole tournament. Top 10 players (out of about 50) were part of the Tunbridge Wells Massive. Except we were short on numbers, being the smallest town out of those competing. So what did Maidstone and Canterbury do? Sack off all their NooBs onto our side....because yeah, that's fair.

Then you read the horror stories on the internet. And it's not just the horror stories of people cheating and schemeing, but the endless whining of those who got beat, and claim it's all unfair, blaming everyone but themselves.

So overall, the behaviour of a minority of tournament gamers has left me seriously asking 'do I want to spend £XXX to get there, get a room and food and that, just to have my weekend's enjoyment ruined by someone who is a cheating, beardy idiot?' The answer, sadly, is usually 'good lord no. I'll just go down the shop then up the pub'