Ah Gencon.  The spectacle.  The events (over 19,000 of them!). The games.  The people (over 60,000 per day).  So many people.  The walking (so much walking).  The sore feet and exhaustion.  Seeing friends you only see there.  And playing Kings of War!

This year we had two tournaments at Gencon.  The first was a How You Use It! event, where the armies were preset on the tables, but the players changed each round (I ran the same one at Origins a couple of months ago).

Everybody had a lot of fun.  We got a kick out of four Carter's being involved (me for running it, two of my sons, and Tyson who randomly shared our last name!)

The participants, Bottom Row - Andy Meechan, Derrick Byrd, Andrew Summers, Doug Brown.  Back row Paul Lang (our ringer), Tyson Carter (no relation), Jon Carter, Matt Carter

I thought it would be fun to use the matchups in the "Edge of the Abyss" worldwide campaign.  We didn't use the scenarios or special rules (as this was a tournament), but we had the following matchups (good on the left v evil on the right).  (Romans were good because they represented the empire that when it fell, resulted in 800 years of dark ages).

• Romans v Barbarians (Celts) - this used the historical rules
• Dwarfs v Abyssal Dwarfs
• Trident Realms v Empire of Dust
• Elves v Night Stalkers
• Ogres v Orcs
• Force of Nature v Goblins
• Basileans v Abyssals  (I don't have a Salamanders army yet)

Making sure that no one played on the same table twice took a bit, but even more so was this is the first tournament I have ever scored by hand.  For some reason, my laptop refused to turn on.  Having worked for a few years in customer support, I figured it was either a PEBCAK or ID-10-T error.  Of course it worked fine back at the hotel and the next day for the Kings of Gencon tournam

It boosted my confidence when later, after entering the first round data, the software made the same matchups as I did manually.

Round 1 underway

Jon (Basileans) v Paul (Forces of the Abyss)

Tyson (Ogres) v Doug (Orcs)

Matt (Trident Realms) v Andrew (Empire of Dust)

Andy (Romans) v Derrick (Barbarians/Celts)

Round two quickly followed

Doug (Abyssal Dwarfs) v Paul (Dwarfs)

Tyson (Night Stalkers) v Jon (Elves)

Andy (Ogres) v Matt (Orcs)

Derrick (Goblins) v Andrew (Nature)

We took a dinner break, then continued

Round three

and I after a long day, I forgot to get pictures of the last two rounds.

And the winners were:

Andrew Summers, Champion

Derrick Byrd, 2nd Place

Andy Meechan, 3rd Place

Matt Carter, Best Sportsman

Jon Carter, new dice (yes, we told him to make that face!

And the dice - why they are the new, exclusive, Ohio War Kings dice!

Of course you can check it out at warscore.net.

How You Use It at Gencon 2017

How You Use it Final

Place	Name	Opponents	Battle	Best Sportsman	Total	Awards
1	Andrew Summers	Matt Carter, Derrick Byrd, Tyson Carter, Jon Carter	83	5	88	Champion
2	Paul Lang (Rigner)	Jon Carter, Doug Brown, Derrick Byrd, Andy Meechan	85		85
2	Derrick Byrd	Andy Meechan, Andrew Summers, Paul Lang (Rigner), Doug Brown	81	4	85	2nd Place
4	Andy Meechan	Derrick Byrd, Matt Carter, Doug Brown, Paul Lang (Rigner)	76	8	84	3rd Place
5	Doug Brown	Tyson Carter, Paul Lang (Rigner), Andy Meechan, Derrick Byrd	66		66
6	Matt Carter	Andrew Summers, Andy Meechan, Jon Carter, Tyson Carter	56	4	60	Best Sportsman
7	Tyson Carter	Doug Brown, Jon Carter, Andrew Summers, Matt Carter	56	1	57
8	Jon Carter	Paul Lang (Rigner), Tyson Carter, Matt Carter, Andrew Summers	39	2	41	New Dice

Because it is all fun and games . . .