War Kings GT

Well it is finally here - the first War Kings GT! With 26 players, it is the largest Kings of War tournament in Ohio. In fact, we had more people than at the tournament at Adepticon this year. There were a few cancellations, and some unfortunate drops during the tournament, but otherwise it was a great time.

Quite a motely crew

Back Row (l-r): Kara Brown, Amy Stamper, Aaron Raleigh, Frank Bradford, Andrew Summers, Bob Boggs, Chris Clark, Mathew Veirmeiren, Tom Ziegler, Jesse (Kind of a Big Deal) Cornwell, Cyle Pool, AJ Fullerton, David baker, Jon Carter, Austin Carrigan, Joey (the) Greek, Bill Robertson.
Front Row (l-r) : Erich Trowbridge, Roger Connor, Matthew Temple, Grant Fetter, Shannon Shoemaker, Derrik Byrd, Felix Castro, Steve Malone.
Not Pictured : Kyle Przelenski
On the floor - some idiot who didn't even play in the event. Who lets this guy in here anyway? Somebody call security!

The venue (The Wingate by Wyndham Dayton - Fairborn) was great, and I got in right after work to set up. The space was huge - so that means plenty of room to grow.

Tables set up, ready for battle!

The swag bags were all ready, including the exclusive event dice (and a dice bag made by my wife!), paint brushed from RGD Gaming, Terrain from THMiniatures and Hidden Forest Gaming and other great stuff (including the bags themselves from gamemats.com).

We had six tables with game mats donated from our sponsors - Mats By Mars, Gamemat.eu, Gamemat.com and Frontline Gaming.

Bright and early the next morning the games began!

Round 1

Frank Bradford v David Baker

Felix Castro v Tom Ziegler

Shannon Shoemaker in a challenge w/ Erich Trowbridge

AJ Fullerton v Kyle Przelenski

Matthew Temple v Steve Malone

Andrew Summers v Aaron Raleigh

Amy Stamper v Joey Greek

Roger Connor v Austin Carrigan

Derrick Byrd v Kara Brown

Bob Boggs v Jesse Cornwell

Jon Carter v Grant Fetter

Mathew Veirmeiren v Chris Clark

We took a brief lunch break after the first round. Unfortunately Kara developed a sever allergic reaction to something in the room and had to drop out of the tournament. She tried to return for round 4 but started feeling the effects after about half an hour again.

Frank Bradford v Derrick Byrd

Jon Carter v Steve Malone

David Baker v AJ Fullerton

Matthew Temple v Chris Clark

Joey Greek v Mathew Vermeiren

Shannon Shoemaker v Felix Castro

Erich Trowbridge v Jesse Cornwell

Andrew Summers v Kyle Przelenski

Austin Carrigan v Grant Fetter

David Baker v Tom Ziegler

Bob Boggs v Aaron Raleigh

Just a quick bio break and we went right into round 3!

David Baker v Tom Ziegler

Bob Boggs v Frank Bradford

Derrick Byrd v Jesse Cornwell

Erich Trowbridge v Mathew Vermeiren

Jon Carter v AJ Fullerton

Andrew Summers v Roger Connor

Chris Clark v Aaron Raleigh

Matthew Temple v Shannon Shoemaker

Felix Castro v Grant Fetter (I loved his Tri-Lam sweater (from "Revenge of the Nerds")

Austin Carrigan v Joey Greek

Kyle Przelenski v Steve Malone

So after round three we had an extended dinner break. Kara her wife Amy made it back just in time to serve the delicious Sloppy Joes they prepared, but Kara wasn't able to stay, though Amy continued with the tournament (even after missing two rounds).

During the dinner break, everyone set up their armies for paint judging and player voting. Each player got to vote for their two favorite armies.

To make things go a little faster, players self scored their base painting (verified by the judges), and then had the option to opt out of scoring for Best Appearance or Best War King.

Felix Castro's Forces of the Abyss

Felix Castro's War King

Bob Boggs' Elves

Bob Bogg's War King

Mathew Veirmeiren's Orcs

Matthew Veirmeiren's War King

Austin Carrigan's Night Stalkers

Austin Carrigan's War King

Grant Fetter's Abyssal Dwarfs

Grant Fetter's War King

Joey Greek's Night Stalkers

Joey Greek's War King

Steve Malone's Twilight Kin

Chris Clark's Forces of the Abyss

Jon Carter's Undead

Jon Carter's War King

AJ Fullerton's Brotherhood

Roger Connor's Orcs

Andrew Summer's Brotherhood

Andrew Summer's War King

Aaron Raleigh's Undead

Matthew Temple's League of Rhordia

Matthew Temple's War King

Jesse Cornwell's Ogres

Jesse Cornwell's War King

Kyle Przelenski's Undead

Kyle Przelenski's War King

I liked the hand painted runes on the wings

Erich Trowbridge's Ratkin

Erich Trowbridge's War King

Derrick Byrd's Dwarves

Derrick Byrd's War King

Jesse Cornwell's Abyssal Dwarfs

Jesse Cornwell's War King

Amy Stamper's Night Stalkers

Amy Stamper's War King

Frank Bradford's Goblins

Frank Bradford's War King

Kara Brown's Trident Realms of Neritica

Kara Brown's War King

Tom Ziegler's Night Stalkers

Tom Ziegler's War King

David Baker's Forces of the Abyss

David Baker's War Queen

After we were all happily filled up with Sloppy Joe's and Potato Salad, we started the fourth round. Since Amy had returned, our Ringer Bill Robertson got to step in and play a game! He made our player count 25. They played a special scenario where the table was flooding, making it a bit more of a challenge.

Matthew Temple v Kyle Przelenski

Amy Stamper v Bill Robertson

Chris Clark v AJ Fullerton

Erich Trowbridge v Roger Connor

Austin Carrigan v Frank Bradford

Grant Fetter v Derrick Byrd

Shannon Shoemaker v Steve Malone

Jesse Cornwell v Joey Greek

Mat Vermeiren v Andrew Summers

Bob Boggs v Tom Ziegler

Felix Castro v Aaron Raleigh

Jon Carter v David Baker

And with that we all headed out for a good night's sleep, and came back bright and early Sunday morning. Unfortunately, Kyle Przelenski had a family emergency, and had to head home after the last game on Saturday.

Then by surprise, Cyle Pool, (who had originally registered several months ago but had to drop due to conflicts with his work) messaged me that he would be there Sunday. So I told him to bring his army and be ready to play by 9, and he ended up taking the place of Kyle (so Cyle P took over for Kyle P (funnier when you say it :-)). Knowing that Cyle was a decent player, I gave him Kyle's score temporarily to allow him to have better match ups. Not only that, but he now made player 26!

Round 5

Andrew Summers v Shannon Shoemaker

Austin Carrigan v Erich Trowbridge

Felix Castro v Matthew Temple

Derrick Byrd v David Baker

Jesse Cornwell v Mathew Veirmeiren

Joey Greek v Jon Carter

Amy Stamper v AJ Fullerton

Aaron Raleigh v Bill Robertson

Grant Fetter v Bob Boggs

Tom Ziegler v Chris Clark

Cyle Pool v Frank Bradford

Steve Malone v Roger Connor

The top positions were still very close, so round six was going to determine it all.

Round 6

Shannon Shoemaker v Roger Connor

Jesse Cornwell v Tom Ziegler

Bill Robertson v AJ Fullerton

Frank Bradford v Matthew Temple

Felix Castro v Chris Clark

Amy Stamper v Aaron Raleigh

Austin Carrigan v David baker

Joey Greek v Bob Boggs

Andrew Summers v Jon Carter

Mathew Veirmeiren v Steve Malone

Derrik Byrd v Erich Trowbridge

Cyle Pool v Grant Fetter

And we were done. Unfortunately blogger doesn't seem to like tables anymore, so for the full results go to warscore. My lovely and talented wife Diane (who graciously helped with the concession table) took pictures of all the award winners:

Dice hate Me - Aaron Raleigh

Best Undead Player - Jon Carter

Best Orc Player - Roger Connor

Best Night Stalker Player - Tom Ziegler

Best Brotherhood Player - Andrew Summers

Best Forces of the Abyss Player - David Baker

Best Abyssal Dwarf Player - Grant Fetter

Best Neutral Player - Shannon Shoemaker

Best Good Player - Derrick Byrd

Best Evil Player - Erich Trowbridge

Best War King - Grant Fetter

Best Appearance - Austin Carrigan

Best Sportsman - Andrew Summers

Best General - Shannon Shoemaker

Overall Champion - Erich Trowbridge

It was a great time, and I am already planning for next year!

I did want to spotlight Austin's army a bit - I just can't adequately describe how good it looked. And he said he only spent 80-100 hours on the big centerpiece (I have had entire armies that I didn't spend that much time on!)

The picture does not do it justice

Also, a couple more pictures of Grants awesome War King.

Finally, Diane also took some pictures during the tournament, so I want to include those as well.

There he is again sitting next to Bill Robertson - we need better security to keep out the riff-raff

Diane took pictures of all the tables before we started. Of course we ended up changing all the numbers around to make things a bit easier :-)

The mat was provided by Gamemats.com

This table was provided by the Indianapolis Kings of War - look for their tournament coming up in August

The mat was provided by Frontline Gaming

One of two mats provided by Mats by Mars

and the other Mat by Mars

Gamemat.eu also provided two mats

the other gamemat.eu mat

they do let anybody in these placed, don't they

Coffee, chips, pop, water, donuts and fruit were all available

Ohio War Kings dice were for sale

as were shirts

and messenger bags

Kyle Przelenski's Undead army

Frank and Dave play while Bill checks things out

Amy watches Mat measure his move

Aaron considers his options

Shannon measures carefully

Matthew pretends to laugh, Bill wonders what he has gotten into while some fat guy attempts to tell a joke. Steve is smart enough to ignore it completely and keep playing

Matthew Temples oriental themed League of Rhordia Army

Ready to get started

Jon watches Grant

One of Grant's "counts as" Horde of Abyssal Grotesques

Derrick is very serious while Kara considers her move

Austin ponders his move while Roger carefully watches

Checking out the standings after round 4

Why does she keep taking my picture?

Felix & Matther

Steve watches Roger

We had some visitors as well. I do wonder what they were thinking about all of this

why can't we all just get along?

Bill seriously contemplating his next move

Look but don't touch

They are so cute at that age

Dave carefully watches the game

Amy checks the pairings while the camera is nearly blinded by that HUGE glaring bald head

Shannon v Roger

Grant and Cyle

What happened to the rest of the Elf tower?

Finally making myself useful putting mats away. Bill is supervising to make sure I get it right

The terrain after the game

I want to thank Bill Robertson for helping out and stepping in as the ringer when we lost players. I want to thank my wife Diane for being the only normal one there (and putting up with me). Thank you to all the Ohio War Kings for helping out.

Finally, I want to once again thank all our sponsors for their wonderful support, we couldn't have done this without them.