This past weekend was the fifth annual Gem City Massacre (with the exception of last year, which the entire world basically skipped!).  Once again it was held at Epic Loot in Centerville, and run by the Ohio War Kings.  We has 12 players for a great time.

Front L-R - Dan White, Kara Brown, Jessica Barnes, Steve Malone, Grace Patterson, Felix Castro.
Back L-R - Jeff Franz, Kyle Przlentski, Erich Trowbridge, Eric Reiss, Tom Ziegler, Jon Carter, Paul Cravo

We made some Holiday themed trophies, reflecting the Christmas spirit.  Plus being Christmas, everyone walked away with something!

We started a little late (I had all the mats/terrain but couldn't set up the night before because I was flying home after spending the week out of town for work), but the games went very smoothly.

Round 1 underway

Jeff Franz (Nightstalkers) challenged Erich Trowbridge (Goblins)

Jessica Barnes challenged Grace Patterson for girl on girl, nature on nature action!

Dan White (Abyssal Dwarfs) v Tom Ziegler (Ratkin)

Felix Castro (Northern Alliance) v Eric Reiss (Forces of the Abyss)

Paul Cravo (Sylvan Kin) v Steve Malone (Trident Realm)

In a battle of the bald beards, Jon Carter (Ogres) v Kyle Przlentski (Twillight Kin)

Pizza was brought in for everybody after round one as the armies were judged for appearance.  It wasn't until the next day that I realized I didn't get pictures of the armies (because while I was scoring, Kara did the actual paint judging (after self scoring by the players).

Round 2

The battle of the Eric's - Eric Reiss v Erich Trowbridge

Paul Cravo v Felix Castro

Jeff Franz v Jessica Barnes

Jon Carter v Steve Malone

Tom Ziegler v Grace Patterson

Kyle Przlentski v Dan White while Jesse Dennison looks on.

While our games were going on, Dr. Jesse Dennison (have to brag on him, as he just recently got his PhD, something to be very proud of) was showing off the new version of Deadzone and doing some demos for it.

Things were close when the third round started

Jessica Barnes v Eric Reiss

Jon Carter v Erich Trowbridge

Tom Ziegler v Steve Malone

Jeff Franz v Grace Patterson

Kyle Przlentski v Felix Castro

Paul Cravo v Dan White

And after three fun rounds, we wrapped things up with awards.

First off was the (un)coveted "Dice Hate Me" trophy, because we all know coming in last place has NOTHING to do with skill and can all be blamed on your dice - so we give this (un)lucky person brand new Ohio War King dice, an Ohio War King wound deck (designed by our own Jon Carter) and an Ohio War Kings dice bag.

Jessica Barnes gets some new dice (though this was the first time we ever had to use a tiebreaker for this award!)

The award for Favorite Kringle goes to Felix Castro with his great Santa on a throne (receiving 2/3 of the votes!)  Unfortunately there was some miscommunication, and his trophy will be forthcoming.

With very tight competition at the top (and only two unfinished armies), Grace Patterson took the Best Appearance Trophy home.

Paul Cravo took the Jesse Cornwall Sportsman Award.  This was a special event for us, as the last time it was held, Jesse won it (and it was his last event).  Plus his first ever event was the first Gem City Massacre, where he took last place!

While there isn't a trophy, Tom Ziegler came in third overall

Erich Trowbridge took Best General as well as 2nd place overall

Jeff Franz took home the best overall trophy in a tight field that came down to soft scores (paint and sportsmanship) to make the difference.

I really wish I could still put up the link to warscore so people could see all the details of the scoring, but alas while the client software still works, the web site is no more :-(.  So here are some of the breakdowns of scoring.

Gem City Massacre 2021

Appearance Scoring

Name	Paint	Additional Painting	Favorite Army	Best Appearance
Steve Malone	7			7
Dan White	16	0		16
Erich Trowbridge	20	7		27
Tom Ziegler	20	10		30
Felix Castro	20	12		32
Paul Cravo	20	13		33
Eric Reiss	20	13		33
Jeff Franz	20	15	0	35
Jon Carter	20	14	2	36
Kyle Przelenski	20	15	2	37
Jessica Barnes	20	13	4	37
Grace Patterson	20	15	4	39

Sports Scoring

Name	Early List	Favorite Opponent	Total	Most Sporting
Jessica Barnes	5	2	54	7
Kyle Przelenski	5	2	55	7
Felix Castro	5	2	57	7
Paul Cravo	5	2	69	7
Jon Carter	5	1	63	6
Dan White	5		54	5
Tom Ziegler	5		70	5
Jeff Franz	5		74	5
Grace Patterson		2	58	2
Erich Trowbridge		1	72	1
Eric Reiss			62
Steve Malone			57

A note on sportsmanship scoring.  There were four people tied at the top, however two of them (Jessica and Felix) won other awards (and even the Dice Hate Me award came with a $35 gift card), so that narrowed it down to to people, so it went to the person with the higher overall score (as it is harder to vote someone who beats you as favorite opponent than it is to vote for someone you beat).

Battle Scoring

Name	Battle	Objective	Attrition	Game Total
Erich Trowbridge	40	11	7	51
Steve Malone	40	10	6	50
Jeff Franz	40	9	7	49
Tom Ziegler	38	7	6	45
Eric Reiss	35	7	7	42
Paul Cravo	35	7	6	42
Jon Carter	25	10	6	35
Dan White	25	8	5	33
Grace Patterson	27	5	3	32
Felix Castro	25	5	5	30
Kyle Przelenski	15	11	6	26
Jessica Barnes	15	8	4	23

Final

Place	Name	Total	Awards
1	Jeff Franz	74	Best Overall
2	Erich Trowbridge	72	Best General / 2nd Overall
3	Tom Ziegler	70	3rd Overall
4	Paul Cravo	69	Sportsman
5	Jon Carter	63
6	Eric Reiss	62
7	Grace Patterson	58	Best Appearance
8	Steve Malone	57
9	Felix Castro	57	Favorite Kringle
10	Kyle Przelenski	55
11	Dan White	54
12	Jessica Barnes	54	Dice Hate Me

an additional note - a max of 20 appearance points is included in the overall score (in case it seems like the numbers do not add up.

A big thanks to Epic Loot for hosting the event (and having a bunch of the new stock to spend gift cards on!), and for Mantic Games for providing great prize support (in the form of gift codes).

Overall it was a great day with a lot of laughs and fun had by all.  It is really great to be able to get together with friends we haven't seen in a while, and feel close to normal.

Because it is all fun and games . . .