Siege of Sussex - Intro

Wolves on Parade

Well I did it. First major goal of 2012 is complete - compete in my first ever tournament.

After only a few games getting back into 40k, I rather foolishly signed up to a one day GW tournament up at Warhammer World. Dubbed 'The Seige of Sussex'. there were 64 players per format for 40k and 16 for Fantasy, all from the GW stores in Worthing, Brighton, Crawley and Eastbourne. I'd be taking my Wolves for 40k, and was expecting to get hammered every game, but this was a chance that was too good to miss. Besides, there's nothing like jumping in the deep end to teach you how to swim!

I was told by the local shop manager, Matt, that there would be about three games using the BRB missions, all at 1500pts. I'll review my list development under a separate post, as that is a story in itself! Other requirements were a minimum three colour paint job (plus faces and hair), based and WYSIWYG. We knew that there were going to be soft scores for painting, but weren't told about sportsmanship (of course a high standard was expected anyway). I wasn't sure what the competition was going to be like, as the field could have ranged from a bunch of baby seals to the local elite (there are a few members of some of the linked blogs (like the Sons) that regularly go the Brighton Warlords tournaments and one nationally ranked player lives in my hometown nearby (Peter Cooke), so you never know!)! I was assuming a mix of youngsters and vets (without any big names), and was going with my game face on nonetheless!

I was really pleased to have been able to paint and base my pups to the required standard, although they definitely have a long way to go before they're finished. However, they with as much free time as I could carve out of my real life, it was good enough for the time being and looking cohesive as a whole, so I was happy.

Without going into specifics, my list had performed well over the 7 games I've played to date (I still can't believe I only played 7 games of 40k since getting back into gaming before going to a tournament. Crazy...). There are clearly a few improvements I'd make, but sticking with the same list gave me a good insight into what I could roughly expect my dudes to do, and didn't mean that I was wasting time painting stuff that I would later drop. There were also still a load of armies I hadn't played, so I was expecting to learn on the fly!

So what about your first ever tournament experiences? Do you have any wisdom or advice to impart to tournament newbs like myself? What are your best/worst memories of playing in a tournament?