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Las Vegas Open 2017 Results + Lists


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9 minutes ago, Bradifer said:

I like to think of the Alpha Strike lists as aggro, except they lack a distinct set of counters through gameplay and list design.

Specifically it's more like MTG's infect/Storm decks. Sometimes they just kill you on turn 2/3 and there's not always a lot of interaction to be had.

^Fine when the games are fast, but I too would prefer a fully interactive game, whether the lists are tuned or not.

Right, in your analogy it's actually combo, not aggro. Infect is kindof aggro/combo, but I think Storm (or really any of the breakfast decks) is a better analogy. 

Aggro is generally fine. Getting in your opponent's face on turn 1 or 2 is a good thing in AOS, and it keeps people honest. Being able to deepstrike, or Sayl enough resources across the table, or put enough fire out to completely cripple your opponent with little to no counterplay is not fun for most people, and in my mind not really OK.

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1 minute ago, Gauche said:

United States. I'm aware GW ran the rules pack, my hope is as they balance the game more they will feel less need to add things like this in OR they go back to a Best General Award in addition to other awards. They used to do this back in the day, I never had a problem with Best Overall being Sportsmanship + Painting + Games Played. However I have a big problem with being shouted down and told my play style is invalid and would not attend events that are run in that manner. However that's my personal feeling only.

Best General awards slowly turned the competitive scene into an all or nothing mentality. We lost best sport, theme, paint, overall in favor if best battle or 1st place in a W/L event that is even more skewed.

There has been a huge push by the community in the US and in other parts of the world for more hobby centric events. #BringingHobbyBack

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Just now, NoTurtlesAllowed said:

Best General awards slowly turned the competitive scene into an all or nothing mentality. We lost best sport, theme, paint, overall in favor if best battle or 1st place in a W/L event that is even more skewed.

There has been a huge push by the community in the US and in other parts of the world for more hobby centric events. #BringingHobbyBack

Hobby is great, I like when there are Hobby Awards as well. I'm awful at painting but I loved when there was Best Painted, Best Sportsmanship, etc. If there's going to be one big AoS tournament per event it seems like multiple awards are the way to go.

I'm sure the community wants more hobby but I'm sure there are also plenty of people who want more competition. But any attempt to even speak about that seems undesired.

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3 minutes ago, Gauche said:

Hobby is great, I like when there are Hobby Awards as well. I'm awful at painting but I loved when there was Best Painted, Best Sportsmanship, etc. If there's going to be one big AoS tournament per event it seems like multiple awards are the way to go.

I'm sure the community wants more hobby but I'm sure there are also plenty of people who want more competition. But any attempt to even speak about that seems undesired.

There is room for every kind of event. In fact, there should be. However, many in the community feel tired of the W/L, Best General only type events that have dominated and excluded the other types. GW just ran a Hobby event and it was a success, but instead of highlighting the fact that GW just ran an event at an Independent Convention, people are bashing the format.

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Why is it wrong to criticize something that you don't like? If you're a Hobby Player then the event catered to you, if you are a Competitive Player than some would say it didn't. No one has said the event was a disaster. If you are someone who only cares about W/L, like me, and the skill/strategy of the game, like me, then the event excluded that type of play style IN SOME WAYS, not all ways.

If I'm to invest money in this hobby, help grow this hobby, then why shouldn't I ask for the things I want just like you ask for the things you want? Especially when I discussed way earlier in this thread how there are many, many options to give everyone what they want without a watered down experience in anyway. I wish people would stop saying the community, there's no consensus on what the entire community wants. People's opinions and desires are more granular than that.

My personal opinion is the LVO left some things to be desired from the eyes of a strictly competitive player. I think offering suggestions and having a dialogue about that is productive. I'm glad the event was well run, it had good turn out, and people had a great time. I would never, ever, say events should be run with only my interests or the interests of one aspect of the player base in mind. I don't understand why there's backlash to what I'm saying.

If you don't care about W/L, that's great! There are probably lots of things you do care about that are and should be catered to. I just want that same treatment as AoS picks up steam and grows. That seems reasonable to me.

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2 minutes ago, NoTurtlesAllowed said:

What I was saying was GW is back in the tournament scene. That is huge. They were absent for years. They are listening by adjusting points in the GH2. Its a good time to be in this game

Couldn't agree more. I am very happy with the overall course of the game and the company, I left them sometime ago when things were not so strong. My only desire is to be vocal about improvements and open dialogues among other players/hobbyists. Hopefully I can do a good job of that. :]

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  As someone who played in the narrative and Championship event, I have to say it was the best experience I have had at a GT in a LONG time.  All 8 of my games were great, great opponents and fun games against beautifully painted armies, even when I had my teeth kicked in (4 out of 6, only won 2 in the champs...lol).

  My list was not optimized for tournament play, so I knew I would be getting free dental work.   The point is, I had great fun.  Even my wife, who played her first 5 games of AoS at the event, had fun.  The event sorted itself pretty quickly with the competitive folks getting matched up after round 2 and the rest of us settled into the middle and rear pretty well.

  I didn't really see any army that was 'filth', even though I don't believe in that terminology.  Some folks go to events to win, tune a list and beat face with it.  That is their fun.  After a round or two they're paired up with people who did the same.  Sure, they might draw a cupcake game early on (like me against Ben Mohlie who finished 3rd in the ITC ranking), but they get to their caliber of opponent pretty quickly.

  I'm pretty sure, at any event, US or UK or anywhere, there are folks that play for any number of reasons.  The pack and the favorite opponent vote requirements had a lot to do with list building.

  The best part of AoS, to me, is that all these different types of players can go to one event and end up having a good time.  That feeling was lost for me years ago in WH40K and I'm damn glad to see it back in AoS.  We surely don't need any of that 40k WAAC mentality filtering into here.  Play to have fun, your own way, with the lists that you enjoy and the events will (hopefully) sort themselves out well.

v/r

Bill

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6 hours ago, swarmofseals said:

Hi everyone, 

As @scrubyandwells mentioned, I've spent quite a few hours jamming all of the data that I could find from the lists of this event into a google docs spreadsheet. I hope some of you find it useful! You fan view the spreadsheet here:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1wKH4-s7Z2t-dHU_gfQHPGbEvT20_h4pdc9NenaLNX-I/edit?usp=sharing

Thanks so much for taking the time to compile this info. It's a lot of work, but it's quite valuable having this information more accessible by the community.

It is exciting, seeing the list diversity from LVO, and I fully agree we should hope to see more events reflective of that diversity. Vince Venturella spoke about this in our recent podcast discussion re: the importance of variance for a healthy meta.

Every participant sharing their experience has had nothing but praise for LVO. I'm sure there's lessons to be learned, though, which will be valuable as well.

On a personal note, I was surprised, but gratefully surprised, we didn't see a larger percentage of known very powerful builds. There were a number of strong builds, but the percentage was lower than expected. It would be nice to have a better understanding of 'why,' although there were surely multiple factors. 

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33 minutes ago, PhantomPhixer said:

  As someone who played in the narrative and Championship event, I have to say it was the best experience I have had at a GT in a LONG time.  All 8 of my games were great, great opponents and fun games against beautifully painted armies, even when I had my teeth kicked in (4 out of 6, only won 2 in the champs...lol).

  My list was not optimized for tournament play, so I knew I would be getting free dental work.   The point is, I had great fun.  Even my wife, who played her first 5 games of AoS at the event, had fun.  The event sorted itself pretty quickly with the competitive folks getting matched up after round 2 and the rest of us settled into the middle and rear pretty well.

  I didn't really see any army that was 'filth', even though I don't believe in that terminology.  Some folks go to events to win, tune a list and beat face with it.  That is their fun.  After a round or two they're paired up with people who did the same.  Sure, they might draw a cupcake game early on (like me against Ben Mohlie who finished 3rd in the ITC ranking), but they get to their caliber of opponent pretty quickly.

  I'm pretty sure, at any event, US or UK or anywhere, there are folks that play for any number of reasons.  The pack and the favorite opponent vote requirements had a lot to do with list building.

  The best part of AoS, to me, is that all these different types of players can go to one event and end up having a good time.  That feeling was lost for me years ago in WH40K and I'm damn glad to see it back in AoS.  We surely don't need any of that 40k WAAC mentality filtering into here.  Play to have fun, your own way, with the lists that you enjoy and the events will (hopefully) sort themselves out well.

v/r

Bill

Hear, hear! 

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Wow that was a lot to read.  I'm glad to see that an event I went to generated so much response.  I can't make it to AdeptiCon so I'm glad I made it to LVO.  It was an amazing event.  The whole weekend was a blast.  I can't wait till next year! 

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4 hours ago, Gauche said:

Couldn't agree more. I am very happy with the overall course of the game and the company, I left them sometime ago when things were not so strong. My only desire is to be vocal about improvements and open dialogues among other players/hobbyists. Hopefully I can do a good job of that. :]

I'd love to have a more in-depth dialog sometime. Definitely appreciate your perspective and agree it's very much a valid one. Events like the UK Masters etc. have a clear, highly-competitive orientation, and that's great. (Based on everything heard, it sounds like that event was a home run as well for everyone involved.) One aspect raised by others is the importance of clear expectations and incentives. While everyone may not have been fully behind GW's LVO pack, it seems like they set clear expectations that worked for the vast majority of participants. This ongoing, big topic is complex and compelling, especially since it seems we do have plenty of room for experimenting, learning, and improving.

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I think that Warhammer tournaments need to be focused on the hobby as a whole since that is what GW pushes the most. In a highly competitive game like magic or Warmachine you can focus on only the person who wins all their games as the champion, but Warhammer I like this approach where they're trying to find a mix between being a good player and having a good army and having it well painted and being a good person to play against and not just whoever brings the most broken combos to dominate and win all their games. It's a good compromise since Warhammer will never be as close in balance as magic or warmachine, so for example they need to have social mechanisms in play to stop the person bringing the filth list from steamrolling the tournament if they arent a fun person to play against.

 

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Hello I'm Brian the Ironjaws player that finished second in battle points.  I ended up 3rd overall with the addition of soft scores, I got 3 Best Game votes, but not a best painted nod.  I wanted to defend my inclusion of 2 Weirdnobs, for I think they are under utilized.  You really cant discount the +1 or +2 to casting and unbinding.  It allows you to keep a handle on the enemies magic as well as dish out a solid amount of mortal wounds.  This GT was one of the funniest I've ever been to and I've been going to them for over 14 years.  I look forward to continuing to show the world that Ironjawz are a top tier army. 

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You can debate the wargame/tactics vs painting/bobby topic all you want, its split down the community and there will never be a consensus. Each TO will make a decision based on how an event is scored and how much hobby factors in. GW is always going to lean toward hobby/painting because, its just more enjoyable for everyone to see beautiful armies than it is to watch somone curbstomp the competition in battle.

@IronjawzBrian
luckily I avoided your beastly army! How did you find out how many best game votes you got? I was curious if  I got any.  I voted for Austin who won most votes.  

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Had to create an account to answer this topic after reading couple of comment. I'm Mathieu (no 8 on the list) and back from a wonderful tournament. I consider i had a pretty filthy list (but not optimal: because in an hobby game like this you're constrained by your available model and time to paint).

First, poeple saying those are weak list and making comparaison with other TCG like magic, you're completly off. This is not a card game. I myself came from a TCG background, and i can tell you the two main difference:

1. Sometime, you can't just play the optimal army. In a TCG you just find the best deck, buy the card you need and go to the tournament. You don't have to ASSEMBLE and PAINT them. Sure, if you have infinite money you could just buy any model and pay someone to pro paint them (but you would miss part of the fun then no?). 

2. There is no prize money. Sure, you went with you're uber filthy list. You crushed all you opponent, giving all of them their worst NPE ever and ended up with your 6 major win after tabling every one. Good job. You just won a nice box of Warhammer Quest. GOOD JOB!!! During that time another guy just went 3 win 3 loss playing against fun guys and he won a similar price by winning a painting contest.

I'm personnally a competitor. If I go to a tournament it's because i want to try to win it, and i'll try to have the best possible army. But in the end it's also about the fun. I will play at the best of my capacity to win games, but never at the expense of sportsmanship. Maybe if there was a 10k prize at the end i would be more of an ass, but for winning a start collecting box and a couple of brushes well i choose being nice over a win any time. 

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5 hours ago, broche said:

 But in the end it's also about the fun. I will play at the best of my capacity to win games, but never at the expense of sportsmanship. Maybe if there was a 10k prize at the end i would be more of an ass, but for winning a start collecting box and a couple of brushes well i choose being nice over a win any time. 

Obviously if someone bring a hard list that makes them an ass and means "I like to win at the expense of sportsmanship". /sarcasm

The entire UK tournament scene is much more accepting of hard lists, AND they have good, fun games without being jerks or calling each other jerks undeservedly. 

That is exactly the point of the comments about the meta. Hard lists at large tournaments are the norm and if you think that makes someone an ass or unsporting, you are part of the problem.

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On 2/7/2017 at 1:49 PM, PJetski said:

Why play in a competitive tournament if you're not going to try to win?

There are lots of opportunities to play AOS (or any game, really) in non-competitive settings; the reason tournaments exist is to give people that want a competitive setting a different way to have fun than your typical friendly game.

I would definitely like to place well at the end of a competitive event, but for me one of the main draws of going to a Tournament is just to get in games. Due to life being busy I usually only get about one gaming day a month and generally that consists of just one game due to time constraints. Tourneys allow me to pack a bunch of games into one weekend. 

I also enjoy getting to play against a bunch of armies that I don't see in my local scene. Most people I play against locally only have one or two armies ( @Rhellion excluded with his multitude of armies ;) ) so a Tournament gives me the chance to broaden my gaming horizons. I also enjoy that it forces everyone to fully paint their army. For me it's just not as fun playing against or with grey plastic, although I do that as well. 

Lastly, but probably most importantly, it lets me hang out with a bunch of people from all over the world that I normally only get to talk to online or over the phone. That's a big plus for me. I can't exactly schedule a casual game with @Dan Heelan considering the Atlantic ocean and all, but when I go to Adepticon in a few months there's a good chance I'll get to play him or at the very least chat and catch up. 

So, in conclusion, there are a whole multitude of reasons why people go to Tournaments. Doing well is certainly one of them, and for many people it may be the most important, but it is by no means the only one. 

This may be a little bit of self promotion, but I actually wrote an article on this very topic awhile ago on Mengel Miniatures http://www.mengelminiatures.com/2016/10/editorial-lure-of-tournament-gaming-to.html

Having said all of that, I certainly hope I do well at Adepticon this year. After doing well last year and winning the (much smaller, but still a tourney) Michigan GT I have a reputation to uphold after all ;) 

Anyway, looks like the LVO was a ton of fun and a big congrats to everyone who won there. 

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6 hours ago, Rhellion said:

Obviously if someone bring a hard list that makes them an ass and means "I like to win at the expense of sportsmanship". /sarcasm

The entire UK tournament scene is much more accepting of hard lists, AND they have good, fun games without being jerks or calling each other jerks undeservedly. 

That is exactly the point of the comments about the meta. Hard lists at large tournaments are the norm and if you think that makes someone an ass or unsporting, you are part of the problem.

Then playing to win at all cost should be the norm too. That include playing at the limit of the rules (and even light cheating), never allowing take back and so on.

My bad at missusing the word sportsmanship. Sportsmanship i guess is just playing within the rules, not cheating and being respectful. I think wargaming event go a step beyond that.

 

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May have to consider this one in the future as well looks like a good time!  

As far as the sportsman scores I've always used them to score my opponents attitude.  You act like a dip your scores gonna dip.  I've never used it to judge an army, but  I wish there was a better way to score a person. At adepticon last year in my very first game I was unfortunate enough to come across a guy using nothing but ratling cannons and storm fiends. He was heavily apologetic from the thrashing I took mentioning he should get low scores on sportsmanship because of it.  I see it as helping me improve and showing me what's strong in the game.  

Hopefully get to see some more interesting stuff at adepticon this year as well.

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But i think what annoy me the most about some comments is that poeple calling the list "bad" did not bring anything close to an argument. They just said list where terrible.

List 1 is clearly hard to me. I think it's also one of the few list that have a chance to handle both sylvaneth and bonesplitter (access to mortal wound and high rerollable save)

List 2 is not a "hard" list, but i mean it's not like he was playing bad units either.

List 3, i'm not a chaos expert but it doesn't look like too friendly to me either.

Then you have all sylvaneth list that play 12 kurnouth, not sure how you can call that nice. It's the most efficient units in the game cost-wise.

the Setra + undead chariot list also seem quite nasty to me.

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@broche
Exactly why tabletop should not be overly competitive. If you want to compete play a competitive video game or chess or MTG. Warhammer is firstly about beautiful models - about art. If you come to a tournament to be competitive, you are kind of misplacing your spirit of competition. That being said its kind of impossible to separate our sense of competition, and its the sense of competition that gets us to buy more models and drives the company growth. I'm happy to see that GW is making a good effort to create a balanced tournament scene so that its not so silly to care about Warhammer competitively.

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5 minutes ago, WoollyMammoth said:

@broche
Exactly why tabletop should not be overly competitive. If you want to compete play a competitive video game or chess or MTG. Warhammer is firstly about beautiful models - about art. If you come to a tournament to be competitive, you are kind of misplacing your spirit of competition. That being said its kind of impossible to separate our sense of competition, and its the sense of competition that gets us to buy more models and drives the company growth. I'm happy to see that GW is making a good effort to create a balanced tournament scene so that its not so silly to care about Warhammer competitively.

Warhammer should not be overly competitive (IMHO of course).  There are (IMHO again) much better competitive games; warmahordes, infinity spring to mind as being tightly-tuned for competitive, dare I say it, cutthroat type of play (not being a tool, of course, just hard lists).  Warhammer has always been the combination, laid back but still strong (nothing egregious) with more emphasis on painting and the hobby in general and even *gasp!* narrative and themed stories than "just" trying to win.

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There are 3 ways to play now, The Generals Handbook makes it so we can run all kinds of different events. I love that we are seeing more and more Narrative events showing up.

Matched Play is a thing too, though. People like to be competetive, I like to play competitively as well. I love looking at Warscrolls, finding synergies, reading Competetive threads and putting it all into Scrollbuilder. I then like destroying people, Orr being destroyed and learning from it.

I can also be a fluff bunny reading all the books and I like to convert all my models and paint them too!

I think it's up to our community to support all of these aspects in whole. Go to a tournament, prepare to smash and be smashed. Go to a narrative event, bring a cool story and open imagination. Go to painting day, and be prepared to learn as well as teach others.

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