Jexik

And I've got some short notes about the armies played, maps used, and opponents faced. Is there anyone out there who still wants to read one of my battle reports? I didn't do super awesome, but if there's at least one person out there who wants to hear about it besides me, I'll take a little time to write something up.

It was fun to hit the Heroscape tournament scene again. I was super rusty but had a good time.

or: 4 years and $13.50 shipping later...

I'm reminded of this blog post, where I contend that I'm not going anywhere.

And I wasn't. But I am. Kinda.

This week, I sold most of my semi-valuable figures. I was short on cash, and I hadn't played Heroscape a single time with my collection since GenCon outside of a cool tourney in Calumet City, IL.

I've still got figures that mean a bit to me, like my Gruts, Krug, Nilfheim, W1, W8, and the D&D stuff. But my keeping some of it has just as much to do with how little I can get for them.

I'm bringing this up not for pity or anything, but just to let people know what's up, and to make it less of a surprise for those who end up listening to the Plaid Hat Podcast episode 45 when it goes up next week. Many people would do this kind of thing quietly... but with nearly 7k posts, I didn't do much quietly here. I still spend a fair bit of time posting about games, but...

Follow this link to see the truth about truth.

[Link]

It has been awhile since I've been to a tourney for 'scape, but the one thing I miss, and will hopefully experience again this Saturday is watching the last 5 or 10 minutes of a game (or having people watch mine).

It's a happy accident and emergent property of the 'standard' Swiss Heroscape tournament format that in games where players are thinking more and using more of the hexes of their starting zone, their games tend to go on longer. As the game progresses, the Order Marker choices, die rolls, and initiative switches become even more important as players try to eke out a win with the scraps of their army.

In short, the most dramatic and interesting moments in Heroscape tourneys have the most eyes on them.

I've been hassling Joe Knapper (AKA spider AKA the Michael Jordan of Heroscape) for the last couple years to write an article about what sort of preparation and skills are really important for going home with a trophy or 20 dollars worth of stuff you already have.

But he never does. Truth is, he probably doesn't enjoy writing as much as I do, and I finally won a tournament again, beating him along the way no less. I liken it to when MJ came back after baseball and tried to jump right into the playoffs and wasn't even able to wear his own jersey right away. He'll be back, just like the terminator he was.

All right, that's enough analogies. On to the advice, in semi-chronological order. The even shorter version of this is to be confident without being overconfident.

1. Don't stress about your army build.

Nine times out of ten, I may come up with thirty different builds, but the one I actually end up playing is one of the first...