Everett, WA - WA North NHSD Tournament 10/28/23

[Nomad]

Originally Posted by Ulysses

Well I guess I rolled a 1-6. It doesn't look like I'm going to be able to make it after all. I hope y'all get some great games in. I know I'll be using these 14 hex mini maps at home ASAP! Happy 'Scaping!

Thanks for considering the trip. I still haven't made it to Salem for one of your events. Some day we will roll dice together.

[obfuscatedhippo]

Thank you for being such an amazing host, Nomad. Tons of maps, great food, and wonderful games!

Appreciate all of the hard work and preparation .. oh, and you kicking my butt in record time : )

[Sir Heroscape]

do tell! I'm curious to hear how it went! 20 RSVP's seems super legit for the Northwest! is that one of the biggest tourney's ya'll have had?

[Longy418]

Enjoyed the day, great job Nomad! Fun format and maps were outstanding for the quick battles. Nice to see everyone, wish there would have been enough time to play against everyone. The Belgor Ruins from Rollies Customs looked awesome on the battlefield, a lot of positive comments on them, great work on those Rollie.

[Nomad]

Originally Posted by Sir Heroscape

do tell! I'm curious to hear how it went! 20 RSVP's seems super legit for the Northwest! is that one of the biggest tourney's ya'll have had?

Super fun day. I will post my reflections soon. 15 participated on Saturday, the most in the last few years. Back in the day, we had tournaments with 30 or more people hosted at a variety of places.

[Nomad]

Thanks to everyone who could make it. I really had fun gaming with you all. Standings are now listed in the OP. Congratulations to @asandygraves for taking the title. The Battle Ground contingent took the top four spots in the standings. Impressive!

Here are some comments from others. Only about half of us are here on Heroscapers.

The two newbies said they had a great time and were very appreciative of the teaching and help provided by all.

Numerous people said that the maps were outstanding! Thank you. Most impressively, they stated that not one map determined the outcome of a battle.

All seemed to enjoy the smaller maps and the quicker battles. The option to go with the pre-built army for each map provided an opportunity to mix things up and play with figures that were different than the norm. For me, my army was stolen from me twice and I went 1-1 against it. I chose the map army twice.

All commented that they had a very fun and entertaining day. Thanks to @Longy418 for doing the cooking and to all who stayed to the very end to help me with a little house project.

Until next time!

[Nomad]

Some pics from Saturday.

[obfuscatedhippo]

I'll preface this with saying I had a lot of fun ..

but .. for the small maps ..I will say that initiative on the very first round is critical with these small maps, and that with any elevation in the middle of the board, it gave ranged units a key advantage for Start Zone bombing ; )

No one brought Zelrig, but he would have been brutal for Z-bombing with a packed 14-hex start zone, but even other ranged units could move up and drop attacks into the start zone with height on OM2 & 3 pretty easily.

And while I had a great time, I personally don't like Reverse the Whip scenarios. If you get handed a crappy army, it can be Game Over before initiative. This definitely happened in one of my matches .. where there was no real way for me to win as soon as we sat down. My opponent had a worse record and brought an army with 5 unique army cards (3 unique heroes, 1 unique squad of 2, and 1 unique squad of 4). My army was much more functional with 3 squads of Samurai Archers as the core ( with average 3 attacks/OM and easier OM management). The board army was just as OM challenged but at least my opponent gave me Marro Warriors that could clone. But once they were dead, I conceded (though Warden816 chopped down 3 Samurai before he went down but that took 3 OM's).

If the board armies were a little stronger, it could have helped off-set being handy a deliberately bad army.

So my suggestion for next time is no Reverse the Whip ; ) and maybe some elevation in the start zone to prevent bombing.

We could also try different start zone ideas like - not having your army IN the start zone to start. First move is from off the board INTO the start zone or something like that. This way you can keep the maps, but not have the bombing problem {unless I am the only one who had concerns about that}.

But overall, great time - lots of hard work & prep went into - and I am thanks to have dusted off the 'Scape!

[Nomad]

Originally Posted by obfuscatedhippo

I'll preface this with saying I had a lot of fun ..

but .. for the small maps ..I will say that initiative on the very first round is critical with these small maps, and that with any elevation in the middle of the board, it gave ranged units a key advantage for Start Zone bombing ; )

No one brought Zelrig, but he would have been brutal for Z-bombing with a packed 14-hex start zone, but even other ranged units could move up and drop attacks into the start zone with height on OM2 & 3 pretty easily.

And while I had a great time, I personally don't like Reverse the Whip scenarios. If you get handed a crappy army, it can be Game Over before initiative. This definitely happened in one of my matches .. where there was no real way for me to win as soon as we sat down. My opponent had a worse record and brought an army with 5 unique army cards (3 unique heroes, 1 unique squad of 2, and 1 unique squad of 4). My army was much more functional with 3 squads of Samurai Archers as the core ( with average 3 attacks/OM and easier OM management). The board army was just as OM challenged but at least my opponent gave me Marro Warriors that could clone. But once they were dead, I conceded (though Warden816 chopped down 3 Samurai before he went down but that took 3 OM's).

If the board armies were a little stronger, it could have helped off-set being handy a deliberately bad army.

So my suggestion for next time is no Reverse the Whip ; ) and maybe some elevation in the start zone to prevent bombing.

We could also try different start zone ideas like - not having your army IN the start zone to start. First move is from off the board INTO the start zone or something like that. This way you can keep the maps, but not have the bombing problem {unless I am the only one who had concerns about that}.

But overall, great time - lots of hard work & prep went into - and I am thanks to have dusted off the 'Scape!

Glad you had fun. Interesting option of starting armies off the board. Yes, stealing armies from your opponent kind of added to the strategy of how you built an army. For our game day, this was chosen as a way to balance things out between experienced players and those newer to the game. Not sure I would want to do this for a competitive tournament, for sure.


Other things we have considered for the smaller maps include movement in the first round for each figure is reduced by half and/or no ranged attacks in the first round. It will take some tweaking, for sure.

[Cyborgs Gaming]

Something that I have done when space was a major issue and we had smaller maps is to eliminate start zones all together. There is two different ways to approach this.

One is the "Heat of Battle" where players take turns placing anywhere on the map 1 card at a time as long as not adjacent to an enemy and squads are kept together (like they could hold hands)

The other I've only done twice and that is to have a single hex start zone that all characters spawn from the first time they are activated. This can be done through a Glyph of brandar or a castle door. What I did when it was a castle door is that if the door gets destroyed then no more characters can be spawned.

[Nomad]

Originally Posted by lafleurhero

Something that I have done when space was a major issue and we had smaller maps is to eliminate start zones all together. There is two different ways to approach this.

One is the "Heat of Battle" where players take turns placing anywhere on the map 1 card at a time as long as not adjacent to an enemy and squads are kept together (like they could hold hands)

The other I've only done twice and that is to have a single hex start zone that all characters spawn from the first time they are activated. This can be done through a Glyph of brandar or a castle door. What I did when it was a castle door is that if the door gets destroyed then no more characters can be spawned.

Great ideas! Thank you.

[White Q Knight]

Bummer I missed out on July it’s been a super busy summer but will definitely try to make the next one.