Very late to the party on this one, but I've finally collected my pictures and consulted my notes on Mantic's Clash of Kings 2018 (held on the 13th & 14th of October). I think my perspective offers an excellent contrast to the (comprehensive and informative) account from Andy Ransome, mostly because he finished 6th and I finished 79th. Oh yeah, spoiler warning for poor performance.
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| I call this picture 'oh dear'. Other names removed for privacy. |
I only have pics from game one (it's very busy fighting three battles in one day you know!) so that story will be told in the captions and I'll recount the other games in the main text. I made brief notes after all my games to help me decide nominees for the 'most sporting opponent' award. As it turns out this tournament didn't have that one, but nonetheless they are a good aide memoir.
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| Group shot taken on the largest surface I had free. Army is mostly unchanged from last time. |
My second game was Dwarves. Not a bad match up: very tough nuts to crack but slow speed and limited numbers mean I have a good chance to outmanoeuvre. I decided that of the two monstrous Steel Behemoths I could only expect to kill one, so I covered the left flank with a token force and made my main effort in the centre. According to my notes, this wasn't too bad a plan, as I managed to bring down one of the behemoths and pull off a losing draw in spite of the "poor dice rolling" I seem to have exhibited.
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| View of both my hand (very attractive) and down the line of Odo's host, blissfully unaware of the pasting that awaits them. |
I therefore went into game 3 confident that things were turning around. My notes read 'stand-off on right, werewolves on left' and I lost again. Honestly I remember nothing about this game, probably because it was the last of the day and afterwards I sought solace in beer and takeaway. That night, back in my hotel room, I worked feverishly to rewrite my entire army list to give me a better chance next year.
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| On half of the Twilight kin, featuring abyssal allies. |
I hoped that the second day of the event would give me a fresh start. Sadly, I must have still been asleep as my defeat in game 4 (Abyssal Dwarves) is ascribed to 'poor placement of units'. I think the worst error on my part was to give ground on my left flank, when scoring was judged by how many units we could get in the opponent's half of the table. I should have just bitten the bullet and charged.
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| The white square is a rather clever template to show where the dragon is, as the tower would get in the way otherwise. |
Another undead army in game 5. I think I set things up for a big cavalry battle on the right flank, but I made a real dog's dinner of it and was decisively defeated. There were also, according to the notes, belligerent ghouls (presumably taking a break from running Manchester schools) whose charge was another significant setback. Final defeat was sped along by my forgetting to move the standard-bearer into a position where he could inspire my soldiers to not run away. The silver lining, which was a feature of most of my games, was that my mounted General and Great Chieftain put on a strong showing and cleared out their opposite numbers.
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| Things heat up on the right flank as my large horde (centre) carries an objective token into my opponent's half to score points. |
Going into the final round I was at least comforted to know that I would be facing an opponent of my calibre and a fellow human kingdoms* player at that. His celtic army also showcased the new formation I hope to include in next year's army by tearing my left flank to pieces. It was another bitter defeat, with me being both out-shot and out-rolled. I'll be honest, after 5 defeats and a losing draw I was pretty upset by this point, but I can't blame my opponents for being competent and they were uniformly polite throughout.
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| Didn't there used to be more of my units here? |
To conclude, I'm not disappointed by my performance, as I don't hold with the idea that one has to improve one's rankings with every tournament. How does one get higher than first? What about the taking part? Someone's got to come last after all (those are my excuses anyway). Regardless, I am excited to see if a major list-revamp will bring better results and even if it doesn't, I have an excuse to get out of the house and socialise with like-minded nerds.
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| Abyssal equestrians decide that charging my spear-wall head on will be a waste of victory points. Notice the rather excellent stegosaurus filling the role of 'fire breathing lizard'. |
Tune in next week (ha! Some hope!) where I report on the tournament freebies, painting progress and discuss in detail my new army list and purchasing plans. I was supposed to be reducing the height of lead mountain this year you know...
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| Complete humiliation is averted by my Great Chieftain wavering the dragon thing. I still lost though. |
*Strictly 'Kingdoms of Men' but I think that's a little sexist.
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