Tournament Report - Take A Breather Lad 2nd Edition

Tournament report: Take a breather Lad 2nd Edition - aka Life sucks and then you die.

well, the tournament was great, it was me who sucked...

Hello Guild Ballers!  Here we are again with the next post on my blog, this one's about my third tournament.  Take a breather lad, 2nd Edition.  As the subtitle suggests, I didn't do very well and you'll read below who/what I blame for that below. (Multiple times)

Intro:

(Boring part)
So it's thursday, I'm up at 04h30 a.m. to go to work after only getting into bed at 01h00 a.m. - I tried to go asleep that night at 11h00 p.m. But keep looking at the
alarmclock instead of closing my eyes for some much needed sleep...  Last digits I saw where these: 0:03.  Again I wake up at 04h30, the alarm goes of for my second day at work.  After I get home from work at 7h12 p.m. (I work 12h shifts and it's about a 1h drive) I see we have guests.  I put of cooking till after the guests leave and opt to get some take-out: chips, aka BELGIAN FRIES. (I have no idea why people keep calling them French Fries).  This, however, is not in any way comparable to any fish&chips place out in the U.K.  It's some local culture thing I guess, so if you ever come visit Belgium/Flanders, talk to one of the locals and get them to take you to a 'Frietkot' + let them order for you what us locals would eat there (aka no curry or awkward 'what can I order here anyway' moment) You can of course help out by saying how spicy you like your food as there are tons of snacks to choose from.
After eating I have some quality time with the wife - watching television on the sofa for the more perverted minds out there - and some pc-time to catch up with e-mails and the like (working on this blog was one of those things) I end up turning in at 02h00 a.m. For Saturday, the alarm is set at 06h30, my kid has a football game and I have to take him. (The wife takes the daughter to music lessons) Then in the afternoon I have to prepare the venue for my mothers party.  She turned 60 and finaly goes into retirement.  I try to get some shut eye (30 min I got) before I spend my evening as bartender till 04h00 a.m. (Sober-ish)
(End of boring part. I hope)

After 4 nights of little to no sleep this happened:

I opened my eyes and jumped out of bed at 8:20.  I had no recollection of my alarm going off at 7:30 like it should have, nor did I remember to have turned off my cellphone alarms set at 7:35 and 7:45.  What was going on?  Is this a sign I shouldn't go play? (I think it was)

Or is it a sign I should go - waking up with a startle like I did, just in time to make it - ?  Well, I decided to go and see for myself. (I shouldn't have)

I have a killer of a headache - lack of sleep probably.  But I so wanted to play I pulled myself together and dragged my empty bag of flesh towards the shower.  I fed my birds, spread some nutella on 2 slices of bread and took them with me in the car on the way to the venue.  Halfway there, about 30 min into the drive, I had a stubborn turtlehead popping in and out ready to be released into the wild and off to the sea.  I held it in as best I could and kept the hello's and handshakes to a minimal upon my arrival.  The liberating feeling upon dropping the brown fella in the enclosed pond that the loo is brought some relieve, but didn't take away the throbbing pain in my head.  I flushed, washed my hands and walked back into the fray.  Different discussions were going on, but I didn't feel like joining in on any.  I kept more to myself than I'm known for, I think, but tried my best to hide the fact that my brain felt like a pincushion. For the same reason I shied away from my usual brew at first and took out some water instead of the good brew I swear by: Duvel.

The System:

Dries, the tournament organiser, pundit, good sport and nice guy overall, went over the rules for everybody again.  We would play 4 roundes, 45 minutes on the timer each.

Teamrosters have 9 players on them, with a maximum of 2 Captains and 2 mascots.  Before the beginning of the game after the toss, players reveal one player at a time, alternating, untill a 6-man team (of 1 captain and 1 mascot and 4 other players) are fielded.

I don't need to go into detail about much else, I'm going to asume you're all well known with the other rules.

My roster of 9 was: Tapper - Scum - Spigot - Hooper - Friday - Stave - A&G - Hemlocke (I was expecting Alchemists to be everywhere, and there were none. So I got the meta all wrong.)

So then it started; Pairings for round 1.

GAME 30 (1st game of the Tournament)

Jens - Engineers.
I played Jens before in the first tournament (Take a Breather lad 1st edition) and it was a close game then.  So I didn't have much hope.  I felt more discouraged  when I saw Pin Vice, and Hoist, two players I've never faced before.  And never read the cards of.

This was his entire list: Pin Vice - Mainspring - Hoist - Velocity - Salvo - Decimate.

My list was this: Tapper - Scum - Hooper - Spigot - Friday and Mash

Short Replay:
He gets to receive the ball, collects it, scores with Velocity after Pin Vice character plays.  I'm trying to keep up with what's happening and think I have a fair chance of keeping the ball away from him next few turns.  It's looking pretty good position wise, plus I get some take-outs.  What I didn't notice is that the Pin Vice plays cost HP, so I should've killed Velocity (who was on 3HP). I didn't do that so meh, I blame the head-ache.  I did kill Hoist though, and then decimate.  After that I lost the ball (still in turn 2) due to not paying attention to where his players were fielded.  I killed the ball carier and it scattered to where I couldn't get to it, but Velocity could, Hooper (active player) had 1 INF left and moved to engage Velocity with his 2" melee.  Pin Vice Push/Dodged me into melee with Velocity (1" melee), who then push dodged me out of melee enabling her to score the 2nd goal.  I got up to 5 take out's (one was mainspring that put 3 or 4 of my players on fire (what was I doing?) but then he got the ball back as I was looking to score and failed to do so due to bad positioning of my players.  Unable to score a goal I opted to take out Pin Vice for another 2VP and take the game, but I should've killed the ball instead.  I ended on 10 VP and Pin vice lived through my attempt at finishing the game.  She, snatched the ball and scored the winning goal for Jens.  I even forgot to use my plotcards! I could've used the 2MP after the first goal, I could've used it after the second goal too... RATS!
By the end of this game my head nearly exploded.  I asked some players if they had any medicene on them, but no luck there.  I didn't want to drink a Duvel since I thought it would only get worse under my skull. (it still being fairly early)

GAME 31 (2nd game of the Tournament)

Koen - Butchers.
Koen has become my Nemesis.  He's the one that walked over me with masons in (Take a Breather lad 1st edition) with 12-2.  This time he brought the butchers.  With Fillet...

Fillet - Truffels - A&G - Boiler - Gutter - Rage.

I took Tapper - Scum - Hooper - A&G - Stave - Mash

Short Replay:
I lobbed a barrel at Filet and Gutter trying to push one back and one forward to start the Tapper hurt on one of them.  The barrel failed to hit once so I only got a KD and push back from Gutter (I think it was her)  I held my team back turn 1 so nothing much more happened then, except Stave  being out there.  I wanted to retreat him next turn.
Have no Idea why I didn't do that as first activation after he got engaged.  KD on 1, Sprint away using Ramming speed to push back the player would've changed my game I think.  Instead I opted to do the stupid thing again and bring the fight to the butchers.  After Rage came in on Stave, I came into Rage with Tapper. Boiler came in and made Stave Bleed.  Rage was still alive so Hooper came in to hit him some more.  Rage died.  Fillet came in and Mash was close enough for a Blood rain trigger to hit him so from that point on it went down the drain.  I lost one after the other model, not recovering and not having a faster player (why did I pick A&G again instead of Friday?
And how about Spigot instead of Stave to keep them and the cat away from the rest of the butchers... ah well)  Mash came back and got the ball from Scum, but didn't have enough influence to sprint + supershot + shoot at goal.  So he was stuck there.  I killed 2 of his players.  Gutter and Boiler if I recall that correctly.  Tried to get Fillet, but hey, she's hard to pin down and on 5+ and a few poor rolls.  I lost a few more players (I hate Greede now) and the game ended with me ready to give up.

Koen felt bad, but did say it wasn't his fault entirely with me picking bad players to face Fillet.  This game was the first game where I felt playing brewers without Stave is easier.  You don't have to invest in protecting him if you don't field him.

Ah well.  At this point I'm having a hard time keeping my eyes open.  I rub my temples frequently, and some players take notice.  I have to explain myself to some. I decide to drink a Duvel after my third game, no matter the outcome.  If I lose the third I might aswell drown my sorrow.  If I should happen to win, well, celebration!

GAME 32 (3rd game of the Tournament)

Lieven - Masons.
First time playing Lieven, can't recall where he's from and I'm not sure I asked.
I always feel shivers down my spine when Masons are fielded.  Normally I always take Stave since his barrel lob is very likely to hit...  Today I didn't.

Lieven has a nice custom goal made, it's like a little castle.  You can rotate the roof to keep score of your VP's! (It also wins best goal after the tournament as it turns out.)

Here is what the Masons fielded: Honour - Marbles - Mallet - Brick - Flint - Decimate

I answered that with : Tapper - Scum - Hooper - Spigot - Friday - A&G

Short Replay:
I'm sorry to say that my brain has stopped working at this time.  Flint had the ball on his side of the board and there was no Mallet Missile coming from what I could see on the influence on the players...  I managed to get 8-12 all take-outs but I lost Scum early and she never came back on since I didn't have husbandry.  I lost the ball after Flint scored by playing dumb again with my positioning of the ballcarrier.  I love Friday against Masons almost as much as I like Stave - oh right, I didn't field him...  The game started with me preparing for a missile anyway in case I missed something, but as soon as honour had activated without giving second activations away I went away from that plan and set up Tapper to soften Flint up (Tapper wasn't loaded to the teeth with INF)  I picked all momentus results, finished him off next turn and gave Decimate some love from Tapper.  I then finished her off with Hooper (where Brick forgot to countercharge on Tapper, I made sure to not get within 6" of him with Hooper)
Then I started hitting Honour, who tried to take revenge on Tapper for softening up Decimate.  Mallet came in, but didn't finish the job, Friday came in, and dirty knived Honour and Mallet.  The monkey came closer so A&G closed in on him (but was to slow to do anything).  I lost initiative, so Honour was able to steal the ball from scum and score again.  I killed Honour in return with Tapper.  Mallet killed the cat and the ball snapped to Hooper. Hooper let go of the ball and went for Mallet.  The monkey played goad on Friday preventing her from going in for the kill.  Avarisse failed to hit the monkey propper.  Brick charged into Tapper, not doing much damage.  Friday walked up to the monkey and failed to hit it. Next turn I killed Brick and moved up with the ball to score with Friday.  Only I managed to loose the ball somehow and Flint picked it up to finish the game.  As it turns out I can't jinx a dice-roll like Parker from the Battle Hammer can...  Ah well, time for a Duvel then...  or two...
Whilst enjoying the intermission between games (ignoring my head as much as possible) Joris Cleeren came up to chat a bit.  I explained why I was loosing my games. (well the opponents are good players, maybe better than me, but still I'd like to blame the headache still) He pulled out an apothecary from his bag, in response.  Allas, the stuff he was carrying around was way to heavy for my liking.  (I hate to take pills, but on a day like that I'd make an exception and take some 'Paracetamol'.  The drugs Joris was carrying were more anti-inflammatory oriented and heavy duty pills...  Didn't want to play my last game under the
influence of too much substances... No cocktail of drugs and alcohol for me!  No sir! Alcohol would have to do :-)

A Player dropped out, had some distance to cover to get home, so no more Bye's  *sigh* I could've used one.

GAME 33 (4th game of the tournament)

Kristof- Morticians.  (Sorry if I misspelled your name bud, I have it written down like this and afterwards used Christophe, so I opted to go with what I put down on the record sheet)

My first time playing Kristof.  He explained he played brewers against Dries (the TO) before so had a rough Idea of what they could do.

He fielded Obulus - Dirge - Ghast - Silence - Mist - Bonesaw/Rage?

I fielded Tapper - Scum - Hooper - Friday - Spigot - Mash

I felt a bit better after my 2nd Duvel (or maybe I just didn't care anymore) and as my chances of winning anything were non-existant, I felt no stress anylonger.  I was relieved.  I promised myself to concentrate on having a bit of fun, inspite of the headache and the past three games enduring it.  I can't remember who kicked or received.  First thing I do remember is Obulus coming in with a full clip of INF on Friday, who was within 4" of Spigot.  He didn't Puppet Master Spigot
away to get the DEF to 4 on Friday but tried to hit her while she was on 5/1.  Well he did hit her, but didn't kill her.  Tapper went in killed Obulus, healed Friday and stood there laughing and pointing...  Then we went for Mist with spigot to 'ball's gone' him, taking the counterattack willingly.  On the other side
of the board Ghast kept Mash busy going into base to base with him, and also engaging Hooper.  So one of his models kept two of mine busy, since they both only had 1 INF I couldn't attack the bugger.  I did put on the though skin on Mash... Friday and scum attacked Mist under Tapper's commanding aura after Friday used dirty knives on her and called scum in for an assist.  Silence died next turn after 5 to 6 roll-offs for initiative.
 We both had 3 momentum and he rolled first every time.  I kept throwing the same number (I believe we rolled like this: 4 - 6 - 2 - 6 - 5 - then he had a 3 and I had a 5 again giving me the turn)  This is the longest I ever rolled for initiative...  I loaded up Mash and Hooper this time to get them into Ghast.  Mash payed 2 INF to hit Ghast once, KD'd him down and did 2 DMG, then hit him again for some more DAMAGE.  I tooled up Hooper with Spigot and Hooper then went and killed Ghast.  Obulus activated that turn, and I had a heap of momentum Rigor Mortus didn't happen;  Kristof was to caught up in the beating he received to remain cool headed about it.  Only after the turn ended and we had to look at the initiative again he realised his mistake.  At that point I had the ball, had killed 4 of his players and was set up to score with Friday. So he conceded the game and bought me a Duvel.  Guess I had a bye afterall (/jk Kristof)

"Well at least I wasn't going to take home the wooden spoon." I told Dries (the TO) "oh, it comes with a bottle of Duvel, I thought you were deliberately going for THAT!?" was his reply. 
My jaw dropped and my head went: if I had known that... ah well, no price at all for me... How much bad luck can a man have?

So that was the tournament for me.  Didn't take pictures, couldn't be bothered since in most games we used my phone as the timer + (yes I'm going to blame it again) the headache.  One could argue that I finally showed my true collours as an average player now that the game is getting more and more 'power' players in.  But let's put that explenation off till my next tournament, where hopefully I will have learnt how to counter Fillet (or the butchers ingeneral) by then.  And I still need to play Corsair who scares the bejesus out of me.  So ahead of me lies much work to improve my game. 

I hope you'll join me again on my next adventure towards achieving that goal!

That's it!
See you next time.
Bob Out.