I believe this to be my first post, so hello MKrealms community. I am XRMNDML, but for simplicity, pronounce that grendel. I am the little brother of Jerrund, well, I'm taller, so maybe just younger, thus I'm also KerriOsu brother in law.

My first exposure to mage knight was many many moons ago, when it first came out. One of Magic/DnD buddies started playing right away (if he was ever on here, it'd have been as IMRAHILII), but I'd sunk so much money into other intrests, I shunned it right off the bat. So skip several years later and go to a weekly Settler's of Catan game at Jerrund and KerriOsu's apartment, which, of course, was buried in click dials. So, one night, we decide to play, and I've been playing in the local tournaments since, probably about 7 or 8 months now. I think I'm getting okay, I've beat Jerrund twice, and Kerriosu that many times probably. Until tonight, I'd won 3 tournaments in a row at the Armoury here in Pickerington, Ohio, and that is why I'm posting.

I did not win tonight, nor was I defeated.

KerriOSU was warlord for this event, we had 9 players. She took our army lists, and shuffled them, setting the random first round pairings down on each of the 4 slots. My sheet did not come up. First Round By. I knew what that meant right away.

So the first round went by and I help two very inexperienced players to lighten the load for Kerri. My "by" victory got me good enough placing to play the highest scoring loser of the first round. I won in less than 5 minutes.

My Army for the Evening:
Fireflower on a Orc Warhorse (to meet the factional requirement) with Mask of Mysteries
Weak Scalesworn on a EF Dragon
4 Standard Solo Shades
1 standard Deathsinger (in retrospect, I'd have put a 5th shade)
and 1 weak Poisonous Salamander

Pretty clear strategy, and I didn't miss an attack roll. I faced 2 mechanoid armies, one with Black Sledge on Harrowblade and one with Stoneshatterer on Kerin. Both times I was first player and killed or crippled everything important with shades ramming in formation and mounted charge/charge. I didn't lose a game, I didn't even lose a figure. I only even took 2 clicks of damage from an opposing figure. But I got second place, because Jerrund won against 3 people, in the winners bracket each time, meaning his opponent's win loss record was much higher. I am not taking anything away from Jerrund's victory, he definately won the tournament, I'd just have liked to have faced him, and tonight I think I could have had a chance, we were well matched. An undefeated second place is just hard to swallow, I now know how Auburn felt.

I'm going to have to play this event again this saturday, for a chance at redemption. This time I stand to face KerriOSU instead of Jerrund, and a couple of other very decent players, so certainly victory is anything but assured.

Here is hoping for a clean victory, or an honorable defeat.

XRMNDML

An aside; my prize for the evening was Mountain Warbird, not a bad little chicken, and I bought 4 boosters, 2 darkriders, 2 sorcery, and I drew Scavange and Pestilence Avatar.

So there were upsides.

Just as a question, does the warlord ever ask for volunteers to take the Bye? In my tournaments, I usually get a few people who don't mind taking the first round bye, and the tournament rules do allow for this - that way, those who don't want it may not have to have it!

But when it comes to byes, it's unfortunate, but I don't think there's any better solution. Giving anything other than a "win" can simply be unfair for other players who earned 3 objectives or x kill points or whatever. Yes, it kind of stinks for the bye player, but that's why the provision for volunteers has come about :)

Just a thought. Not that it's my tournament to run, and I don't know the situation in specific, so it may not apply here :)

if you're his brother, play him for his prize the next time you visit. when you kick his butt, give him your chicken.

Very unfortunate indeed.
Another idea if time permits, at the beginning of the tournament, is to have the warlord declare there will be an additional round if one of the players with an undefeated record has had a first round bye. I have always liked to have a clear cut winner in any tournament I've run or played in.

I remember a lengthy discussion on byes way back when. I was against objective or points being given but do think that the bye player should have a shot at first place. Even though their rounds are typically against easier foes.

I like this idea. If I ever have a situation where it comes up, I'll have to try it. Again, I think this would only apply if nobody volunteered, though. Usually, someone who volunteers for it is willing to accept a loss,e ven if undefeated :)

And it all depends on time availabilty :)

I just thought I should point this out to you, I don't know if you meant literally moving the Shades in formation, but that is illegal. You cannot use Ram whilst in a Movement Formation. So in order to Ram with all those shades, they'd each have to get their own action.

Since that seemed to be a big part of your strategy, and since you planned on using it again, I thought I'd bring that to your attention.

-Dal-

The problem was, that there were 9 people and only 3 rounds. You can half the "all winners" every turn, so for 9 people you'll need 4 rounds instead of 3(3 rounds are only enought for up to 8 players). This is a sad story otherwise, i really do know how you felt, because the same(if not worse) happened to me on our nationals.

There were 16 people -> 4 rounds. We had an incompetent judge, who openly admitted he doesn't know anything about MK(he was a MW guy), he was just there to tell the names. Our first round went well, there were 8 winners and 8 who lost. In the second round the bomb exploded, someone used an illegal army(2 relics on 1 fig) and the opponent noticed it. the rounds already started, but the guy who lost against this "illegal player" demanded to have his point back and they gave him a win! Since the pairs did not change, there were 3 pairs of winners, 3 pairs of 1 loss guys, and 2 pairs of win/loss. Problem was, that the in the last groups the winners won again, so we had 5 2time winners instead of 4! 3rd round 3 stayed, and on fourth 2 of us stayed in. I won all my rounds to 6-0(token of total destruction), except for the last round. That's why i became second! Was that unfair or what??? :mad: :mad: :mad:

How did the first player miss the illegal army? By tournament rules, each player is responsible for verifying the opponent's army. If I were the Warlord, there's a chance I would have just DQed the offending player, but not retroactively changed scores, since each player is responsible for checking the legality of opponent's armies, and if he misses it, and finds out later it was illegal, it's not fair for everyone else to give the player who didn't check an advantage for not doing what he's supposed to be doing.

If I have 3-6 people, I normally have 4 rounds. This give even those people that lost a match a chance to come back in the finals.

My thought exactly, but i couldn't argue that time. Even our warlord(who wasn't a warlord there) agreed, that it was a false decision. That's why i won a Demon Stag, instead of a Ley Dragon+Pain.

This actually isn't a bad idea, but it wouldn't have worked last night. As it was, after 3 rounds we were right on top of the venue's closing time (the down side to running an event on a Monday evening).

Usually at either of the venues for which I am Primary, the bye is not an issue, as we generally get <8 players per event. At this particular venue, however, the numbers have been creeping up and yesterday we got 9. In the future, if there are more than 8 attendees at a tourney and there is an odd number, I will probably put the volunteer option out there. Can't say what my wife will do at the events she runs, but I'm sure we can come to some sort of agreement. :)

Now... as to how he would have fared in a heads up match.
I was running:
Magus Alment-Lan
-Stone of Scrying
Ironwolf/EFHS
-Threadcutter
Khurga
*Zombie Centaur x2
***Dwarven Forgemage

I didn't have the optimal terrain template to deal with MoM, but I would have made do. I have a pretty good idea about how to place Objective Tokens/Terrain to deal with terrain based threats, so I think I could have minimized the first turn rampage, and more importantly, kept both Ironwolf and Magus alive and reasonably healthy. I have enough figures in my army to prevent the MC/C from touching Ironwolf, so then he has to decide which of my remaining figures will take the hit. I'd try to get a position where the ZC's and Khurga are the most vulnerable.

Bottom line is that it would have been a very fun game to play in. One thing to keep in mind, xrmndml, is that I haven't taught you quite everything I know. :)

I am the warlord who ran this tournament last night. I usually run a standard three round tournament because honestly, I've really never had more than 8 players. Last night, we had a great turnout and I hope it continues. I really liked the idea of adding another round, but last night was not feasible, because round three ended just as the store was getting ready to close.

However, with this many players, I will definately try asking for a volunteer for the "bye". Many of the participants at this venue are younger kids who have sometimes in the past asked to have a bye so they can watch their buddy's game. So I will keep this in mind for future tournaments. If I don't get any volunteers, I will have to resort to the random selection, unfortunately. I guess I just got used to "randomly" selecting the bye when their is a need for one to keep it completely fair. If you have read this entire thread, the participants at events usually include my husband and brother in law, so keeping the tournament unbiased is very important to me.

you are absolutely correct, it was completely unintentional on my part (otherwise I certainly wouldn't of posted it). I made a mistake, I didn't double check, nor was I questioned, and now I'm pretty ticked off at myself. I am getting a decent grasp of the rules, but I still have alot to learn, mainly in getting the details correct (big detail in this case).

It wouldn't, however, have changed my build, and I would have been able to do the same damage (one successful surging ramming shade does 4, and I would have mindtapped quickness to move the others in base, thus the same number of actions), but now i feel super crappy. This especially annoys me because it wasn't a preplanned part of the stradegy, i decided to do it based on the specific lay out of my first opponent.

Way to make myself look stupid on my first post.

If you looked stupid making these mistakes and posting about a game in which they were unintentionally made, join the club:D There's a lot to handle in 2.0 and I usually try to work the game in a way where we're both helping each other and at the end, noting the places where we got a rule wrong or let an SA slip through the cracks unused.

I wish I could play more to get really sharp. As it is, you got a good learning experience, some rules clarified and now you're ready to find the next gap in your gaming ability. Over time you'll fill in those gaps and the more you play, the quicker they'll fill in. I just hope your playgroup is one that is friendly and sportsmanlike so if a tournament gets won due to a mistake caught later, no one will be too upset.

At least you have a playgroup for real play going on, so keep on keepin' on, post your reports and please do let us know what your experiences with the learning curve are like. As you go from struggling to get it right to recognizing what's there to becoming pretty good and (hopefully) becoming a killer player, you can show others here on the Realms the stages of progression for a player and give them hope that they too can master the intricacies of 2.0. I bet once you do get the stuff down, you're gonna be a real handful! *smile*

Don't let the Man get you down:)

Wyvern