Quake City Rumble – Arrival

 

QCR is really the highlight of the yearly local events for Fantasy in Northern California.  Makes me a little sad to say this, as I would love the local SAWS to be this flagship event.  SAWS is however lacking in one major aspect… Beer.  This year they increased the beer from 3 kegs to 4.  And that is for an event the exact same size as the previous year.  They finished 3 between noon and midnight Saturday and the dregs of the fourth before lunch on Sunday.  It was quite impressive.  I did notice that there seemed to be less people who had brought their own drinks, but that could just be because those people whom I normally see in Sacramento who brought their own booze didn’t attend this year.  There was actually a big drop in Sacramento attendance (the Feliz brothers, the Havener brothers, Dustin, Grigsby, and Carbone, just to name 7 off the top of my head as I write this).

I hope that next year they finally take the step and expand, as I’m sure that would allow other areas besides Texas to fly in a large group.  The LD2 group, and some peripheral gamers, like myself, who travel have been doing their best to try to get the word out and encourage other areas to attend.  I hope that they are successful at getting this additional attendance, but not at the expense of the long standing players and other local growth.

The LD2 guys have come up with quality tournament terrain, if basic.  None of the fancy stuff of Northstar and WaaaghPACA! but good quality tournament terrain.  The fancy stuff does sometimes have the drawback of impeding play.  They know their stuff, and I think we only started 15-20 minutes late on Saturday morning and on time-ish Sunday.  I wasn’t able to stay for scores (oh no, end talk during arrival post!), as I had to go home for a personal thing I needed to do in the evening.

I’ve already talked about the missions, so I won’t be doing that specifically.  I will be mentioning them again in the context of the game and the match up.

My goal for the event was to not get a 20 on the table.  Or at least not for the first rounds.  I figured that my judge composition score of 6 could either be an advantage or a disadvantage, and that it was up to me to decide which.  If I went and scored a 20 rounds 1 and 2 I’d end up playing with the big time comps, the 1s and 2s by the end of the day.  I knew the people at that end of the spectrum (heck, I’m often one of them) and I knew they play for blood.  But if I skimmed 18s out of every game I would play softer composition armies, and later in the even players who had been able to get a few early 20s but then got slapped with losses when they hit the big timers.  I decided on the later.  Get 18s, have easier games, which would be less stressful.  Yes, perhaps that would mean that even with 5 wins I wouldn’t place, but that wasn’t a big deal.  After all, this is 2013, not 2012.  RankingsHQ is dead, I’ve proved I’m good and therefore can relax and play for fun (that is fun besides ‘winning is fun’).

I’m sure I could ramble on a little while longer, but I won’t drag this near pictureless post out.