Control: 40k Blues

I, Dalton Lewis, play Warhammer 40k, a brutal strategy game of war and murder in the far future. In order to play the game one builds little miniatures, paints them, and then plays a war game with them. I played the Thousand Sons faction in a tournament this weekend.

I first heard about this tournament online on a facebook group for the game a month or two ago. I looked at an example of the winnings and enjoyed the list of winnings — an Adepticon ticket for the winner was a neat touch. I noticed that the judge and organizer was someone who had judged me previously and I knew him. I signed up and asked if my friends would show up.

“Nah,” the one friend said. “I have stuff to do that weekend.”

The other friend — who goes with me to a lot of tournaments — wasn’t up for it.

“I’m not going,” he said. “I have been crammed every weekend recently. I worked on a film shoot last weekend. I just want to relax and do nothing for a weekend. I’m not going.”

I looked at the list of people and nine people were scheduled to arrive. I wanted to support it because I felt badly that the organizer, the judge, had put a lot of work into it. I wanted to support that. I hadn’t slept the night before but decided to go because I just thought that I should try it. I went to the game without sleeping at all and felt okay when I made it. The uber ride was crushingly expensive but I lived with it. I’m supposed to spend less money and am trying to do that. I buy fewer entire armies and eat out fewer times.

I arrived an hour early and talked to the employee there.

“Is this Dragonfall?” I asked.

“Yeah,” he said.

“Is there breakfast?” I asked. I am a fat man and regularly need food.

“Not until seven,” he said.

I waited until 7:10 and then ordered two chocolate chip muffins and a soda for the caffeine. I ate them and sat there in the large conference room. The judge showed up, and I knew him from Adepticon. I played the first game against a fellow chaos marine player. I gave Magnus a 3++ invul and a -1 for opponents to hit him and he survived the opponent’s first turn of firing. Magnus then killed my opponent’s knight — a great win for me.

I then shot his havocs off the board which took out a lot of his firepower. I managed to win the game and was proud of myself. I texted my friends on their group chat and was ready for game two. I was doing great.

Things got worse. Since I won I needed to play the ringer, the player who showed up to make sure that there were an even number of players. He played imperial guard and ultramarines and I had real trouble doing any damage to him. He screened with guardsmen and bullgryn, and I couldn’t get past the screen to kill his characters and tanks. I got annihilated after taking the objectives in the center and sitting on them. I didn’t have an army that could survive his attacks. I lost game two.

I began to get sick at that point. I hadn’t slept for a very long time then. I stood there, trying to play game three, and I totally broke down. I didn’t move my tzaangors up to screen for my characters and lost all my characters turn two against my third opponent. I could hardly think or function. I gave up on the game then and took an uber home. I took my meds and went to bed. I slept for twelve hours and then woke up ready to go back to the tournament for day two. I have a long history of missing the second day of these tournaments, but I managed to finish this one.

Games four and five went poorly. I didn’t have the capacity to do enough damage to stay in the games. I died too quickly with the frail units that I had picked for my army. At the end of the tournament the favorites had won most of their games and won the tournament. I went home and vented at going 1–4. I just hated being terrible at that game.

I don’t know that I learned anything. I am trying a different army, something easier to play with. I hope to play better in the future. I’m sorry that I’m bad at my hobby. I wish that I learn something from this set of games.

Thanks, and take care, friends.