Monday, April 11, 2016

Adepticon 2016 Bolt Action Coverage



 What an amazing weekend! All the dice, armies, fubars, and last minute heroics all mashed up into one big ball of Adepticon! 

I have a tendency to ramble on so I am going to try and keep things controlled and precise! 

First off, a gigantic thanks and thank yous to our sponsors; these are the guys, besides Adepticon, that really make this happen! 

Warlord Games
Trenchworx
Blitzkrieg Miniatures
Army Group North
Black Tree Designs
Sarissa Precision
4Ground
Cigar Battle Mats
Frontline Game Mats

Equally important are all the people that helped make this happen and continue to impress me through time, effort, and coffee donations.

Hank Edley 
Matt Weeks
Andrew Chesney
Jon Russel
Jon's US Volunteer team
Mercenary Miniatures, local chicago team
Kyle Toth
Brent Sinclair
Chris Thomas
Jeremy Olsen

Schedule Recap: I do not have any photos from the thursday events but I will try to track those down.

Thursday Morning: Tank Wars
Thursday Evening: Combat Patrol
Friday: Team Doubles
Sat/Sun: US Nationals 

We had 20 teams show up for the event, 40 total people! The local scene has really rallied to this format. I encourage anyone to try it out! The biggest challenge is having people who are too nice and turn into chatter boxes! 

For this event I preset all 3 rounds of match ups. The Team event is tailored specifically to be the more casual and thematic event. Thus no swiss system was used. 


 
 As I go through improvements each year, this was a big hit! Gone are the days of yelling out match ups or posting a tiny little piece of paper! 

I used this for the nationals as well, so I could just fill in table assignments after each round. 

We had a lot of German teams show up for the Doubles event, I contribute that to the house rule of allowing armored transports to fire 1 weapon system without being full. 

Day of, I also added the house rule of, "Recce units may not perform an escape move when shot at by an ambush order" People applauded and threw babies... 

Note on Scores: For both the published results below, there was an army list submission penalty applied of 5% if lists were late. The theme score is based on a 5 point check list. Not in order, but things that affect it, multiple infantry flame throwers, more than 2 assault rifles per squad, time period mash ups, multiple recce vehicles (inconjunction with other offenses), background or write up, balanced/realistic force make up. 

Please feel free to email me at wyrdhobbyservices@gmail.com for copies of these rubrics, missions used, or other materials. 

Doubles Results: Listed as Team Captains Name

 I do not award a "best overall" award for this event because it is about having a good time. That is why sportsmanship is the top award.
Best Sportsmanship: Andrew Verticchio
Best Axis Generals: Bruce Romanick, sports tie breaker
Best Allied General: Duane Zoldak, sports tie breaker
Best Painted: Mike Malake, player vote tie breaker
Duck Boat Medal (theme award): Seamus Hamrin, sports tie breaker

130 maximum total points, % are weighted to get the overall
*All armies are Generic Reinforced Platoons, the army list description is merely my shorthand.

US Nationals Event Coverage 


What a marathon of Bolt Action events! People were troopers with a lot of excitement going into the weekend. While the title denotes a large, perhaps GW feel, IT ISNT! While more competitive armies were present, a theme score persisted and overall people had some great armies. I encourage ANYONE to ask attendees their thoughts and impressions. People had a blast.

 With a large German field the day before we had a more even split for the weekend. We had 40/48 attendees show up day of.

Army Break down
German: 13
British: 10
Soviet: 4
USA: 6
Hungarians: 1
French: 2
Chinese: 1
Polish: 1
Finns: 1
Japanese: 1

All missions, including the doubles packet were rifts on book missions as well as some old ideas from the Lord of The Rings Strategy Battle game days. This was a full on swiss system pairing event with each round being based on battle score, highest to smallest. Match-ups were adjusted depending on if players already played each other. 

US Nationals Results




While this event is also about having fun we do award an overall trophy.
Some folks may not like the look, but it is PERFECT for an Adepticon Event. The Adepticon Skull logo, an order die in its mouth, and 5 rifles supporting a 105mm round. Each of the rifles from the major powers during the war. Over the years Adepticon has done a great job incorpating all aspects of wargaming into its brand. Saga, 40k, fantasy and historicals.








Award Winners
Overall: Ben Cone
Best Axis General: Richard Davis
Best Allied General: Sabas Parada
Best Sportsmanship: Duane Zoldak, player vote tie breaker
Best Painted: Jeremy Olsen, player vote tie breaker
Duck Boat Medal: Kevin Dowsett

 *All armies are Generic Reinforced Platoons, the army list description is merely my shorthand.

130 maximum total points, % are weighted to get the overall



 The photos that follow are some of my favorites from the weekend. If you see a lot of tanks/vehicles that is from the doubles. Also check out the PHOTO ALBUM on the top right hand side for TONS of more photos.

write up for the army above, for more info on this army, A Bridge Too Far



New Burma table!


Slovak Rapid Division!

German City Fight

Hungarians March to the German Music Death on the Danube

So many amazing looking armies!

This guy so copied my winter theme germans... really great weathering

training exercise?

Kevin's best theme army for Nationals. A Brilliant Homeguard force.





Our newest table from http://www.mercenaryminiatures.com/

Straight from the movies!

Sarissa's V1 kits!

Brits try to storm the Russian Train

The Russian Train Tables. Future plans include expanding the track to 3 tables and having the train moving the entire time during games at a slow crawl. More for themed events, during the doubles the train moved between tables once at the half way point of each round.



American Flyer train and tracks