Tom's Adventures in Facebookland - Part 1

There are 3 terrible places where you can find people saying dumb things about 40k. Obviously you can find these people everywhere but these are probably the most notorious:


1) Online 40k Forums
2) The Bell of Lost Souls Comments section (in fact a lot of the article are trash can worthy as well)
3) Any 40k related non ETC Facebook group.


Here is an interaction I had today. I recently joined an Eldar group as motivation to paint stuff, and I came home from a movie night with friends to a monstrously long comments section on debating Warp Spiders wound Artillery.


Tom Leighton: Guys this really isn't complicated. It's not down to player discretion, it's down to actually reading rules. FAQ > Codex > Main Rulebook is how it's always been and how it continues to be, whether or not the main rulebook says 'always wound against toughness' is irrelevant if the individual entry for the weapon in the Codex says initiative. End of story. Pick up your Warp Spiders, find the initiative of the Guardian Crew, and move on.


Random: for 95% of my games its down to that or a TO the other 5% is my mates having a laugh and using the thing that makes sense if it was IRL are you saying that us having fun is wrong? but its FAQ Where advanced rules apply to a specific model, they always override any contradicting basic rules then Codex>main rulebook


Tom Leighton: Uhm, what? xD. Ok, going to address a few points from that.
1) 'are you saying that us having fun is wrong?'. Did I write that in my comment? No. Then probably not :P.

2) 'where advanced rules apply to a specific model, they always override'. Define, 'advanced rules'. Explain how toughness of an artillery piece is a so called 'advanced rule' and the way you wound with a death spinner isn't, and lastly but most importantly, can you find me any rules reference currently in use anywhere to back up the assertion that 'this rule is complex so screw what your Codex says'.

Even for a British guy I'm horrendously sarcastic.


Random: Citation as requested the artillery type is an advanced rule and as such in some cases can over rule codex (none come to mind as im English and its 00:03 and not sure where you are from been British but if its scotland n ireland or walesyoull appreciate the time)
page 468-469 of the digital version

Basic rules apply to all the models in the game, unless stated otherwise. They include the rules for movement, shooting and close combat as well as the rules for morale. These are all the rules you’ll need for infantry models. Advanced rules apply to specific types of models, whether because they have a
special kind of weapon (such as a boltgun), unusual skills (such as the ability to regenerate), because they are different to their fellows (such as a unit leader or a heroic character), or because they are not normal infantry models (a bike, a swarm or even a tank). The advanced rules that apply to a unit are indicated in its Army List Entry.


and on your rules reference currently in use anywhere to back up the assertion that 'this rule is complex so screw what your Codex says'. part did you read the post before jumping in my post before yours ran through all this with the conclusion of .... well ill let you re read and ill wait here for my apology


Tom Leighton: Thank you for the citation random, it makes this much easier 'Advanced rules apply to specific types of models, whether they have a special weapon (such as a boltgun).' and 'because they are not normal infantry models'. That second one is probably the one most closely relating to the artillery, but any of them make my point.
By this definition, there is no denying that the toughness value of an Artillery piece is an advanced rule. However, by the first quotation that I made, the statlines and special rules of any and all weapons are also advanced rules. Therefore we have 2 seperate advanced rules competing against each other, therefore we refer to Codex > Main Rulebook. Therefore wound against each other.

Hence, it really is that simple.

That said, I find it actually hilarious that you are asking for an apology for me not actually reading what you wrote, when what you wrote actively failed to address any of the points that I made in my post, even going so far as to accuse me of being anti fun for pointing out the method of the rules. So you can stuff your apology quite frankly.

I literally lifted quotes from what you wrote and addressed them individually, and yet you accuse me of not reading your post. Alright mate.


Random: so you agree with my original statement,
apology accepted

i'm glad you now realise you only go to the codex rule if it specifically over rides the rule book not just assuming that it automatically does


Tom Leighton: Yeah I did, hence why I was a little bit surprised :P. However not as surprised as I was to click back onto Facebook and find dozens of comments on a very basic rule ^^.


Random: lol i know why i went into full sarcasm mode with you because even tho you were correct no need to talk to people like that its better for advanced players like yourself to help people if they only play with their friends then its fine to play it as it affects the gun in anyway they find enjoyable but point out if they play outside that group most people will do it this way because of then point it out in the rulebook


Tom Leighton: I'm sorry mate, you seem like your heart is in the right place but I cannot take that seriously. Of course people are welcome to play the game however they enjoy it, to suggest anything else is ridiculous. The conclusion that Warp Spiders wound against initiative had already been asserted on multiple occasions, and yet no-one heeded it. I took a different approach and broke the whole thing down, in my own sarcastic way. I even made this very clear that I was being sarcastic, and therefore my tone was not to be taken seriously, but at the same time i had to be firm with it, because it was clearly the only way to get through. I am a little bit perturbed that you are now trying to lecture me on behavior after trying to acknowledge an apology that i explicitly did not give. After all, my sarcasm was noted and noticeable (i literally wrote that I was being sarcastic) to avoid upsetting or offending anyone, yours was not.
Also, I never assumed automatically that the Codex overrides the rulebook. What I perceive to know is not always the same as what I actually know, it's merely a rhetorical device to lead those interested to that conclusion. I've been playing far too long and at too high a level not to know that xD

I'm an ETC player now. Why. The Fuck. Do I still have clowns. Trying to debate rules with me, and then personally attack me?

Forge World and its Relationship with Domestic Tournament Play

So the ETC’s over for another year, the dust has settled, drama has been unleashed, and many tired
and sweaty gamers have returned to a few weeks of not thinking about 40k. Because I’m crazy
however, I am already preparing for next year. A new Wraithknight’s torso sits atop my desk (I’m
striving for nice paint jobs this year, after the abomination I was using previously), a new list in the
works to try out at a tournament at the end of the month, and a slew of tournament packs on my
desktop to pick through at a later date.


One such rules pack is that for the 2016/2017 GT. The GT has somewhat been a bogie event for me,
despite attending 3 finales now, I have never actually qualified top 50% from a heat before
(FeelsBadMan, I know I suck). This year however it’s looking a little better for me. A new look
committee has moved one of the Heats to Bristol, so I now do not have to endure either a hotel or
my parents’ house in order to compete. The biggest change however, is that the GT is now moving
to an ETC format.


I personally really like this change, not only for my own selfish reasons, but for the benefit of the UK
tournament circuit as a whole. It has however kicked up a few issues regarding the exclusion of
Forge World, which a number of people are upset about. I am personally very much in the ‘against
Forge World’ camp, and the aim of this post is to explain why I believe this. The comments section is
open for discussion below and I will be paying attention to it.


Why ETC Format?


The primary reason for the exclusion of Forge World from this event is very simple, the ETC excludes Forge World, and the GT is attempting to mirror it. The question then can be broken down into 1) why does the ETC exclude Forge World? And 2) why does the GT want to mirror the ETC?

I’m going to start with point 2 first, as it is easy to break down. The 6 nations of the UK, Ireland and
Belgium, send a combined total of 48 playing members to the ETC every year, add on coaches and
mercenaries and you come to a number that easily exceeds the 50 margin. Then count the number
of players harbouring ETC ambitions, the number of players interested in the England squad for
example will figure in the dozens. So for just 1 of those 6 teams, you have dozens of people who will
want to play ETC format events.

Therefore, ETC events in the UK are incredibly popular.
Caledonian Uprising 2016, the single largest 40k event to be held in the UK this year, was an ETC
event. It held side events such as the highlander but the single largest was the standard, which was
pure ETC (no Forge World). In addition, many of the players that were in the highlander and other
such events were only there because tickets for the standard had already sold out, and many
expressed their desire to have instead played in the standard to me personally.This change therefore is a good choice from a ticket sales perspective, as ETC format is the most
popular in the country.

In addition, the ETC is arguably the biggest prize available to British players, and therefore it is held
with a degree of prestige. The GT too was once considered one of the most important events in the
Country; however with recent changes to the points and the allowance of Forge World, it removed
itself from the ETC style which people are so eager to prepare for. Therefore, Caledonian Uprising
became the toughest tournament to win in the Country, simply due to the number of top players
that it attracted. The switch back to an ETC format is an attempt to move back to this status of ‘main
domestic event’.

There are multiple other reasons too, such as nurturing players for the biggest stage, but the reason
for the use of the ETC format is not the issue that I want to address here. Therefore I am going to
move on, if you have any questions regarding the format selection let me know in the comments
below and I will elaborate on this further.

1) What is Manageable? - Organisation

It is not disputable that there are a lot of rules in this game, we have a large number of army books,
supplements, and digital additions. The ETC already has an independent FAQ of approximately 50
pages, which a variety of different rules questions relating to these books alone. Forge World’s rules
are undoubtedly horribly written, and thus the amount of effort that it would require to incorporate
all of these within the ETC FAQ would be unfathomable.

To explain why I am going to give you a brief rundown on how the ETC makes rulings for its FAQ.
They are all done by committee. So for each individual question, you have to gather together all
relevant parties (gathering 40k players is like herding cats), make the case for and against each
ruling, and then come to a democratic conclusion. Now consider the amount of Forge World rules
that are available, now consider that GW don’t even release any of their own FAQs for Forge World,
now read a Forge World book and tell me how well they are written (in terms of the rules in them
interacting with the rest of the game) and you begin to see that Forge World’s position in a serious
international event is untenable.

2) What is Manageable? – Players

As already mentioned, there are already an incredible number of resources for players to trawl
through, and thus the inclusion of Forge World makes this problem worse, especially when you have
to refer to a massive FAQ every other page. ETC players will often spend the best part of a year
honing their lists to a point where they are happy, even with current allowed resources. Adding
further piles of expensive books to this list not only adds to that time, as players try out different
combinations, but also force them to invest even more practice time after lists are released, learning
what various different things do.

The point I am getting at with this is that the line has to be drawn somewhere, and the line between
what is Forge World, and what is not Forge World, seems a logical place to do it. The moment that
you cross this boundary you are opening the gateway to pick and choose which Forge World you
allow, thus forcing the same situation that you would have had with the Forge World FAQs earlier.
With a simple yes/no answer of course, but the process remains the same.
So there you have a good reason to not use Forge World. However wherever you have people who
would like to use Forge World, you have reasons why they would like to. I’ve come across a few of
these recently, however only one really elaborated on why he believed that Forge World should be
in play.

1) Game Balance – Eldar

Eldar is running rampant over the domestic circuit, it’s not really debatable. The argument that was
made here was that allowing Forge World would create a level playing field where everyone would
have access to more options, and stronger ones at that.
In reality, this doesn’t work. The GT last year allowed access to Forge World, and guess which faction dominated? Eldar won again, and we got to see the fun that is a Warp Spider Wraithknight, and

Warp Hunters. It does not provide a level playing field at all, as Eldar get the same boost as everyone
else.

What it does do however is elevate the game into a ‘Dota 2’ style of balance. If something is too
strong, just buff everything else around it to level the playing field right? Assuming that this was
something that we could do, it would be damaging to the tournament circuit in the long run. In a
MOBA, it is absolutely fine. In a term based game, it reduces it down to who has choice of turn. Of
course, this is only a very primitive view of how this works, but it does take a large amount of skill
out of the game. It is not a Forge World only problem, and it has been a grievance of mine for a
while now, but it does accelerate the issue.

Things Bell of Lost Souls says

Yeah they'll encounter people playing like trash and won't know how to deal with it.

Bitch please.

Prologue

One of the things I’ve been looking to do with the new blog is make it more personal. In the past I would take units within a vacuum, cite uses for them, what they work well with, what they don’t, compare and contrast them with other units in the book, etc. This was effective to an extent, it could really show efficiencies and inefficiencies within a book itself.

What it failed to do however was give an accurate representation of how something would play on the tabletop, and as such it often gave the wrong impression. For example, mutilators. On paper they are pretty garbage, however I do not believe that they are the worst unit in the book, far from it. For example, Khorne Berzerkers. They have a distinctive idea behind how they should play on the table, however there are units and setups that simply do it far more efficiently, and with a lower base cost in the first place. Mutilators are the most efficient point per wound value (Toughness, base save, etc) in the book with the Deep Strike special rule. Need a Terminator Lord deep striking but don’t want to have him blown away? Here, take a single Nurgle Mutilator as a meat shield, enjoy.

Therefore, I would like to get more practical application across in this blog, rather than it just being a documentation of my mistakes in game and a list of units as judged on paper. So, here is a timeline of me in the hobby.

2003: Begins playing the Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game at the age of 9.

2008: Changes school, is introduced to Warhammer 40k.

2011: Discovers 40k Podcasting, attends first singles event with 30 Ork Nobz in trucks. Comes mid table.

July 2012: Attends first ‘Throne of Skulls’ event. Gets bodied 1W 1D 3L. First run out with Space Wolves.

December 2012: Meets first high level tournament players at Oxford Gaming Club (BM and MC)

January 2013: Attends second ‘Throne of Skulls’ event. Improves to 3W 2L.

February 2013: Attends Battlefield Birmingham 3. Finishes event 2W 3L.

March 2013: Attends first GT Finale. Finishes event 2W 4L.

July 2013: Attends Toy Soldier. Finishes event 2W 1D 2L. Defeating first ETC player. First run out with Chaos Marines

August 2013: Attends second Invasion. Finishes event 3W 0L. Best Sportsman.

October 2013: Attends first GT Heat. Despite finishing Day 1 on Table 2 narrowly misses out 2W 1D 3L.

January 2014: Attends first Caledonian Revolution. Finishes event 3W 2L.

March 2014: Attends second GT Finale anyway. Finishes event 3W 2L. Best General CSM.

April 2014: First introduced into the England Squad.

May 2014: Attends first War of the Roses. 3W 1D 1L.

July 2014: Attends second Toy Soldier. 2W 3L. First run out in 7^th Edition.

November 2014: Attends second GT Heat. After being conned out of 2 games finishes event 2W 4L.

January 2015: Referees at Caledonian Uprising.

May 2015: Attends second War of the Roses, gets rekt.

July 2015: Attends Caledonian Revolution. Finishes event 3W 2L.

October 2015: Attends first Luton event. Finishes event 2W 1L. First run out with Eldar.

October 2015: Attends third GT Heat. Finishes event 3W 3L, after a highly contentious ruling in the last game.

January 2016: Attends second Luton event. Finishes 2W 1L, losing on the top table in the last game playing for the tournament.

January 2016: Attends second Caledonian Uprising. Finishes 4W 1L, finishing 8^th in the largest 40k tournament ever run in the UK.

March 2016: Attends third GT Finale. Finishes event 3W 3L, due to narrow losses and crushing victories, finishes 13^th.

April 2016: Attends Clash of Lions team tournament. Finishes 2^nd.

May 2016: Attends third War of the Roses. Finishes event 4W 1L, losing on the top table in the final game to Josh Roberts. Finishes 8^th.

June 2016: Called up to represent an unnamed nation at the ETC.  

Wargaming with Rampage Reborn

And here comes post number 3 or 4 of this blog’s relatively unpopular series, ‘I’m sorry I’ve been away for so long but I promise there will be loads of exciting and regular new content’. Here is a place that I was once very proud of, the traffic was good and it stimulated a lot for me in terms of how I thought about 40k as a game. Of course, my thinking has evolved since then, and although I stand by a lot of the points I made here, in a lot of cases I feel that the way I went about it could have been much better.

I started this blog at the age of 18, with the aim of documenting my journey into the competitive realm of Warhammer 40k in Britain. To be honest I have skipped huge parts of this. I documented my first couple of independent tournaments but never really continued. There were a couple of reasons for this which I may go into another time but none of them are really valid.

The end goal however was always to win the ETC, and in 2 months’ time I will be making my debut in Athens, without really documenting that journey.

I’m now an IT technician in a fancy school, specifically dealing with A/V and what have you, meaning I have access to all of the fancy software that comes with it. This means I am now capable of delivering the complete revamp that I have always wanted for Wargaming with Rampage. I will be keeping the URL, and all of the old content will be staying up, however otherwise I am hoping to completely overhaul this blog. The 22 year old ETC debutant and GT contender who runs this place is very different to the 18 year old Dakkanaut and Throne of Skulls shitter that created it, and I would like this blog to reflect that. Stay tuned.  

New Leads

About 2 years ago, I retired my Space Wolves. The army had seen my from my first forays into the tournament scene (dipping my toe in at Throne of Skulls) to the 2013 GT Finale in May. I was excited by the prospect of a new army now that I was slightly more familiar with the scene, and I loved the Chaos Marine book.

The plan was, that this would be the army that saw me out of 6th edition, and well, it has done that. Admittedly 7th came slightly earlier than I anticipated, but it has achieved part of its goal none-the-less. The aim was also to be, that this army would see me through University, and allow me to put my mark on the tournament scene.

To be honest, I think it's done all 3 of these things. Obviously, I have been using it a year into 7th edition, and I have finished University while still using the army, however, I have had a number of issues with the book, leading to where I am today.

I do believe that it has allowed me to impact the tournament scene. This is mainly because I am known as 'that one pleb who still plays Chaos Marines', but I've also had fun with it. We've won a lot of things together, and scared a lot of people with late game clutch plays. But I think now is the time to put the book back on the shelf.

The book itself all comes down to one fatal flaw: It has very little in terms of appreciable damage output. It could handle itself pretty well in the beginning, Heldrakes dominated for a while, but then came Tau, and Eldar, and Marines, and every other book out there, then Eldar and Marines again. After the release of Tau and Eldar you could see Chaos Marines respective damage starting to fall off, so this really led to the increase in Chaos Marine lists that functioned in a similar way to my old Land Raider one. Don't die.

This basically relies on you trying your best not to be killed until turn 5, where you fly onto objectives and then try to stay alive until the game ends, which is much harder to do than the previous 4 turns.

However, with the age of D-Weapons, and the release of things like Eldar that are more than capable of just melting a Screamer Star with it's 2++ up, it's getting harder. Sure, there are some things you can do (which is why there is a CSM showing at the ETC this year) but honestly, I can't be doing with investing hundreds of pounds every couple of months into an army just so that it might be able to stay alive. With these kinds of Daemon based CSM lists, the entire game can swing on one dice roll, and sure, that's seat of your pants stuff, but it's only ever going to swing one way, and when it swings, it goes right up your booty and it ain't coming out. You rarely kill anything, and you spend the entire game running away from that one dice roll that will screw you, and even then there's no guarantee of anything. All for the low low price of multiple high investments every quarter.

So, that's why I'm retiring my Chaos list, and putting my book away. It's been fun, but head office doesn't seem to care about Chaos (see, Codex: Khorne Daemonkin, a sloppily written abomination to appease Chaos lovers knowing no-one can be arsed to write a proper book), they'd much rather release 2 hideously broken Eldar books than update the central Chaos ones.

Caledonian Revolution will be my last tournament with them, and I will consider it a success if I can get in the top 3/4s. Not been playing well recently, and the book isn't helping, nor is the fact that I'm very bored with it.

Who knows, if a new book gets released I might hop back on CSM, however it is unlikely. Expect updates on what I will be running around with shortly. My new toys are already on the assembly line.

If this happens at the ETC then...

So the ETC lists have been submitted and released, however due to the fact that I stick the the England squad like a rash I don't really want to talk about them too much. This is entirely to preserve competitive integrity as obviously I've been involved in the discussions both of our lists and regarding the lists of other squads since the release date.

But I do want to make a quick prediction, and release one of my thoughts regarding the eventual victor of the tournament.

I know a lot of readers will be upset about this, and if you have a rational argument to counter my thoughts, or you just want to vent, use the comments below. So, here we go:

I've been having a quick run over the general forum reaction to the lists, and I find the fact that so many people are seriously predicting the USA to win actually hilarious. If USA wins the 40k ETC event, I will personally take 12 nudes of myself using my webcam, and upload them to this blog.

All opinions expressed above are my own and not representative of anything or anyone else. In fact, I haven't even bothered to ask anyone about USA.

Have a nice day.

ETC Draft and Overkill

Held off on the latest post a little bit. There wasn't really anything to write about in terms of 40k goings on. So instead, I've spent the day looking for jobs, playing in the League of Legends IP boost weekend, and watching geography documentaries on YouTube (such nerd).

However, I have also been waiting for a couple of big moments, which occurred at midnight. The first of which was the list submission deadline for the Caledonian Revolution, which is mainly a prep tournament for the ETC, and which I needed to submit a list for.

The second was the ETC list deadline itself, after which the lists were released. As the squads have effectively been announced in full capacity, I can formally announce that I will play no part in either the English, nor the Dutch ETC squads this year (as I am eligible as a national for both). Instead, I'm going to spend my money going to watch the League of Legends World Championship in September and October. Fun times.

However, with the deadline now passed, I have been rifling very quickly through the lists. I have not looked at all of them yet, as I do not yet have access to all of them, and I have not had an in depth look either. However, a quick scan over 60% of the field has given me a couple of thoughts.

Firstly, I'm just going to take a very quick example, not naming anyone or anything like that, more to demonstrate a point. If you are a team, with a couple of world renowned, legendary players, with the rest of the team being fleshed out by people that are obviously known in your community, but not considered great players on an international stage (eg, Glenn Johnsons), then you need to think about list allocation, especially if the legendary players are known for changing their list every single year.

So, you have lets say 2 epic players, and 6 1/1 plebs. You then think about your draft. You have a number of 'power picks' so to speak. Lists that are extremely strong and should be harvesting huge points.

For an optimal team, you take the - lets say, there are 2 - power picks, so you have 2 lists that are pretty much guaranteed to get you loads of points, and 2 players that are pretty much guaranteed to garner you decent points as well. So, why on Earth would you put the 2 power picks in the hands of the 2 epic players?

Sure, you are probably going to get a very good haul from those 2 players, but in the end you are leaving the remaining 6 players that managed to perform ok in the isolated environment of their own country and throwing them all into the deep end with 'pocket picks' or '2nd tier lists'.

To be frank about this, if you throw a random with a pocket pick into a squad like the Germans, the Poles, the Swedes, the English, the Welsh, the Spanish, etc, they are probably going to struggle, and when you have 6 players out of your 8 really struggling for points, you are not going to win the round, and if you can't beat at least 2 of the above teams, there is no way you are going to win the ETC.

I talk about this a little bit as an outsider, I am also a 1/1 pleb. So if anyone holds a different view, please be sure to set me straight in the comments below.

Thank you 11th Company

When I look back over the last couple of years, and contrast 40k in 2012 to 40k in 2015. There are a huge number of differences. 3 years ago, we were on the verge of 6th edition, with Grey Knights and Necrons the most dominant on the scene.

Fast forward to 2015. The line of domination is blurred, with a wide variety of options available to the elite of the ETC squads. This does not mean that some codecies are not more powerful than others, Eldar for example are back to their usual state from 3rd edition to 7th edition with a vacation during 5th. 

You can talk about the enjoy ability of the game all you like, with the slow and considered releases of 5th edition, with all of the hype and speculation that came with them, to the rampant codex firing machine of 7th. But to be honest, I still love this game. 

One of the biggest of 40k for me cannot be laid directly at the feet of Games Workshop (although to claim that they do not hold ultimate responsibility for this would be naive in the extreme), but the passion from the community is gone. There is no longer a huge amount of hype for each Codex release.

This evening, I came home from a round of magazine delivering for hard cash to discover that the 11th Company had published its final episode, being laid to rest among such other great podcasts as Death or Glory and 40kGlobal (the latter of which I often appeared in). 

The 11th Company, and the 40kUk podcast (as it was known back then, before I met BJ) were the two driving forces that got my through my 500,000 word (with each word being a line of coding) A level Computing coursework, and are definitely the main reasons I got into competitive 40k. They drove my enthusiasm for the game, and challenged my assumptions on what would be strong, what made a good player or a strong list, or in general, how to play the game. But also did so in a way that was incredibly enjoyable. 

Without Dave Symcox, or Neil Gilstrap, or Pat, or Blackmoor, I would have never continued playing 40k, and 40k was the only thing that kept me sane in my first year of University, before I discovered other hobbys to accompany it. And so all I can say to the guys that created these podcasts, is thank you.

These podcasts are gone, many blogs have also folded, leaving us with the barren, money grabbing swamp that is the badly thought out, arrogant wasteland of Bell of Lost Souls. 

Unlike Bell of Lost Souls however, my plan of action is not to release a sniveling, stupid and shameful display of self pity blaming an entire community because I lack the motivation to actually organise things properly.

Yesterday, I graduated from University, and am currently considered unemployed by the British Government. In the meantime, whilst I am applying for jobs, I might as well be doing something constructive. Therefore, over the coming days, weeks, and months, I plan to be releasing more video and written content than ever before. 

Thank you 11th Company.

Learning to Improve at 40k

Over the last year I haven't really been able to play much 40k. This has led to some disappointing results: Mid table at Toy Soldier, being knocked out of the GT  (an event at which I had won multiple awards the previous year) in the Heats, and coming 5th at a tournament I really felt I could win or at least should be making the podium.

Practice is key it is true, often people quote 'practice makes perfect'. This to a degree is true, but it is not the be all and end all. For example, about this time last year I was nailing practice, beating down most of my opponents convincingly and getting lots of games in. The results from then were as follows: Top half at Caledonian Uprising, mid table at Death or Glory, mid table and Best Chaos Space Marine at the GT Finale, and top third at War of the Roses.

Lets start with the Caledonian, at the end, I was pleased with the result, it was the first time I had ever legitimately hit top half, but looking upwards, given the size of the event, I felt I could have done a lot better.

Death or Glory next. This one started really well, and I flew to the top tables. I then lost to Dan Sackett and Rob Madeley - two players that I highly respect - to be in a break match for top half with Steve Setterfield, who I had played at the GT Heats, and had one. This time however, we were both really tired, and he had a hangover. Despite this, I whiffed and drew the game.

GT Finale, I can't really argue with this one, although I feel there were games in there that I messed up and could have easily turned a loss into a win.

And War of the Roses. Pretty solid tournament overall, although my only loss was a case of me throwing the game away with a huge mistake.

So, despite all of the practice, I was still making massive mistakes or just straight up getting outplayed at every single event. Therefore I would argue that it is not the amount of practice that counts, but the quality of it. For an extreme example, I would rather go and spend a weekend practicing with any ETC squad than playing at the beginners club at a local GW every day for a year.

But you don't need ETC calibre players in order to learn. It is exceptionally easy for you to evaluate your own performance, and think about where you need to improve. For example, around last year I was horrendous at judging match ups, so I worked on my deployment play, spent ages micro-engineering it for the best possible result. It would take a while, yes, but it would set me in really good stead for the rest of the game.

I played a game on Monday, against what I perceived to be a difficult match up, but my deployment allowed me to capitalise on positional mistakes and punish. At the end of the game however, I was given time to stand back, and evaluate my own performance.

The result was, that I was proud of some elements of my play - such as my deployment and my micro management - but that I was unable to translate it to an overall steamroll. I focussed too heavily on individual pockets of fighting and deciding where I needed to allocate various units at what time, that I lost a sense of the greater picture, not even considering what my opponent might do next turn and how I needed to play around it.

Such playing in the moment can be beneficial, as it opens you up to utterly snowball the game out of control if you win every single pocket of fighting simultaneously and at the right time. But this is exceptionally rare, so during War of the Roses this weekend, my goal is not to hit a certain position, but to rather improve my macro level play and not get so caught up in the moment that I forget about what my opponent could do. I've learnt to do it during deployment, now I need to focus on potential plays as they unfold.

Video Battle Report

Hi everyone, been really busy the last month with University work and what have you. However I have managed to grind out a recording of a game I played with John Booth over Vassal last month, with 5 hours of cut footage. Have at it.

Open Letter to Bell of Lost Souls

Dear Administrators,

I used to read  your website on a regular basis, however due to the number of adverts crashing my terrible computer I gave that up a couple of years back. Now, with my brand new PC, I find myself back at your website reading what I have to say is one of the most misguided pieces of journalism that I have ever read.

Let me first introduce myself, my name is Tom Leighton. I am a regular player on the UK tournament circuit, and a final year student of a BA Honours Degree in Publishing Media at Oxford Brookes University.

In case you cannot recall, I am talking about your article entitled 40k: Breaking the game (Found here: http://www.belloflostsouls.net/2015/02/40k-breaking-game.html). Now, I am all for an analysis of the mindset of a competitive player and why they enjoy the game the way they do, anything 'philosophical' I can generally approve of. This article is not philosophical, this article merely comes across as the author's way of making themselves feel like a legitimately decent 40k player after being smacked about by someone who brought a more powerful list.

Now, for a portion of this article I can agree with the author, playing a game where the lists are completely mismatched is not fun. However, I would like to take a quote from the article here,

'Some people, like myself (there should be a comma here, back to the quote) want a nice, balanced game to stretch our abilities and make it all about your choices on the field rather than list building.' 

This is but one example of the author's complete lack of experience regarding the tournament scene, other examples include 'Checkers is a completely balanced game', it is impossible to completely balance a game. And, 'A competitive list in 40k basically amounts to "how many rule-breaking units can I stack together" I'll ignore the last bit from the initial quote as I'm coming to that anyway, but that isn't the formula for the vast majority of competitive lists.

If you just think of competitive 40k for a second, you probably think of tournaments, an environment where everyone is trying to build a strong list, so every game you are playing against someone, who has also attempted to build the strongest list possible. To paraphrase, if one 'dick list' is facing off against another 'dick list' is this not a relatively fair pairing? Both players have come into the game with the same goals, and the same expectations, and thus we have an enjoyable game where both players know what to expect and essentially, it comes down to which player can understand and play the match up between the armies the best. Aka, who can make the best 'choices on the field'.

If you think about running into a guy at your local club or friendly local gaming store, and it hasn't been the greatest of games due to a mis-match in terms of the end goals of the lists of each player, one of two things has happened.

1: You and your opponent have been involved in some miss-communication, your opponent is a competitive player who may be preparing for a tournament and was coming down to the club in anticipation of a practice game to help improve, while you came down in anticipation of just bringing your collection and rolling some dice.

2: Your opponent is an arsehole who gets an ego boost off turning up at the local club and kicking the crap out of a fluffy army.

If the former, there is nothing malicious here and there is no reason to defame competitive players as 'dicks', there was simply a mis-understanding regarding what to expect from the game.

If the latter, then firstly, you do not have to play the guy in the first place. If this is what they are like then they probably have a reputation and you know what you're getting into, and if not you'll soon discover that they are not someone you would enjoy playing and so you can simply refuse to play them.

In the case of the latter, you can label them as a dick all you want, admittedly you could refuse to play them but that's by-the-by. Call them all of the names under the Sun if you like, but it is completely unacceptable, and quite frankly - defamatory, to say that they are a competitive player. If this individual is turning up week in, week out, to beat lists that are a complete mis-match for them, then that is by definition the exact opposite of a competitive game, because there was no competition. And let's say for the sake of argument that this individual does attend tournaments, I can guarantee that they probably won't do very well at them given the practice that they will have had, and if they act like an arsehole at a tournament and ruin the experience for people, they will simply be barred from the tournament (at least in the UK).

To conclude, I have been on the UK tournament scene for going on 2 years now, and I have only met one individual that I would not call a friend. Competitive players are not douchebags looking for a quick ego boost off a player who enjoys the game in a different manner, they are lovely guys who also happen to enjoy testing the strategy, not just of the game, but also of list building, to its limits against like minded individuals, and I am disappointed that Bell of Lost Souls of all places would publish a piece (given your collection of writers) categorising competitive players as 'Dicks' and passing it off as 'philosophy'.

I hope that this will not happen again in the future,

Tom Leighton

The Difference Between Tournament Players and WAAC Douchebags

I was recently reminded of an article I had prepped for the 'Northern Wastes' blog, during the production of the next post, and to be honest the next one is taking rather a long time to process. So in the meantime I thought I would have a little rant here regarding the perception of tournament players.

Now for some context, this was around about Adepticon when Nick Nanavati won it with his Flying Monstrous Creature list. An article detailing this appeared on Bell of Lost Souls and of course this was advertised on Facebook. This post was then commented on by one of my friends and Welsh ETC player Mr Mike Collins so - ever interested in the American meta and their circuit - I decided to take a look.

Now I am well aware of the infamous commentors over there known as the 'BoLS Trolls', but to be honest I feel that no matter whether they are trolling or not, this is an opinion shared by a large chunk of the community, especially online. But to be perfectly honest, this was just in the Facebook comments, not even on the main sight.

The general sentiment given was that Nick is a prick (that exact word was used) and a WAAC douchebag for taking such a bent list and winning a tournament with it, and that a chimp could win a tournament with it. And I have a few problems with this.

Now I'm not here to defend Nick personally, hell I've heard stories that he's a pretty cool guy but I've never met him and I only heard the stories after my initial disappointment with the community so it had no impact whatsoever.

Firstly, it is worth pointing out that the expectations of what you're going to face at a tournament and what you're going to face at your local store or - if you are commenting with such tripe on a public space - in your mum's basement, are completely different. At tournaments, the fun is in going up against the best players with the best lists and giving them a tough game, the fun is in the puzzle of how to win the game and working out the best strategy and tactics for each scenario, not in turning up, sitting around for 40 minutes carelessly removing your beautifully painted models from a table courtesy of the titan in the apocalypse game, before spending another 40 minutes doing the same to your opponent. If you want to get pissed and throw dice around, to each their own, but you have no right to impose how you enjoy to play the game and your expectations of what you should face on others.

Therefore, you can guarantee that the vast majority of the 256 people in the room will also have attempted to bring the strongest list they can. Sure, if you're going to compare one optimally efficient list with your 'little bit of everything' Tyranid list, it's probably going to be an unbalanced game because the tournament list is clearly the more efficient. But then when you compare it with a list built for a similar purpose, suddenly it's a bit closer, and that's the entire point. You are all striving for the same goal of winning the tournament and that's the fun of it.

So when you have a room full of 256 armies all built to be as strong as possible, how can you possibly say that you could take the same list and win the tournament 100% guaranteed without being a crazy good player. In my opinion, I don't think that there is anyone in North America that could  say that, and I even think that in Europe it's a stretch (if you want to compare NA with EU in 40k I have tonnes of ammunition to say that EU players are stronger, I don't think it's even a discussion). The fact that you would even believe such a thing shows how much exposure you have to tournament play, and that is absolutely zero. You don't understand the concept of relative balance and you don't understand the fact that beating up random 12 year olds on vassal with the curtains closed does not make you an ETC calibre player. It just makes you a borderline paedophile with a messiah complex.

This brings me to my point regarding WAAC players and tournaments. Anyone reading this who has ever made a comment relating to tournament players being dicks, I urge you. Go to a tournament. I don't even mean a local one where you might know some of the guys, I mean a big tournament, with loads of strangers, and tell me that you had a bad time. Yeah, occasionally you might get the one insecure guy pretending to be good who is kind of an arsehole but no more than 1 a tournament. I have been going to these things since 2012, and I have only run into one individual who I would truely call a hateful human being.

Sure, tournament players are trying to win their games, but the at all costs bit is extremely steep. There is no point winning unless you can do it fairly, otherwise you are just proving the point that you do not believe you can beat the opposing player without cheating your way to it or sapping all of the fun out of the game. And that's what this hobby is about at the end of the day, fun. We have recently had the Charlie Hebdo terror attacks in France, something that has hit me as it is in an industry that I will work in in 4 months time. The entire point of that is down to freedom of speech, and that by extension means freedom of political, religious (or lack thereof) and philosophical views provided they do not mean the taking of human life.

This is a vast hobby, with multiple avenues to explore, so please, make sure you educate yourself on a topic before you judge it.

CSM in 7th and Obliterators

It's all requests Tuesday, and as I can't be arsed to go to bed due to the 48 hours of pain I have lined up over the next few days here's a blog post.

I've spent the last month or so coming out of my cocoon of 6th edition and out into the big bright world of 7th, and a lot has changed. As such, I've been trying out a variety of Chaos lists from variations on the goofy curveball raider list that did so well for me in 6th, to ripping off a gentleman from Belarus. In the end, I think I've settled on stealing from the Belarussians with a few tweaks, which I cannot go into detail of right now for a number of reasons.

Instead, I'd quite like to talk about Obliterators, and how they fit in the modern game of 40k. If you disagree with any of the points made here, I'm more than happy to discuss them in the comments section, and if you just think that I'm a flat out dipshit with less game knowledge than a 12 year old in a hobby store, I'm more than happy to compare our credentials (/snobbery).

I have always been an advocate of one particular style of play since getting into Chaos Marines, and that is board control. If I am able to dictate where you are on the board throughout the game through my threat ranges then I can essentially dictate which objectives you can get to, and if I can dictate which objectives you can get to I can take necessary steps to prevent you from claiming them and take the ones out of your reach to close out the game. With my old Land Raider list it was essentially possible to win a game without either player losing a single model. Very few want to get near to them, and if you only have 4 Lascannons et al I'm just going to dance around the board's terrain and laugh, pushing you into a corner all the while, because my threat range is as long as my arm. Of course there are match ups which completely shut this down, but that is the case with most things.

In 7th I believe this theory of board control to be even more important, and this is simply due to the fact that it is much harder to contest objectives now. With only Eldar and Necrons able to do it to a consistent 'turn 5 jumping' level. But lets break this down to a very core level. 5/6 missions are based around capturing objectives, so lets use this as a base win conditions. So the 2 ways to win a game of 40k are to 1) hold more objectives than your opponent, or 2) wipe them from the table (a very crude breakdown but lets roll with it for a second).

Of course, you can kick the crap out of your opponent in order to claim more objectives, it's a perfectly viable strategy because you're obtaining board control via removing your opponent from the table, but the point remains that you can essentially substitute 'hold more objectives' with 'have better board control'. This is precisely why objectives need to be 12" apart, these missions are literally designed to test board control. Even if you are jumping the objectives with jetbikes turn 5, and the game ends for you to win after hiding in the corner for 4 turns, the point still stands. Your opponent was not able to bubblewrap the objectives properly, and you were able to capitalise on it, in short, you were able to control the board better because you were able to exploit the parts of it that you needed to.

So lets come back to our win conditions, 1) Control the board better than your opponent 2) Wipe them from the table. Now how do Obliterators fare in terms of helping you fulfill those win conditions?

Obliterators have always been a solid individual unit within the Chaos Codex. They're versatile, they're pretty tanky, and generally produce something that the Codex lacks in terms of a viable shooting unit. If you're looking for a rundown of Obliterators at the start of 6th edition, by a 19 year old that was still getting embarrassed at small events and Throne of Skulls, you can find it here (http://wargamingrampage.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/chaos-marine-analysis-obliterators.html) I sucked. However, 2 years down the line with a crap load more experience at a top level and a few things in my trophy cabinet, do I still think that there is a place for them in competitive lists with reasonable expectations of winning games? I'm going to jump the gun here and say no, and here's why:

(Wednesday) Lets start from the ground up here. I spent last night drafting out a list centred purely around Obliterators, and making them as efficient as possible. I'm not going to go into full detail with it because I need to be at work in 45 minutes. Essentially you're going to start with 3 units of 3 Obliterators with Mark of Nurgle, taken in a primary detachment of Crimson Slaughter for the Divination psykers and whatnot. So 2 Sorcerers on bikes, then in 2 units of Spawn to provide peel for the Obliterators, you don't really want them getting charged because - although proficient in close combat - they are still not fabulous especially with the lack of Fearless, and every turn you spend in assault is a turn you're not shooting.

Then you probably want to take a brick of Tzeentch Heralds. They can go in a Horror unit they're fine you don't really need them in anything faster so you'll save points on discs and an extra squad there. Then just use the remaining points on a few mandatory scoring pieces, some more peel or more flashy upgrades. Then sit as a brick, daemons in the centre, then Oblits, then Spawn. Cast up Cursed Earth every turn to give the Obliterators a 4++ save and then spend the rest of your dice spawning. Then move up into the centre of the board and take it. You can then spread if you need to but essentially you have a 24" threat range from the edge of your circle, so approximately a threat 60" in diameter.

So lets go back to our win conditions, and to be realistic, Chaos Marines should not be wiping people from the board very often. In terms of damage output we're pretty weak. Obliterators are our only ok shooting unit (they're pretty expensive for their output per turn really when compared to other factions, a perfectly reasonable comparison because that is what you are going to be attempting to outshoot), and once you've fully loaded yourself on those there's nothing else to add. Shooty CSM does not really work. Assault wise, possibly, but if you are smashing someone based on assault they have not taken the tools to protect their big hitters which will help to clear you or kite you around the board, and they should revise their list. At the top tables, you are not going to be able to table someone via assault either.

So then you come back to board control. Taking the example list above, you are having an effect over a large section of the board, but how great is the effect? Spawn are exceptionally good at tying things up and wiping squishier units but it's not a unit that makes you crap yourself in terror. Obliterators are a similar story. Sure if you have all 9 pump their fire into something then you will probably kill it, but damn that's a lot of commitment. As I mentioned earlier, the damage output per Obliterator per turn is not that great.

Now you can head down to your local gaming club, play a guy with a nicely painted Space Marine army, beat him by taking the middle and claim that it works. But that isn't evidence for working in tournament play. So lets compare it against the last 9 lists that I played against in tournament play (the last 2 events) and see how it would do:

1) FMC daemons. Come down, spawn tie up 2 DPs, the rest charge the Obliterators and kill them. They don't care about your threat, you don't have enough protection and your Oblits are unlikely to kill a flying DP in a turn even with Prescience.

2) Centurion Marines. You might do ok here. Really depends on the first turn.

3) Shunt Grey Knights. Again, can just jump forward, they had enough force weapons to deal with the spawn followed by the 3 Dreadknights eating the Obliterators. You might kill 1 before it gets in but if he commits fully you are in trouble.

4) Wraithwing. The real problem here is that he doesn't care about your spawn.

5) (at work on my phone) Dark Eldar. He didn't really spam lances or poisoned so really the list would be fine here.

6) Wave Serpents and Lance. He doesn't really care about your damage or your potential to tie him up so he can dictate the board much better. Until he catches up with and kills you.

7) Wave Serpents and Wraithknights. Slightly bette as you can now try and tie him down. But then he'll probably spend the first couple of turns clearing a few spawn before going for it an doing exactly the same thing.

8) horde nids. You can't tie everything down so he'll lock down your spawn with his bigger stuff, the oblits with gaunts and then have free reign of the board with the rest of his stuff.

9) weird ass summony ork/chaos list. Similar problem except he is more able to kick your teeth in with his DP.

So how's the list performing? Not particularly well. The main problem really here is that you don't have enough clear and your strength of board presence in terms of your threat because of this just isn't enough to deal with most. In short, an obliteration centric CSM list does not work.

So would they work as a support stor file role? I think the question you always have to ask yourself when building a list is 'why?' Why am I taking this unit? What does it bring to my army that nothing else does as well. I've use mutilators at tournaments in the past, not because I wanted to be that guy that used weird ass models, but because they were better suited to a role than anything else. Therefore, it doesn't matter if a unit is considered universally solid, if it doesn't fit the role you're looking for taking it is like pouring points down the drain.

If your list structure is 'I have some choppy units, now I need some snooty units' then to be honest you may struggle. When building your list ask how you are going to win games. Thus, you can generate an overall play style, and if a unit doesn't fit with that, leave it out.

10pm Christmas Eve. Still at work. On the toilet. The problem then is, even if you have a list maxed out on Obliterators. They don't provide any threat over the boar due to their relatively lacklustre point for point damage output, and despite the fact that they're tanky they don't have the speed to really tie anything up unless your opponent is exceptionally careless. Meaning that for their points cost they neither threaten a large enough area of the board efficiently enough for what they do (spawn do it better) and are not really able to clear most units well. 

Tl;dr. Obliterators are an expensive unit that provide very little in terms of achieving the win conditions of 40k.

Army List Advice on Forums - How good is it?

Seeing as I love to write scathing and sarcastic rants regarding things I hate (University Accommodation Internet Connection. Maybe I'll post it sometime), I decided to nostalgically delve deep into the sarcastic 40k underbelly that are online forums. Recently I've been pretty patronising of forums and users in a few of my posts, and I'd just like to clear the air.

Firstly, just don't post your list for advice on a forum if it's fluffy. Because any advice anyone gives can easily be dismissed 'because it's for background'. If it's for background, nice, just don't come into a setting purely there to give competitive advice when that's not what you're looking for. That said, I wouldn't necessarily recommend it if you are looking for competitive advice either, and here's why:

First of all, you have to think about what forums do, they essentially provide a platform for individuals to communicate and discuss a certain shared interest, right. And one of the appeals of this is that everyone is on a level playing field in terms of how your opinion is viewed and perceived. As a personal example; you could be the best Chaos Space Marine player in the United Kingdom or a guy with 300 points of Chaos Marines who names every model in his army and your opinions will carry the same weighting unless the poster has some knowledge of who you are, which is exceptionally unlikely as if they were looking for a particular opinion they would come straight to that individual rather than posting on a public forum hoping to snipe an individual.

Sure, you can make the argument that they are looking for someone with more experience with the faction, but it comes back to the point again, it's a complete lottery, and frankly, the vast majority of opinions I have seen given in the last week of nostalgically browsing DakkaDakka.com could practically be written by a bot because it all follows the same formula.

1. Check list for units commonly perceived as bad.

2. If units are found, remove from list.

3. If units are removed from list, replace with unit of same slot commonly perceived as good.

4. Check unit gear for perceived sub optimal loadouts.

5. If loadouts found, remove from list.

6. If loadouts are removed, replace with publicly perceived optimal loadout.

7. Once the above steps are complete, attempt to insult or patronise anyone who does not follow this formula.

From someone who has built weird and whacky lists from scratch and done well with them in top level tournaments, this is not how to write a good list. The only list I can think of that was ever any good that effectively used this formula was Wraithwing, and even then it just so happened that they worked well together (D-Lords, Wraiths and Night Scythes with barebones Warriors). Besides, that book is now the oldest in the game, and that list was first created in 5th edition.

As mentioned in the previous post regarding Obliterators. The key to a strong list is one where all its components are working together towards the same win condition, not just blindly picking units that seem good at certain roles. The days of well-rounded 40k lists covering all bases with each unit are over. If you have an 1,850pt army, whose win condition is to smash your opponent so that they cannot physically control enough objectives or flat out tables them, then having 600 points put into Plague Marines is not going to help you achieve that, so you effectively have 1,250 of a tabling army. You have an inefficiency, because quite frankly you don't need a beefy ass unit holding your backline if the enemy has nothing to clear it with, which quite frankly, is EXACTLY what your list is trying to do.

Forget the plague marines, take the dirt cheap option and pour all of those points into something that will actually help you win the game.

EDIT: This is not to say that if you reply to posts on forums you don't know what you're talking about, it's very kind to offer assistance with other peoples lists and you have my respect for it. However I would highly recommend that you try to think a little bit more about the box in terms of helping the playstyle that the original poster is going for. 

Year Behind, Year Ahead

Despite the fact that this blog has been dormant for the last year, I'm still pretty ok with how the year has gone. To be honest it's been a bit of a wake up call. I came out of 2013 with my first bits of tournament experience under my belt and thinking that I was 'the big dog', and to be honest, in the first 8 months of this year I really felt I was progressing, and I was playing the best 40k I had ever played by the end of it, but in the grand scheme of things I was no where near winning anything and was very much a middle of the pack player. Finishing consistently top half, but now occasionally giving ETC players good practice, winning my first ever awards outside of sportsmanship (well, physically, I still count the doubles at the end of October 2013 as a tourney win, there's a rant back there somewhere), and striving forward in the scene.

Then 7th hit, I started to get more and more into PC gaming, 3rd year University hit, and I reverted back to complete scrub status.

So what am I looking to achieve in the next year. First and foremost I want a trophy. Not a certificate. I want a big ass cup on my mantlepiece, and a KR case with a label on it. I don't care if it's 20 man, my aim is to win it. I don't want to be in mid table obscurity anymore, and the step to that is to stop playing like I belong there. I'm giving myself until the GT finale to get my form from the end of 6th back, and then I intend to press on, getting any games I can and playing against ETC calibre players at every opportunity, as I also want to make a serious push on the England team for the 2016 season.

As for the blog, I have been wanting to rebrand for a while now. The original name came from my forum alias which is really both far less known than my real name on the tournament circuit and far worse as a name than my IGN on PC. I've also grown up a lot these days, and the players and forums I used to beg for advice from are now my equals all over the world and 9 year old Jimmy down the club. I may press on with this in the next few months, the site name is also likely to change so keep your eyes peeled for that but all the content should still be up there.

Anyway guys, thanks for sticking with me. I've got some exciting things that will be coming up at the end of next month, so prepare yourselves, the next year is going to be exciting....

Getting Political - UK Voting Age

A bit out of left field this one, not much has really been going on 40k wise since my last post. Been trying to get in as many games as I can to really get used to the list before the England event in December, but I've been watching Sky News and they have an advert about their youth politics programme or whatever it is, and in it a point is raised regarding the voting age. It is a point that has been raised on the eve of at least the last 2 general elections here, and the statement went as thus.

'She's allowed to vote, she's 19, I'm 16, and I'm not allowed to. It's not fair'.

Ok, there is so much wrong with this statement, so let's dive in.

Firstly, I'm 21, and I still don't think that I should be allowed to vote. I'll get into that a little later, but first of all lets rip apart the quoted sentence.

Number 1: If you are a teenager, and you end your point with the phrase 'It's not fair' you lose any credibility that you and your viewpoint may have had for the purposes of that argument. You are literally using the most sterypical quote quote for your demographic and playing directly into the assumption that you are naive, immature, and with a completely unwarranted belief that you should have more power in the world, i.e, the power to vote.

Number 2: So let's ignore the above for a second, assuming that it in fact is not fair, you have still not made your case for this. 'She's 19', so? 'I'm 16', ok? Therefore, 'it's not fair' that I can't vote.... I can take 2 facts and come up with a completely unrelated conclusion as well. If you were to say that the age and maturity difference is negligible and therefore you have just as much of a right to vote as your sister or whoever, ok, at least you've made a point here. Regardless of how strong of one it is at least you have some foundation.

As for the legitimacy of the above point,  the 19 year old has been alive more than 15% longer than you have, and has far more experience of the world as she is no longer stuck in a system that she is legally bound to in the form of school, which, even if you are no longer in school, you cannot have been out longer than a few months come the election. This is not a question of age, one party has experience of the outside world, one does not.

Number 3: Which brings me very nicely onto my next point. Voting age is not a question of maturity, I've met some very mature teenagers and some very immature people in their 20s (I'm a prime example). But coming back to why I believe I should not be allowed to vote. I have not been a part of the working world in its entirety. I went straight from school, to 6th form, to University, and yes I have worked a summer job I have not had experience of the outside world without the safety net of a mentor or a teacher or without accommodation provided for me via outside funding.

Even at University I have never been solely responsible for myself. I've never been out on my ass trying to make it or completely provide for myself or a family, it is very difficult (with the exception of tuition fees) to become a victim in society due to political decisions. In short, I am directly effected by very few political choices, therefore I lack the experience of the consequences of those decisions to give an informed weighting to any policies and therefore any party.

This ignorance is not down to me not paying attention to politics, I've eagerly followed the politics of the UK and the United States in particular for the last 5 years. I ran a politics forum for a year in the 6th form and am always happy for a debate. The ignorance comes from the lack of experience. It is one thing to read and article or a book and make a decision based on that but that article or that book will already come from the perspective of its author, which in turn will be influencing you.

So how can you possibly say, as a 16 year old, that you have enough experience of the world outside of school and the fallout of political decisions to make an informed and educated opinion on how our country should be run?

Sit back down. [/rant]

GT Heat 3 Report and T.Leighton vs National Rail

Prepare yourselves for a pause and restart post because this one is going to be an essay, all encompassing events over 4 days. Oh Joy. Before you think about the pain of reading this lengthy abomination, think about the pain I'm going through writing it. The events documented in this post may have scarred me for life (especially Friday, that was awful).

A Glorious Return - Who Am I Now?

When I started this blog it was designed as the documentation of the introduction into the UK tournament player. This player was an 18 year old kid who got his ass handed to him at Throne of Skulls, losing 3 games including 2 tablings and only picking up 1 win. If I had the opportunity to talk to this scrub I'd have instructed him to sell all of his 40k and to go and spend his money playing something that was more to his skill level. Like Minecraft. This kid went by the alias of Rampage, and despite the humiliation of getting bent over a table by a group of GW store egos, for some reason he wanted more (maybe he  just swung that way or it was some kind of weird fetish I don't know), and if this story intrigues you go and have a look at the 200 posts that proceed this, you'll be in for a fun evening if the alternative was attentively watching the BBC News Channel et al for the 8 hours that such a marathon would take. Still, it's a higher standard of writing than the 50 shades series that thing is trash.

But back to the point, not even I can understand the insanity that crossed this kid's mind, and to this day 2 1/2 years on his Win/Loss is very much mid table. That said, I am not the same player that I  was 2 1/2 years ago, I have moved on from such things as having a terrible alias and attending tournaments as merely an objective (seriously anyone can fork over some money and turn up at a table). Phase 1 of my journey as a competitive gamer was to consistently finish in the top half of tournaments and give top level British players a tough game, and when I'm on it I can do that. After about half a year's break from the hobby I'm back with a new objective. Challenge for podium spots at big tournaments, win small events with ease, and represent my country at the ETC. So let's begin with a quick rundown of where I am now.

In the last 6 months I...

In June 2013 'Wargaming with Rampage' hit a peak, almost making 5,000 reads in a single month. Since then, I have struggled for motivation, and this has been all too evident in the crappy content that I have put out since. This has at part been due to University, partly due to my growing League of Legends addiction, and partly due to the fact that I no longer feel I need to validate myself by posting maths on the internet and hoping no-one complains. A good example of the latter is Blackmoor's blog, not much content been going up on there since he's been on the 11th company (just kidding I'm not Blackmoor (I'm better than that guy (bring it Blackmoor! (Just not on Vassal I play really badly on that system)))).

So, in short what have I been up to in the last 6 months. Well, I went to the GT heats, was sick in a gutter and missed out on automatic qualification by 1 slot because people didn't turn up for day 2. However I still got through courtesy of 'Best Chaos Marine player at heat', and then turned up at the final in March and claimed best CSM player in that too, despite being docked points for not being able to write lists properly.

In January I went to the Caledonian Uprising, where I bagged my first top half finish, again using my prized Chaos Space Marine army. 2 weeks ago I decided to pick up Necrons for the first time and take them to an escalation tournament. Which I then flopped at because I wrote a really bad list. And then last week I went to the War of the Roses, a 2 day tournament in which I only lost one game, albeit because I made a stupid mistake but still only one game, which I was happy with, making me a more consistent top 50% player.

In addition, I have been heading to the England squad days and weekends on a regular basis, helping the 9 out and getting some top level experience, which has served me very well in the last couple of big events.

In short, I'm really looking forward to get back into blogging, not for my own self validation or for an ego boost, but because I enjoy writing, and with the game getting shaken up so much in the next couple of weeks, things are going to get interesting.