Quite simply “wow”!

Who would have thought that after three years and a fair few lads and lasses through the doors that we have such a strong and loyal group of members. today, the 11th of July 2010, the Apple j-ax Warhammer 40,000 gaming group had its first tournament, and what roaring success it has been! Firstly a huge thank you to everyone involved, both the gamers and the people behind the scenes, a particularly large thank you to Sue for all her hard work in organising the event.

If I'm honest I initially thought that most of the guys who were with us at the beginning would have moved on to pastures new by now, but many of the lads are still with us and come along almost every Saturday. Without the regular players today would probably not have happened. I for one an very proud of what we have achieved, we may be a small, independent, and we may not get it right first time, but we work well. the lads that attend the gaming days are brilliant, they’re well behaved and polite and they clearly enjoy the game, and of course that’s the most important thing. Ours is a hobby that is open to all, young, old, novice and veterans, and the hobby attracts so many different types of people. we welcome all through our doors, from part time players to full time painters. the great thing about the hobby is that we, as gamers and painters, are happy to share our skills and tactics. of course there’s rivalry and debates over which army is the more powerful, everyone knows it’s Necrons, but the debates are limited to talking smack, and that’s not really taken seriously.

I sat for a moment, and I really do mean a moment I must have walked as far today as I did last Sunday. I was looking around at  the gaming action and the guys playing their games and I thought, “we have something really good here!” I’d imagine that the great and the good in Nottingham would frown upon what we do, we bend, break and at times completely ignore the rules, well lets be honest they do get in the way sometimes.

Well today saw the culmination of many years of botched games and disagreements over whether or not a Carnifex gets an armour save against a bolt pistol. something in the region of forty games were played today, excluding a few hiccups today went really well.

Congratulations  to our two first place winners, James in the 500 point group and Will in the 1000 point group. whilst all the guys played well and every single one of them deserves a mention here, there are too many of them, Will gets a mention, not only because he won his group and overall winner of the first ever Apple j-ax tournament, but because his first game was a well deserved win. Will was up against a strong Necron army and, perhaps, a little out gunned, for the first three turns Wills opponent had the game firmly in his favour, but on turn four the whole game switched, Primarily down to the fact that a Trygon Prime and a Mawloc couldn’t do anything to take out a Monolith. fortunately Will had the points in his favour, bringing him the victory. Pictures of the event will soon be found on the Apple J-ax facebook group, feel free to take a look.

So once again a huge thank you to everyone, from the guys franticly running from table to table checking rules and solving disputes to the mums selling refreshments in the corner of the room, you are all fantastic.

I, for one, am looking forward to our next big event, I hope that many of the lads involved today will still be with us for it too.

Here’s to the future!