THE WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS OF WARHAMMER | FIELDREPORT BY DINO KHO

After a couple of days of rest and a few nights of good sleep I’m now able to string together full sentences and share with you my experience at the World Championships of Warhammer - and let me tell you, this was probably my best warhammer experience ever!

A little more than a year ago we all saw the article on the Warhammer community website where the WCW was announced. At the time I had the impression that this was just one of the many US events held, except now they were handing out tickets across the world and some of you would be lucky enough to get their flight and hotel paid for. Ruud and I were organizing the Dutch Masters at that time, the most competitive Warhammer tournament in the Netherlands, and the season finale to see who had won the DTC ranking for the year. We were fortunate enough to be granted a golden ticket which we could hand out to the winner and make sure there is a Dutch representative at the WCW. This turned out to be the first or second golden ticket in the world so we thought that was kind of cool. Last summer we switched from 9th to 10th edition, which meant Games Workshop updated their tournament pack and terrain layouts and I was very impressed! The layouts looked much better, the missions were diverse and interesting and I was starting to get interested in the WCW! In the end we had 2 golden tickets in the Netherlands, none of the other TO’s wanted to provide an event where we could play for the 2nd ticket so Ruud and I seized the moment for another Dutch Masters event which provided Dick with his golden ticket. 

Rob Goossens(right), our first golden ticket winner. Coincidentally everyone in this photo (except the local janitor) managed to grab a golden ticket last season!

 It’s a great feeling when you’re able to help your friends achieve their hobby goals but at this point, I was feeling the FOMO and I really wanted to be part of this unique event! I did my research and was looking at events in Europe where to grab a ticket. England and Germany both had a lot of golden tickets but also far better players than I am. Belgium was handing out tickets at Warmaster, arguably one of the toughest events to win with all the best players of the world flying in so no bueno as well. All that was left was Cyprus and Luxembourg.

With Luxembourg being nearby, Thomas and Aron driving to Luxembourg, and Mani going as well (who has already won a ticket so placing 2nd should be enough to get a ticket) made it look like the stars aligned for lil ol me. After a great weekend hosted by team Luxembourg, I managed to snag a golden ticket and I was now ready to embark on my adventure to the WCW in Atlanta! 

With the help of the Dutch gaming community (thanks Wardice!) I got my flight partially funded, I and Dick booked a reasonable hotel and it was full-on practice mode! After at least 40 games on the GW terrain which is wildly different from what we normally played, I decided to bring my World Eaters. It was the army I had the most fun with and because of their game mechanics, it was pretty much always insured of a fighting chance into any matchup! My goal for this event was simple, have fun and maintain a 50% win rate! 

15 minutes before the first pairings.

So, I had the list, I had the reps, I was prepared and with the release of the pods, the pre-fun could start! Dick and I were lucky enough to end up in “easy” pods, Rob however was a bit less lucky and ended up in the pod With Mani Cheema, David Gaylard, and Anthony Vanella. Pairings would be made 15 minutes before the first round would start so there was nothing left to simply prepare for all 22 possible opponents. I felt fairly confident and dare I say I saw a winpath to end up 4-1 in the pod phase! 

Dick and I flew out from Schiphol on a Tuesday morning, arriving on Tuesday 18:00. The airport of Atlanta is huge so going through customs and such went fairly easy and with a short 20-minute cab ride we were in our Hotel room by 19:00 and fresh as a daisy! The next day we went to Walmart to grab some healthy snacks and water for the upcoming days and of course presents for our families at home. We checked in at the venue Wednesday evening, grabbed some stuff from the Warhammer store and catched up with all the players from across the world. It was all very moderate and relaxed as well all realized this was going to be a very enduring event so by 22:00 we were all in bed pondering on what our first matchup would be! 

Day 1 consisted of two 4-hour rounds of the pod phase. The idea behind this setup is to let the players ease into the tournament giving everyone a fresh start. Well, that did not go entirely as expected. My first-round opponent was Lachlan Rigs from Perth, also known as Lochie. A giant of a man, with a pretty standard CSM list on dawn of war. I felt pretty confident in this matchup but I completely underestimated my opponent 

(who ended up 3rd!) and the overwatch on his cultist. This game spiraled out of my control from turn 1 and I simply never got the chance to get back into it. We had a laugh about it, we wished each other well and it was a welcome wake-up call. This is not going to be easy. 

“CSM on dawn of war? Some giant Australian? goig second? EZ”

Dick managed to catch the only ringer thus a nice comfortable win, Rob got got a draw round 1. We had more than an hour break so there was a lot of banter going on and I was eager for a win and refreshing my BCP app constantly. Round 2 came up, CSM again. A pretty similar list on sweeping engagement, this time against the German WTC prospect Manuel Wayand. I was not feeling it at all, especially since I got paired-upwards into Manuel. Apparently, pairings were done manually to guarantee that players from the same nation would not play each other. I felt a bit bummed but again, there are no easy matchups so I had to push on through and smash face! I went 2nd again, my opponent moved aggressively forward and I gave myself the time for a long think. Either I try to trade slowly with an army that has more units, long-range fire, and better datasheets or I go all in and get the maximum results out of pile-ins and consolidates. I’ve been in a similar situation before in a TTS game and while it is extremely bloody and I will lose a lot of units I should be ending on top in the end so we prayed to Khorne, dropped a drop of blood on the mat and we charged EVERYTHING! In the end, I managed to pick up 2 units of nurglings, 1 unit of chosen and lord, 5 warp talons, leaving the brick of accursed cultists  brick on two mutants and the demigogue dude. My opponent failed a couple of leadership checks thus keeping some of my units locked in combat. Angron soaked up all of his shooting but besides that I was in pretty good shape after my opponent's 2nd turn. With my turn two my opponent simply lost too much, was not able to score primary or secondaries and to make matters worse, Angron came back in my turn. A solid win for Deangron! We exchanged some feedback for each other, wished each other well and I felt good about day 1!

Day 2 was going to be a long day with three 3-hour rounds. I personally loved it. A tournament is as much a battle of endurance as it is a battle of skill and I know I can easily do 3 games in a day and stay sharp for each of the rounds! I started the day with Jeff Brown, the Canadian in leggings with Eldar. Let me tell you something about Team Canada, you will not find a more warm, welcoming, and honest group of players in the entire world! We’ve played against Team Canada twice now at WTC and both rounds have been an absolute blast! We already had dinner on Wednesday evening with Jeff so we were pleasantly surprised when we were paired. Jeff had the double avatar Eldar list and I just decided to steamroll him. This was a good matchup for me and I went first! Jeff deployed very conservatively which only meant it would take a turn longer to destroy his units. A strong win at the start of the day and I was ready for more! In my pod, there were 2 players I was really scared of - Alex Mcdougall and Alejandro Serrano, a Spanish WTC player. Alejandro and I played a grueling game at LGT two years ago where he nicked the win from me by 1 or 2 points. We both knew this was bound to happen sometime, it seemed only fitting we got our rematch at the WCW.

The game where i decided to just roll sixes

Alejandro was running a Blood Angels list in a Gladius detachment. I haven’t had a game before VS Blood angels and I consider Alejandro to be a more skilled player than I am, but hey sometimes you’d rather be lucky than good, and this was one of those times! In my turn two Alejandro managed to rapid ingress his big Death Company squad with Lemartes out of 12” charge range of my units. This felt really bad as he also had 12 Inceptors waiting to drop in. I was royally fucked if I didn’t manage to pull some tricks out of my hat. After calling over a judge to help us out and some high level measuring we managed to find a path to get Angron into the Death Company with piling and such. With the reroll I managed to get Angron into his Death Company!

Now, if this was the only moment of luck Alejandro would be fine but I’ve been scamming him on saves and FNP rolls for 2 turns already and you could see the physical pain on his face (I’m sorry Alejandro). To keep things fair and balanced Angron kind of whiffed on his rolls and he only killed 4 Death Company. On the clapback he picked up most of my army except Kharn, the Master of Executions and all my Khorne Bezerkers. I again went crazy on the rolls and between those 2 units, Angron returning and simply not failing save rolls, Alejandro had no chance. Another strong finish versus my big rival, I was literally over the moon. Now I'm not going to say I played incredibly well, I just rolled hot, and when you roll hot with World Eaters magic simply happens. It’s one of the main reasons why I picked this army haha. @Alejandro, see you at WTC man! Next time the dice will surely go in your favor.

Round 5 pairings went live and I got paired into one of 2 factions I hate with a fiery passion - Necrons. Chris Langton’s list was a bit of an odd one, 3 c’tan and only 20 warriors, it seemed very doable and after having a small chat with Anthony Vanella I had a solid game plan! Chris went first, which was good for me. The game went according to plan and I was controlling the primary, secondaries were on point and his units were dropping like flies. Chris kept his warriors in the back so they had no impact on the game and I was heading to a solid win, until turn 4. My Master of Execution was on a mission to kill the last Transcendent C’tan. Armed with the berzerker glaive, and the +1 to wound stratagem this should not be an issue but alas, MOE whiffed hard. The C’tan survived on 4 wounds. In the Necron turn MOE whiffed again  - leaving the C’tan on 1 wound! This was a 12 point swing on Purge the Foe! To make matters worse, Chris pulled off a 9” charge into Angron on his home objective which got him another 8 points! A solid win turned quickly into a narrow loss and there was no way I could have turned that around in my last turn. This was the one loss of the weekend where I knew if I played a bit cleaner, and was a bit less sloppy I could have won that game. I ended the pod phase  3-2 and this may seem a bit “average” but when looking around the hall I wasn't the only one in the 3-2 bracket. Top players like Nassim Fouchane, Josh Roberts, and Innes Wilson were all in the same bracket or worse. This was truly the hardest tournament ever and 3-2 was a very respectable score! The pod phase was over, we got to sleep in the next day so it was time to hang out in the evening and we hooked up with the boys from Team Canada. Now I've mentioned before that Atlanta is pretty much shit so the options were scarce. Between the very expensive hotel restaurant and Hooters, the boys opted for the last bit, purely for the chicken wings (which were shit) and the beer tubes. We had a laugh and a bit too much cheese sauce but it was a great conclusion of the pod phase.

the lovable Canadians who are obviously wearing flannel shirts..

After a good night's sleep we were all ready for the world bracket. I’ve set myself new goals, 1: End higher than Rob and Beckers (EZ), 2: Do not fall behind Dick. Yes, I am petty like that and my ego is frail. I didn’t care too much about the ranking of the WCW. Thus far the event has been stellar but I didn't like the way players were ranked and paired. Apparently everyone gets placed into a bracket after the pod phase. What you score after the pod phase doesn’t matter anymore as you can never rise out of your bracket. I found this a bit cumbersome and not very representative of how a player has performed at the event. So anyways, back to the world bracket: Round 1 was the mirror. This time against Angel with the Jakhal list, Angel is another WTC player/prospect from team Spain and my reputation has preceded me already after my game against Alejandro. I was the “lucky rolls” guy. Well, I stayed true to my name and scammed Angel with my saves/FNP rolls again. After Deangron bonked his Angron in turn 2 the game swung in my favor and it was merely a case of how fast I could get the game done. Game 2 on Saturday was a bit more difficult though. I got Paired into  Kit, a well known T’au player. We both knew this was pretty much a go first and win scenario, mostly because of the terrain/mission combination. While I do like the GW terrain layouts some of them don’t mix well with certain missions. There were some tables which had objectives in the open or huge firing lanes, stuff that combat armies don’t like. On this table there was no staging ground for my units and Kit’s coldstar/crisis units could basically shoot me off the board anywhere. 

His T2 go-turn whiffed pretty hard which gave me a fighting chance, but in the end, it was just too little too late to win the game. We concluded with an 8-point win for Kit. This one really hurt. I’m totally fine being outplayed by a skilled opponent or realizing I made a critical mistake, but this was just a no-win scenario purely based on who goes first or second due to terrain. But hey, I can't do anything about that. We went out for drinks and food with the Canadians again, originally we were eyeing up this barbeque place that supposedly had great brisket but they close at 20:00…who closes their restaurant at 20:00 on a Saturday?!?! Seriously, Atlanta was failing on so many levels. The local brewery next door had an OK dinner menu so we filled our bellies and rolled back to our hotel so we could have our final game the next morning. 

My last game at WCW, against my beloved tau.

The last day consisted of 1 game, I’m going to be honest: I wasn't a fan of it. Most players at this point were exhausted and wanted it to be done with it and if you want to hang around for the ceremony you’re going to have to wait a long time. I hope they change the scheduling next year cause we’ve been waiting for 8 hours! My game was into Donald Plummer with his T’au, luckily this time there was a better terrain layout! Donald went first and did his utmost best to screen me out, but I still managed to find a small gap. I charged with almost every unit to create a better staging point and start the trading game early. To my luck, he wasn’t able to fall back with the unit I tagged with most of my army which meant I could keep doing this for another turn. I was slowly but surely moving up the board, killing as many units as possible. Donald had 1 go turn in battle round 3 where he picked up most of my army, barring Kharn and his boys in the Rhino and leaving Angron on 1 wound. I had enough resources to finishhis important units and secure the win. In the end, me and Dick both ended 5-3, Rob and Beckers far behind us. 

All in all, I had a great time! The terrain looked great, and most of the layouts/missions were fair and balanced. The hall was set up very spacious and there were more than enough drinks and snacks available in the area. The toilets were regularly cleaned and all the judges were very helpful. 

So what sets this apart from any other event? As always, the players! When you take 176 players who are considered the best in the world you’re bound to have stellar games. The common understanding of how to behave on the table, how to interpret the rules and sportsmanship is unlike anything I have seen anywhere else. While the WTC is also my favorite event for the same reasons as mentioned before, I dare to say that the playerskill at the WCW is definitely higher. I’ve been complaining about Atlanta for a bit now in this article but even that wouldn’t stop me from trying again for next year's event! we now know which places are good options for dinner and knowing the schedule we could skip 1 or 2 days saving us extra costs thus making the trip a bit more affordable.

I can also now share that the DTC (Ruud, Adam, and Dino) will be making sure there are golden tickets available in the Netherlands for next year as well. The first golden ticket will be handed out to the winner of the DTC season 2023 at the Dutch Masters! So if you want to have the opportunity to witness the World Championships of Warhammer in Atlanta make sure you grab your ticket for the Dutch Masters now!

With the conclusion of the WCW my single-player tournament season has come to an end. I will now mostly be hosting events and switching over to Teamplay in preparation for the WTC. Obviously I'll keep you all in the loop on how my progress will fare and I hope to see you all again soon;)

Dino