I’ve probably spent more time than is healthy thinking about Kings of War tournaments. There’s a fairly wide range available, with different ways of rewarding everything from hobby skills to smashing your opponents. I have no problem with a day of games, it’s convenient and straight forward, and given tournament organisers for Kings are doing it for the love it’s also eminently sensible. You also don’t have to read the tournament pack.
There are though those organisers who go above and beyond, who have events that I would file under cult classic. Steve Hildrew’s Bullrun series (that has some of the nicest trophies going), Mark Cunningham’s Shroud of the Reaper (my Christmas is no longer complete without a visit to Bexley) and The Rushden Rumble (some seriously engaging scenarios). There are others that I’ve not had the pleasure of attending, such as Battlemasters and The War of The Roses, but these are the events I’ve had some great memories from.
So much have I enjoyed the variation and twists these events introduce, I’ve really wanted to find a way of bringing something new to my own events. The thinking process began before Christmas, and a couple of failed attempts later I’ve just opened the entry gates to The Field of Kings, and I’m nervous, so I’d thought I’d share a bit of the thought process behind it.
My starting place was asking myself what sort of event would I really want to attend. I love a good themed event, something with a story. One of my favourite events last year was Roll Out The Barrels where we brought two separate factions, played the first game with one, the second with the other and the final game with both. Trying to find the tenuous link between my Ratkin and Halflings led to the birth of my Halfling’s back story as The Grand Mercenary Company of Mimos.
The next thing I wondered about was the scoring system. What was I going to reward and how? There is so much debate as to how to score various aspects of gaming and crafting excellence I decided to stop listening and sit down in a dark room with a fresh piece of paper. Eventually I turned the light on and decided a new piece of paper would be helpful. Slowly it dawned on me that regardless of what anyone else was doing, I wanted to reward based on how people reacted to the theme of the event and that opened up so many new ideas (at least to me). As I picked through each one it became apparent that I could create an event scored equally on game play and hobby skills, but there was a down side, it meant I would probably have to throw out the traditional game scoring and there wouldn’t be any points on offer for those attendees wanting to increase their standing in the masters rankings.
There is a logic (or so I’ve heard) which says this is the fastest way to stop people attending, but I feel, based on what I hear from podcasts and read on blogs, that there is thirst in the Kings community for something a bit fluffy. More than that, I’m not trying to rival Clash of Kings (well not this year at least) in terms of numbers. If I can get a few like minded souls together, that works for me.
Central to the idea around the scoring is that it’s more about enthusiasm and engagement, particularly on the hobby side of things. Read through the pack, create a couple of units that really fit the theme, and anyone could grab max points. The scoring for games is a little different, but I’ve tried to reward behaviours that contribute to telling the story, so I’ll be really interested in seeing how that’s received. Genuinely, I think it will make for a massively fun day, the biggest risk though is whether anyone will read the pack…
Fortunately, since unleashing the pack on Saturday night I’ve had some great feedback and a third of the spaces are gone. What’s more everyone seems to have read the pack… there is hope.
Interested in reading the pack? It’s here.
Over the next couple of months, I’m going to do some follow up articles going a bit more into the hobby scoring and providing some hints and tips on how to make the judges happy.
Don’t want to miss the next instalment? Drop your email below to subscribe.
The Wizard's Bookshelf 