Moonraker Mansion today hosted the 2022 Moonraker Invitational Tournament.
The aim of the tournament was to practise using the Red Book. The first game involved a 2,300 point KoW game which was followed by 2 Ambush games at 750 points.
We, of course, had to first raise the Moonraker flag.
In the 2,300 point games:
The Fox took on the Rustmeister in the Realm of the Abyss.
Jon’s Green Lady fought Ed’s Forces of Nature in Nix Swamp.
Moonraker Andy’s Halflings challenged Leo’s Forces of the Abyss in the Desert,
Lunch was held on the estate’s river bank.
After lunch, there was much mayhem as Ambush games came and went in the blink of an eye.
For the final game, Andy and Rusty went off-piste and played a 1,000 point Firefight game. Andy won this, his first game, beating the 18th highest ranked player in the world.
Great fun was had by all and several observations made about the Red Book.
OBSERVATIONS FROM THE DAY
GENERAL RULES:
We played without the optional Withdraw rule. There were a few occasions where units that could have previously charged a new unit were unable to do so but there was no major impact on the game. It was somewhat of a relief to not have to work out the future position of units that could Withdraw when charged with the checking of charge arcs from their potential locations.
AMBUSH:
While the game was pleasant enough, there was a feeling that it lacked the complexity and depth of full blown KoW and some players felt that they would not travel to an Ambush tournament. Everyone recognised the benefit of Ambush as a tool to introduce new players to KoW.
At 750 points, we felt that units costing 250 points could unbalance the game and we limited units to a maximum 200 points.
The average size of armies was 5 units. We Had one army with 4 units, 3 armies with 5 units and 2 armies with 6 units.
Shooting with 18” range, Piercing (1) was shown to have good value in the game.
Games flowed swiftly and smoothly.
A single lucky event could have a major impact on battle outcome. With few units, it was difficult to recover from an unfortunate dice roll.
It was felt that it will be some time before a list-building meta appears.