It's days after the conclusion of the 50k Championship, and since the whole weekend is still completely fresh in my head I wanted to put it in writing. There's no strategy here, it's just a recollection of my thoughts and my experiences from right before Gen Con started up until the last night. If that doesn't sound interesting to you, you may want to wait for my next article which will be my reflections on the 50k from a more strategic standpoint, specifically my thoughts on why certain warbands did well and certain warbands didn't (our warband put two people in the top 8 and one person in 19th, and top 8'er Michael Ayars' warband I believe was inspired by our list as well). This article in many ways is meant to be my tribute and way of saying thanks to Dreamblade and its wonderful community that I have grown to literally love in such a short amount of time.

PREPARATION

After 10k Manchester I spent a lot of time specifically testing Corpsebuilt and Chaos Wells in France with Michael Pozsgay and Nicolas Pilartz. When I came back and was trying to decipher the metagame, I eventually concluded there were basically five established tier 1 warbands that I had to look out for: Corpsebuilt, Hellbred, Chaos Wells, Hunter-Killer, and Valor Passion. I knew there would be some new stuff, and there were other warbands to watch out for like Valor-Madness or possibly even Hivelings, but those five were the ones I was most concerned about and that I would end up testing against.

Throughout the season, every member of the Redcap Council has really helped me prepare for an event at some time or another, but because we are so sprawled out I am not constantly working with all of them. During the weeks before Gen Con the person that was the most instrumental to my preparation was Ian Stickland, with Sam Black and non-Redcap Mike Pozsgay being the other two people whom I felt really helped me. Ian is whom I have always tested with the most (except for a few 1ks in Prague), and I really want to offer him a huge thanks here for being absolutely crucial to my success as a player over the entire season. He has been a great friend and teammate. Sam has been great for talking to about warbands and draft theory this past month, and actually, a conversation with Sam is what sparked the idea for the warband Ian, Mike, and myself played to great success at the 50k. Pozsgay is a good friend whom I have tested and theorized a lot with. I talked a lot about warbands with Mike during the latter half of the season, and he gave good feedback when I let him in on the warband we were thinking about for the 50k.

I hadn't drafted as much as some, but more then most, and I knew my intuitive draft ability and my on-the-board play were strong, especially when bolstered by draft theorizing sessions with Sam and Ian. I had been testing constructed with Ian a reasonable amount, but as you'll see, it wasn't until the night before the 50k that we decided on what turned out to be quite the warband.

WEDNESDAY

Though I was anxious about the 50k for the entire week or two before it happened, It was Wednesday, the day before Gen Con, that I really sat down with myself at home and thought about the tournament. I read two pieces of writing: The Prince by Machiavelli and Becoming a Competitive Player by...me. Don't you love it when someone writes an article about themselves and mentions that their own success was partly attributed to reading their own writing?

Well, masturbatory or not, it's true. I knew I wanted to win, and I knew that I didn't want to let myself lose this mindset or become weak. I penned two things on my hand during my solo pump-up session on Wednesday:

1. Win
2. NTB

That's short for No Take Backs. I didn't let a single player take back anything all weekend. I told the incredibly nice guy I played in the first round “I'm sorry man. If it was any other tournament.” I also aggressively called judges when my opponents were playing too slow. Anyhow, I'm getting ahead of myself. Back to Wednesday.

Even up until Wednesday night, the night before Ian and I would fly up, we weren't sure if we should play our few weeks old, not quite tested enough Hellbred-Wells hybrid warband, or if we should default to Valor-Passion (which Sam and Justin ended up playing). “Chaos Well-Bred” was testing pretty well, but we still weren't certain what the exact build needed to be. Wednesday night at Ian's ended up being a bit of testing, a bit of drinking, a bit of Starfox 64, a practice draft, some riverside contemplation, and a whole lot of uncertainty.

THURSDAY & FRIDAY

Thursday we flew up. I spent most of the day with my sister and dad, whose leg was broken, and I spent that night solely on non-dreamblade gaming. Friday during the day was the same (there's other stuff to do at Gen Con besides Dreamblade right??) and then my family left. As Ian, Dave and I made plans to get food and then test in Sam's hotel room I had one of those moments where reality hit me all of a sudden. I found myself saying to Ian “oh my god. The 50k is actually tomorrow.” I could feel how badly I wanted to win, and how desperately i wanted to be certain of our warband choice. Ian, myself, and some teammates tested a good amount that night, and our list “Chaos Well-Bred” was doing well against both Valor Passion and other Chaos Wells lists. We were still uncertain just how good it was, but there were three things that pushed the decision for me and possibly Ian: It was doing very well and felt good in my hands the night before the tournament, Mike was fully convinced it was the best warband, and it was our brand new creation, which people wouldn't have tested against like they had against Valor Passion. The decision was set.

Friday was also the night that Ian, Dave and I went to Houlihan's and decided that the word “boom” was the best word in the English language. That night would set a precedent of lucky high-fiving and aggressive boom-shouting that would pump us up, strike fear into our opponents, and make the entire boom-shouting Red Cap Council drunk with camaraderie by the end of the weekend.

Since my family was gone, Friday night I slept alone in my hotel room.

SATURDAY

I was sporting some lucky welding goggles provided by Ian, and it felt good to have a sick accessory along with fellow Redcaps Ian (gothy, expensive, skull encrusted, steel-toed murder boots) and Trey (you saw that awesome mask). Note that we three would end up making top 8 along with Mike Ayars in an Octorilla suit, and you realize that playtesting is not really what success is all about.

Before the player meeting started, Jean Sebastien Pruneau, whom I first met at Hartford, approached me and said that he thought I was going to win the entire tournament. That made me feel great. A few minutes later I realized I needed a six-sided die, and where could I find a luckier one then from this man who had just prophesied my good fortune? Special thanks to Jean Sebastien for the lucky d6 (which I still have and will return somehow).

My warband started off 2-1, taking a loss in the third round to Carl Reddish. I was very upset at this early setback, and after one of many useful pep talks I would receive from Ian throughout the weekend, I recovered my focus by listening to Butterball by Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass. Before the draft started I wanted to get some lucky high-fives, and so Ian shipped me one. Then, Jesse Dean tried to high-five me, which would have been bad luck since he is on the enemy team. Fortunately, Ian knocked my hand out of the way a split second before contact, and my good luck was safe from enemy absorption, much to Dean's chagrin.

Draft was an absolute blast. I really loved all the guys at each of my draft pods. I ended up 5-1 for the draft portion, and my favorite warband was my second one, which featured crazy amounts of utility from two chaos puppeteers, a lockjaw, and a war eagle. There were no mid-cost bombs like gothic or butcher, but plenty of solid beaters and the very powerful Arch of Triumph.

I thought that all of my opponents drafted well, and I had to play my future final opponent, Matt Hoffman, in the aforementioned second draft round. I had been in a 1k top 4 previously with Matt but had never actually seen him play. I knew he was good, and he also possibly outdrafted me by a pick or even two in our draft, which featured by far the toughest decisions for the players out of all of my pods. I beat him though, partly due to a pep talk, as Ian could see that I was nervous about the pairing.

In case anybody is curious of what I think are the most over and under-drafted pieces, from primary and secondary experience I noticed that the very powerful Immortals Resting Place was underdrafted all Saturday. On the other side, I noticed that the good-but-not-quite-as-nuts-as-something-like-gothic-for-example Kitsune was taken first when it often should have been taken second or third.

I ended the day at a solid 7-2, and the Redcaps and a few friends headed over to Red-Eye Cafe for some delicious burgers before sleep. Nico had come to dinner with us, and the Parisian actually upset me for the first time by stealing my last bite of hamburger. I explained to him that this is absolutely forbidden in America, accepted his apology, and let him crash at my hotel room.

SUNDAY

We woke up, made coffee, and got ready to go. On the walk over, I listened to Butterball a second time to get ready. I probably needed to go 2-1, and its possible I would need to go 3-0 to make top 8. My first round I played against Chaos Wells, piloted by Lance Hemenway of Team 31st century. Lance and I had a great game, the early Sprite on Sprite action causing us to be very careful not to misstep in the first few turns. I set up an initiative early where I could Lord Slobber a puppet and avoid his sprite strike if he won the initiative, but punish him with my sprite if I won. He won that initiative but the next time it went my way, and I got up on board position, and stole a lot of turns early, and ended up taking the match. In the next round I played against his teammate Joe Suber, playing Valor-Passion. I had complete control of this game until I allowed him to take a risk which I could have probably avoided granting him had I haunt gambited that turn, something Joe and I discussed after the game. Anyhow, Joe was smart enough to know he needed to set up such that he would get harshly punished in all spawn rolls except for the no-spawn him first. And he got it. The problem was that he rolled awfully, and so I ended up OK anyway. Joe and Lance were both very solid players though, and I really enjoyed playing against both of them.

That set me at 9-2. Who would I have to play in the last round?

Ian Stickland! Booms and high-fives ensued, Ian conceded the match to me, and we went off to get food and mentally prepare for the top 8.

TOP 8

First round I paired against Jeffrey Wong, piloting Corpsebuilt. This match was covered very nicely by Wil so I won't go too much into it. My second match was against Jon Tschida's Valor Passion, and I believe I got out a second turn Crypt Worm which basically allowed me to control the entire match. I finished way before the other top 4 match did, but someone had said it seemed like Matt Hoffman was going to win. I knew Matt was good, as I had played him during the draft portion of the tournament. The play I was most worried about was a nine spawn going into eight spawn, which would allow him to spawn Hunter-Killer followed by a Blademiller while I spawned a Screamer and a Worm. As I played out turn three in this scenario in every different combination of shifts, trying to find optimal set-ups and responses, Ian talked to me like he was Mickey and I was Rocky. He wrote B-O-O-M across my knuckles in sharpie, and then “Dibs on Winning” on my hand. As I nervously awaited the finals to start, fretting about the early plays, Ian said “Stop worrying so much. You have the better band. You're the better player. Just win.” I put on the Ipod one last time and waited to face Matt.

CONCLUSION

The final match was covered by Wil Upchurch, who did a great job with all of the coverage, and so I won't recap the game here. I will say that Matt was a gracious opponent, and didn't flip out about some of the bad spawn rolls that set him back so much early.

The event was very well run, and on the whole I thought the judges did a good job of administering slow-play cautions and warnings. After the finals had concluded many of the players had their playmats signed by those who had been important to their dreamblade experience over the year, which made this last huge event feel that much more special. We had two birthdays to celebrate, Redcap Jenna Nardone as well as Mike Pozsgay's, and so my night ended with Limousine rides, Champagne, Bennihanna's, crazy-dancing-Sam Black, a cigar courtesy of Redcap Marcus Spicer, and a Horse and Carriage ride with some lovely redcaps, some lovely ladies, and that sexy monster Nicolas Pilartz.

So why did I win the 50k?

I feel I had pretty bad luck in both of my losses. But I also had my fair share of good luck. There was one round where I could have lost if my Caged Grawlth hadn't rolled about 17 total on a double strike. And boy did I give that Grawlth the pep talk of his life before his second strike, after he rolled a paltry five damage on the first one. I think I was playing the best warband at the tournament, which I will discuss and dissect in my next article. I had the desire to win, and I had the support of my teammates. I stayed focused, I played as carefully as I could without getting DQ'ed by slow play, and at times I found absolutely crazy ways to climb out of holes. Of course my victory is also due to the support of my father, my first and favorite hero.

Thanks for making it a great weekend everyone, there were certainly people that I didn't mention in the article that I had a blast with or that I felt helped me win by pulling for me.

Thanks again to the Redcaps, the Dreaming Dragons, Milos, Tomas, and Michal for keeping me in practice overseas, and extra special thanks to my miniatures and the Gods of Luck, both of whom I literally called upon several times to imbue my dice with good fortune.

Thanks to everyone who plays and I hope to see you on the message boards.

- Ben Stoll