tournament preparations

Tournament Preparations...

Well, here we are, 1 week away from the Berks Spring Assault tournament for Warhammer 40K. This will be our second such event for the Berks Warhammer club, and also my second such endeavor running/hosting said event. I am very excited and nervous with all of the preparations, but the excitement is builidng and I'm having fun with it all.
We had so much success with our first event, a small 500 point combat-patrol style tournament in January, that the resounding response was "When is the next one?!". So, after some planning we are now looking at a fairly serious undertaking. Our last event was held in the Hobbytown USA in Reading where the Berks Warhammer 40K club meets on Saturdays. We were tight on space and were forced to limit our event to just 14 participants playing on small 4x4 tables. With a larger venue, we could have easily filled 24 slots.

So, after some time, I was able to find a suitable facility for a good price. Now we are hosting our event at the Country Inn & Suites in Wyomissing, PA. This is a great location and the room is large enough to hold 18-20 tables. We are hosting a 1000 point Warhammer 40K tournament now, and have slots for at least 36 players. I may be able to squeeze one or two more tables if I absolutely must. We shall see. Part of that idea was comprimised when I had decided to add the Berks "Golden Grot" competition to the event as well. Now we will be having a Painting Competition for the players involved. Everyone participating gets one entry in each of 3 categories: Individual Model, Squad, and Vehicle/Large Model. The models do NOT have to even be from Warhammer 40K, and can be from any game line at all.

This was something fun I had decided to do and we will have small prizes for the winners and certificates of recognition for 2nd and 3rd place in each category. This will hopefully create more of a buzz for players to paint their armies. I am hoping to achieve a few things by holding this event. One is to unite our club with other local gaming clubs and other players, thus strenghening the presence of our hobby. I am also hoping that my friends get more of an appetite for tournaments and attend larger events with me in the future.

So, as I am working on things for the tournament, we had picked up another sponsor in addition to the Adventurer's Guild and Dragonfly Miniatures. Mike, from Terran Scapes, has offerd to supply us with a gift certificate, and we matched his contribution with our prize support money. That Gift Certificate will be included as a bonus for the winner of Berks Spring Assault.

Some of the nice terrain I got from Terran Scapes is this really well made hill. The piece is solid, good size, and heavily flocked and coated well. It's not going to fall apart and was reasonably priced for the quality of it. I put some models on it to show size and scale.

I also purchased some of the Martian Buttes. The ones on his site were done in a nice reddish rock color, but I wanted to paint them more suiting to my own battlefields. So I ordered unfinished pieces. The light resin cast is very nice, and well detailed. I added a Large Martian Butte with Arch as well. This piece really stands out and the arch is large enough for even a Space Marine Terminator to fit through. I got a nice collection of the models and after washing the resin casts, I spray primered them in black.

Once the Martian Buttes were dry, I gave them a generous basecoat of Charadon Granite from Games Workshop. This color turned out better than I had hoped, as I feared that it would have been a lighter shade. To keep things simple for me, I am attempting to do as little paint mixing as possible, thus allowing me to keep features uniform. This will also help if I choose to purchase more terrain and want to paint it to match.

Next I heavily dry brushed Fortress Grey from Games Workshop, on the Martian Buttes. As that dried, it started to take a really nice rocky

After that level of color dried, I than proceeded to apply a drybrush and highlight of Bleached Bone (GW). Now these pieces are drying and it's time for me to work on the base more. I am still looking at my colors, but I am looking at using Scorched Brown for the base and than dry brush it with Graveyard Earth. Once the entire model is dry, I will give it a wash with Delven Mud, and than see if I need to touch up any dry brushing or highlights once more. With any luck, I'll have this done soon and can add some flock or static grass and have these pieces ready for the tournament this coming weekend.