T5s Inbound

Got a 6 bulb T5 fixture inbound for my 125 gallon aquarium.  Also 7 ATI brand bulbs.

4x Blue Plus
1x Purple Plus
1x Aqua Blue
1x True Actinic

Going to tinker around with configurations until I find something I like.

Additionally I'm thinking about scrapping the rock frag rack and planting a nice size staghorn on the center pillar rock and making the one on the end into an acan rock.  Zoas would also be put on the staghorn rock.  Gorgonians might also make an appearance in the 125, I havent decided yet.

Filefish is almost halfway through the aiptasia, so in the next couple of weeks I'll start busting corals off the existing rock and placing them in the 125.  Some of the existing rock will live in the sump, and the leftovers will be sold off.



The office tank is in shambles.  Current plans are to change up the rock into something  more interesting and grab a blue tux urchin.  Massive water change tonight/tomorrow.  Soon I'll add another clown to replace the one we lost (back up to a pair of ocellaris clowns).  Maybe a black/white one.


Pics later maybe.

Dragoncon 2015: A Recap

This was perhaps one of the best Dragoncons I've attended, in large part to a fantastic room dynamic and a distinct reduction in responsibility and lack of drama.

We only had 9 people in the room this year and they got along swimmingly.  Don't worry, we tip housekeeping pretty well for the over occupancy.

I managed to make it to some nice panels for the Maker track.  The Molding Hacks panel was pretty educational with some nice tips and tricks.  RC Everything track was cool because it dealt with some hardware do's and donts.

Are You a Deatheater had a massive crowd this year.  I counted 9 games running concurrently, staggered to allow people removed from play to start playing in a new group.  We ended up having around 4 decks go missing after the session...we'll have to keep better track of them next year.  I'm still a little disappointed in people for stealing those.

The other disappointment of the convention was the CoolMiniorNot booth.  They didn't bring any miniatures to the convention for their vendors booth.  It was all board games...high quality board games, but board games none the less.  I'd have bought quite a bit of the Goritsi faction for Wrath of Kigns at the convention had it been available.  After talking with the guy at the register, CMoN evidently tried selling minis one year and didn't sell a single one.  I think it was poor marketing on their part not to try to push Wrath of Kings a little better.  They need to really be pushing it and making it more visible if they want it to continue to grow.  It feels like they're trying to just throw it out there and let it grow based on it's own merit, which is a mistake in a market so crowded with competition.

The vendors hall being in Americas Mart Building 2 this year was interesting.  It was a lot further away from the con than anything else but was much better organized.  Having the lightsaber booth and chessex right next to each other was problematic, but otherwise a solid transition.

I'm sure I'll have more thoughts on this year's Dcon.  So maybe a part 2 to this later.

Wrath of Kings Motivations, wave 2

I'm now out of motivation decks for Wrath of Kings.  Friends got most of them, raffled off 3 decks at the 2 tournaments I went to this month.  So I'm ordering 9 new decks with some updates (like this blog's logo).  I plan on having them in time for Dragoncon!

Wrath of Kings Tournament at Game On! in Chattanooga

Flying Squirrel Bar in Chattanooga...go there!

This past Saturday I attended a tournament at Game On! in lovely Chattanooga Tennessee.  I always love going to visit Chattanooga (it helps that I have some excellent friends who live up there and know all the best places to eat/drink).  This trip was no exception.

Check out the Flying Squirrel Bar if you get a chance.  Excellent beer selection, great setting, and most importantly fantastic food!

On to the tournament!

Zach Beker did a great job running his first tournament.  Using the Conquest of Kings tournament setup, he deviated slightly by allotting time to deploy before starting the round timer, thus giving us more time to actually play.  Both styles have their benefits, but I'd much rather have more time to actually play the game than spend a portion of it deploying.

Game On! is a clean store with excellent air conditioning and friendly staff.  The locals gave me a warm welcome and I got to see (and play against) against several people I first met at the CMoN Expo.

We had 6 players (2 each from the houses of Teknes, Nasier, and Hadross) in this skirmish level tournament and played 3 rounds.

My Hadross list consisted of:

Gutter Friar x2
Frenzy Charger x1
Carcharian Frenzies x3
Sevridan Gutters x4
Deepmen Guardians x4
Calith Reavers x2

Option A:  Ilva
Option B: Sevridan Gutters x3

Motivations were (in order): Treasure Hunt, Burn It Down, Land Grab

My first round was against a fat bottom girl list from Ross, one of the local Nasier players.  Lots and lots of Pelegarth, including a Howl and the character.  Wow are they tough to crack open.  My first onslaught with the Carcharians resulted in a lot of sloughed off strikes while the Sevridan had a better go at it.  I was mopping up objectives for Treasure Hunt while he was trying to get his leaders stuck in but not over extended for Call to Glory.  Ilva was the MVP of this match as her Wail obliterated swaths of pelegarth.  Hadrossian victory!

Round 2 resulted in 3 mirror matches.  My opponent was the other Hadross player Chasen.  We had been talking tactics most of the day so far, so I knew it was going to be a grueling bout.  Hadross is expertly equipped at taking out Hadross.  He brought more sharks than I did, but our lists were pretty similar.  He racked up points using Sever the Head and got a huge early hit taking out my Ilva with his.  After our armies took severe beatings all game, we drew at 0 to 0.

Final round I played against Mike Schaefer.  Mike's a real stand up guy I met and played at the CMoN Expo and so far his pigs and linemen went undefeated.  Taking the win in this match would put me at 7 Tournament points to his 6.  We both took Land Grab for our motivations, and I was confident that I could lure him away and drop either sharks or crabs on my objectives to keep things close.  Starting out 11 to 8 morale (he had a lot of pigs and linemen) meant that I had to keep the pressure on him.  Ilva's Syren's Call and the Sevridan's Gelatinous Shift were extremely useful for keeping him from popping his objectives.  His Zalaak's abomination was troublesome...and the CAGE didnt see much action.  The game went to time with a score of 8 to 7 in Mike's favor for the tournament win relegating me to somewhere around 3rd or 4th place.

I did get Top of House and a set of gold foil Hadross stat cards though!

Ilva was hands down my MVP.  Ilva riding a crab the first round or two is absolutely killer.  Unfortunately you have to really dedicate to that list with at least 3 ranks of specialists...and by unfortunately I mean for your opponent's 1 wound infantry.

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The tournament point system is interesting in the fact that after 3 round I was playing for 1st or 3rd place, but not really 2nd place depending on how the other 2 games went in round 3.  So even if you lose a round, you're still in the running.

As people get more practiced at the game, I'm sure the 1 hour time limit for skirmish level will be more viable.  I urge TO's with newer player bases to let the games examine cards, make choices, roll for side, and deploy before starting the round clock.  Or adding a few extra minutes to the pregame period and allow deployment during then to give the players more time to actually play.

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Some pictures of the tournament taken by Zach Beker!

CAGE MATCH!

Hadross on Hadross Hate!

More from the Hadross Hate Bout

3 Mirror Matches

Hadross: A speed bump

I played a couple games of Wrath of Kings this weekend (and a game the previous weekend).

This weekend's list was:

Torvosh
Frenzy Charger

3x Carcharian Frenzies
2x Sevridan Gutters
8x Deepman Guardians

Ilva
Orsund

First game this past Saturday was against my friend's Nasier at skirmish level.  He played the motivation where he had to get markers for his infantry for interacting with my leaders/specialists.  I chose burn it down.  The game was over pretty fast, as Ilva devastated his Pelegarth and the rest of my forces picked apart his ashmen before they could do any real damage.

The second game was against Goritsi playing alpha, wolves, some dance masters, Anton, and shield breakers.  Motivations were disrupt supply lines for Goritsi and Land Grab for my fish men.  I was wrecking his wolves the entire game, but he kept me penned in and slowly worked his way to one of his objectives and popped it (while sitting on one on the far side of the board in wait).  He then popped the second one and killed the carcharians and leader and a few guardians.  Dropped me to zero and it was all I could do to grab one of my objectives.  Final score was 2-0 Goritsi.

I played a similar game the previous weekend against Goritsi using Disrupt Supply Lines.  The wolves having skirmisher and their raw speed with the Alpha as Commander makes that matchup an uphill fight.  I'm still working on how to beat that one with a tournament list (core for all games and 2 sets of options)

Holding Water

I was out on staycation last week and finally got the 125 gallon acrylic system setup.  Only had a couple leaks.  One was where I threaded my hose barb into the manifold as a placeholder (teflon tape fixed this).  The other was a missing O-ring on one of the ball valves which was replaced.

I bent some acrylic and used weldon to attach it to the stand to support the manifold and anchor the return lines on the back of the aquarium.

I utilized the Marco Rock I got from a LFS on sale...around 65 lbs of it.  The 2 pieces on the right will be supports for a natural frag rack.  I plan on placing a piece of shelf rock with a grid of holes drilled in it for frags to sit in.  I'm not sure if I'm going to stack it higher than what you see there yet or not.

Eventually I'll end up putting T-5 lights in it.  I'm not convinced with my LEDs abilities to grow well and produce the colors I want.  I've found them to be lackluster.

My existing rock will have all the corals removed from it, and then it'll get sanitized due to the extensive aiptasia infestation I'm battling.  Then that 65 gallon tank/stand/canopy and sump will be sold to buy more equipment for this one.

The Waveline DC 10000ii does not disappoint.  It pumps so hard that I have to keep it around 3-4 (out of 6) to keep water in the chamber for it to pump out.  And wow is it quiet.

Death Eater: Rules and Moderator Guide

Time to post up the rules for Are You A Death Eater...and the handy dandy moderator guide.

These will be handed out at the Dragoncon panel on Friday night at 10pm.  They have a double time block this year, so double the time to play!



First off, the Rules:

And the Moderator Guide.  This really helps the game to flow.