Josh is a great player, and he had a great pull. He's also had a lot of experience with 2e, having played in several prerelease events at the D&D Experience in Arlington.

*shakes fist* Drat that Josh! I'll get you yet! :)

I ended up coming in 2nd, losing to Josh in our third and final match. I was running the following:

Skeletal Tomb Guardian

Magma Brute

Halfling Paladin

Howling Hag

Goblin Picador

Iron Defender

Kobold Archer

Deathjump Spider

My other rare pull was the Fen Hydra, which was simply too many points to build a solid enough warband around and have decent activations. Of particular note, I was the only one of the seven of us at the Aloha event that did not pull any champions whatsoever!

The first round I ended up getting the bye, as we had that odd number of players. However, one person (who won the first round, but I believe was a relative newcomer to the game) left after round one, leaving us with six players for the next two rounds.

In the second round I fought a fellow (Todd, I think his name is?) running a Hook Horror, Champion of Bahamut, Halfling Paladin, Deathjump Spider, Elf Archer, Defiant Rake, and one or two more small pieces (maybe the centipede and the orc raider?). We played on his map, Broken Demongate, which actually worked in my favor. I selected the "good" side, and was able to bottleneck him and concentrate on his two big hitters one at a time, systematically eliminating pieces to a clear superiority at the end.

The final round was against Josh, as mentioned. Experienced player aside, I knew as I was in trouble, as Death Knight, Cleric of Pelor, and Champion of Moradin form an incredibly effective combination, even without his other good pieces like the Howling Hag. The one marginally good thing that happened to me was that I did win map init, so we ended up playing on my map (King's Road) and not his (Frostfell Rift). No being pushed into pits for me!

Despite that advantage, my dice rolls were otherwise relatively anemic--a whole lot of 4s kept appearing in particular in the two games I actually played. I did my best to avoid the Death Knight and take out some of the other pieces, but ultimately was forced to engage, and got the triple whammy of being hit by the dwarf champ, pushed to the Death Knight, hit with a free attack, then attacked by the Death Knight on its activation. Lost my Skeletal Tomb Guardian that way. I believe he also critted me once or twice; I had been critted three or four times in the last round, but it was always with archers, so the damage wasn't that great. This time, however, being critted for 40 damage really hurt, even with my high-hit point units.

By the end of the final match, we were still surprisingly fairly close in points. I needed to take out his Dwarf Champion to possibly pull out a victory, but I screwed up, activating my Hag before my Magma Brute, which he was able to base and lock into place with his Champion ability, preventing me from finishing off the pesky dwarf. Ah well...next time, Josh! *another fist shake* :)


My prize pulls (3 booster) were so-so: a Death Knight (where were you when I needed you!?), a Rakshasa, and the Spectral Mage hunk of goo. The person who got third place did much better, drawing a Young Silver Dragon and another good large I can't remember at the moment. Kudos to you!


Overall I had fun, though I do wish I could have played in the first round, and that there had been more people there. This was my first time actually playing 2e minis, and my impression is, I like the way initiative and activations are handled, but I'm not sold on the diagonal movement = 1 space rule in particular. Time will tell. Maybe I'll go to the Release Tournament tomorrow for a rematch...