DBA @ Wintercon
Or – “Lets start with the bit where Dave gets beaten by a 12 year old girl, coz that’s never getting old”.
Sunday 22nd July marked the return of De Bellis Antiquitatus (DBA) to the Wintercon lineup after a six year hiatus. We ran a standard 15mm fixed list open tournament on 2’x2’ boards using DBA 3. Players brought their preferred army with no options to chop and change elements between games and took on all comers in a six round event.
Entries were low during the lead in, and I had to prepare for a pre generated round robin style draw as the Swiss Chess format does not play well in a 6 round format for 8 players. However as the countdown to the day hit the final few days some extra players came in allowing me to have a field of 12 with myself included to make the numbers even. We welcomed two new players to our community – India Searle (daughter of Brenton, one of our veteran players) and Julian O’Sullivan who made the dash from Sydney in the hope that there would be room.
The opening round saw several whitewashes where Mark Baker, Guy Sheppard and Stephen Hopkins won their games without suffering a casualty. The other three games were closer. As I was playing I saw less of the rest of the action but am confident that everyone enjoyed themselves. Notable games included seeing beginner India Searle with her 100 Years War English picking up three wins from six including a brilliant demolition of my Christian Nubians with spectacular shooting. Guy Sheppard brought along the Hawaiians and was the twice defeated losing half his army in the process. Ironic as he had won the Executioner Award at the previous tournament (Common Ground in May). By round 5 Gary Moriarty was in an unbeatable position with 5 wins from 5 and only newbie Julian O’Sullivan stood in the way of six in a row. However the battle for the remaining spots on the podium was intense. I finished the day with three wins from six with a lucky break in the final round against Steve Hopkins’ Burgundians.
The final scores were:
1) Gary Moriarty – I/32b Western Chou and Spring & Autumn Chinese (Wu or Yueh) – 48 Points
2) Brenton Searle – III/65 Nikephorian Byzantine – 40 Points
3) Mark Baker – IV/80 Hussite – 37 Points
4) Stephen Hopkins – IVI/76 Early Burgundian – 34 Points
5) David Lawrence – III/12 Christian Nubian – 34 Points
6) Tony Cotton – II/32b Later Carthaginian – 34 Points
7) Greg Kelleher – III/52 West Frankish or Norman – 32 Points
8) Julian O’Sullivan – IV/83a Wars of the Rose English – 29 Points
9) India Searle – IV/62a Hundred Years War English – 29 Points
10) Peter Phelps – II/56 Early Imperial Roman – 26 Points
11) Guy Sheppard – IV/12c Hawaiian – 22 Points
12) David Lucas – IV/35 Mongol Conquest – 9 Points
Tony Cotton won the Executioner Award for most kills in a single battle with a body count of 6 against Guy Sheppard’s Hawaiians
The Magister Militum Prize (AKA “The Maurice”) for the highest adjusted score outside the podium trio went to David Lawrence whose Christian Nubians moved him from 5th in raw score terms to 3rd in adjusted scores.
None of this would be possible without the support of a number of sponsors
• Ray Compton of Essex Miniatures Australia -
www.essexminiatures.com.au/ who provided vouchers for first, second and third place
• Brian Hall from Hall of Ancient Warriors -
www.hallofancientwarriors.com/ who donated the first place trophy
• Mick Sellman of Mick’s Metal Models -
micksmetalmodels.com/ who donated a DBA Army for the Magister Miliutm Prize
• Dean Bedlington of Olympian Games -
www.olympiangames.com.au/ who donated vouchers for the Executioner Award and Last Place as well as the fluorescent dice which was part of the last place haul. Dean also engraved the trophy plates.
• Barry Scarlett of Leadbear’s Tufts -
www.facebook.com/search/top/?q=leadbear%27s%20tufts who donated a voucher to each of the prize winners.
Please support these businesses that do so much to support us by ordering lots of product from them, and if you see them at a tournament – why not buy them a coffee or something.
Wintercon DBA is the second event in the Magister Militum Per Capitoline Territorialis Circuit – the rest of the circuit of events are Landwaster 2018 in November and the two days of Cancon in January 2019. Anyone who competes in at least three of the events (Cancon is two events) could win the “Grand Maurice” which averages the best three adjusted scores across the events.
So get the lead out – paint it and play DBA
Let’s make Landwaster Great again.
See you then.