This past weekend it was the annual UK Team Championships over in Milton Keynes (and some minor tournament in Minnesota but no one was paying attention to that, right?). Myself and others from Vagabond Squadron have been preparing for this for a while now, and the majority of 2.0 games I’ve been playing have been all about finding my list for the event.

In the end I went with:

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Whisper (64)

Juke, Director Krennic, Fire Control System

Rexler Brath (88)

Juke (plus Optimised Prototype)

Colonel Jendon (46)

Total Points: 198

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Somehow I’d ended up being voted in as captain for our team, leading the fine bunch that is Steve Boulton (Rebels) and Lian Smith (Scum). We went pretty hard with our overall bid (no thanks to me, haha!) at 20 points, which as it turned out gave us first choice of matchups all day.

I usually do full on game reports, but for this I’m just going to talk generally about the day as I was incredibly tired, didn’t take any photos other than game 1, and lastly we really didn’t care too much about how we got on. I’ve heard good things about the event, having never attended before, and just wanted to have a fun day of plastic spaceships with some mates and see what else everyone else was doing with the 2.0 environment so far. And the day did not disappoint.

It was a very early start to the day, my alarm going off at 5:30 am is unheard of. But I made it to Steve’s on time to join up with others for the trip. Now, anyone who’s shared a car with me as a passenger knows I will fall asleep at some point, whether I’m tired or not. Obviously this was no exception…

Fuckers. I’ll get you back at some point! So anyway, we got there with time to spare, which was a good job as it apparently takes forever to pay for parking in Milton Keynes. Either that or it was Steve’s lack of tech-saviness causing the issue. He’s not allowed out that often, you see! Anyway, we got all registered and issued with some lovely alt art swag and got ready for the games ahead.

I can’t remember the names of all the teams we were paired with, but a big thanks to all my opponents from those games – Chris, Phil, Alessandro, Rory, and Ed. You were all fantastic opponents to play, regardless of the result of the actual game, I thoroughly enjoyed every single one and I hope you all did too. Despite my best efforts (I finished 2-3 for the day personally) we ended up going 4-1 and 6th overall. I’d like to think it was my ace captaining skills that got us there, but truth be told Steve and Lian played great all day – well, other than Steve turning Luke the wrong direction, on the stream game of all times and then taking 9(!) crits on his Luke. Steve, I know you’re always trying to get a mention in my blog, but seriously, that was too much. 😉

So yeah, somehow we ended up placing 6th out of 47 teams, way ahead of any expectations we had. Big congrats to the Warlords for yet again taking home the title, I’m starting to think they might be a bit good at this lark. The list variety on display at the event was also great to see. I don’t recall playing against anything remotely similar for any of my games, and it certainly seems, for now at least, that 2.0 has really diversified what people want to and can play. That’s never a bad thing. In terms of my own list, I struggled to get the best out of Whisper all day and with a tinge of sadness it might be time for me to put her back in her box for a little while now.

So what does that mean?

Mist Hunter, baby! Aww yeah! I’ve got my shiny new ship from the talented hands of Natalia Oracz (check out her Instagram), and can’t wait to play some more games with it. This has now turned into a commission series from her, so look out in the near future for the Hawk she’s going to be doing for me shortly. It was a bit weird seeing quite a few G-1A’s at the UKTC – I’ve never seen one on the table at any event as far as I can recall, other than the ones I’ve taken myself. So I’m not sure how I feel about that; I guess I’m not a special snowflake anymore! The fact that it’s now a seemingly competitive ship is great though, and I’m looking forward to many games together.

And for the only three people who will get this reference, one final thought to remember: Cows, they’re a bit like dogs…

Happy hunting!