Achievement format go!
The Long Road - Drive from the Bay Area to Bellevue. 13 hours of driving with two of my best friends. Was totally rad. Loved the whole trip, especially the last couple hours when it was open season for jokes found via Google. And yes, I had my Sloan model blue-tacked to the dashboard of my car the entire trip, much to the torture of my friends. It was glorious.
Veteran Warrior - Feel like a real LnL Veteran. I felt like a real veteran of LnL, having attended 4 years in a row now, especially given how many people were commenting that this was their first year. Especially given that this is now 3 years at the same venue, it made things familiar and easy to know where things would be.
Master of None - Play in Masters. Yep, totally played in Masters. I got pretty thoroughly stomped, going 1-3 in the early heat, and coming in at 47 out of 102. That makes it sound good, but lots of people dropped. In fact there were 2 people that dropped and still ranked higher than me. Still though, I had a fantastic time. All of my opponents were great, especially the indomitable Brad Fish in my last round. We had a delightful chat about Cygnar after he assassinated Sturgis with Caine2 top of round 3. All of my games were a delight though, and I wouldn't change a thing. This was the first time I played in Masters and I have to admit that it was a great way to start the entire weekend. In previous years I arrived just planning to play in the arena, but now I think future years might feature more tournaments than anything else.
Hang With The Cool Kids - Go for drinks where the PP staff does. So it turns out when you take all your buddies out for drinks at a nearby upper class restaurant bar, you end up seeing the Privateer staff there too. We didn't interrupt them as I believe they were celebrating a number of things, not the least of which was probably Simon leaving. Still, it was great to see a bunch of them all hanging out and enjoying drinks together.
Sole Unbound - Play Unbound with Jason Soles. It finally happened! Clearly my biggest and most exciting achievement. I was the only one to show up for the Unbound event and Jason happily kept the event on. It was an amazing game and wrapped up in under 6 hours amazingly. During the game I got to chat with Jason a lot too which was really enjoyable. He's a really nice guy and clearly enjoys the game. The Mk3 release was clearly a huge event and now being able to talk about it was clearly a huge relaxation for him. It was hilarious watching him rip Mk2 cards out of their sleeves as I finished them off and toss them with a cackling "Goodbye Mk2 card!" So many things going away in Mk3 that make the game more enjoyable not just for the players, but for the staff as well. Getting to ask him questions like "what's your favorite thing about watching people explore Mk3" were especially fun to hear his commentary on. I'm sure he was getting a ton of questions about individual models, but having a more broad view of the entire game means he has such an interesting high level perspective on the new edition that I think most people didn't take advantage of. Anyway, again, the Unbound game was awesome, and Jason destroyed me pretty handily. There was however a shining moment...
Dice Bending Miracle - Get a crazy run on dice. So in a desperate move during the Unbound game, I managed to teleport Sturgis into Jason's backfield and right next to eFeora and a Judicator. I then proceeded to win the initiative, go first, and have an incredible run of dice for Sturgis to assassinate a full-focus-camp eFeora. It was epic, and I think Jason was actually pretty shocked.
Shut Up And Take My Money - Buy lots of stuff. Yep, totally bought a bunch of stuff at the store. Got 4 card decks, 2 starter boxes, 2 Gun Mage Riflemen, 2 Hellmouths, and 3 blisters of Gobber Drudges. So great.
Stay on target - Play a bunch of games towards my yearly goal. I played 9 games total while I was there which really jumps me forward on my goal. I could have played more undoubtedly, but between Masters and Unbound, it ate up most of 2 days of gaming time and I did also want to have some general hanging out time as well.
Getting the gang back together - Play games with all my friends. Check and check. I was especially enjoying that I got 2 games in with my buddy Mike who made a last minute plan to fly in for 2 days of LnL. It was really great to see him.
And that's pretty much it. Another Lock and Load in the bag and a pile more memories of a great time. I'm already hoping to attend next year!
The Long Road - Drive from the Bay Area to Bellevue. 13 hours of driving with two of my best friends. Was totally rad. Loved the whole trip, especially the last couple hours when it was open season for jokes found via Google. And yes, I had my Sloan model blue-tacked to the dashboard of my car the entire trip, much to the torture of my friends. It was glorious.
Veteran Warrior - Feel like a real LnL Veteran. I felt like a real veteran of LnL, having attended 4 years in a row now, especially given how many people were commenting that this was their first year. Especially given that this is now 3 years at the same venue, it made things familiar and easy to know where things would be.
Master of None - Play in Masters. Yep, totally played in Masters. I got pretty thoroughly stomped, going 1-3 in the early heat, and coming in at 47 out of 102. That makes it sound good, but lots of people dropped. In fact there were 2 people that dropped and still ranked higher than me. Still though, I had a fantastic time. All of my opponents were great, especially the indomitable Brad Fish in my last round. We had a delightful chat about Cygnar after he assassinated Sturgis with Caine2 top of round 3. All of my games were a delight though, and I wouldn't change a thing. This was the first time I played in Masters and I have to admit that it was a great way to start the entire weekend. In previous years I arrived just planning to play in the arena, but now I think future years might feature more tournaments than anything else.
Hang With The Cool Kids - Go for drinks where the PP staff does. So it turns out when you take all your buddies out for drinks at a nearby upper class restaurant bar, you end up seeing the Privateer staff there too. We didn't interrupt them as I believe they were celebrating a number of things, not the least of which was probably Simon leaving. Still, it was great to see a bunch of them all hanging out and enjoying drinks together.
Sole Unbound - Play Unbound with Jason Soles. It finally happened! Clearly my biggest and most exciting achievement. I was the only one to show up for the Unbound event and Jason happily kept the event on. It was an amazing game and wrapped up in under 6 hours amazingly. During the game I got to chat with Jason a lot too which was really enjoyable. He's a really nice guy and clearly enjoys the game. The Mk3 release was clearly a huge event and now being able to talk about it was clearly a huge relaxation for him. It was hilarious watching him rip Mk2 cards out of their sleeves as I finished them off and toss them with a cackling "Goodbye Mk2 card!" So many things going away in Mk3 that make the game more enjoyable not just for the players, but for the staff as well. Getting to ask him questions like "what's your favorite thing about watching people explore Mk3" were especially fun to hear his commentary on. I'm sure he was getting a ton of questions about individual models, but having a more broad view of the entire game means he has such an interesting high level perspective on the new edition that I think most people didn't take advantage of. Anyway, again, the Unbound game was awesome, and Jason destroyed me pretty handily. There was however a shining moment...
Dice Bending Miracle - Get a crazy run on dice. So in a desperate move during the Unbound game, I managed to teleport Sturgis into Jason's backfield and right next to eFeora and a Judicator. I then proceeded to win the initiative, go first, and have an incredible run of dice for Sturgis to assassinate a full-focus-camp eFeora. It was epic, and I think Jason was actually pretty shocked.
Shut Up And Take My Money - Buy lots of stuff. Yep, totally bought a bunch of stuff at the store. Got 4 card decks, 2 starter boxes, 2 Gun Mage Riflemen, 2 Hellmouths, and 3 blisters of Gobber Drudges. So great.
Stay on target - Play a bunch of games towards my yearly goal. I played 9 games total while I was there which really jumps me forward on my goal. I could have played more undoubtedly, but between Masters and Unbound, it ate up most of 2 days of gaming time and I did also want to have some general hanging out time as well.
Getting the gang back together - Play games with all my friends. Check and check. I was especially enjoying that I got 2 games in with my buddy Mike who made a last minute plan to fly in for 2 days of LnL. It was really great to see him.
And that's pretty much it. Another Lock and Load in the bag and a pile more memories of a great time. I'm already hoping to attend next year!
7 days now. It's very real.
Missed a week on the countdown, but not a lot of progress anyway. Last week was crazy.