Daily Chronicle: AdeptiCon 2017 Recap

This year marked the 15th year for AdeptiCon and I was really happy that I had attended.  I remember playing back at the 1st and 2nd AdeptiCon's and then being the TO for Warhammer Fantasy for the next 2 years before moving down to Arizona.  After we moved to Arizona, I was able to come back for AdeptiCon 2009 and 2010.  So AdeptiCon 2017 was my first time back in 7 years.

Back in 2002 AdeptiCon just started out as a Games Workshop Warhammer 40K and Fantasy Tournaments (with the help from Games Workshop themselves in regards to prize support and securing the venue).  Once AdeptiCon was able to grow in attendance, they were able to secure their own venue and then add other events from other manaufacturers until it grew to what it was this year, which is amazing.  I truly love attending events like this where you have so many choices to chose what you woud like to do.  My son and I are planning on attending next year and we know what we want to play in, just need to wait and see if our events will fit into next year's schedule.

This year for me, I was only on planning to attend AdeptiCon just on Saturday to do some vendor shopping and catch up with some old friends (since I moved back to Mid West in the late Fall, a lot of events were already filled up).  Then with my excitement with Bolt Action again, I saw they had spots remaining in the 2 day US Nationals Tournament.  So I called up my oldest son back in Arizona and asked if he wanted to fly out and play in the event, of course he said YES! so it looked like the two of us were going to play.

Friday March 24th, 2017

Friday started really really early for me.  I had my son on a red eye flight from Arizona arriving in Chicago around 6:00 AM.  So I had to leave Michigan around 4:15 AM with a 2:30 hour drive to O'Hare Airport.  Once my son landed it was a short drive to the Schaumburg Convention Center.

Friday was our day to do our vendor shopping, check out all the gaming rooms and events and catch up with old friends.  Which I am glad that I did see quite a few friends, but I also know I missed a lot too.  Right when we checked in for our badges and I presented my name, I heard in the background "Dean", and sure enough it was Jeff Chua (founder of AdeptiCon) behind the tables saying hi, and we chit chatted for awhile.  I used to live really close to Jeff and I hosted 'Beer and Pizza' late night Warhammer 40K Tournaments in my garage (8:00 PM - 3:00 AM) and Jeff used to attend these.  Later in the day when we passed by the registration desk again, we cran across Jamie Welling (original LotR Organizer) and Mattias Weeks (co-founder of AdeptiCon) and we chit chatted some more.

After we got our badges it was time to check out the gaming room and events.

 

Registration area.

 

X-Wing/Guild Ball/Warlord events room. 

Privateer Press room. 

Once we were done with checking out the events/gaming rooms, it was time to do some shopping......and I had a grocery list of items I wanted to pick up.

I do not airbrush much, but it was there so I picked some up.

 

Broken Egg Games (friends from AZ) just released their new War Stick for Warmachine/Hordes.  I had to pick up Minions for myself and my son grabbed a set for his Circle army.

 

Battlefoam was there with a 10% discount (perfect, was not expecting that) I was just hoping to save on shipping by purchasing this bag hear and being able to drive it back home.  I wanted to get this bag for my Engineers (and now also Brewer's, see below).

Steamforged Games was there with a really nice sized booth selling product and showing off the new Farmer's Guild.  They had plenty of the 2 player Guild Ball starter game 'Kick Off' with them.  Even though my son and I both picked up Guilds at the LVO (Engineer's and Hunter's), for $70, Kick Off is worth it.  You get two full 6 man Guilds (Mason's and Brewer's), a card board 3'x3' gaming mat and card board tokens.  I kept the Brewer's Guild (and printed mini rulebook) for myself, and sent the rest home with my son.

Picking up 'Kick Off' was just a bonus, the real reason for visiting the Steamforged booth was to pick up 'Locus' for my Engineer's Guild, a new model just released this weekend.

Now it was time to add some models to my Minions collection for Hordes.  With the new Blindwater Theme just being released before AdeptiCon, I needed a few models to fill out some lists.  Privateer Press sells 'exclusive' miniatures at conventions, so I picked up a 'Blindwater Brew Witch Doctor' from them (just to have a different pose from the regular Witch Doctor).  A local game store Chicagoland Games was also selling Privateer Press at 20% off, so I was able to find everything I needed for my lists.  The 'Sacral Vault' was just an added bonus.

Once shopping was completed we carried everything out to car to free our hands again (it was really nice to be able to drive to AdeptiCon and not worry about getting this all on a plane).  Then we grabbed my Hordes bag, gaming mat, and some dice and my son and I headed upstairs to where they had some open gaming tables and threw down a 20 point Hordes game using just a Battlegroup.  I told my son not to pack his Circle army (since we were just officially playing in Bolt Action) but I had a small Skorne army with me that he could use.

My Minions were able to get their first Win of the year. 

After that game we packed up our stuff and headed to our hotel to check-in and get some dinner.  It was a really long day for my son and some rest was needed for Saturday's Bolt Action tournament.

Again, since I decide on AdeptiCon so late in the year, I reserved a room at a Day's Inn about 3 miles South of the convention center (right next to Woodfield Mall and plenty of restaurants).  It was also much cheaper than the host hotel.  Having a car there, staying offsite is not a big deal, but unless you want to drive back to convention center after dinner for late night gaming, you kind of lose on that feeling just being able to walk down from your room.  I am still undecided on what we want to do for next year.

Saturday March 25th, 2017

Bolt Action US Nationals Day 1

I am not going to go into a play by play recap of each game (honestly do not remember), just a quick recap for the day.

Saturday was 3 games and the remaining 2 were to be played on Sunday.

Game 1 vs Dominic Manley (from my local Michiana Club): 'Breach The Defensive'

I was able to just squeeze out a Minor Victory 3-2 in this game.  Even though Dominic was from my local gaming club, I had never played him before, so it was a fun game.  I really did not expect to win any games this weekend, let alone starting off 1-0.  Now that puts me with the winners, so I knew game 2 would be tougher.

 Dominic

Game 2 vs Bruce Romanic (from North Dakota) 'Point Defense'

I decided to play the Defender in this mission.  Bruce was a really fun guy to play against with a nicely painted early war German Army and he knew how to hide his army well.  Bruce was able to control 2 objectives so I received a Major Loss.

 Bruce

Game 3 vs Bill Harvat (from Oklahoma) 'Sectors'

This table had a plentiful of buildings which really limited my line of sight for my weapons.  Bill did a great job hiding his army also.  He had an awesome themed Polish Army and was using a Bear for his mascot (which at the end of the tournament he handed him to me, I was really shocked).  I lost this game 12-5 for another Major Loss.

So I ended Saturday with a 1-2 record.  That was 1 more win than I was expecting.  We wrapped up around 6:00 PM and then again headed out for some dinner.

Sunday March 26th, 2017

Bolt Action US Nationals Day 2

Game 4 vs Derek Manley (from my Michiana Club) 'Key Positions'

Derek is Dominic's father, and just like with Dominic, I had yet to play Derek before.  I am glad I did.  It was a fun game and we were both learning from each other.  This mission is again controlling objectives where you randomly roll how many you will be playing with.  We ended up with the full 5 objectives, and you controlled the objective at the end of the game with no enemy units within 3".  I was able to hold onto 2 objectives from the beginning and get a 3rd one late in the game while contesting a 4th and losing the 5th.  You also scored .5 points for each enemy unit destroyed and 1 point for each enemy Officer.  I achieved a Major Victory winning 12-5.5

My actual plan was not to win this game.  Since I wont be playing Bolt Action again with my son till next year, my son and I wanted to play each other in Game 5 before I said good-bye to him.  Jeremy the TO (a friend of mine), still allowed us to play each other.  Maybe this would give my son his first win.

Game 5 vs Dragi Vuckovich (my son) 'I Want My Scalps'

This game was basically about destroying your enemy and earning scalps.  Every time your unit killed an enemy unit it would earn a scalp.  But if your unit was later destroyed, they would lose all the scalps that they earned.

I just wanted to play this game with my son and have a laid back gaming experience to finish out the tournament.  Unfortunately for my son, my dice finally decided to heat up for the weekend and I could not miss with anything,  I was winning 8-1 and time was running out, but I gave him one more shot to earn some scalps (and take some away) before the game ended, and 10+ shots failed to kill a single guy.  It was not his day.  I achived the Major Victory.

I ended up going 2-0 on Sunday and finishing 3-2 for my weekend record.

We packed up our armies and took them out to car and headed back in for the awards ceremony.  Jeremey had a bunch of awards laid out on the table and if you won something you can pick from what was left.  My son going 0-5 for the weekend got the lowesr battle points and he ended up grabbing a Konflikt 47 rulebook.  I was someplace near the top for overall and grabbed some old sprues and a Broken Egg Games template (which is what I wanted from what was left).  Also some random player (and I forgot to catch his name) was nice enough to hand my son his Trenchworx $15 gift certificate.  This will be well used for his US Army.

That about wraps it up....  it was a really good time and looking forward to next year.  Next year the plan is just to play in single day events more than likely the Bolt Action Teamj Tournament, Warmachine/Hordes Team Tournament and some kind of event for Guild Ball.

Here are just a few more photos I took.

My Brisith Army. 

The Manley's

 

My son's US Army.