Putting the Champion Back in Championships [Part 1]


In the waning days of 2009, with AdeptiCon 2010 registration well under way, we were faced with a bit of a dilemma. The Warhammer 40K Championships had always been our most ‘normalized’ event and to that end, it was not receiving the attention it deserved. In previous years (2008 and 2009) we were able to run a parallel Invitational event that drew the top finishers from several other Games Workshop Tournament Circuit tournaments. While not a perfect solution by any means, we were simply limited by the resources available to us. The space, tables, volunteers and time it took to fit anything additional into an already jam-packed event schedule simply did not exist. With the demise of the Games Workshop Tournament Circuit in 2009, hosting an Invitational was out of the question, so the Warhammer 40K Championships stood alone.

What we failed to foresee was the massive increase in interest for this event. On one hand we fully realized that Games Workshop was no longer running many of their traditional events. On the other we acknowledged the state of the economy and the burden it placed on people when traveling for recreation. Just prior to New Year’s Day, the Warhammer 40K Championships sold out. Normally in situations like this we take a second or third look at the table layout in the hall and make adjustments to open up as many additional tables as possible. And we did. Then it sold out again…and again. In the end we had 240 players in the event with 59 others on a waitlist (for comparison, the 2009 Warhammer 40K Championships and Invitational had a total of 176 players, a 58% growth in demand). We were at our absolute breaking point in terms of table space and available terrain, but now we had a new problem…

Historically speaking, Friday evening was the precursor to the actual convention and always hosted the ‘fun’ event. In the beginning this was mainly dominated by the Gladiator event, in all its resin glory, and often found players finishing their final round at 3AM. In 2006 we expanded the convention to a full 3-day format and started adding additional events. The Gladiator, true to its intentions, retained the Friday evening position acting as a primer event for the rest of the weekend. In turn this relegated the Warhammer 40K Championships to Sunday, and due to time constraints, three rounds. For the next couple of years, this format suited the convention just fine. While the Warhammer 40K Team Tournament was still considered our flagship event, other events were slowly proving that the convention could support a full schedule on Friday in terms of attendance. Fast forward to late 2009…we immediately recognized that a 240 player 3-round event would simply not suffice, but at the same time we were already locked in place in terms of the hall, table rentals, terrain and volunteers. At that point a decision was made to run two parallel Championship tournaments in 2010 and immediately get to work on refining the event and schedule for 2011…

:: To Be Continued ::

Up Next: Goals, and Scoring!

1 comment:

  1. For some reason this comment got caught in the spam filter and wouldn't release properly:

    From: Hulksmash on 8/27/2010
    First draft of the mission is looking good. I look forward to seeing what you guys do with the rest of the missions. I like the format quite a bit and an event like this could get me out to Chicago this year. After how much fun I had at the Nova this is an excellent direction for the 40K Championships to go.

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