The first Waterbowl for the boys started at 5:30am on the Saturday for a three hour journey to Manchester, picking up Jip on the way. This begged the age-old question – “if the house is in complete darkness and the person you’re picking up is not responding to their phone, how long do you leave it before abandoning them?”. Luckily for him, the answer was more than 10 minutes, so he was able to make the journey!
80 coaches (biggest WB ever?) were there at the marvellous North West Gaming Centre, unrecognisable from a few years ago, and home of Element Games. I was using Wood Elves, in my quest for a tournament win with as many races as possible, Linus had Khorne, his 24th of the 26 races and Alex turned to Pro Elves. I took two throwers, a variety of roster that I hadn’t seen before (probably for a good reason) and a Jump Up tree, as well as a M9 catcher for one-turn score shenanigans, but much more besides.
My first game was against previous NAF Champion and recent UKTC team winner Sizzler with Dark Elves. I was pretty happy with how I played, keeping him in his half while the wardancer leaps did their stuff, but the casualties took their toll, and when I started the second half with 6 against his 11, a 2-1 loss was actually reasonably respectable. Time to start drinking! Alex drew against one of Valen’s kids, throwing away a 2-0 advantage (tish!) and Linus lost narrowly to Chaos Dwarfs.
I was rewarded for my loss with some goblins, who had lost 5-0 in their first round, again against wood elves, so there were high standards to meet. Boom! 7-1! My biggest win, which I think wasn’t too horribly painful for him (but maybe it was). Alex managed another draw against orcs this time, out-injuring him with his elves (nice!), and Linus went down to Undead.
Skaven for me game three, and it should have been comfortable once his M10 gutter headed to the dead box, but a couple of critical nasty dice rolls and a dead Leader made life difficult. I should have been able to stall out for a 2-2 draw, but I took the score in hope of a turnover win, and paid the price going down 3-2. Linus went down again for an entertaining but fruitless Saturday, but the result of the round went to Alex who pulled some crazy dice out of nowhere for a draw against Mr Joemanji and his Undead.
Leading on most touchdowns, I’ll hope to consolidate that position today against Lokjaw’s Norse. Alex is leading the Sann Clan on 030 and has Bim, from Sweden, with Necro, and Linus is looking for his first points against Muttley’s High Elf team.
Honourable mention at this point to Jip, currently king of the car after wins in games 1 and 2 and a tie in game 3, all against top coaches. Hoping for some silverware to take back to Swindon!
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