Battle for Stones River 2012: Thoughts from the Tournament Organizer.
So the 2012 BFSR has come and gone, what a day it was though. I feel like it was quite a successful tournament. We had 67 players total, a new venue, some new terrain and some new tables. I have quite a few pictures to post but I wanted to give you guys my take on the tournament.
To start with, I want to thank everyone involved in the tournament from prepping terrain/tables to setup/cleanup. My fellow Istvaanians; Danny, Josh, Phillip, Keith, Patrick and Shannon thanks for all the help! Thanks goes out to Chris from Grand Adventures for all of his support. Thanks to Matt for providing everyone lunch. Also, thanks to Todd for helping with odds and ends. Finally, a giant thanks to all the players for making the day great! I think we had a great bunch of players and some awesome looking armies.
On to the new venue, the Lane Agri-Center. I was thoroughly ecstatic with our new location. It turned out to have more room than we originally calculated which gave us the opportunity to spread the tables out. The past four years have been a tight squeeze between tables and the feedback I got was that everyone really appreciated the extra room. The space was perfect for what we needed, it allowed us to split the 6 table rows into two. This gave us a huge walkway down the middle of the room. I think next year we will keep a similar layout but still be able to add a few more tables. Usually after the tournament my feet are killing me, but I think that thin layer of carpet actually provided some cushion. Overall a very nice and clean facility, looking forward to next year.
On to the new venue, the Lane Agri-Center. I was thoroughly ecstatic with our new location. It turned out to have more room than we originally calculated which gave us the opportunity to spread the tables out. The past four years have been a tight squeeze between tables and the feedback I got was that everyone really appreciated the extra room. The space was perfect for what we needed, it allowed us to split the 6 table rows into two. This gave us a huge walkway down the middle of the room. I think next year we will keep a similar layout but still be able to add a few more tables. Usually after the tournament my feet are killing me, but I think that thin layer of carpet actually provided some cushion. Overall a very nice and clean facility, looking forward to next year.
 |
| 2/3rds setup Friday Night |
 |
| New Desert Tables |
We added new desert tables to our existing terrain this year so we could increase the size from 50 players last year to 70 this year. The desert terrain turned out really well. I think it gave plenty of cover and looked outstanding. We also added terrain to our snow and brown tables in response to comments last year about a lack of LOS blocking terrain. I didn’t hear any comments about not having enough terrain this year. Danny and Josh gave up a lot of time and energy to help produce all this new terrain, so if you talk to them say thanks! We also built a new style of light weight table this year. They worked really well and stood up to the rigors of the day very well. Hopefully we can replace the old worn out plywood tables over the next year with some of the new style ones.
The scenarios we chose seemed to workout pretty well. We didn’t have too many questions or problems come up. The overall points spread was pretty good too. I was amazed to see Brian Crew score 80 out of 80 Battle Points on the day. First time in BFSR history of a perfect day, as a matter of fact.
Well the conquerors for the day were Brian Crew (Overall Champion), Matt Rogers (2nd Place Overall) and David “Tarzan” Jensen (3rd Place Overall). Best General went to Matt Rogers, Best Painted went to Grant Wyatt and Best Sportsman went to Chris Enfinger. Are usual style of Civil War replicas for trophies was carried on again this year. We brought in the big gun for Overall Champion, a replica Enfield Musket. We also brought in a replica CSA Officer’s Sword, a replica Cavalry Sword and a replica 1853 Army Pistol. People really seem to love the trophies and it is something different than just giving out product as a prize. Being on the Games Workshop GT Circuit this year also provided our Overall Champion a ticket to the Throne of Skulls Tournament in Memphis and $150 gift voucher from GW. Also 2nd Overall gets $100 GW gift voucher and 3rd got a $50 gift voucher. We stuck to our policy of only giving out one trophy per person this year but didn’t factor in the GW prizes, so we ran into the situation where Best General was also 2nd Overall. With Chris from Grand Adventures providing Battle Forces for the Best Painted/Sportsman/General we actually gave away that and $100 from GW to the same person. This is something we didn’t take into account and will have to look into for next year. Congratulations to all of our winners!
 |
| Best Painted |
 |
| Best Sportsmanship |
 |
| Overall Champion |
 |
| Best General |
 |
| Chris from Grand Adventures and that's me on the cooler. |
 |
| Grant Wyatt, Best Painted +Catachan Jungle Fighters+ |
 |
| Chris Enfinger, Best Sportsman. Voted favorite opponent by all four of his opponents! |
 |
| Matt Rogers, Best General |
 |
| David "Tarzan" Jensen, 3rd Place Overall |
 |
| Quite excited! |
 |
| Matt Rogers, 2nd Place Overall |
 |
| Brian Crew, Overall Champion |
Shannon was nice enough to take our results and create some cool statistics for us. I hope you guys enjoy them. Thanks Shannon!
So we will take a little time off and then get back to work on planning for next year so if you have some good ideas you think could make our tournament better, please send us a note. I hope to see everyone back next year along with a few new faces. Thanks for reading and enjoy the pictures.
| Army Type* | # | % | Running Total | ||||||
| Space Wolves | 13 | 20% | 20% | ||||||
| Grey Knights | 8 | 12% | 32% | ||||||
| Space Marines | 8 | 12% | 44% | ||||||
| Blood Angels | 7 | 11% | 55% | ||||||
| Imperial Guard | 5 | 8% | 62% | ||||||
| Necrons | 5 | 8% | 70% | ||||||
| Tyranids | 4 | 6% | 76% | ||||||
| Dark Eldar | 3 | 5% | 80% | ||||||
| Eldar | 3 | 5% | 85% | ||||||
| Orks | 3 | 5% | 89% | ||||||
| Black Templars | 2 | 3% | 92% | ||||||
| Chaos Space Marines | 2 | 3% | 95% | ||||||
| Tau | 1 | 2% | 97% | ||||||
| Chaos Deamons | 1 | 2% | 98% | ||||||
| Unknown | 1 | 2% | 100% | ||||||
| Total | 66 | 98% | |||||||
| *One Tau player removed after leaving early | |||||||||
| Army Averages and Top Player Scores | ||||
| Army Type* | Overall BP Earned | Overall Avg | Standard Dev | Top Player's Score |
| Grey Knights | 347 | 43 | 12 | 68 |
| Blood Angels | 258 | 37 | 24 | 80 |
| Imperial Guard | 183 | 37 | 9 | 46 |
| Necrons | 162 | 32 | 20 | 60 |
| Eldar | 93 | 31 | 12 | 40 |
| Space Wolves | 396 | 30 | 19 | 66 |
| Black Templars | 60 | 30 | 7 | 37 |
| Space Marines | 224 | 28 | 11 | 43 |
| Dark Eldar | 84 | 28 | 5 | 35 |
| Chaos Deamons | 28 | 28 | 0 | 28 |
| Tyranids | 103 | 26 | 7 | 37 |
| Chaos Space Marines | 43 | 22 | 19 | 40 |
| Orks | 55 | 18 | 4 | 23 |
| Tau | 14 | 14 | 0 | 14 |
| *Unknown removed | ||||
| Average Army Performance By Round | ||||
| Army Type* | Round 1 BP Average | Round 2 BP Average | Round 3 BP Average | Round 4 BP Average |
| Grey Knights | 9 | 14 | 8 | 13 |
| Blood Angels | 8 | 13 | 9 | 7 |
| Imperial Guard | 6 | 16 | 4 | 10 |
| Necrons | 9 | 5 | 8 | 10 |
| Eldar | 0 | 12 | 15 | 4 |
| Space Wolves | 7 | 7 | 9 | 7 |
| Black Templars | 2 | 6 | 9 | 15 |
| Space Marines | 8 | 2 | 11 | 7 |
| Dark Eldar | 5 | 0 | 13 | 10 |
| Chaos Deamons | 0 | 14 | 3 | 11 |
| Tyranids | 10 | 4 | 2 | 10 |
| Chaos Space Marines | 0 | 0 | 12 | 10 |
| Orks | 3 | 10 | 2 | 3 |
| Tau | 0 | 0 | 11 | 3 |
| Best Player Score By Round | ||||
| Army Type* | Round 1 | Round 2 | Round 3 | Round 4 |
| Grey Knights | 20 | 20 | 20 | 20 |
| Blood Angels | 20 | 20 | 20 | 20 |
| Imperial Guard | 20 | 20 | 17 | 20 |
| Necrons | 20 | 20 | 20 | 20 |
| Eldar | 0 | 20 | 20 | 11 |
| Space Wolves | 20 | 20 | 20 | 20 |
| Black Templars | 3 | 11 | 17 | 20 |
| Space Marines | 20 | 6 | 20 | 20 |
| Dark Eldar | 9 | 0 | 20 | 20 |
| Chaos Deamons | 0 | 14 | 3 | 11 |
| Tyranids | 20 | 11 | 3 | 20 |
| Chaos Space Marines | 0 | 0 | 20 | 20 |
| Orks | 6 | 20 | 3 | 9 |
| Tau | 0 | 0 | 11 | 3 |
| Paint Score Average By Army | ||
| Army Type* | Average Painting | Standard Dev |
| Grey Knights | 22 | 9 |
| Blood Angels | 26 | 9 |
| Imperial Guard | 24 | 9 |
| Necrons | 26 | 7 |
| Eldar | 20 | 7 |
| Space Wolves | 23 | 8 |
| Black Templars | 20 | 10 |
| Space Marines | 26 | 7 |
| Dark Eldar | 21 | 15 |
| Chaos Deamons | 31 | 0 |
| Tyranids | 17 | 8 |
| Chaos Space Marines | 28 | 3 |
| Orks | 23 | 6 |
| Tau | 37 | 0 |
| Army Type* | Overall Army Sportsmanship Average | |
| Grey Knights | 27 | |
| Blood Angels | 29 | |
| Imperial Guard | 31 | |
| Necrons | 24 | |
| Eldar | 29 | |
| Space Wolves | 28 | |
| Black Templars | 30 | |
| Space Marines | 26 | |
| Dark Eldar | 26 | |
| Chaos Deamons | 40 | |
| Tyranids | 26 | |
| Chaos Space Marines | 29 | |
| Orks | 33 | |
| Tau | 32 | |
So we will take a little time off and then get back to work on planning for next year so if you have some good ideas you think could make our tournament better, please send us a note. I hope to see everyone back next year along with a few new faces. Thanks for reading and enjoy the pictures.
 |
| Tarzan and Randy |
 |
| Justin's LED Wreck Markers! |
 |
| Alan rolling dice... |
 | |
| Brian Crew's Blood Angels |
 |
| Brian's Death Company Dread |
 |
| Cody Mitchell's Carcharodon Marines |
 |
| Josh Alexander's Blood Angels |
 |
| Keith Hoffman's Night Lords |
 |
| Chris Bryant's Space Wolves |
 |
| Grant Wyatt's Catachan Jungle Fighters, Winner of Best Painted! |
 |
| Shannon Dickens' Tau |
 |
| Tarzan Jensen's Necrons |
 |
| Phillip French's Nurgle Marines |
 |
| Chris Enfinger's Nurgle Marines |
 |
| Black Library's Mike Lee! |
 |
| Jeff Guillotte"s Black Templars |
That's all for now. If you have any photos I would love to post them up. Let me know and send them our way. I will try to get captions in the photos soon so you know whose army is whose and who everyone is. Thanks again!