Hey everyone SaltyJohn, an LVO Senior Judge, and member of TFG Radio here with an important announcement.
Lists for the Las Vegas Open 2020 are beginning to be parsed for data and it there are hundreds of Space Marine lists that include Chaplain Venerable Dreadnoughts and Thunderfire Cannons. Those models tend to be pretty hard to come by. We announced multiple times, and multiple places that Conversions should be sent to us for approval. The number of lists using these models, and the seeming lack of conversion approvals for them in relation to that number, is disconcerting. So please take the following under advisement if you are using a conversion of a model, especially the Chaplain Dread or TFC, and did not get it approved beforehand.
Counts as, is not allowed at the LVO. Two examples for “counts as” a regular Venerable Dreadnought with no conversion work done being used as a Chaplain Venerable Dreadnought, a 30k Space Marine Quad Mortar being used as a Thunderfire Cannon. Conversions that do not match the size of the actual model, and where the size difference would be an advantage tot he player, will be pulled and penalties issued to the offending player. Conversions that do not meet basic standards of what the model should look like to make it distinct will also be pulled and penalties issued.
Again, it is looking like a LOT of you are bringing Chaplain Venerable Dreadnoughts. So here are a few things to be aware of. 1. Those models aren’t widely available and while we received a lot of conversion approval requests for them, we did not receive them in the numbers we are seeing in the lists. So, if you didn’t get one approved and you don’t have the actual model you need to make sure what you’re playing is a conversion, a counts as will be removed and a yellow card issued. 2. Chaplain Dreadnoughts got a lot better via the FAQ, however, they did not gain the <Chaplain> keyword. As far as Thunderfire Cannons go we will have some real ones with us and will be comparing them to those of you fielding converted Thunderfire Cannons that did not get our approval beforehand. The deadline for getting your conversions approved has passed, the Google Form is closed and none of us will be approving them, it is up to you now. We will be keeping an eye out for these at LVO 2020.
To reiterate, it is too late to get your conversions approved now, that window has closed. This is also not just applicable to Chaplain Dreads and TFC Conversions, any conversion we did not pre-approve will be subject to us inspecting and removing.
And remember, Frontline Gaming sells gaming products at a discount, every day in their webcart!
Good on ya! I’m tired of seeing toys as stand ins for models. I hope you guys will be proactive in looking for and removing these.
It’s funny to see people freak out. This has been our FW modeling policy for almost a decade, lol. When we first introduced FW to competitive play back in 5th (prior to us doing that almost no one used FW in tournaments) we laid out these guidelines. So if someone is reacting to this as if it were new info they’re really late to the party, hahaha.
A decade Reece? Surely you jest…
It’s all well and good to raise standards but perhaps we should dial up Brett Perkin’s 2017 winning list and have a looksee at what he used for his renegades army?
; )
This hobby stuff is a super recent development, and I think it’s awesome – but it really is. Until even two years ago hobby requirements functionally didn’t exist.
So it’s great – it means the scene’s maturing. But yeah, I can relate if it’s jarring for some out there.
Our FW model policy has actually been in play since mid 5th ed, lol. This is nothing new, home slice =P
How do you consistently have such terrible takes on this stuff? It’s honestly a bit impressive, yet quite out of touch.
I do think this is a great policy and I love what you have done to bring the LVO up to hobby standards. I believe that it’s the only good long-term strategy. But making an announcement this close to the event and after list submission is going to make it impossible for some well-meaning players to comply. I understand you have WYSIWYG and FW policies, but this level of enforcement is stricter than anything established over the last few years and thousands of ITC events (many streamed events).The “Quad Mortar” is a Space Marine GW model almost identical to the Thunder-fire Cannon. The fact this kind of infraction is so harshly punished is not an established norm.
The announcement is not being made now though, lol, that is the point. These have been the policies all edition and beyond. Players have had the opportunity to get models approved for a long time. We’re making this announcement now so people can get up to snuff while there’s still time that might not have been prepared in a way they needed to be.
If you are using a dread as a chappy dread, make it look like a chappy dread (it’s very easy to do). A quad mortar as a t-fire is a straight up proxy. It would be like using a Taurox as a Rhino (or whatever) and expecting that to be OK.
If you are using Quad Mortars, simply beef them up a bit, add one some tail bits to make the footprint the same as a t-fire. The quad mortar is actually quite a bit easier to hide than a real t-fire and as such (especially considering how many are coming) going to grant an unfair advantage to the player using them. Thinking that us saying no to proxies is something we just decided to do right now out of the blue is simply false. This has always been the case, just us reiterating it specifically in reference to these models has made it very real for some players. And if people weren’t enforcing it then OK, but that doesn’t mean it’s not still the rules.
Like I said, the judges are going to be reasonable about it. If you try to make the model look like what it is meant to represent in shape and size you will be OK. Just put some effort into it to make it a reasonable substitute. It’s seriously not hard.
And, as we’ve been saying, better now than at the table when it is really painful.
Like I wrote, I do agree with the strict enforcement and I do expect people to be reasonable at the tables and event. I’ll be bringing a beefed up Quad Mortar. Thanks for the reply and I look forward to the event!
Fair critique, and we look forward to hosting you, buddy!
You can make all the announcements that you want; the reality is that a lot of people just won’t pay attention, or will put it off. I see it every day at work, with both students AND staff, and I know I’m guilty of it at times as well.
Plus, didn’t they add Quad Mortars back in as an option for SM armies at some point? If so, that’s a clear violation of counts-as, so it really should not be a surprise.
Sometimes you just gotta drop the hammer.
Yes. I even played an Imperial Fist recently that had 3 Thunderfires AND three Quad Mortars (and a Scorpius).
You wanna go full artillery, it’s a list you can do.
Number of Chaplain Dreads sold FW: 10 Number at LVO: 300.
Laughs in Mandarin
Lol, you’re not entirely wrong, haha.
But looking at the discrepancy between the number of Chappy Dreads that got model approval for conversion vs. how many we’re seeing in lists, it’s a BIG difference.
great to see you being firm on this
Anonmouse:
“I’m tired of seeing toys as stand ins for models. ” At tourneys?!
You can’t possibly mean FLG events. I have not seen a ‘toy’ used in an RTT nor GT, since I got in on the scene in 2012. FLG events, many local RTTs and several GTs throughout. Not once.
Where do these things actually happen? Which events?
Casey H
Team BeerHammer
I made a daemon Prince of Khorne out of the incredible hulk I’m pretty proud of ?
Granted he’s only seen play in my back yard and garage
My very first LVO during 7th ed I played against a tau player that used a full-size Castle Greyskull from He-man as his void shield generator. So dumb.
Yeah, we had a bunch of AWFUL void shields that one year, we had to really crack down after that.
I bet we’ll be seeing A LOT of these:
https://www.shapeways.com/product/4V2XTA3YW/aquila-pattern-dreadnought-conversion-kit-3x?optionId=88700451&li=shop-inventory
That is an expensive alternative
I’m not attending LVO so don’t know if these would pass the test but my local GT approved them for space wolf venerable chaplain dreads
I used the blood angel furioso torso for the “wings” and then wolfed mine up
http://image.bolterandchainsword.com/uploads/gallery/album_15551/med_gallery_49686_15551_131806.jpg
“ Number of Chaplain Dreads sold FW: 10 Number at LVO: 300.
Laughs in Mandarin”
CHINA…