Hello, Competitive Warhammer 40k fans! SaltyJohn from TFG Radio is here with your weekly ITC report!
This weekend, and the past week, are big weeks for the ITC! Last weekend we saw two large events Warzone Houston and Frontline Gamings Las Vegas Team Tournament was held for the first time! Before we jump into who won those let’s take a quick look at the top 10 in the ITC and the top 10 in the ITC among Warhammer Clubs.
The top 10 hasn’t changed too much, but as of writing this the scores from the weekend still hadn’t populated into the rankings so we might still see some movement when that happens. Lennon, Nayden, McDade, and Cherwien continue to vie for the top spot overall, and the scores in the entire top 10, event the top 20, are close enough that without something big breaking one way or the other it will all come down to who wins the Las Vegas Open at the close of the season!
The top 10 Teams, Club is more apt in my opinion, isn’t too surprising. Several of the top clubs are tied to coaching services. Like with the top 10 players though the scores are all close enough that the prize for the top club for the season is likely to come down to which team can have the best performance at the Las Vegas Open 2022.
This past weekend the Warzone Houston event was hosted in, surprisingly, Houston, and it had a great turnout. The competition was largely a field of Texans, but being a large state with a lot of 40k players that means the competition was still stiff. Two weeks ago I interviewed Colin McDade for this article series and this weekend he put in a really strong showing at the Warzone Houston event coming in second!
The top 10 had a decent spread of armies which is nice to see. First place was won by Russel Tassin piloting Black Legion! His list was a mix of the expected, Abaddon and Dreads, and the unique. While Abaddon is a practical auto-include in a Black Legion list, as are dreads, his list featured some unexpected combination of dreads. Instead of simply triple Volkite Contemptors, he took 2 Contemptors with Las Cannons and Missile Launchers, a Leviathan with Grav Flux Bombard and Storm Cannon, and a Decimator with Soulburner Petards. Interestingly he also had a Terrax-Pattern Termite and a Lord of Skulls! That’s a lot of beef in that list, I like it. Without a single Ad Mech in the top 10 I am wondering if perhaps the event banned them! With just two Ork and two Drukhari armies in the top 10 and lack of any Sisters, it seems a bit more balanced until you realize that all the other armies were Imperium of some type, except McCormick’s Renegade Knights. Congratulations to Russel Tassin at taking the top spot with Black Legion!
Frontline Gaming hosted their first-ever Las Vegas Team Tournament this past weekend as well. Turn out for the event was huge and FLG continued this season’s tradition of trying out new things. The player-optimized terrain system they started using at Atlantic City Open was once again tweaked and used at the event. This team tournament also eschewed the usual format in an attempt to, among other things, discourage skew lists and encourage playing to win matches. Looking through the army lists there didn’t seem to be too many attempts at bringing heavy skew lists for specific matchups. The event was an overall success and preliminary reports from the teams were predominantly positive.
First place went to Art of War who put together a strong team and great scoring; the top 5 represents some of the best players in the ITC and the Western region for the United States. Congratulations to Art of War for taking the top spot at the event and #REKT for taking home the Renaissance Award. Due in large part to the skills of Brandon Grant, Jeff Poole, Allan Hernandez, and Carlos Kaiser on the tabletop and Derek Page getting a great hobby score. Here are a few shots of his army, the display board he made was particularly nice but the photos don’t do it justice. If you want to see more of Derek’s work check out his Instagram rumrunner_hobbies. His Samurai-themed Dark Angels with a matching Japanese-themed display board are really nice.
This weekend the 2nd US Open from Games Workshop is coming to New Orleans. After the first-ever GW US Open in Orlando last month this event is set to be just as successful! The competition in the GW tournament system that utilizes brackets and specific terrain setups is both unique and highly competitive. The New Orleans event has drawn even more of the big names and with some returning players from Orlando like Jack Harpster, it is set to be another great event to track. Clifton Russel, David Villareal, John Lennon, Kicker Kalozdi, Siegler, and Seth Oster are all registered to play.
I will once again be there to help Games Workshop judge the event and I look forward to seeing what they have in store for attendees this time around! Next week I will write up about my time judging the US Open in New Orleans. As usual let me know what you think in the comments, or let me know about upcoming events you think I should feature.