A set of four documents reveals the shape of 40k organized events in the new edition. Check out what to expect.
Another major piece of the 11th edition puzzle falls into place today with the release of four Event Companion documents. In the past, Games Workshop released a single master Events Document, but for this edition, it’s been split into four convenient and more manageable documents.
The primary Event Companion is an overview document with extensive notes for tournament organizers and breaks down the changes to mission sequences. This information is accompanied by suggestions and advice for managing pairings and rankings. It also includes an updated list of all base sizes for all 40k units, as well as a selection of recommended Terrain layouts.
This is essentially the baseline document for running events and is worth reading even for us narratively-focused players.
Dispositions and Terrain
We’ve already learned a lot about the new Force Disposition system in basic games of 40k. However, the Events Companion alters this sequence. In a standard game, you may choose any Force Disposition affiliated with any of the detachments in your army. But when playing in an organized event, you will choose a single Force Disposition when submitting your army to the organizers. This choice will be set for the entire event, meaning you will only need to master the five primary missions associated with that Disposition.
In order to keep games from becoming stale, the Event Companion also includes a set of three different terrain layouts for each mission, along with suggestions for which event rounds they’re best used during. This brings us to perhaps the biggest change in 40k events this edition: players now set up their terrain after being matched with their opponent.
The new Terrain Footprints combined with the Event Companion’s diagrams and annotated measurements should make this a speedy process, but event organizers will certainly need to build in a little extra time between rounds.
Double Your Pleasure, Double Your Fun: Doubles Events
Doubles has been one of the most popular 40k tournament formats for many years and it’s great to see it finally receive official support. These 2v2 matches can see some crazy rules interactions.
Orks and Aeldari might fight side-by-side against Black Templars teamed up with the Death Guard and this document is here to help smooth out these corner cases. For example:
For example, do you gain extra command points because there are two of you (nope), or can your Ork Boys hitch a ride in your mate’s Wave Serpent (also nope).
The team at Warhammer Community also took the time to answer a question that’s been a hot topic amongst the community this week: How do armies with only a single 3 DP detachment (like some Imperial Agents) play at 1,000 point games where they only receive 2 DPs? Since this would effect Doubles tournaments on a basic level they’ve addressed it here:
While we’re on the subject of doubles forces, we’ve seen a lot of questions about whether you can use a 3DP detachment as your only detachment in your army at 1000 points (a common size for doubles games). Our intent is to let you do so and we will be making an update to clarify that in the first update to the Muster Army rules after launch. Effectively, you can always choose to pick any one, lone detachment, regardless of the mission size, even if it costs more Detachment Points than that game might normally allow.
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This is definitely good news since it suggests that this will be the default interpretation of the rules for all formats, casual or organized, and not just in Doubles.
Team Tournaments
Team Events involve teams of players competing in tandem throughout an event. Each round, each member of a team will play a game against an opposing member with the aggregate scores of all teams determining the round’s winner. There are some big changes here to accomodate the new Force Disposition and Missions systems:
First up, for every five players (rounding up), only one player can select each Force Disposition. This means that your combined team will have to master a number of different playstyles to come out victorious.
The way that opponents are paired and layouts are selected is a little different too. For most games, each team secretly selects a Defender and two possible Attackers. Once these are revealed, the team then secretly selects which Attacker they want their defender to face, and each team’s Defender gets to choose which mission Layout they want to use.
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Interesting stuff, almost a “rock-paper-scissors” approach that adds a lot of uncertainty into the mix of missions. It’ll be really interesting to see how players approach these challenges as the edition evolves.
Dominatus Campaigns
Personally speaking, this is the Event Companion I’m most interested. The document promises to smooth the process of running a Dominatus campaign over an event and how best to pair off players. I’m definitely going to give this a close read as I prepare my own Armageddon campaign.
Just one week remains before the launch of 11th edition and the release of Armageddon. It seems we’ll be getting an updated 40k app next week which will include all the new mission layouts. Presumably the Munitorum Field Manual, with all unit points, is just days away, as well!
Maybe I’ll see you at an event next month at the Tacoma Open?
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Simon Berman has been a wargamer since 1993 and has worked in the tabletop games industry since 2008 as a staff writer for the first three editions of WARMACHINE and HORDES. These days he’s the General President of the Brush Wielders Union, a worldwide organization of miniatures painters of all skill levels, a freelance games writer who has contributed to a number of roleplaying games like Eclipse Phase, Dune: Adventures in the Imperium, and The Hammer and the Stake. He runs his own small-press publishing company, Strix Publishing, and paints more miniatures than he can keep track of. Simon lives with his wife in Tacoma, Washington along with a number of cats and a pack of savage wiener dogs.
Source: Bell of Lost Souls
