40Kings

Hi Tom, nice to have you here. Could you please introduce yourself and your 40k background to our readership?

Hey guys, my name is Tom Adriany and I’ve been playing 40K for about 7 years now after getting suckered into it by witnessing a 2^nd edition game at a friends place. I’ve had almost every army possible in that timeframe, barring Tyranids and Chaos Space Marines but I’ve shrank it down to Blood Ravens, Deathskull Space Orks and Space Wolves to keep it manageable at this point. It was the cool models and the background of the whole 40K universe that got me so hooked more than the aspect of playing. I’m an addict for Black Library books, and only started investing myself in the local tournament scene about two years ago, organising several events as well as attending most of the tournaments that are part of the ‘Ranking Der Nederlanden’, which is an overcoupling sort of Ranking system that also includes tournaments from our Dutch friends and then groups all those tournaments into one combined yearly ranking. I was extremely fortunate to take home the title last year by beating the regular champion by one point. Sorry again, Nico!

So, I guess its the first time Belgium is participating at the ETC? When did you take the decision to go? Was it hard to muster a team for the event? It involves a lot of traveling after all (or not so much if you live in eastern Belgium since Münster is quite close then).

The Fantasy side already had several chances to get acquainted with us Belgians but it’s a first time for the 40K Team yes. It’s actually Klaas, the head honcho of the Belgian Fantasy Team, and also one of the council members for the ETC, that approached me to take on the role of 40K Captain somewhere last January I think. I had heard about the event prior to that, but I didn’t have any aspirations to become Team Captain as I generally prefer to keep low-profile and I don’t consider myself to be a great player in any case so I was/am sure there’s better candidates out there to take on that role, but on the other hand it seemed like a great opportunity so I took on the role and started sending out some emails. It wasn’t that hard to find people to tag along with me, as almost everyone I talked to about the ETC since we decided to take part was really enthusiastic. I was told the critical point was booking the hotel much in advance, so as most of my team would be comprised of students who didn’t want to spend insane amounts of money to go and play an event like this (the hobby is expensive enough as is), we didn’t opt for qualifying rounds or selections of any sort but I just went with the first 8 people who gave their OK to go. For next year, if people would still want me as their captain, I’m sure things will be handled differently and we’ll be sure then to give everyone interested in making the team the chance to prove their worth. The travelling bit is not really a problem. We Belgians are lucky that we are localised quite centrally in Europe, and there’s people who come from much further away so … just takes finding people with the right motivation I guess J.

Thinking of your community as rather small, how did the selection process go about? What is your special role as a captain, what (or who) did appoint you as captain after all? Did anyone try to install two captains, one for each party in Belgium?

You’re right when you say our community is really small. I think between the Ranking in Belgium and Holland combined there’s maybe some 20 regular tournament players, and then there’s the language border which is still somewhat of an obstacle we can’t really seem to break through in a manner that matters. I’ve recently taken a chair in the board of the Ranking Der Nederlanden, so I took it upon myself to go play some tournaments in the French speaking part of Belgium to try and get those people involved in the Ranking as well, and to bring our scene together a bit more. I have to say that the ETC has played a big part in that so far, together with Mattias’ Tabletoptournaments.net, which is a lot more popular in the French speaking part of Belgium than in Flanders. As I’ve been going to almost all the tournaments for the past two years I know most people in the tournament scene, so after Klaas asked me to put together a 40K Team I just sent some emails to some close friends asking if they wanted to join, and I also took the liberty of writing to most of the regular tournament players from across the language border as well (with help from the T3 NTR ranking system and using my admin powers to drag up their emails), as I wanted the Team to have representatives from both ends! In the end our team has a 50-50 make-out of French and Dutch speaking players so it worked out perfectly in the end! As I’ve won the Ranking last year and am currently leading the Ranking Der Nederlanden tables and the NTR ranking on T3 for Belgium nobody questioned my Captaincy, but I’m open for anyone willing to take on the position. I’m fine with stepping down and just trying to make the team as a player in coming years. I think it’s clear by now that there wasn’t any selection process involved this time around, but I did take it upon myself to organise a few practice sessions where everyone from the team could get acquainted and I have to say a big step has been taken into uniting the scene from both ends, and I’m now lucky to count some of our Walloon counterparts amongst my friends, whom now also come to play in Flanders regularly as well!

How do you have to imagine the Belgian 40k community? Is it a small as I think? Do you visit tournaments in neighbouring countries, maybe France or the Netherlands? Or do you actually have a vivid scene yourself? I know there is at least a “Benelux” GT…

It’s even smaller than you think, at least when you consider tournament play. There’s a LOT of casual Warhammer gamers in the country, but they stay away from tournaments because most still look at them with a frown simply for having the wrong notions about what it is actually like. I’ve had lots of discussions in my own Gaming Club about this, but it is simply hard to convince people. The Belgian and Dutch tournament scene is really great I think, and you don’t come across too many hardliner army lists, so it is mostly a very fun experience. The whole idea from the Ranking was to get enough interest in tournaments going, so we regularly visit our Dutch friends and vice versa, but I’ve never taken it upon myself to go play beyond that, and I know from experience there’s not a lot of people who do, except our Walloon friends, who have taken the trip across the French border on occasion. I would still like to attend a GT UK Heat at some point, or any other major event in the UK. It’s really strange actually how lately the 40K tournaments only have like 20-30 attendees in average (there are a few exceptions like Full Tilt, which every year has a complement of 60 40K players and 120 fantasy players and that just because they are at max capacity) while the Dutch GT was sold out in 2 weeks last year with 120 attendees for 40K alone. I can’t help to ask myself the question where those other guys are at the rest of the year. It’s just something I cannot easily explain but we’re working hard with the Ranking to get the interest going a bit more by changing our Ranking format by next year. So far the Ranking has about 20 tournaments across the year in the Netherlands and Belgium both so it’s not as vivid as once could hope for J. At least we still have an outrider program running in the Netherlands, so we can count ourselves lucky that we still have a GT to attend! I’ll be participating for the first time this year so that’s something I’m really looking forward to after the ETC!

Your rosters look serious from my point of view. Some lists I cannot make sense of so far, but overall the strong tendency towards 3+ in your setup makes for reliable armies. Do you think marines (and traitor/witchhunter) is the way to go? There are very few other countries that field Dark Angels for example. Does your setup maybe derive from a limited set of available players? Having a good player for each and every army and than simply picking what you like as a captain does not seem to be an option in Belgium I could imagine.

It’s strange that you look upon our lists as serious. Most of my team just took their regular tourney army builds so there’s no combined strategy behind our selection of lists. I hope everyone can play to the strengths of their army and that we don’t get bitten in the ass too much by the pairing rounds, but that’s something we can’t avoid I think. We didn’t go into this with any basic plan in mind, so that makes my job as a captain all the easier I guess. I am also not the kind of person to impose anything on anyone. Most of my team members are seasoned players that know how to handle their armies so we’re just hoping for the best really. With the ETC restrictions in mind and what every player had at his disposition this is the best we could do under the circumstances. I believe in diversity, so I don’t think a bunch of marine-equivalent lists is the way to go (and I’m not going to invest myself in this whole balanced list-issue Stelek raised either as it is of no consequence, but that’s just the way the cookie crumbled this time around. I was hoping we’d get a Tyranid player on board, and I was thinking about attending with Tyranids myself for a while, but I would never have been able to get the army ready so we had to abandon that plan. We’re not really there to be strong competitors, but more to have a good time and join in on the experience. It’s just a great notion to be able to defend your country’s colours while duking it out with little toy soldiers against guys whom travelled hundreds of miles and can come from all the way across the ocean! We think that in itself is worth the trip. It is true we have two hardliner type players in our team, with very competitive builds, so we’re counting on them a bit to get the job done, but overall I’d say our lists are still well below par compared to what has been put out there. Benoit is our odd duck out with his Dark Angels, but he’s a great guy with crazy painting skills so there was no way I could deny him a spot on the team after he showed his interest. Maybe next year we’ll have qualifiers of some sort and then the Belgium Captain might have more options that would make for a more competitive Team Belgium, but we decided amongst ourselves that this year would be a trial-run, where having fun is more important than anything else. We even bring presents for our adversaries! You’ve been warned!

Do you know some of the players from other countries, some you might have already faced in the past, maybe at international GTs or tournaments in other countries?

Not really, no, as I haven’t attended a GT so far, and it was too short notice for our Dutch friends to send in a team this year as well. We hope to get some bets going between the Dutch and Belgians for next year though J. I’ve been following the history of the ETC a bit, and I’ve been reading all the info on the captains forums so I have a good idea of who most of the other captains are and how they might think, but other than that it will be all new for me, which is also one of the primary reasons for going of course! I hope to make some new friends though. Maybe the Belgian beer we’re carrying along can help with that.

Being a newcomer and one of the smaller countries as well, were do you put yourself in comparison with other participants? Who would you imagine being up to par with you, which countries are going to fall to Belgium and where do you think end your capabilities? Within a range of 24 contenders, where will you end up?

Well, anything near the middle regions would feel like a victory for me as a captain personally. Anything above that short of a miracle J. I would imagine all the players at the ETC are really competent, so since I view our tournament scene as somewhat on the softer side of things, I think we’ll be hard pressed every round no matter against whom we will be playing. We really are one of the weaker brothers I think, but we’re going to give it all we got. I’m a bit of a competition beast myself, not in the sense that I want to win at any cost all the time, but I do want to leave the table with the feeling that I got the best possible result under the circumstances, and I expect nothing less from the other players on my team.

Last but not least: What is your attitude towards the ETC in general? Some guys are very relaxed, coming for the show, some a quite serious about the whole issue (still relaxed though, but maybe more ambitious…)

I love the concept of the ETC, and I’m amazed at how we can get so much enthusiasm going all across the world. Thumbs up for the organising committee and everyone involved in hosting the event. It seems a daunting prospect and we can all be glad that there’s people crazy enough to take this insane amount of work upon their shoulders to give us all the chance to participate in an event of this ilk! Let it be clear that we don’t have ANY ambitions coming into this, except having a great time and hopefully giving our opponents across the tables a good time and preferably a good showing as well. For me personally I see it as a way to enhance my gaming experience. I’ve become a bit saturated at this point with the Belgian and Dutch tournaments I attend, as I think I’ve little left to prove to myself, and the ETC is the perfect medium to take it that one step further and hopefully meet a lot of great people for a day of excellent gaming. We come into this expecting to create a lot of opportunities for grudge-matches in years to come. It doesn’t matter who we come across, but I do hope we can avoid the top-tier as getting your ass handed to you every single time because of hardline army-builds and uneven pairings doesn’t seem like fun to us. But we won’t hold it against you!

Thank you for joining in at 40kings

Thanks for giving us the opportunity to speak our piece. Much obliged! See you next week?