Games Day 2012: The Good the Bad and the Ugly

The Good, White hat and all!
Well my main entry made it to the finals but didn't win the big show. But as I really had no thoughts of even making it that far it was pretty nice. All four of my entries made it past the first cut and the Pathfinder Diorama made it to the finals. If they were right about which level of the display meant what I think I got 4th .. as 1 was on top and 3 on the next level. But either way the coolest part was seeing people checking out my miniatures and giving it props. During setup I had my minis sitting on the table ready to be placed and got some people standing in line near me. When they placed the diorama on the shelf a guy next to me was staring at me. I turned and looked at him.. "Hey".. "Wow man ... you did that? Looks awesome!" haha .. thanks .. glad you like it. I would stop by the displays from time to time and saw people moving their heads around looking at the diorama .. I was pretty happy with the blend ..

Thanks to Dave at Chuck's Comics.. I was on the will call list and got in for free plus a free mini and T Shirt. I help run their 40K events so I was their representative. 8)

Getting in a bit early to enter the competition was cool. We got to see the boards and display stuff before it got crowded so that was pretty nice ..

The Armies on Parade has some nice layouts... the DE that one was nice (reminded me of Skeletor's Snake Mountain) and won but I voted for the Tomb Kings display .. the painting was exceptional (pictures in the link below).

We saw The Watch before we went to the Airport .. a must see .. UBER FUNNY!

There were some nice Mini's on display.. There was a line so I got the best pics I could.. Here's a Link to all the Pictures I took

Games Day 2012 Pictures

The Wrath of Heros video game looked pretty cool.. I'll be downloading that and giving it a try.

The new Fantasy Flight game Relic (40K Talisman) looked very interesting.. it was only a demo at the show but I think it's got potential.

The Bad, Enter greased handlebar mustache
This was the first GD I had gone to since it moved to Chicago. I'm not saying this because it's not in my backyard anymore but the show didn't seem as BIG as it usually was, the number of people although still decent seemed to be much lower then what I remembered. The last year in Baltimore it was PACKED and there were a lot more display tables plus more tables for people to get some games in. That area seemed to be lacking quite a bit here. And I think it has to do with the location, nothing against Chi Town but to me there should be two North American Games Days .. one East Coast and one West. Baltimore was a good location because it's pretty close to a lot of other major cities. DC, NYC, Philly .. the east coast is a highly populated area. For West Coast I'm sure California would also draw a lot of people as again there are alot of people nearby and just in that state alone. Just my thoughts ..  but hey what do I know.

The line for the Terrain Make and Take was crazy! .. from the get go it looked like you were going to have to invest at least an hour and a half. We passed..

The PA system at the convention center was terrible. During the contest announcements I could barely understand what category they were talking about.

The price for a bottle of water was $3.50 ! WHOOA .. Thankfully the hotel was close haha

The Ugly, Like Ogre UGLY!
Forge World, We got in line early and only took about 20 mins I'd guess. I get up to the counter and figured I'd get the new Apoths and Command Squad.. plus I still needed the TL LAS Arm for my Contemptor (today's my birthday so I figured it would be happy BDAY to me). The guy comes back and tells me it's the only Apoth they have so win for me. And now I'm thinking that's cool, so I start to walk over to pay, wait and then head to a cashier. They can't find the items as they are new I suppose. twice a guy goes away and comes back.. with the item number and his price. $45 for each .. Ummm What? I pulled out my phone and showed him their site.. 20 pound for one and 25 for the other..  That's not 45 dollars for either..  He says that's strange and walks away again. He comes back and says sorry but that's a show price. I just stare at him.. Hows that? You are going to charge more then they are listed for? For the privilege of buying it here? No thanks .. now it was his turn to just look at me. You don't want them? Oh I do but I'm now going to get bent over .. I'll just order them and pay the shipping .. no tax and normal price beats your jacked up prices and almost 10% tax here. A lady walks up and we start talking about the issue of which they didn't seem to give a crap, I said I'm glad I was in line early as I would have been pretty pissed off standing there for an hour and get that price .. I bought the TL Las and started to walk away. "We're sorry about that" "Really because it doesn't seem like it" .  Most shows will give you a discount for coming out and supporting a company .. not GW.. it appears they think you should pay more .. even if you flew out there and stayed in a hotel ..  just plain sad.

We had a horrible delay for our flight .. we sat in the Airport for over 7 hours.. boarded the plane only to be told we had to leave the plane. Wait two and a half more hours then board again. We got in at 4 this morning ..  And here I sit at work dying ..  My eyes are burning and my head feels cloudy.. I really hope this is making sense haha ..

Final:
But whatever .. I'm home ..  with my wife and daughter (plus little man soon to arrive) .. was a finalist in the competition .. talked to some cool people and over had a good time.. Here are a few of the pictures of my mini's being checked in .. I ended up taking my Brood Lord as well.. figured what the hey ..

And the Diorama with the finalist pin..