I played in the Invasion tournament at GenCon. I didn't do well, but I only bought one box of the game, and didn't spend time building a deck. I just took all the dwarf cards and put in enough neutrals to bring the total to 50. I played vs. Empire, Orcs w/ Chaos, and Empire w/ Dwarves. Since I go to GenCon to shop and see what's coming out on the dealer's floor almost exclusively, I didn't spend time building a constructed deck or getting multiple copies of cards that only come one per set as my opponenents did, so I'm actuallly happy with my performance. Rounds were limited to 1 hour, after which the current turn is finished and if victory is not claimed, a draw is determined. That's how my first game went. After that, rounds were cut to 45 minutes, mercifully, as I had a dinner reservation. My second game was timed out as well, but my opponent was able to defeat me with that final turn. Third round I was destroyed well before time was called. Fourth round my opponent dropped, and since I wasn't getting into the final four, which was cut to after that, I left, which turned out well since I could spend a little more time on the dealers' floor before it closed. All in all, it's a fun game and now that I realize I need multiple copies of it to build a deck, it'll be even more fun upon release.

agreed. it was fun to play in the tourney though.

Are you saying the game usually takes more than an hour to play? I was really hoping for 30 minutes tops. My enthusiasm really shrank right now :/ Or were you playing best out of three or something?

Remember it's a brand new game that is not even released yet through normal channels...give it a dozen play or two and I'm sure you can cut down the playing time.

Were there any kind of cool prizes? What type of deck won?

There were 29 players, we had about an even break down between Order and Destruction. I BELIEVE the top three were Dwarf, Orc and Chaos (which was odd because empire was favoured to win). I looked away during the last few games to demo UFS and Warhammer Invasion to others while the last few rounds were going on, and then also food.

Games for me, after playing quite a bit, were taking between 15 to 40 minutes. I THINK its possible to maybe do a best 2/3 kinda thing if we had an hour... pretty sure, as myself and a few 'special' people were talking about it... but nothing's set in stone yet, right?

We had a few more warhammer invasion binders, one playmat, and one tablet/trophy for the winner. Good times, really, and people kept playing later that day and the next.

The game sold out on Friday at 4:15 too!

Top two were Orc decks. Third place was an Empire Deck.

Yup Ork vs Ork final. Forth was a Chaos deck that was literally the 40 chaos cards from the box plus 10 neutrals, played against him with my Empire deck and lost pretty brutally. Dwarf didn't seem to do so well, but I feel that the field will even out once people start mixing races more.

But a fun time was had by all (i hope)

Hmmm... I must've read the pairings wrong. I think I was looking at the standings prior to the last round finishing or something... IDK. lol.

Yeah that chaos deck was great. If you draw the right cards with chaos, good things happen.

Here's a quick rundown of my experience at the tourney. I didn't
get many names, so apologies to my opponents for that. I was
playing Orcs, and going in I thought that we were limited to making
a deck out of one copy of the starter, so the deck I played was not
really ideal; but, lucky for me, the bad Orc cards are still pretty
good.

Round 1 vs. Guy from Maryland's Orcs
I have a good opening with a lots of cheap hammers. He was playing
a larger deck and didn't really get rolling for a few turns
resource-wise. We both get a Lobber Crew (Sacrifice to make
opponent sacrifice a guy) early and ask some rules questions that
arise from having two of those out. I then play a second Lobber
Crew and the eventual attrition war leaves him with not much of a
board. We play a second game for fun, which looks like it is going
more his way until a Troll Vomit (kills all units for 4 + 2 orc)
shows up. Win in about 30 minutes.

Round 2 vs. Guy from Chicago's Orcs
He is playing a very similar build, but he had splashed a few Chaos
cards (including 3x Seduced By Evil, which corrupts any unit for
one Chaos icon). I get the Crooked Teef Goblins (1/1 battlefield
only for 1) with two Choppas (+2 hammers in the battlefield for
one) out on turn one, which is about as fast as the damage gets in
this game. He corrupts them a couple of times, but they stay on the
table most of the game. Win in about 20 minutes.

Round 3 vs. Other Guy from Chicago's Empire
So I hadn't really paid attention to Judgement of Verena during my
perusal of the box that morning, so I didn't know to play around
it. It kills all units AND support cards in each zone without a
development, which can be pretty devastating. Luckily, after I got
hit with it, the next turn I'm able to Rip Dere Heads Off! a
Grimgor (kills all developments/supports in each player's
corresponding zone) to blank his considerable kingdom zone, which
bought me some time. Since he has amassed a pretty good-sized quest
zone and had a City Gates out for a while (free development from
top of deck each turn), he ends up decking himself before he can
muster a big enough battlefield. Win in about 40 minutes.

Round 4 vs. Tim (Jim?) from Toronto's Chaos
He's playing mono-Chaos from just one starter. He gets locked out
of some multiple-icon cards early and has trouble ramping up
resources. I drop two Followers of Mork (2 indirect damage to each
player) in the early going which turns on some stuff for me and
accelerates the game a bit. A Waaagh! to one-shot a zone seals it.
Win in about 20 minutes.

So, after four rounds, there are two players undefeated, both
playing Orc, and one Chaos (Tim) and one Empire also in the top 4.

Semifinals vs. Guy from Tennessee's Empire
This game I am trying to playing around Verena, but still get hit
with it twice, with Will of the Electors (move up to two
developments for one) setting it up. However, he plays them pretty
early, so he doesn't have a huge board to swing in with after
nuking my dudes. I think I managed a Grimgor in this game too, by
saving my resource zone from Judgement and then playing him to the
Quest zone. In any case, he doesn't draw a lot of cards after the
Judgement. I rebuild and win in about 30 minutes.

Finals vs. Guy from Melbourne(!)'s Orcs
He's a cool guy and offers to split the prizes before we begin.
There are only two prizes: a plaque and a playmat; we decide that
while the playmat is probably shinier, it wouldn't make much sense
to have the second place player have the Champion plaque, so we
decide the loser will take the playmat.

Neither of us get off to a great start. I waste a couple resources
early on and use a Lobber Crew. He plays an alliance, but I don't
see any other Chaos. Turn 3 or so he lacks a second icon for
Pillage (destroy a support card for 2 + 2 Orc) and is forced to
waste a couple resources. Eventually, he's the first to field a
beefy battlefield and burn one of my zones. Next turn, I attack to
drop one of his zones low enough that I can burn it with the
Smash-Go-Boom I have in hand (destroy X developments for X + 2 Orc)
and then wipe the board with Troll Vomit. He responds with a couple
guys to the battlefield, who put three or four points on my empty
battlefield. I draw nobody in my next three cards and scoop, as
another turn would finish me off. Loss in about 20 minutes. So, I
score the custom binder and playmat, and my opponent is nice enough
to give his binder to my friend, since he already got one from the
FFG booth.

It was definitely a fun time, and I think the game has a lot of
potential. I agree that the decks will diversify quite a bit when
people have more cards. I've already tried out a couple alliance
decks and they seem to work pretty well. Empire really benefits
from borrowing a couple of the Dwarf units (Troll Slayers,
especially) to give them some wallop. And Chaos, while it has a lot
of really good cards, also has some pretty poor ones; so, bringing
in some utility Orcs helps round them out nicely. I haven't tried
making a deck that starts the Dwarf capital yet, nor have I tried
an Orc build with Chaos splash.

Really nice! Thanks for that review of your games.

cyberfunk said:

How much difference could you have build in a the mono orc deck with just one box?

I am how much boxes I will need.

jogo said:

The best ork you can make require you to get cards from 3 starters. As some really good cards like Rip Dere 'Eads Off!, Ironclaw's Horde, Boar Boyz, Big 'Uns etc are only or two copy per box. With 2 boxes at hand your deck will be a lot more good.

cyberfunk said:

Called that card a bit earlier. Any card that can generate that much card advantage with a few careful set-up steps has the potential to be defining!

Although congrats on packing the orc counter that was beautifully times

Osiris

You can't do TOO much variation with MONO - FACTION anything with the starters. There are only 40 cards of each faction (cept elves which get like 6). There are 20 nuetral cards, which for the most part are resource generators, though there are three quests and then Pilgramage which makes a player return target unit to its hand.

If this is upsetting, remember two things.

1.) You CAN splash other factions in there.

2.) You get enough cards in the base set to make basically FOUR DIFFERENT DECKS out of the cards. And if you've ANYone to trade just a FEW cards with, the decks change greatly (say some chaos cards for some empire cards kinda thing).

In regard to how many copies of the game you need to buy for an ideal deck: I think the answer is, not surprisingly, three. However, I think mono-Orcs can be built very close to ideally with only two copies of the game; you're really only missing out on the third copies of Ironclaw's Horde and Big Unz, and the third Urguck, if you want him (he's very good, but unique). I can see a case for a third Grimgor's Camp, too, I guess. While several of the Tactics are good, I don't think any of them are better than 2-ofs, except We'z Bigga, which comes two to a box. I think there's a real possibility that you won't want 3x Ironclaw's Horde or Big unz after we see a few expansions, but for now I guess it's a matter of whether you want to spend another $40 to optimize the last two or three spots in the deck.

Empire, on the other hand, desperately needs three copies of the game to be competitive, because the Judgement/Electors combo is the only thing that gives them a chance. And three of each is much better than two of each, since 1) you have to draw the two cards together, 2) you need to draw the combo reasonably early, 3) Judgement is even better when drawn with two Electors, and 4) it is sometimes necessary to play the combo twice.

At least, if you buy three sets, you can build an ideal deck for both sides.