Bolt Action Tournament!

Bolt Action Tournament!

Oh, Panzerbaum, oh Panzerbaum...
Wie stark ist deine kanone?

The Spotsylvania Area Gamers have many members who are members of another miniatures group in our area, which meets at our local game store, Your Hobby Place - Fredericksburg. This group, YHP Bolt Action Club, meets roughly once a month at Your Hobby Place to play Bolt Action, generally a series of linked scenarios related to a single campaign. We've done Operation Barbarossa and beyond, Operation Market-Garden, and now we are doing Afrika Korps versus 8th Army.  The games are a lot of fun and open to anyone interested in playing Bolt Action. We might even expand to Konflict '47 sometimes.

On 7 December 2019, the club sponsored a Open Bolt Action Tournament, each player brought a 750 point Bolt Action infantry platoon list, any from a published book (No vehicles with an armor value 8+).

We played three rounds in a round robin style tournament, 2 hours per round. The first mission was Meeting Engagement, the second Key Positions, and the third Top Secret (the latter two modified for tournament play).

Your Hobby Place provided prize support and we also purchased pizza for lunch.  It was a fun, light-hearted tournament; we ended up with 10 players from all over the area.

In the first round, there were many more draws then expected!

We tried to vary the terrain, with two snow boards, two temperate boards, a jungle board, and a desert board. Unfortunately, a couple players ended up on the same board twice.

Win-loss-draw record determined the standings, with total earned victory points as the tie-breaker.

Here are the final rankings (Wins-Losses-Draws, Total Victory points):

1st: Jacob Nedza, Japanese (3-0-0, 16 points)  Jake was the only undefeated player!

Jake Nedza plots his victory in the jungle
on his way to tournament dominance!

2nd: Mike, U.S. Army (2-0-1, 8 points)
3rd: Ben Pixley, USSR (2-1-0, 16 points)
4th: Allen Adams, German (1-0-2, 13 points)
5th: Ren Westermeyer, Gebirgsjäger (1-1-1, 13 points)
6th: Matt, Deutche Afrika Korps (1-1-1, 10 points)
7th: Eric Gauldin, SS (1-1-1, 8 points)
8th: Josiah Andrew, U.S. Airborne (0-1-2, 9 points)
9th: James Carroll, USSR (0-1-2, 6 points)
10th: James Young, U.S. Army (0-3-0, 7 points)

The tournament really was a great success,the player's asked for another in the Spring, so we will definitely have another one then.  We might change some things up, maybe allow armor with 8 armor value, maybe different missions. Please let us know in the comments if you have suggestions.

Here are some pictures of the games, some great painted figures appeared on the board!