Eight individuals gathered outside a small school hall, preparing to shun the lure of the basketball hoop outside it to venture into the building to engage in a fierce battle of board gaming skill, not seen in these quiet streets ever before. Yes, this was Hamiltron – city of the future (or Hamilton as it is often mistakenly called) – and this was HamilCon – the first Star Wars Miniatures event of its kind!

In the three years that Save11 has been running in NZ, its often been a Hawera-Hutt affair with the majority of the Save11 players coming from those two areas, but steadily the number of players has been growing in the northern regions. Mid-2012, when the dust was settling on an inaugural successful New Zealand SWM tournament, the Save11 crew decided to expand the number of major tournaments in the calendar and try to grow the northern region in one hit. Richard stepped up and was given the task of creating the Save11’s newest major in his hometown of Hamilton (otherwise known as Hamiltron – City of the Future!) and so HamilCon was born! Not only did Rich make the event happen, but he knocked the lights out, setting up and running what was an excellent tournament with plenty of prizes, action and – what the crowd most wanted to see – a NEW Save11 Major Champion!

With both Graham (theHutts) and Aaron (Sharron) not able to attend, that meant that the tournament winner was going to be a fresh face. And there was certainly some major players in the ring. Hawera was sending two of their brightest – Bev and Dave (doug*platapus) with Bob (kfcs waiting for you) pulling out at the last minute due to work commitments. Napier and Auckland were sending their own heavyweights – Oli (Darth O) and Tim (MinitankHT) respectively (Tim still being heralded as the man who helped the 2012 GenCon winner choose his squad). Lower Hutt’s sole representative was me (kezzamachine) who carried the hopes and dreams of the Hutt-faithful with him. Finally, Hamiltron offered not only Richard’s avant garde style, but also two brand new players – Nick and Louw – to make up the 8 combatants for the HamilCon title. Also in attendance were two more Auckland representatives, Tony and Nathan, both new players who were keen to watch and get an idea of what a minis tournament looked like. Their presence was exciting for us all and we were really glad that they seemed to really enjoy the event. (All going well, we look forward to seeing them represent at HamilCon next year!)

Without further ado, this is what they choose to run:
Tim [MinitankHT] (Republic) 'Missil'd Mace': Mace/Zam/Lobot/Tarpals/Evazan/R2/Gungan Art. on Cantina
Bev (Imperial) 'Witchcraft': Thrawn/Mas/Lobot/Mighella/NS Mother/NS/Evazan/KDBH/2 Klaat BH on Rhen Var Citadel
Dave [doug*platapus] (Sith) 'A Brief History of Pain': Revan/Maul/Jaq/Lobot/2x Recruit on Ruined Base
Nick (Mandalorian) 'Jaina and the Mandos': Vindicated/Jaina/TrainSGT/Rohlan/Scientist/Saboteur on Peaceful City
Kez [kezzamachine] (Rebel) 'Rebel Pilots Need Their X-Wing': HanSTA/LukeRC/Lobot/Dutch/4x Aces/Dodonna/Juno on Asteroid Base
Richard (Republic) 'Obi's Ladies of the Light': GOWK/Luminara/Barris/Atris/Echani on Asteroid Base
Oli [Darth O] (Republic) 'Badbottom Motherflipper': FlObi/Mace/Rex/R2/Mas on Jabba's Palace
Louw (Rebel) 'Yoda, the Return of': VAR/Master Yoda/Ben/HanSTA/Riekaan/Deena/Dodonna on Jabba's Palace

Due to some late pullouts, the number of tournament players dropped to 8 which, in most standard Swiss tourneys, would allow only 3 rounds and a final. In NZ, we always tend to push for that extra round, as the games double as ranking opportunities, so we committed to the four rounds and then had a Final and a 3rd-4th playoff. Also, Save11 uses the 3-2-1 scoring system, the 1pt coming in a loss where you manage to score half the build points, in this case 100pts.

Anyhoo, here’s how the games went:
Round 1
Tim beat Kez 3-0 on Cantina (204-5)
Bev beat Oli 3-0 on Jabba's Palace (210-83)
Dave beat Rich 2-0 on Ruined Base (170-72)
Nick beat Louw 2-0 on Jabba's Palace (75-65)

Round 2
Oli beat Rich 2-0 on Jabba's Palace (169-78)
Nick beat Dave 3-0 on Peaceful City (200-19)
Tim beat Bev 2-0 on Rhen Var (108-84)
Kez beat Louw 3-0 on Asteroid (206-41)

Round 3
Tim beat Nick 3-0 on Cantina (215-5)
Oli beat Dave 2-1 on Jabba's Palace (188-131)
Bev beat Kez 2-1 on Rhen Var (152-111)
Rich beat Louw 2-0 on Asteroid (166-6)

Round 4
Rich beat Kez 3-0 on Asteroid (199-51)
Bev beat Nick 3-0 on Peaceful City (205-89)
Tim beat Oli 3-0 on Cantina (220-89)
Dave beat Louw 3-0 on Ruined Base (203-24)

Final Swiss Results
1. Tim 11pts (4-0) 3 3pt wins
2. Bev 8pts (3-1) 2 3pt wins
3. Dave 6pts (2-2) 1 3pt wins
4. Nick 5pts (2-2) 1 3pt wins
5. Rich 5pts (2-2) 1 3pt wins
6. Oli 4pts (2-2) 0 3pt wins
7. Kez 4pts (1-3) 1 3pt wins
8. Louw 0pts (0-4) 0 3pt wins

3rd Place Playoff
Dave beat Nick 3-0 on Ruined Base (245-41)
Final
Bev beat Tim 2-0 on Rhen Var (89-72)

So, Dave got up to beat Nick and Bev got up to beat Tim – therefore congrats to Bev our newest Save11 Major Champion! Bev’s been involved with Save11 from the beginning, now running Save11 in Hawera, and has always been a top player. His squad was the most unlikely championship squad but its craziness worked well under his careful watch. Commiserations to Tim, after coming top is swiss, being the bridesmaid again (after his final showing in the New Zealand Tournament last July) but I don’t believe he will be long away. He’s certainly doing better than me!

Vset 4 pieces were represented, without being too overwhelming. I am surprised there wasn’t more of them, actually, but the ones that were there were in good form. Tim’s use of Zam was excellent (and rather annoying) and his inclusion of Evazan and Tarpals made for a tough day for his opponents (me included!). Nick made good use of the new Mando’s – Vindicated and the Training Sergeant – taking him from never having played in a tournament before to 4th. Bevan surprised many with his squad and the inclusion of Mighella stumped us all, but her Parry saved Bevan on many occasions… and you can’t complain with 1st. Master Yoda and the Klaatoinian Assassin also made an appearance along with a bunch of other Vset pieces like the aforementioned Evazan, the ever-popular Mace, Revan, Maul, Jaq… they’re everwhere. Long live the Vsets!

Bev (who, after seeing Weezer on Friday night, the tournament win on Saturday and a Red Hot Chilli Peppers concert on the Monday, was having the weekend of his life) walked away with the 1st prize which was a Fantasy Flight “X-Wing” Starter kit, generously donated by the folk at Mark One (www.mk1.co.nz) who provided a bunch of awesome prize support for the event. A big thanks to them for wanted to look after groups like us! (Go and check them out people!)

Hamiltron was also the big winner on the day being awarded Lower Hutt’s “Masters of the Force” trophy. The MotF award was put up for the first time at the recent HaweraCon and is given to the region (with a minimum of 3 representatives competing) that gains the most tournament points. After Lower Hutt beating Hawera in the HaweraCon tourney, they had no chance of defending their title by only sending one player. Hawera, likewise, failed to put up a team when Bob had to pull out 20 minutes before the car left on Saturday morning. Therefore, with three representative, HamilCon was unopposed and are now Save11’s Masters of the Force.

This bodes well for the future of Hamiltron as a centre of minis in Save11 and NZ, and a really well run tournament which was well sponsored by an awesome local store means that HamilCon was a) a success and b) will be back and better than before. The goal for it was to give the northern region its own Major tourney (especially after strong showings by Oli and Tim and a major commitment to the area by Rich) and that goal was a wild triumph. Kudos!

That leaves us looking ahead to the remainder of our 2012-2013 season too. Hawera now goes into its own Regional League, just as the Hutt League is almost wrapped up. The Vassal Regional League will kick off soon too (expect an email!). Tournament wise, Hawera is still yet to have its Hawera100, but for Majors we have LowerHuttaCon 2013 in April and the second New Zealand Tournament in July. Dates to be confirmed and will follow shortly!

Lastly, but certainly not leastly, how did our latest Major effect the rankings? Well, Oli started as our top seed, followed by Dave, Tim and Bev but the results threw that grouping on its head almost. Dave was the winner in terms of rankings jumping up to 4th in NZ, but no one could touch the Top 3 – Bob’s unfortunate pullout unable to hurt his #2. Here’s the full table:
1 [1] Aaron - 237
2 [5] Bob - 225
3 [7] Mike - 209
4 [8] Dave - 208
5 [10] Graham - 198
6 [13] Bev - 192
7 [17] Tim - 174
8 [18] Robin - 172
9 [23] Hutt-Dave - 150
10 [29] Ian - 122
11 [30] Stuart - 122
12 [35] Oli - 111
13 [41] Alan - 91
14 [42] Kurt - 87
15 [44] Dan - 82
16 [45] Kez - 80
17 [46] Paul - 76
18 [47] Richard - 75
19 [50] Baz - 53
20 [51] Glyn - 52
21 [59] Nick - 27
22 [61] Andrew - 20
23 [62] Danny - 18
24 [68] Henko - 8
25 [91] Kāhu - 0
26 [92] Louw – 0

Great to see we have 26 ranked players in NZ and the potential of more. Bring on 2013!