I think what a lot of people learned from this event, was that the combination of rule changes DCI made in January really have improved the game tremendously. Very few games went to time (Lou wasn't kidding when he said we finished 12 rounds in 13 hours, with two 45 minute breaks). We also did 50 minute rounds, and people were still finishing.
The map list, the figure choices, and the mindset of players (we were using the 2pt 3pt system for overall results), all put the players in the correct mindset to try to finish their games. Many of those that did not finish were based on one player being relatively new and/or young, or the occasional bad match ups (stalemate situations).
But there weren't many of those at all in this event. And many of those, were high scoring games as well. For example, one of my own two games that went to time against Sithborg in 200pts, was about one round short of completing (we played about 8-9 as it was). He had a 10hp Tyranus left, and I had a 30hp or so Vader - both were likely to die next round.
Very few people ran "camping" type squads, and those that did were generally smashed by the better players running more in your face builds. It was literally shocking to see that many players finally buy into something I've been claiming for a couple of years, that melee when played well competes just fine. In fact if you watched these tournaments, you would actually have to admit that melee is better than non-melee in the game right now, with the current DCI rules at least to some degree. There were shooter squads that did varying things and were successful, but most certainly they were the ones that included other significant gimmicks, and were played by top players.
Case in point, I was able to beat Deri's 150 shooter squad, with my melee squad, by basically carefully timing my run across his map (Jedi Temple) from corner to corner (he was wisely camping as much as possible). This would be a situation that most players would not attempt, nor be successful at, but I timed it well, took the appropriate chances, made a couple of saves and defeated his squad under the time limit. Doesn't mean my squad was better, but the rolls weren't that bad either way, he had the map advantage, and the range advantage and I won the game. Things that some of you claim are not possible, or not normal. In this case it was.
Anyways, my point is, melee competes, players can complete games in time, and its absolutely a blast to play out your games rather than finishing every round at a 42-28 score (multiple people mentioned this). Several people said their "skepticism about the rule changes was now gone - and that the rules are excellent".
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