Bad Dice End of Year Awards

Given that it is nearly Christmas, a standard practice is to look back on the year and decide on the Best and Worst of things. It's a format that is probably going to make up the majority of the TV schedules next week after all! This year though, the excellent Bad Dice Podcast have decided to do a Warhammer related awards show. They were looking for open nominations, and given that this is exactly the sort of thing that a Blog can be used for I've decided to share my nominations.

There were three sections to the nominations, the first focusing on the people in the tournament scene. I'm going to add a disclaimer here that these are all just opinions, and that there were several categories that were very difficult to decide between - for these I've given some Honourable Mentions.


Warhammer Personality of the Year - Rafael Harbinson. His blog has been one of the most refreshing things to read about this hobby in a long time (and is one of the main reasons that I'm writing this!), he's always happy to talk lists and he's always in contention in most of the main events. Top bloke.

Warhammer Villain of the Year - Craig Johnson, for not getting the result at the right time to live up to his own hype! For those not in the know, Craig had a bet with Tom Mawdsley that if he could finish higher than Tom in the UK Rankings when the Masters invites were sent out, then Tom would have to quit Warhammer for a year. Craig missed out on the result in the last eligible tournament meaning that 12 months of banter and jibes were in effect wasted. Making it worse was the fact the Craig then won Downfall a week later, but alas this missed the cut off for the Masters and therefore doesn't count!

Player of the Year - Jack Armstrong for hitting the big 400 Rankings points! Again, for those that don't know, the Rankings system gives 100 points if you win a 60+ player event and takes your 4 best scores to give your overall ranking. In May, Jack became the first person ever to have 4 active 100 scores on his profile, therefore reaching the magical 400 point cap.

Chump of the Year - Tony Hayle. Two events this year he has been leading the pack on Table 1 for the start of day 2, my own Raze and Ruin event and the aforementioned Downfall. At Raze and Ruin, he recorded a spectacular 0 points on day 2, and at Downfall he managed a slightly better 4 points on day 2! Despite leading overnight, he finished out of the running in both events. Having had the pleasure of meeting him at Raze and Ruin though, I have to say that he is a fantastic sport about this, and I hope he won't mind me bringing up all of this again!

Best Painted Army of the Year - Byron Orde's Daemons of Chaos. The best army I have seen in the flesh this year, Byron is part of the team that runs the excellent Element Games webstore. He deservedly won Best Army at Brothers in Arms 2 in August, and you can see from the tutorials that he posts on his site that he is a top notch painter.

Warhammer Event of the Year - I think it has to be Blood and Glory. This was the most fun I've had at an event in a long time, mainly down to the other events outside of the tournament itself. I managed to stay at the venue for the evening for this one, and playing board games all night was a great way to spend the Saturday Evening of a tournament! However, Brothers in Arms 2 and the Maelstrom Team Event were both excellent events too, and deserve Honourable Mentions.

Warhammer Podcast of the Year (other than Bad Dice of course!) - The return of Heelanhammer! I don't listen to many Podcasts any more, and certianly none with any regularity. However, Heelanhammer's return actually got me to download and listen to a few of their offerings this year and are still producing top quality stuff.




The second section focused on Games Workshop's releases of the past year.

Army Book of the Year - For all the complaining towards the end of the year, the Daemons of Chaos book was brilliant. So many options in the game, a complete re-invention of the way Magic Items are done and a fantastic range of figures.
Unit (rules) of the Year - Lizardmen Bastiladon. Went straight into all of my Lizardmen lists, really cheap for what it does. Just a shame that the Ark of Sotek isn't all that good an option.
Models of the Year
-Single Model - Shadowblade, obviously! Beautiful figure.
-Unit - Terradons/Ripperdactyls. Fantastic kit, really nice and easy to assemble too.
-Monster - Troglodon. Just wish it had rules to match.



The final section was a more Off Topic selection, focusing on many different things.

Table Top game of the Year - Assuming we can't nominate Warhammer itself, I'd go with Malifaux. Refreshingly different, and the models are pretty cool too.
Non GW Model of the Year - The Mierce Miniatures Dragon from their Kickstarter. Technically not released til January, but it's amazing. Some photos on my Twitter account, and hopefully more to follow here!
Boardgame of the Year - I'm hoping the new Firefly game will make this list for next year, but the best new game I've played this year has to be Village. Won the Spiele Preis (Best Family/Adult Game) at Essen last year, it's a brilliantly simple game that I've yet to win!!!
Videogame of the Year - Pass on this one, I don't really play video games. Though if the iPad adaption of Warhammer Quest counts, I'd go for that.
Movie of the Year - Thor: The Dark World. Not only the best superhero film of the year, but one of the best films I've seen in a long time.
TV Show of the Year - The Newsroom. Best thing on TV at the moment, despite only having 9 episodes. Honourable mentions to Agents of Shield and Game of Thrones.
Bad Dice Daily Episode of the Year - So many to choose from! I've enjoyed the recent MSU series, running the same topic over a few episodes was a nice idea.


That's it for my own nominations, though if you have different ideas then please leave a comment telling me why I'm wrong! Also, if you have the time, Bad Dice are still looking for nominations. You can send them in by email to bencurry@baddice.co.uk