Hi everyone! Bryan here, co-founder of Wargame Trader. We've been hard at work over the past few months spreading the word about the magic of Wargame Trader far and wide. This past weekend, I was at Gen Con, North America's largest tabletop gaming convention, competing in the 2025 Heroscape World Championship!
Day 1
I already had a bye into Day 2 after winning my local Store Championship in NYC, so I was able to relax and enjoy the con a bit on Day 1. After that, I ended up with a pretty successful run in the tournament, getting lots of good conversations about Wargame Trader in along the way. Here's a bit of a rundown on how the weekend went and what's next for Wargame Trader!
Day 2
Day 2 door prizes for the 2025 Heroscape World Championship!
I arrived at 9am on Day 2 to check in in Hall D before the event started at 10. I take some time to prep for the 6-round, 7 hour tournament, making sure I have my army ready and chatting with some of the community about Wargame Trader. Judges handed out the Day 1 and Day 2 Door prized: an exclusive gold-based Raelin the Kyrie Warrior figure with a foil plastic card and some sweet exclusive dice.
Day 1 and 2 Door Prizes: Dice and an Exclusive Raelin figure and card
Round 1 comes around, and I’m lucky enough that it’s a good matchup for me! My army was an Eisenek build, specifically Iron Lich Viscerot, Scavorith, Lord of Ruin, Revnan Alcolytes, and Grave Grimm, for a total of 415 points out of the 425 limit cap. The gist of the army is to have Lich bond with Scav, who can use Lich’s vile injections and X marker ability to move up to 14 spaces and roll 14 attack dice on a single order marker to deal a powerful first strike, then use the Alcolytes to buff Lich and Scav to close out the game.
Scavorith, Lord of Ruin (Scav for short)
I’d done a good amount of practice with the army before I flew out to Indianapolis for the championship, and the range of Scavorith (Scav for short) and Lich meant that the melee-based Army I was facing could be whittled down before they reached me and I could take them out. Specifically, I was up against a set of bears (Frostclaw Paladins and Knight Primus Adelbern), Haluscia, Scion of the Wild, and Onshu the Welkineye. I killed two out of my three Alcolytes turn one so they could respawn in round two, holding Scav and Lich back and forcing the bears to come to me. I took them down before they could do too much damage.
Playing Round 1 of Day 2 of the 2025 Heroscape World Championship!
Round 2 was a similar matchup and another win. Round 3 was where things started to get a bit trickier, running into Queen Maladrix and the Festering Honor Guard, with Exiles of the Sundered Sea and Fia Bonny. I knew that was a tougher matchup for me, since Mal and Scav were similar powerhouses and a one on one confrontation could go either way. The exiles were ranged but didn’t hit for much against the more tanky Scav and Lich, so Mal was really my biggest concern. I needed to be very careful with my positioning and make sure I could whittle Mal down as much as possible before she managed to strike. I got lucky with some of my rolls though, and managed to come out with the win with time to spare.
Round 4 was a real nail biter. I was up against Sir Heroscape, the largest Heroscape YouTuber and a top player in the community. He had a Mal army similar to the one before, but with some tweaks including Necrotech Wraithriders, Exiles of the Sundered Sea, and his own set of Alcolytes to buff Mal. Sir H ended up streaming the match, giving Wargame Trader a nice shoutout at the start.
The Queen Maladrix the Conqueror mini, a tough opponent in the Heroscape World Championships
Sir Heroscape’s Wraithriders came in first, and I managed to take them out with Scav and lich before they could do any real damage with some lucky rolls. From there, though, things got really intense, his exiles landing some lucky hits on Scav and Mal closing in for the kill. With my main powerhouse down, Lich managed to get a couple hits on Mal before he went down as well, leaving a 4-health Mal and a single exile against a couple of my Alcolytes and Grave Grimm. I managed to get height on Mal with 20 seconds on the clock, rolling 4 skulls on all 4 dice to just barely take her out for the win!
It was a really close, fun match, and it brought my record for the day to 4-0, clinching a place in the top 32 for Day 3.
There was a break for lunch, and then round 5 came along. It ended up being a rough match for me, losing to the semi-finalist in last year’s world championship. Round 6 I ended up agreeing to a mutual draw with my opponent after confirming with a Renegade judge, since we were both guaranteed a spot in Day 3 already and wanted to enjoy more of the con instead of playing out the match.
I walked around the exhibition hall for a while, saying hi to some of the Renegade staff who worked on some of the upcoming Heroscape releases, then headed back to the hotel to prepare for Day 3.
Day 3
The next day, I show up early again to the convention center and start setting up for round one of the top 32. Judges handed out the Top 32 price, custom foil order markers, which looked great:
Top 32 Prize, custom order markers
I got lucky again in round one, facing off against another melee bear army and pulling off the win without any losses. There was a tight moment where my Scav had only one life left but I managed to keep him alive with a good defense roll to close out the game, bringing me into the top 16. I received my top 16 price, an exclusive foil glyph set, which were stunning:
Top 16 Prize, a foil glyph set
This round was a really tough one, a mirror match where my opponent had swapped Alcolytes and Grimm with Wraithriders. In a Scav versus Scav matchup, getting the first strike of two vile injections for a total of 14 attack dice really matters, since you can kill your opponent's Scav before they can go. Unfortunately, I lost initiative in that first round, and those fears were realized: I blanked on one of my defense rolls and lost my main units before I could hit back effectively. From there it was easy for my opponent to close out the match.
That ended my World Championship run in the Last 16. My opponent ended up getting 3rd overall, and I finished 12th, which was a great result for my first Gen Con. I picked up lots of nice prizes and freebees. More importantly, I got to meet a lot of great people in the community, like DogginDays, Tales of Valhalla, and RogueScaper, among others in the community. People were really interested in seeing Wargame Trader succeed, and I can't wait to collaborate and compete with them in the future!
Final Standings of the 2025 Heroscape World Championship!
That's all for today's update. You can see the final results of the World Championship here. Till next time!