Malaya Madness - February 2014 - In Retrospect II

Summation and Aftermath

All in all, the inaugural Malaya Madness was a resounding success. Although limited by the exigencies of the venue and the short notice any new event has before kick-off, the actual tourney achieved a great deal more than it set out to do.  What happened in Singapore gave the Asia-Pacific community a jump start on finding itself and discovering an identity.

I’m not sure that saddling the tourney with a Championship label does it any real favours however.  The ASL community in Asia is still very much in its infancy as a collective and with so many coming from alternate gaming backgrounds, “Championship” and “Competition” have very different connotations from that considered the norm in ASL where it’s more a convenient label to hang on a long weekend or two weeks away from home playing games rather than a strict representation of the focus.

I know I’m fortunate that I don’t have the  domestic responsibilities to consider when attendance at an ASL event occurs, however I will admit to some disappointment with the disinterest shown in the event from the Australian ASLers. Timing was certainly an issue, with CanCon (which is an expensive event to attend) only occurring some 4 weeks prior. Also the unproven nature of the event was always going to count against it with such limited advance notice.

As for the future of the event, if it can be placed on a sound financial underpinning in a more central and less rustic venue, I’m certain that it can build into an event of some significance in this area of the ASL world. What I don’t want to see is all the hard work that George Bates put into this event end up as a single occurrence footnote in ASL history.

To that end, I’m going to commit to underwriting 2016 and 2017 event for venue and some other ancillary hosting costs. I had hoped to do this for 2015, but it’s only now, at the end of September, that circumstances permit the corresponding application of funds, and I feel the event needs to have at least 12 months lead time for proper planning and fiscal certainty. It’s not a case of build it no matter how and they will come, more a case of having an integrated venue, commitment and solid format ready to go with a core group of confirmed attendees. And that is where the extra lead time is all important for people, so that travel and leave can be arranged, particularly as international travel costs are such an influence on this event.

George and I have already mapped out a couple of prospective venues in Singapore, and yes the cost is a factor, but a central, comfortable location with good facilities and ease of access will make this a much better and stronger event.

I do feel strongly that Singapore is the best location moving forward for a regular Asia ASL event, as it is more centrally located by comparison than say Hong Kong or the Philippines  to a greater  number of potential attendees. The actual structure of the event itself is less of an issue I feel. I used to think that the tourney itself was the raison d’être of the event, but I’m seeing that like ASLOK, it’s about celebrating ASL by playing rather than winning. 

Whatever happens though, I’m so glad I attended. I’ve made some damn good friendships out of Malaya Madness and I’m proud as hell to have contributed in a very small way to helping the ASL community grow.

Malaya Madness - February 2014 - the Games II

The Games

Game 3

J45 Strongpoint 11 vs George Bates

I have very little memory of this game other than it was a no-contest pretty early on. I really didn’t offer George a good game to my regret.  I owe him a much stronger game next time.

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Game 4

J128 Opium Hill vs Zeke Crater

I’d forgotten that I’d played this game until I read an AAR from Zeke. That’s not an indictment of the game or of Zeke, just reflecting my poor health over the last few months which left gaps in my memory. Rather than try and comment on stuff I can’t recall, I’ll quote Zeke’s AAR. Sad really as what little I can recall of the game was overwhelmingly positive.

“New Zealand's Pete Palmer and I next played J128 Opium Hill. Once again the dice were kind to me but cruel to my opponent. Pete had perfectly positioned his leader directed MMG up on the only hill, dominating the IJA entry zones. Pete's first shot broke the MMG and my armor assaulting IJA moved on in relative safety. A few more equally bad dice rolls for Pete and great dice rolls for me whittled down Pete's Malayan and British troops, delayed his AFV, and Xed his MMG repair roll. As we neared the end game Pete graciously conceded.”

This was where I doubled my Boxcars for the tourney…Snakey Pete was but a dim, distant creature of mythology by now.

The Quick and the Dead.

I swear I play worse at Tourneys than I do normally. I might manage one good game out of 4 or 5 but the rest are generally atrocious displays of tactical ineptitude and poor decision making. However, as per usual the pace of gameplay was pretty good. My natural style of play is conducive to a fast game and even being below par physically didn’t seem to affect this, thankfully.

I will admit to a somewhat skewed sense of pride at being considered a fast player, but I feel that all too often ASLers get too wrapped up in their comfort zone and play at a snail’s pace because they do not know any better. The strongest players I’ve faced are usually among the quickest as well. So I tried to demonstrate for some of the new players that you don’t need to analyse every possible outcome but as you get more comfortable with the core structure of the system, go with your gut.

A fast game is usually a good game, and if you can eliminate some of the ancillary time sinks ahead of time by creating and sticking to a plan, as well as some self-belief in your own play, then you will tend to play faster and smarter. It’s not about your game so much as making your opponent do the hard yards in response to the dilemmas you set. 

But there is one vital corollary to all this:

Speed is Fine, but Accuracy is Final.

Malaya Madness - February 2014 - the Games I

 The Games ( Rounds 1 and 2)

I only managed to play 4 games instead of the planned 5/6, thanks to a stress induced illness that blindsided me completely. Of those four games, I lost three and won one. So my results were pretty dire compared to my pre-tournament expectations. But really the results were immaterial in the wider scheme of things.

Game 1 (Mulligan round)

G46 Triumph Atop Taraldsvikfjell vs George Bates

George and I had both played AP08 A Bloody Harvest previously so I think we decided to opt for this one as neither of us had played it previously. 

I started out pretty well, but a couple of tactical no-nos on my part and George’s consistently efficient play put this one to bed pretty early on. I didn’t pace my game properly and it caught up with me.  I think I played the attacker but my memory is very vague at this remove of time. It seems I played the Germans. 

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Game 2

J103 Lenin’s Sons vs Stanley Neo

This game was a complete 180 degree change for me. I’m really not a good enough player to teach ASL and I’m not suited to teaching. Or so I thought. I felt a bit for Stanley, as this scenario is my Gavin Take/Totsugeki – I’ll play it at the drop of a hat. I modified the pace I play at so that there would be time to go through the whys and wherefores of ASL with Stanley if he wanted to ask questions. 

As it happens, Stanley has a solid grasp of tactics and he can focus…so time was always available and yet we played at a good solid pace. I did the usual Soviet blocking detachment + Commissar in the woods and despite a couple of scares on the ineffective Small Arms dicerolls, pretty much had the game in hand. What this did was allow me to show Stanley why I set up the way I did and what a German Player can do to mitigate the inherent strength of the Soviet wood defence.

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The pic doesn’t quite show how shattered Stanley’s Germans were at the end of the game but it does show the channeling that I created.

Malaya Madness - February 2014 - The Attendees

The Attendees

From the time George first mooted the idea publicly, I’d tried to be involved in promoting Malaya Madness, hoping to get some Aussie ASLers to come along (no joy, unfortunately), and when I saw John Knowles was actively considering attending despite his reservations and disdain for competition-oriented events, well that was even more reason to make damn sure I made it to Singapore.

There were going to be a fair few Gamesquad residents attending, including Mark Humphries and Ian Percy, plus some relative newcomers to ASL like Vlad See and Jackson Kwan. The enthusiasm was definitely there and I felt like my attendance would mean I was actually putting something back in to the ASL community in some small return for the years of enjoyment the game has given me.

So in the end we had a group of 14 attendees in total, some of whom were only able to drop in for one day. Never mind, it’s better to attend at all than spend time after the event wondering why you didn’t.

Of the attendees, I would say there were four or five who had been playing for five years or more, notably Alan Smee, George Bates, John Knowles, Ian Percy and myself.  Then there were the experienced boardgamers who were finding their feet in ASL: Mark Humphries, Zeke Crater. These are people with life and gaming experience.

The newer players had the enthusiasm of the neophyte ASL player, but a willingness to learn, socialise and participate in an ASL event for the first time. Malaya Madness turned out to be their event as George had always intended it to be and his work in organizing this cannot be overstated.

So for Jackson, Vlad, Stanley, David plus Jaime and the others who attended, Malaya Madness was an eye-opener into the all-consuming passion that ASL can become. I mean, what kind of lunatic flies 6000 kilometres to play 3 games of ASL over a long weekend?*

 

 

* I had intended to play 6 games, but there were external issues back home that affected my health  to the point where I had to can playing after the Saturday.

Malaya Madness - February 2014 - Travel & Accommodation

Planes, Trains and Hotels

If I was going to make attending Malaya Madness a reality, I needed to minimise costs as much as possible, so it was off to a budget carrier for my flights and some research into cheap lodgings while in Singapore.

As far as flying goes, there is no way I wanted to use Ryan Air or Jetstar (Qantas’ budget carrier offshoot). I’d much rather fly with a regional carrier who was based out of Singapore and thus had planes returning there constantly.

I briefly dallied with Singapore Airlines and Cathay-Pacific but couldn’t find a reasonable priced ticket to fit my austere budget. However Scoot Air is Singapore Airlines’ budget flagged carrier and they were offering a return ticket for AUD $450! A win for the ASL junkie!

Scoot had to be better than the only alternative Jetstar, who were getting a lot of very negative press online and in the domestic media at the time. As it turned out I made the right choice as the not only was the outbound light with Scoot more comfortable than many of my Qantas flights across the Tasman, but also it left the ancient United/Qantas 747-400 I’d flown to ASLOK XXV well behind.

Now that the flight was booked and paid for, it was just a matter of finding a place to stay. This could have been a bit of mission, but after viewing a few places on Trip Advisor and reading some reviews, the choice was very simple. I’d budgeted for around $100AUD per night at most, and I was having no problem finding places. When I first pondered attending, I’d done a cursory search online and one place stood out as very new, very distinctive and looked to be great value for money.

 

Many years ago I first heard of “Coffin” style accommodation in FASA’s Shadowrun RPG, and as I only needed a secure place to crash at night, all the expensive extras a standard Hotel would offer just weren’t needed. So I booked my 4 nights at The Pod. For less than SGD$50 per night, I ended up being very pleasantly surprised at the value I received. 

The kicker was that the beds were good quality, security was excellent given the dorm style accommodation and the location was central enough to the interesting parts of Singapore and access to the MRT system was within a short stroll.

So flights and accommodation were all sorted and in the event were great value for money.