Welcome back to our nearly complete coverage the 2023 World Championships of Warhammer. Yesterday we took a look at the meta of the top 8 bracket at the event and spoke with the players who finished fifth through eighth. Today we’re looking at the championship bracket in full and talking to the top 4 players from the event.
As a reminder: The Champions bracket is a double-elimination bracket with no ties. Tiebreakers for this format were determined by playing additional turning points where players vied for control of objective markers.
In the chart below the Winners bracket is on top.
Unfortunately many of these games ended up off stream, and as such are only recorded in the memories of the participating players. Hopefully next year Games Workshop can give us Kill Team players some time in the sun. The good news is that many of the games with the Spanish players were recorded on Jon Sao’s stream, Kill Team: Granada. With how well they performed overall many of those matches were big ones to watch, so we’d recommend checking them out.
It’s worth noting that the champions bracket was a grueling affair, particularly if you had to fight your way back through the loser’s bracket. There was a particular moment at the end of Saturday when Orion and Adrian duked it out for the honor of playing an additional 1-3 games against Chaos Cults. That game wouldn’t end until 2 am on Sunday, leaving Adrian, the winner on tiebreakers, with only 4-5 hours of sleep before Sunday’s loser bracket finals against Java.
For our interviews, we’re again asking everyone the same six questions:
- How was the experience at the World Championships of Warhammer as a competitor, and as a fan? Did you meet your goals?
- What did you think of the event? What worked? What didn’t? Are you planning to make a return next year?
- In what ways was the meta different at WCW, compared to your home regions? How did you feel about the meta and the terrain at the event?
- As far as the meta goes, are you happy with it? If you could make changes to it what would they be?
- Talk us through some of your best plays throughout the weekend! Give us some of the details that you’ll never forget!
- Final shout outs to the readers of Goonhammer? Store shout outs? Practice partners?
It seems that rumors of Gellerpox weakness may have been overblown, as Orion was in striking distance for a second time this year! While he may have won best in faction for showing up, deep into Saturday night the returning players were still in awe at his piloting skill. Orion remains the de facto leader of the hulks, making his way through groups with 0 losses!
Orion Wilfong, Fourth, Gellerpox Infected, United States
How was the experience at the World Championships of Warhammer as a competitor, and as a fan? Did you meet your goals?
- I did Achieve my goals, [I] met a ton of new people and gave them my best! Good experience overall, you could tell there was a lot of effort put in by the Staff.
What did you think of the event? What worked? What didn’t? Are you planning to make a return next year?
- The event was quite ambitious, and overall I think it worked well. The judges were very helpful and table layouts were good in my opinion. The pairing of the 1st 2 days to avoid other players from your region was interesting, but didn’t hold up so well as 3 of my 5 games day 1 and 2 were vs US players. However, there were things pertaining to Kill Team specifically I didn’t enjoy so much. The lack of streaming felt a bit of a let down when the event had around 4 tables set up for other game systems. In addition the 4 hour rounds were far too much time, by the end of day 3 it was just an unsuitable time committed to playing kill team as I along with a few others played from 8:30 AM to at least 10 pm. If the amount of games and time slots stay the same I’m honestly not sure if I would return.
In what ways was the meta different at WCW, compared to your home regions? How did you feel about the meta and the terrain at the event?
- It wasn’t all that different as I mostly played breachers, elites and Kommandos. All these teams are pretty popular on the east coast, but if i were in a different pod perhaps it would’ve been different. I can say at the very least it was the most Star striders and inquisition players I have seen in a while. Terrain was good, no complaints from me about it.
As far as the meta goes, are you happy with it? If you could make changes to it what would they be?
- It’s solid overall. Cults and Kommandos likely need just a bit of a tone down, but more importantly there are a number of teams that just don’t see any play like exaction squad or warp coven and I’d like to see that fixed.
Talk us through some of your best plays throughout the weekend! Give us some of the details that you’ll never forget!
- It’s an entire game that’s most iconic for me that I swore I lost at the end of turn 1 vs Qiqems. He had managed to essentially kill 2 of my hulks, and injure thrice cursed at the start of turn 2 for a trade of just a bomb squig and a Snipa boy. We both agreed he won from that point, but somehow … again neither of us are really sure how it happened, I came back and won. Glitchlinigs and a bloat spawn clawed their way back into the game, with a legendary battle of kommando grot vs glitchling that helped bring an edge over my opponent. In this game my glitchlings ended up dealing a majority of my damage despite a grenade play blasting 3 orks that tragically dealt 0 damage to any of them. We both were just kinda shell shocked afterwards at the end result, I guess it’s true there’s always a chance to win some games. (Author’s note: A critical skill for top players is identifying any lines that can get you back into games. Sometimes it’s a glitchling winning a fight!)
Final shout outs to the readers of Goonhammer? Store shout outs? Practice partners?
- Big shout outs to Marc Garrett and Nick Craven who kept me alive during day 3, I wouldn’t have eaten much that day without them.
Speaking of the top end, we have worldwide #2 Adrian B, who climbed out of the 5th round game against Orion W on Saturday. A game that truly went down to the end of both players’ wells of endurance, with 18 hours of gameplay on Saturday. His run totalled 7-3-0 over the 4 days, and he’s sure to have some thoughts about the overall event. Along with some thoughts about rumors of Cults’ early demise due to their “bad” match up against Orks.
Adrian B, Third, Ork Kommandos, United States
How was the experience at the World Championships of Warhammer as a competitor, and as a person?
- As a competitor it was probably the single most intense gaming experience I’ve ever had (Saturday I’m looking at you specifically!). Don’t worry – I’ll expand more on this below!
- As a person it was an incredibly rare and special opportunity to get to meet key individuals from Games Workshop (including Elliot, the mastermind himself!), as well as so many top players coming from multiple countries across the world! And on top of that – to be able to share the entire experience with fellow Kill Teamers from my local scene I feel strengthened that Brooklyn bond even further.
What were your hopes coming in, and how did your games reflect those hopes?
- I knew I had a shot at winning the entire thing, but I also knew looking at the field that it was far from guaranteed to even make the top cut. So, as I do with all of my tournaments I went into WCW cautiously optimistic.
- My hopes really boiled down to doing the absolute best that I could – on a personal level, on a competitive level, and as a representative of the Brooklyn KT scene and the USA as a whole.
- To finish best in faction (against some truly skilled fellow warbosses), highest placing American, and to stand on the podium in 3rd place after fighting for my Kill Team life in two back-to-back incredibly narrow 1 point wins is honestly surreal!
- All things considered, my hopes were definitely fulfilled!
In what ways was the meta different at WCW, compared to your home regions? How did you feel about the meta and the terrain at the event?
- I’d say the meta was fairly similar to what I’ve seen over this past year across several tournaments. I think the top teams in the game right now have sort of been identified. What was interesting was to see how certain factions were piloted differently than I was used to, and also which teams could truly be pushed to the limit.
- There’s always a lot of discussion on which teams are the best, but it’s often hard to know for sure until a truly skilled pilot takes them to a tough event and showcases the true capabilities of the team. For example, many people still thought Chaos Cults were good after the nerfs, but to my knowledge no one was able to pilot them to the extent that they were piloted at WCW at any headline event leading up to this.
- As for the terrain, my thoughts in a nutshell are that I’d really love to see more varied open boards that encourage players to solve puzzles upon showing up to the table. At WCW, due to the limited number of open layouts – which all featured a high density of heavy cover in the mid board and safe drop zones – the open maps played similarly to the ITD layouts. Less variation and lots of safety encourages you to figure out optimal deployments & gameplans, and stick with them – often despite playing different opponents and even different factions.
- I don’t envy the people in charge of creating board layouts for tournaments, as no one will ever be completely happy! But I do personally feel that Kill Team is such a competitive game at its core because it is designed around player agency and the ability to solve problems on the fly in a changing game state. Both ITD, and the open layouts featured at WCW, I believe to be at a direct conflict with that principle – as they encourage you to arrive ahead of time with a team and a plan that can do well in these environments, despite outside factors, therefore placing less of an emphasis on your decision making and creativity in game.
As far as the meta goes, are you happy with it? If you could make changes to it what would they be?
- Again, I do not envy those in charge of balancing our game! But I do feel that Kommandos and Cults can certainly be oppressive to play against for the same reasons I mentioned above when talking about the terrain – they reduce the agency of your opponent in game.
- There are definitely other teams that could use a buff or a nerf, but those are the top two which I’m sure are on everyone’s minds after this past weekend!
Talk us through some of your best plays throughout the weekend! Give us some of the details that you’ll never forget!
- Oh man, so many. I will never forget Saturday November 18th. Up at 6am. First game at 8am. Two hours through game 2, they tell us there’s been a mistake in the pairings and we have to restart with a new opponent. Fast forward to 2:00 am, I finally finish my 5th (but officially only 4th) game of the day. Get to bed by 3am, and have to do it all again the next day!
- During that day the highlights include:
- 1) Losing to Aleksa (the eventual winner) by a mere 2 points (1 point being a completely unforced error on my part). Hanging on for dear life in the final moments of that game trying to scrape out a tie.
- 2) Then having to fight my way back up through the field through Wallace West’s Kommandos in the mirror match on loot, on open, as the attacker no less! Somehow clawing my way back after being completely zoned out of the mid board and scraping out a 1 point win on the final turning point! My bomb squig is the hero of that match, killing three orks cleanly in one single explosion!
- 3) Going into extra time (round 5) after tying Orion in the last activation of TP4, and winning that game by a mere 1 point as well after an extremely intricate series of plays from both of us – during which my comms boy somehow survives an overwatch from Vulgar’s flamer, lives to do one single point of damage to injure a hulk to prevent it from capturing a point, and proceeds to remain standing after Vulgar charges and fights him with only his bare ork fists to defend himself!
- 4) All the incredible support of my teammates, the event staff, and fellow kill teamers who brought me water, coffee, advil, food and electrolytes as I stood over a table for 18 hours staring at 5 different kill team boards trying to survive. And I did!
- I honestly have never played Kill Team like that ever before. I’m sure I’ll be recounting all the individual plays, dice rolls and highlights on some podcasts in the near future – so stay tuned!
Final shout outs to the readers of Goonhammer? Store shout outs? Practice partners?
- We came, we saw, we skirmished, we officially put Brooklyn on the international map!!!
- Shouts to: The Brooklyn Strategist, and all my sparring partners from the NY/ NJ area! To Travis, True and Mike, for competing alongside me to help the USA secure an overall victory for the entire event! To GW and all their partners for putting on a mega, mega event. And to the global Kill Team community for coming together in what is surely going to be remembered as a historic and truly international tournament!
While many mentioned Ace as a favorite to take the WCW, the Spanish quietly whispered that Java, Wallace, and Qiquems were all in it to win it. After Ace’s Thursday upset losses, his 3 Spanish teammates carried the Spanish torch into the top 8. Java had to climb over Wallace, Kamil of Poland, with a final loss to Aleksa. However, clearly he found a secret with the Cults, so let’s hear from him!
Alberto “Java”, Second, Chaos Cult, Spain
How was the experience at the World Championships of Warhammer as a competitor, and as a person?
- As a competitive player, it was one of the most enriching experiences in terms of learning, because all the players taught me new things they were doing in their local meta, and that made all the games exciting and tied until the last turns. And as a person it was something amazing because until you’re there playing against such good opponents and you notice the whole community supporting you, I didn’t realize how important that tournament really is.
What were your hopes coming in, and how did your games reflect those hopes?
- I knew that the open maps against orks was going to make it very difficult for me to place high, but by practicing a lot with Qiquems and Wallace I had hope of getting into the top8. But I knew that if I didn’t make many mistakes I could get in and with some luck in the matchups I could get into the top4.
In what ways was the meta different at WCW, compared to your home regions? How did you feel about the meta and the terrain at the event?
- The global meta is very clear all over the world where the greenskins dominate almost all the countries, that’s why I prepared a lot for this matchup. The meta was as expected, what I did not expect was to play the diagonal maps so many times, as they favor certain factions and are somewhat unfair. Thank goodness there were no Heirotek Circle players.
As far as the meta goes, are you happy with it? If you could make changes to it what would they be?
- I’m happy with the meta but without any doubt I would play something of the fast deployment of the orks and I would do something with chaos cult, but I could not tell you the one xD. But above all I would pay more attention to factions with low winrate.
Talk us through some of your best plays throughout the weekend! Give us some of the details that you’ll never forget!
- Waiting for the orks to fail with the choppa was the move that worked best for me! Haha! The chip damage with the warlock with the Malefic Vortex, and then charge with the torments to kill in one hit with the Horned mutation charge damage, is the move that I prepared the most. (Authors Note: Guaranteeing 1-4 mortal wounds makes Torments able to take out most 10w operatives with relative ease. On a good day you can even 1-shot an ork.)
Final shout outs to the readers of Goonhammer? Store shout outs? Practice partners?
- Follow Travis and Ace’s advice on this page and you will notice how you will improve little by little.
The land down under has risen up to claim its place at the top of the Killteam meta! With games against the worlds best, Aleksa’s cult reigned supreme dropping only 1 game to Java in the bracket reset, ending with a 8-1-1 record. Ultimately he showed that Australia may be hard to travel to, but their skills are not to be ignored. He spilled some of the beans already on Just Another Killteam Podcast (link) this Monday, and hopefully he’s got some more choice wisdom for all of us readers.
Aleksa Pavkovic, First, Chaos Cults, Australia
How was the experience at the World Championships of Warhammer as a competitor, and as a fan? Did you meet your goals?
- I had a great time. It was amazing meeting people from all over the world who were just as passionate about Kill Team as I was. Meeting the best players from all around the world really put me to the test and that was a big part of what I wanted to experience. Seeing so many amazingly painted models whether in Kill Team 40K or Underworlds/Age of Sigmar, was also an amazing part of the experience.
- As for my goals in my previous interview I said i wanted to win and I did 😛
What did you think of the event? What worked? What didn’t? Are you planning to make a return next year?
- For the most part I think the event was fantastic. I think maybe the 4 hour rounds were a bit too long and an extra game in the groups would have been nice to keep things more exciting but otherwise most things were good. I do intend to return next year.
In what ways was the meta different at WCW, compared to your home regions? How did you feel about the meta and the terrain at the event?
- The meta was a lot more focused on a few top teams. It’s very rare to have multiple duplicate teams here in Aus so something like 7x Kommandos doesn’t really happen. That being said, it makes sense from a competitive point of view.
- As for the terrain I think it was okay. A lot of people spoke about how it favored teams like cults and Kommandos strongly but I also think there was more people could have done to use the terrain better. For my part I think a slightly more open middle and slightly safer drop zones should be the go to for map design
As far as the meta goes, are you happy with it? If you could make changes to it what would they be?
- Sneaky git limited to once per game ( its fine they are still S tier even with this change) and maybe just a scratch dosen’t work vs crits. Any more than that is overdoing it.
- For cults its a bit trickier. The main problem is the difference between ITD cults and Open cults. For the sake of this I’m gonna just ignore ITD because it would be too long a list. My main change would be making Unleash the demon cost additional CP with each use. Other than that maybe nerfing the range on the mindwitch -1 APL psychic action. On open cults are very beatable. On ITD you’d need to do a lot more nerfs but it would make them basically unplayable on open.
- Corsairs ploys getting some changes. Outcasts just needs the range restriction removed and let me change orders with deadly ambush and the elves would be in a great space, you could probably even give them both a heavy and regular gunner just for some flexibility, the heavy gunners just aren’t very good in the team and I don’t think it would be an overdone buff.
- Wyrmblade is similar, so many of the ploys are overly restrictive. Meticulous plan could be changed to work with models that started concealed so it actually has use on ITD or past a cheesy turn 1 4-2 play. A fun change I’d like is making it so that the leader allows you to use the free ploy even if you have used that ploy earlier that turn allowing you to use coiled serpent or slink into the shadows more than once per TP.
Talk us through some of your best plays throughout the weekend! Give us some of the details that you’ll never forget!
- Well I can’t leave out getting hit with a 6 man stikkbomb even if it didn’t turn out as catastrophic as it sounds. I think Adrian deserves a shoutout for his ITD performance against my cults. It was Capture on ITD which should just be a nightmare game but he managed to keep me sweating right up until the end of turn 4. The nature of cults makes unforgettable plays rare as they are a team that slowly pushes up and chokeholds you without leaving any openings and I was too busy in my own head to watch other games.
Final shout outs to the readers of Goonhammer? Store shout outs? Practice partners?
- Kill team is a great game and you should try it. A general thanks to all the people who gave me practice games leading up to the event, Liam, Jay and Sam all helped me figure out some of the tougher matchups and a thank you to all the people down under who were cheering me on!
That wraps up our interviews. We’d like to once again thank all of the players for agreeing to speak with us and congratulate them on their accomplishments. We’d also like to wish them luck in their next event, whether that’s LVO or something sooner.
That nearly wraps up our coverage of the Kill Team World Championships but we’ll have one or two more things in the next week so stay tuned. And if you have any questions or feedback, drop us a note in the comments below or email us at contact@goonhammer.com.
