22/03/2026
WATC - past, present and its future.
To kick things off - no, WATC isnt going anywhere. I did want to share some thoughts i was having for the event and offer some perspective on where it came from and why.
Like all good Obsec things, its Emmas fault (or maybe genius?) that we have WATC. Its 2016 and I had been captain of the WA team for ATC for the past 2 years and was about to captain my third. I lamented we didnt have a WA event like it as Team events are one of my favourite formats. Of course she said - lets do it! She even offered to TO it so i could play! The premise was simple - get some interest in WA for team 40k and see how it went. 8 players per team seemed like a big call to start so we went with half that.
WATC in 2016 was 4 players and a lot of learning. We learned WA loved the format and that we needed more tickets but also we learned about terrain needs and space and timing. 2017 was again 4 players but by then we knew 4 player teams made pairing largely pointless. 2018 we raised the bar to 6 players while keeping it 1 day. This would be the last year i played (and was part of the winning team for the first 3!) because we had so much interest we needed more hands on deck and we were still hand scoring things at the time!
Moving to 2 days in 2019 with teams of 6 was a huge deal - we also hit 120 players that year from memory. This format has continued through the pandemic and all the way through to 2025 with us capping at 120 players (we did hit 132 one year but felt it made the event very cramped so capped it after that).
In 2026, I have been pondering if its time to take the final logical step and take it to teams of 8 for this year. We certainly have the community and its likely that it will be played with a new edition only a couple of months old at the time. The original goal was to mirror the format of ANZTC and WTC and this feels like the right time to take that final step to teams of 8. While the terrain and rules format is an issue i couldn't hope to answer (again with the likely hood of 11th around the corner) I feel like this is a time to see what you - our community thinks about going to teams of 8 rather than 6.
A couple of my own thoughts on the matter...
Pro, but potentially also a Con - more diversity in armies but also could make teams harder to get armies together. I am likely over thinking this as the variety and scope of armies in WA is huge and i suspect the community within a team could make 8 armies work.
Logistics - teams of 8 means we likely need to review tickets - 128 players means 16 teams. With our current resources and location this is doable but also caps out the main hall and likely sees us needing to hire at least one other space for the weekend if available. Boards we should be ok for but we likely need to seek help from the community to ensure we can meet the terrain needs.
Rules - this is a limbo question pending if we do get 11th (IMO likely june) and then what missions and terrain layouts look like. It feels safest to me to stick to GW layouts given the short turn around and to make adapting existing sets easiest but this is simply an unknown for now.
Here is where you have your say! Comment below what you think - should we take that final step and move to teams of 8 for 2026? We always like to know what the community thinks before we make any calls for our events, especially for an event that we (and many in the community) hold as a favourite. Leave your thoughts below!
