Warhammer Heroes
In 2017 Games Workshop announced an award “Warhammer Heroes” would begin in 2018.
Warhammer Heroes was set up to find the people who turn this hobby into something more, the hidden champions and tireless workers whose efforts have helped to shape and enhance Warhammer for hundreds if not thousands of others. – Games Workshop, Warhammer Community
2017 saw over 12,000 nominations for the 2018 award and tens of thousands of nominations came in in 2018 for the 2019 award. Nominations for the 2019 award closed December 2018.
Winners Announced
The winners were announced at the Las Vegas Open on Thursday 7th February (Las Vegas Time).
Mike and I had received an email from Games Workshop a few days before notifying us that we had been named a 2019 Warhammer Hero.
Mike saw the email first, read the first line of it and told me to check the emails and then he ran out of the door to do the school run. As he left I read the whole email. Where our kids go to school there is very little reception so I quickly tried to call him hoping he was still in range. Luckily he was in range. Me “did you read the whole email?” Mike “no” Me “did you tell anyone or make any announcement about it?” Mike “no, not yet.” Me “Good! Don’t!”
The email from Games Workshop had asked us to keep it a secret until the announcement was made in a couple of days at the Las Vegas Open. I’d had panicked visions of him doing a live video announcing that we had won because we were both so excited by it. Thankfully he hadn’t!
We had to keep it a secret for a few days. I’m an introverted relative hermit so it was easier for me. I think Mike nearly burst trying to keep it to himself!
The day of the announcement
The morning of the 9th of Feb (for us) we received an email letting us know that the ‘awards will be announced tonight so please hold off until tomorrow to share the news.’ There started one of the weirdest conversations we have had. Me ‘great so we can do a live this afternoon to talk about it!’ Mike ‘no they have asked us to wait until tomorrow’ Me ‘yes, but it is yesterday in Las Vegas now so by this afternoon it will be today which is effectively tomorrow so we can tell people’ Mike ‘so when will then be now?’ He thought he was pretty funny.
As it was, we didn’t need to wait! We found out that the announcement had been made when people started posting the picture and sending us private and public messages on Facebook to congratulate us! It was wonderful to have so much excitement in the community.
My thoughts:
Not quite 4 years ago, M and I started Objective Secured. Our aim started small, we wanted to run some Warhammer 40k events. The idea grew and instead of focusing on running events we focused on trying to build a WA gaming community. We wanted to bring people together, to find fun, to break down stigma and stereotypes AND create opportunity to roll some dice. In 2017 it grew again and we ran our first Southern Hemisphere Open.
Last year Games Workshop created an award called the Warhammer Heroes. Out of 12 thousand people nominated world wide 18 Heroes were chosen from US/Canada and Europe. This year tens of thousands of people were nominated again and (as with last year) Mike and I nominated at least a dozen community members from WA. People who make a difference in clubs, teams, and those who are the quiet achievers in our ObSec events who are there making every event happen!
Again we were humbled to have both been nominated for our role in shaping the gaming community here in WA and this year we are so very proud to have been awarded the title of Warhammer Hero! We are the only Australians on the honour roll and we are so proud to be representing WA and Australia!
To the people who nominated us – Thank you!
To the people we nominated who didn’t receive the nod – thank you for all you bring to the community. While it may not have been acknowledged in this award, please know that we see all that you do. We appreciate it and we celebrate you.
Our local heroes.
I’m not going to name the people that M and I nominated, however, I think it’s really important to highlight the amazing people in our community.
There are a small number of dedicated volunteers that keep the clubs going and without them the community would fold. Obviously the staff at GW/Warhammer stores are amazing with all you do for the community (but sadly due to the rules we couldn’t nominate you). There are the players who started stores or formed their own gaming groups and teams and each player in those teams plays a role, however there are driving forces within each team and members who teach and share information so willingly. These are the more visual heroes in our community.
Then there are the the heroes that seem to go unnoticed. The people who hit like and share on Facebook posts. The ones who turn up at events early to set up every time. The ones who aren’t playing but come anyway and offer to help in anyway they can. The ones that take 5 days off work so that they can be there to help out for any and all of SHO.
Honestly YOU are MY heroes. You are the ones that keep this community together and we couldn’t do it without you.
You can learn more about Warhammer Heroes here:
From one of last year’s heroes this year’s, welcome to the family!
Ahhh thank you, what a wonderful family to be a part of!