Last weekend, the largest Altered tournament to date took place in Angers, France: the Altered Open, organized by Ludotrotter, which brought together over 1024 players in a festive and friendly atmosphere. Part of the Altered team attended the event to meet the community and provide you with a detailed report of this exceptional event.

Initially planned as a 128-player side event, the Altered Open exceeded all expectations, leading Ludotrotter to open additional seats, and ultimately welcoming 1024 players on Sunday, October 6th.

On-site, the atmosphere was lively and enthusiastic, with a wide variety of player profiles across all ages. Impressively, 47% of all players were participating in their first tournament, almost half of the participants!

Regarding the decks played over the weekend, there was a great diversity in strategies that players chose to bring to the tournament, but a few favorites are already emerging.

Below is a meta analysis of the Altered Open in Angers, broken down by heroes and factions.

Starting from the Top 128, certain trends become apparent:

• Fen & Crowbar, Sigismar & Wingspan, and Waru & Mack represent the top decks of the event
• Treyst & Rossum, Kojo & Booda, Fen & Crowbar, Teija & Nauraa, Sigismar & Wingspan, and Afanas & Senka are the most played heroes in their respective factions.
• Ordis represents a significant portion of the most competitive decks, despite Gulrang & Tocsin's low presence in the Top 128.

After 10 successive Swiss rounds, 16 players stood out to make the Top 16 of the Altered Open in Angers, entering single elimination.

At the end of these matches, the final saw Neuro's Waru & Mack deck face off against Nadir's Waru & Mack. In the end, Neuro claimed the victory.

In the spirit of Altered, we would also like to congratulate each of the players below for leading their factions as far as possible. Here are the top players of each faction at the Altered Open in Angers.

Check out the Top 8 players' decklists below.

We had the chance to welcome Kawa to cover the event in English and Asao and SuriPlay for the French coverage. Their streams are available for replay with game analysis and many interviews. Relive the event as if you were there!

• Swiss Rounds (1 to 10)
• Top 16 to Final

We had the great pleasure of meeting many members of the community and seeing that the elements of our universe and game that we hold dear also resonate with many of you. Here are some portraits of the players we encountered this weekend and what draws them to Altered.

A few artists also attended this weekend, either to play or to showcase their creations. We took the opportunity to ask them a few questions.

• Can you introduce yourself?

Hi, I’m Zael, or at least that's my artist name! I’m an illustrator, and I've done illustrations for Altered as well as a few board games. I grew up either on a pony or with my nose buried in Harry Potter, and my library continues to grow (it’s about to overflow soon). Since I love creating, in addition to writing, I picked up the first pencil and paper I could find and started sketching as soon as my neurons knew that 2+2 made 4 (and I haven’t stopped since).

• Which Altered cards did you work on?

Yzmir: Studious Disciple

• Could you walk us through your creative process?

  I start with doing some intention research on my iPad (sketching is much more instinctive for me on this tablet). Usually, it doesn’t look like much—it’s mostly to figure out the general dynamics. Once I'm satisfied with the result, I move on to a more detailed sketch to lay out the foundation of all the elements. After that, I switch to my large PC tablet and work on color/ambiance research (sometimes I need to work on the character’s colors first before integrating them into the image and adjusting them to the ambiance).

  Once everything is in place, I move on to polishing (I usually focus first on the most important narrative elements, so I can gradually reduce the level of detail for less important parts). This phase often leads to evolutions and modifications of patterns or the character’s design if it’s a scene, as adding volume sometimes raises readability questions.

  In parallel, as the base illustration becomes more satisfying, I test the first iteration possibilities. If the ideas work, I duplicate the file two more times and refine each version.

  And tada!

• Which faction do you prefer or would you like to illustrate cards for?

  I especially loved working on the Lyra cards (in upcoming expansions). The characters’ dynamics are fantastic to illustrate.

• How did you get into illustrating, and how did you get in touch with Equinox?

  I started illustrating the day I discovered (in high school) that I could make a career out of it. So I did a year in preparatory class and then went to art school in Nantes.

  Afterward, I got into board games and met a lot of people during festivals (notably the International Games Festival in Cannes). That’s how I got in touch with Max (Altered’s Art Director). I emailed him, did my first test, and I haven’t stopped illustrating for Altered since!

• What are your personal inspirations, favorite artists, and favorite themes?

  Jesper Ejsing, Even Amundsen, Jeremy Fenske, and Aurore Folny are some of the artists I’ve been following for many years. But in general, I draw my inspirations daily from images on Instagram, with books—I’m particularly fascinated by the subtleties of atmospheric perspective right now.

  I grew up immersed in fantasy and the fantastic (The Lord of the Rings, Game of Thrones, Harry Potter, Eragon—the books, etc.), and that’s clearly what inspires me the most in creation! Bonus points for Villeneuve’s films, the sound design alone is a real pleasure.

  In terms of animation, Arcane and Puss in Boots 2 were two amazing experiences I had in recent years.

  Music also helps me a lot. I can spend hours listening to movie soundtracks while illustrating, they help me dive into the universe I’m working on.

  In terms of themes, I love working on creatures, and I’m increasingly discovering the joy of drawing characters that are very, very expressive narratively, haha. But I’m relatively curious about everything, as long as it’s somewhat within an alternative, fantastical universe.

  Naturally, working on Altered is a real treat for my mind.

• Where can we find you on social media?

  You can find me mainly on Instagram, ArtStation and Cara !

          

The entire Equinox team would like to thank all the players who attended this weekend, Ludotrotter for their organization, the streaming team led by Kawa, Asao and SuriPlay, as well as the entire judging team who made this event a success.