TRM Luca Style (State Championship Deck)
Title: TRM Luca Style (State Championship Deck)
Author: Luca "Luca/Tzizvvt" Costanzo
Date: May 13, 2001
Rating: 4.5
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Cards:
‘Starting (5)
Yavin IV Throne Room
Insurrection
Staging Areas
YISYW
HFTMF
Locations (6)
Home One Docking Bay
Hoth Docking Bay
Spaceport Docking Bay
Hoth War Room
Home One War Room
Dagobah Yoda’s Hut
Effects (11)
(3) Goo Nee Tay
Revolution
Bacta Tank
Honor
Battle Plan
Launching The Assault
I Hope She’s All Right
Ounee Ta
Order To Engage
Interrupts (16)
(3) Nar Shaddaa Wind Chimes
(3) Sense
(2) Fallen Portal
(2) Weapon Levitation
(2) Mess/Proficiency
(2) On The Edge
Run Luke, Run
Alter
Ships (1)
Home One
Weapons (2)
Luke’s Lightsaber
Anakin’s Lightsaber
Dudes (19)
(3) Ishi Tib
H’nemthe
Bothan Spy
(3) LSJK
(3) Ben w/Stick
(2) Leia w/Gun
(2) Han w/Gun
Chewbacca, Protector
Lando w/Axe
Corran Horn
Wedge Antilles, Red Squadron Leader ‘
Strategy: ‘
This is the deck that I took to the Victorian State Championships, with one change. I had a Major Haash’n in there in place of the Alter. This deck won all of its games without working up a sweat, beating on an old skool Careful Planning deck, Brangus and Dark Surgeon style AOTBS. In playtesting, it has beaten everything thrown at it from Texas-Style Hunt Down to MKOS.
** NOTE This deck was made before Tatooine, to be played before Tatooine. Don’t rate it with Tatooine in mind. **
** REPLIES TO REVIEWS **
NOTE zwitter D-mailed me to say that he meant to give it 5, in case you were wondering about the inconsistence in the comment P
MyLordMartin- WOW A review by the Falke Master himself To answer your question about scum, really it comes down to Goo Nee Tay and Battle Plan. These two effects together will win you the game. In playtesting it demolished court and beat Stuart Jones’ MKOS, although that did get a little close. Simply, they have to come to you at JP or they get drained to death and when they do you Fallen Portal the living crap out of them. Mess/Proficiency takes out key characters in the AC. If you don’t like it, though, an extra Chewie, Protector would help or a Lando with Axe. Like I said, it’s all about metagaming.
Garion- No, you do not need drain sites in this and if I did include one it would be the CCCarbon Chamber. I prefer not to give away any force, so I would never end up deploying it anyway. Against ground based decks you take their sites. Against the SYCFA based decks you mentioned, you take their Death Star Docking Bay and deploy your Spaceport Docking Bay to set up IHSAR. I had my doubts in playtesting about that card, but it won me games. That, combined with Battle Plan will win you the game against space decks. In any case, any 2 drain site is just going to be hit by an Arica, U-3P0 or Dreaded Imperial Starfleet, but if you ditch Insight for IHSAR and get it set up around the 4th turn, that will usually be enough. I know that no drain sites looks suss and that’s what I thought when I started playing TRM, but trust me- you NEVER NEED them to win.
Rei- What the hell is a ’mains beatdown deck’ without Draw Their Fire and Frozen Assets/Beggar? If I wanted to play beatdown, I’d play German WYS. It’s not about beatdown, it’s about control.
** END RESPONSES **
So why does this deck work? Quite simply, you activate more than your opponent and you dominate the game. I took this to the states because Melbourne has a very random metagame. I needed something that can beat Hunt Down, Court, MKOS, ISB, Ties, Ralltiir Ops and Endor Ops consistently. This deck can do it purely because of the ABSENSE of bullets. Against Ralltiir, you will never be holding a Transmission Terminated. Against Ties, you will never be holding a useless Menace Fades.
You all know how TRM works, but this one is a little bit different. I started off with your usual TRM deck, then slowly tuned it more and more to my tastes. For starters, there were a hell of a lot of Twixes in most and no way to recycle. Most scrubs that got thrown down to the Docking Bays just sat there for the rest of the game and were essentially useless. Ishi-Tibs are completely ridiculous. Rather than go through this all in one paragraph, I think I’ll do it card-by-card
Non-uniques package I wanted a consistent first turn Ishi-Tib. Most scrubs are deploy 2, so you don’t get to draw cards if your opponent doesn’t give you any force. With Ishi-Tibs, you can cycle cards you don’t want to get at cards you do, protect yourself from Monnok, activate more and sift out the low destinies from your deck. Seeing as I had the 3 chimes in there to ensure early Ishi-Tibs, the Bothan Spy was a natural to allow access to non-battleground docking bays to stop early generation via Mob Points and kill Merrejk. The H’nemthe was debatable, but proved to be a good scrub to drop with whatever went to the Executor and generally helps with the force-choke aspect.
Locations You don’t need to activate a crapload, you just need to be activating a fair bit more than your opponent, wether this be 9 to 2 or 15 to 10. I went with only the ’safe’ twixes and no Rendezvous Point because it cancels LTA. With the Tibs, you get them quickly, so having only 3 Twixes is not an issue. Add more if you really must, but trust me- it’s fine how it is. Spaceport Docking Bay? Really, it’s only in there for ties and MKOS. Ties will usually give you a docking bay from SYCFA or Endor Ops, but you need another battleground for IHSAR. Don’t forget; opponent’s pilots are deploy +1 there.
Goo Nee Tay There are many cards that stop revos choking, but few that stop Goo Nee Tay. It’s destiny 4, so it’s preferable to play 3 of these things instead of one and Signals. In the early game, you can’t afford to Signal for this, no matter how many twixes you have. In the late game, signalling for it will largely be a moot point.
Revo Only one. A lot of decks will have in-built counters, but against something like BHBM, Endor Ops, ISB or Court, you can probably spin an important location.
Wedge RSL Yes, he only cancels with Corran Horn. Either he’s unbelievable and cancels destiny or is a big scrub. I have found that even without a Red Squad dude, he makes a good pilot on H1, getting around Zuckuss. If only one guy that he works with really bothers you, take out the H’nemthe or Bothan for Tycho.
Non-Combo Cards Combo Alter doesn’t cancel Sense. Combo Sense isn’t needed as you can cycle quickly with Ishi-Tibs, but combo Sense would screw up your rig and enable your opponent to cycle through as well. Also, combo Sense doesn’t cancel Alter or Reacts. Combo Nar Shaddaa Wind Chimes would help to stop a beatdown on Ishi-Tibs, but this deck doesn’t have too many high-destiny cards, so I preferred to keep the destiny as high as possible. Also, you often won’t want to save 4 or 5 force in the early game.
On The Edge Leave a 6 or something rigged in your opponent’s turn. If you don’t need to Fallen Portal, retrieve 5 and send your 6 to the bottom. If you have two Ishi-Tibs, you can activate all but 4, Tib twice and have the same 6 on top. Kill guys with the shaft (Responsibility Of Command/Much Anger in Him) on them. Kill off characters that you need elsewhere. Hell, you can even use it to retrieve
Home One I think that it’s accepted that light gets beaten down in space. You can fetch it when you need it by ditching Insight for LTA. It should be saved for late game when you can tell if your opponent can beat it down. During the States, I had Haash’n in there to cancel Lateral Damage, with this version you need the Alter. Always be ready for Lateral with it and don’t forget about the H1 War Room.
Notable Exceptions
Clash of Sabres (Too much CTR going around. Does cancel POTF, though)
Aim High (Found it was not necessary against Scum or Ties. Power +5 was nice, but SAC is better.)
Orimaarko, Tawss (Not strictly necessary. A second Lando would be better than either.)
Shocking/Grimtaash (I so wanted this in here, but it just didn’t make the cut. 61st card)
Falcon (Why go to space if you don’t need to? H1 is much more efficient and you need Han on the ground)
Don’t your Ishi-Tibs get beaten down?
Yes. I have not had a game where a Mara hasn’t dropped on an Ishi-Tib or a POTF hasn’t shown up to ruin my fun. Literally, every game. Did that stop this deck winning? No. You have to expect the beatdown and be ready with a Fallen Portal. Alter can also stop POTF, which is another reason why I replaced Haash’n with it. If you don’t need the activation, don’t be greedy. Move them to a Dbay which is safe. In the first turn or two, when you need them, the worst that can realistically happen is Mara, which isn’t so bad. Later on, like I said, you move them somewhere safe. Don’t forget that if Mara goes to a Dbay, Honor can stop her from draining.
Specific Matchups
MKOS Deploy <> Docking Bay to tat and move your guys over. If it’s not a swarm, Goo Nee Tay can easily win you the game. If it’s a swarm, you’re still fine if you get to the chamber and kill the rep. Don’t restrict yourself to not deploying to JP. If you need to, second turn LSJK to the AC can win you the game, but sense the NSP. At the Docking Bays and Jabba’s Palace, you can Fallen Portal everything you need to. If you get Goo Nee Tay and Battle Plan (possible starting, or ditch YISYW) out, they won’t have much force spare.
Court Pretty much the same as MKOS, except that it’s a little easier. There is already a site next door to the AC to march into without fear of NSP. There is almost no chance of a court swarm, but Goo Nee Tay is hindered by the objective. Deploy it anyway. It still hurts Jabba, Ephant, Boelo, Chall and Xizor at least. The may have Hidden Weapons, but you have Senses.
Hunt Down Ditch Insight for Honor, set up your activation and wait for them to deploy No Escape or make a mistake. If they are playing duelling, apply Obi sparingly where Vader isn’t and keep Luke around. You will need to find Run Luke, Run if you can. They will probably deploy some guy to the Executor Docking Bay to get some activation, so you need to beat that down. If you can drop Goo Nee Tay and beat them off their Executor Docking Bay, you will cause more damage than they can because they will not be activating enough. The H’nemthe can help, as can Fallen Portal with a rigged 5 or 6. Lev the living crap out of their sticks.
ISB Space Can be tricky. If you get first turn Goo Nee Tay, they can’t Piett first turn. Find a spy and kill Merrejk so that they can only get one system out. If you find the rev, they lose. You should activate much more than them if you keep whacking them off docking bays and you can probably cause more damage with I Hope She’s All Right.
BHBM Once again, this game is all about force generation. Stop theirs and you win. Play like against Hunt Down with a few differences Luke comes from reserve for 3 force to the H1 Docking Bay second turn and if you need to stop yourself from being duelled (although it seems pretty spectacular to get 4 cards stacked), put some spies down to the Throne Room. Don’t forget about -1 defense value from Insight to Dark Jedi. Steal all of their sticks.
AOTBS The key to this is to not be stupid and try to kill Xizor. It is more important to keep LSJK and friends on table. An early LSJK and a few guys with him will stop your opponent from ever being able to use their objective and by doing so you can stop them rigging destinies to kill him (seeing as few if any Agents decks are playing Reactor Terminal). Don’t go to the Death Star Docking Bay with fewer than four or so guys as PASOA can be really bad. You’re probably better off to deploy your DB to Kuat or whatever and set up Luke there. You don’t have to worry about Mara beating down on your scrubs, but you do still have the worry of POTF, so don’t get @#$%y. This shouldn’t be a hard matchup, seeing as you have all the tools necessary to win. Just make sure not to make any stupid mistakes. Take Snoova’s Axe.
Ralltiir Ops Start Ounee Ta instead of YISYW. Kill anything at docking bays. They may hold off on deploying their sites. If they do, you just deploy your <> Docking Bay to Ralltiir to stop the flip. If you can keep them choked and get H1 to Ralltiir, perhaps with a Rev on it, you win. It’s that simple.
Ties/Space You are easily able to kill any Merrejk that would otherwise grab a whole bunch of systems to screw you. Set up I Hope She’s Allright and Battle Plan. Be very careful when deploying Home One. You want to ensure that it’s not going to get beat down. Be sure to have defensive SAC to use to stop Lateral Damage, Relentless Pursuit etc. In practise, though, it is often not necessary to go to space. Ties will run out of retrieval and be force choked. They may also deploy the Death Star War Room, which would give you a nice drain. If it’s some weird deck with Star Destroyers and Chiraneau, they’re even worse off. With two Mess/Proficiencies and Corran Horn, you will be able to stop any undercover spies.
Here’s how your average game will probably go
You Docking Bay, Ishi-Tib, go.
Him Something, go.
You Docking Bay, Ishi-Tib, Goo Nee Tay go.
Him Set up something, go.
You Beatdown on whatever, go.
Him Umm … crap, save up, go.
You LSJK, Stick, draw, go.
Him Deploy, go.
You BEATS, go.
Him Umm … crap, save up …
Of course, not all games go like that, but about half will look something like that. You will find that you can probably do at least twice as much as your opponent in most games and win.
And that’s all there is to this deck. You can pretty much beat anything, just as long as you keep your wits about you. Like Marin Akesson said, though, this deck depends on knowing your meta, so be prepared to tailor it to suit.
Luca ’Luca/Tzizvvt’ Costanzo
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