Court Racer (Post-Coruscant)
Title: Court Racer (Post-Coruscant)
Author: Devon "Devonator" Clark
Date: Aug 20, 2001
Rating: 4.5
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Cards:
‘Start (9)
Court of the Vile Gangster / Flip-side . . . What flip-side?
Tat Great Pit of Carkoon
Tat Podrace Arena
JP Audience Chamber
JP Dungeon
Boonta Eve Podrace
Sebulba’s Podracer
Watto’s Box (Switch for Allegations of Corruption if opponent is podracing)
Start Your Engines (Placed in reserve deck)
Characters (18)
Emperor Palpatine x4
EPP Vader x2
Darth Maul x2
Mara Jade
Dr. Evazan & Ponda Baba x2
4-LOM w/ gun x2
P-59
Prince Xizor
Guri
Tusken Raider
Janus Greejatus
Weapons (2)
Mara’s Saber
Maul’s Saber
Starships (5)
Maul’s Sith Infiltrator
ZiMH
BFiS1
Stinger
Virago
Locations (2)
Executor DB
D2 DB
Interrupts (15)
Force Lightning x2
We Must Accelerate Our Plans x3
Podracer Collision x3
Sniper & Dark Strike
Ghhhk & TRWEU
Young Fool
Vader’s Obsession
Maul Strikes
Omni Box & It’s Worse
You Are Beaten
Effects (9)
IAO & Secret Plans
Allegations of Corruption
No Escape
There Is No Try
First Strike
Do They Have A Code Clearance
You Cannot Hide Forever
Search & Destroy
Security Precautions ‘
Strategy: ‘
PLEASE READ STRATEGY BEFORE REVIEWING
**STRATEGY UPDATE**
Remove 1 YCHF…Add Come Here You Big Coward
Remove 1 Dr. E & Ponda Baba…Add second Janus Greejatus
In my strategy section, I make references to deploying my Tusken Raider, first turn with the AC text. This is a BAD choice. One A Step Backwards will leave that Tusken Raider exposed for a beat down. Either back him up or wait until second turn before you deploy him. He still wins you races though, so he’s not leaving.
O How the mighty have fallen. The Court Racer has suffered a loss. It is now 16-1. If you want to see how the Court Racer suffered a loss, read my Colesville TR However, I must admit, it was my sloppy play and not the deck that lost me that game. This deck is still one of the best in the environment.
**END UPDATE**
I played a version of this at the Atlanta DPC and it went 4-0 (+119), single handedly carrying me into the top 10. I posted the deck on decktech and it got a lot of good reviews. Well, at least one person wanted me to post a post-coruscant version, so here it is. And in my opinion, Coruscant has made this deck twice as good as the one I played at the DPC. I’ll explain how when I get to the Card choices. But first, a little background . . .
Going into the DPC, I knew DS podracing was the way to go. If your opponent isn’t podracing ,a 22 force swing is too crippling to endure. I knew I could do the deck well with multiple Palpatines for ground power and high destiny. It was just a matter of finding the right objective to get past the restriction of starting only Watto’s Box. Well, Court pulls sites, starships, and characters. It has direct damage and, if done right, it absolutely owns Tatooine. So, I engineered this deck to maintain a drain of 2 for the majority of a game, and then let the 22 force swing do the rest. With the direct damage and that continuous drain of 2, your opponent has to do something about Tatooine. When they try, you hit them with your big mains and destroy their hopes in battle. With that simple strategy, you have the tools to handle any deck.
And if you’re worried about its track record, the pre-tatooine version went undefeated, and the post-tatooine version is undefeated so far. It has an answer for whatever your opponent plays. If you don’t believe me, look at the cards . . .
CORUSCANT ADDITIONS
P-59 Do I really have to explain this? P-59 is the best card out of Coruscant, PERIOD He (as well as 4-LOM) belongs in every, and I mean EVERY, dark side deck. He battles and drains. He has high power and defense value. He draws battle destiny by himself, and he is immune to attrition. He has a permanent weapon that makes your opponent lose 2 force. There’s nobody better. (IG-88 certainly didn’t stand a chance against the uberdroid, so he lost his spot.)
Allegations of Corruption Odds are pretty good that your opponent is playing interrupts. Odds are even better that you’ll want to grab one of them. Well, this is the card for you. Yes, it lacks the subtlety of the traditional grabbers, but it makes that up in economy. 1 force vs. 3 force, Destiny 5 vs. destiny 3 . . . and you can start it. Perfect for your podracing opponents.
Do They Have A Code Clearance In the strategy section of my original Court Racer, I mentioned that the most important cards to grab were retrieving Interrupt. Well, this is a grabber for EVERY retrieving interrupt, so you don’t have to grab them with Allegations. And as more interrupts get stacked, it becomes harder and harder to retrieve. Also a Destiny 5.
IAO & Secret Plans It’s Secret Plans, which is a must . . . only with a higher destiny . . . and other game text that helps you.
Tusken Raider A Tusken Raider Who plays Tusken Raiders? Well, you should if you want to win the podrace. Place the Podrace Arena next to the Audience Chamber vs. racing opponents. Pull the Raider with the Audience Chamber first turn and move him over. Odds are, in this deck, that he will shoot at least one destiny off of your opponent’s racer. That’s a free Podracer Collision that can’t be cancelled by Too Close For Comfort. That wins races. Just make sure that you don’t leave him unattended when the race resolves.
Maul’s Sith Infiltrator Is this an Independent Starship? NOOO, It can’t be. Well, would you look at that It is That means I can pull it with my objective. Plus, it’s immune to attrition when Maul is piloting, and it’s destiny 6.
We Must Accelerate Our Plans What? There’s a Twilek Advisor that pulls Podrace Interrupts TOO Sign me up. Now I’ve essentially got 7 Podracing Interrupts . . . and still 3 Advisors. Now, that’s an efficient use of a card slot.
Maul Strikes This card took the slot of the Weapon Levitation. It still pulls sabers, it’s higher destiny . . . and it allows me to add battle destinies.
NON-CORUSCANT CARDS
Janus Greejatus In the original Court Racer, many people complained that I didn’t play Janus or Sim. Well, I told all of you that I wanted to add Janus, but I couldn’t find room. Well, Weapon Lev is out, and Aurra Sing followed shortly thereafter. That means that there’s an open character slot. Janus is in.
EPP Vader ALSO, many people told me that I should play EPP Vader instead of Vader and his saber. I apologize for ever doubting you. You were right. He is a better use of the card slots. I’ve seen the error in my ways.
There Is No Try With no traditional grabbers, Oppressive Enforcement isn’t as good for SAC protection as There Is No Try. It makes Sense a source of Direct Damage, and with this on the table, if you remember that Sense is unique, you can engineer some wicked mind games where your interrupts are concerned.
Stinger and Virago They’re higher destiny than Dengar or Bossk in bus. And if I have one of the appropriate pilots in my hand, I can use my objective to pull the appropriate ship.
Vader’s Obsession If it’s in your hand, you’ve got a nice surprise for Luke. If it’s in your deck, it’s a destiny 6.
Young Fool If it’s in your hand, Palpatine can teach some young whipper snapper a lesson. If it’s in your deck, it’s a destiny 6.
Security Precautions Even with the Sith Infiltrator beefing up space, Hidden Base was still one of my biggest problem match-ups. No longer
The rest of the card choices should be self-explanatory.
And, as before, the 61st card is STILL Come Here You Big Coward. It wrecks MWYHL, The Pile, The Senate, and it goes oh so well with Darth Maul. I just can’t ever seem to find room to add it in.
General Strategy
Placing your sites Yes, that’s right. There is a strategy to placing the Podrace Arena. It’s a non-battleground site, and that means good things for your objective. Versus non-podracers, use it to break up the battlegrounds. Vs. podracers, place it next to the Audience Chamber, so you can move the Tusken Raider there immediately.
Early Game In your Activate phase, start the race. Your first action of your control phase should be to sabotage Anakin’s podracer and draw destiny. If you don’t get a good draw first turn, don’t stack it. You will put yourself in greater risk of losing the race if you allow your opponent’s first race draw to be a ”draw 3 and choose 2” opportunity because you had to stack a 1 first turn. Deploy Palpatine to an opponent’s site to lock down a site. Pull Force Lightning. Don’t be afraid to lose force to your objective. You’ll retrieve it when you win the race.
Mid Game Back up Palpatine. He’s great early by himself, but as your opponent amasses characters, he’s more likely to brave the Force Lightning. In the meantime, keep draining. Set up a second drain if you get the opportunity. Up to this point, you shouldn’t have played any Podracing Interrupts. Now is when you start to play them to make sure that you win the race. Oh, yeah . . . WIN THE RACE
Late Game That force swing should have propelled you around the corner. Now, you just have to battle, damage, and drain to close out the victory.
The three biggest criticisms
You don’t activate enough force With all of my activation potential on the table, I activate 10 force. If I can activate 10 a turn, I’m in good shape. And you don’t have to deploy every turn, so save up a few force and then deploy. Plus this deck deploys some high power mains for little force. I rarely need more than 12 force to deploy in one turn. So, I can save a few one turn to deploy the next turn. Intelligent management of your force will make force choke a non-factor.
You don’t have enough starships to hold space I pull starships from my reserve deck. With that ability, I react to my opponent’s space deployment and beat them down. I might have to sustain a couple of drains before I attack, but I will beat them out of space. Against a dedicated space deck like EBO, things are little bit sticky, but I will only have to stop a few drains to win the space power race. I have the tools to win in space.
WYS Podracing will beat you in the race I start a grabber. So there won’t be any repeating A Step Backwards. And on the off chance that my opponent does win the race, this version of Court owns WYS. I play WYS, so I know how nasty the deck is, but you’re stacked against WYS. You have the tools to win that game, too.
MATCH-UPS
Podracing (except Podprofit) Your opponent must be dedicated to racing to beat you. Start Allegations of Corruption to grab A Step Backwards. Pull the Tusken Raider with the AC and move him over to the Podrace Arena. Podrace Interrupts are more important than Effects. Pull them with Accelerate Our Plans. The race is everything. Use those racing interrupts wisely.
Podprofit Next to EBO, this and WYS racing will be your toughest match-ups. You don’t get the AC’s text, and you should NOT start the Tusken Raider. Most Podprofit decks NORMALLY start Goo Nee Tay and that would bite . . . BUT the exception to that rule is against Court when they start The Camp. That doesn’t affect you much. Start Allegations of Corruption to catch ASB. WIN THE RACE. Once you win the race, it shouldn’t be a contest. Otherwise, just play this match like a regular Profit.
Profit Start Mara and Dr. E in the chamber. Pull her saber immediately. The AC should be locked down for a while. Drop Palpatine in the Audience Chamber early. If you have Young Fool, you can remove Han from the game. If you don’t, you can simply fry Leia before she has a chance to free him. Remember, you have an action between their deploy or move to the AC. If they can’t keep Han on the table, they can’t win. Grab Sense, Blaster Deflection, or Fallen Portal.
WYS Always a tough match, because WYS is a tough objective. But Palpatine, Guri, and Maul own smugglers. Get Palpatine into the Cantina and back him up. Drain for 2 for the entire game. Maul cancels the presence of everybody except Melas and Luke. Guri stops destinies from getting out of control. Grab Control & Tunnel Vision. (I have played and beaten every variant of WYS with this deck.)
Hyperdrive Deploy the Podrace Arena between the City Outskirts and the Junkyard. Set up Palpatine in the Junkyard early. Kick them out of the Junkyard and they can’t flip. If they can’t flip, they can’t win. Grab whatever.
The Pile The Pile is basically Mains with Force Choke. Mains is always a tough match-up. Force Choke isn’t much better. However, that 22 force swing will do the trick. Find your SAC protection. Ideally, first turn, drop Palpatine to the Great Pit of Carkoon, move over to Shmi’s Hut, and fry Shmi before she can pull 3PO. Then drain for 2 there. Grab Sense.
Hidden Base Used to be my only loss. Security Precautions makes it an easy win. Wait for them to flip, and then start probing with your smugglers and/or Maul. Set up Search & Destroy. That and Court will win out. Grab Organized Attack.
MWYHL Always a tough match. Don’t pay to force drain if it means you’ll under-deploy. Court Damage will put pressure on early enough. Set yourself up and then begin to drain. Set up S&D. The constant pressure and 22 force swing will win out. (And for God’s sake, move test 2, it makes them take an extra turn to finish testing.) Grab whatever.
QMC QMC has a lot of tricks, and that makes this a tough match. If they don’t deploy to Tatooine, Court damage will take its toll. Set up shop in the AC with Mara and some back-up. Use the rest of your forces (Maul and Vader) to disrupt them on Bespin. Eventually, that 22 force swing will catch them. Grap Path of Least Resistance.
RST Court will take its toll. Treat Endor like Bespin in QMC. Set up shop in the AC and use Maul and Vader as disruption on Endor. The 22 force swing will win out. Grab Insertion Planning.
TIGIH Same as above except keep Palpatine and Vader together so that if he Luke finds his daddy, Palpatine can zap him.
Senate Court will take its toll. Avoid the Galactic Senate. You can’t win there. Although, if you found room for CHYBC, they can’t drain there. But, the Senate can’t be there only means of fighting you. It just gives them nifty tricks. Use Maul and Vader to disrupt them wherever they go and solidify your Tatooine forces. Grab Squabbling Delegates.
EBO This is your toughest match-up, but with the addition of Maul’s Sith Infiltrator, you now have the ability to effectively fight them in space. Set up Serach & Destroy. Use your space forces to contest one or two systems. Then let your 22-force swing win this one out. Avoid Hoth for fear of Ice Plains. With your direct damage, a constant drain in the Audience Chamber, and some intelligent management of space forces, you can win this game.
These are all of the prevalent deck types I can think of. So, if I didn’t cover one, I apologize. D-Mail me with any questions. Personally, I believe that your cards are simply tools in beating your opponent, but you have to use them. I think you’ll find that this deck has the tools to beat any opposing deck type if you play intelligently. Give it a try. I think you’ll like it
Devon ”Devonator” Clark
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