Speederholics Anonymous

Title: Speederholics Anonymous
Author: Steven "Sir Yoda" Lewis
Date: Aug 15, 2000 Rating: 4.5

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Cards:

‘Starting (10) There Is Good In Him / I Can Save Him Jedi Luke Luke’s Saber Endor Chirpa’s Hut Endor DB I Feel the Conflict Heading for the Medical Frig Draw Their Fire Staging Areas Insurrection

Locations (4) Hoth DB Home1 DB Endor Back Door CC Downtown Plaza

Characters (4) Boushh Treva Horme ASP-707 x2

Starships (8) Red Leader in Red 1 X-wing x7

Vehicles (18) Snowspeeder x6 Sandspeeder x6 Rebel Snowspeeder x6

Effects (10) Incom Corporation x2 Yarna x2 Maneuvering Flaps x2 Mech. Failure Frozen Assets S-foils Honor of the Jedi

Interrupts (5) Signal x3 Organized Attack x2

Weapons (1) Ewok Catapult ‘

Strategy: ‘

This is the deck card-for-card what I played at the GenCon Continentals Day 2 and placed 2nd with. Some changes need to be made which I will discuss at the end of this section.

First off, pull the Docking Bays from the deck and move Luke out to drain. Dump a speeder or two at each Docking Bay for Force activation with Staging Areas. Pull up Yarna as soon as you can and start drawing for speeders and effects while your opponent gets set up. Once you drop the Incom to the HothDB and Flaps is down, you are ready to start wrecking. You can then win by 1) knocking your opponent off of whatever sites or systems he’s on and draining at his locations, 2) wrecking your opponent in one battle with the Frozen Assets or the Treva Horme and tons of beatdown, 3) winning 3 battles and crossing Vader with the stacked Ewok Catapult. Usually a combination of all 3 options is best, but you’ll have to react to what your opponent does in any case.

Why start DTF? Because YOU should be initiating most of the battles, which allows you a 2-card Force swing every time. Also with this on the table from the beginning of the game, the 1-turn beatdown is always available when necessary.

Why only 6 locations? You don’t need any more. With a couple speeders at each of your DB’s, you are activating 12 just off of your locations (assuming Luke has been captured). If your opponent gives you any Force or if you get out any of your 2/2 battlegrounds, you’re activating even more. Your opponent will almost always drop someone to grab Luke, so you don’t need a lot of site drains to tempt an opposing ground force either.

Why Treva Horme? Treva is a Frozen Assets which is immune to Alter. Use her to sell the opponent a card and he has to use ALL of his Force so that Ghhhk is unplayable in a battle you initiate (with DTF down). The Frozen does the same thing, of course.

Why the Ewok Catapult? You already have 2 ASP-707 droids in the deck and you start the EndorDB so this is an easy card to stack for destiny. It works best when trying to cross Vader. Activate your whole pile and stack the 7 for an auto-crossed Vader (provided you’ve stacked 3 cards on ICFTC which isn’t that hard).

Why Boushh? Defense against a drain at Chirpa’s Hut and other interior sites. Also she is a way to cancel Visage in the off-chance that your opponent can deal with the Honor of the Jedi in other ways. She’s also a spy which you can drop to an opponent’s 1/0 docking bay to allow the speeders to follow with a beatdown. She is unbelievable in here.

Why only 7 x-wings? Because the deck is not meant for space battles. The wings are there for a fighting chance against fast space decks, and they work well with the Incom Corp. Remember, 90% of your opponent’s will come to the ground eventually even if they’re playing mostly space.

Now for the match-ups…

VS. Huntdown Get the Honor of the Jedi as early as possible and wreck Vader off of whatever battleground he goes to (usually a docking bay). If he captures Luke and runs to Chirpa’s Hut, Honor or Boushh will stop his drains and you should be able to outdrain at your sites.

VS. Rops This is usually a breeze. Set up your speeders and battle like a champ on his planet. Once you wreck him off of two sites (use the Mech Failure wisely) you should be able to control the rest of the game.

VS. Bring Him Before Me A very tough game. Vader and Emperor will usually run to the D*2 so set up speeder drains as fast as possible and try to track your destinies to win the duels. If he puts stuff out, battle it and win some battles. Once you win 4 battles or duels, you can cross Vader with the Ewok Catapult.

VS. Scum Go to his sites and drain early. Luke should be protected also (back him up with speeders to avoid the 4-LOM beatdown). You should outdrain if he doesn’t come outside. If he suicides his guys to retrieve force, you should be stacking cards on ICFTC like mad. If he tries to fight you, you’ll wreck him.

VS. TIEs Drain on the ground ASAP and save the X-wings for a one-turn beatdown. This is a very tough game, but your drains should be able to do him in if you get them fast enough and if not, the battle in space may pull it off.

VS. Manip Drop speeders to the Home1DB as soon as you get them (to avoid Alter/Monnok devastation) and transit them for free to any other DB’s to drain. Beatdown whatever he puts out and try to outdrain if it comes to that.

VS. ISB Spread your drains to wherever your opponent goes and watch for the one-turn beatdown opportunity. The X-wings are great for taking control of a system also. The beatdown is usually what wins this game, but you have two 2/2 drain sites in case that doesn’t work. Also, be wary of some possible spies and guys which might wreck your early speeders at the docking bays.

VS. Operatives Wreck them in a one turn beatdown and then spread across their planet. Let the battling damages do him in. Also, take control of his system with your wings.

I absolutely love speeders and x-wings since it is one of the most efficient decks you can construct (with Incom, S-foils, and Flaps you have ability=2 and power=6 each for only 2 deploy). I have built every possible variation of this deck, and this one seems to work the best. The idea came from a search for the most consistent Light deck and a suggestion from Clint Hays to make it work with TIGIH/ICSH. Cheers to Clint for the inspiration.

Here are the problems . . .

1) A deck with SAC in it can be problematic. If Luke gets captured (and he will), your opponent can Alter off your Flaps and probably the Yarna (if he gets it early enough). You could pull 3 speeders for a Wise Advice and a couple grabbers for this. Or just add 3 controls (my favorite choice).

2) A deck that can totally avoid you and drain at interior sites is a problem (like interior Dark Deal or Jabba’s Palace ISB), but these decks aren’t very popular anyway. Besides, he has to come get Luke evetually. Once he does, wreck him. So if this is all you lose to, then so be it.

3) Space decks are tough. If you can’t get your X-wings fast enough, some swift space drain damage can hurt pretty bad. You could add more X-wings or even a Landing Claw or two for this.

Otherwise this deck plays real well and wins consistently. If you doubt me, build it and try it and then tell me what you think.

2nd Place 2000 Continentals, Steven Lewis ‘