kashyyyk-regionals-9-12-99

Title: kashyyyk-regionals-9-12-99
Author: Michael "rayc" Hawley
Date: Sep 20, 1999

Well this was the worst showing I have made at a tournament in over a year. I would have to pick the Regionals to go brain dead. I want say that I do not mean to put down any of my opponents. If I emphasize my misplays over their good plays, it is because I remember my own mistakes. The fact remains, those who beat me played better than I did and I give them my congratulations and my respect.

What I was playing:
A MWYHL deck that tested up to test 2 and used insurrection to beef up forfeits and stifle Elis Helrot
A Big Blue Yavin 4 ops deck.

LS vs Jeremy Crusco’s CPI deck
This was a beautiful deck that took me completely by surprise. His approach was to blow up Yavin 4 and use the effect that adds 8 to the deploy cost of rebels. Then he deployed ability x3. I let him do his thing for too long while I looked for a spy and some heavy beatdown stuff and while I tried to get Leia recycled and deployed wTest 1. By the time I had what I needed, he had blown up Yavin 4 and, since I did not have Obi down, everyone was deploy +8. I finally got Obi in hand and saved up force to deploy him with a Bothan Spy to the one Death Star location he had deployed – only I screwed up. I did not notice that he had characters that add to the deploy cost of Rebels to the Death Star. So I deployed the Spy and did not have enough force to deploy Obi. I managed to get Tawse Kha down with the Spy but the beatdown was still crushing. At the end I had a nice loop going with It Could be Worse and I could have timed the game out but I did not want to screw up Jeremy’s chances. I drew up 30 seconds before time was called. In retrospect, I made about eleventeen mistakes in this game. When I saw the SuperLaser and the Death Star site, I should have abandoned Jedi Testing and concentrated only on getting a spy and some guys to the Death Star. I should have Deployed Obi to either the Death Star or one of my Cloud City drain sites so that I would not suffer from that effect. Full loss by 22.

Highs: Seeing a CPI deck do well. Facing a gracious opponent
Lows: Making the wrong decision at virtually every point in the game.

DS vs Ben Ivey MWYHL deck
This was a very slow game with lots of Ebb and flow. Ben did not know about the ruling indicating that DOS had to be deployed from the reserve deck in order to be used with the MWYHL objective (this is a monumentally stupid ruling, as are many of the rulings that have come out of Decipher lately). I insisted that the ruling be observed since I had suffered from it myself in the previous game (I knew Leia was in my force pile and, if I had been able to deploy her from hand, I would have simply drawn up until I got her rather than trying to find ways of circulating the force into my reserve deck. This gave Jeremy extra time to blow up Yavin 4). Anyway, this game had lots of battling the ground with cat and mouse over force drains and good space battle over Yavin 4. My critical mistake was to use up my There’ll be Hell To Pay on his Surprise Assault (thinking that he would retrieve it with On The Edge or something) only to have him play It Could Be Worse on the next drain. Had I grabbed the It Could Be Worse, I would have won. He had no retrieval that I saw. As it was, it was a close timed game that he won by ~7 force.

Highs: None really, I was still reeling from the CPI deck, I think. I guess it was kind of liberating to know that I was only playing for fun from this point on.
Lows: Stupidly grabbing the wrong interrupt. Knowing all hope for the regional title was gone

DS vs ? Hidden Base Endor Our Most Desperate Hour deck
Well I had to take it out on someone. This guy deployed all his ground strength to Endor, where they sat and did nothing for the rest of the game (U-3PO went for a visit). He got off one Our Most Desperate Hour with Lando; but this hung poor Lando out to dry. I beat him down in space and finished him off with Organa’s Ceremonial Necklace + Rebel Base Occupation. I love Our Most Desperate Hour; but it can’t be all you have going. Full Win by ? >20

Highs: Winning a game
Lows: Thinking that I could easily have lost this one too if my opponent had not left all of his characters sitting impotently on Endor.

LS vs Daryl Wolfenden HDADTJ
I don’t remember much about this game except for the fact that Daryl did not deploy Epic Duel and I did not notice this until about 6 turns into the game – after making sure I had Glancing Blow and Courage of A Skywalker in hand before deploying Luke and Obi. I took full advantage of tests 1 and 2 in this game. The KFC and Bacta Tank combo just rocks when you get it going. FW by ? >20

Highs: Winning my only LS victory of the day. Getting the KFC Bacta Tank thing going.
Lows: Daryl’s a nice guy. Sorry to beat him like that.

LS vs John Monfredo Abyssins
John is one of my favorite people in the game. He was a tournament director in Worcester when my daughter and I were going together to lots of tournaments. I always enjoy our games and this was no exception. John was playing Abyssins. He started Expand the Empire on Jabba’s Palace and got out Scum and Villainy early on. I considered going non-interactive. I could have used It Could be Worse, Projection of a Skywalker and drained at Kessel and Cloud City making strategic hits here and there. But, instead I went Hell for leather. I went wherever he was and battled. I won the battles, for the most part but he was retrieving with Scum and Villainy and my Draw Their Fire. He was using alien leaders and Jabba’s Twerps which is a beautiful card in both of its uses. When time was called, John had the edge. The most fun I had all day. Timed loss by ? not much.

Highs: Playing John. Seeing Jabba’s Twerps and an alien deck. I like alien decks.
Lows: I would rather have won.

DS vs Schuyler Dunn-Flanagan Hidden Base
Young kid who was unfamiliar with the current rulings about drawing destiny. Anyway, it all came down to him deploying Coruscant and putting 4 x wings there. He didn’t notice that I was saving force. When my turn came, I had > 36 force to use and a hand full of star ships and pilots. Down went Vader’s shuttle to Coruscant for +2 force. Now all of my star ships and imperials have reduced deploy costs. I put Vader in his shuttle to eliminate his destiny draw. I then deployed 2 more star destroyers, Bossk in the Bus and more pilots. His Organized Attacks didn’t help much and he had an Out of Nowhere and didn’t believe me when I explained about the new (Stupid) destiny ruling. The Decipher rep apparently didn’t know about it either. I had to direct him to the current rulings document. It’s a shame too, because it’s another STUPID RULING from Decipher. I then moved to Kiffex and probed. Got it! I had started Security Precautions so he had to lose a bunch of force from that. There were a few more turns left. It wasn’t pretty. Full win by? > 20

Highs: Well I won
Lows: I hate doing that to a kid. I really figured he must have a Houjix in hand.


In Summary:
My Decks were good. My play was bad. I don’t remember what place I finished in. My score was 6 + ?. As I said, my worst showing in over a year.
I played a bunch of games for fun before and after the tournament (not with my tournament decks). And I did have a lot of fun. I really did not see the decks I prepared hardest for. I saw interesting decks though and learned some useful stuff. Congratulations to everyone who played. And to Steve Brentson, the winner, good luck at worlds.