cincinatti-ohio-6-24-00
Title: cincinatti-ohio-6-24-00
Author: Frank "FrankLamanti" Lamantia
Date: Jun 25, 2000
Location : Acme Games, Cincinnati, Ohio
Tournament Director : Heath Scheiman
Number of Players : 19
So I'm doing pretty good as of late, 15-1 in my past 3 tourneys including states. My rating has hopped over 110 points in my last 3 tournaments and I still want to get it into the 1900s. I see a tournament in Cincinnati, Ohio and figure that the competition there usually is pretty good. I spread the news to the Dayton crew and it looks like Russell Hockenberry (state champ) and Matt Sato (state scrub) are going to go to. So as it stands, the number 1,3,4 players in the state are going to be there. Matt Sato won the last tournament here a month ago so I have to keep an eye on him too.
Anyways, Matt calls me on Friday and he wants me to meet him down there an hour before the tournament so he can test his decks. So without boring you with the ride down there, I beat up on his Eloms Throne Room deck by like 17 even though I made a mistake and he beat my Mara down for 12 cards. He doesn't even have a dark deck built yet and his light deck sucks so he makes 2 completely new decks in about 20 minutes.
LIGHT : Falke HB w/ some meta stuff in it. In a fun game Matt Tallon Rolled my super Falcon so I added 2 Hans Toolkits and an Its a Hit. I was playing 2/2 SAC and starting Wise Advice. It worked out well.
DARK : ROps. Been there done that got a T-shirt.
Game 1 (Dark) vs. Casey Thompson (1500)
This guy is new and I can tell it. He starts Rendevous Point (no Hidden Base obj) and Haven. I don't get any twix in my opening hand so I start tracking my AT-STs and my locations around. Meanwhile he drops about 6 ships for free at Rendezvous Point and moves them to Kessel for a 3 drain. I flip 2 turns later and go searching for my ships so I can get up Decree. He also drops the Hoth Docking Bay and loaded up General Solo, Chewbacca and Obi-Wan Kenobi there. I have to suck up the 2 drain for another 2 turns before I find Decree, and set up at Kashyyyk and Ralltiir. He realizes hes pretty much dead like this so he transports over to the Ralltiir docking bay. I battle him and drew a 10 for battle destiny but he used General Solo to cancel it. Doh. He moved some of his ships from Kessel to Ralltiir trying to flip back my objective and shuttled General Solo and Chewie up, and shuttling Luke, Wedge down to join Obi-Wan. I drop Bossk in Hounds Tooth to Ralltiir and battle at both spots, Trampling Wedge in the process and pretty much clearing his guys from Ralltiir. Drained him out for a win by 17.
2 (+17)
HIGHLIGHTS : Winning
LOWLIGHTS : Playing a newbie
Game 2 (Light) vs. Scott Hickey (1480)
Scott came late so he didn't play the first round and he gets paired against me. Hes playing Bespin and that one Dark Deal objective. I set up and drop my Bespin and beat the heck out of some Cloud Cars there. I then set up for my OMDH runs and then like 4 ships come down to the Falcon and he battles. I Know, Punch It, draw 7 battle destinies (mainly of 6s and 5s) and he has like 26 attrition and has to lose them all. So I set up Our Most Desperate Hour and he finally gets some drains going in the late game but Battle Plan limits him a lot. Drain him out and I let Legendary Starfighter kill him too. Win by 35.
4 (+52)
HIGHLIGHTS : Winning
LOWLIGHTS : The dude right next to Scott that wouldn't mind his own business and kept insulting me
Game 3 (Dark) vs Matt Scott (1772)
Hes playing Dantooine Base Ops and starting Insurrection. He pulled Docking Bays for the activation and then went to do Death Star Plans. Wierd deck. Alright so I flip and the turn after he flips too. I drop Devastator and 2 pilots to Ralltiir and move it to Dantooine for free, then Mara w/ Stick and Tempest Scout 3 w/ AT-ST pilot to his Farm. He runs away from me there. So he isn't draining for anything, I'm getting him for 5 a turn (I flipped DBO back) and then he starts doing Death Star Plans with a Bothan Spy. I search for an Alter rather than Secret Plans because I thought I could Alter DSPlans. The Bothan Spy says I can't. Crap. So he retrieves like 13 one time and draws poorly his next only getting 7 but by then I found Secret Plans. Win by 21.
6 (+73)
HIGHLIGHTS : Winning
LOWLIGHTS : None I guess.
Game 4 (Light) vs Russell Hockenberry (1868)
Russ is our state champ and a pretty good player. I told him it would mainly be who got the best draw would be the winner. I get 8 red cards and he gets a pretty good draw. Dump my systems and 2 Projections on his Ralltiir sites but he has another Ralltiir site out and Mara Jade w/ Stick draining at the other draining for a total of 3. I finally set up super Falcon and start retrieving. He tries to Alter one of my Projections and I grab it but he still misses it :P He drops AAA on me and he won't battle my Falcon (doesn't even have any ships out at this point). Alright so its a long game with not a lot of battles and him just draining at Coruscant and his 2 Ralltiir sites. I retrieve and lose to AAA, thanks to Matt Sato for pointing AAA out to Russell every turn (sarcasm for sale, 10 cents a pound). So I lose because he probes my base correctly on the first try (first time I've ever used Alderaan as my base and he got it). Otherwise I would have cancelled his 2 drains of 2, retrieved a tad and drained him at Kessel. I think the outcome would have been different had I played with something else as my base. Loss by 6
6 (+67)
HIGHLIGHTS : Almost winning against ROps
LOWLIGHTS : Losing to ROps
Game 5 (Dark) vs. Wes Sutermeister (1606)
Hes playing Dantooine Base Ops starting Insurrection just like Matt Scott. I set up and flip and he puts Nudjs at his sites so I can't get there. So I drop my own Spaceport Dockingbay to Dantooine and invade that way. Beat him up, Trample stuff, drain on Ralltiir and at Dantooine and win. I Trampled Han, Leia then next turn I tracked my stuff around pulled Trample from my deck and then Trampled Lando and beat up on a lone Chewbacca. That was pretty awesome. He did deploy Tantive 4 to my Death Star so I moved over Zuckuss in Ship and he could move to my Ralltiir (where I had Bossk in Tooth) or stay there and get beatdown. He chose to stay there and so I kicked the crap out of him :) I was draining for like 6 a turn the entire game. Win by 30
8 (+97)
HIGHLIGHTS : Winning
LOWLIGHTS : None
Game 6 (Light) vs Chiawei Gee (1688)
Hes playing his TIE deck that had beat me at a tourney a long time ago. Not exactly a good way to end the tournament. First turn he drops Secret Plans (doh). I take control of Wakeelmui early (he started with it) and then Alter his Sienar Fleet Systems. I then dropped Wedge, Melas and BoShek aboard the Redemption that was at Tibrin. He came down with a couple TIEs to Wakeelmui and I grabbed his All Power to Weapons and played Legendary Starfighter on him so hes taking 4 damage a turn. He takes a few turns to recooperate and drops 2 TIEs, one of them with the SFS cannon (equivalent of the X-wing Laser Cannon) and Dengar in Punishing One against me. He aims at the Super Falcon and draws a 6. The words holy **** go through my mind. I played A Few Manuvers thinking it would make my manuever greater than his TIE Cannon total. If he got me, it would surely be game because I only have 10-11 cards left at this point. I finally notice Captain Han's text and make him redraw his TIE Cannon destiny... and he drew a 2 so Falcon stays. I clear his side again and its looking good for me (I did have to lose Leia, though). He drops IG in ship and battles at Wakeelmui and draws a 5 (crap) so I lose Han and the Falcon is sitting there in space making him lose 2 cards a turn without the possibility of beatdown :P I lose 3 from hand so that Captain Han can make an appearance back on the Falcon, and drain him down to 1 card left, then I flip HB. Retrieve my entire lost pile (I rarely do this, but I needed to make sure that if Russell lost I had enough differential to take the tourney). Win by 37.
10 (+134)
HIGHLIGHTS : Beating a pretty good TIE deck
LOWLIGTS : Having to smear him
I go watch Russell and Matt Sato's game. If Matt wins I take the tourney. If Russel wins I'm second and Matt is like 5th. The game is close the whole way through but Matt takes control of the only battleground system out with Captain Han and Chewie of Kashyyyk on the Falcon with Battle Plan on the table. He also has Master Luke w/ Anakins Saber at the JP: Entrance Cavern and Ben Kenobi w/ Saber at Mos Eisley. Russell is pretty much helpless and forgets AAA (I probably should have reminded him like Matt reminded Russ when we were playing) and Matt wins by 3. So I take another tournament, but it was a close one.
Props
- Heath Scheiman for running a smooth tournament
- The people I played
- The Dayton crew for going 1-2-4
Slops
- The guy who kept making fun of me and offered a handshake to the person who beat me.