hayes-hunter-goes-to-gencon
Title: hayes-hunter-goes-to-gencon
Author: Eric "bounty22" Hunter
Date: Aug 14, 2000
this double TR wasn't actually a TR to begin with, it was an email to my dear friend (hi julia!) about my trip to gencon. as i was writing it though i kept getting pestered for details about how i did and what i was playing etc. from ppl on AIM (my sn is 'rufuse' in case you care), so i figured since my bro went 2-2 and dropped on day 2 he wouldn't have much to say (that didn't pretain to dragon ball z), hence the following TR...
note: this won't be spell checked or whatever just cause there are far to many abrreviations etc. so bear with it. thanks.
it all started about a month before D*II. the 3 other players i stayed with while in milwaukee (paul 'paul' maholick (sp?) the RI state champ, brian cieszynski (sp?) the NH state champ, and my bro, eric the MA state champ- (i was runner up)) had all started playtesting the new cards. thanks to will schmidt aka gold 18 we had the spoiler list so we'd cut up the texts and slide them into cases with cards that had the same destiny # and same card type. we quickly discovered many things about the set (although not quickly enough, nor to many things, in retrospect) but i had to leave for a sleepover camp/summer school after about 2 weeks of that. well, we've all heard those stories about what goes on at camp, especially at band camp for some reason, so let me first say that they are all true. each and every single one of them. needless to say, i had little time to do anything SW related (oh darn- i actually developed a life. just look at what happened...).
so D*II comes out and i get my boxes at camp, which is good, but then again my regional is in 3 days, which is bad. so i come up w/ some decks (a BHBM deck for dark focused on getting the emperor, janus, lord vader with vader's saber, and a presence of the force all at a kit kat (as opposed to a twix, a kit kat has 4 icons, 2 for each player). this version sucked as it also tried to tackle space w/ a bunch of admirals and ships w/ immunity and imperial command. there was also a bunch of SAC and tons of anti undercover (duh). for light i had another crummy deck that was local uprising on endor w/ strike planning, squadron assignments, some nudjs, some twixs, suicide epps, and 2 kessels.) which i neglected to edit after my regional and brought to gencon (3 weeks later) with me, where i beat gary carmen (the defending world champ) 2 outta 3 with them (about the only positive thing that happened that weekend for me). anyway i come home firday night to do some play testing w/ my bro and his friend steve baroni who is also on decktech, but i forget his name (it might be 'stevie' though). man did i suck. but what the hell, kashyyyk sucks, so i'd fit right in. onto the regional...
well i'm psyched. i live in boxborough, the crappiest town in the world, but at least is has a holiday inn, specifically the holiday inn in which we will be holding the regional. so i get to wake up later than most ppl. unfortunatly something i ate really didn't agree w/ me, so i was stuck on the can for quite some time making me about 5 minutes late (@#$%!... literally). the regional is fairly uneventful. gregory reid who placed 8th last year in the worlds representing bespin just moved here and got his ass handed to him, i lost one game to steve brentson (the only other 2000+ rated player in kashyyyk) by 4 cards (he was playing profit- i got draining outside at the palace, and he had harc seff in his opening hand, which saved him about 30 force loss) who went on to go undefeated, as did my bro, eric. so it was steve and eric in the final and me in 3rd place. @#$%.
let's take a quick time out here: eric is a star wars genius. anyone who knows the twiggs, or the sokols, or most any other good tandums (like clint and steve) knows that the ability to play a game of SW at any given time is invaluable. what seperates most of the best from the rest is playing time and practice- as such i basically owe my success to my bro for being there. and in turn he has benefitted greatly as well. while he may not be the best SW player out there he is certainy the best 12 year old (as i'm sure you guys have heard from him time and time again). so i won my regional (and first tournament) at the age of 13 against brentson- this eric's chance to surpass his mentor, this is his chance to win his regional at the age of 12. to bad it didn't happen. so that's the kashyyyk regional. i'll do you a favor and spare you the details of my games cause they all sucked.
well back to camp/summer school for me to do some more 'learning' *wink wink*. the next weeks fly by. randomly, you know how whenever you meet someone from some where you ask them 'do you know so and so?' like just because they are from that same country or state or what ever they will somehow know who you do? well i met this girl that knew/hates/despises matt potter. so yeah.... small world... or something...
umm, onto gencon. i left thursday from exeter so i could pack up for my 7:55 am light outta boston. so we're up at 5:30, in the car at 6- some fun. anyway we reach the airport in time but the next thing we know our flight is delayed, then delayed some more, and then finally canceled. more fun. well we finally make it out on a flight at about 11:30, only to learn that our luggage took a different flight and that we're going to have a 3 hour layover in detroit. so much fun. we get to the con at about 6pm w/o our luggage, and its too late to play in anything so we shmooze- i played gary carmen at this point, and brian (mentioned way way above) beat brian hunter in the final game of the sealed deck tourney that was going on netting him another box of D*II (the guy had already boughten over 20). we get back to the hotel at about 10 that night (11 our time) after a dinner at some wierd buffet place thingy that musta been the hispanic capital of milwaukee. paul arrives at about 12 and i still need my decks for the next day (day 2 since we all had the bye) but i decide to sleep instead.
DAY 2
so i wake up the next morning and discover i have somewhere contracted conjuntivitis (aka pink eye. fyi if you can't opend your eye due to the amount of mucas covering it, there is a good chance you have pink eye). WTF? i have the flu or something (in addition to my chronic fatigue syndrome) for the worlds in 98, the @#$%s for my regional, and now this for the continentals.... now that i think about it i even had a broken wrist when i played in my regional for 98. man i suck. my recent encounter w/ gary helped fuel my decision (which was more like indecision and laziness) to just tweak my decks. so i mad some bad changes. i totally misinertpretted the meta. i was playing the same decks basically, but narrowed their focus- bad idea.
note: the following is as close as i remember: keep in mind i was all doped up on tylenol and sudafed.
GAME ONE- my dark vs clayton atkins
i was raped. horribly. never in my life have i ever suffered such a loss. i start BHBM and pull oppresive enforcement, you cannont hide forever, and crush- not knowing what to expect from his old TR carfeul planning start. you know how his first turn goes- drop a twix, a nudj and draw. keeping in mind that my deck has 12 characters TOTAL i activate my 4, and see that my hand has 3 lords, an emperor, 2 vader's sabers, sim aloo, and some random red stuff. great. well i drop the emperor from my deck to the farm (he forgot to move the nudj) and don't draw as i saw all my locations were still in my deck. he activates drops another twix, another nudj and i get to go. i activate my 3, drop sim, kill the nudj and let him go. down comes obi and leia i think, he hits the emperor w/ artoo in red 5 and a narshadda chime. great. i draw 2 destiny, onmly for one of them to be a twix, and he loses liea, i lose the emperor. he kind of grins and says, "out of commission." " @#$%," i say, completely forgetting my dad's presence just behind clayton. prepared defenses and the emperor sit in my pile. i shuffle. he chooses.... not the emperor!!!! sweet jesus! (no, not you brian) my turn i try to kill off epp obi, but i draw a 0 and he hits sim. oh boy. he goes and drains and starts drawing like nuts. next thing i know the emperor is out of play due to the 2nd out of commission in his entire deck. this is just lovely. eventually i get out vader, he gets out civil disorder and some spies to my throne room. i attack obi w/ vader and stick but he weapn levitates and i don't have enough SAC to fend it off. i then proceed to draw another 0. soon w/ about 25 cards in my lost pile (2 of which are vaders) he plays the 1st OOC again... the cut... vader joins his master to scoff at their so called prepared defenses. i think you guys can guess how this ends up.
FL -25 0 (-25)
highs: if you are going to lose a game it might as well be the first...
lows: are you illiterate?
note to clayton: i finally got your shoe out of my ass, lmk if you want it back.
GAME TWO- my light vs paul maholick
if you're on the serv you may know paul is basically the best sport in the game (from my, or maybe 'houjix ghhhk's testimony). he is the most honest player i have ever met, and he is such a cool guy- i don't know how any one could not like him. was playing a big blue type thing w/ BHBM and i had my endor nudj thing going. basically farm boy joined vader pretty early, my undercover tycho and harc seff kept the ground under control for a while and i was free to drain at kessel. it was kindof an uneventful game cause we had played basically the same matchup in those 2 weeks before D*II came out.
FW +17 (or so) 2 (-8)
highs: none
lows: playing someone i came with.
GAME THREE- dark side vs matt baker (guy who won TN states)
let me say that this game might actually be game 4, not game three. hayes is easily confused when on drugs (you shoulda seen me at 1am that night in the sealed). he starts profit w/ scrmabled transmission, insurrection and staging areas. i start oppressive, you cannot hide, and secret plans and mara. first turn i get mara to the palace w/ her saber and the emperor. he eats the drain and finally realizes he must start fighting back, so he frees han w/ ben. all i can say is that harc seff didn't make it out. vader and stick make a fast apperince as did janus, sniper was awsome and i was able to capture boush w/ a hutt smooch, effectivly rendering his objective useless.
FW + 13 i think 4(+5)
highs: kicking profit's ass
lows: having to clean my eye of mucas almost every single turn
GAME FOUR- light side vs i'm sorry i can't remember your name
basically he was playing the dark deck that i played at my regional (the one i was playing today had 3 ships and only 12 characters, as opposed to 5 ships and around 18 characters) and as such i knew exactly how to beat it. i out SACed him early on and got kessel going fast. once again my 1 undercover in the deck went unconteseted (shoulda kept 2 like at the regional) and it was an uneventful game. i guess this is what i get for losing my first game by so much.
FW+ 15 i'm guessing 6 (+20)
highs: none so much
lows: mucas makes things hard to see
GAME FIVE- my dark vs maxim birand (sp?)
he was playing yannicks deck almost exactly. and he is a good player. he just had horrible luck, and i had exceptional luck. i get out the emperor, janus, mara and saber, presence, and vader w/ his saber at the downtown plaza in about 4 turns. prior to that i had hit him w/ a drain of 4 where he had lost jedi test one. he was able to actually clear that site (after much battleing) but i had hoped he would-- luke was stuck there w/ u-3po so vader was free to drain for 3 at the cantina the rest of the game. i only got hit by AFA once
FW+ 16 i know 8 (+36)
highs: it was alot of fun playing against that crazy canadian
lows: jedi test one off the top. luck sucks (see first and last game)
GAME SIX- my light vs ray bordier
ray starts BHBM, IAO, mobilization points, and you cannot hide, just like everyone else i played against. out comes the emperor and a DB and rendili, big whoop. i get, from 9 locations in addition to the 2 starting ones, 2 kessels in my opening hand and all red. i mean it's bad enough that my deck sucks and all, but then to get that vs the 2nd decent player i get to play all day jsut blows. anyway lando gets in the falcon and drains at endor for the game, meanwhile farmboy joins his father for the 3rd time today. on the turn after i gave luke a new home i realized ray didn't lose the one from his objective. i reminded him that since the card was on his side of the table it was more his resposibilty to remember, but we both 'forgot' so i didn't mind so much. i do my drain and draw some, trying desperatly to get one of the 5 twixs in the deck (it' about 5th turn now). he goes and conveniently forgets again. of course i realize this in the activate phase, as opposed to 'the end of the turn' and i remind him once more- saying that i already reminded him once. he refuses, claims it's to late. i bring over the guy who was filling in for juz, and of course, he rules in ray's favor despite the fact that ray claimed he was new to the game and didn't know what the card did. hmm. the only remarkable play was his one insert hitting me for 5 (he had the emperor and janus at some docking bay and vader killing my nudjs- i had han and lando and wedge). ray had 11 activation from turn 2, i had 11 activation at the most- you do the math.
FL- 19 8(+17)
highs: none. i'm pretty boring.
lows: ray being a @#$% about the objective. yeah it's cut-throat at the top but that's not really a reason to be a bad sport.
i'm sure you've all read steve's report so you know how this thing ended. fyi, i finished 10th or 9th or something. later that night i won a sealed deck (i got the D*II DB, IAO, mobilization points, and prepared defenses among other cool cards like sima aloo) for a box of D*II and the next day before i flew out i had shannon baska (sp?) sign a bunch of stuff.
props:
-courtyard mariott for having *good* free coffee 24-7
-my dad for his time and selfless behavior for me and my bro
-my opponent in the last game of the sealed deck, sorry i forgot your name, for his uncanny sportsmanship
-jim li from the sealed deck also for about the same reason
-brian hunter for deserving the #1 spot in the world and not being a total @#$% like i had been lead to believe
-gary carmen for being such a fun guy and, as steven mentioned, a total SW nut
-steven lewis for his admirable effort and for remembering me
-and finally yannick lapointe for playing like a champion. congrats on your victory
slops
- the @#$%head cab driver we had going from the airport to the con
-northwest arilines for not getting a single plane of 4 on time
-jim li's opponent in the sealed deck for being the prick that he is
thanks for reading. i'll see you all at D-con.
-hayes hunter