parker-co-10-21-00-total-carnage

Title: parker-co-10-21-00-total-carnage
Author: Brian "HuntaWarya" Hunter
Date: Oct 22, 2000

Well, I had actually done some intensive playtesting this week. 3 nights in one week, which is a lot for me, since I don’t really get to play a whole lot outside of tournaments. For whatever reason, I had decided I wanted to have a good showing at this tournament. I was originally intending to head to the tourney with Randy Scott, Mike McConnell, and Van Melancon, but Van had stayed out just a tad late the night before (okay, so he was out until 8am) and was in no condition to get out of bed for the tourney. So the 3 of us forge ahead to Parker, to represent Littleton’s glory as best we can.

Decks:
Randy has selected SYCFA/tie swarm for dark, and fake hidden base/mains for light. Mike uses MWYHL/test to 3/beatdown with speeders & x-wings for light, and ralltiir for dark. this is a switch for mike, since he has been playing hunt down lately. But since JPSD will wreck Ralltiir on Wednesday, I guess he wanted to use it one more time. I, on the other hand, have been using Ralltiir consistently anyway, and did not need to switch. But, just for the sake of variety, I converted my at-st ralltiir into speeder bikes. I changed about 8 or 10 cards from the "Steven Lewis is a Genius" version, playtested the deck in 2 games, and decided it was good enough to use. When Endor was first released, I used a deck I called "ralltiir bikes" that was based around the concept. I played it in a tourney, it went 3-0, so I posted it to decktech to see if anyone had any ideas to make it even stronger. Everyone thought my deck was crap, gave it a bunch of 2 and 3 star reviews, and it got lost in the next purge. But I decided to keep using it anyway, and it went 3-0 in two more tournaments, before I switched away from it (due to the increasing amount of MWYHL/surprise assault decks running around at that time) When I built "ralltiir bikes" I used exclusively foil speeder bikes and foil biker scouts, and I still had them all, so I figured it would be fun to give them one last go, before ralltiir crumples. On the light side, I decide to bring something really...bizarre, just to try and prove to myself that I can beat anyone with any random pile of crap. So I bring an ebo/baragwin/super falcon deck that is loosely based on jim li’s "stimmed jim’s ebo". The deck has no clear means of winning a game, but the retrieval keeps you alive while the ishi tibs try to cycle to whatever you need. Kinda goofy (okay, I admit, REALLY goofy), but it looked like it would be fun. I playtested the deck one game, and decided I would use it.

We arrive to the tournament a bit late, but the tourney has not started yet. We are the 15th, 16th, and 17th players to show up. Kyle Craft (#2 in Tatooine, #4 in the world) has come down to Parker from Boulder today, and has brought his "apprentice", Tim McKnight (whom I like to call "Mickey T") with him. Kyle is talking trash about the usual amount today. I think he has only made 3 or 4 varied comments about his plans to defeat me today, before the game 1 pairings are announced. When my game is announced, Kyle seems disappointed not to be playing me yet, as he knows that I am the biggest potential rating points source in the universe, and he has been trying to get to #1 in the world for....as long as I can remember.

Game 1: My ralltiir bikes vs. Cory Whitton’s Profit deck.
I start no aliens (as mara jade is the only alien in the deck, and it is hard to support her in an interior location, by using a bunch of vehicles). He uses premiere han, intending to retrieve big when the moment is right. I get Emperor Palpatine and Overseeing it personally in opening draw, so he is pretty much doomed. In the early game, we stick to our respective planets. He is using a combination of alien swarm and mains. I drain for awhile on ralltiir, his drains on tatooine are nothing after I flip. After he’s lost a fair bit of cards, he frees han with master luke, flips, and retrieves 10. I start losing a few cards to his objective, but his drains are still nothing. the emperor oversees everything on ralltiir, and on my last two turns, I drain him for 14 and then 14 again. The entire game lasts maybe 10 minutes. Full win by 29, putting me at (obviously) 2 (+29)

Randy loses game 1 to Kyle Craft by 27, so the Kyle/Tim combo strikes first against the Littleton crew. Mike defeats Larry in a close one, by only 7.

Game 2: My ebo freakshow vs. Tyler Herman’s Jabba’s Palace.
Tyler won his first game by 32, and so gets paired with me in game 2. I get out wise advice early, and have a grabber in hand, so I decide to start deploying effects with no worries. The Projection slows his drain on tatooine, while the baragwins take care of some of the others. super falcon drains him for 3 a turn at corulag. He deploys so many characters to tatooine that I decide it is safe to deploy to the north ridge also, increasing my drain to 4. I use a couple of on the edges (with tracked 7’s) to insure the high differential in the end-game, as he did not decide to draw up until it was already too late. Basically, the 3 point drain at corulag every turn was how he lost all his force. Full win by 34, putting me up to 4: +63.

Kyle wins by 27 again, so we are all set for an early showdown in game 3. Randy and Mike both win in game 2, so we are a combined 5-1.

Game 3: My ebo silliness vs. Kyle Craft’s BHBM.
Kyle is playing "The Beast", with about 3 cards difference, maybe. He informs me that he and Hayes Hunter designed this deck, but that the Terwilligers took credit. But when I look at the tournament reports by Sokol and twigg from Decipher Con, and when I look at the actual deck listing, I do not see anywhere that the Twiggs claim to have invented the deck. Anyhoo, Kyle took 3rd place at worlds this year, knocking off Martin Falke, Bastian Winkelhaus, Gary Carman and Matt Sokol in the process, just to name a few, so I guess he is feeling pretty good about his skills. I also heard that he had gone to one local tournament since D-Con, and posted a 6-0 performance in that one. he deploys the CC db from reserve deck on turn one, and puts the emperor from reserve also. He uses his fourth and final force to deploy janus to the same site. So he sets up a drain of 2 and monstrous activation, before I’ve had a turn. Neat! Better yet, since I am using the echo war room as one of my ebo sites, I give him one of the 3 cards he needs for his Much Anger/responsibility of command combo. Neat again! I have do or do not in opening draw, and quickly signal for wise advice. I use a baragwin to try and lessen the pain created at the CC docking bay. Mara Jade comes to the north ridge with her glowstick, and wanders under the shield. this is getting ugly. I add a second baragwin, and drop Projection at mara’s site. Blizzard 2 with ds-61-2 come down to the north ridge, and mara wanders to the echo docking bay. I bring epp luke out from reserve deck, and he sends Ms. Jade to the lost pile. He goes to mine. Kyle quickly deploys another jade, and she wanders under the shield again. I deploy luke from lost pile, and kill her again. Luke goes back to my lost pile. Kyle grows weary of my suicide luke, and deploys epp vader to the north ridge. so I give him Luke, and he starts losing force from his objective. I put the second projection down, this one at the north ridge. The baragwins continue to try and stave off the drains, but they are slowly losing the race. Kyle Monnoks both of my on the edges. Ouch! At this point, it occurs to me that there is a good chance I will lose this game. Which is odd, because the game that Kyle and I are playing is STAR WARS, and I almost never lose a game of STAR WARS. In fact, I had not lost a single tournament game since the infamous Steven Lewis/Monkey Ties fiasco at Gen Con back in August. The possibility of losing again before November rolls around is giving me a headache. I try to focus harder. Must...not...lose...game. Must...not..lose..at..STAR WARS. Must...not...lose...to Kyle. Kyle is...only #4...in the world. I am not...supposed...to lose. Must...win...game. Tempest 1 comes down to the ridge, piloted by Commander Igar. Kyle replaces epp vader with premiere vader, and puts a saber on him, to increase the drain. evazan joins vader at the north ridge, while blizzard 2 and tempest 1 come in under the shield. I assemble my arcona/order to engage combo, but the arcona’s react gets sensed, and I must houjix the damage. argh! Must...not....lose....game. I put out honor of the jedi to keep the walkers from draining under the shield, so kyle deploys bossk in hound’s tooth to space, to get a third battleground, and drops search & destroy on me. eek! must....win....game. Melas and some scrubby pilot show up on the falcon, and wax bossk with a tracked 7. I forfeit the scrubby pilot, and put legendary starfighter on melas’ falcon. the direct damage from leg. starfighter, plus the direct damage from his objective, is eating away at his life force. he comes to space again, but an unexpected spiral keeps me alive. he has to start fleeing from the falcon, which costs him force from order to engage. and he ultimately runs out of cards before I do. Full win by 4. Making me 6: +67

In this round, Mike defeats Tim, so the littleton crew strikes back twice in the same hour. Randy gets defeated by Joe. We are now a combined 7-2. For food during the break today, I have a mountain dew, some pretzels, and some "hot tamales" candy. breakfast of champions! :)

Game 4: My ralltiir bikes vs. Mike McConnell’s MWYHL.
Mike is the only other 3-0, so it’s time to get it on. I drop bad feeling on turn one, which slows his testing a bit. the drains set up on ralltiir REAL fast, and search & destroy comes out early. he loses 1 on each of his turns, 6 on each of my turns. His speeders never have a chance to get rolling. This game takes less than 15 minutes also, just like my first ralltiir game. Full win by 24. Making me 8: +91

Randy wins his game by 32. Mike, as you already know, lost by 24. we are now 9-3. Tragedy strikes for Kyle in this game, as he gets beaten by his apprentice, Tim McKnight, by 1 force. With a record of 2-2, Kyle contemplates dropping out of the tournament early. Then, he considers quitting the game of Star Wars altogether. Eventually, he decides to finish out the tournament, but says that he intends to sell the majority of his collection soon, and will not be attending the Phoenix grand slam.

Game 5: My ralltiir bikes vs. Joe Helfrich’s Profit.
Yay! I get to use ralltiir against profit again! :) But unlike my earlier opponent, Joe isn’t even playing a REAL profit deck. He is playing something that strongly resembles Steve Brentson’s "white shadow" series of decks, with docking bays, and madine, and scouts, and gold squadron 1, and controls, and tunnel visions, and all that stuff. Joe plays a pretty solid game, virtually no mistakes, but there is simply no way for anyone to beat me with Brentson’s pile of crap. Joe puts down both projections on ralltiir, and lieutenant blount with an undercover. (yup, there is actually an undercover in that decklist) I flip with some bikes and the emperor, adding overseeing it personally to the mix. ben kenobi and jedi luke (wielding anakin’s saber) make it to ralltiir in almost no time. But he doesn’t have order to engage, so I let the jedi have their site. I put relentless tracking on blount. Madine is chillin’ in the home one war room with a scout. Mara Jade pays a visit, hacks the scout with the saber, attrition kills madine. mara is immune to the attrition. neat. Mara Jade gets pounced on by general calrissian, nien numb (who adds a destiny with lando!) and chewie of kashyyyk. he initiates, but I have projective telepathy, and cancel the battle. mwahaha! On my turn, I bring DVDLOTS with his saber, and tarkin. Initiate. Choke chewie with vader. hit nien numb with vader’s saber. hit lando with mara’s saber. he draws a zero and a four for battle destiny, so tarkin cancels the four. He has to lose nien numb, lando, and NINETEEN. (there is no houjix in the Whiter Shadow) He frees han, flips, and retrieves some force, but I pay 7 to transit the tarkin/vader/mara crew back to ralltiir, and there is really nothing left to say. This game might have taken more than 15 minutes, unlike my other two ralltiir games. Full win by 23. I am now 10: +114.

Tim McKnight has just avenged his loss to Mike. Randy wins again. we are now 11-4. Kyle wins in game 5.

Game 6: My goofball ebo vs. Mike McConnell’s Ralltiir ops
Tim just played the same allegiance I did, so Mike ends up paired against me in game 6. He uses his dsII docking bay along with the ralltiir docking bay to get some big activation early. He manages to flip quickly, but I put projection down on two of his sites. the baragwins handle the other drain, along with the search & destroy that he gets running early. Mike deploys the ice plains, and then starts sending at-sts in under the shield, for easy imperial decree. I have the super falcon at corulag, but even with ebo out, the drain is still zero. Mike deploys come here you big coward, which keeps my baragwins from retrieving. Since the ice plains is out, the north ridge is now under the shield, and no longer a battleground. I cannot satisfy search & destroy without going to ralltiir, and if I want to satisfy CHYBC, I have to either go to ralltiir, or deploy another battleground system. So I put out kiffex, with home one/melas there. this lets the baragwins start retrieving again. I use obi-wan, ackbar, a hnmenthe, and some other miscellaneous crap to beat up his at-sts under the shield, to take his decree out of effect, so I can actually start draining for a decent amount in space. He drops secret plans, which slows the baragwin/on the edge retrieval, but does not stop it. He puts boba fett in slave I out, and I deploy order to engage, then move the super falcon in front of it. He deploys bossk in hound’s tooth, and lateral damages the falcon, then battles. I hyper escape away, cancel the damage, and come right back at him, bringing home one along this time. He puts ds-61-somebody on bossk as a passenger for forfeit value, and decides to battle me instead of losing three to OTE. I react with the spiral, then draw 5, 5, 7 for battle destiny. He draws 11 attrition, so I lose the spiral and melas, but he has to lose everything. He has ralltiir ops on the seven side, along with secret plans, imperial decree, and come here you big coward, yet was unable to stop my retrieval or my force drains. how weird is that? Full win by 26. So I finish at 12: +140

Kyle wins again in Game 6, avenging his earlier loss to Tim, to go 4-2 and place second. (there were no 5-1 players) Randy loses again to Joe, finishing 3-3, and Mike’s loss to me makes him 3-3 also. The Littleton crew finishes with a combined 12-6...not one of our better days. my first place prize includes packs of reflections, cloud city, and special edition (the store was sold out of Death star II) I open the reflections packs. My foils were decent, but nothing spectacular. I keep the special edition and cloud city packs sealed, to add to the piles and piles of other unopened boosters I have at home. (which I cannot think of a good use for.) Since this was just a local, I will keep the props & slops short.

Props:
Kyle Craft, for deciding not to drop out of the tourney, after losing 2 in a row.
Mike McConnell, for making our games a lot of fun to play, as always.
Randy Scott, for driving.
Tim McKnight, for defeating his mentor. (here is the best part: Tim beat Kyle with Hunt Down, and actually dueled Ben Kenobi out of the game, with the Circle Is Now Complete. Hmmm, I guess it WAS complete, because there was a whole learner/master transition going on in that game)
Brian Reed, for SOMEHOW going 4-2 with a differential of -29!! How does that happen?? Kyle went 4-2, with a differential of 94. Larry Granato went 2-4, with a differential of -13. How did Brian Reed go 4-2, with a differential of -29?? Amazing. Gotta give props for that.

Slops:
Van, for being too hungover to go to the tourney. hehe.
Kyle, Tim, and Randy, for ALL 3 of you coloring your hair YELLOW. Not blonde, mind you, but YELLOW.
Me, for ALMOST losing a game of STAR WARS! What’s up with that?

Until next time...

Brian Hunter