huntsville-al-11-25-00

Title: huntsville-al-11-25-00
Author: Andy "Solo337" McClure
Date: Nov 26, 2000

Well, I have decided to write at least a short TR for every tournament I play in. Here is the tournament today. It won’t be incredibly long or detailed, but here goes.

Pre-tourney stuff:
Okay, so I showed up with my brother to meet our friends to playtest at about 1, 2 hours before the tournament. We playtested some new Closed decks, and my DS TOTALLY dominated. Then we play open, and my 12 year old brother beats my GRAND SLAM winning Palace Raiders deck TWICE with a ultra-crappy Bring Him Before Me Deck he built last night in about 15 minutes with limited cards. So on the spot I build some crappy Super-Falcon EBO deck. It’s solid, but slow, so I wouldn’t play it in a big tournament, but I wasn’t even sure if it would be sanctioned, so I didn’t care.

The tournament is Open, so I decide to play my 15 minute EBO and my nearly invincible Abyssins. I have total confidence in my Abyssins, so I have no need to playtest it before the tournament. My EBO does pretty well in playtesting, but it is still too slow.

Finally we get 6 players to show up, and 1 player who was just gonna watch. Ashley McNeely shows up at the last minute to make 7, and we convinced the player who was just going to watch to use a couple of my friends Closed decks to play in the Open tournament, so we get 8 players. Thanks for coming Ashley!

The tournament consists of 8 players, and I know them all:
Me, Andy McClure- Decipher rating: 2046
My brother, Chris McClure- Rating: 1740 (and he’s only 12)
Clay Wilburn- Rating: 1686
Brian Buchanan- Rating: 1656
Tom Culpepper- Rating: 1571 Playing with borrowed Closed decks
Jason Wade- Rating: 1418
Robert I forgot his last name and have no idea what his rating is (sorry)
And of course, Ashley McNeely- Rating: 1442

1st game:
My EBO vs. Robert’s Dark Deal w/ CC Occupation

I start my normal set up. He puts Lando at the Carbonite Chamber first turn. First turn I grab the War Room and Echo Base Garrison and draw. He drains me for 1 with Lando and drops Lord Vader with saber to the Carbonite Chamber. Next turn I grab 2 more Echo sites, draw a couple, and save. He drains for 2, I lose a card from my hand, and the rest of my hand is good, so I lose off the top. The 1 card off the top is EBO, so now I am playing ANSB without EBO. That’s gay, but my EBO has TONS of ground beats, and I have Launching The Assualt and Ackbar. So, EPP Obi, EPP Luke and Blount go to Vader and Lando, Clash Vader (Yes, I play Clash in my EBO deck), and beat Lando for about 9 cards, even though he had A Real Hero. He gets the Executor and another SD at Hoth so I send Ackbar in the Home One to Kiffex for a drain of three. OtE eats him up, and I win by like 21 cards.

FW 2(+21)

Game highs: Winning with an EBO deck without EBO.
Game Lows: Obviously losing my EBO of the top 2nd turn.

Ashley then dropped, like she normally does, but we thank her for making our tournament sanctioned anyway.

2nd game:
My Abyssins (they’re on my page if you want to check them out) vs. Brian Buchanan’s (1656) Profit

Well, as I pull my starting stuff for this game, I realize that just for the games I was playing during the week, I had dropped my Well Guarded for another card. That could be very bad if he gets in a well timed Grimtaash.....

Brian is a good friend of mine, and we have playtested these decks several times. He has put up 1 good game, but the Abyssins are tough to beat, and he knows that coming into the game. I start Secret Plans, Power Of The Hutt and Opressive Enforcement and the Lower Passages so he can’t convert mine Jabba’s Palace. After I draw my opening hand, I then remember that I can start some aliens, but forgot to. I asked Brian if I could go ahead and get them, and because he is the MAN, he let me. Thanks, Brian. So I start Chall and Jabba, and activate 3 force, then Twi-lek for Scum. I get a pretty good hand, and even though I spent 3 for to Twi-lek, my aliens deployed so cheap that I could get 3 Abyssins and Bib at Jabba’s Palace for a 1st turn flip, and Ephant Mon and Myo in the Audience Chamber. From then on, he was in trouble. He tried to come down a couple of times, and in the end, and Elis beating wins me the game by like 27 force.

FW 2(+27)
Total: 4(+48)

Game highs: Brian being cool enough to let me go get Jabba and Chall. I pulled off an Elis beating. I LOVE ELIS BEATINGS! Not losing the game to a Grimtaash.
Game lows: My Abyssins running through one of my good friends. I hate to do that to them, because even I have no idea how to beat the Abyssins.

I am in first place after 2 games. I know Clay is playing an Abyssins deck, a carbon copy of mine, maybe 4 cards off, so I am worried. I have no idea how to beat the Abyssins deck, and I don’t think my EBO has a chance, so I PRAY I don’t have to play Clay this game....

Luckily Clay lost to Tom (Tom was using Clay’s borrowed Closed Environment BHBM deck). Tom converted Luke!

So 3rd game I get to play the only other undefeated player, my 12 year old broter Chris.

This game should be a pretty even game, IMHO. An EBO deck I threw together in 15 minutes vs. a BHBM deck he threw together in about 15 minutes.

3rd game:
My 15 minute EBO vs. Chris McClure’s (1740) 15 minute BHBM
This game is a blur. I set up EBO and let him have Luke, and he got some insanely fast ground drains, and Search and Destroy set up early. I don’t remember the specifics, but I barely pulled the game off by 5 cards.
FW 2(+5)
Total: 6(+53)

Game Highs: My brother is becoming a machiene, and he is only 12. Every deck he seems to build is good, and I barely help him at all with them! It’s great that he can give me good games now.

Game Lows: Only beating my little brother by 5. If he had had 1 more turn of draining, I would have lost. And I was insulting his BHBM, too....

So I avoided having to play against Abyssins, thank God. I knew my Abyssins would win the 4th game, and since this was a 4 game tournament, I knew I would win the tournament.

4th game:
My Abyssins vs. Clay Wilburn’s (1686) Profit
I start Jabba and Chall and get a Scum opening hand. I spend the first turn or 2 putting guys at the AC. On his 2nd or 3rd turn, Clay drops Lando w/ Ax and Ben Kenobi to the AC. He battles, can’t exclude Boelo, and draws a 4 and a 1, and I cancel the 4. I lose Gailid for attrition, he loses and revives Lando and loses 2 more damage. I respond with 5 free Abyssins, Bib, Iggy and Dengar with Blaster Carbine and initiate battle. I retrieve my entire lost pile. Iggy captures Lando, Boelo cancels his Battle destiny, and I get 2 battle destinies, each destiny +2 because Jabba and Bib are on table. I have power 52 on his 5. He loses Kenobi and 38 more cards. Good game.
FW 2(+34)
Total: 8(+87)

Game highs: The BEATING of a Kenobi. Getting a good opening draw. MURDERING Clay’s Profit deck as payback for it BARELY beating me the other day in a fun game when I played like
crap.
Game Lows: Again, my Abyssins running through one of my friends. I kinda hate to do it. There is almost nothing Profit can do, because I can start Jabba and Chall at the AC, so right off the bat my aliens are deploy -2 and my Abyssins are for forfeit 6 without Myo (+2 for Jabba, +2 for my Objective, which I always flip 1st turn vs. Profit.)

So I won the tournament, woo hoo. Well, that’s one step closed to my goal of 10 tournaments won in a row. I’m currently at 4: 2 local Closeds, 1 local Open and a Grand Slam. Wish me luck, I need 6 more :-)

Chris McClure, my brother got second. For the third week in a row, I got first and he got second. The McClures dominate!

Props:
-First and foremost to Brian for being such a good sport and letting me deploy Jabba and Chall even though I had drawn my hand. I would have done the same for him, and I hope he knows it.
-To Ashley, for showing up just in time to help get it sanctioned ;-)
-To my brother for being the best 12 year old ever.
-To My Abyssins, for winning twice without Well Guarded.
-To Boelo, because EVERY SINGLE TIME LANDO TRIES TO EXCLUDE HIM, HE NEVER SUCEEDS!
-To my EBO deck, for winning by more than 20 cards without EBO.

Slops:
-To Ashley, for dropping, as always, after the 1st game.
-To everyone in Huntsville for not showing up so we BARELY couldget it sanctioned.
-To my brother, for almost beating me with BHBM.

Hope you enjoyed-
Andy