smeg-vs-mothra-battle-royale
Title: smeg-vs-mothra-battle-royale
Author: Casey "Smeg" Barson
Date: Apr 1, 2001
LS: TIGIH with lightsabers and Intruder Missiles, main and toys.
DS: HDADTJ with Intruder Missiles, Vader’s and a butt load of high destinies.
I thought they were pretty good decks and I felt like I had a pretty good chance to place well. I arrived at the tournament about an hour early to get in some trading and what not. I wasn’t expecting a big turnout because it’s a Saturday and most of the players prefer to play on Wednesday’s. I was kind of impressed when we had about 13 show up. I guess we can get them to come on a Saturday. So the tournament starts and we all get paired. Wouldn’t you know it, bye for me.
Game 1 DS Me vs. me
Rated: 1752
Good: I got a win! My first win with a theme deck And who says theme decks can’t win. Pee-shaw!
Bad: Getting the bye the first round and not being able to play for like and hour and a half.
Ugly: Cortney is forced to play Tom again for like the gazillionth time in a row at a tournament.
Game: FW 2(+0)
Standing: 2(+0)
So now I’m ready to play a mediocre player who got a win last game and had a low differential. Little did I know that I was the second highest player for the Dark Side for that round. Who knew the Dark Side was so weak?? Huh. So now I end up playing Jason Ayre who is a really damn good player if I do say so myself.
Game 2: Me vs. Jason Ayre’s Nighttime Tatooine Court Scum Defel deck.
Rated: 1852
So I break out my theme deck, fully expecting to get my butt whipped when I see a glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel. He is starting Court, which means he’ll have no imperials to take control of Luke for the whole game. Man am I glad that I put the Tatooine docking bay in my deck. So he starts off and just draws up his first turn and loses one to Court. My turn I get to drain him for one at the Chirpa’s hut and deploy the Tatooine docking bay along with EPP Leia. I move over Luke, don’t lose one to his objective and say go. He deploys a Defel to the AC along with Scum and Villainy. He also deploys the Tatooine system with a Sunsdown on it, not the combo card mind you, but the normal premiere one. He draws a few and says go. I drain him for three at the docking bays respectively after activating a huge amount of force. I look at the Defel to se why he is so cool that he can hold a site by himself. I read that under nighttime conditions he can hide for the cost of one force. Pretty slick. So I drop premiere Obi-Wan to the AC along with his LS and initiate a battle. I use my action and move his Defel away. He doesn’t want to send him to the Pit of Carkoon so he moves him to the dungeon instead. Works for me, as now I don’t have to worry about him draining me. I use 4 force to cancel Scum and draw a few. This is pretty much how the game went. He would deploy in front of my guys and I would kill them off. He tried once to come after Leia with Guri and a Prince Xisor, but my weapon destiny of 7 took down the Prince and he drew a site for his destiny so I only had to lose force. I didn’t mind as I needed something in my lost pile to retrieve with my Off the Edges. Other than that I didn’t lose hardly any force at all, except to a well timed Monnok. Lost a few Intruder Missiles, I think 5 and two Surprise Assaults. I pretty much retrieved it all and ended up killing his Defels with my weapons. It was kind of funny, he was claiming that he could hide, but I pointed out that it wasn’t a just action and so it would happen during the weapons phase of the battle. So if I initiated the battle I would get first action which would be to shoot the Defel. He would then pay his force to hide and the battle would end and the Defel would be lost. It was pretty funny because I had almost the perfect deck to go against him. I would have beat him by more if I wouldn’t have stuck Home One at the Tatooine system to stop a drain of 1. Lateral Damage and I lost a few cards. Its not easy being a Home One against Dengar in ship and Bossk in his. Fortunately for me He drew really low destiny and I drew really high, I think it was a seven if I remember correctly. So I lost Home One and about 8 more force, thanked myself for being stupid, and proceeded to drain him to death.
Game: FW 2(+14)
Standing: 4(+14)
Good: Getting to beat Jason with a theme deck when he was playing his normal DS deck.
Bad: Getting the beat and lowering my differential when I thought I’d be cute and use Home One to block a drain of one. Instead of losing 1 I lost 8 plus the ship.
Ugly: Cortney and Tom go at it again. Cortney can’t win against Tom and takes another loss by 31. Woah!
So now I’m standing pretty close to the top of the board. I’m kind of excited to finally get to play my DS deck as I feel it’s the stronger of my two decks. You just can’t go wrong with Vader and about 20 cards destiny 6 or above. So now’s my chance.
Game 3: Me vs. Christopher Aulepp’s TIGIH mad scout lovin’ deck
Rated: 1567
Chris is a pretty decent player for his rating. I’m still a little shocked that he is also at the top and is now forced to play me. I figure why not. First turn I have a Vader, his saber and an Emperor in my hand. So I lay down the Emperor to the Endor Docking bay, we both lose one and now its his turn. He activates his two force, uses one to move over Luke, who is immediately captured by the Emperor, and the other is drawn into hand. He then attempts to OOC/TT my Visage, but I laugh as I play my This Is Some Rescue to cancel it. So we both lose one more and now its my turn. Reactor Terminal his the table as does Lord Vader along with his lightsaber to the Docking Bay to back up the Emperor, I transfer over Luke, flip my objective and smile as I say go. He deploys Rebel Landing Site, then Crix along with Han and a few more scouts, and moves them all over to say "Hello" to the Emperor and his first mate. There are about 5 characters in all. I say "Fu*k that" and move the Emperor and Vader over to the Landing Site. I can take a drain of 1 off the top, or so I let him think. His turn he activates and drains me for one. Hello what have we here? I saved a force. Why would I save a force?? Hello Counter Assault!! I draw my destinies and am less pleased with them as I could have been, but its still enough to make him lose something like 8 force. I love making people lose force on their turns. So he deploys a few more scouts and decides to hold the platform. I’ll let him as I’m making him lose to Visage and a drain of 3 at the Landing Site. My turn I deploy Janus, because Janus is God, and drop all of my 7’s back into my deck. His turn he drains for two off the top all due to those pesky scouts. Next turn he thinks that drain of 4 is looking a little scary so he decides to move his forces to the Landing Site. I give a little smile under my breath as I say, "Thanks, you done?" He loses another to Visage and says go. My turn I activate to my tracked 7’s move over Emperor, Vader and Janus and say go. He activates and then nonchalantly says, "Drain for two off the top." I smile as I use another force to play another Counter Assault. This time the destinies are more to my liking as I draw all 7’s accept for one 6. He has to lose about 18 force and I smile as I see the majority of his deck fall into the lost pile. That leaves him with about 4 force left. Thus giving me just enough time to allow me to put my hand back into my deck for a huge differential. Sorry Chris, but business is business.
Game: FW 2(+32)
Standing: 6(+46)
Good: Getting to prove to everyone that a theme deck can win and win big.
Bad: Not getting to battle once the entire game.
Ugly: Counter Assault from hell. Kind of reminiscent of the last time we played and I did that to his X-wings who were draining me for 3 a Kessel. Got him for 14 then.
So I’m officially in first place with the closest person being Tom who, after beating up on Cortney, had a timed win his last game. So I’m up on him by 1 point, and he has me beat with differential. Damn that bye, they always seem to bite me in the arse. Lets rock Tom!!
Game 4: Me vs. Tom Ercanbracks MKOS Chevin deck.
Rated: 1665
Tom is one of those hit or miss kind of players. He either does really well or he does really poor. That’s kind of scary because he seems to be doing pretty well this tournament. And when he’s hot, its hard to stop him. But I know what deck he’s playing as it’s the same one he’s been playing for the last few months. He pretty much just sets up on Tatooine and drains you to death. He feels that with his draining you’ll be forced to come to him instead of him having to leave his place and come to you. Little does he know what he’s in for. Knowing full well what his deck does I feel its my duty to go to him and go to him fast. I know that my chances will decrease as my deck gets depleted. First turn he set up his AC and I move out my Luke. No real surprises there. Second turn He deploys another site as well as the Sail Barge and the Lower Deck for that. I need to act quickly and so I test the water and deploy Obi to the Lower Passages and battle his guys there. I force his Chevin to move away and proceed to draw my big fat destiny of 1. Damn! His Xisor remains. He deploys on his turn to that location and I barrier, glad to know that I put them in the deck for some reason, and moves over his other Chevin. I activate and tunnel vision for Obi’s saber and deploy it on him. I also spend 9 force to try to deploy ECC Chewie but he gets None Shall Passed. I battle, move away a Chevin, cut Xisor and proceed to draw my big fatty 1 again. Holy hell!! You’d think that with over half of the deck being over destiny 3 that I would be able to draw anything else. So I lose force for the difference and Obi clears the site. He’s draining me for a few with Galid helping out in the AC. I don’t have a large enough force to make a show of it there yet, but I will soon. During my turn I ask if the Sail Barge is immune to attrition and he says yeah and points to Power of the Hutt. I say, "But doesn’t that just affect your characters, and the Barge isn’t immune to that unless you have someone present at the Passenger Deck." That seemed to jog his memory as during his next turn he deployed a lone Chevin to the Passenger Deck. Well whatever I said worked, because he forgot to force drain me that turn. He just deployed to the site and moved over a couple of guys to the Lower Passages. When will he ever learn that you just can’t kill Obi? I deploy Chewie again for 9 force and he has no answer this time. I battle and have his guy move away, shoot, cut, draw a 7 (finally) and clear the site. I have to lose Chewie to attrition and he loses everyone there. He isn’t retrieving much force as he hasn’t been able to draw his Scum yet so the majority of his deck is in his lost pile. It’s only a matter of time before I get my Blout on and my game on with Obi killing every motha’ in the palace. I got my win pretty easily.
Game: FW 2(+26)
Standing: 8(+72)
Good: Bad mamma jamma Obi don’t take no crap from no one as he completely trashes the palace with his b*tch stick.
Bad: Not much bad happening for me, a lot going wrong for my man Tom though.
Ugly: Eric getting the bye for his first win points of the night. Sorry Eric, had to mention it.
So the tournament is officially ending after this round and I’m really excited because I’m in first with theme decks and am undefeated to boot. Then someone brings up the idea to play 6 games instead of 4. I look at the scores and realize that all I have to do to win the whole thing is to win one of the next two and I’m set. So I agree to do it to and there is one guy who has to leave, but the tournament continues with me leading the way. Man I should have taken that foil Masterful Move when I had the chance. Here’s Jason again and he’s not so happy this time.
Game 5: Me vs. Jason Ayre’s Hidden Mains
Rated: 1852
So now its Jason’s turn to feel the power of my "Technological Terror I’ve Constructed." I get my opening hand and see that I have a Choke Vader, his lightsaber and a Holonet Transmission. Before I activate he plays to cancel Visage with a OOC/TT and I kill it with my Holonet. I’m feeling pretty good about my hand and my first turn I deploy the Executor Docking Bay and draw a few, leaving me enough force to deploy Vader next turn when I activate. His turn he pulls out the Home One Docking Bay and the Tatooine system. Draws a couple and plays a Throw Me Another Charge. So already I get to look through his deck. It is now that I discover that I’m going to be in for some trouble if I don’t do some big damage quick. So we both lose to Visage and now its my turn. I deploy Vader to the Death Star Docking Bay along with his stick and flip my objective. I’m feeling pretty good with a PASOA in my hand to deal with pretty much any rebel that might want to come tussle with the Dark Lord. So I make him lose his force after drawing up a couple Intruder Missiles. His turn he sticks down Jedi Luke to the H1 docking bay along with his stick. Now I know that I might be in for some pain as he also deploys the Tatooine Docking Bay and moves him over. Now my objective is re-flipped and we both need to lose one. As I’m looking through my hand I see that I have a Twi’lek Advisor and can’t think of any effect that I could possibly use against his deck to be effective and so I lose that one. Probably one of the dumbest moves I’ve made in a while as I come to find out later in the game. So its my turn and I’m feeling pretty good with my "high destiny" deck that I think that I can take this kid to school and seal the deal on this soon. So I deploy the Emperor and Janus to the Death Star Docking Bay and move Vader to Lukes site. I don’t really want to duel because I think I can take him in a battle so I hold off on the duel. I have Focused Attack and so I figure that I’ll get him in the middle of the next battle and stomp all over whomever he has left. His turn he deploys EPP Han, EPP Leia and good old fashioned Chewie to Vader’s site. Now at this time I’m thinkin’, "That’s some heat!" I consider dueling him before the battle, and thus negating him the opportunity of even being to battle because my objective would flip and he wouldn’t be able to use Leia, who is a Skywalker. I don’t (stupid) and let him initiate a battle. He plays I know and I ask the TD if that will still work if Han is no longer in the battle, I get the ruling that it would, which sucks, its true, but it sucks. So then I try to choke Han to limit his destiny to 3 instead of 5. I draw a 3 and he stays. He then cuts at Vader with Luke and gets him. I try to swing at Luke and draw a 4 and a 1. I figure that my bad destiny must be all gone and so at this time I decide to duel. I use my Focused Attack to draw three destiny and he only gets two as he lost his courage earlier in the game to Visage. He draws a 3 and a 5 that I believe my deck should easily beat. So I go to draw my destiny and I get a 1 another 1 and a 4. With him subtracting 3 from the attempt I lose Vader and the 9 force that goes with him which is pretty much all covered by the cards in my hand. At least I didn’t have to lose more than that which would have happened if Vader had stayed in the battle. From then on it was pretty much downhill. I finally got my Reactor Terminal, that I could’ve gotten with the Twi’lek earlier in the game, but lost it because I have a horrible memory. Ended up draining him for a few with Janus and the Emperor, but not enough left in the deck without Vader to do any real damage. Mara made a short appearance with her saber, but that didn’t last long as she got slaughtered by Luke and his stick. Needless to say, my game face was not on for this game as I watched him retrieve twice with On the Edges. I eventually decide to draw up before he has the opportunity to retrieve his whole deck.
Game: FL 0(-17)
Standing: 8(+55)
Good: Canceling the OCC/TT on turn one.
Bad: Me losing my Twi’lek to Visage third turn.
Ugly: Pretty much the rest of the game from the "good" part.
So Jason gets his win and in doing so hands me my first loss. But I cheer up as I realize that I can still win this thing if I get a solid win during my next game. Since I’ve already played Jason twice I now get to play someone else there, the majority of which I don’t fear. So the parings come up and I get this .
Game 6: Me vs. Zach Marshall’s SYCFA Scum, a poor copy of the Brangus Glee Superstar deck.
Rated: 1713
Now its do or die time for my theme decks. I lost the last game due to a couple of stupid errors on my part and now I really need a big win to even make it into second, because I’m almost positive Jason’s going to win his next game. So Zach starts off with Set Your Course and right off I know exactly the deck he’s playing, mainly because he got rid of all of his cards about 2 months ago and hasn’t been able to get a wide selection of cards. I mean, he’s basically borrowing my cards to make his decks work. Because of this fact I know that it’s not going to be easy to beat this deck. This game was pretty much a blur for me. I don’t think I’ve had anything go this wrong for me in a game for a couple of years. I moved Luke to the docking bay first turn to get in my drain of two. He then on his turn deploys Arica to Lukes site so that I can’t do anything and Brangus to the Death Star Docking Bay. I then get balsy and move Luke to Brangus’ site and he decides to follow with Arica. His turn he breaks her cover, sticks down Scum and Villiany and plays a PASOA. I should have seen this coming as I know you need that card to make his deck work effectively. So now I know that Luke is going the way of the dodo even if he draws a destiny of only 1. So I cut Brangus for being such a jerk and making me loose my Jedi Luke. So I lose Luke and have just now realized that he shouldn’t have been in the battle at all, but should have been captured by Arica when she broke her cover. Now that I have proven to the whole Decktech community how I don’t know how to play my own deck, let me continue. So from here on it’s pretty much a loosing battle for me. I get a few EPP’s at a few sites, but he just overpowers me at the sites, and with the retrieval combined with Brangus, which got redeployed. He basically got to retrieve his whole deck and I just got beaten to a bloody pulp. I did get off a Counter Assault that made him lose 9 force, but that was the most damage I was able to do. My retrieval didn’t even work. I lost a guy on Cloud City to an Off the Edge that I drew a destiny 1 for. This just wasn’t meant to be my game.
Game: FL 0(-25)
Standing: 8(+30)
Good: Can’t think of anything good about this game except maybe that Counter Assault that did 9 damage
Bad: My skills in my not noticing that Luke should’ve been captured, which would’ve changed the entire game
Ugly: I lost to Zach in a tournament, first for me for a long time
So I end going from first to third, all by agreeing to play an extra two games. Here are the final standings for the tournament.
1. Jason Ayre 10(+97)
2. Zach Marshall 8(+38)
3. Me 8(+30)
4. Cortney Haggerty 8(+13)
5. Tom Ercanbrack 7(0)
Props:
Everyone that showed up to make it such a fun tournament to be in
My theme decks for showing that theme decks can do well in a tournament
Barry for coming to his first tournament and learning a ton
Tom for beating Nathan even though he retrieved almost 40 force.
Matt for not being there telling us all to get out of his store
Me for running the tournament
Slops:
Nathan for retrieving almost 40 force and still losing
Tom for having 4 wins and a 0 differential
Me for not realizing Arica should’ve captured Luke
The prize support for only yielding a Captain Han out of a box of R2
Well, I’d like to thank you all for reading and I hope to have another report posted soon.
Cheers,
SMEG