the-bull-at-dpc-vegas
Title: the-bull-at-dpc-vegas
Author: Alfred "ThaBraHmaBuL" Dong
Date: May 6, 2001
Its been awhile since my last TR, so I figured Id write one up about the DPC. Sorry if the details are a bit choppy, the whole weekend was kind of a blur to me right now. Lets do this....
My actual agenda in going to Vegas was really to see how I matched up with players everywhere else, seeing as how I hadnt been to any real major ones people from everywhere went to. Also, Cali States were following week, so I needed an edge I could only get from a DPC event.
I had been talking to and playtesting with Ohmy Fasudhani the past few weeks, trying to tweak and play several different decktypes and get a good feel for all of them. Ohmy had recently come back into the game after a year off, and he was trying to get his rhythm back. After some convincing I managed to talk Ohmy into coming down with me, as well as Clayton Atkin and Mike Mendoza.
Clayton and I ran identical LS decks in TIGIH Scouts, and have consoled each other with our different versions. DS would be a cross between MKOS Skrillings or ISB Scum, something I would think on and decide later. Thursday night I get things set up and stay up until 4, and after much consolation with Clay and Ohmy, we leave from my place at 7 in the morn. I would stay up all night confirming things and packing up.
So after 2 hours of sleep, I get up and wait for Clayton to show up so we can head out. Clayton wakes up late and gets to my place an hour late, but Im too tired to care, I just wanna jet. We head down after I make some final checks, and head out to pick up Ohmy and Mike in SF. From there, we head down the Bay Bridge and were rolling.
The car ride down was 8 hellacious hours, one of the longest road trips I have ever endured(as well as one of the hottest). Clayton liked a bit of crack to keep himself up(okay, metabolife diet pills, same dif....as Clay put it, "legal crack"), and Ohmy pops some as well as they switch up on the wheel during the trip. Clay is a pretty solid driver, speeding down the road at 80 MPH, but damn, Ohmy is the shizt. He flew down 95-100 MPH and averaged 3.5 miles per minute(so it seemed, we timed it), cutting people off and shaving 3 hours easily off our trip.
We get to Vegas and my @$$ is on fire(quite literally, I cant wait to get out of the car) . Were a few minutes late to the store for the prelim tourney but Clay nags Girard and were in. I dont have time to mess with decks, so I just play what I have and hope they work out. Im running TIGIH Scouts and MKOS Skrillings, and I wont bother with the details there, All I’ll say is I went 2-2 taking out Clayton and Casey Barson and lost to Brandon Gravo and some SoCal guy’s name I cant remember.
So after that I get some insight and add a ship to my MKOS Skrillings back at the hotel, and realize I shouldnt have lost to that SoCal guy because Decree didnt work even though I thought it did. Im feeling like a scrub and I go to sleep for 2 hours only to wake up to some of Clays loud noises. I go down for some juice and go straight there. I sit around and do decklists and I get to meet Nick Burke and Alan Sagan, nice people. Everyones up and its about to go down....
Decks
LS: TIGIH Scouts - TIGIH with Scout Tricks and HIGH destinies
DS: MKOS Skrillings - A version of TJ’s Normal winning deck, moded to my preference
Game 1: DS vs. Jared Arthurs LS EBO Scouts
Jared sets up EBO and Im starting to feel glad I added that extra ship. I set up on JP gradually and he sets up EBO. On one turn, he draws up to 12, then on his next he grabs 2 sites with ANBase and I hit Monnok Used to slow him down. I set up Gailid and Den of Thieves and he sets up EBO. He drops a Corvette with a random pilot down to Kiffex and I counter with Zuckuss and IG and a few Skrills. I clear him out with some decent overflow, and those 2 ships never leave table. He tries to spread but I drop Bossk and chase with Zuckuss and IG, and Bargaining Table is doing the rest. He does manage to get Menace Fades through with an Arcona, but a few Skrills to Hoth cancels that. Im hitting him for 6-8 Force a turn, hes hitting me for none, and an Abyssin for 8 seals the win for me. Win by 22.
Cumalative Score: 2(+22)
Highs: Playing a cool guy, and winning my first game
Lows: Nothing much
Game 2: LS vs. John Border’s DS Stolen Alex Tennet’s AOBS deck
Under some different circumstances, I wouldnt have trouble against John. Not to discredit him, but you know what I mean. This whole game was crap. John starts by dropping one of his 6 Emporers to my Dbay first turn, cutting me down to 2 Force. All I can do is bust out the H1 Dbay and move Luke to Palpy and flip. His turn he drains and I lose off the top and there goes my other docking bay. He moves Xizor over to the Coruscant Dbay and goes from there. I drop Crix and start grabbing Scouts, but I am thoroughly Force choked. He drops a Vigo for free and slides both him and Xizor over to Palpy and flips. He drops a 6 back and starts tracking. 2 turns later, he Force Lightning’s Luke and I wont see him again for the rest of the game. From there, he drops WAY too much power at every site for me to mess with him, and I cant find my Undercover Spies to deal with it. I do manage to get out the Back Door, but I cant hold it and it ends up just being another place for him to kill me at. Loss by 27.
Cumalative Score: 2(-5)
Highs: Nothing really.....I played like an idiot the whole game, but he wasnt playing the deck all that well either
Lows: Pretty much everything
So now that SUCKED. I talk to Dan Lujan and his friends and they asked me how I did, it went something like this:
"Hey, howd you do?"
"I lost."
"Really? to who?"
"Borders."
"BORDERS? JOHN BORDERS?"
"......Yeah."
"WTF?!"
So after hanging my head in shame for the next 10 minutes Im about to kick in the wall. But hey its only game 2, and Im only down 1 at this point, so I tell myself Im not losing another game. Clayton comes over and dogs me for the loss.....just wait.
Game 3: DS vs. Don Kitzman’s LS TIGIH Scouts
So I look down the row and EVERY LS I can make out is TIGIH. Thats odd. He gets a great jump on me by getting the Back Door in his opening and Luke walks over first turn. I Twilek for Den of Thieves to keep me alive a bit longer and draw but I cant find anything but red. He drops Leia to the Back Door and slides Luke over to the Endor Dbay to max his drains at 4. Hes sitting there hitting me for 2 a turn and I lose alot of the red so I can draw. He then drops Lando w/ Ax and Corran to my AC, and it looks like Im screwed. He drains another turn and he drops Tawss......and Mirax. So I come down on my turn with Jabba, Pote, Dengar w/ Bazooka and 6 Skrills to battle. He passes on the just action so I play Stunning Leader. Just Dengar and 6 Power 4 Skrills vs. Mirax now. She gets lit up and I pull a 4 and hes losing about 26 from the battle. From there I exert board control and I take back JP with Gailid and drain him out. Win by 20.
Cumalative Score: 4(+15)
Highs: One of the best comebacks ever
Lows: Nothing much
So then Clayton ends up playing Borders and he takes a timed loss to him by 20. Great job, Clay :-). Im backing my word up Im not looking to lose another game that day.
Game 4: LS vs. Shane Watner’s DS Throne Room TIEs
He starts Throne Room on DS2 but no BHBM. This game was auto win for me. He was choked for force early and I got mines by the dozen. Crix came out and set up Chewie of Kash and Wuta for my sites, and Midge for more drains. Im hitting him for 6 a turn to his 2 early on, and eventually I take over his Throne Room with a few spies too. I Signal for IHSAlright and its completely my game. He manages to force a few ties through and get a few back, but in the end, he just couldnt deal enough to me to pull off any miracles. Win by 22.
Cumalative Score: 6(+37)
Highs: Winning with my LS after dying horribly with it earlier
Lows: Nothing much
Game 5: DS vs. Tim Guzman’s LS MWYHL Test to 1 Mains
I finally get to play Tim, who Ive heard a bit about. He starts off MWYHL and Im thinking its going to be a slow game. I get a good jump on his early with Jabba and Gailid first turn. He sets up Yoda. I drain and come down with Ephant and a Skrill to flip and move them together. He comes down with EPP Leia and kills both of them. It goes like this for awhile, until he inserts A@#$%ression in my deck. I activated for the full amount first time, and it doesnt pop, so I use Power of the Hutt to grab Boelo. I shuffle and he cuts, and next turn same action, same result, it doesnt pop. I do that for the next few turns and it takes about 5 turns for it to pop, much to my liking :). He sets up Corran and finishes Test 1 and locks me down with that, Battle Plan and Aim High. Hes not letting me battle, so I cant retrieve, but Im hitting him with all that I can. Two more AFAs later Im in trouble. He drops Kessel and SuperFalcon there and I cant handle it for too long. I manage to keep him down for a few turns with Den and my Objective, but he kills me shortly thereafter. Loss by 7.
Cumalative Score: 6(+30)
Highs; Playing Tim, and having a close game.
Lows: Nothing much.
Game 6: LS vs. Casey Barson’s DS Hunt Down Dueling Smackdown
I smacked Casey around like a dog at the prelims, but he’d get his revenge here. He sets up for force the first turn, and I move Luke out of the hut. He comes down with DLOTS 2nd turn to take Luke and its goes downhill from there. He’s force choking me much like Borders did, and I cant do a damn thing about it. Crix is getting my scouts but I lack the force to deploy a decent hit squad to make it count. He sets up Emporer at the DS2 Dbay for more force, then backs up Vader with his stick, Ozzel, and 4LOM to make it worse. Im trying to save up for something to happen. He then plays Rise, My Friend, and drops Presence the the H1 Dbay where Crix is. Down comes Lord Vader, stick, Tarkin, and Tempest 1, and he crushes me by 25 to pretty much end the game. Loss by 31.
Cumalative Score: 6(-1)
Highs: Playing Casey who at least made this thing fun
Lows: Losing my 2nd in a row.
Clayton is now 5-1 going into the 7th game, but his last few wins had been timed ones. He needs to start getting the full wins to make this thing count, and to make it into the final 4. Ohmy gets back from the Casino after dropping(after going 0-3), and hangs around till were done.
Game 7: LS vs. Simon Lee’s DS Endor Ops Build DS2
He sets up quickly with Jerjerrod at the DS2 Dbay and starts building the ping pong ball. I move Luke out and start draining and setting things up. He completes DS2 after about 2-3 turns, but not before I have free reign over Endor with Midge and Solo at the Back Door and Luke at the DBay for a drain of 6 a turn. He drops DLOTS to Jerjerrod and shuttles over to the Endor Dbay to snag Luke. From there I drop some mod squads and try to take them out, but DLOTS chokes one out every turn, and another dies to attrition. Eventually though, EPP Obi comes down and takes them out, but not before he kills over half my guys and the drains in space and DS2 damage is killing me. In the end some Off the Edges saves me, and I edge him out by 5.
Cumalative Score: 8(+4)
Highs: Playing a fellow asian :)
Lows: Nothing much.
Game 8: DS vs. Simon Lee’s LS Hidden Base Flip mains
So I get Simon again because I didnt win by enough to play anyone else at this point. He gets a slow start, missing when he looked for a system the first two tries. I set up with Skrillings everywhere and set up Hutt Influence. He drops a slew of mains to the <> Docking Bay he dropped to Tatooine, and he NABRUNS his way inside my Palace and besats the snot out of everyone there. I reel and regroup at the Lower Corridor, and start hitting him for 1 there and 1 with some people at the Sail Barge outside. He finally flips HB and I drop ships down to the wrong planets to probe. After about 6 turns I finally draw my last ship to place his objective out of play and get 6 probe cards back. He drops Order to Engage and massacres Kessel and starts piling on the pain. I keep his Kessel drain under raps with Den of Thieves but Order to Engage is killing me. Eventually, he wipes me off Tatooine and wins the game. Loss by 11.
Final Score: 8(-7)
Highs: Finishing the tourney
Lows: Nothing much
Well so thats it. I scrubbed out and finished 4-4 with a negative differential. I place 27th out of 72, not bad considering the following. Mike wants to stay for the final confron, which is between Jonny Chu, Brian Hunter, Kyle Craft, and Chris Shaner. You all know Brian won, so I wont bother getting into it.
Clayton, Ohmy and myself left before Hunter and Shaner got into it, and headed down to Carrows for some food. Ohmy is insisted the waitress likes him, he even got the seasoned fries over the regular fries on his Club sandwich to back his claim, but the waiter played him, just like SW all week.
So we head back to the room and it doesnt take us long to pass out. We wake up early the next morning and head down the road, much more alive than the first time. Clay, Ohmy and myself get into a big dicussion over comics and what they used to be, made up scenarios such as Captain America vs. Wolverine, and Namor vs. Aquaman, and stuff like that for a few hours of the trip, and talk about alot of our games. We get home all too late, and Clay still has about 3 hours ahead of him before hes home. Even though I proved myself a scrub, I had a blast. Now for props and slops...
Props:
Clayton Atkin: For making it possible that we can go, and for the deck advice
Ohmy Fasudhani: I had alot of fun
Mike Mendoza: I had alot of fun
Mike Girard: For a well-runned event
Brian Hunter: For winning the DPC
The SoCal crew: For being there
Casey Barson: For making the whole thing more fun
The Waitresses at Carrows: For feeding us
Slops:
Those 2 sonuvabizatches that told us there was a Wherehouse in the next town.
For the record, YES, I know this report is late, and its probably not the best TR youve read from me, but Im a busy man, and my time leads elsewhere nowadays. If I forgot anything, sorry, my memory’s not what it used to be, son. :)
I hope it wasnt too bad a read, and at least someone enjoyed it.
Alfred Dong
The Brahma Bull
Smack being laid down 24/7