the-bitter-viper-games-7-8-vegas-dpc
Title: the-bitter-viper-games-7-8-vegas-dpc
Author: Steve "BlackViper" Marshall
Date: May 8, 2001
GAME 7: DS vs. Scott Anderson’s Profit (1928)
DISCLAIMER: This is the DIRTIEST game of Star Wars I have ever played in my entire life. I have NEVER even HEARD of a game being this one-sided in the history of the game.
In playtesting against my own Profit, I know that Mara and Xizor are the best aliens to start in the Chamber. That’s just that. Choke Vader dropped to Jabba’s Palace turn 1 for the flip, and Search And Destroy hits the table. This starting hand is from the almighty Lord God himself. He hand delivered it in person and everything to make sure it was perfect. So now he’s losing to Visage and Search And Destroy, and it’s only turn 1. That, my friends, is a beating. He gets Honor down a turn or 2 later, so I drop Carida and secure it with Zuckuss, Fett, and the Chimaera with Admiral Cheerio aboard for the extra drain. 3 - count ’em, THREE - battlegrounds. Search And Destroy and Visage again. He’s only generating 6 Force a turn because I won’t give him an icon except Carida. About 6 turns later, he can finally deploy Ben and Jedi Luke to the Chamber to stop the madness, but he doesn’t have the Force left to battle. I do so. Mara hits Ben, Luke lives and Xizor dies. He loses to Search And Destroy because Luke is a destiny 6 - tee hee. That’s twice the high destiny has hurt! The first was an unfortunate game-deciding Alter with Leia. Anyway, Jedi Luke moves outside and hires Nabrun to escape to my Cloud City DB, but he’s still losing to both S&D and Visage.
Boushh drops in front of Palpy and Vader, but the Dark Jedi sense the evil presence and zap her away with a tracked 5 for Force Lightning. I was planning on using that for destiny later, but whatever. I’ve got other cards tracked. I lose Blast Door Controls off the top of my deck to Visage - this would hurt a little. He drops Order To Engage, and Ben Narrow Escapes away from my battles, forcing my next door forces to lose 3. Janus doesn’t like that very much, so he uses his mind tricks to bring a 7 to the top of my deck and I use Set For Stun to stop the Direct Damage and still drain 3 over him. I feel ashamed of this win - it was too dirty.
FW by 19
7 (+43)
The Good: The Lord God Himself shows up in all his glory, pays no attention to his Son who has lost 2 games so far today, and picks my starting hand for me. I had the guy under my thumb the entire day, and it was ugly.
The Bad: Losing Blast Door Controls just before the OTE / Narrow Escape maneuvers kinda sucked in timing.
The Ugly: EVERYTHING that I did was bad for him. If I was him, I would have reached across the table and slugged me.
Props To Opponent: He was really put out from this game. We shook hands, and I tried not to be the guy’s enemy, but I don’t think he’ll ever talk to me again after how this game went. He got a bad hand, and I got a great one. It happens. He seemed like a nice enough guy...
The game took all of 20 minutes. I feel happy that I won a game and that I’m batting over .500, but I don’t like a slaughter, no matter which side of the table I’m on. I used so many cards on the table to dominate that my diff was fairly low, but EVERYTHING went my way. I brag to my Phoenix buddies as they come along and try to make heads or tails of my new Jedi Knights cards in front of me. I really feel bad for the guy, but I want to win the next game really badly. Last game and we get to gamble and go home... finally.
GAME 8: LS vs. Chris Hines’s Agents Of The Dark Sun / Manipulation (1975)
If I had only known what he was playing before we started the game, I would have won this game easily. He can look through my Used Pile and make me lose Force for what’s there, rearrange my Force pile as he sees fit, and all sorts of other bad stuff. He searches for something - a docking bay, maybe? Anyway, it doesn’t matter because it’s not in the deck and I get to check. SWEET. On my turn, I activate 3 and IMMEDIATELY Signal for Scrambled Transmission. IT’S NOT THERE! It’s one of the 3 Force I used!!!!! NOT FAIR! I need my Waaaamburger! Then he goes and Visored for my Signal, turns out there’s another one in there, too. I lose 2, then I lose them both. I make sure NOT to lose Scrambled. Right now I wish I had started that card.
I’m having trouble finding Luke, and that’s really not good. I chose Master Luke because he bounces Xizor so easily, but it doesn’t work if he never pops out of the deck! He leaves the Chamber to drain, letting Boushh free Han and letting me flip. I don’t retrieve because of Secret Plans - that’s the least of my worries right now. They would hold the Chamber the rest of the game. I drop Ounee Ta to get Luke’s Saber back and drop him down with the energy blade in front of Xizor and a pair of Vigos. I realize as soon as I’ve used all but 1 Force for the deploy that he’s probably holding a Projective Telepathy, which he is. I can’t battle. He drops down Guri, IG88, and an extra Vigo down to initiate. I bounce Xizor, causing his armor to be lost. He flips... SWEET! I hit a Vigo (confident that he’s got Oh, Switch Off in hand), but my crappy destiny is a 1. DOH! I lose Luke and 5. I run around to Direct Damage and drain him away, but he follows, drains, and beats me out in the Force game. His manipulation was cut short when I finally got Scrambled Transmission on the table, but he was too far ahead at that point for me to do anything. Too bad.
FL by 18
7 (+25)
The Good: That was a REALLY good game. Guri doesn’t stop Master Luke from getting to Xizor!
The Bad: Visored Vision for my Signals turn 1 really sucked.
The Ugly: I could have won this game if I started that dirty card - I was considering it anyway to get my Grimtaash. I thought he was playing 6 Palpatines.
Props To Opponent: I finally figure out how I recognize Chris - he’s a Vegas player. We chat and have a good old time. He gave me a fun game.
Well, 7 of 8 games were fun, and that’s a good thing. I’m still bitter about the timed win, but it’s over now so who cares. I finish somewhere in the mix - Chu gets 1st, Craft gets 2nd, Shaner is 3rd, and Jesus gets 4th. Prizes were given out to top 12, and our little Yoda Muppet friend got 13th. DOH! Sorry, Jared!
1st: Jonathan Chu @ 14(+129)
2nd: Kyle Craft @ 13(+138)
3rd: Chris Shaner @ 12(+107)
4th: Brian Hunter @ 12(+95)
5th: Jason Kilby @ 12(+88)
6th: Arian Delisle @ 12(+83)
7th: Tim Guzman @ 12(+69)
8th: Paul Feldman @ 12(+56)
9th: Ted Hansen @ 12(+52)
10th: Caleb Smith @ 11(+88)
Shaner’s in the final 4, so I’ve got to wait even longer to leave! Craft chooses to use his undefeated Dark Sun against Shaner’s scouts, but Shaner absolutely bends him over the table. Xizor gets sliced by EPP Obi’s stick and dies, then he comes back only to get sliced by the old man again. Here’s the kicker: Shaner hadn’t used Kenobi all day long. All day. He finally gets both copies in his starting hand, and there could have been no better timing for that to happen. 1st turn Monnok would have killed him. He takes it in stride because Shaner’s a good guy, and I try to pump him up for his last game. He can win. Shaner is going to be the Vegas DPC champion! The win was kinda strange, because I had my DPC points on Kyle. Now the guy who I’m staying with knocked him out of the top 4. Craft paid 8 Force for Guri, setting a record for the most expensive droid in Star Wars history. Because of the extra cost, she didn’t do anything. After the battle damage with the 2nd Xizor against Obi, General Solo, and Chewie, he just flipped his deck over. NOTHING against Kyle - he’s still cool. But you really should have been there to watch the thing. I’ve never heard of Kyle going down like that before.
Hunter was taking Chu out as well. Chu had trouble getting his twix sites out, and Hunter’s deck got a solid start. I was watching Shaner’s game, so I didn’t catch many details of this one, but Hunter won the good game, pitting him against Shaner for the 2nd time tonight. Shaner won the first game against his Hidden Mains, so I think he can win today.
Shaner is 3rd, so he chooses to play against Hunter’s ISB first. I don’t know why - I think he should have played the deck he knows he can beat first. But then again, he’s in the top 2 and I’m not, so who am I to talk? ;-) Shaner sets up with Crix at the H1 DB and Delevar, and Hunter has a beatdown crew ready, you can tell. He picks up Delevar, not exactly sure what his gametext says. After reading it, he holds it up for all of us to see and says "This card doesn’t let me reduce anyone’s forfeit. Delevar saved Shaner’s game. This is a good card." We all applaud the entertainment, Crix stays alive, and the game continues. Hunter knows how to entertain - the entire game was amusing to watch. Shaner is getting the upper hand quickly and gets down I Hope She’s Alright, forcing Vader to escape from the Executor DB (with Luke) to a battleground. A party soon breaks out at the Endor DB, and Shaner wins the battle by like 25. Hunter loses everything except the ISB droid (excluded with Wicket - GO EWOKS!!!) and around 8 more. Blount is parked with Han and a couple others at the Coruscant Spaceport DB, so Hunter is on the 0 side the entire game. Heavy space drains soon get the Son Of God back in the game. It’s about even, but Jesus is getting those uncontested drains in space. Hunter again visits Endor, but this time Vader and Tarkin are together, and Vader is armed. Shaner can’t compete with that this time, so Wicket grabs a scout (Midge?) and runs away to Chirpa’s Hut, and the rest of the crew run away to the Back Door for the drain of 3. Hunter drains and moves over, and Shaner can’t keep up so Hunter wins the game by 18. DOH!
The last game of the night! Finally! Haven’t I said that twice already today? Well, this time I can’t be wrong. Hunter sets up Hidden Mains and Shaner goes with ISB Scum. Edges keep Hunter’s Lost Pile low, but they are both caught immediately. He sets up Menace Fades at Tatooine and the CC: DB, but Shaner again drops Jabba’s Cruiser with an Outer Rim Scout to Rendezvous Point and moves to Dagobah for the popular Yoda’s Hut drain (Hunter took that drain in 2 different games already today). "You’d think I’d learn from my mistakes, but I’m going to do this again anyway," he said as he deployed the system and the Hut from reserve. This time the Superfalcon moved to Dagobah, forcing Shaner to lose 3 to OTE and stopping him from the suicide landing. He ran back to Rendezvous Point. He had a pair of Walkers chasing Obi around tatooine, and eventually the Jedi ran away to Cloud City. He got a few good drains in before he ran away. Each tatooine site has like 5 Outer Rim Scouts at it, and it hurts to look at. NO ONE should have that many scouts!
The guys at the table across the room are holding a conversation SO LOUD that people still in Phoenix are complaining about the noise. Girard tells them to shut up, and they actually have to lower their voices to SHOUT "Okay" back to him. Dudes were LOUD!!!!!
Back to our heroes - Menace Fades was keeping Shaner’s enhanced drains under control, and Aim High hurts his retrieval. At one point, he tracks his Abyssin Ornament to the top of his Force pile with 1 destiny left in his deck and just enough Force left to pay for the retrieval. He draws it - no ornament. Shaner didn’t read his articles. "I’ll bet Steve Marshall knows where the Abyssin Ornament is," Girard cracks. Hunter looks up and finally realizes who I am. "You’re Steve Marshall?" he asks. "Yeah, but I’m rooting for the other guy."
Okay, I didn’t really say that, but I wanted to. It would have been amusing. After missing the Ornament, there is nothing Shaner can do, so the game finishes out in Hunter’s favor. They decided before the game to split the money $500 for second and $700 for first instead of $200 for second and $1000 for first. Shaner didn’t feel comfortable with $800 at stake for a card game, and Hunter apparently agreed with him. That was a wise choice - this is just a game, after all. So Shaner ONLY wins $500. That’s too bad. Everyone takes pictures, and Hunter poses as Jesus at the Final Supper for Girard because he thought it would be amusing. Shaner is glad that he passed on the opportunity to be Choonphol’s padawan learner. tee hee.
I talk to Hunter after the games to see if any upper level players are getting ANYTHING from my tracking articles. He tells me that he doesn’t do most of the stuff I mentioned and that I’m insane for tracking so much! "You probably track better than I do," he tells me.
That’s nice, but you’ve got $700 and I don’t. Where’s the balance in that? ;-) I don’t know how anyone who meets Hunter can say poor remarks about him - I think he’s a great guy with a good sense of humor. He knows this is a game. We FINALLY take off, after 14 hours of playing Star Wars.
PHOENIX BROUGHT BEATINGS!!!!! Girard was handing out raffles to players between games, and Phoenix players took about half of them home. Phoenix players gave Brian Hunter his only 2 losses of the day. A Phoenix player ranked #2 on the day. 3 Phoenix players were in the top 13 overall. SWEET!!!!! Phoenix is cool!
We head out to food because we’re all hungry - we haven’t had anything to eat since McWaaaanald’s before the tournament. I’m apparently driving DJ and Jared to their place because Jay left early. Yeah, all 3 Phoenix people who actually go by their first names got a room together. First names stick together! ;-) We drop stuff at our hotel and Hickey has the beer ready. We hang for a little while, then we all go eat. I can’t drive Hickey and his buddies - Jared’s knee is shoved up against my shifting elbow anyway. Shaner sees a couple of guys he recognizes outside the Venetian, and actually takes off running to catch up to them. Yes, Chris Shaner ran through Las Vegas. The rest of us just stared in awe at the spectacle of Shaner running. I don’t think he’s ever done that in his entire life, and it caught us ALL by surprise. We go to the Venetian, but they’re shutting off the power in half an hour, so we decide not to stay for that one. We head over to other casinos, but nothing has good restaurants to eat at still open.
We drive DJ and Jared back to their place to drop stuff off before we head out to Denny’s, our last resort. Denny’s is ALWAYS plan D! These guys got a full-out condo. 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, a HUGE living room, and all the kicks to go with it. I hate these guys. ;-) We go to Denny’s, and by this time, there are about 12 of us I think. We’ve just been attracting more people as we roam the streets. We get a table and eat our sub-standard food. One of the cooks tried to kill Jolicoeur with bad eggs, and the waiter behind me tried to assassinate me by throwing plates across the restaurant! It was frightening. Shaner was kind enough to share his winnings with Team Signal (and DJ and Jared for riding with us), paying for dinner. That was cool. They want to hang around the city, but it’s 2:00am, and my guys want me to drive home around 9:00, so I’m going to sleep. They walk around and I drive Jolicoeur back to the hotel where we crash for the night. I would never actually get to my homework I needed to do.
When we get back, I learn that Mike apparently brought 10 sets of clothing for "any situation" that might come up. This guy could have gotten married and been ready for it! No wonder we were hard up for room in the trunk of my car... DOH!
In the night, Hickey tries to get in but doesn’t have a key. Mike tells me to answer the door, and I tell him to get the door. I was talking to him in my sleep - I guess it happens a lot. "You get it!" "No, you get it!" Neither of us can remember who answered the door. Even later in the night (morning), Choongie and Shaner return. Choongie mentions that Shaner lost $2000 gambling. I wake up just long enough to roll over, comment "That’s nice," and go back to sleep. I was too tired to care. Turns out he didn’t lose the money - he was just trying to get us upset. Um, it didn’t work... :-)
We get up, and Hickey is sleeping next to me wearing only boxers, which I can’t see - I wake up to see this big naked guy sleeping next to me and fall out of the bed in pure fear. He won $150 at Bally’s Horse Race machine, which I found to be incredibly fun last December. Lucky bum. We eventually start the drive home - it’s a 5 hour drive, Mike needs to be back at 2:00, and we leave around 11:00 and stop for lunch. I don’t see it happening. We would arrive about 4:00. We stop at McD’s and confuse the hell out of the guy taking our order - he can’t get what we want in order, and he seems to be in a big hurry, even though no one else is in line. We keep telling him he got the order wrong, and he keeps giving us new stuff. So now we’ve got extra cokes, fries, and all sorts of stuff. Cool. Shaner won $2 from his French Fry box, and he gets all excited again.
I really feel the need to express concern here. This is the guy who buys SW cards by the CASE. He just won $500 and wasn’t bouncing off the walls. Now he wins TWO DOLLARS and he’s more excited than I’ve ever seen ANYONE in my entire life!!!!! That’s insane! He kept the box, and I think he turned it in for the cash, but he might have framed and mounted it on a wall somewhere... who knows...
I need to stop for gas in Kingman, and it’s a good opportunity to stretch. Hickey digs through the trash and finds McD’s questions that haven’t been scratched off yet. He tries to win a couple bucks, but he scratches off the small fries and drinks instead. He tosses them away. It’s bad enough that he was digging through the dumpster - if he had just kept the stupid things, we could have all had drinks and fries for the rest of the drive! We drop off Hickey on the way, and everyone else gets off at the Outer Rim. On the drive home, I got to see some of the inner workings of Shaner, and I don’t think a lot of people get to do that. It was really cool, and I find that I have a lot more respect for the guy now, just by talking to him and getting to know him on a personal level. We as SW players take a lot of stuff for granted about other players. We get to the store, and I just go home and go to bed. This entire weekend has been one long day, and it’s time for it to finally end. This was fun.
TO CONCLUDE THE NOVEL:
I know that I owe Shaner a Ben Kenobi and a Tatooine Celebration, and I owe Pat Hug a DVDLOTS. Shaner owes me a Blount. Anyone else who owes me cards, please return them! I appreciate it!
PROPS:
* Girard for hosting a GREAT weekend
* All the assistant judges for doing a great job as well
* Phoenix players for bringing beatings
* Vegas players for being cool
* Mike J. for sacrificing a game to give me a chance
* Shaner for making top 2! SWEET!!!
* Hunter for being cool
* DJ and Shaner for beating the world’s best
* My rating for going up ;-)
* Kitani for giving me the quote of the day
SLOPS:
* Me for falling asleep in game 5
* Pat for not making the trip
* DJ, Jared, and Jay for getting a condo while we’re crowded! ;-)
* Ghhhk for vanishing into thin air
* Characters for not being in my deck game 4
* Me for playing TOO well in game 7
* This TR for never ending...
Thanks for reading (if you actually made it this far)! I have ALWAYS written my TRs in one day - this one took me 4 tries to get it finished. But now everything in my tournament notebook is checked off, so I’m signing off.
-Steve