denver-world-qualifier-weekend-day-one

Title: denver-world-qualifier-weekend-day-one
Author: Brian "HuntaWarya" Hunter
Date: Jul 3, 2001

There are 4 tournaments for the World Qualifier Weekend. A sealed deck, a swiss-style warmup, the Open itself, and a Team Tournament. I decide to skip the sealed deck, and play in the other 3 events. My goal for the weekend is to equal (or, if possible, improve upon) the performance I had at the Phoenix Mega Weekend. On that weekend, I competed in 3 tournaments, winning two of them, and placing 2nd in the other.

Friday, June 29th. The Warmup Tournament

This would be a 4-game tournament, with 1st prize being a complete set of Death Star II. Since I already owned a set of Death Star II, if I won this one, I could just sell it, and that would be pretty sweet. So I really wanted to win this tournament badly. I playtested almost every day for 1 1/2 weeks, preparing for this 4-game event. I have never been so well-practiced before a tournament. We have 18 players, if I am not mistaken. Since there is a good chance of more than one player finishing undefeated, I decided to go with decks that can win by large differential, rather than just decks that will always win. So I chose to play podracing on both sides. Dark is Hunt Down racing with dueling, and light is EBO fakeout racing with Mains & Toys.

Game One: HD Racing vs. Chris Mead (1628)
Chris is using old school throne room mains. He tosses out Goo Nee Tay and deploys his nudjes while we both lose force to visage. After a while, he gets corran horn into the holotheatre, backed by Qui-gon and his apprentice, each with their respective lightsabers, establishing a drain for 4. On my turn, I draw high enough in the podrace to go over 24. I deploy Vader to the podrace arena, and during my move phase, I retrieve my lost pile, while he loses 11 to the race. the arena becomes a battleground, so I flip my objective, preventing his multiple jedi from draining me on the Executor. He draws cards, searching for a nabrun leids to pounce vader with, but doesn’t seem to be finding it. Vader drains him for a few turns until Jedi Luke comes down at the podrace arena. But I barrier him and then add characters to the tatooine site and kill off Luke, flipping to the 7 side again before Chris can drain me. The next time he deploys luke, it is to yavin 4. he kills off his nudj to get me back on the zero side. I elis helrot the beatdown squad over to luke for the game-ending battle, but luke nabruns over to the podrace arena. I spread out to drain on yavin 4, but take the 4-point executor drain for a turn or two before Chris runs out of cards. i win by 34.

2: (+34)

Game Two: ANSB racing vs. Chris Fanchi (1882)
Fanchi is using the desert landing site/JP start, with bunches o’ darth mauls. I get Ben and Qui-Gon to his JP sites early, and start chasing around his characters. He doesn’t have a sense for the nabrun leids that I use to kill his early vader. The race is close, but I win it, and once I do, "I Did It!" keeps him from saving force. Draw Their Fire puts the nail in the coffin, keeping him from sensing my battle interrupts, or playing any of his own. Too Close for Comfort cancels his weapon targeting, and the game becomes wholly one-sided. I get a win by 39.

4: (+73)

After Game Two, Van Melancon and Mike McConnell drop.

Game Three: ANSB racing vs. Joshua Bader (1879)
Josh is using HD racing, which is something I know I can beat. To ensure that my deck would not lose podraces, I use 5 "race helper" interrupts. I played 3 games against my own HD racing deck before the tournament, and won all 3 games without difficulty. BUT, Josh’s deck is much more freakish than my own. He uses 4 twileks to pull out dark path on turn 1, ensuring that he can always get over 24 within 3 turns. Despite my best efforts (and some help from the card "a step backwards"), I am unable to keep myself from losing the race. He retrieves his lost pile (of exactly 11 cards), and since he deploys no escape the same turn he wins the race, I lose the full 11. I can’t believe my podracing deck lost the podrace. I have won four (yes, FOUR) podraces in sanctioned games, with non-racing decks. But now that I have a racing deck, I lose the race!! I commence an intense session of @#$%ing while we continue the game. I use on the edges to retrieve some force, but they quickly become buried in my massive lost pile. Vader comes down against Jedi Luke and Qui-Gon, and thanks to "I have you now", the site gets cleared on both sides. I use Corran Horn and Mirax to cancel the visage, but I cannot drain there due to the threat of counter assault. I plink away at him in space and wait to see what happens next. Josh deploys a second vader and battles me. I draw high enough to kill Vader, and Corran Horn dies to attrition. On my turn, I replace Corran Horn with epp leia, and deploy the bacta tank. Josh deploys his 3rd vader, and with help from a card he had put back with reactor terminal, draws high enough to kill both my characters. Mirax goes to the tank, Leia goes to the lost pile. I draw another 6, and vader goes down again. Emperor Palpatine goes to the podrace arena. I take mirax from the tank and put her up in space, allowing me enough power there to drain without fear of more counter assaults. qui-gon comes down on the emperor and forces some battle damage. Josh activates down to the visage he had put back with reactor terminal, and plays force lightning to kill Qui-Gon. There were already 3 force lightnings in Josh’s lost pile when this happens, so I was stunned when he plays a 4th. Qui-gon goes to the tank, so I pay 8 to take him out. Vader joins the Emperor. Qui-Gon comes down and battles again. Vader and Qui-Gon die. Josh is all out of Vaders, and cannot flip again this game. I again pay 8 to pull qui-gon from the tank. Josh plays shut him up or shut him down and cancels the bacta tank. I deploy Qui-Gon against the Emperor and Josh kills him with Force Lightning AGAIN. Yes, that is FIVE copies of Force Lightning! I think I played better in this match than in any game of Star Wars that I’ve played in a long, LONG time. I do not think I made a single error in the entire game. But in the end, it just doesn’t matter. Jedi Luke makes a late appearance against the Emperor to cause a little more battle damage, but Luke’s immunity to attrition <6 does not hold up long against the reactor terminal, and once the Emperor has cleared away all opposition, Josh drains me out for a win by 12.

4: (+61)

There will almost surely be a 4-0 at the end of the tourney, so I have been effectively eliminated from the tournament. I know my deck is strong against HD racing, so I can’t believe I lost the podrace, and will not be getting the set of Death Star II. But since I was able to vent my frustrations (or @#$% up a storm) for the last 35 minutes of that game, I am feeling much better by now. NOT. So I continue to @#$% about my woes to anyone who will listen (and anyone who will even pretend to listen) until the pairings for game 4 are announced.

Game Four: HD Racing vs. Joshua Bader (1879)
I’m so livid about losing the tournament that I am not even able to be happy about my chance at revenge against Josh. Josh is using flipping Hidden Base, with matching pilots. I draw a 6 for my first race destiny, so I start out up 9-0. I get a 1 for my second destiny, making my total 13. Meanwhile, Josh stacks a 7 and a 4 to get up to 11. That’s not cool. Hidden Base decks aren’t supposed to draw 7’s. Since I’m all pissed off about the previous game, I decide to podracer collision BOTH of his destiny draws, just out of spite. :) So I kick him down to 0 and win the race a couple turns later. I also get my no escape out so he loses 11 while I retrieve 11. He flips his objective so I’m not force draining him at all. I can only cause damage via the visage. I send the Hound’s tooth up to space against some dorky SE pilot (bren on red 8 or some crap like that), but josh plays organized attack to make himself immune to my battle destiny, and power pivot to make my power zero. I lose bossk and a couple, he loses nothing, and continues to drain me at his systems. nice. I toss some more starships up into space, and after a couple of tries, successfully probe his hidden base. Tk-422 gets snipered, so I can start draining at the podrace arena again. I also have a dejarik draining at the imperial holotable. Josh lands artoo in red 5 at the arena, and luke steps out to flip me back. Josh didn’t figure I had held onto a Vader’s Obsession this long (after all, I’m getting drained for like 6 or 7 a turn), but he was mistaken. I cross luke to the dark side, re-flip my objective, and win the game by 17.

6: (+78)

Josh explains that flipping hidden base was the best thing he could come up with to beat Hunt Down racing, so that’s why he used it. I explain that my answer to Hunt down racing was just to use a racing deck myself, packed with racing helpers. So Josh beat my "anti-hunt down" light deck, with Hunt Down. And I turned right around and beat his "anti-hunt down" light deck, with Hunt Down. How stupid is that? Anyway, Jason Keen is the only 4-0 player, and I easily have the best differential of the players who went 3-1. Jason wins the set of Death Star II, while I have to settle for second place, and some packs of Reflections II and Tatooine. Grrr. But I pull a Qui-Gon out of the Tatooine packs, so I am feeling much better about the loss now. NOT. I stay after the tournament and continue to @#$% about how much I hate HD racing. Josh and I stay and talk with Scott (the store owner) until long after all the other players have left. We discuss strategies for how to beat HD racing, and cannot come up with anything better than the light decks we used today (both of which, of course, lost to HD racing!!)

Things are not looking good for my goal. I took second place at the warmup, so in order to match my performance from the Mega Weekend, I will have to finish first in both of the other events this weekend. I decide I will change both of my decks before competing in the open, and make the trip home to do so....

Props:
To me, for driving. (I dunno, I always give props for driving, so why not?)
To Chris Fanchi, for recovering from the loss by 39 that I gave him, and finishing at 3-1.
To Joshua Bader, for using force lightning to kill my Qui-Gon not once, but twice. (that is just wrong)
To Josh’s dorky special edition x-wing, for kicking the crap out of my hound’s tooth (that is also just wrong)
To Jason, for winning the set of Death Star II.

Slops:
To Scott, for making the tournament only 4 games. :p
To Josh, for playing with Shut Him Up or Shut Him Down (that’s not a card!) :)
To Podracing, for being ridiculous.
To me, for using podracer collision on ALL of Josh’s early race destiny draws, like a bastard. :)
To me, for setting a new standard in unsportsmanlike conduct, when it comes to foul language. ;) Hehe.

Day 2 report coming soon.....thanks for reading.

Brian Hunter