god-i-hate-cedar-grove-nj-7-21-01
Title: god-i-hate-cedar-grove-nj-7-21-01
Author: Pete "Ghetto 13" Flamini
Date: Jul 21, 2001
Just about the furthest you can drive from my house and still be in New Jersey (except RamapoCon) is pretty much Cedar Grove, NJ. It’s about a 2-hour drive each way. And next to the store where we play, is "Poppa Tony’s World Famous Pizza". I don’t know what’s it’s famous for. It could be "World’s Sh*ttiest Pizza", it could hold the record for "Most Pizza Related Fatalities", I don’t know. It’s just @ss. But the man makes a chicken sandwich that’s out of this world. I’d rather play a tourney two hours away today than one fifteen minutes away tomorrow, just to get this friggin’ sandwich. I caravan with Kim Caton, Dan Bordier, Greg Hodur, and TJ Holman, and off we go in search of the chicken sandwiches. I hit MAC ahead of time, I was planning on buying four. But guess what? For the second tourney in a row, that M-F’er is "closed due to kitchen fire". So I’m already in a foul mood when the tourney starts, and the competition level isn’t going to help.
We’re talking about a 12-player turn-out that includes the NJ State Champ (Mike Daulton), PA State Runner-Up (Dan Bordier), TJ Holman (if you don’t know who he is, get out of my report because you’re oblivious to SWCCG outside of your basement), Ghetto Leader Greg Hodur, Kim Caton (9th at Origins), not to mention other solid-ranked players like Chris Gogolen, Rich Haman, and George Gundry, (all of whom can beat me in any given game). It’s gonna be a long day, with no easy games AND no friggin’ chicken sandwich. Why didn’t I just stay home and pack for Virginia? BTW, I’m moving to Chesapeake this month, so you can just start calling me "2002 Virginia State Champ" now....
Anyway, my light deck is WYS, which everybody knows is a beast (don’t give me any sh*t, I was the first person playing it in my area) , and my dark deck is this bizarre Endor Ops/matching TIE pilot thing. I know Endor Ops is fruity, but it started out as a counter to townies playing RST/QMC and has since evolved into a respectable deck that gives WYS and Mains/Toys a run for their money too. I came in rated 1925, and here’s how it went....
Game 1 - My Dark vs. Dan Bordier’s (1727) LS Assault
I swear, you never know what to expect from Dan. Today he’s starting Moisture Farm/Careful Planning/Mos Eisley. I thought he just got an unusually fast start, but it turns out his deck has over 40 characters in it, making it almost impossible for him to NOT start draining on turn one (look for the deck, "Huge Cup of Pepsi" or something on Monday). What’s worse is he’s playing all exterior sites (read: I can’t bomb anything) and he’s actually using Arden Crell, Vaporators, and Hydroponics Stations. The sick b@stard is draining for six at his two sites by his third turn. Luckily I had Tatooine in my opening hand, which allowed me to throw an early ship there to Tarkin’s Orders one of his drains while I looked for something else to do. I drop EPP Vader to Crell’s site to kill his modifiers. I forget CZ-4 next door allows react deploys to adjacent sites to, so a Talz comes down. WTF? Of course I swing at Crell, the Talz takes his place as "hit", and my destiny kills another guy, but I come no where near clearing the site or killing his drain bonuses. I need a new plan. So I fish out U-3PO to block one drain, and use the occassional Tarkin’s Orders to block the other when I can, all the while draining 2 at Endor, 2 at Sullust, and 1 at Tatooine. I swear, I actually could have lost this game if not for that early Tatooine.
Full Win by 16; 2 (+16)
Game 2 - My Light vs. Mike Lee’s (1423) TDIGWATT/I’m Sorry
I feel bad for Mike and another guy who was there. Both are new (rated <1500 with <12 sanctioned games played), and outside of them, the average rating in the room is probably well over 1800. If I thought I was having a bad day, I’ve got nothing on them. Anyway, the WYS deck is pretty much auto-win against Dark Deal with Tremor being errata’ed, it’s just a question of whether you take the fight to them, or just ignore them and sit behind Menace Fades/Battle Plan. He spends his first turn drawing up after deploying Bespin, so I just go about my merry way. I’ve got Mirax/Pulsar Skate along with Dash in my opening hand, and he gave me four force with his CC locations. So I Squadron Assignment Dash and Outrider to Kessel, and drop Mirax/P. Skate to Bespin for the first turn flip. On the second turn, he looks for something from his reserve deck that isn’t there, and I get a peek at his deck. Almost no space except As$-ecutor, and all high-cost characters. So I fortify Bespin with an extra smuggler, drop Luke to HO:DB, move to DB94, and wait. By now he finally has what he wants, so he throws Vader, his Saber, and Empy to my Cantina. Bah, whatever. I’ll Control/TV that drain next turn anyway. So I drain, and sit. When I control his drain, he gets all salty and drops Maul and IG to the Cantina (I don’t know why, since he then wanted to move them to the DB94), and tries to move the whole group over. But Empy cant go, so IG sits with him and Maul/Vader move in front of Luke. I drain, move Luke inside, he gets a woody. Apparently, he had been holding this massive beat-squad and they all come down. All kinds of gay guys, Bossk w/ Gun, Jodo Kast, Mara Jade, everything. Sorry, It’s a Trap, battle cancelled. My turn I move Luke to DB94 where I eventually let him battle just to kill Luke so I can re-deploy him on CC for a bigger drain, all the while draining him for seven in space.
Full Win by 19; 4 (+35)
Game 3 - My DS vs. TJ Holman’s WYS
I know TJ’s deck, it’s the same one Clint Hays was playing at Origins, and it’s good as hell. But I gave Clint a run for his money (not that I actually beat him, he’s a machine) so I’m thinking if I catch a break or two, *maybe* I could pull the upset. Heh, sometimes I’m so dumb. I had him a little bit early. He got a bad opening hand, and while he re-grouped I did some Tatooine bombing to nuke his Cantina and DB94, but eventually he flipped in Space via Captain Han at my Kashyyyk and Wedge at Kessel. So of course my bobo-TIEs have no hyperdrive, and I have a hard time chasing him around while generating little force, so we’re gonna have to fight it out. I chase Wedge off Kessel, then off Endor, so finally his best option is to go square off against Baron Von Big D1ck at Tatooine. We’re both sporting our respective cannons, so it’s going to come down to destiny draws. He initiates, fires first and draws the four that sinks the Baron. But I Dark Maneuvers to survive, then try to bust a cap in his ass. I make x=3, then draw 3. Not good enough since Wedge adds 2 to maneuver on Red 2. Sh1t. 28 cards in the deck are 4 or better, and I get the three. Since he survives, he Darkliter Spins a six to break my immunity (I didn’t have All Power to Weapons), and Baron goes down in smoke. Once the Baron goes down, the whole deck starts to unravel. We tried the same dance again later with Major Turr Phennir in his ship, but Wedge shot him down too. Wedge is a f*ckin’ beast. I should take a pen and draw some more kill marks on the side of his ship. So at this point he’s out-draining me, I have little left to throw at him, and he takes me down DESPITE losing his Tatooine sites.
Full Loss by 24; 4 (+11)
Game 4 - My LS vs. TJ Holman’s SYCFA/Brangus/Podracing
We all know how this is going to work. If I’m smart enough to only use Dash/Mirax/Talon Karde/Freighter Captains in space, he can’t do the Much Anger/Resp. of Command combo on me and I should be O.K., especially if I win the podrace which is highly possible. My opening hand? EPP Han, Cap’n Han, and both Melas. Great. So I opt for Plan B, take what I have and try to cause enough early force loss to maybe bury the combo-cards where he can’t Brangus them. So Cap’n Han/Falcon to Alderaan and move to D* it is. Of course silly me, TJ had Hoth: War Room, Responsibility of Command, Zuckuss, and Brangus all in his opening hand first turn, then in our first battle, flipped Much Anger in him which he promptly got into hand with Brangus. So by TJ’s third turn, Theron Nett is under the Combo, Brangus is retrieving the Control/Set for Stun that’s cancelling my big drain, and I’m on my way to losing the Podrace compliments of race draws like Dash/Outrider/Chewie. So I lose the podrace, get nothing accomplished draining, and can’t move Theron Nett away from losing four force. I move to Tatooine, he follows. I land at DB94 he deploys, I transit to HO:DB, he deploys Arica. Good god. This game ended quickly, and TJ and Greg went to eat some day-old pizza they heated up by leaving on the back ledge of TJ’s car for a couple hours.
Full Loss by 22; 4 (-11)
So sh1t, I’m 2-2 looking down the barrel of going .500 for the day, given that my bomber deck shouldn’t really win another game against this group. Afterall, it’s an effective fun-deck, but a fun-deck nonetheless. Oh well, at least I should be able to get another LS win....
Game 5 - My LS vs. Andrew Cirigliano’s (1444) SYCFA-Flip
Going into this game, I had no idea who Andrew was, I just figured "Hey, he doesn’t act like a townie, but surely he can’t beat the light deck". I was almost wrong. First turn, he activates, pulls a D*-gunner, and draws a couple cards. Now those of you who looked at my old Watch Your Step deck know my theory. I don’t care about giving them early force from Kessel, because theoretically, the odds of them being able to do anything better than simply removing my ship are slim to none. So first turn, I drop Dash in the Outrider to Kessel, and draw a few cards to plan a flip my next turn. I should have just dropped Melas in the Cantina and flipped first turn to cut his activation, but he had enough force saved that a ground beat-down was easy. So I just stayed pat. Turned out he had Thunderflare, Thrawn, Lateral Damage, and Imperial Command ALL in his opening hand. WTF? That’s two games in a row I got screwed by God-draws. So when he attacks Dash, and draws 3 destiny (1 being the Emperor), I lose Dash, the ship, and 16 more cards. ON HIS SECOND TURN. After 40+ games with the light deck, the odds finally caught up with me. I went into panic-mode, dropped Theron Nett to Tatooine with X-Wing Cannons, and Luke and pickle-smuggler to DB94 to flip. He goes back to getting on course with his objective, and on my turn I play Control/TV to find nothing of value. I take a Power Pivot just to make sure Theron Nett doesn’t suffer Dash’s fate, and he grabs the Control/TV. This turned out to cost him the game, because he later couldn’t grab On the Edge. While he’s playing around getting set up to destoy Alderaan, I’m hitting him with a small steady drain, and using Balls-in-the-wind 3PO to set-up my comeback. While we dance back-and-forth in space with Theron Nett Hyper Escaping and Cap’n Han/Melas/Falcon kicking Thrawn’s @ss, I set up 1 On the Edge from hand, and next turn two from the lost pile to pull back a total of 14. Almost what I lost from the Dash-debacle. Now I’m hitting him 3 at Kessel, 2 at the Cantina, and 1 at Tatooine, while he’s draing for 2 at Sullust when I’m not just blocking with Theron Nett and Hyper Escaping. I said it before, and I’ll say it again, Theron Nett is the Inter-galactic Pimp. I make one of my better comebacks (although the credit should go to the over-powered objective) and get the win.
Full Win by 17; 6 (+6)
Game 6 - My DS vs. Chris Gogolen’s WYS
Chris and I have been talking back and forth about decks a lot lately, and the end-result is that we know what each other is playing right now almost card-for-card. So this game gets really rough, really quick. First turn I drop Baron Von Big D1ck at Tatooine so I can hold the system to bomb, but when I draw for a Heavy Fire Zone and don’t get it, Chris knows he’s got a chance to drop in there and hurt me. If I can’t hold Tatooine, I can’t bomb his sites, and therefore can’t beat WYS. Dash, the Outrider, and Melas come to Tatooine, make Baron’s power=0, and draw a blind 6 for destiny just sinking the ship and everything on it. He’s already smiling because like I said before, without Baron the Beast, the deck has problems. I respond next turn with Jendon/Onyx 1, Lateral Damage, and draw a 5 for destiny. Since his objective isn’t flipped, (no forfiet +2 on Melas), he has to lose Dash. On his turn he drops Kessel and limps over there. I drop Jonus/Scimitar 2/Proton Bombs at Tatooine, which was what Chirs was waiting for. He throws Luke and a Freighter Crap-tain to Endor DB to flip, thus forcing me next turn to deploy a Dreadnaught and carry the bomber over to Endor. He doesn’t have another ship to deploy to Tatooine yet (since we’ve been constantly deploying instead of drawing), and transits to DB94. I drain at Endor, bomb my own DB to limit his ability to get back, the reinforce Tatooine and carry the bomber back over. Cap’n Han shows up somewhere in the Falcon, but after I bomb Luke in DB94, Lt. Hebsly/Scythe 3 come blind Tallon Roll Han out of the picture. The objective flips back and I go back to the order of chasing down the Outrider. We do this constant deploy/battle thing for a few more turns while I polish off the Cantina and leave Jonus alone at Tatooine. Jonus is such a beast. If you don’t deploy to Tatoonie, he drains you for two. If you come kill him, he takes no battle damage and I just deploy another one, thus wasting your time and force. So we’re both working on minimal force, and I’m winning the drain war, but Chris is pulling off On the Edge’s here and there so who knows who’s actually "ahead". But as the game goes on, Phennir shoots down both Theron Nett/Red 10 and Mirax/Pulsar Skate while Cap’n Han came back yet again. This time Chris pulled a 6 on the Tallon Roll to get his total to 14 (Han had a co-pilot), but Lt. Hebsly proved to be too much yet again as Dark Maneuvers and a drawn five got his total to 15. Bye bye Han. At that point he’s out of ships, got no rebels to On the Edge, and is on the 0-side of WYS. What’s left of my once proud starfleet limps through some drains to finish out the game. I don’t know exactly where I won this game, but I’ll take it. Chris has beaten me more than enough times for me to not feel bad about it.
Full Win by 20; 8 (+26)
So TJ wins the whole thing at 10 (+95), Greg takes second at 10 (+92), Daulton gets third also going 5-1, and I take fourth as the only (I think) 4-2. After that I wasn’t really paying attention, I just wanted to go eat. But not a chicken sandwich, because god forbid Poppa Tony’s re-open 5 weeks after a tiny little fire. Lazy b@stards.
So we hit turnpike Roy’s for some fried chicken, and TJ and Greg bomb Kim’s car with 80mph Iced Tea coming down the highway. We tried to launch a little counter assault with a soda-soaked tampon, but well, Dan’s aim was a little off. And don’t even asked what happened to the Condom water-balloon. Highway Wars are fun.
Everybody seems to like this part, so here you go:
Props:
Rich and Chris for once again running a tourney in less time than it should take.
TJ and Greg for coating Kim’s car with a sticky layer of Iced Tea splatter.
Turnpike Roy’s for not only having slammin’ fried-chicken, but also selling Dan the 64oz. insulated mug that he is now going to marry.
Kicks in the Head:
Poppa Tony, his lazy-eyed wife, his chunky-but-doable daughter, and anybody else who might have had anything to do with that damn kitchen fire. All I wanted was a friggin’ chicken sandwich.
Kim for smacking about 50 pickle slices out of my hand in the parking lot, which would have made excellent ammo going down the highway.
Peace.....