father-william-and-endor-closed-7-29-01

Title: father-william-and-endor-closed-7-29-01
Author: Michael "rayc" Hawley
Date: Aug 1, 2001

After a long day of gaming I got back to the hotel room I was sharing with Mike Pistone. Mike was wired from drinking eleventy million cans of Pepsi. I was completely worn out from having only gotten 4 hours of sleep the night before and eating only one meal all day. So I sat on my bed and ate chips while Mike worked on his Endor/DS2 Closed Environment decks. He had me look at the decks and I made a few suggestions but I really couldn’t concentrate very well and I did not remember much about the decks, except that the LS was a Rebel Strike Team deck that attempted to blow up the bunker.

I was planning to take two of my regular tournament decks to the No Such Thing As Luck tournament that was running at the same time as the Endor tourney. I planned to make a couple of switches to give them glaring vulnerabilities that I would be able to exploit when I switched decks with my opponent. I was going to take all of the space out of my decks and put in a few more sevens. That way, if my opponent’s decks had any starships at all, I could deploy the ships immediately with no fear of a beatdown. I figured that I could do this just before the tournament, so I went to sleep as soon as Mike had his decks built.

Well the next day came and I played in my 2-man space tourney (see my other tournament report); and next it was time for the No Such Thing As Luck. It turned out that the prize for the No Such Thing As Luck was an R2-D2 tee shirt, which Mike really wanted. So he changed his mind and switched from the Endor thing to the No Such Thing As Luck. This left the Endor tournament with only three players. So I decided to take Mike’s Closed environment decks and play the Endor so there would be 4 players.

Actually this was complicated by the fact that Eric Hunter had showed up and was going to borrow Mike’s decks to play in the No Such Thing tourney. So I loaned Eric a Brangus deck that I used for playtesting and a WYS deck that he did not like and gave back to me. He decided to use his own light deck.

Of course Eric had modified Mike’s decks a bit and there was a mad scramble to switch cards in and out. Eric had suggested that I put Carida, DS2 Docking bay, and Mob points in the dark deck. So I did that. I also added a Chimaera, a third Emperor, and an additional Imperial Command. I took out some low destiny interrupts, like Ghhhk; but I left in the Monnoks.

As we went through this, I began to realize that I hated the whole blow up the Bunker idea and that there were a lot of changes that I wanted to make to the light deck. So I tool all of Mike’s spare Endor and DS2 cards and went off to the tournament room and made changes while the tourney was getting underway. Basically, I added a lot of starships and pilots, got rid of the explosive charges and changed the interrupt mix as much as possible. All this time I was talking to myself about how I could not play the deck and I can’t believe I said yes to 6 copies of Insertion Planning. I think Mike was under the impression that Monnok would not be legal for this tournament and it was because it was in the DS2 starter decks.

Well the pairings were called and I got to play dark side first, so I would have a little more time to tweak the light deck. Because there were only 4 players, there was no time limit and we decided to only have 3 games:

Game 1: My (Mike Pistone’s) DS Endor Ops w/beefy characters and Blue stuff vs. Kris Earle’ s There Is Good In Him with Space with weapons.

I started the usual Endor Ops stuff. My starting effects were Mob Points, Imperial Arrest Order, and You Cannot Hide Forever (to lose for something like search and Destroy). He started There Is Good In Him with the usual stuff. He started Squadron Assignments and the effect that allowed him to forfeit weapons to the used pile. I don’t remember his third effect. On the first turn I got out Carida and the DS2 docking bay and drew up. After drawing I had three star destroyers (Chimaera, Dominator, and Accuser) in hand along with Igar and Tempest 1, Captain Sarkili, Monnok and some other red. I was hoping for a Lord Vader but no luck.

Kris activated and drew up as well. Next turn I had good activation. I looked for a docking bay with IAO in order to determine what was in my force pile. Well all the Lord Vaders were in the reserve deck but only one Emperor. So I knew that there were 2 Emperors in my force pile. Kris got to verify and saw that I only had one or two starships in my reserve deck. He concluded that I had very little space. Little did he know that I had three ships in hand. I deployed Igar in Tempest 1 at the Endor Docking Bay. and drew up the rest. I got the Emperor but still had no Lord Vader.

Now Kris could not activate much because I had an imperial at the docking bay. He deployed a starship and matching pilot at Carida and moved Luke in front of Tempest 1. He started to draw up cards. He picked up the cards with a very tentative motion and, as he did so, he shot a furtive glance at his weapon enhancing effect. I knew what I had to do. I activated and paid 4 force for a Monnok - lost. Kris smiled and made a good-natured derogatory remark about my weak character and questionable ancestry and placed 7 intruder missiles in his lost pile!

Eventually I got Vader down spread and drained with him and the Emperor and Janus and star ships at Endor. Kris made a valiant effort to come and block drains and take out Vader but he missed and only got Sarkili. I got the full win by 20 something.

Fill win ~25

Highs: Beating Kris - a great opponent who is familiar with this format and that Monnok.
Lows: None

Game 2: My (reinvention of Mike Pistone’s) Rebel Strike Team vs. Renee Brand’s Endor Ops

Renee started the usual Endor Ops stuff. She used Operational As Planned as her starting interrupt to get DS2, Moff Jerjerrod, and Inconsequential Losses into hand. I started Rebel Strike Team stuff, Strike Planning, Your Insight Serves You Well and Squadron Assignments.

Before activating, I sacrificed Insight for Battle Plan. I also got General Madine from the reserve and deployed him to the Rebel Landing Site after activating. I then used his game text to get Wuta. I deployed Wuta to the same location and used his game text to get out a 2/1 Endor location (Chirpa’s Hut was in my used pile). Renee brought down a small hit squad and managed to kill Madine but Wuta stayed and that’s what mattered. Next turn I got Chirpa’s Hut and a bunch of reinforcements to Wuta’s location.

One of the things I did to change Mike’s deck was add more ships and matching pilots. This was key as I was able to get a huge presence in space. I deployed Wedge in Red Squadron 1 and Tycho in Green 3 to Endor so that I could enforce Battle Plan without having to pay for it myself. On her next turn, Renee got out a bunch of AT-STs and Bikes with biker scouts and scout blasters. She also got down Vader with his DS2 lightsaber. She won a few battles but could not get the big kill. I refused to take her bait and initiate a battle of my own until I was able to pull Beezer and deploy her to prevent the huge react I figured she was planning. I then spread, flipped the objective and waited for her to act.

In the meantime, I had moved over to the Death Star and was draining her for 5 there. After pulling the scouts and sites, my deck had huge destiny and, even with her Imperial Arrest Order, she was going to suffer a fair amount of attrition in any battle she initiated. So the rest of the game consisted of me making big drains and her initiating battles at the big site and moving to block some of my drains. Since there was nothing she could do to me in space, I won the drain race handily.

Full win ~19

Game 3: My (reinvention of Mike Pistone’s) Rebel Strike Team vs. Bob Bragdon’s Endor Ops

Bob was playing a much more balanced deck. He started the usual Endor Ops stuff and got out Battle Order, Inconsequential Losses, and the Dark side version of Squadron Assignments. I started Rebel Strike Team stuff, Strike Planning, Your Insight Serves You Well and Squadron Assignments.

On Bob’s first turn he used and imperial command to get Piet and deploy him at the bunker. He then used Piet to get Commander Merrejik. He deployed Merrejik and got himself a system (Kessel, I think). I could see that Bob’s deck was much more balanced that Renee’s had been. I would have to tread lightly until I saw what he was up to.

Before activating, I sacrificed Insight for the effect that lets me get Home One from reserve. I also got General Madine from the reserve and deployed him to the Rebel Landing Site after activating. I then used his game text to get Wuta. I deployed Wuta to the same location and used his game text to get out Chirpa’s Hut. At least I was not giving away a lot of force. Deployed the Home One effect and re-circulated. While he activated, I got Home One from my reserve. Now he had to be careful.

In the early going, I fortified my ground forces. He came down with Lord Vader and Dueling Stick but I was able to absorb the losses. When your opponent can not reduce your forfeit, it is amazing the staying power those cheap Rebels have. Luke came down and sliced Lord Vader and managed to survive Vader’s blade, so I had the advantage on the ground.

Bob, however had the advantage in space. He had a mix of ties with matching pilots, weapons and weapon tricks. He had deployed a bunch of systems so we were playing a very tight game of Cat and Mouse. He was the Cat in space and I was the Cat on the planet surface. I had the advantage because I was able to spread on the ground and ping him with small drains although he had control of the Endor system for most of the game and was able to keep me on the zero side of my objective most of the time. He had Chiraneau out but I was able to get out Menace Fades and keep it in effect by running away to systems he did not occupy. He would have to chase me there and leave another system open and I would just run to that system.

In the end I was able to converge all ships on Endor and keep my objective flipped for 2 turns, Thus draining him out with all my drain bonuses at the Endor locations. A very tense, tight and enjoyable game.

Full win ~9

Highs: Just about everything
Lows: None

So that’s it. Three games. I won the tournament as the only undefeated player. It was fun.

Props to
Kris for the game and for running the Con
Renee for the game
Bob for the game and for our sealed deck game the previous day.
Mike Pistone for the decks

No Slops

Thanks for reading.