wenatchee-wa-3-30-02-clone-wars
Title: wenatchee-wa-3-30-02-clone-wars
Author: Earl "farScape1" Sessions
Date: Apr 4, 2002
PROLOGUE
It’s ten on a Friday night. Tomorrow is the Tournament on the Clone Wars, and I’m still looking for cards to complete my dark side deck that I started working on earlier. I haven’t even started constructing my light side deck. This is the first time that I waited so close to make my decks before the tournament, and I’m so scattered brain because I haven’t been playing many games over a month. Well, this is what I get for slacking.
11:00: I’m almost done with my dark side deck. Taking a breather from Star Wars, I pop in Farscape to watch Crichton get his brains sucked out by Scorpius. How fahrbot is that? 11:45: I’m back to making my decks, but then I get company. Casey Honeysett and Steven Pool want me to help them with their decks. I have my hands full with my own, so I point them towards my cards and tell them to help themselves only if they write down what they take. I want to make sure I get my cards back after the tournament. Casey Merry decides to help himself to some of my cards as well.
I spend almost an hour looking for the few cards that I needed to complete my dark side deck since my cards are scattered everywhere. I try to keep them organized, but they never do stay that way. 1:00: I finally move on to work on my light side deck. I pretty much just throw it together as best as I could since it is getting late, and I still have to help the others. Now Tome Potters wants to make a deck as well, but I tell him that there are too many digging into my cards right now. I tell him that he can scrape up whatever he can find when the rest of us are finished. I didn’t think he would.
Finally at 2:30, I complete my decks. Both my light and dark side are LSC. In my Dark side, I throw in all five of my Maul’s, a couple of Aurra Sings and her Blaster Rifle, a couple of Sidious, and some Destroyer Droids. I throw in high destinies so that I can do Podracing as well. Knowing that this is an Episode I only environment, I throw in a lot of Podracing interrupt cards because I’m sure that there will be a lot of Podracing going on in other decks. I wanted to make sure I win all Podraces. I did the same for Podracing on my light side deck. I throw in several jedi, Amidalas, Panakas, Tarpals, and about five Jar Jar Binks with Brisky Morning Muchen as a start with Podrace Prep. I figure that I can at least have a fun time by annoying the opponents with a ton of Jar Jar clones who keeps coming back.
I’m finished, but now Tom decides to take me up on my offer on making his decks. Frell! It’s 2:30 in the morning, and I don’t have enough thinking power to come up with anything good. There just isn’t enough time, and we all are delirious at this late. That’s how it happens. We throw together two of the craziest decks we can think of, with the help of the others. A LSC deck that only contains Gungans, and a deck that has tons of Jawas and weak senators to take over Tatooine. With all the fun of creating these brilliant decks, we stay up even later to test them out. I wanted to check out how my decks work anyway. His decks made me laugh so much that I forgot to drain a couple of times. I saw a strategy in that. 6:00: We are done, and now I’m already regretting on staying up so late. What was I thinking?!? Oh well... only live once, and I was living at the moment. I know that I will feel like dren in the tournament tomorrow. I crashed, wishing that I had the brains to do so earlier.
ON WITH THE GAMES
10:45: My alarm is going off, and I do not know why. Where am I? Who am I? Oh... I remember now. I’m playing in a tournament, and I was stupid enough to stay up til 6:00 in the morning. I’m up... barely. I know I can do this.
I slowly get ready and everybody comes back to the house. They take off before me because I had to pick up Stephen, my stepbrother. I get to the card shop about 12:45, which is 15 minutes before the tournament starts. I decide to buy a pack of Reflections III, and I pull Darth Maul AI Foil! I feel good already, despite that I didn’t get much sleep.
GAME 1: LS LSC vs. Jason Herrin’s Watto Objective
I’m playing Jason Herrin who made up the Clone War Rules, and I haven’t really tested the rules much myself. What a start! This will be our second game ever, so I didn’t feel too bad. He’s playing the Watto Objective, and takes off with the Podracing as well. I did the Watto Objective in the last Episode I only, so I know how nasty this can get. This is one of the first times I went up against one though. His first move, he slaps down Watto at the junkyard and slaps down a battle droid at Mos Espa flipping the objective and forcing me to lose two forces right off the bat. For some reason, he forgets that losing two forces causes him to put the card in his used pile, and lucky for me that card was a Lord Maul. I knew I had to stop his Watto before this continue or I will be frelled, so by my second turn I put out Panaka, Amidala, and a few Jar Jars at the junkyard. If my memory serves me, I take out his Watto with one of my Jar Jar clones, but he hits my Panaka with a Destroyer Droid. I battle him again on the next turn, and I knock out the rest of his characters there with only a couple of Jar Jars left to control the site. In the meantime, he plants a Maul at my Generator Core flipping my objective. He also gets out Deep Hatred telling me that his deck is Anti-LSC. I can see that I was going to have a problem with this one, especially since I can’t get any Jedi into my hand. I also couldn’t get any podracing interrupts into my hand to help me out on the race. I was staying behind on the race with about a difference of 3 - 5. Everything else was going all right since our loss piles were looking even. The podrace was about up, but he decides to drain me before drawing for the race. Go figure, I lose two sixes that would have been for race destinies. Now I pull a 2 and a 3, losing to the race. I believe I would have won if he didn’t drain me first... so I lost 11, and he gains 11. It would have helped if I had the DShield A Close Race, but I didn’t have any until after the Tournament. Too late. Anyway, I knew I was pretty much a goner now. To top things off, he puts down a couple of Darth Maul clones to make my Jar Jars ability equaling 0. He was draining right threw them, and there was nothing I could do. I did get a Windu out, but he took him out right away just as I got him down. Oh well... I go into the hole by 21,I think, in my first game.
-21
(-21)
GAME 2: DS LSC vs. Tom Potter’s LSCing Gungans
Well I knew that this would be my break, especially since Tom lost his last game by 42. I did play this game last night, and his Gungans ended up being more of a challenge than I thought it would. But I was more prepared this time, and he wasn’t getting all the cards he needed out. I start out by damaging his imaginary Pod with Hit Racer, so he doesn’t even bother with placing anything down. I get Maul down the next turn with his double stick, and I start draining him 5 at the Generator Core. He has no Jedi, so I don’t have much to worry. He finally gets his Battle Plain out and moves his Gungans there, but he already lost too many to the drains I am giving him at the palace. I deploy a clone Maul and a Destroyer Droid, and I move into his Underwater sites to get an extra drain. I win the race, retrieving most of my forces back and making him lost most of his. We battle once at the underwater site... I win. Then I finish him off with drains. I win by a whopping 40, which puts me back in the positives.
+40
(19)
INTERMISSION
Well the game with Tom only took about 20 minutes, and now I’m bored. Everybody else was still playing, so I finally decide to break down and get my first Lord Of The Rings starter since Tom has a deck. I get Tom to teach me how to play while everybody else continues with their games. I liked what I learned, but the game didn’t last after our pizza came. Scratch LOTR, I’m hungry! My lack of sleep hits me while I’m eating my slices, so I don’t really remember much of the conversations. I was lost in some distant part of my mind... trying to find a way home. Everybody was laughing about dren, but I was mostly clueless. I was ready to get this over so I can go to bed before I become comfortably numb here.
THE FINAL BATTLES
GAME 3: DS LSC vs. Dennis Jeffris THGG/WNANO
Huh? How did I get here? Last thing I remember, I was eatin’ pizza. Well I’m awake again, and I’m up against Dennis, who I always end up playing in every tournament. And he is using the LS objective that I used in the last Episode I tournament. I didn’t get to play that objective much, so I couldn’t remember all the details on it. I knew I didn’t want him draining me at the Junkyard. He is also doing Podrace, but neither of us initiated the race until later. I was waiting to get the right cards before we started on that one. He gets control of the junkyard fast, and I’m losing to credits. He sets up a docking bay next to the junkyard, and places the pain-in-the-neck Secure Route. I was ready to deploy to Theed, but I changed directions to take over the docking bay, canceling Secure Route. I was going slower than ever in this game because there were so many dilemmas and I’m still working on the clone war rules. He was using mostly senators in his deck. I finally initiate Podrace, and I damage his Podrace with Hit Racer... but he in return damages mine. My first pull is a 7, so I lose one force to place it... he puts his back. I end up winning the race in three turns, so I gain 11 and he loses 11. I move Maul and his double stick, Aurra Sing with her gun, a Destroyer Droid, and a few other characters over to the Junkyard to stop the fourth drain. He deploys and battles me. I hit his Obi-Wan, PL and another character, but he overtakes me in power because of his clone Amadalas riding Eopie added 2 more battle destinies. I should have looked out for that. He also hits my Maul with Obi-Wan’s lightsaber, so I end up losing everything... I was pretty well slaughtered. Not only that, it added another credit to his objective, and it was flipped. So now I’m hurting, even after winning the podrace. He starts spreading his characters out, and he deploys a few senators to Theed. I keep ending up with Mauls in my hand, so I deploy one to Theed with another double stick. But things are not going fast enough because I’m losing a lot to the senators occupying battleground sites, and I’m stuck with decisions on what to do with my other Mauls in hand. To make things more intense, he gets his Secure Route back out... and now the time limit is up, so he have to finish off our turns. I decide to deploy my Mauls in a couple of places to stop some drains. I battled in one place, but I couldn’t make him lose any forces. He got to force drain me a little on his turn, and we ended in a time out game with a difference of 7 his way. We always get close games like these. I still stay in the positives.
-7
(12)
GAME 4: LS LSC vs. Casey Merry’s Invasion Objective
I didn’t think I would be going up against Merry since he is in the lead. He’s won three in a row, and I lost two out of three, so I was going to try my best to take this one. Besides, he needed his ego knocked down a few notches since he won the last Episode I tournament. I pulled out a great starting hand that contained some great combo characters. I picked up a few cards and started saving my forces for the deployment. He didn’t even bother picking up for race destinies, so I’m getting an easy win on that. By the third turn, he starts deploying to the Throne room and flips his objective. I knew it was time to make my move. I deploy Amidala, Panaka, Jar Jar and a clone Jar Jar, and Tarpals. I think I had a couple of weapons too. Anyway, my clone Jar Jar suicides with OWO-1 With Backup knocking down his power quite a bit, and I throw in We Don’t Have Time For This and No Giben Up, General Jar Jar! to give me a total of five battle destinies. I forget that he is getting extra power because of his starships at Naboo, but I still took control of the Throne room flipping his objective back. I won the battle, but the war was far from over. He started deploying to the Generator Core to get that drain of three, and somehow I had it to where the Throne Room was a couple of sites away. So I just started building up while we were draining each other until he got Sidious in there, which flipped my objective. I started moving all my Jedi towards him so I can drain again at the Throne Room, and he moved some of his battle droids there. I deployed more Jar Jars to take out his OWO-1 w/Backup, and I continued to win the battles at the sites. I also took out his Sidious through LSC, so I was able to drain where I had Jedi again. Sometime in this, I won the Podrace and placed I Did It, and I retrieved most of my cards back. I started placing clone Jar Jars all over the place to get more drains in, and I believe there was one or two more battle. Jar Jar easily took out any battle droid, and I finished up off with the drains. I won by 17.
+17
(29)
Well, I knew I wasn’t high enough to get the top two or three, but I was ahead of most. There were ten people all together, but I can only remember the top four players.
1. Dennis Jeffris (congrats on your first tournament win)
2. Jason Herrin
3. Casey Merry (sorry for having to knock you down to third, but thanks for getting me to fourth)
4. Me, whooo hooooo
Ok, I guess I can give a few highs and lows of the day.
HIGHS
-getting a Darth Maul AI Foil
-beating Casey Merry in a Episode I only environment, ha
-buying my first LOTR cards and getting into the game finally
-lots of pizza for everyone
-finally getting the DShield A Close Race, thank you Mike!
-getting many stares from all my Jar Jar clones, heheh
LOWS
-not enough sleep!!!
-losing my first Podrace
-losing my first game mainly because I lost the Podrace
-taking longer than usual on my turns because I’m out of practice
So I had a lot of fun even though I felt like a zombie. I will try to make my decks soon, so I will be a month ahead of the next tournament. I also want to try the LOTR tournament if I can learn enough on how to play it. Anyway, until a flock of geese truly kills a Jedi, I’ll see you next month.
EPILOGUE
I head home to my mom’s house to grab some grub thinking on what to do next. Hmmmm... so many things I would like to do. I’m already pumped to make new decks, and I want to try some things with the V cards. I also want to watch some shows that I have recorded and haven’t viewed yet... but I notice something strange happening to my body as I’m eating. I think it is trying to shut down on me for the lack of sleep. Needless to say, I found my entertainment by dropping dead into my bed for most of the night... that was until I got company again...