Editor: James Kong. Sunday 5th June 2005.
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Editor: James Kong. Sunday 5th June 2005.
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 "The EPIC tourney report Part III" 3rd Sealed Deck
The Deck
I could not have been happier with this deck. When we sat down for the final deck construction, I realized it could go either way, and I had failed to capitalize on a very strong pool the rounds before. I thought I could run out of luck here, but I got exactly the sort of deck I wanted. This deck is extremely simple, but flexible. It has some very good cards, like Jigsaw and Face The Master, but more importantly, it has consistency in teamups and on curve, and has offensive, defensive and generally flexible plot twists. Whatever my opponents could do, I was likely to have an answer for. Even better, the deck practically built itself. Cloak is terrible, so I didn’t even consider him. Good Night, Sweet Prince could have plausibly made the cut, but I am a huge fan of Meltdown, and Penance Stare is an amazingly underrated trick. I am continually surprised at how often one of those plot twists totally reverses the result of a game when both players are in negatives. I was very confident with this deck, and I was sure I could pull out the two wins necessary to mise Top 8. Rd 7: Scott Hunstad At any tournament you are going to have to hit the good players eventually, and even though I would rather not have had to play Scott here, it’s every man for himself. I missed my two again and I get beaten down by Zodiak. I land Stick and Scott has Daredevil I think, so I take more endurance. I have Masked Marauder and Scott has no four, so he drops New Blood and another three drop. Would you rather miss your two drop and get to play your four, or hit two and have to play another three drop? I like to think of these sorts of situations as similar to something that arises in chess, where you sacrifice the exchange (say a rook for a minor piece) for tempo. Obviously there are differences, but the player with the Four drop should look to consolidate their advantage by playing for the long game, whereas, the player with the three needs to turn around there short term loss quickly (i.e. their next initiative) while maintaining their short term endurance gain. So following this plan, and my usual maneuver when down on characters, I smack my three into the New Blood who obviously gets KO’d. I then send Masked Marauder into his Zodiak and pass, and he flips Marvel Team-Up. I don’t have a teamup yet, and I flinch. Scott notices. I call a judge to see if his stuff stacks, in case I want to tap some dude in response so his guy isnt team-stamped for something like Face the Master (His other 3 is a CL character, but I cant remember which one). Unfortunately there is nothing I can do and I pass, but Scott merely reinforces and I am visibly relieved. Blown To Pieces or Face would have destroyed me, and Scott is now well aware I have no teamup. At the very least I am able to work out he doesn’t have either, as he really had to pump if he did after I reacted so badly. He passes and we go to turn five his intiative. I land Jigsaw in response to his Vivisector and I have the Judge, Jury and Executioner so I put Jigsaw in front of Stick, with Masked Maruder at the back wing, hoping to get Scott to attack on Curve for fear of infinite pumps, and then I can KO Vivisector with Stick. So we go to attack and the craziness ensues. Scott sends Zodiak and Daredevil into Jigsaw, and passes. I do a quick double take and remind him he has passed, and his mistake dawns on him. He hadn’t pumped Daredevil so his attack wasn’t even enough to force me to use tricks. I pass and Daredevil goes down. He is then forced to send Vivisctor at Jigsaw and I am happy to see them both go down. Obviously rattled, Scott passes, and I think the best thing to do is just to not lose my head and consolidate my now brutal board, so I decline to attack with Masked Marauder, flip Judge Jury and KO Daredevil and Vivisector. It is amazing how such a seemingly small error can be so big a deal in the game. With hindsight I have no doubt that Scott would have destroyed me in that game, even after missing his four. Then again, we play the game because we think there is skill in it, and every little bit counts. I made it quite clear I was willing ‘to win that way’ regardless of what Kim Brebach might think, and even had a quick think about whether there was anyway I could fixate Scott on his mistake to make him play even worse. It was unnecessary as Scott was doing a pretty good job of beating himself up about it. Its not that I don’t know how it feels, I could be a double 10K champ if not for a monumental screwup, but situations like that harden you and I focused on trying to cement the win on turn six. I drew a teamup turning Jigsaw on big time and played Jaime Ortiz. Scott had Nuke, sort of canceling out my Masked Maurader. I try to attack as conservatively as possible as I have a seven and an eight in my hand, and I am still behind on endurance surprisingly enough. I am unable to stun Nuke, and he is able to recover his three and we got to 7 with the scores tight but with me having a much better board. We both recruit Bullseye and put Bullseye and Jaime in the front with Masked Marauder and Jigsaw in the back. Scott has Made Men however, and my formation is now in ruins. He hits Masked Marauder with Nuke and I have four pumps in my hand, but one is Ghost Rider (8), so I want to keep him. If I pump three times I have nothing left if he has a DEF trick, leaving me way open to Bullseye beatdown. It is crucial that depending on what Scott has, I can very easily be dead on this turn if I am not careful. Thus I take the extremely cautious option of playing Shakedown reinforcing and pumping once. Scott trumps me with No Rest. For some reason I thought I was still on the same DEF as Scott’s ATK and I pumped again for no reason. Realizing my error I kicked myself and forced myself to slow down again. At this point I was extremely frustrated. I couldn’t help but feel Scott deserved to lose for such a ridiculous mistake earlier on, and I was having trouble telling myself that the game was still in the a balance. I had just made a minor error of my own and I was in danger of throwing it all away if I wasn’t careful. I thought for a while and I deciced that I was better off just stunning Nuke, ensuring that next turn I would be able to kill him when I dropped Ghost Rider, so I stunned the Marauder and Jaime took on Nuke. Scott had no tricks. Phew. Bulleseye came over on Jigsaw and I took a truckload and moved to turn 8 down by ten or so. I untapped with a good row and dropped Ghost Rider (8). I can’t remember what Scott did but my work wasn’t over yet. I sent Jigsaw into Nuke and pitched three times, knowing that even if he exhausted all his dudes to pump and my guy died I would deal enough endurance elsewhere to win. They both went down. For the killer blow, I sent Ghost Rider into Bullseye and powered up, emptying my hand. Scott looks at his row, and has nothing. I attack with my other guys and he is left with a concealed guy who can attack with flight, but I have Penance Stare as well so I never look like losing from there. I had just won an extremely draining game that was frustrating to no end. I had to compose myself a little afterward, particularly because I was now 6-1 and only needed one more win for Top 8. Scott was obviously annoyed with himself but thems the breaks, and I will take the W through any legal means at an event of such a high level. I had done enough to deserve the win, even if I made small errors along the way, and I thought my deck was good enough to pull one of the next two games. Rd 8: Sam Kwang Sam introduced himself as ‘wukwang’ from the VsParadise forums. Like most NZ’ers, a lack of high level tournaments made it hard for them to get exposure, so I had no idea how good he was going to be, but I wasn’t about to underestimate anyone who was 6-1, particularly after he had beaten Scott Smith last round, denying me the potential concession and two free rounds into the Eight. Sam opened with Roscoe, which irked me, as I have never hit that guy 1st turn in the 10 or so games I have had him in my deck, and it usually spells bad times for the sort of game I like to play of building up small advantages. I have Hannibal King on turn 2, Sam has Iron Fist. Attack, Attack. I have a Kingpin for Sam’s Daredevil (Sam has been thinning his deck with Roscoe this whole time) and after he attacks predictably, I send Hannibal into Roscoe and he plays Missed Drop pitching Saint Anna. This sucks for me, because I am of the opinion that Saint Anna is practically unplayable, whereas Missed Drop is clearly good, and it seems as though Sam just made a highly efficient play giving me no return on my concealed investment. I have no pump (Armoury would have been so brutal lol) and sigh. Next turn I have the stellar Moon Knight and after a bit of thought I decide it is best to go for it a bit here, as Roscoe is going to destroy me if I am too conservative. I send Moon Knight on Daredevil and he has nothing. Mise. I teamup, and send Hannibal King and Kingpin into Saracen TBS-style (for exact damage). I have Shakedown (my only Plot twist so far!) but Sam has nothing. You can never underestimate the disabling effect this sort of attack can have on your opponent when it succeeds and I try to make a point of ‘how lucky’ I am there but Sam doesn’t bite. The true ridiculousness of Roscoe shows next turn when he fetches the double loyalty Elektra and I stare down the barrel. I have the similarly savage Jigsaw, but initiative is big here. Again my opponent has the No Rest For the Wicked after I pump Moon Knight twice, so I merely reinforce. Saracen went after Kingpin and I am forced to lie down. I then send Hannibal into Roscoe with a belated Armoury pump, and we pass, with Sam taking a minute to decide whether to keep Rosoce around. I don’t understand why you wouldn’t, as he now has Hand Dojo, and Roscoe is not going to be a liability when he has so many characters. If he always intended to get Jaime next turn Roscoe wants to hang around. Anyway, he keeps him. Next turn I have Kirigi to Jaime. With Roscoe in front I am forced to send Hannibal into Roscoe straight away, where I am surprised that Sam doesn’t stun to put Jaime into the combat to save him a point of endurance. I mean, if I have +11 ATK anywhere this turn he is dead however he looks at it. The presence of Elektra means I am pretty much forced to use Kirigi’s ability to send guys into the dark, but because of Jaime I am forced to use the ability then attack Jaime first. This sucks, considering life totals are so close, but 14ATK on a 5-drop is obviously hard to deal with. I pay go after Jaime with Kirigi, pumping with Armoury, so we both stun, and then I put Moon Knight in against Elektra. Jigsaw goes in against Saracen, me paying for Hand Dojo this time, to make sure I retain the board. The scores finish me on 3 with Jigsaw and Kirigi to Sam’s team of Elektra and Iron Fist and his 6 life. This will be tough. Interestingly Sam doesn’t drop a 7 but plays Spiderman-6. Sam’s intention is thus clear. He wants to tap my dudes down and swing over with Elektra on Kirigi for the win. I look at the board, look at my hand of both sevens, an eight and dudes and I realize that if I play a seven I will just lose to his plan, as at best he will send Elektra into Kirigi, I will have three pumps left with Jigsaw and my guy will fall over and I will lose 1 to –3. So the only play for me here is to not play anything, not even a resource. I have five guys in hand, so if he has no tricks I can pitch four guys and he will go to 1 and I survive, however emaciated. I pass, and Sam has to continue with his plan of exhausting my team, coz if I have the five guys and he teams with Iron Fist and Spiderman I can get to 16 DEF and he cant attack again or he will lose, or he just gets attacked back and loses. He taps my dudes, attacks and I pump out. Amazingly he has no extra trick and I survive. To go back to chess (I cut my gaming teeth in competitive chess, not MTG, as assumed), there is something of an axiom that the worst plays you make are always the plays you make after you just made the play that should have won you the game. I'll let you, dear reader, dwell on why that is so, but here I fell into that trap. After my amazingly counter-intuitive but nonetheless correct play last turn, I had clawed my way back into a game were I had been destroyed by Roscoe in the hands of a very tight player. The way the cards had fallen gave me next to no right to win, yet I had played out of my skin and given myself a chance. Too busy congratulating myself I had accidentally pitched the wrong card. For some reason I had kept my eight drop instead of one of my Sevens and now I was lost. I drew no characters off the top, and Sam played Daredevil. I had to scoop. After such an amazing game, I had thrown it all away right at the end. If i had played my own Daredevil I was likely to win there, and I was incredibly disappointed. Obviously I still have much to learn and I just concentrated on steadying my nerves. I was still in with a shot of drawing an X-1 Sydney player who could concede to me, but I had to be prepared to play. My deck was good, I knew I was good, and I had to stay focused for one more game. So I took a few deep breaths, waited for the standings and found out that I had to play. It wasn’t good times, but I wouldn’t let myself think it was bad times either. Composing myself I decided to stride over to table 4 and just win the damn game. Rd 9: Tom Langley Tom was a very cheerful guy who seemed to be genuinely enjoying himself, and he congratulated me as I was leaving the next day, which is quite underrated and much appreciated when you don’t know someone that well, so thanks Tom. I had seen him make some small errors against Scott Hunstad earlier so I knew this match would be in my favour skill-wise, but not so much that I could afford to be sloppy, if that is ever true. I mulliganned a terrible opening hand with both sevens and no other characters, and ended up with something like a three and a six and two plot twists, and drew two more plot twists. However I drew on turn two and didn’t find a two, so Tom bashed me with his. I had Elektra on turn 3 and did a little damage and then got bashed again. Then on turn four I was completely up against it. Tom dropped Moon Knight, and all I could muster was freakin’ Sniper! Bad times. At the end of the fourth turn the scores were 40-20 in favour of Tom. I am not kidding. Read it again. Then look where I ended up. Now you and my mum both think I am amazing at this game. I am not going to lie, I was bordering on distraught at this point. 40-20, sheesh. Moon Knight. God Damn. My sevens on the bottom of my deck with no shuffle effects. ****! Not even a visible character! I don’t know what happened then, but something just clicked inside of me. I just felt like there was no point giving up now, the game clearly wasn’t over, and if this really was a game of skill, I would lose this game at least pushing the absolute limits of it. I sort of went on tilt, except that it was positive rather than negative. I had Jigsaw and Jaime in hand, so I could be defensive. I had limited options on the board, so without seeming like an arsehole, I could subtly raise the speed of play to put Tom under pressure. I was suddenly thinking really clearly, and the rush was incredible. I knew what plays were the right plays were to make, and I knew not only that I would have to take certain educated risks, but that I would have to present them in a way which would give my opponent the most chances to screw up. I laid Jigsaw and knew I had to go for some tight attacks. I wasn’t going to lose my head, I was just going to make the plays and frustrate my opponent. I had Drive-By Shooting with Sniper teamed up, as well as Face The Master, so I knew I had to hinge my plan on beating off his next attacks with an untapped Jaime if I was to have any chance of winning. I attacked conservatively to ensure that I had enough board to make Drive-By relevant and I got to the next turn with some of the endurance back but the same lopsided board. Tom hit a six and I play Jaime, putting Jigsaw behind him and waiting for the moment of truth. Tom sends in a team for +1. Have to play the Face The Master first, as it would be too obvious if I play Drive-By and leave Jigsaw untapped. Tom has the requisite pumps, and I trump him with Drive-By, fingers crossed. Tom thinks for a second, and I think back to my Jedi training. These aren’t the pumps you are looking for. He sighs and flips his guy, and even though he is still in front by miles, the tide has turned. He can’t attack again so he has to sit there and take a Jaime beating bringing the scores back to respectability. I think it is like 25-15 or something going into my turn. I really wish I could remember more about this match. It was glorious (Thanks Ron Burgundy!)! So I have no sevens but I have Kirigi, and being out of D tricks I really have to win this right now. It is ok, as I have some pumps in my row I just have to be able to push through with Jigsaw. Tom has his Seven, forms and passes. I move into attack mode and he asks if he can change his formation. I have my plan now, and I can now smell what was before an unlikely victory, so I flatly refuse him. He accepts it somewhat sadly and I know I have it if I can work it out. I am able to take down his seven with a combination of Jaime and Sniper, then Kirigi is able to take out his six. Jigsaw goes in with a few pumps to sort out the five and our life totals are pretty even. He is on about 5 or so and I am on something like 7. I swing with Elektra into his last character Moon Knight, and I play Shakedown and pump with Armoury and he extends the hand. I could not friggin’ believe it. 7-2. Top Eight. I had just made the most remarkable comeback to Top Eight, and only Tom and I had seen it. That said, I didn’t care. I was ecstatic to make Top Eight. Sealed deck might be a bit of a mise, but I had definitely rode the rollercoaster all day and I believed I had played well enough to make the Eight. Although winning in the end was nice, for me it really is all about Top Eight, as single elimination is pretty brutal; I much prefer Swiss rounds as a determinant of skill. Three Top Eights in Three 10K’s is pretty insane, and puts me in a pretty exclusive club not only in Australia, but in the world. I wanted to win the draft, but honestly, once splits had been organized, and I was guaranteed the grand, I would have been happy with any other result. Ok except a Kiwi win. :) [ Email the Author | Discuss this Article ]
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