Joshua Grace Foil Japanese Vader Day Mirkwood 2-6 (tournament report)

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Joshua Grace Foil Japanese Vader Day Mirkwood 2-6 (tournament report) is the tournament report Joshua Grace posted on DeckTech on 7 February 2001 about February 2001 Minneapolis tournament (6 February).[1] Joshua Grace finished 3rd at the Tuesday-night Mirkwood tournament in Minneapolis on 6 February 2001 with ISB Operations and a Throne Room mains deck, going 3–1 (6, +38) and losing only to Michael Raveling (playing Dion Erbes's decks) in the last round; Tim won the tournament and a foil Japanese Vader.

Report info

Games

Games as the author describes them; margins are as stated in the report.

Round Opponent Author's deck Opponent's deck Result Margin
1 Rich Jeffery Light Throne Room Mains with Ishi-Tech SYCFA Manipulator Win (report: 'Rich Jeffries'; 2(+29)) FW +29
2 Nick Dark ISB powerhouse w/DB's (not-quite-Ravelling-style) WYS Win (first name only (from St. Cloud); margin from running total 4(+42)) FW +13
3 Michael Raveling Light Throne Room Mains with Ishi-Tech Dion Erbes's CCT Hansicle Win (report: 'Mike Ravelling', playing Dion Erbes's deck; margin from running total 6(+51)) FW +9
4 Michael Raveling Dark ISB powerhouse w/DB's Dion Erbes's Hidden Base (pure space) Loss (rematch; 'whittling Mike's force down to a differential of 13'; final 6(+38)) −13

Other results named in the report

Original report

foil-japanese-vader-day-mirkwood-2-6

  • Author: Joshua "Stormcrow" Grace
  • Published: Feb 7, 2001
Usually, the Mirkwood tournaments draw 10 or a dozen players, but there are the occassional (and random) nights when a good-sized crowd will gather at Mirkwood for Star Wars CCG mirth and merriment. Tuesday’s tournament was one such tournament, gathering around 20 players, including Royce, a suprise guest from the Alderaan region who, much to my chagrin (and Scrye’s), opted not to play Rescue the Princess... Anyway, to continue the protracted preamble to this report, I went up to the register to fork over my dollar for the tournament (since I forgot to take one of my Cloud City packs from my apartment) and overheard Tim, the store’s co-manager, and Garrett, a player, talking about something when Garrett said, "We should really let Josh decide." Naturally, I asked, "Let Josh decide what?" Tim said that, due to my performance in Mirkwood tourneys over the past month, I had earned a foil Japanese Vader. The option (!) in this decision was that I could put it on the line, allowing the eventual tournament winner to claim the Vader. I actually thought about this for a few seconds; that’s my proof that I’m a sporting fellow. Then, like any sane individual, I took the Vader. And promptly traded him with Chad & Jerry for a Jedi Luke (yes, Chad & Jerry will get "props" this week instead of the usual trader "slops"). It turned out Tim had another foil Japanese Vader to throw on the line for the tournament winner, anyhow. So, feeling like less of a heel, I entered the tournament hoping to win a 2nd Vader. My chances were pretty good, I thought, since Mike Ravelling had decided to play Dion Erbes’ decks and let Dion play his. My Light Side was a Throne Room Mains deck with Ishi-Tech. Dark Side was an ISB powerhouse w/DB’s. Game 1: My Light Side vs. Rich Jeffries’ SYCFA Manipulator To make a short story shorter, we both dumped a bunch of sites out onto the table in the first couple of turns while I controlled the DS:DB early with Obi-wan. He put Vader down to battle Obi (and an Ishi-tib, I think), but a Fallen Portal was the end of Vader. Lucky draw, but that’s how it goes for me against Rich. No big surprise. So, then he put Mi’yoom at the Executor DB (?), planning to start his manipulation, and drew up... all of his cards! (??) So, Lando w/Axe, Luke w/Saber and some others came down to kill Mi’yoom with Draw Their Fire hitting the table, and shortly after Rich lost that battle, I ended the game with no lost pile. FW 2(+29) This has apparently put me in the top pairing which, with a foil Japanese Vader on the line, was pretty darn cool. Game 2: My DS against Nick’s (not-quite-Ravelling-style) WYS Having lost to Mike Ravelling’s broken WYS deck on Saturday, I decided to play cautiously, setting my forces up to avoid a multiple-destiny beat-down. This allowed Nick to get in a couple of early drains against me, but soon I had an undercover spy blocking his Cantina drain, Walkers and/or the Emperor (and the ominous Force Lightning) blocking all the battleground DB’s, and big blue in space at both Tatooine and Kessel (with enough destiny draws to crack his Falcon’s immunity). There wasn’t any battling since he played a barrier when I set Grand Admiral Thrawn and the Chimaera up against a lone Captain Han, and, from that point on, Nick was afraid to challenge my forces, and it just didn’t pay for me to attack him, since all his drains were cancelled each turn (or I would lose an ISB agent and retrieve him with the objective each of my turns). However, Nick made me pay for my impatience when I grabbed his Rebel Barrier. He must have played On the Edge 10 times and retrieved 4 force with it each time. Yet, the ISB lock- down proved too effective for him to overcome, and it was merely a matter of time before my drains overtook his retrieval. FW 4(+42) After this game, I managed to trade with Royce for a Smoke & Mirrors 5. X-Files may not be a popular game anymore, but it’s cheap, baby, and fun! I think I traded a Mon Cal cruiser for the X-Files equivalent of a Mara Jade (and her saber). Surprised to learn that Dion Erbes had an extensive X-Files collection, I taught him the rules for the advanced game. So, going into game 3, I was again in the top pairing, this time against my own personal Lex Luther (or am I his?), Mike Ravelling. But Mike was playing Dion’s decks, so I didn’t expect as tough a game as usual. (Meanwhile, Mike’s decks were 1-1.) Game 3: My LS vs. Mike Ravelling playing Dion’s CCT Hansicle I didn’t draw any 2/0 locations in my opening hand. Just the Home 1 DB. So I threw that down and searched for the Echo DB. Oola went out to the Home 1 DB for early generation and, hopefully, to get out an early lock. But Mike played his 1st turn intelligently (duh) drawing a handsize just above my activation and saved the rest of his force. On my 2nd turn, then, I deployed Leia w/Blaster to the Carbon Chamber and moved her over to rescue Han. With no Rebel Barrier in hand, I saved a force hoping to bluff Mike. But it was to no avail. Mike, in fact, had drawn a Mara and deployed her against Oola, fetched her saber and put First Strike on the table. Oola died, but Mara drew Mara for destiny, so the loss was recoverable. I hoped to take advantage of First Strike by throwing out Chewie Protector, KFC, some other scrub and Luke w/Saber against Mara. But Mike had the barrier for Luke. I don’t think I battled that turn. The next couple of turns saw me losing battles at the Home 1 DB while Mike was retrieving from First Strike. I eventually decided that it wasn’t worth the fight and had Luke transit the heck away. So it became a drain race for a while, and I was losing. But Mike attacked Leia and Cap’n Han with Ephont Mon and Mighty Jabba. When the smoke cleared, Ephont Mon had died along with Cap’n Han, but Mighty Jabba couldn’t afford to run his lard @$$ away from Leia before we all discovered that Han hadn’t died but had just run away to fetch his blaster. So I initiated battle, hit Jabba with Han, targetted again with Leia to add 5 from Aim High, and drew a total destiny of 9. Mike ended up losing Jabba and 11 force while Han took Advantage of the situation to run over to join Obi-wan and Major Hashish at the CC DB. I ate another drain of 2 at the Home 1 DB before I was able to deploy Boussh to block that site. Mike was now losing the drain race and attempted to retrieve force by battling Luke w/Saber and an Ishi-tib with Bane Malar. However, that move backfired when Luke sliced Bane and drew a 4 for destiny to Mike’s... 0 (I didn’t even have to lose the Ishi-tib). That pretty much summed it up. One or two more turns of draining ended the game. FW 6(+51) And it’s looking good so far since there are only 3 undefeated players left, and one of them, Tim, has a timed win. I’m 19 differential ahead of 2nd place and think I might get two Japanese foil Vaders in one night. Game 4: My ISB vs Mike Ravelling playing Dion’s Hidden Base Well, this wasn’t what I wanted. After the last game, I had breathed a sigh of relief and shook Mike’s sweaty hand... Only, as it turns out, to play Mike again. Royce, the other undefeated player with full wins, is on the same side as me, working his Alderaan tech with Scum. (Tim, meanwhile, is playing Light Side and *should* be playing me, but Decipher’s software doesn’t see things that way. And none of us realize this until after the game.) So Mike and I sit across from each other once again. I decide to start You Cannot Hide Forever in order to ditch it later for Search & Destroy. Mike starts Squassin, Wise Advice/Do or Do Not, and the effect that lets you forfeit weapons. So I think it’s a B-wing deck or such and joke that I’m not going to be stupid enough to deploy to space. I get an Emperor in my hand and deploy him for free to the Coruscant site, use IAO to get the Coruscant DB and move Palpy over. Along with Rendili, this gives me beaucoup activation early. Mike reveals Tycho to fetch Green Squadron 3 and set him up at Rendili. Well, I swallow my earlier comment about not deploying to space since my hand holds: the Executor, Chimaera, Grand Admiral Thrawn and that crazy Victory Class whose name I shall never remember. So I save force for a turn and deploy Thrawn in the Chimaera to his Barrier. Blah. We then battle frequently in space, and I lose. I can’t get agents on the ground to flip. I can’t set up Imperial Decree or Search & Destroy. I can’t kill Corran Horn. And, when on my 2nd turn I search for a docking bay, the only one in my deck is the <> DB that I want to deploy to Kessel, Kiffex or Coruscant. Except I forget that people who are playing pure space play the Coruscant system, so I deploy my generic docking bay to some drain-1 system instead. While I go about losing all my ships in battle (including Bossk which I draw later), I probe all of Mike’s systems except the correct one. In the end, I’m upset that I’m going to lose the foil Vader, but given my poor play, whittling Mike’s force down to a differential of 13 was an accomplishment. So, I go 6(+38). Royce loses his game by 4 or so. But Tim notches a 4th win to take the tournament and a foil Japanese Vader. Mike Ravelling gets 2nd. I get 3rd. Nick, who travelled down from St. Cloud for the tournament, defeats Royce, knocking him out of the top 4, to claim 4th for himself. Chad, Jerry, Justin Alfs and I discuss the possibility of taking what I know of the incredible, edible Middle Earth: the Drinking Game and modifying the rules for Star Wars CCG. Cheers: Tim for the big win! Mirkwood for all the tournaments and the great support. Chad & Jerry. To get them off my back. Graham for the surprise Cherry Coke. Mike Ravelling for being one of the few players to consistently play well enough to merit shaking a consistently sweaty palm. Jedi Luke being for destiny 6 (even if I never drew him). Foil Japanese Vader for being trade-bait for a Jedi Luke. Rich Jeffries, thanks for the auto-wins ;-P Royce, Nick, Nick’s brother, Sam, and Sam’s friend (even though he cheated) for joining in the fun. Royce for the Smoke & Mirrors 5. Jeers: Herb. Had to constantly avoid him. Decipher’s software. I get screwed weekly. Ex-girlfriends in general. Joshua "Stormcrow" Grace

See also

Sources

References

  1. ↑ foil-japanese-vader-day-mirkwood-2-6, DeckTech (Joshua "Stormcrow" Grace, 7 February 2001). Preservation copy: GitHub Pages.
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