This tourney report is hideously long, but hopefully you’ll find it worth reading. First, some background. I’m not really a Harry Potter player. I have not read any of the books, and haven’t even seen the movie (sacrilege!). However, my two sons, Daniel and David (ages 10 and 8), are big fans, as are my brother’s two kids who are the same age. My brother Greg Hodgkinson, who makes occasional contributions to POJO’s website, runs the Harry Potter league in our local Wizards of the Coast (WOTC) store in Columbia Mall. Being a long-time Magic: The Gathering player, it wasn’t hard for me to read the HP spoiler lists and figure out what cards/strategies were likely to have more success. I created my son’s first two decks from two starter sets and a few extra booster packs. I subsequently kept buying cards and improving their decks over time and coaching them on how to play the game in general and their decks specifically. As both decks were creature-based, and our local store seemed to have predominantly spell-based decks, I created a third creatureless deck to help them practice. I eventually tuned this deck to be almost as good as the two primary decks.
I
continued to sit on the sidelines until my brother mentioned the free Diagon
Alley Pre-release tourney weekend, where free boosters and promo cards would be
given out to winners/participants. Sounds good to me! I love free stuff. We
played in 3 events, two on Saturday the 23rd and one on Sunday April
7th. I’ll summarize the first two and give an in-depth report on the
third one.
We
started play at the local WOTC store where my brother helps out. Greg had to run the show, so the Hodgkinson
clan made up only 5 of the 19 people present. I came in second place, tied with
three others at 5-1. My 10 year old
nephew Neil was the only kid placing in the top two positions. The store was
gracious enough to add in their own boosters to make sure that all participants
received at least two packs of cards. None of the folks who went 5-1 played the
6-0 winner(Brian)! Still, everyone went
away happy!
On
to the next tourney. We had an hour to
get to the location and eat. This
tourney was held at another WOTC store in the nearby Arundel Mills Mall. This
time, using the same creatureless deck as before, I had the best overall record,
at 9-1. But I did not win! My brother,
who was playing a deck that I literally built for him between the two tourneys,
ended up beating me out for first despite four losses. He simply played faster,
and had more games. The third store, DugoutZone in Eldersburg, was not able to
schedule the tourney that
"correct" weekend. Instead, they delayed their tourney a few
weeks so they could advertise it. This store gave every participant a free
Promo card, but only gave out the free packs to the top four winners: 20 for
first, 8 for second, 4 for third, and 2
for fourth. All three stores had a different prize structure.
Here
is the report for that last Diagon Alley tourney held on April 7th
at the DugoutZone.
Unfortunately,
my two boys had a conflict with attending this tourney, so only four of us made
the journey to play in this tourney. We arrived at the tourney to find there
were 8 other players besides us. The organizers chose to have five preliminary
rounds with randomly chosen partners, with the four best records to move on to
the medal round single elimination portion. However, two players came half an
hour late, and the organizers decided to squeeze them in anyway. So the format
was changed to six preliminary rounds, followed by the top five players advancing
to the medal round. Instead of throwing out preliminary wins, they now switched
to keeping track of all wins/losses throughout the tourney.
All
told, there were 10 players outside of my family: three adults, two older kids,
and five young kids. A quick glance around and I see trouble on the horizon.
Whereas our store rarely has anyone running McGonagall as a main character,
this place was filled with them. Even some of the kiddies were running her.
That’s bad. I also came to find out that the vast majority of the decks were
creature-based, including those of the toughest players, the adults. This isn’t
good, as I’ve been tuning our decks to play in a more spell-based
environment.
So
we play. Here’s the deck that Amanda played:
Professor
McGonagall (starting character)
10
Potion Lessons
13
Creature Lessons
2
Cage
4
Vicious Wolf
4
Cunning Fox
4
Cobra Lily
2
Quintaped
2
Kelpie
2
Guard Dog
2
Mountain Troll
1
Hedwig
4
Steelclaws
4
Diffindo
4
Bruisewort Balm
2
Burning Bitterroot Balm
Amanda
had only a day to practice with the deck. Her inexperience and some bad luck
led to a 3-3 record, causing her to miss the cut for the next round. Predictably, that round of five players
included four adults and my nephew Neil(because of the odd number in the medal
round, the sixth place finisher{an adult} played in the medal round too). Neil
played this deck:
Madam
Hooch (starting character)
25
Potion Lessons
1
Nimbus 2000
4
Pulling Up
4
Fouled
4
Cobbing
4
Ouch
1
Hufflepuff Match
2
In The Stands
1
Professor Quirrell
2
Butterfly Weed Balm
4
Bruisewort Balm
1
Weakness Potion
2
Dogbreath Potion
2
Malevolent Mixture
3
Draught Of Living Death
He
came in 4th, edging out my brother. Here is the deck that I played:
Professor
McGonagall (starting character)
13
Charm Lessons
11
Creature Lessons
3
Dragon Heart Wand
4
Stream of Flames
1
Halloween Feast
4 4
Privet Drive
4
Diffindo
4
Lost Notes
2
Picking On Neville
2
Lapifors
2
Transfiguration Test
1
Hannah Abbott
1
Trevor
2
Guard Dog
4
Mountain Troll
1
Black Dragon
1
Hedwig
In
the first round, I played a kid (Matthew) with McGonagall. He looked scared to
death at having to play an adult right away. He got so nervous that he forgot
to use his character’s ability when I put down a Privet on him. I rolled him
quite easily. Thankfully, he made it through the game without passing out.
Next
up is one of the adults, Brian. He has McGonagall. He looks nervous too. He knows who I am. He was the one who came
to “our” WOTC store and went 6-0 to win that previous tourney. My brother says
he’s this store’s top gun. Brian wins the die roll and starts to play a deck
that looks a lot like mine. The differences are that his deck is
"lighter" and carries quite a few more creatures and less control
type cards. He gets off to a fast start by playing low cost creatures. I try to
kill them as quickly as I can, and also target his creature lessons to slow the
rush. He errs in discarding his last creature
lesson to play out a River Troll to keep the pressure on. I promptly Steam of
Flames it and start to lay down fatties. He kills my Guard Dog, but a Mountain
Troll soon shows up, followed by his twin brother. Brian’s hands are visibly
shaking now, but he holds it together, drawing into a Steelclaws that decks me
the turn before my creatures would have decked him. That initial die roll in
his favor ended up being crucial. Oh well.
It’s only a preliminary round.
The
third round features another adult, Dana. She has McGonagall. She plays first,
getting out a Mrs. Norris. I look at the card in disbelief, furrowing my brow.
She sees my perplexed expression and explains that it helps her to play knowing
what her opponent has in his hand. So I lay down my hand, and she cringes a
bit. She now knows what the freight train looks like that is going to run her
over. One word of advice to anyone considering Norris: Don’t. It doesn’t really
help you win, and if the other player has something they don’t want you to see,
it’s easy to slaughter this one-health creature. Anyway, I stifled her
development with lesson destruction, then lay down the fat, and win easily. She
ends up in 6th place.
Next
up is the other adult in the tourney, Ed. He has McGonagall too. Am I sounding
like a broken record yet? This is the guy who winds up in 3rd place at the end.
I finally win a die roll for once, and develop quickly. On turn three I put
down a Dragon Heart Wand followed by a Mountain Troll. His eyes bug out at such
a large creature hitting the table so fast. The troll then proceeds to hit him
repeatedly, along with his brethren. He gets pummeled, as much of his removal
is meant for smaller creatures.
In
the 5th round, the curse of McGonagall finally ends. My young opponent (didn’t
catch the name) is playing the old Hermione. I win another die roll, get a
Privet in my opening hand, and play it down on the first turn. The kid smiles
and says that it won’t hurt him, since his deck is nothing but lessons and
creatures. What? I never heard of such a kind of deck. It certainly looked
unusual. He had too many lessons, and I had no problem killing his guys as fast
as he played them. He couldn’t do much about my guys, however.
In
round six, I faced one of the older kids. Yeah! He’s not playing McGonagall
either! Instead, he is running the old Draco. This was the longest game of the
day for me. He wins the die roll and plays a first turn Troll In The Bathroom.
I make a face and have McGonagall make it go away. Two turns later he follows
up with In The Stands. Ack! Bad for me. To solve it, I need to discard four
creatures, and my deck only contains 8 such cards. On the plus side, my deck
does have four Diffindos. Also on the plus side, I get out a Privet Drive,
which completely stuffs him. He eventually solves it, only to face another the
very next turn. I have no problem killing his few creatures he gets out, so the
game slides into a stall of drawing. At long last, I get down Hannah Abbott. I
draw my 3rd creature the following turn, and then use her to get a 4th from the
graveyard, and my Halloween Feast. I discard all four to solve the adventure
and then cast the Feast to get them all back. I then proceed to steamroller
him. A very long game, but I was never in danger.
On
to the medal round! It’s a rematch with Dana. Do you know that look someone has
when they know they’re going to lose before you even start? She had it. I
showed no mercy, clobbering her in the same breathless fashion as before. Next, I finally face a fellow family member,
my brother Greg. He has a good deck,
but he is not used to it and he drew poorly to boot. So I gave him Das Boot. He
looked resigned to his fate around turn 6. Next up is Ed again. He looks
determined to beat me. It doesn’t matter. It’s a replay of our first game, as
an early Dragon Heart Wand leads to a troll. The next turn there are twins. Can
you say three? Trolls look better in
threes. He croaks one with an
Incarcifors, but I replace it with a Black Dragon. He gulps. Two turns later he
is quite done. Sometimes this deck is really the hammer.
So
now I get to face the top guy again, right? Wrong. They end the tourney right
then and award Brian first place. They reasoned he was undefeated and had
played me once. I’m disappointed in that decision, in that there is a 12 pack
difference between first and second. However, it does keep going my streak of
always finishing in second with one loss. Lets give a Bronx cheer for that,
shall we?
Afterwards,
I talk with Brian and we compare decks. He said that he received helpful advice
from two POJO denizens: Snuffles and MadEye, and had worked on his deck via
Apprentice. Here is his deck listing:
Professor
McGonagall (starting character)
11
Creature Lessons
10
Charm Lessons
1
Lapifors
3
Lost Notes
4
Steelclaws
2
Picking On Neville
4
Borrowed Wand
2
Halloween Feast
4
Stream Of Flames
4
Boa Constrictor
4
Cunning Fox
4
Vicious Wolf
4
Doxy
1
River Troll
1
Scabbers
1
Black Dragon
This
is a fine deck, although I don’t believe the last three creatures belong for
various reasons. As for our decks, some of the card choices were based on the
limited extent of our collection. We also wanted the decks to be good but also
very different from one another. Thanks to everyone who played in and helped
run these events. We all had a great time
and met a lot of cool folks.
Jeff
Hodgkinson (Columbia, Maryland)