Casual Fridays: Going To Bat For Your Team

Revised on October 25.2004, tournament scenario changed

Note: This article is not a discussion on the 5 civilizations (like their pros, cons, tactics) or mono-civilization decks. It’s simply one tossing out an at-home casual dueling scenario utilizing mono-civilization decks.

I’m a Cardinals baseball fan. I’ve been one since I was 2 years old and my dad took me to my first baseball game. I want to take a moment to show my support for the Cards because they defeated the Houston Astros in the National League Championship Series. Now they’re headed to the World Series. GO CARDS!

I credit the Cards for jumpstarting my interest in trading cards and sports. My first collectible cards were baseball cards, and my favorite sport from elementary to university involved a bat and a ball—softball. So, I’d also like to thank the Cards for influencing my tomboy days and my aspirations to become a baseball when I was two. Okay, to make a long story short, when my dad asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up I said “a baseball” instead of “a baseball player.” Since an illustrious career as an inanimate object didn’t pan out for me, I’m here writing about a game that I love to play without the desire to become an actual trading card. What a difference 25 years can make. ; )

This rather off tangent stroll down memory lane does have relevance to Duel Masters because I’m writing about supporting a team, or rather a civilization. As you already know, Rampage of the Super Warriors was heavily lauded to usher in the era of “single-civilization dominance.” Even though that didn’t quite happen, since Diamond Cutter is really killer with the addition of Terror Pit and Water/Nature decks have been dominating the scene too, it’s still fun to have the 5 civilizations go head-to-head to see which one emerges victorious. That reminds me. I never did write a tourney report for Gen Con Indy (please accept my utmost sincere apologizes). Allow me to very briefly recap one Duel Masters event there—the Single Civilization Tournament—since I’m on the subject of single civilizations. 

The Single Civilization Tournament was an eye-opening event with regards to what duelists felt were the strongest builds of each civilization and which civilization they thought had the best chances of winning. Most duelists went with Mono-Nature, which wasn’t a surprise since that civilization received Raging Dash-Horn and the Beast Folk are…well, beasts. Several duelists stuck it out with mono-Fire and mono-Darkness to take advantage of newcomers like Baby Zoppe, Searing Wave, Jack Viper and Snake Attack. But vying for top spot were mono-Light and Mono-Water. It came down to a tough match up between Gen Con Champ Christopher Rodgers’ mono-Light Diamond Cutter and my mono-Water Lancer Stall. When the smoke cleared, I took home top prize with a 4-0 record and a 53-card deck that I slapped together literally 5 minutes before the event (I carried the wrong card binder to the tournament). Considering that no one else played Water or decked Larba Geer/Scarlet Skyterror, everyone had to respect “The Cluster/Lancer Gang.” It wasn’t an impressive Mono-Water build by any means. If you saw the deck then you’d probably cringe at some of the card choices I made. But, the deck worked at that event because there wasn’t much blocker-hate (my deck had 15 blockers).

Looking back on that event sparked my idea for heart of this Friday’s article. Why not present a fun tournament scenario for C-Note readers along the same lines? So here’s the fun tournament exercise scenario:

The 5 Civilization Swap Meet Tournament

Whenever you have free time, gather some friends and host your own single civilization tournament. Have everyone build a deck using only one civilization and 40 cards. So that you don’t have everyone playing the same civilization figure out a fair way to make sure that each civilization is represented if you have at least 5 players (if you have less than that, figure out a way to ensure that each player is playing a different civilization). How you do that is up to you, maybe draw straws for first pick or something. After everyone has their assigned civilization, give players a few days to design their decks. Do NOT consult each either about your decks. You’ll see why in a second…

There’s a catch for the main event: you don’t get to play the deck that you’ve made. That’s right, you read that correctly. You don’t play the deck that you’ve built!

At the tourney decide who is going to play what deck by drawing from a hat or bowl. Write down each person’s name on a piece of paper and place it in a hat. Have everyone draw a name from the hat. If you draw your own name, then toss it back and draw again. You play the deck made by the person whose name you draw. Give players several minutes to look over the decks they’re handed, and then get underway with the chaotic fun. This sets up really funky situations: do you build a very strong deck knowing that it can come back to beat you or do you build a so-so deck in hopes of sabotaging your competition? And what if your friends are thinking along the same lines? Will the tourney mostly consist of solid mono-builds or booby-trap decks? How well will you play a deck that you’ve only been acquainted with for a couple of minutes? Did one civilization prevail because one person built a good deck and others didn’t? It’s all part of the fun.

If you have plenty of time to play, then you can have everyone swap decks several times. If you want some ideas on where to start for the mono-civilization decks, like foundations for decks, there are some starting-point builds for each civilization below.

Remember, these are “suggestion” decks for the single civilization tournament exercise so they are NOT built for various local tournament scenes.

The decks below are geared toward this exercise. If you take one of the decks below to your local tourney and it loses, then please don’t blame me because you’ve been advised. Anyway, even if you “net deck” you should tweak a deck to reflect the climate of your local metagame and the focus you want for your deck. Here are the “sample” decks for the exercise, please feel free to alter them or have everyone make their own decks for the exercise:

Mono-Nature, “You Bring Out The Beast In Me”

4 Fighter Dual Fang
4 Barkwhip, the Smasher
4 Raging Dash-Horn
4 Bronze-Arm Tribe
4 Burning Mane
4 Silver Axe
4 Steel Smasher
4 Rumbling Terahorn
4 Natural Snare
4 Mana Nexus

Mono-Light, “Staring At The Sun For Too Long Will Blind You”

4 La Ura Giga
4 Emerald Grass
4 Senatine Jade Tree
4 Dia Nork
4 Mist Rias
4 Gran Gure
2 Phal Eega
2 Toel
4 Holy Awe
4 Screaming Sunburst
4 Diamond Cutter 

Mono-Darkness, “Beyond The Grave”

4 Bloody Squito
4 Marrow Ooze
4 Wailing Shadow Belbetphlo
4 Scratchclaw
4 Mongrel Man
4 Gray Balloon
4 Jack Viper
2 Zagaan
2 Lost Soul
4 Death Smoke
4 Terror Pit

Mono-Water, “Total Liquidation Sale”

4 Crystal Lancer
4 Aqua Hulcus
4 Aqua Solider
4 Angler Cluster
4 Hunter Fish
4 Corile
2 Aqua Knight
2 Crystal Paladin
2 Psychic Shaper
2 Teleportation
4 Brain Serum
4 Spiral Gate

Mono-Fire, “If You Can’t Take The Heat, Then Get Out Of My Kitchen”

4 Deadly Fighter Braid Claw
4 Mini Titan Gett
4 Immortal Baron, Vorg
4 Armored Blaster Valdios
4 Rothus
4 Baby Zoppe
2 Flametropus
2 Garkago Dragon
2 Scarlet Skyterror
4 Volcanic Arrows
2 Crimson Hammer
2 Searing Wave
2 Magma Gazer

As usual with my Casual Friday articles, the point is to have fun. Of course, this exercise will be more fun if you bring your own deck creations to the at-home event and do the swap exercise were you play your friends’ decks. If you do this tournament scenario, please drop me a line and tell me how things went. Rep a civilization today!

Oh, and here’s that plug again: If you live in the MO/IL area please come to the Shadowclash of Blinding Night Release Tournament on November 11, 2004 at Dizzy Dugout:
104 South Morrison Avenue
Collinsville, IL 62234
(618) 345-6453

If you have any questions, want to see something covered in an article, or just want to chat, then drop me a line at kaiserpso@hotmail.com. As always, cheers!