Steven Cantrell
Galactic Quest
Lawrenceville, Georgia
Saturday, January 22, 2005
Five Dollar Entry Fee
16 Duelists
Swiss Format; Matches best 2 of 3; 4 Rounds
Today was really crappy weather-wise. Foggish, rainy, and somewhere in the twenties, yuck. But as far as Duel Masters goes I was pumped up for the first post-Survivors tournament. Before the tournament I decided to stick with my Black/Blue and not use a Green/Yellow I had been messing around with. Here it is:
Darkness [20]
4x Bloody Squito
4x Horrid Worm
4x Mongrel Man
4x Death Smoke
4x Terror Pit
Water [20]
4x Aqua Guard
4x Aqua Hulcus
4x Corile
4x Crystal Lancer
4x Brain Serum
Deck Strategy: Get out Squito and Guard out early to drag the duel on until I can start controlling their field. By about turn 12-15 I should have field and hand advantage. Then I start raping them with Crystal Lancer and its too late for them to make any comeback.
I got to Galactic Quest a little after twelve and pulled off some nice trades beforehand as well as throughout the day. I got 2 Brutal Charge for the secret puzzle piece, 2 Alcadeias and Charge for my 2 Zagaans, my Avalanche Giant for 4 Rothus, and a few others nice deals. At about 1 Justin finally got the tournament going and the pairings were announced.
Ramsey is a pretty good duelist but I have only faced him once before in a tournament. This week he was trying out a Black/Green deck with Ballom and mana acceleration.
Both games were close. The first duel he was controlling the tempo and managed to get out more creatures than I could handle. I was starting to get nervous when I topdecked an Aqua Guard, evolved it to Lancer, and won before Ramsey had the chance to finish me off. Next duel, my Corile made short work of his Horrid Worm multiple times and I controlled the game all the way.
Lee is probably the best duelist here as far as skills are concerned. I have a lot of respect for Lee and we usually have really competitive matches. He, of course, uses the infamous Dark Tide.
My memory is a bit hazy because I was concentrating so much on the duel. In duel one I got out several blockers early and we battled deep into the game when I think Lancer finished him. Next duel I got a crappy hand but rebounded nicely and took control. His Paladin popped in somewhere and almost wrecked things, but order was quickly restored. I took my time to set up my field and starve his hand with Corile, then Smoke anything he played. After a while I had a Lancer and multiple other creatures (Hulcus, Corile, Worm) and decided it was time, obliterating his remaining shields. Not to mention that my two remaining shields were both Terror Pits.
Well, Lee wasn’t going to take this loss easily so we dueled two more times and he won both games handily. Better luck next time in the actual tournament. During the intermission, Austin apparently was mad at himself for losing and took out his rage on a card…by eating it.
Round Three: Vs Stephen F.
This kid looks just like any other noob, but he doesn’t act anything like them. For starters this is probably the only kid under 12 who doesn’t run mono Fire. Stephen has a pretty good, simple Blue/Green/Yellow deck.
Both duels pretty much happened along these same lines: He went first and came out with a quick Barkwhip. I let him take around three shields to fuel my hand while Horrid Worm left his empty. Then I bombed his field with Corile and Smoke, both of which I’m liking more and more. After taking control, I set up the field for 5-10 turns before massacring all his shields at once.
To this point we were the only two to win all three matches so Tyler and I duked it out in the finals. Or more like he blasted me to pieces and made my strategy look like a joke. Tyler took this round and claimed first place. I really don’t know how to explain what happened. He just came out with his Barkwhip, FDF, and Chaos Worm and the duels were over too quickly.
The worst part was that since I lost this match 2-0 I still only had six points. In the meantime Justin, who runs the tournaments, won both his duels to finish with seven points and steal second place from me. That means I got left out in the cold with none of the Survivors prize support. I was pretty disappointed because I felt like losing in the finals should have at least gotten me a pack or two.
Props:
Finally beating Lee, currently my best competition
Pulling off nice trades and making my binder shinier
Doing well today (except for the finals that is)
Getting to come for three straight weeks
Slops:
Pulling Crap in the two packs I bought
Justin getting Avalanche Giant in his prize packs (grrr..)
Once again my name is Steven Cantrell. Contact me at Smcman7@aol.com. I still need a name for both my deck and suggestions are appreciated. If you’re in the Atlanta area I highly suggest you come and check out Galactic Quest. We have good tournaments every Saturday with 15+ people. And Pojo, please make Lee Sandow his own article section to rant in.