"The Illusionary Mystery" by Rob "NBK-Valkier" Cummins

Tournament Location: Toy Revolution, Indoor Markets, Sutton Coldfield, UK

Date: 05-02-'05

Heya all

After the aftermatch of the last Duel Masters tournament in Sutton 2 weeks ago, it was that time again for yet another exciting (and possibly interesting) DM tournament in the Sutton Coldfield Indoor Market! Even though it was only 2 weeks since the previous tournament, I was definitely excited about this tournament, but also a bit anxious at the same time as I had to go and defend a title, which can be pretty difficult to do. I got up myself at 7:30am, got something to eat and headed off for the bus, got into Birmingham city centre and caught the bus to sutton coldfield and getting to the market for about 9:40am, which was good time. Met up with a good number of duelists for the tournament and chatted away but eventually the tournament got going.

I had been fine-tuning my deck up so that it was for this tournament and I couldn't really change anything about the deck and I was confident to do well with it again after its success in the previous tournament 2 weesk earlier. Here's the deck....

"The Illusionary Mystery"

4x Sarius, Vizier of Suppression

4 x Senatine Jade Tree

4 x Magris, Vizier of Magnetism

4 x Holy Awe

4 x Wailing Shadow Belbetphlo

4 x Bone Assassin, the Ripper

4 x Locomotiver

4 x Terror Pit

4 x Emeral

4 x Corile

4 x Illusionary Merfolk

Total Amount of Cards: 44

The tournament itself consisted of 15 duelists and was run using the same Table format. All 15 duelists were split into 4 tables (3 Tables of 4 duelists & 1 Table of 3 duelists), and the top 2 duelists from each table would then qualify for the Play-Offs, in which it would an automatic knockout if they lost. The prizes involved were Boosters from the new Survivors of the Mega Apocalypse set, Giliam, the Tormentor JDC promo's for everyone who entered, and for those lucky few who would make it into the top 8, a exclusive Twin Cannon Skyterror Pre-release promo! With some good prizes at stake, I was hoping to do well and get in the top 2 like I have done for the past 4 tournaments. I got placed on table 1 and my 1st opponent was little James.

Round 1 vs Little James (Mono-Water Lancer Stall deck)

Now, I found it very ironic that I got drawn against this kid on the same table as me because in all my previous tournaments so far in Sutton, I've had to face him at some stage and with his formidable Mono-Water deck (which he still hasn't changed since the 1st tournament I played him), I couldn't take him lightly. 1st duel saw the usual stall by James and me building up my own blockers but using my slayers also to hack away at his shields and he generally was forced to block them with his good blockers. Eventually, I got some Coriles and Terror Pits on him to remove his field, before he got a Crystal Lancer out on me and started going at me. Unfortunately for him, he hit a Terror pit, which i used on his Angler Cluster and suicided my wailing into him the turn after and his field was completely empty. Eventually I used Holw Awe to finish him and attacked all his shields at once and took him out in one blow. 2nd duel was a bit slower as I didn't get the best of hands, but he got out his blockers pretty quickly and got Crystal Paladin out fast. Again though, he hit a terror pit and was back at square one. He continously waited to get his Lancer and Paladin out and stalled with his blockers but eventually, his defences were broken down and his shields gradually got taken away from him and he ended up losing. Was a well played duel and finished up pretty quickly so I was left waiting for a while for the duel beside me to finish up. Finally, after a 15 minute wait, a winner was found and the kid who won challenged me straight away so, Let Round 2 begin!

2-0

Round 2 vs Little Mike (Darkness/Water Bounce/Merfolk deck)

Now I had been asked by little Mike after the previous tournament 2 weeks ago to help him out with his deck as he wasn't at all happy with his Table rounds exit at the previous tournament so he wanted a change. So with the help of my older bro (who wasn't at this tournament by the way), we constructed him a very quick Darkness/Water Bounce/Merfolk deck and put it down on paper for him to construct on his own. I personally wasn't expecting to play the deck as some of the cards weren't exactly easy to get but he got the majority of the cards he needed and played the deck pretty well against Suneal with his Fire/Nature deck in the 1st round so it was gonna be interesting to see how my Illusionary Mystery deck would do against a deck I built myself. The 1st duel saw a fair bit of stall, but also a lot of shield manipulation and bounce with emerals, coriles, and illusionary merfolks flying everywhere to cause havoc to each other. The fact that I had Light in my deck though, proved to be the little advantage i needed as I had Holy Awe in my deck and it proved to be the winner of each duel as he had no way to save himself from it as with some of my merfolk's and magris', i was able to clear his field a lot and put him constantly under pressure. He eventually lost to a swarm attack of corile and emeral. 2nd duel was a lot quicker as I was able to counter him a lot and put pressure on him with my wailings so he was forced to block, even when he didn't want to. He got his Lancer out at times, but it was taken out pretty much straight away the following turn with a slayer or terror pit. The 2nd duel eventually led to me winning the duel when I Holy Awed him and finished with a Magris! Was a very good duel and was quite impressed how Mike had used the deck, considering he hadn't been using the deck at all beforehand. With my 2nd win on the table, I was pretty much assured a place in the Play-offs but I had to face Suneal in the 3rd round to finish it all off!

4-0

Round 3 vs Suneal (Fire/Nature Rush deck)

With Suneal having lost both his previous duels 2-0 (to James and Mike), he didn't look at all happy having to duel me last and so without holding up the duel any longer, I got things rolling. The 1st duel was very one-sided in my favour and with the blockers on hand to assist me, this duel didn't last long as he was never able to muster up a good enough force to get at my shields, and when he did, he only assisted me more! His deck was demolished within 5 minutes of starting. 2nd duel was another one-sided duel, but in the opposite direction as I got probably one of my worse hands ever, 5 & 6 mana cards! I couldn't put anything on the field until turn 4 but at that point it was far too late to pull off a comeback as he had managed to get DFBC x 2 and Burning Mane down on his 1st 3 turns so I only delayed the envitable from happened and went down without hitting a shield, how embarassing! The 3rd and decisive duel made me panic as somehow my hand turned out fairly once again and somehow, the same thing was occurring again as in the 2nd duel but I got some blockers down in turn 2 & 3 to stop him in his tracks and halted him for a bit to prepare my force and to disrupt his hand in the process. Eventually, I had cleared his field and hand completely of cards and finished him off with a Emeral to win the duel, and finally be able to relax as I was stressed out after it all as it was possible of me to end up losing to the deck that duelists who I had beaten in the 1st and 2nd rounds had beaten 2-0!

6-1

With the table finished of all its group matches, the final standings were as follows.....

Rob Cummins - 9pts (Winner)

Michael Slattery - 7pts (Runner-up)

James Anderton - 5pts

Suneal Boyal - 3pts

It ended up with myself and Mike making it to the Play-Offs and James and Suneal being knocked out. Suneal didn't help his cause at all though as he apparantly told me he hadn't played any Duel Masters since the last tournament he attended, which was back in December, so he's only got himself to blame for getting knocked out so quickly. With the other tables having to sort out their results and matches, I relaxed for a bit and watched some of the other duels while they went ahead. After 30 minutes, the other tables were finished and the final 8 duelists were found out. Noteable mentions go out to Rikki Boyal, Mike Griffiths, & Mark Harris, who all failed to get into the top 8 and were unlucky, bad luck guys, maybe next time!

The Quarter Final Bouts were announced and here they were in according to seedings......

Bracket A:

Rob (No.1) vs Mattie (No.8)

Alex (No.7) vs Mark.A (No.2)

Bracket B:

Will (No.3) vs Seb (No.6)

Simon (No.4) vs Mike (No.5)

According to the seedings, I was up against Mattie, an unknown duelist in my eyes and I hadn't seen him duel before but knew he was one of Simon's friends so I couldn't take him too lightly either.

Quarter Final vs Mattie (Darkness/Light Alcadeias deck)

Simon had been telling Mattie about me and what I was like as a duelist even before I got to the table to sit down and originally looked nervous but once he noticed I wasn't fussed about it, he calmed down and we got on with the match. 1st duel started off with me stalling with Light blockers and him putting down a few Bloody Squitos. A few turns later and he got a critical blade and a slayer out, which was causing me a few problems but with corile and a few shield manipulations, I was able to change things to my favour. However, on turn 6, he got Alcadeias out, which shocked me as I certainly wasn't expecting him to play such a card on me, but he didn't realise that he was field was completly empty, except for Alcadeias and I had a slayer, ready to take it out the following turn but he attacked anywayz, gave me 2 new cards, and next turn, had Alcadeias annihilated on him and from there on, it went downhill for him, and I ended up winning the duel. The 2nd duel was different but followed along the same lines as some of my earlier duels with Holy Awe playing a big part early on along with Merfolk so eventually with my superior card drawal and mass destruction with Terror pits and slayers, I took him out and went on to the semi-finals, where I would end up meeting Mark!

8-1

Semi Final vs Mark (Fire/Water Speed Attacker deck)

With having faced his twin brother in the 1st round (James by the way), no doubt Mark was looking for some retribution for his brother's early exit from the tournament and was hoping to cause an upset by defeating me. While he wasn't exactly enthusiastic to play and wanted to wait for a while to play me, I persuaded him to just play the match and get it over with. His deck worried me slightly as I don't particularly like Speed Attackers being played against me (unless Im using them against my opponents!) and so with that in mind, I had to take a few precautions during the duel. The 1st duel so some early attacks by both sides, with me using emeral and him using Brawler Zyler. Next, the blockers came out, with me using my Light blockers and him using his Water blockers. I took some advantage when i started pulling out corile's on him and bouncing back his creatures on him, something which he wasn't too happy with after a while, and combo'ed them with Merfolk to get mass drawal within 3 turns. After that, while he did get a Twin-Cannon Skyterror out me, I destroyed it with a Terror Pit, and continued to destroy his fields and then slowly went at his shields as to not let him get back his field. I ended up with the 1st duel without losing too many of my shields and the same pretty much occurred in the 2nd duel I had with him, except he suprised me with getting a Lancer on the field and playing a few early attackers like Snip Striker and Rikabu. At the end of it all though, I came out the winner of the match with some nice shield triggers in Terror Pit and Holy Awe helping out a lot and the Merfolk combo coming into play a lot here. With this win, it was a victory to get me to my 5th consecutive final appearance!

10-1

Now, to give an update on the other Bracket. In the Quarter Finals, Mike went on to beat Simon in a pretty gruelling match-up where Mike's bounce overcame great odds having to defend against Simon's onslaught of Fighter Dual Fang's, Barkwhips, and blockers but managed to come through to claim a place in the Bracket B Final. In the other duel, which by the way lasted a good 50 mintes!, Will finally managed to finish off Seb's impressive Mono-Light stall deck and also advance to the Final of the Bracket. The final of the bracket was pretty interesting as I had a front row seat for it all while waiting for the winner of it all. Will took full control of the 1st duel and managed to wittle out Mike's shields slowly but surely and then used Twin Cannon Skyterror to win it for him. In the 2nd duel, there was a bizarre ending to it all with Will looking as if he had practically won the duel and only had to attack with Marrow Ooze to win the duel, but he ended his turn without realising he could attack with it!! On Mike's next turn, he finished Will off to make it 1-1 but you couldn't help but laugh at the incredibly bad mistake. Still, with the embarassing mistake he made, he still went on to win the final duel without too many problems and took him out with Rikabu to win the bracket and to set up a Grand Final clash with yours truly! LET THE GRAND FINAL BEGIN!

Final vs Will (Darkness/Fire Stall/Speed Attacker deck)

With having seen Will duel in the Bracket B final, I was aware of his tactics and his cards so I was at least not nervous going into the duel but with luck coming into it at the end, it was hard to predict who would win. Pressure was put on me to win straight away by the tournament Organiser, Dan, by stating that I was the previous champion and that I was unbeatable etc., which annoyed me a bit as it was a bit partonising, but I got on with the 1st duel nonetheless.The 1st duel was decent I guess, with Will stalling with Bloody Squito's and using Missle Boy (!?!?) to do most of his attack for him, which was quickily killed by blockers. With Missle Boy on the field though, setting my blockers down was set back a bit so a lot more darkness cards in my deck saw play and with his stalling with Bloody Squitos, I was beginning to get annoyed. The use of rothus and critical blade didn't help me but eventually i got the advantage back in the duel and ended up winning the duel by using merfolk and it was funny to see Will trying to block with Giliam, the Tormentor (!?!?). The 2nd duel was rather frustrating as again he played numerous Bloody Squitos and Brawler Zylers and took ages making his moves, continously counting the cards in his mana zone and hand from time to time, which tested my patience ten fold. He got some slayers out, which I countered with some of my own and it was a massarce on the field by me to clear his field. However, he got his field back in place very quickly, which suprised me and I was put on the defensive once again. Eventually, he got TCS on the field again and I kept having to remove it by corile and it was envitable that I would lose the duel by Marrow Ooze. The 3rd duel went very much like the 2nd duel but it went down all the way to the wire!

In the final move of the match, I attacked with a corile and hit his final shield, only to hit a critical blade, which would happen to take out my only blocker on the field defending my last shield. Next turn, he somehow got 2 rikabu's on the field and with Missle Boy already on the field, managed to defeat with his Rikabu to cause a bit upset, and I couldn't help but be disappointed. It turned out that if the blocker had stayed on the field during his turn, I would have won the following turn as my final shield trigger was Terror Pit! I was annoyed that I got defeated at the end, but suprisingly enough, the criticism I was expecting to get for losing actually turned to praise for Will as everyone was suprised he beat me. I was slightly stunned as I was expecting an onslaught of taunts for losing to a much weaker duelist and Will had said before that he was shocked to have gotten so far in the tournament.

11-3

Final Position: 2nd Place

I was disappointed to have lost but I guess you only learn from your mistakes and of course, this loss will only fuel me on to win the tournament next time in March and get my revenge! With my 2nd place, I got 3 Twin Cannon Skyterror promo's, another Giliam, the Tormentor, & 2 SotMA booster packs, in which I just got Cannonner Bargon and Skullsweeper Q, so it wasn't a total loss! It turned out to be a very good tournament and with a new champion for the next tournament, it was gonna be exciting at the next tournamentsometime in March.

Thanks go to Dan for setting up the Tournament and Congrats to everyone who participated. Until next time all!

NBK

If anyone is wants to chat to me about anything about the report or anything in Duel Masters, just contact me (Rob Cummins) at mexflash@hotmail.com and I use msn messenger so we can chat on that. I go under the name "NBK-Valkier" Thxs for reading! Next report will be in March!