Q's Universe

Origins Tournament Report
Part 2 - July 8, 2004

As Round 3 Vs Chris S

Going into round three I was pretty happy to be 2-0 but I also knew that the hard matches where about to begging. I knew Chris was playing a pure Fantastic 4 deck with tech upgrades and knew he was playing Entangle but wasn’t sure about much else because I only watched him play a bit before I moved on to observing the match next to his.

Game one was a pretty normal game. I didn’t see a Lost City the entire game but was able to fight him off a few times thanks to an early game Avalon Space Station and he wasn’t able to get his Fantasticars and keep them in play for long. The game was actually pretty slow and there wasn’t a lot going on, the most exciting thing each turn was figuring out formation and trying to find a way to break trough your opponent’s. He had an advantage when he dropped Hulk on turn six and it just went downhill from there. I had to start playing defensibly to try to survive until a Lost City would decide to stick it’s head out. The Lost City never came but the game was still closer than I had expected, going into the last turn of the game I was at two and he was at four endurance. I know we both hit negatives but the Hulk’s attack value of sixteen was able to give him the game.

Game two was perfect… for me anyways. I had a Lost City in my starting hand and the Avalon Space Station decided to show up on turn three. Needless to say this was a very fast game. I was able to fight him off every time he attacked me and was able to counter-attack dealing a lot of breakthrough damage. I believe the game still went to turn six or seven but the game had been over for a while. I had the set up in play with an extra Lost City face down and had been lucky enough to draw the right characters I needed. There wasn’t much he could have done. The game ended with me still sitting at 32 endurance and we both joked about how well the deck decided to work before we started our final match.

Game three was a lot like game one… for me anyways. I wasn’t able to see a Lost City again, even after I aggressive mulligan for one throwing away two Genoshas. I knew if this game reached the late game I would probably lose thanks to his pesky Entangles and the malevolent Hulk. I wasn’t even lucky enough to see an Avalon Space Station until turn four and it didn’t help much because I was only drawing a bunch of Magnetos. The game was no where near lost though but it was going to be a bit hard for me to pull this off. There was only a ten endurance difference between us but the game officially ended on turn five when he dropped three Fantasticars. I tried to play defensibly but there wasn’t much I could do about his characters flight so he was able to break my formation and come in for some major damage. I believe I scooped at the start of turn seven when I failed to draw a Lost City. He was at 39, I was at 13 and there was no way I was going to be able to break trough his wall of really, REALLY big characters.

2-1

Round 4 Vs Eric Wood (One of the nicest and better players I’ve had the pleasure to play against)

I wasn’t too pleased about losing my 3rd match because I knew one more loss was going to pretty much take me out of the top 8 cut and you can only imagine my surprise when I learned who my 4th match opponent was… Eric Wood. If you have been living under a rock and don’t know who this gentleman is here’s a little info about one of the few PROs out there.

Eric was playtesting this game long before it was released and had found the deck I was using long before the set had even hit the streets. He made the top 8 cut at the 10K in Philly (believe finished 6th) and made the top 8 cut once again the day before at the 10K in Origins (believe he finished 6th again).

I wasn’t too happy he was in the losers bracket thanks to a very slow playing friend of mine who was able to beat Eric in the first match because they were 1 and 1 when time was called and everyone knows how much Big Brotherhood decks hate the 4 turn tie breaker. To make things worst I knew he was playing a variant of the same deck I was using and I had to do my best not to show how intimidated I was. My deck was very tweaked for the mirror match and in theory I had an advantage but there was no way in hell I was going to play aggressive against Eric, so more or less I was in a pretty bad spot.

Game one got started and the bad dream became a nightmare. I had to mulligan and the earliest drop in my new hand was a six drop. I knew I didn’t really have to worry about drawing a low drop until turn three but this was yet another thing to worry about. Neither one of us played anything in the first two turns and when we reached turn three I believe he played a Quicksilver. I was in a bit of trouble because it was turn three and I didn’t have a three or four drop on my hand, just a bunch of five and six drops. I had been drawing a lot of locations which was good because I had two Lost City’s and an Avalon Space Station but I had no use for them because I couldn’t get a character to save my life. Turn four came and lucky me drew two five drop Quicksilvers. He played Feral Rage tossing a Blob away, looked at me funny and felt sorry for me because he was waiting for me to recruit and all I said was I’ll pass on my recruit phase. I knew Quicksilver could possible make a stand next turn because I had a total of three of them in my hand and an Avalon in play but by the end of turn four I was at 25 while he was still sitting at 50… things didn’t look too good for me.

I was happy to draw a Relocation and a Global Domination but then I remembered he had initiative on odd turns and that took away the bit of confidence I had. I placed a Relocation face down, played Quicksilver (5) and passed. He recruited a Quicksilver of his own and prepared to attack. Neither of us had bothered to use our face down resources and we both knew that was going to chance this turn. I had a pair of Lost Cities, an Avalon Space Station, Ka-Boom! and a Relocation I had to assume he had at least two Lost Cities and at least one Relocation and tried to prepare my mind so I wouldn’t miss anything because this turn would either bring me back into the game or break me.

He attacked with Quicksilver which told me he probably didn’t have anymore Sabertooths in his hand and had at least two Quicksilvers because otherwise Feral Rage would have been the better choice with a natural attack of 11 while he would have to boost his Quicksilver once to be able to reach that attack value. There was a Quicksilver (3) in his Discard Pile so it was very likely that he had at least one more in his hand.

I asked if he was passing priority and the fun got started….

He flipped over a Lost City and attempted to boost.
I chained with a Relocation to his Lost City.
He chained with another boost.
No more chains.
Last boost resolved giving his Quicksilver +3/+3.
My Relocation Resolved.
But before his 2nd (first) boost resolved he activated a Relocation of his own to his relocated Lost City.

At this point I had to call for a ruling to make sure he could let some links resolve and then add more links before the entire chained resolved. Judge said it was perfectly legal... my mind flooded with ideas of how to abuse that because it was something I didn’t know but then I had to return to the game at hand.

No chains to his Relocation.
His Relocation resolved.
But before his last (first) boost resolved I used my Ka-Boom! targeting his Relocated Lost City that had been re-Relocated.
He flipped over an Avalon Space Station and attempted to use it to get a pair of Quicksilvers back.
I allowed him to pay the cost (discard a Brotherhood character to get two back) and chained it with a Global Domination from my hand to cancel the effects of Avalon Space Station.
No chains.
Last (first) boost finally resolves giving his Quicksilver a +1/+1.

At the end of al this chaining and linking and asking if opponent had any more chains and figuring gout when what resolves his attacking Quicksilver had a total bonus of +4/+4. How do I remember how all of this happened you wonder? Simple, I’ve told the story enough times that I dream about it and I wrote everything down in my little pad at the end of the match. = )

He finally passes priority. I flip over my own Lost City, boost my own Quicksilver twice to give him +6/+6 and stun his attacking Quicksilver. Now it was Sabertooth’s turn to try to take down Quick silver. I flipped Over my Avalon Space Station, discarded a Sabertooth (6) to get my two Quicksilvers back and boosted Quicksilver twice again to keep him from getting stunned. I believe Eric smiled at this point as I was celebrating what I was referring to as my Quicksilver’s last stand. The really funny thing is that he took four damage from the stunned Sabertooth, five damage from the stunned Quicksilver and sixteen points of damage from my Quicksilver attacking him twice which put us both at 25 endurance at the end of the run. Even tough we were tied in endurance the game was pretty much over because he would need to draw another Lost City with in the next two turns to even have a chance at stopping my Quicksilver and five drop Magneto that came down to say hi in turn six with three other Magnetos in my hand thanks to a Genosha. He managed to get me down to 15 endurance before I sealed the deal and we move on to game two.

This game started off a bit different, we both got out two drops and got them in play in the turn they’re supposed to drop. It was a showdown between my Pyro, Vs his Toad. I was rather happy about the match up and I used Pyro’s ability to burn him for three and teased his toad for not wanting to attack Pyro. The next couple of turns where exactly what you would expect from two Big Brotherhood decks, we were practically recruiting twins each turn and trying to get some damage in where we could. He tried to Overload me a couple of times but I would never allow myself to go into Overload range unless I had a Not So Fast in my hand. Somehow this game felt a like a magic match… don’t ask why it just did. Both of us were good boys and kept our cards face down in the resource row pretending there was nothing there. When turn five came around neither of us had flipped over a single location so once again I had to assume the worst. This time I had a Lost City, a couple of Relocations and a pair of Genoshas. I wasn’t happy with what I had because I wanted to be prepare to answer everything he could throw at me and not having Avalon Space Station or Global Domination kept me from going aggressive. He had decided to take the initiative on odd turns and he came at me flipping over a Lost City. I Relocated it in response to his first boost and there were no chains or any other tricks. His Sabertooth got to stun mine and after looking at the board for a second he passed on his attack. This scared me more than anything you could imagine because I had to assume he only had pumps for one of his characters and it was going to come down to whether I attacked the right character or not.

At the beginning of this game I had told him he could stop declaring his intents to attack before he exhausted his characters and ask whether the attack was legal or not because I didn’t have anything that could stop him (Entangle). I asked him if I could stop asking too and he said no which meant he was playing Entangle. Since the biggest characters on the board where our five drop Quicksilvers I decided to attack his with mine and see what would come out of it.

I declared my intent to attack his Quicksilver with mine and….
He responded with a Relocation to his Relocated Lost City which meant that this is what he had been hopping I would do.
He was giving me a false sense of security by letting me keep his Lost City so that I would declare my intent to attack and he would get to Relocated his Lost City before my attack was declare legal so that I wouldn’t get a chance to boost using his Lost City and there was no way I could back out from attacking at that point… INGENIOUS!
That also meant that he probably had another Relocation to neutralize the Lost City I probably already had face down.

At this point I called a judge over and Eric thought I was going to ask whether I could boost my Quicksilver during my declaration of attack and before the judge even got to the table he said I couldn’t do that because Quicksilver wasn’t attacking yet. That was not the question I had, what I wanted to know was what would happen if I flipped over my Lost City in chain to his Relocation, but I let him believe he was right incase I didn’t want to flip my Lost City in chain and wanted to keep him from knowing I had a Lost City face down. Granted he probably figured I did but it was better to keep him guessing and to think that I didn’t have one in play which was why I was probably asking gif I could boost during my declaration of attack… GO MIND GAMES! lol

The judge told me he couldn’t give me a ruling until after I did it because that would be considered coaching or something like that. I had to ask for the head judge Alex to the table because I wasn’t going to potentially make a mistake because of this judge. The volunteer judge went to talk to Alex which gave me and Eric a couple of minutes to look at each other and wonder what the other had face down. He kept telling me that I could not boost during my declaration and I kept telling him I still wanted to ask the head judge… lol. Poor Alex finally got a chance to walk over to our table because he was bouncing back and forth the entire weekend making sure everything went down smoothly. I asked him the question I had as best I could with out letting Eric know what I was really asking and at this point I was reminded how much Alex does to ensure all events are ran properly. He had practically completely lost his voice from judging the entire weekend and it was a bit hard to understand him but he cleared his throat and said “The wording on Relocation is switch this card with target location in play. Based on that you have to make your decision.” His statement answered the question I had with out coaching me or giving me an edge over my opponent. He also stuck around a few more minutes to ensure what we did was correct and to ensure that his ruling would not create any mistakes or miss plays in our match.

[[Alex I don’t know if you can spare the time to read every Vs article online but incase you come across this one I simply want to say thank you for going the extra mile to make sure every event is ran properly and thank you for being so devoted to your job.]]

I flipped over my own Lost City which KO’d the Lost City I had Relocated from Eric.
Since the Lost City Eric had targeted was no longer in play his Relocation had no target to switch places with, sooooo….. he kept his Relocation, his Lost City was KO’d and I got to keep my own Lost City. To my surprise Eric didn’t have anything else in waiting for me and that was the big chain, priority, and boost fight for this game.

Having a Lost City and knowing Eric didn’t have one or a way to deal with mine gave me the confidence I need it to blow up both of my Genoshas to try to get more characters to discard in my hand and an Avalon Space Station. I got the Avalon Space Station and when I played it that pretty much sealed the deal and gave me the game.

3-1

Playing against Eric didn’t only teach me that not every PRO is a #$%@ who will try to win by knowing more rules than you because at points in the game I had two hands. I kept setting my cards down in the table and got so focused in the game that I would just draw my new cards and think that was all I had in my hand and he was very cool about every n00bish error I was making like accidentally setting my hand to close to my resource row which can normally cost you a game. I also got to develop my poker face because I don’t think he had an idea of how insecure and scared playing against him made me. The most important thing I learned from him is that it’s ok to lose even if it’s a major event because going over every mistake in your mind will not help you and will actually make you make even more mistakes. It’s ok to lose to your opponent but try not to lose to yourself.


Q’s Deck

?x Pyro
3x ????
?x Mystique: Raven Darkholme
?x Sabretooth: Feral Rage
4x ???
4x ???
?x Quicksilver: Speed Demon
3x ???
?x Sabretooth: Victor Creed
?x Magneto: Master of Magnetism

?x Global Domination
2x ???
2x Ka-Boom!
3x ???
?x Flame-Trap

4x Lost City
?x Avalon Space Station
?x Genosha

Chris S.

4 She-Thing
2 Human Torch: Johnny Storm
4 Thing: Ben Grimm
2 She-Hulk: Jennifer Walters
4 Invisible Woman: Sue Storm
2 Wolverine: New Fantastic Four
4 Mr. Fantastic: Stretch
1 Ghost Rider
3 Hulk: New Fantastic Four
2 Thing: The Ever-Lovin’ Blue-Eyed Thing
1 Invisible Woman: Sue Richards

4 Savage Beatdown
4 It’s Clobberin’ Time
4 Acrobatic Dodge
4 Tech Upgrades
2 Overload
2 Entangle
4 Signal Flare
2 Reconstruction Program

4 Fantasticar
1 Personal Force Field

Round 4

Eric W.

4 Toad
4 Quicksilver: Pietro Maximoff
4 Quicksilver: Speed Demon
4 Mystique: Raven Darkholme
4 Mystique: Shape-Changing Assassin
4 Sabretooth: Feral Rage
2 Sabretooth: Victor Creed
4 Blob: Fred Dukes
4 Magneto: Eric Lehnsherr
4 Magneto: Master of Magnetism

4 Overload
2 Acrobatic Dodge
3 Entangle
3 Relocation
2 Savage Beatdown

4 Avalon Space Station
4 Lost City



~Q signing off.

 

IQ

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