“The
Dark Circus”
Tournament
Report by Creon316
Admission: $2
About
20 or so participants, with double elimination
Hey
all, I’m back with my second tournament report.
I got lots of feedback on my “Legendary Aqua” deck report from August
2003. No, I didn’t quit the game over
that, I just needed a reality check and to remind myself that it’s a GAME. But that’s another story. As promised, I’m back with a report on my
favorite deck type, Gravity Bind. Here’s
the rundown.
Deck
Name: The Dark Circus (Wouldn’t say that to anyone’s face though, I
simply called it “Hand Destruction Deck.”) So named because of the Clown aspect and that
many monsters are Dark attribute.
Total
cards: 42
Normal
Monsters (2)
2x
Giant Soldier of Stone (Everybody knocks
these guys, but they have bought me some serious time. I did remove my 3rd one today for
Mystic Lamp.)
Effect
Monsters (15)
3x
Dream Clown
Penguin
Soldier
Yata-Garasu
(cackle)
Inaba
White Rabbit (Has won me many a game;
someday I may let him have Trix.)
Giant
Rat (This was a last minute addition,
and boy was I glad. See later.)
Cyber
Jar
Sangan
Witch
of the
Nightmare
Horse (A kid I work with let me borrow
this, I have to give it back soon. He
wouldn’t trade for anything.) L
Hayabusa
Knight (LOVE this card! Heeere,
Crass
Clown (Not loving this one. You ARE the weakest link. Goodbye!)
Mystic
Lamp
White
Magical Hat
Magic
(16)
Raigeki
Mirage
of Nightmare
Graceful
Charity
Delinquent
Duo (Which I ALWAYS get on the first
hand. Seriously. Fine though, best time to use it.)
United
We Stand (Nightmare Horse bait,
BWAHAHAHAHA!)
Messenger
of Peace (I only own 1, otherwise I’d probably run 2. Heeeere, Jinzo!)
Premature
Burial
Pot
of Greed (You put your WEED in it!)
Harpie’s
Feather Duster
Dark
Hole
3x
Mystical Space Typhoon
Change
of Heart
Monster
Reborn
Trap
(9)
3x
Gravity Bind (‘nuff said)
2x
Magic Drain (Used to go with Jammers,
b/c when I flip a trap, I WANT it to work, not maybe, but these seem to get the
job done unless it’s a game-winning move.
When your theme is hand destruction, you’re still getting your way. Fun to use against Pot of Greed…they get no
hand advantage either way.)
Imperial
Order
2x
Robbin’ Goblin (Really a key card here.)
Mirror
Force
I
know, my monster/M-T ratio is WAY off.
17 monsters to 25 M-T. Sue
me. I think I did okay. I never once had the problem of not holding a
monster, and I seem to pull off speed and get fistfuls of magic.
See
how the Circus theme comes in? We have 3
Dream Clowns, the one Crass Clown. Oh,
it’s a hand buzzer and pie in the face of the Messenger of Peace! Then White Magical Hat could be the
ringleader. LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, BOYS
AND GIRLS, CHILDREN OF ALL AGES! Giant
Rat and Sangan are the freakshow. Come
see the three-toed, three-eyed hairball that WANTS to be killed! He’s related to Watto from Star Wars episode
1 and 2! Come see the big rat that
collects skulls! Marvel at the pole
dancing rabbit! Nightmare Horse would be
the pony show, ooh ahh jumps through flaming hoops. The Witch could do some magic hexes with that
Mystic Lamp. There’s a guy with a bird
head doing sword tricks, maybe swallowing them.
Then there’s a penguin and a crow flapping around the room, and Goblins
are pickpocketing all the spectators. I
may add Queen’s Double to this deck, since I traded all my Jinzo #7’s and
Servant of Catabolisms. She could give
Dream Clown a haircut with those Wolverine blades. Doesn’t it all sound like fun? (*Pauses to wait for HBO to call and hire me
as a writer for “Carnivale.”*)
(*not
happening*)
Ever
notice that Queen’s Double and Princess of Tsurugi are the same girl with a
different colored robe? However, in QD’s
picture, you can see her reflection in all of the crystals around her, while
with PoT you cannot. They both look like
Maha Vailo when she was in elementary school, playing with her Barbie Hand
Crystal Knives.
I
got the idea for this deck from a friend who sent me a complete list for a
killer hand destruction deck. I don’t
own all the primo cards, so I had to improvise with what I had. Funny that I had all this stuff just lying
around the house.
Side
Deck
Graverobber
Royal
Oppression
Prohibition
Soul
Release
Collected
Power
Fengsheng
Mirror
Ordeal
of a Traveler
Spiritual
Energy Settle Machine
Bad
Reaction to Simochi
Exchange
Vengeful
Bog Spirit (makes Yata useless)
Reverse
Trap (makes Bazoo suck his thumb)
2x
House of Adhesive Tape (underrated…will destroy Yata, Goblin Attack Force, and
Spear Dragon)
I
didn’t use a single one of these today.
Don’t even know why I mentioned this.
And it’s 14 instead of 15. Sue me
again. They are to combat Exodia, lots
of equips, or burn decks, and I didn’t go up any of those today. A few are for particularly nasty beatdown
decks that go heavy on recursion.
Conspicuously
Absent, because I don’t own them: Spirit
Reaper, Axe of Despair, Injection Fairy Lily, another Messenger, Call of the
Haunted (well I own one, but am trying to cut down on M/T cards). Heart of Clear Water would probably help a
lot, but still conserving space. Reaper
on the Nightmare would fit in with a vengeance, too, but I don’t own a Spirit
Reaper, plus I would have to fool with fusion magic cards. Maybe when Magical Scientist shows up I will
try it. Also, missing a Fiber Jar. Read my last report and you’ll know why.
I
got to the tournament late and therefore got a free BYE. The first guy I played against was one I’d
seen every week but haven’t played in a tournament in a long time.
Tourament
Match #1: Me vs. nice guy with Dragon
deck
Dragon
decks are getting popular around here. I
tried one myself, but was lacking in Luster and Tyrant dragons, and it never
really cut the mustard. It just kind of
squooshed it flat and then ruined the cards.
Cave Dragon was the best I had going there. It was either pull a Lord of D/Flute thing
off and do 9000 damage in one turn, or die horribly. Had nobody to hold the fort while I drew
power cards.
I
let him go first even though I won a die roll.
Here’s why—in a weenie deck like mine, you rarely attack on your first
turn. Unless you get a Heart of the
Cards on your initial hand, you will be setting something in defense, or
setting Gravity Bind or activating Messenger.
And if the fate of the world vs. life in the Shadow Realm doesn’t depend
on your next draw, it won’t always happen.
You won’t have had time to activate Robbin’ Goblin, so even if you can
get a direct attacker down, you will have to leave them in ATK mode. The couple hundred direct damage is not worth
it without something like Goblin to stir up trouble, because on the next turn
you will most likely lose them to an 1800 or something worse, and take overflow
damage, losing your precious attacker to boot.
Unless you get a staller card right away, you could try it, but with
your opponent coming off their first hand, they will likely have set a Magic
Drain or MST or Imperial Order.
Exception for Reaper on the Nightmare—but good luck summoning that on
your first turn. ANYWAY…I like to let my
opponent go first, because they will not be able to attack. I wouldn’t have attacked on the first turn
anyway, so I like to stick them with that.
I have won more than one game at the last moment with a direct attack,
when my opponent would have won on their next turn. Therefore, that one first turn with no
attacks made all the difference. Also, I
always seem to get Delinquent Duo on the first hand. I can activate that straight away after
they’ve summoned/set 3 or more cards…this cuts their options in half right
away, hope they set good stuff. If I
need help, I can get my sister to come watch me and poke her eyes out so I can
draw inspiration from her courage to get optic surgery, and tell her I will
sell the packs after I win to pay for her surgery. But she lives in New York, so that would be a
lot of work.
First
Duel
He
started by setting a monster and some M/T.
As usual, I got Delinquent Duo on the first hand. I played it and discarded crap. I set Gravity Bind and Goblin, summoned
Nightmare Horse and hit him directly. He
goes, tries to attack but I flip Bind. I
set Giant Soldier of Stone, flipped Goblin, attacked again. Now he loses another card. He draws, grumbles, and passes. I set Cyber Jar just in case.
Within
a couple turns we’d both run out of hand and he had destroyed my Nightmare
Horse with some magic. I was stuck and
decided to flip Cyber Jar to give us some hand.
That was my first mistake. After
his Graceful Charity, he managed to assemble a Lord Of D, Flute, Blue Eyes, and
Luster Dragon. Right away I was staring
them all down, and exclaimed “You suck!”
I had set 2 clowns in DEF from Cyber Jar, and they were gone in short
order but I survived the first attack. I
had set Penguin Soldier also, and used it on Blue Eyes and something else…I
forgot about Lord Of D’s effect, and so the Blue Eyes stayed and I wasted
that. I managed to draw Dark Hole, but
he flipped Imperial Order. I said “You
F-ing suck!” I said it just like that,
edited and all. The guy next to me says
“Whoah, Rob’s getting MAD!” I said no,
I’m just talking trash! I had a fistful
of fun stuff like Pot of Greed and Monster Reborn, but was sunk. My Giant Soldier of Stone was no match for
his onslaught and I lost on his next turn.
Second
Duel
This
time I started. Got the usual lot
of Delinquent Duo (I swear that’s not on purpose!), White Magical Hat,
Messenger of Peace, Secret Pass, Dream Clown, and …hey! There’s Yata!
Come out of hiding. Slap down
Messenger, summon Clown. His turn, he
Exiled Forces my Clown, then does Premature Burial on Force. I drew another Clown on my go, summoned it,
and killed off X-force. His turn, he
sets a monster and one M/T. He’s
sweating now. I draw MST and blast his
card…it was Mirror Force. Whew. I set Penguin Soldier. He draws, sets another monster, and ends. Over the next couple turns I managed to
eliminate his hand, due to some Goblins and Hat and such. He set 3 M/T’s…I was holding MST and Feather
Duster. I wanted to get rid of them all,
so first I played MST on one just to draw out the Jammers/Drains/etc…anything
but Imperial Order so I could then activate Duster without fear and finish the
job. He didn’t counter. So then I used Feather Duster to get rid of
the remaining two. Before long, I got
the money shot. I flipped Penguin,
returning his two monsters to his hand.
I summoned Yata, attacked directly with both Penguin and Yata, he lost
all his cards and was locked. He
conceded immediately without me even asking.
Wow,
that was easy. This was the FIRST time
I’d ever scored a win just because of Yata-Garasu. I wonder if anybody else knows that this is
possible! Wait’ll this gets out! It’ll be bigger than the Magical
Scientist/Catapult Turtle combo! But you
didn’t hear about that from me. I am
still paying damages to Upper Deck for when I first suggested someone try
Backup Soldier in an Exodia deck.
One
duel to go.
Third
Duel
Don’t
remember all the specifics of this, just that I lost after some serious drama
near the end. Early on I did use Yata
with Secret Pass to the Treasures just to keep one more card at bay. This time he just pulled all the right
counters out and slowly amassed a force.
I did pull off a nice combo…I Change of Hearted one of his Troop
Dragons, Prematured one of my Clowns, normal summoned Nightmare Horse, and
slapped down United We Stand, and like Emeril’s garlic, BAM! 2900 direct damage. Hmph…maybe should have killed that Opticlops
instead. He did it for me though, his
response was Dark Hole. Near the end
though, he had one more monster attacking than I had defending, b/c of his
Tyrant Dragon’s effect. My last defender
was Giant Rat. For some reason I was
thinking its effect would let me search a monster and add it to my hand. The direct damage from the last attack would
finish me before that did any good, so I declared him a win and said oh
well. Then the guy next to me, the same
one from before, corrected me on Rat’s effect—it lets me search an Earth
monster with 1500 ATK or less and SPECIAL SUMMON it in face up attack. (Shoulda
READ the card when I slipped it in my deck at the last moment.) I said thanks for the tip, but the best I
could do was Hayabusa Knight. However,
that did enough…his 1000 ATK cut into the direct damage and left me with 700
LP. That kept me going for a few more
turns. I did manage to get another Bind
out and stalled him. When I had a direct
attacker ready, he flipped a Mirror Force.
Ouch. With my empty field, he
played Reborn on one of my Dream Clowns (3 stars) and hit me directly for the
win. Pretty slick—used my own strategy
against me. I must have been close,
that’s a pretty desperate move.
Okay,
I’ve had much worse. After the game, the
guy next to me shared something he was itching to tell me but didn’t want to
interfere in the game. He said that if
it’s your turn and your opponent activates a trap, you can chain with MST from
your HAND…I didn’t know that. It
wouldn’t have made a big difference in the situation where I could have done
it, but I’ll remember that.
Loser’s
bracket here I come. Apparently calling
it that hurt someone’s feelings, so they began calling it the “Not Winners
Bracket”. My next opponent was a guy
I’ve dueled a few times. I mentioned him
in my last report, he had a Weenie Rush deck then. Now he had a more stylish beatdown deck. But hey, if I was facing him now, that means
he already lost to someone too, so I wasn’t as worried.
Match
#2: Me vs. another nice guy with a
standard beatdown
Manners
make all the difference—it even says in the instruction manual that they are a
must.
First
Duel
Don’t
remember much about this. Just the usual
Gravity Bind vs. Beatdown deck fight…you can probably work this one out in your
head. I play bind and unleash the ankle
biter monsters, he gets out Jinzo and bowls over Gravity Bind, I activate
Messenger, Nyah Nyah, he draws an MST in due time, I magic drain, he discards
Dark Hole, yadda yadda yadda…I finally get rid of Jinzo, …I remember him Snatch
Stealing my Giant Rat and trying to attack while I had Bind out, it’s 4
stars….thought I had it made as Snatch Steal racked up the points while my Rat
did him no good. He finally played Heavy
Storm, which usually means a one-turn kill for a deck like mine, and this was
no exception. I did play Mirage of
Nightmare, and ended up discarding Inaba White Rabbit, R.I.P. He won.
Second
Duel
I
let him go first, for the reasons I described above. He had out Jinzo in 2 turns, and reborned a
Charity’d Summoned Skull and got in a direct attack. By the start of my THIRD turn, I was at 100
LP. It looked grim as he had these heavy
hitters and several M/T’s set.
Undaunted, I pulled a Graceful Charity.
Used that, and got a Pot of Greed.
This gave me a fistful of magic.
I slapped down my Messenger, and set one Bind. My only monster was Giant Soldier of Stone,
so I defended with it. I also activated
Mirage of Nightmare and set MST, emptying my hand, then passed. On his turn, I drew 4 more cards and then
Typhooned my Mirage. In that 4 card
hand, I got Inaba White Rabbit, Dark Hole, Raigeki, and another Bind.
BWHAHAAHAHAHA! I survived the next
turn…I must have destroyed one of those heavy hitters or Penguined or
something. He had a couple M/T set, so
with my empty field I again tried to draw out M/T removal. Since I was monster free I activated Dark
Hole. He couldn’t stop it…probably b/c
of Jinzo. Suck on that, Android Psycho
Shocker! Stop ripping of Psycho Mantis’
look! That guy should have at least 5 legs
for all the Achilles Heel’s he seems to have.
I had drawn MST, and used it on a facedown…it was Mirror Force! YES!
Silly rabbit, life points are for kids!
And
the onslaught began. He never recovered
from that. I slowly hacked him down
solely with Inaba White Rabbit, getting a Robbin’ Goblin in the process. He had absolutely no hand for a while. I managed to revive a Dream Clown and add to
the fun…all his cards were DOA. With the
same stinking 100 LP I’d had since turn 3, I had turned it around and won the
duel.
Third
Duel
He
decided to go first. Ehh…see First
Duel. Pretty much the same. He did make the same mistake with Bind—he
Change of Hearted a Crass Clown and tried to attack. People seem to assume that all of my monsters
can go under Messenger or Bind, but a few don’t make the cut. I did pull the same trick with Yata and
Secret Pass just to annoy him, but he used Waboku. Waste!
He won with the usual safeguards against my attacks, cursed out Gravity
Bind a few times, then complimented me to heck and back on my deck and said it
was a really good game, the longest he’d had all day. I do remember him using two Spirit Reapers—we
both got confused. I remember using
Crass Clown’s effect to bump a Reaper to his hand, then eliminating it from his
hand with a direct attack and Goblin…HOWEVER—Crass Clown’s effect should have
killed it instantly. It’s all the same I
guess, but neither of us thought of that.
He suggested that I get rid of all the Giant Soldier of Stone’s, add a
second Secret Pass to the Treasures to use with Lily if I get one (he did it to
me once), and add more direct attackers, no matter how lame. *cough Queen’s
Double- cough-* I guess that’s true…if
you have Robbin’ Goblin in effect, any attack is damaging. I really need an Axe of Despair, but can’t
find one for a decent deal.
So
now I’m out of the tournament.
Again. I didn’t start to look for
rope to tie around the low TV monitor and hang myself like last time though…I
pulled out 2 wins and made both of them work for the Match victories.
Me’s
ready to trade by now. I really wanted a
Limiter Removal or two, so I could work on a Gradius/Machine deck, as well as
stock up for a Fire Princess deck. I
showed one kid my entire collection while he waved a Limiter Removal in my
face, but he just handed it back and said no thanks. I had my near-defunct Ocean deck with me, and
traded 1 of the 3 Legendary Fishermen to another kid that plays Ocean, in
exchange for a Fire Princess and a Japanese Gradius. Brings me up to 2 of each of those. He also really wanted another Tornado Wall,
and I have 3, so I traded him 1 for a Scapegoats. 2 of them now too…and hey, they could also
work in this deck. I also traded a Cave
Dragon for a Forced Requisition, which may work well in today’s deck, but
didn’t try to squeeze it in. (Ever see
the Seinfeld where George put one more thing in his wallet and it
exploded?)
Then
I was hungry. The store sells food, so I
asked the guy at the counter if I could have some popcorn chicken and a
soda. He said okay…do you have some
money? I said yes, I do…hey, how about I
trade you some money for the food? He said,
that’ll work! Ok, guess you had to be
there. He also asked me why I don’t buy
cards anymore. I told him I got cheap. What he doesn’t know is that the folks at
Citibank are anally raping me with finance charges and I have to turn all the
money I can over to them.
All
I need before I can make a rough copy of my Machine deck is a third Gradius,
and some Limiter Removals. As for Fire
Princess, I think I have everything I need except for…a 3rd
Princess. I used to run a
healing/annoy/summon 1000 Eyes
Restrict/stall/slice-dice-juliann/deck-out/complete calculus homework deck,
fitting all that in with a mere 80 cards.
So, if I dust off that archetype and make a few minor changes, I should
be set to go. I won a few games via
deck-out with 13000 or so life points.
Would have won them a lot sooner had I owned any Princesses. And now there is a card called Dark Snake
Syndrome…tee hee hee. I called that deck
“Thousand Eyes Annoy.” That deck was
home to my favorite combo ever, one I thought up myself: Play Painful Choice, search 3 Marie the
Fallen One’s, Sinister Serpent, and whatever else you don’t mind losing. 98% of the time they will pick a Marie, and
you win all around.
Okay,
I’ve strayed. I’m not done reporting
yet. I played two more free duels and
WON BOTH! I knew I didn’t suck at
this! My deck is finally starting to get
some results.
I
beat the first guy 2-0. He had the usual
assortment of 1800 attackers, spirit reaper, jinzo, etc. I won the first duel by clearing his field
with Penguin soldier and attacking directly with three of my monsters and one
of his, getting him to 600 LP, and when he rebounded for the kill, I won at the
last minute thanks to Inaba White Rabbit.
In the second duel, he had Jinzo and Summoned Skull out and would have
clobbered me. I held out via the usual
assortment of Robbin’ Goblin with direct attackers, Dream Clowns as damage
magnets (your opponent WILL spend monster removal on it), activating Messenger
with a set Gravity Bind…let them get cocky and MST messenger, watch them summon
a’plenty, then flip Gravity Bind and be ready to duck. I even survived dueling Cyber Jar flips—even
when your monster and M/T ratio is off like mine, speed still makes the
difference. Think I played 4 magic cards
in one turn, finishing by setting Secret Pass.
He killed my Sangan, I searched Hayabusa Knight. I summoned that and flipped Secret Pass,
dealing 2000 for the win.
I
beat the next guy the same way, 2-0, and made him really irritated in the
process. He had nasty stuff like Heavy
Storm and backed it up with Magician of Faith’s, but I managed to get all the
right stuff like Magic Drain and Imperial Order right when I needed it. I even kept Imperial Order active for a few
turns since I was so far ahead on life points, which gave me time to draw and
set Magic Drain and MST, to counter the magic cards he was saving up. Later, I did manage to lose my White Rabbit
from discarding ONE card with Mirage of Nightmare, but it was okay, once again
I pulled off the Nightmare Horse with 2900 ATK via United We Stand, and when I
lost that, I chipped away with Mystic Lamp and Robbin’ Goblin. Why don’t people ever MST those things? There is usually one on my field for the
whole game, and nobody does anything about them. He also had a thing for using 2 Spear Cretins
for infinite revival. But when you’re
running direct attackers, it doesn’t matter, but that can really screw someone
up. Sort of a jury-rigged Spirit
Reaper. I once got the great idea to use
Mask of Darkness with Backup Soldier for infinite returns, until I read
Soldier’s description closer.
People
usually don’t bother with Magic Cylinder on direct attackers. However, Inaba White Rabbit tends to draw out
Mirror Force, just to get rid of it. I
had crazy luck with destroying Mirror Forces today, except for that one. I’ve never seen Barrel Behind the Door played
at my game. So I’m usually safe from
direct or reflected damage.
After
this, the double duels started and I left.
One of the best days I’ve had at a tournament overall. I went home not irritated for a change.
I
shall return, with either a machine or Fire Princess deck, whichever I can set
up first. Also, if I can ever get my
hands on 3 copies of Metamorphosis, I will try my 1000 Eyes Restrict deck
again. I like this idea—get Meta into
the graveyard (Painful Choice anyone?), flip a Magician of Faith, get back
Meta, then use it on her to summon 1000 Eyes.
Fun for the whole family.
Props
and Slops:
Props:
-Me
getting some decent trades for a change, acquiring Fire Princess, Forced
Requisition, Gradius, and Scapegoats
-Winning
a Duel with 100 LP
-Inaba
White Rabbit for being the real “powerful engine of destruction.” WHOAH! Just had a thought—get Gaia Power into
play…he becomes a 1200 direct attacker.
Queen’s Double is 850…Hayabusa Knight becomes 3000 if done right…Dream
Clown is 1700….Giant Rat becomes a Gemini Elf with a bonus effect….Giant Soldiers become
1800/1500…this could work! Call my
agent! I’m excited now. Maybe I should call this The Earth Circus. Every day should be Earth day!
-To
my young friend from work for lending me Nightmare Horse
-To
my deck, for pulling out a total of 6 wins out of 10 duels through sound
strategy, speed, and not just lucky draws
Slops:
-If
you read my last report, remember the kid with the insect deck? He’s still showing up, and argues about every
card played, calls people names, got totally mad when lost and began yelling
and cursing. Next time I have to duel
him, there will be trouble. My day job
is as a kids’ counselor, but I don’t see myself being very therapeutic with
him. He also has lots of dandruff and
farted openly during the tournament. If
I worked in the store, he would not be allowed to come anymore.
-To
the one tight-fisted kid who wouldn’t trade a Limiter Removal.
-Another
guy who kept trying to sell me a holo Relinquished, Dark Room of Nightmares,
and something else…he asked me like 3 times if I would buy them.
-Hmm,
I can’t really think of anything else. I
was pretty happy with today. If that one
kid weren’t there, it’d be perfect.
See,
there’s hope for me yet. Thanks to
everyone who responded to my “Legendary Aqua” report with deck advice and
support.
Other
than tournaments, I don’t know anyone else to talk about Yu-Gi-Oh with, so please
write or instant message with cheers, jeers, or challenges. I haven’t won a single online duel yet, so it
will be good for your ego.
AOL
Instant Messenger: crooner316
It’s
all fun and games until someone gets hurt.
Then it’s hilarious.