Sunday, 15 April 2012

Locals Adventure - 1st Place With Chaos Dragons

My, my. I've got alot on my plate this week following the shenanigans that happened this weekend. Both YCS Dallas and Toulouse had Chaos Dragons make big splashes with a 2nd Place finish and 1st place respectively. The impact of this will be profound as at long last Konami has gotten their secret wish in that Dragons actually topped and won YCS level events (despite Disaster Dragon making several Top 16 appearances in Europe last year) and we can all expect and increase in Chaos Dragon play at the Local, Regional and Dueling Network level for the next while. My immediate recommendations? If you're not siding Macro you'd better have Light-Imprisoning Mirrors ready as shutting down the Lightsworn engine and Lightpulsar Dragon is key to winning the matchup. Just be weary of MST and Royal Decree stopping those cards.

That said perhaps it was a sign of something being in the air as this weekend for locals I decided to run the deck as well with the intent of dismantling it afterwards. I've spent alot of time (and videos) with the deck on DN for the last while and I really wanted to see how it would perform against competent people while also not putting up with bullshit randomizers.

Pre Tournament - I get some games in with my Budget Dark World deck against Infernity. Save for one game where I drew Broww then nothing but spells and traps I smashed the hell out of the deck through sheer speed and power. I can only imagine what'll happen once I get TGUs.

ROUND 1 - vs Zombie World (2-0)

Game 1: He let me go first. I opened with Future Fusion. Honk honk!

Game 2: Nothing special here. He was clearly a newer player as I had to explain to him what can and can't trigger Torrential Tribute and stuff like that. Couldn't get through Lightpulsar looping.

ROUND 2 - vs Wind-Ups (2-0)

Game 1: Veiler'd his Magician and Pulsar/REDMD took it from there. He wasn't able to get much going.

Game 2: Oh god he gets the loop off and I don't have my 3 Veiler, 2 Maxx "C" and 2 D.D. Crow to stop it! He hits all but one of my cards in hand and that turned out to be a Gorz that helped me fight my way back. He wasn't able to mount much of an offense afterwards as Lightpulsar Dragon held down the fort and I was eventually able to normal summon Maxx "C" and poke for the win.

ROUND 3 - vs Gravekeepers (2-1)

Game 1: Upon having Trooper attack into a Spy I realized I was in a world of trouble. My worst matchup by far and my hand is full of graveyard reliant cards! He's able to establish some beaters backed by 2 Necrovalley (I MST'd one) and I scoop it up.

Game 2: 9 Cards were sided in for this and I saw a few of them. Unfortunately he got Royal Tribute off so I lost a couple guys. But through destruction effects and Future Fusion I'm able to turn it around.

Game 3: Managed to get Heavy Storm, Dark Hole and a flurry of Chaos Monsters off for a huge win. Not surprisingly he drew Starlight Road afterwards.

TOP 8 - vs Zombies (2-0)

Game 1: A bit of a haze other than I'm staring down an Ill Bud that just keeps going and going. But she's unable to get around Lightpulsar Dragon + REDMD and I eventually win.

Game 2: I get Future Fusion off but it would be a while yet before I had a hand of monsters able to capitalize on it. Eventually I drop boss monsters and win.

TOP 4 - vs Infernity (2-0)

Game 1: Same deck I faced with Budget World so I knew that if I could overwhelm him with a couple big dragons he'd be force to make subpar plays, which he does a few times. Lightpulsar was just too difficult to play around.

Game 2: He uses Card Destruction which sets up my graveyard for my Chaos Monsters. Sorc and Pulsar do their jobs.

FINALS - vs Koa'ki Meiru (2-1)

Game 1: Set Ryko and pass turn. He Dark Holes that and summons KKM Urknight and it goes downhill from there. Didn't help the rest of my hand was Pulsar Dragon, Sorc and REDMD. Really needed that mill to go off.

Game 2: This one was foggy but I remember getting Future Fusion off and taking it from there.

Game 3: I open Future Fusion and drop BLS to clear his monsters. Pulsar Dragon follows this but he's able to make it a close game with Enemy Controlling BLS and coming at me (the second time though I rammed LPD into Soldier and got REDMD) before I drop Five-Headed Dragon and win locals for the 1st time ever at this location.

After this I get some Pokemon Emerging Powers Boosters and pull 3 Thunderus in a row.

PROPS
-Lightsworn Engine put in tons of work. To the point that Future Fusion was a dead card at times because of how many dragons I milled.
-Lightpulsar Dragon managed to win over some respect from me.
-Random Debris Dragon enabled game turning Black Rose Dragon plays.

SLOPS
-Not paying closer attention to the number of Dragons I had in play/graveyard/banished as on 3 occasions I used Future Fusion and all I had left were 5 Dragons including Eclipse Wyvern.
-REDMD at 3 was too much. Taking this down.
-Side deck card of Kinetic Soldier was a complete fail. I expected to face Six Samurai and turns out none were present.

Wouldn't you know though that at this tournament which I played a Chaos style deck almost /everyone/ was playing a Light/Dark heavy deck. I probably would have ran Disaster Dragon had I known this for Drago Trolling. Oh well. Perhaps next time.

Sunday, 1 April 2012

Locals Adventure - 3rd 3rd Place in a Row

Been a long time since I've done one of these, eh? Unfortunately my work schedule made it outright difficult to compete during March (never) and this month isn't looking too good either. I'm gonna have to make it a point to book off the preview of the next Pokemon Set and Galactic Overlord pretty soon.

Enough of that however! Today I have a report of how I fared at Locals this fine afternoon. I must admit I was pretty stoked to be competing for the first time since Regionals in an environment where I'd be facing actual people as opposed to those fucktards on Dueling Network. No 60 card decks here! Deciding what to run though was a huge problem as I really just wanted to play something fun following the Regionals and my choices were either Skill Hero Beat ala what topped Long Beach or Chaos Dragons. Ultimately I decided to go with the Hero deck just so I could see how much work Evocator Chevalier would put in over Crusader of Endymion.

ROUND 1 - vs Chaos Dragons (2-0)

Game 1: This was a bit of a blur but I remember Alius, Spark and Miracle Fusion just being too much to handle. I was able to keep him from getting Red-Eyes Darkness Metal Dragon and Lightpulsar Dragon onto the field which was a big help.

Game 2: More of the same. My backrow and beaters got in there.

ROUND 2 - vs Dark World (2-0)

Game 1: Oh geez, my worst matchup and it was against a Turbo build. I prison some of his monsters and Gemini Spark the other stuff. Miracle Fusion finishes it up.

Game 2: He's able to set a face pace but then his deck fails him and he's unable to draw into his needed combos. During this I just keep swinging for 1900 damage while my sided cards maintain my momentum.

ROUND 3 - vs Infernity (2-1)

Game 1: Turn 1 Thunder King + backrow = gg

Game 2: Didn't side and it cost me as he was able to just aggro the hell out of me with a flurry of big beaters to my hand of Stratos, Alius and Barbaros (with no Skill Drain).

Game 3: I sided here and it won me the game. Shadow-Imprisoning Mirror + Dark Bribe to keep it safe locked his deck down completely. Forced out a Warning with Barbaros + Skill Drain then Miracle Fusion'd for the win.

ROUND 4 - vs Legendary Six Samurai (2-0)

Game 1: He makes the fast Shi En and tries to come at me but D Prison + Skill Drain stops it and turns his deck into a bunch of weak beaters that I just trounce.

Game 2: Surprisingly he didn't side at all which is odd because he sides D.Fissure + D.D. Survivor into EVERYTHING, including Lightsworn. No complaints here as he overextends into a 4 monster field and I Torrential Tribute to take the game around.

ROUND 5 - vs Chaos Dragons (1-2)

Game 1: I smack him around pretty badly. Skill Drain stopped his Lightsworns and it slowed up his deck enough for me to beat him down.

Game 2: I made some bad choices in siding and I'm sure that's what cost me this match. Had a hand of Gemini Spark and Hero Blast but couldn't get to a Hero for the life of me.

Game 3: He opened the nuts. Not much I can do against Red-Eyes Darkness Metal Dragon + Chaos Sorc + 2 Call of the Haunted to my open field and having just used a Solemn Warning to stop the Darkness Metal. Both Super Poly I sided in were dead in my hand. Never going to side it in against Chaos Dragons again until Escuriado gets out here.

So I finish 4-1 with Drain Heroes, using Chevalier a bit (RoTA target + Nova Master food) and losing due to some bad luck and poor side decking decisions. If I had known Chaos Dragons, Dark World, Zombies and such would have been at Locals I would have just used Disaster Dragon (which people were expecting me to use) as Koa'ki Meiru Drago would have just shat all over half the players. There WAS a Disaster Dragon deck in play though as one of my friends had a friend come down to meet up with me and get some ideas for his deck since he likes Dragons and I'm the guy to go to with help on that. He finished 2-3 but that's to be expected for someone picking up Disaster for the first time while not having a completed deck.

After all of that I bought some packs getting very nice pulls (Ultra Prison, Super Crow from Ra Yellow and Laggia from Photon Shockwave), new sleeves and some much needed additions to my Psyren and Rurouni Kenshin Manga collections.

PROPS
-Going 4-1 and getting another top 4 finish with Heroes. They're easily my 2nd best deck for competitive play.
-Pulling Evolzar Laggia, Super D.D. Crow, Ultra Dimensional Prison and Ultra Kyurem among my booster packs.
-Grabbing ultra Macro Cosmos and Hydrogeddons via trades. Now I can build Dino Heroes for legit AND I have a blinging side deck!
-Helping a fellow Dragon enthusiast getting a start into play.

SLOPS
-My deck getting garbage hands at terrible times. I was able to play out of the first one but the second time around, yeesh.
-Half of my Player's Choice sleeves becoming marked up from shuffling. These things clump together badly and their backs bend and mark up way too easily. The Dragon Shield ones I bought in desperation (had to re sleeve my entire deck in the 9 minutes I had before the top 4 started!) didn't do much better. From now on Ultra Pro sleeves for everything.

And that's pretty much it. I won't get another opportunity to compete for another 2 weeks so unfortunately its back to Dueling Network for the next while. Chaos Dragons, Heroes and Budget Dark World will see testing at some point and perhaps Glads as well.

Until the next time folks and remember; If its not Blue it ain't True!