First up I have to say YAY HUNDERS!!! It makes me happy to see a deck I love to play get 2nd Place at ARG Montreal. Looking over the build I must say its very standard with techs to beat the Dragon Ruler matchup. I also won't be surprised if more people hop on the Hunder bandwagon now the deck has done legit well during a format that decks like it struggle. Not that it bothers me any. Stuff like this stopped bothering me long ago when I came to the realization that people will try out something that topped for many reasons;
-It topped a major event
-It's something new in a format that many except the extreme competitive (like Pat Hoban) find to be stale now
-They want to know how it works
My only issue with this is that retarded hipsters will not realize these points and call anyone who plays Hunders after this weekend an uncreative, netdecking piece of shit tryhard. Fuck you buddy. Fuck you.
Secondly I didn't actually legit play at locals. Instead I was offered the chance to be Head Judge which I won't lie is something I've contemplating trying to get into after talking to the guys who ran our last Regionals. Mind you this is locals, in Regina, during a -45 C winter nightmare. To say this was small was an understatement.
Anyway the way we do things here at Locals is the judge "plays" against people but anyone who faces him gets 2 wins. You may remember me mentioning this in one of my reports during the Genex Undine portion of Mermail format. I decided much like Cameron do bring multiple decks with the intention of changing what I played between rounds and a totally legit Extra Deck.
Turns out it may have been a good idea to play today as I was on FIYAH with each deck, beating my opponents 2-0...even if for all intents and purposes I lost 0-2 against them. Undefeated yet winless at the same time. Oh the contradictions!
Round 1 - Assault Rulers vs Gagaga.dek
The guy is your typical ReRe that overextends, has no concept of strategy and runs a handful of destruction cards meaning anything that puts out Stardust has a field day with him. This went downhill oh so fast.
Round 2 - Herald Agents vs Yugi Reloaded
This was the guy playing Exodia last week so I thought it fitting to use a deck that does largely the same thing; not allowing the opponent to do jack shit at all. Difference is I still win my games through monster attacks.
Round 3 - Constellar vs Photon
This was where I had to bust out my old Dueling Network Moderator muscles as a couple of things came up that I had to explain like Veiler vs Pollux and how Galaxy-Eyes works. Not to be mean or anything but...even if the person has been playing Photons for a long while (and admittedly his build has improved since the last time) when it comes to Dragons I know all.
Anyway the first game is ridiculous with me opening triple Pollux and two Algs so I'm forced to make Paladynamos and such. It ends up being 300 vs 100 LP thanks to a clutch Forbidden Lance and I hang on just long enough to topdeck a Sombres and cowbell for game. Game 2 I open ALL THE BACKROW and have Trap Hole, Void Trap Hole, TT and much more to stop several summons and such. Then I start drawing monsters and win.
After that the top cut is announced and Megamonkey defeats Agents with Inzektors to win it. The tournament went smoothly and I had a few judge calls. I was able to respond to them quickly and I tried to keep the rounds moving while also throwing down the gauntlet on a few things that at this point have become really fucking dumb. I enjoyed the experience and look forward to doing this again. Once the tourney wraps up rades are done and I pick up more DT Constellars (!!) before we head to Robins, play some Vanguard then later on I talk with Monkey about the secret to immortality and other evil stuff. The universe will be mine in due time after all. Nah, I'm just kidding.
First up I'm sorry I didn't write anything else last month. The only other Locals I was able to make it to ended terribly for me and I wound up coming home late, tired and not really motivated to blog.
Long story short I took Red-Eyes Dragon Rulers to Locals and god did the deck ever brick out on me. From losing to bad players to getting smashing grounded by good players the inconsistent nature of the deck was just too difficult to overcome. Don't give me that garbage of "you just have to believe! Anything can work if you give it a chance" that hipsters like to say.
Some things just don't work. Some cards are just flat out AWFUL. I'm looking at you Red and Blue Six Samurai monsters. And its not just "oh that's because people don't try to make them-"
WRONG ASSHOLE. Established decks do NOT play shitty situational cards that are a part of your awesome 5 card OTK that loses to a finger poke because the skilled players are quick to realize that some cards of an archetype completely suck. Fine deckbuilding comes from being able to realize what theme cards don't work and what non theme cards go with the deck. Just because you're playing a theme doesn't mean you HAVE to run all of the theme cards. It's not required. If you're doing so because "you have to" then you're holding yourself down with a shitty mindset and you'll lose to the people who expand their horizons. Don't be like these people, dear readers. You're better than that.
...
I have no idea how I went from talking about a bad tournament experience to shooting on Hipsters for what feels like the bajillionth time. Let's just say Red-Eyes Rulers looks nice in theory and when it wants to work plays quite well. However its got issues like the Blue-Eyes build. Both are bad compared to Standard Rulers which is what I took to this tournament. Megamonkey was sitting this one out and lent me his Sixth Sense to use. Would I actually be able to use it?
Round 1 - vs T.G. Madolche (2-1)
I forget a good bulk of this match. I know two of the three games I lost due to bricking. It seems that the more techy Dragon Rulers become and the less monsters it runs, the more passive its early game is and tendency to draw outright unplayable hands. All monsters? You lose. All Spells? Oh you lose that too.
Anyway he's able to build advantage off of Ticket and I can't really do much about it. The one game I Maxx "C" him and don't draw into the Fader and get OTKed, the other I do Dragon things and the last one I resolve Black Rose and leave him topdecking which is never good against this deck.
Round 2 - vs fuckingfaggotbullshitstallretardsolitarefest...I mean Exodia (2-1)
I hate alternate win condition decks. I always have and always will. Game 1 he hits all of the draw cards and sadly the stall cards needed to get all 5 pieces. I'm talking Threatening Roar and Waboku for 6 straight turns. Do you know how frustrating it is not being able to do jackshit during your turn? People complain about lockdown cards and guess what? Alt Win decks basically do the same thing. They lock you out of your turns and your ability to play a normal game of Yu-Gi-Oh! Not only that but they do it s-l-o-w-l-y.
I honestly would have much rather preferred Dark Hole and Power Bond into Cyber Twin for game. OTKs > Alt Win decks.
Game 2 goes much more to my favour thanks to Star Eater's ability to not be Swift Scarecrow'd and all that jazz. The critical moment comes to when while under Reckless Greed he goes off with a 3 card chain with Accumulated Fortune at the end;
Game 3 was basically Star Eater beats as he burns his Battle Faders early and runs out of steam.
Round 3 - vs Mecha Phantom Beast Karakuri (2-1)
This one was crazy and derpy. The one game had him going completely the hell off against my set monster and being able to power past my Phoenix Wing Wind Blast to put lethal damage on board. Unfortunately for him that set was a Fossil Dyna that completely annihilated his board and won me the game.
Oh yes, I main deck Dyna now. Why run Vanity's Emptiness when you can have it on legs while being food for Redox?
The other game has him going off again and being unable to kill me, but I can't do anything to his board and get Cowboy'd. Then in the last game I'm forced to go out of my way to answer a Dracossack + Power Tool Dragon with United We Stand on it play. I do so by clearing the sack, taking Power Tool with Big Eye and using Sacred Sword to banish it for the draw 2. I'm pretty sure I also flipped Return at some point.
Top 4 - vs 3 Axis Fire Fist (2-0)
I opened kind of weird in the first game and maybe misplayed? I remember leaving myself with a Tidal without protection and I get Blader'd but play out of it with Blaster popping and some other things. Fire Fist Swallow is interesting to deal with but even with these new tricks the deck can't compete with Dragons without heavy siding and he didn't get to his anti Dragon cards.
Final - vs Bujin (2-0)
This was big. I got knocked out the last tournament by this deck opening extremely anti Dragon (Kaiser Colosseum and Fossil Dyna) and me opening piss poor game 3. I dedicated several cards in my side to this matchup as it's going to be very relevant next format.
Mind you this is all moot as I flipped Return in both games, with the second duel having a Sixth Sense that resulted in me drawing 6. I didn't JUST play it however as I was low on life in both games and could not afford to have him Honest or even Crane me. I spent a few turns trying to get the Yamato off the field or having a way around it. Game 1 was via my spells and traps while Game 2 was with my sided in Exploder Dragon and Smashing Grounds. The Return play in Game 2 ended with Exploder and enough damage on board to OTK him.
After the tourney I pick up several card needed to build Harpies, Mecha Phantom Beasts, Photon and Bujin. I may not care for the deck currently but the next format may well be a three way contest between Noble Knights, Bujin and Gravekeepers. I'd play NKs but well...Medraut. Fuck Gravekeepers.
Props
-Beating Exodia. Fuck that deck.
-Fossil Dyna. He's an extremely good Meta call right now. Honestly because of him I could see Battle Fader being dropped for Scarecrow again BECAUSE of Dyna. It's very possible to set up a Return play that has him coming out.
-Taking Power Tool Dragon and using Sword to get rid of it. That was some crazy shit right there.
-Beating Bujin.
Slops
-Losing a game to Exodia. Fuck that deck.
-Bricking. I should honestly name my deck Xbox 360.
-Return and Sixth Sense sacking.
FINALLY, the Green Slayer HAS COME BACK...to Comic Readers.
Welcome to the Blue Corner on Blogspot dear readers and to a bit of a different report from Locals.
Yes Locals. Not Lolcals.
Turns out it wasn't just me who was unsatisfied with the competitive scene in Regina. In fact several people expressed an interest in changing things up in addition to being less than pleased with how Tramps has been conducting themselves over the last while. The way things were going I honestly saw something ugly happening down the road. Just saying.
However it ended up never coming to that due to a really lucky break coming up in the form of Comic Readers expressing interest in having Yu-Gi-Oh! Tournaments which made me really happy. For those that may not know for a long time Regina had TWO places to go to for Yu-Gi-Oh! Locals. Tramps and Comic Readers. Of the two Comic Readers was the more competitive place to be as all the good players went there wheras Tramps was where all the retards and scrubs played. Topping Comic Readers actually took considerable effort because of the player quality present.
Unfortunately as time went on many of those good players stopped coming to Readers and the challenge there dropped significantly. Ultimately we stopped going entirely as Cardfight!! Vanguard Locals was just a better use of our time and the end result was the discontinuation of tournaments.
Fast forward to now and through some negotiations Comic Readers has opted to start having Local Tournaments again, this time on a Sundays! This is again great as I was never able to go to Readers tournaments in the first place because of my work schedule so it's great to know I can actually take part in the GOOD tournaments on a frequent basis and actually improve my game (which honestly I feel has been slipping. You're only as good as your competition you know). Furthermore if the tournaments have decent turnouts on a frequent basis we could end up doing things ala Collector's Lane from Saskatoon (Box Tournaments, Sealed Play, maybe Goat Format)!
That in itself is a long ways away. Right now we just have to get things rolling. I am really hopeful though that we can make these things happen. Regina REALLY needs this. I've said this a few times now but in comparison to Saskatoon, Winnipeg and Alberta we're a laughing stock. I want to change this. I want Regina players to be able to command respect. I told everyone in the room as such while we were opening our Shadow Specters Sneak Peek packs. I pulled the Bujin Ultra Rare, Ulti Dragluon and picked up dragon stuff that I needed before getting ready for a regular tournament using Dragon Rulers with Dragon Shrine and some other oddball card choices. My reasoning was;
-Dragon Shrine is another copy of Ravine to get cards into the graveyard without having to rely on chancy milling aspects like Card Trooper.
-No Cards of Consonance as I want to use my tuners for either Synchros or for Shrine.
-Trap Stun over MST can just lock out all of the things that this deck hates; traps and floodgate cards.
-Battle Fader over Scarecrow as you can Fader a Star Eater.
-No Vanity's Emptiness as I want real traps to disable my opponent.
Ultimately I had a build teched out for not just the Mirror but the randomness of Regina. Much to my surprise Magnus was present and playing Megamonkey's Dragon Rulers. Good to see him back.
Round 1 - vs Mermail (1-2)
This was rather unfortunate. Game 1 I open with the hand that puts out 2 Sacks and 3 Tokens with a Ravine in hand but he has both Maxx "C" AND Effect Veiler to stop my combo dead at AFD. Afterwards he summons Leed from his hand (lol), pops AFD with Infanty, summons 2 Aqua Spirit and a Marksman for the OTK. Game 2 I get rid of his Iron Wall and Warning a clutch Abyss-Sphere play while Game 3 he had all of his answers to my one MST. I should note I had 3 Maxx "C", 1 Fader, 3 MST, 3 Wind Blast and 2 Trap Stun in my deck post siding. I only saw 1 MST out of those. No hand traps at all against a deck that I really wanted them for.
With that said I'm now out of top cut as I lost a round. Unfortunate.
Round 2 - vs T.G. Synchro (2-0)
I can't help but feel kinda sad when I play Mr. Hobo. He was fucking on FIRE two months ago at the Regina Regionals and the day after with his Madolche deck. We played in the finals of the locals following that tournament and he gave my Blue-Eyes Rulers a really good fight. Since then he's stopped being serious and opted to start dicking around again and it makes me again a bit sad. At the rate he was going I honestly felt he could have very well topped the next Regionals or consistently made it into the finals of Locals. Perhaps I'm being hard on him but I call it as I see it and that's something that the people reading this blog apparently enjoy. Especially when I rip baddies a new one.
I still hate that fucker who plays the dumb as hell Ground Collapse Gravity Bind faggot stall decks, by the way.
Anyway back to this one. He's playing T.G.s the way Konami wanted them to be meaning he'd be minusing the HELL out of himself to get combos off against a deck that pluses all day long. Both games were lopsided.
Round 3 - vs Utopia Zexal Weapons (2-0)
And I end up finishing on the bubble. I pull crap from my Astral Pack and end up doing some Pokemon stuff. I scrape someone with my In Game team before we all head over to Robins where more games are played. Megamonkey and I had a Ruler mirror that wasn't very good on both ends and I got to playtest my Sweep Command Dragon deck on some people before we called it a night.
Props
-Playing at Comic Readers for the first time since May. It does feel good to be back.
-Sweep Command Dragon is a boss surprisingly.
-Got almost everything I wanted from the Sneak. Just gotta wait for Mistake and Felgrand to drop in value (both are under 30 now).
Slops
-Not topping. This was the worst I've done with Rulers at a Locals. Gonna have to give E-Con and Book a try...
Things could be so much better. Unfortunately as long as the incompetent are catered to this will never come to be. Regina Yu-Gi-Oh! has always been a laughing stock as far as competition goes. Our locals are a joke. Our players are 80% casual fags with no desire to grow, accept change and have this notion that a player's skill is defined by how horribly made their decks are-LOL I MEAN HOW ORIGINAL IT IS. Its no surprise that these are also the people that scrub out at the Regionals we have here, doing AT BEST 1-5 and that the players that come from Saskatoon, Winnipeg, Calgary and Edmonton see us as some backwater town whose few "good" players really aren't as all they've done is beat shitty Crystal Beast Six Samurai Alien Zexal Weapon Neo Spacian 60 Card Wonder.dek left and right. I disagree with the notion that all Regina players are terrible. I mean there's people like Megamonkey, Magnus, Bossman and obviously I'm going to throw my hat into this. However it's pretty damn hard to prove otherwise when the majority of the player base here is full of scrubs and dinosaur hipsters who can't adapt to the times.
Even more saddening is that for the few competitive players that want to grow and become better its really discouraging to play it out because it's not worth the effort (or the lack thereof). At this point I'm not really going to Locals for competition. I'm just going to play a few non meaningful games before the REAL stuff happens at the Robins AFTER the tournament.
Again though things could be better. For one we could have a tournament organizer who knows their shit and actually keeps up with the game. I don't mind being asked for rulings help and such but when people are coming up to a player and not the judge for Rulings, Mechanics and other things that the judge is required to know about...there's problems. Also the things that other locals have. More packs for winning, box tournaments, player of the year rankings. Yes these things cost money and would require customers to pay up front to participate but they would be so worth it as A) Better reasons to win and B) Because there is more of an incentive to win people will actually TRY to win. They'll raise their game to beat out everyone else which in turn increases the level of competition in the environment. If this were to consistently happen then the overall skill level of everyone participating at these tournaments would increase and create....a good community. If you're going to the trouble of coming down to Locals which is located downtown why not make it worth the effort with a rewarding experience?
Obviously this kind of thing is doomed to fail because everyone is poor as fuck and would feel left out, the playerbase is again 80% retarded and they would be against it as it would "suck the fun out of the game", "everyone will just try hard and play the same boring, unoriginal decks because they win" and all of that other garbage that casualfags spout. Since Tramps caters to these nincompoops obviously they'd side with them. Oh and there'd be the whole issue of the current owner being a cheap as fuck pennypinching moron who is known for being horrendously out of touch. I can only imagine the issues that would come up.
Whatever. I don't care at this point. Again I'm not going with the intent of gaining anything from my duels. Let's just get on with this actual report;
So I decide to build Gishki on a whim and I tech it out to deal with Dragon Rulers. Turns out the other Ruler players that don't fail are playing other decks. Well then.
Round 1 - vs Badstellar (2-1)
He's got Honest and Dark Hole game 1. Game 2 he takes a Gigas fist up the ass and Game 3 he opens up with all of his sided cards but like a champion I live off just enough to Wing Blast his Prohibition and start swinging with Gigas. Also who the fuck runs Pitch Dark Warwolf and Horn of the Phantom Beast in Constellar?
Round 2 - vs Badstellar (1-2)
He takes too long to show up for the match and loses game 1. 3 Minutes people. Game 2 he opens up all backrow and of course I can't draw anything to play around it. Every one of my Gishki Abyss got hit by Fiendish Chain and my one Gigas was Bottomless'd. Game 3 I couldn't draw monsters and I lose after resolving Morphing Jar 2 and several Xyz Encores. Turns out I'm up against THAT GUY who runs Hyades AND a 22+ monster count. The first thing that I thought? "I lost to a fucking awful Constellar player. That is NOT how you play this deck."
Round 3 - vs Bad Rulers (2-0)
Oh hey I'm up against Dragon Rulers!
"My build is different. It runs things that other people don't."
Translation from Hipster talk; I'm running cards people deem as shitty because I'm so intent on being different from everything else even it comes at the cost of making my build VASTLY inferior to the other players. I'm just too stubborn or terrible to realize this.
Anyway I flip Iron Wall on him Game 1 and he can't do jack about it. Game 2 he resolves Return but my Swift Scarecrow cockblocks him and I sweep his board clean with Dark Hole, Gishki Beast and Zealgigas.
Apparently I made top 4 but because the TO failed to have someone keep an eye on the computer the results got messed up when nobody was looking? How the hell does someone tamper with your station twice now? Anyway because of stupid things there is no top four and we all get punished because of some random dickwad being a dickwad. Would have gotten Astral Packs 3. I also lament on my inability to play Blackwings after seeing Monkey's build. He'd have KILLED me if we played btw.
We all head to Robins where some more games are played, except this time my Neo Lightsworns are used and glorious things happen. Also I had a best of 3 Pokemon X/Y battle against Darkzane;
Game 1 - I lead with Greninja after seeing his team of Delphox, Lucario, Blaziken, Yveltal (I scolded him for bringing an Uber into this fight), Sylveon and Talonflame so I knew it would outspeed anything he had. We traded hits but I had 2-3 Pokemon to his Yveltal and Gardevoir took it down.
Game 2 - Leadninja into Ampharos to spread some T-Waves. I was able to paralyze his Mega Blaziken which set the stage for Gardevoir to come in, copy his Speed Boost and do dirty things. Then it went down and Gogoat saved the day with Earthquake.
After that monkey and I discussed ideas for a 100 card Dragon deck and called it a night.
Props
-New Lightsworn Tuners are good. They aren't AMAZING but they're actually enough to add speed. Those extra mills make up for the lack of CotH.
-Evolved Haunter into Gengar. Yay.
-MOTHERFUCKING GRENINJA.
And that's how I am going to start off one of my best reports ever. Why you ask? Well simple. You see many of the good players in the city had to work on Sunday which meant that overall quality would be down. Thus I took it upon myself to be the shining example of greatness that our lost and disorganized Tramps Universe needed to remain decent at best. If that meant that I had to become a villain then oh well. In the end it would be best for business to do this and so I did. Before starting the tournament I did some trades and picked up Trigons, sleeved up Dragon Rulers and set out to accomplish my one single goal for the tournament;
Put myself over in a manner befitting the head of the Yu-Gi-Oh! Lunch Club, even if it meant I had to BURY a few people along the way.
Round 1 - vs Blackwings (2-0)
Game 1; He plays Swallow's Nest and Elphin the Raven. Of course I scrape him. Colossal Fighter too stronk.
Game 2; He's a fucking hipster playing a shitty build of a good deck because it's "original." Like I'm going to lose to this garbage. Only fellow members of the Lunch Club can pin me.
Round 2 - vs Ophion.dek (2-1)
Game 1; I win the dieroll but open 2 Redox, 2 Maxx "C" and Sword into my third Redox. He makes Ophion like any mid carder does and I can't clear it.
Game 2; He summons a monster and sets five. None of those five are negates so I Black Rose him and win.
Game 3; He puts me down to under 900 but I've got Skill Drain up and by the time he clears it I've got the outs to his plays. Anyone who thinks Ophion.dek auto-wins Dragon Rulers is a fucking moron.
Round 3 - vs Lightsworn
Game 1; Lightsworn sacking the shit out of me? Like that's never happened before.
Game 2; He doesn't sack the shit out of me therefore I win.
Game 3; He tries to sack the shit out of me again with BLS, Sorc and Trag snatching my Colossal Fighter but I've got Book. I make Big Eye, take BLS and attack over his Sorc and my Fighter who attacks over his Leviair.
Top 4 - vs Fire Fist (2-0)
Game 1; He summons a Gene Warped with 4 backrow. I Black Rose him and win.
Game 2; He opens with Mind Drain but I play around it like a boss, picking off his set cards then making Black Rose again to wipe his board and win. Another mid carder buried.
Finals - vs Fire Fist (2-0)
Game 1; He goes Dragon set five but unlike the other mid carders one of those is a Breakthrough Skill for my Black Rose! Oh well I make Dracossack and wreck him.
Game 2; He opens with Dragon set a bunch but like I'm worried about Fire Fist sets. I make Colossal Fighter and pin him for the 1-2-3.
I win lolcals, burying the competition in the proccess. Unfortunately I was hungry so I didn't even think to cut a glorious 45 minute promo that would have the crowd hanging on every word I said while putting myself over even more and making sure mid carders like Dolph Ziggler would never amount to anything.
...too soon?
Then we went to Robins for Vanguard and to chat it up with the Apex Predator of the Lunch Club before calling it a day.
Hunter
-Putting myself over
-Burying Mid-Carders
-Securing a spot in the main event
-Black Rosing idiots who set their hand to the backrow without thinking
-Making people regret facing me at my maximum power
Hearst
-No epic promos
-Not having a 3 Disc DVD Set of my own
Helmsley
-Turning a bad Lolcals report into a lulzy one.
At last. The day that I've been preparing (and dreading) for the last month has finally come and gone and I must say things went VERY well. Granted I started things off like any self respecting person would; shower, shave, deodorant, etc before heading down to Tramps to meet up with friends and people that I haven't seen since March. To my complete shock the place was packed the the highest turnout yet.
Me: Jesus that's alot of people.
Megamonkey: Thing is though we have a So Cal guy here and he said this is basically the size of a small locals to him.
Well that's disheartening. Still I don't believe that a turnout alone doesn't detract from the results. The quality of the player base at our Regionals has improved each time and the guy that I'm talking about did lose games. To top a Regional you will have to beat good players to finish well. I've done this in the past.
That said lets get to the good part of this post. The tournament itself. I decided to play the Blue-Eyes Dragon Ruler deck that has talked about by alot of people (Jeff Jones posted an article on the deck for instance) as I felt more and more comfortable with it as I continued to play. I dislike the mill aspect of Standard Rulers and Hand Traps are 4x Super Effective against Dragunity Rulers wheras the Blue-Eyes Ruler had the speed of the second version without having to worry about Hand Traps as much. However this comes at the risk of drawing absolute SHIT. This is a longtime weakness of the Blue-Eyes engine (see SOL Hopeless) and while it's not as bad here it's possible to flat out lose games because you opened with all of your draw pieces but nothing to use them. It's very Dark World esque in that you rely on alot of two card combos to thin out your deck. Still it was something that I knew alot of people were not aware of and that's always something that will give you an edge in an environment where many things could be played.
The most played decks at this were; Dragon Ruler variants, Prophecy, Mermail, Fire Fist variants, Evilswarm, Constellar, Infernity, Madolche with alot of rogue and stun decks. Gravekeepers, Malefic Stun, Light Zombie Hero Beat. What would I face first? Well...
Round 1 - v Last Warrior.dek (2-0)
Are you kidding me? I have to face one of our local guys off the bat? Not only that but its the guy who plays awful stuff. There's not really much I can say on this. He AHLs into a Prisma that I Veiler then Blader Game 1 while I Wing Blast his Last Warrior game 2 and summon Blue-Eyes White Dragon to win the match with WHITE LIGHTNING.
So I've won my first round, but it was against a bad deck. My confidence isn't feeling awful at all right now. Nope.
Round 2 - vs Dual Axis Fire Fist (2-0)
Dragons have a strong matchup against this and Game 1 went on for a little bit, buuuut I was able to burn out his resources and resolve a wonderful Scrap Dragon + MST play. Game 2 he got off both of his Debunks on my Blaster summons but Fencing Fire Ferret gets in there and stops his momentum when I pop his Bear. I'm able to out advantage and win.
Got paired up with a Sask player and a really good one at that. I've always wanted to duel Jay and now I have. It was enjoyable.
Round 3 - vs Madolche (2-1)
It's been a LONG time since I played this guy and as expected he gave me a good fight. Madolche Ticket is a fucking annoying card but I opened the nuts. I'm talking multiple Sacred Swords, Cards of Consonance, Trade-In AND Dragon Ravine. When this deck resolves three to four of its draw spells in a turn you are at a TREMENDOUS advantage and thanks to it I was able to keep the pressure on him with my beaters and Hand Traps. Game 2 goes by shortly after I get a Game Loss for drawing too many cards by accident and creating an irreparable game state. Well shit. Game 3 comes down to me setting up a Skill Drain + Blaster that he can't get around.
A little rattled by that game loss. Granted I drew shit anyway so I may have lost regardless.
Round 4 - vs Samurai (2-0)
How the hell is THIS DECK at the top tables. Magnus said he even got destroyed by his previous opponent. Whatever. He goes turn 1 Barkion set a few which I force out or something. I end up Bladering him. Game 3 he opens with Mind Drain to my Sword, CoC, Skill Drain and Maxx "C" which makes me sad. He beats me down to 2500 when I top a White Stone, CoC it off to draw Dragon Rulers which I sword off and it goes from there. I Skill Drain him as he attempts to make a comeback and that's that.
Easy 2-0. Samurai suck against Dragons.
Round 5 - vs Four Axis Fire Fist (2-0)
Another Regina player and it's the man known as Boss. He's been playing this deck for a long time now and we're both aware of how the matchup vs Dragons go. I'm able to deal with his backrow and win game 1 while drawing two MSTs to deal with his turn 1 Mind and Soul Drain. It snowballed from there as he couldn't draw monsters and I had Stardust + TRA.
So now I'm sitting at the undefeated spot at 5-0. So are a few other people, namely the only person aside from myself that was running Blue-Eyes. Guess who played him next?
Round 6 - vs Blue-Eyes Dragon Ruler (0-2)
I open complete ass game 1. Triple Cards of Consonance without things to pitch for them set me back alot compared to him hitting the kind of hand that I got against Madolche. Not good. He disrupts my attempt to clear his Colossal Fighter but I have the Veiler for his Blader play. Sadly I have to scoop it up. Game 2 went alot better as I was able to set up the Colossal with a Wing Blast that I use to get around a Big Eye. But then he flipped Return.
Oh.
Disappointed? Yes. That game 1 will haunt me for a while. Definitely need to hammer consistency some more.
Round 7 - vs Spellbooks (2-0)
I made several misplays both games but thanks to Ravine I keep him from advantaging off his Tower and timely Blaster pops cleared the way for my beaters to do things. Game 2 I ultimately Big Eye ZA WARUDO and win.
After ALLLL of that was said and done I ended up in 3rd place, earning this;
More trades and such were done before we went to Boston Pizza where I had pasta and Megamonkey had a pizza burger which looked amazing. I swear if god (uuuhhh) made food i would be this. Then we chatted there and at Cam's before wrapping it up.
Props
-Getting my third invite
-Getting a new deckbox
-Getting a Star Eater mat
-Playing a deck with Blue-Eyes in it
-WINNING a match with Blue-Eyes White Dragon
-Trades
Slops
-Awkward hands. Especially in the Mirror
-Misplays. I should have Veiler'd Temperance of Prophecy, not what it brings out.
-Getting that game loss.
All in all I was satisfied with how things went. I played well and barring the Prophecy matchup I don't think I misplayed really badly. I ran a deck that was good and something I was comfortable with and it worked. Will I continue to run Blue-Eyes Rulers? For now, yes.
So I started my day off like any other. I got up, ate breakfast and took a shower before heading out because you know, that's how the awesome people do it. Unlike some people though I went the extra mile and actually used soap and deodorant before leaving for locals! Fascinating, is it not? Well results speak as I was one of the few people who DIDN'T attract the flies. No I'm not kidding. There were at least 5 flies in the shop and they were attracted to the individuals who have always placed Card Games as a higher priority than hygiene.
And yet for all of that they still amount to scrubs whose decks stink even more than they do. Ever wonder why they also never sleeve their decks? I know. It's because the smell of rotting flesh and feces would cause Ultra Pros to wither up like leaves from a dying tree. In that case I can understand why spending money on sleeves that you'll ruin in a matter of hours would be bad.
Or you could spend the money on some fucking soap you filthy bastards.
"I don't bite!"
Condescending? Perhaps. But it is the truth. You DAMN RIGHT. Onto the locals where I decided to play Fire King because I had Wolfbarks that I wanted to get some use out of before possibly selling them! It's not the first time I've made a deck just because all of the pieces fell into my lap.
Round 1 - Dragunity Ruler (0-2)
Game 1 - Unfortunately not much to say on this. He had answers and I made a misplay that ultimately cost me the match.
Game 2 - He's got the answers again. Vanity's Emptiness is a real pain for this deck to deal with if you don't draw the MSTs which I didn't.
Anyway with my spot in top cut now confirmed I was now disappointed. If you lose just a single round at locals with the turnouts we have you're pretty much screwed out of a top finish unless the people you beat have good records which would require them to be good..
....
Yeah exactly. My chances of being paired up against competent players were extremely slim. This was confirmed after the next pairings were announced.
Round 2 - Typical DevPro Player.dek (2-0)
Game 1 - ...did he seriously use Sakuretsu Armor on a Fire King monster?
Game 2 - I'm surprised he wasn't running 60 cards. What, you were expecting more elaborate stuff? "Oh I played against a scrub using a random pile of cards that did nothing but stall and annoy me! It's okay though because I CRUSHED him."
Yeah whoop dee FUCKING do. Next round.
Round 3 - vs Junk Doppel (2-0)
Game 1 - He makes Librarian which is cool but then I played trap cards that disrupted his strategy and won.
Game 2 - Bottomless on Road Warrior is a painful thing. I resolve an Onslaught and it's over.
As I thought I finished out of top cut which was disappointing. I got to see Dragunity Rulers vs Inzektor Agents and Prophecy. The last one was a near 40+ min long match.
On that note I've got a lot of mixed feelings about Dragunity Ruler. I can see its power and speed but I don't know. I've been testing it as well and I'm not quite getting the hang of things. It's easy to just play it as a Dragunity deck with extra monsters to summon or vice versa (which is considered to be "doing it wrong" but I'm certain there is a style of play that intertwines the two decks. Can I understand enough of this deck to take it to Regionals where I KNOW the Mirror Match and things using Maxx "C" will be present? Time will tell.
That said we all went to Robins where games of Vanguard were had and I played Cubed where I had both pleasant and REALLY salty experiences. Fucking Divine Wrath. Fucking super situational combination of random cards. Take my Crimson Blader then BOOK IT so I don't get it back.
I did resolve some turn 1 Dustshoots and made a Trishula. He should not come back.
Props
-Proving that once again when it comes to Fire Kings I AM the better player. Woodhouse has nothing on me and I've only played the deck sporadically since release.
-Picking up an Ultra Upstart Goblin for various purposes.
-Played as well as I could with what I had
Slops
-Misplays. They cost games
-Fucking flies everywhere.
BONUS: Derps
-Return from the Different %(*ing Dimension. This card is SO getting banned.
I was originally going to go with "Storming into a new format" but then things happened. Awesome things happened.
Anyway welcome to the new format! Isn't it grand? I'm throughly enjoying myself even if I've only played a few games in this. In fact the first Locals of the new format kicked off today and I decided to run Dragunity. Turns out today was a good day for Dragunity in general as one got Top 8 and a Dragunity/Dragon Ruler hybrid got Top 4 at YCS Toronto. My build wasn't anywhere near as aggro, however. I opted to focus on being consistent and having traps to back up a simplified game state of even Stardust Dragon or to be able to hold down the fort for a turn while I assemble a nutty hand. Threw together a side to deal with what would be sided on me and some matchups I didn't like and proceeded to take flight.
Hahah. See what I did there? I r so gud.
Round 1 - vs Heroes (2-0)
Game 1 - He T Roar'd my first attack then tried to do some stuff. I remember Compulsing his Shining and that was it.
Game 2 - I open with the Mystletainn, Ravine, Phalanx hand and go the fuck off. I decided to end my combo with a Crimson Blader to shut off his fusion plays...and he has Threatening Roar again. He Dark Hole's my field and I'm forced to recover after making such a giant push. I do because this guy is bad and running Jaden cards like Woodsman and he's unable to answer Crimson Blader.
Round 2 - vs Fire Fist (2-0)
Game 1 - He opens with a Bear and backrow, drops Dragon and swings into Mirror Force. I establish Stardust and Thought Ruler over a couple turns and take it.
Game 2 - I open "the hand" and go off.
Round 3 - vs Fire Fist (2-1)
Game 1 - I open all monsters with 2 of them being Tempest. Not ideal when dealing with a competent player and several backrow. I bait out Fiendish Chain with Aklys so that Legionnaire can score the +2 on my next turn before he Bears and swings for game using Tensen. I could have Veiler'd the Bear but I opted not to because I wanted to use it on his Xyz play and was not expecting the trap. My mistake.
Game 2 and 3 - These are kind of a blur. I know between the two of them a Maxx "C" is dropped and I consider taking the challenge but don't when I really should have given well...what do Fire Fist run that I'd have to worry about them drawing into sans Veiler? They're not like D. Rulers who benefit from a 15 card hand. Also basically it became a grind of Stardust, Redmd and Tempest just poking and poking. He ultimately clears the board but my own backrow starts to put in work and Legionnaire + Phalanx + Tempest get enough shots in to win the match.
Top 4 - vs Chronomoly (2-0)
Game 1 - Every single of my Dux summons were hit by Veiler or Breakthrough Skill. I'm able to get around this with Mystletainn in one instance and grinded it from there.
Game 2 - After getting around a negate I get "the hand" and go off.
Finals - vs Ophion.dek (2-0)
Game 1 - This is a clear example of how people will say "well if he does that I have this for that" but then it actually never does. In a perfect world you will always have your ideal setup with your counters to their counters. However this is the real world and you don't always get that. Win the dieroll and make a Turn 1 Ophion? Thats fine. Guess what? I've got the Legionnaire + Aklys combo that my deck has to get around that. No Safe Zone or Forbidden Dress? Well too bad! Anyway I +2 on him (and get his Pandemic off the board with Aklys) and Fiendish Chain his second Ophion because he's able to drop another one the following turn. I play Mystletainn and he tries to tell me I can't before I have to tell him about Fiendish Chain (this combined with his general aura that I got from him pre match allowed me to determine his player level by the way). Afterwards I Synchro Summon Thought Ruler Archfiend over anything else because everyone knows just how much Evilswarm LOSE to Master of Blades and well, TRA is alot like that and my decision was correct as he tried to Forbidden Dress him and things went downhill from there. He also tried to Prison the Stardust I summoned later but I dodged that and took it.
Game 2 - He opens with a Heliotrope and protection but I've got Dark Bribe and a hand that allowed me to drop Thought Ruler and Stardust again. It snowballed from there. He looked really disappointed that he lost, especially to a deck that I've noticed alot of Ophion players think they they roflstomp.
Newsflash. The Dragunity matchup is nowhere near that simple. We have just as many outs to your deck as Dragon Rulers. Legionnaire + Aklys is very real. Zerofyne is also a thing. Your deck is ass and the only reason it will ever relevant is Ophion. By the way how about that YCS Toronto? I'm pretty sure Ophion.dek did a whole JACKSHIT after top 32! I have no problem with Evilswarm as a theme. I think they're neat. What I do have a problem with is the snobby elitist attitude that the people who play the deck because of Ophion's power have.
Ophion is not god. This is;
After that we went to Cam's place and watched Gurren Lagann and got to see the epicness that is SUPER TENGEN TOPPA GURREN LAGANN. Jesus fucking christ. Oh and I saw a bit of Aladdin before Megamonkey and I talked about how awesome it is seeing Daniel GOD DAMN Bryan being so over.
Props
-Storming into a first place finish at the first Locals of the new format with Dragunity.
-Picking up alot of good stuff via trades. 3x Hootcakes, 4x Secret Blaster, Gold Rare Lonefire.
-Super Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagan. Jesus christ. IT SHITS OUT GALAXIES. WHAT MORE DO YOU WANT!?
Slops
-Misplays. There were two of them and they cost me dearly.
A Saturday post? Quite rare indeed. Also rare was the chance to play either Pokemon or Vanguard at locals today because nobody plays Yu-Gi-Oh! at Comic Readers anymore.
I opted to play Vanguard over Pokemon despite this being the last possible weekend that I could play Zekrom/Eels at a tournament and roflstomp everyone because everyone at Pokemon Locals except for the organizer is over the age of 13 and don't play the game seriously.
It's totally not awkward at all.
...yeah. So Vanguard locals it is! Turns out we got to choose the format and it ended up being Tag Fights. I partnered up with Megamonkey who was playing his DOTE Deck much to the chagrin of many in the room. We called ourselves Team Fire Storm which is badass and all but now that I've had some time to think on it I have a better name;
Team BLOODY END.
With the two most try hard peopl-*remembers that this is a Vanguard Locals* okay nevermind. There's at least 3 people who are more try hard than us. Still with two SKILLED people teaming up this thing should be a snap, right?
Oh how little you know.
Round 1 - BLOODY END vs I don't even fucking know (Loss)
I open awful with no Grade 1s for a turn which is far too long in this game. I also draw all 3 of my Heal Triggers so was up to Monkey to keep us alive while I tried to recover.
But then the opponents got 2 Critical Triggers when we were sitting at 6 damage and it was over.
Round 2 - BLOODY END vs DOTE/Bermuda Triangle (Win)
This one was much, much better as I opened strongly and the Bermuda Triangle player was an idiot or something according to the opposing DOTE player. Anyway I'm able to hit the Crossride and BLOOD's 13k causes him to burn more resources than he wanted to on defense. I also resolve an Ultimate Break to set things up for Monkey's end game push.
Round 3 - BLOODY END vs Kagero/Triangle (Win)
These two were in over their heads, basically. We pretty much dominated them from the start and between DOTE and BLOOD they just couldn't keep up.
Round 4 - Narukami vs DOTE (Win)
Our team had no opponents, so we ended up "playing" each other. Instead we pissed around and read "YGO Players you would Fuck" and other riveting topics from DuelistGroundz. Oh and we played a War Duel.
Round 5 - BLOODy END vs Bermuda/Zeal (Loss)
I have no idea what the hell happened here. We both played well and made correct moves. They just...blargh. I never saw a Perfect Guard and I'm certain Monkey only saw 1. The Zeal Player was able to sack into a Megablast that put Monkey's DOTE at 7000 and neither of us didn't have enough defense to stop it. Did we hit a Heal Trigger? Oh no. Certainly not! After all we don't sack. We beat our opponents with skill.
By the way. Just because you managed to beat someone with a card that is widely considered bad by many players that doesn't mean the card is good. It's still bad.
After that we were eliminated from top cut. Being the Captain (I guess) I was entered into another tourney without really knowing. It was to win a BLOOD mat.
Round 1 - Bye
Yeah I got to play no one.
Round 2 - vs DOTE
The DOTE guy from an earlier round. He hits me with a double Crit. I try to do the same but sadly I don't get the double crit and my YOLO drive fails. I storm back and beat him down.
Finals - vs Sacky McLucksack (Loss)
The Zeal guy from Round 5. I had every intention of paying him back in full for what happened before and frankly this almost seemed like it was right out of the anime. A ferocious start that puts him on the ropes with a Cross ridden Vermillion "The BLOOD" with 2 Intercepts staring him down. Unfortunately I'm not drawing near as well as I could (my Drive checks were either 5k) and he pulling triggers up the ass. Would it have been too much trouble for me to get a Perfect Guard? Ugh, I had him beat at least THREE times if it wasn't for Heal Triggers. Worse yet he's also "that guy" who runs Stand Triggers in decks that aren't Aqua Force or Nova Grapplers and after he Zeal's my BLOOD down to 8k and attacks with his RGs what does he do? Rips 2 Triggers off the top, one of them being a Stand. I of course don't get a Heal off of my damage check and victory is stolen from me.
I flat out called him a fucking sack and this opinion has not changed. I had that game won. I kicked his ass from the start, played damn near flawless and he gets rewarded with some of the most bullshit lucky breaks I've seen in a long time. I don't fucking care if this makes me sound like a pretentious asshole. I don't care if "its part of Vanguard, man."
That was complete and utter horseshit. I swear to Triple H that I'd better get some kind of karma reward down the line and start 4x critting people with Dragonic Descendant in the winter.
Props
-Tag Fights! These are mad fun when you can choose your own partner. There's at least 5 people I'd enjoy Tag Dueling with.
-Picking up a playset of Eradicator, Spark Horn Dragon. First of the new Archetypes in the game!
Slops
-Getting super sacked. Two games were outright STOLEN from double triggers at the worst possible time.
-Buying a box of Judgment of the Light and pulling A-S-S. You're guaranteed a Secret and an Ultra in the box, right? Nah I ended up being the poor sap who bought THAT ONE bad box in a case. Yeah I'm done buying YGO boosters again.
Well this was an interesting day. Judgment of the Light's Sneak Peek was yesterday and to be blunt everyone pulled S-H-I-T. Nowhere near as well as Saturday's Sneeks apparently.
Whatever, I got mostly what I needed? Picked up some Shwarzchild Limit Dragons which is a card that's flown under the rader imo. Its basically a free 2000 Beatstick at Level 8 if the opponent has a monster with 2000 attack or more which honestly what deck DOESN'T pump out monsters like that? I see tremendous potential with this thing. I just don't know how to use it at the moment outside of "stick it in Blue-Eyes."
Then I participated in my first Locals since the end of June! My deck of choice? Constellars.
Round 1 - vs Fire Fist (2-1)
Game 1 - Tengu set four with my only form of backrow removal in hand a Heavy Storm? Yeah I wasn't going to get much done here. This was made clear when I had no choice but to Heavy or lose and saw the Starlight Road and lose regardless.
Like it was basically summon a monster? Bottomless/Compulse/Warning. My hand was all monsters too.
Game 2 - Much like the first one except I open with backrow too! It took ALOT of tries but I finally got monsters on the board! I also got to make Omega and I rode it to victory.
Game 3 - I summon a monster and it dies or gets bounced. I use backrow on a monster and it gets Lanced or something. It got down to use topdecking and he topdecks a Tenki into Bear and I do the same, except my Tenki into Bear was enough to win.
Round 2 - vs Wind-Up Zexal Weapon (2-0)
Game 1 - He's got Summoner Monk into Magician/Shark but I've got the Veiler for anything threatening and just sit on Thunder King.
Game 2 - I don't remember much on this one either. I just beat him down with Constellar plays.
Round 3 - vs Prophecy (2-0)
Game 1 - I won the dieroll and that's the only reason I didn't get blown out here as I had the all mighty, super powerful and once format definining play of turn 1 Thunder King Rai-Oh. Priestessless Prophecy I think might actually have some difficulty against him since you need a fuckton of spell counters on Star Hall or Power to get over him. He didn't have those so I beat him down.
Game 2 - I had EEV.
Top 4 - vs Fire Fist (0-2)
Game 1 and 2. Backrow. Backrow for days. Days. I couldn't do jack shit. Between Fire Formation Gyokku, Bear/Gorilla picking off my field (he managed to pin down the exact cards that he needed to hit out of my backrow, it was disappointing) and Solemn Judgment I scooped it up and I had to take a breather AGAIN out of frustration. At the time I thought I was pissy because of the way things were. Nah. I just hate being 2-0'd without getting a fighting chance. That's something that will always upset me to the point of being unable to think straight or talk to people.
Then I traded for Tour Bus and German Super Rare Debris Dragon and all was kay. Playset of German Super Debris now. GET ON MY LEVEL.
Then we went to Robins and I played some games of Yu-Gi-Oh! against Megamonkey's Zero Fucks Given - Synchro with my Zero Fucks Given - Gishki deck. I'll just leave these here;
That's over 15000 damage on board.
Monkey throwing poop at me (get it!? LOLOL!). Haven't even taken my turn. Thank god for Maxx "C".
My hand upon finally getting my turn.
Much to my sadness this was all I could do.
PROPS
-Getting that 2nd Debris.
-...LOOK AT THOSE PICTURES.
SLOPS
-Sloppy play all around. I made several moves I wish I didn't in the Fire Fist games.
-Pulling GOD AWFUL at the Sneak. Yeah I pulled Armades but I did not come close to making back the money I dropped.
It's been pretty dead on here, eh? That's what happens when you don't Yu-Gi-Oh! for a while I guess.
Oh well I can write down some stuff regarding Vanguard and Pokemon. So lets do it!
Pokemon
I didn't play this as much as I thought I would. Only made it to 2 Locals and at those I played Zekrom/Eels and dominated Team Plasma. Highlight of the whole experience? Getting Zekrom EX to annihilate a Lugia-EX with Strong Volt for 300 damage. Good deck is good. Too bad it dies next month.
Vanguard
Pretty much summed up as;
Vermillion Catastrophe!
Thanks to friends (mainly Megamonkey) I was able to pick up a playset of Vermillion The Blood, Spark Edge Draco Kid and Dusty Plasma Dragon which was all I needed to complete my only good deck in the game; Narukami.
I'll spare you all the gushing over having a finished deck and just say The Blood puts in a TON of work. 13000 on offense/defense is an incredible asset and it forces the opponent to play around it. Oh and I also have a 10k Booster so I'm swinging for 23000. I've played and defeated;
-Dungaree Narukami
-Narukami the Blood
-Great Nature
-Aqua Force
-Murakumo
-Oracle Think Tank
-Pale Moon
-Dark Irregulars
-Dimension Police
-Mega Colony
-DOTE Kagero
It really is the little changes that help. Having Blood and Plasma gives the deck a ton of offensive power. The fact that I can go toe to toe with DOTE is really impressive. In the hands of a skilled player Narukami could honestly do serious damage in the format. Easily Tier 1.5.
Oh and I also participated in the Dazzling Divas Sneak, pulled an SP, the Break Ride and got 2nd Place earning me a mat that is well...
Quick recap of my last two trips to Pokemon Locals;
-I played and won the TDK Mirror Match through EPIC N plays and clutch Catchers.
-Got a Landorus EX and Entei EX for a Latias EX and Zapdos EX. Bitchin.
-Redeemed ALL of my stocked up codes for packs I traded off to build a legit TDK + Landorus deck Online.
Now onto the topic of this post and that would be what I intend to be my last Locals Report for Yu-Gi-Oh! for the duration of this format. Following the last couple of times I've gone and ended up raging to the point of leaving the bloody store I've come to the painful realization that I take the game way too much for my own good and it's ruining the fun of it. Its causing quite a bit of stress and I really don't need to be having that so honestly a good month or two break will do me some good and when I ultimately decide to pick things up again I hope that I'll be a better person in mind and all that jazz.
That and I'm just tired of how the format and the people have become. Be it Youtube, forums, DN, Facebook or even at locals I've found myself facepalming to the point that I just need to get away from the environment.
What will you do though, some people may wonder. Pfft. I've got at least 5-6 JRPGs on my Backloggery that need to be :B:. Tales of Vesperia, Final Fantasy XIII, Tales of Graces F, The Last Story, Xenoblade Chronicles, Pandora's Tower, Persona 3 Portable, Persona 4 Golden, Trails in the Sky, Wild Arms XF, Radiant Historia oh dear god it doesn't end. Not to mention the non RPGs like DmC and Bayonetta or all of the good Wii Games that have come out in the last three years.
So about 5 games then. *badum-pish!*
That said since this was going to be my last locals in a while I figured I may as well go out with a tremendous roar in a manner befitting a Dragon Highlord and play Dragon Rulers at their absolute best since the deck is going to get hit in September. Don't deny it. It's going to die like Inzektors. Oh that deck had its moment or two in the following banlist but lets be real. Inzektors now are absolute SHIT compared to March 2012. In doing this I also knew that I'd be steamrolling through most of the people and probably get some jeers from the people who think the deck is auto pilot, unskilled and the type of opinions from people that they've gained from other people but never actually played the deck. Don't even fucking care. I'm not going to bother defending the deck. It's a really good Rank 7 Toolbox and unless you're playing something on its level it will annihilate you much like the "great" decks of the past did against anything outside of their tier. Now let's get to the tournament itself...where there will be blood. Dragon's Blood.
Round 1 - vs Dark World (2-0)
Oh look. A deck that's even derpier than this. People may call Dragon Rulers degenerate but at the very least the deck has a tremendous number of plays outside of the obvious Dracossack combos to handle situations. Dark World...summons Grapha over and over again while trying to rip cards out of the hand. That's all it does. One of the most linear decks out there. If that deck is not spamming Grapha it is not winning. That simple.
Game 1 - I open pretty ass with Tempest and a Lightning while the rest of my hand are spells not useful for the situation....like Card Destruction. I set the Super Rejuv in case he tries to do Dark World bullshit which he does. Upon seeing me chain the Rejuv he stops there and I start forcing out his backrow. I saw at least 2 Evac Devices before I drop a Crimson Blader and kill him a couple turns later.
Game 2 - Oh look. He played Dragged Down. That's a fair card right? Super Rejuvination is a completely busted and horribly designed card that was never seen in play until Dragon Rulers came out and ultimately started abusing the card and now everyone wants it hit because it's completely unfair to be on the receiving end of such bullshit whereas Dragged Down is a COMPLETELY fair card. Right?
It's fucking dumb shit like this that I hate about people. Super Rejuvination needs to be hit but Dragged Down is fine? THEY'RE THE SAME FUCKING THING. They are old cards that were never seen much play (well except in Dragon Exodia but that's not a deck. That's solitare) but then came a deck that took these cards and completely broke them to the point that they are completely unfair in design and are the reason the decks are hated and need to be hit. The best part though? There are even people that defend Dragged Down saying that Dark World NEED it to compete. They aren't a deck without the hand ripping which is complete horse shit. I fucking want some of that weed that these idiots are smoking because Dark World at its CORE is about making use of discard effects and summoning big monsters. Not attacking the hand. Want an example? See Dark World Creator Turbo. That's an example of Dark World without the bullshit hand attacks.
Anyway despite that and a Mind Crush hitting my Eradiactor Virus I fuck him up in a few turns after resolving some Sarcs or something. I was too busy listening to everyone around us complaining about the power of Dragon Rulers. We were the last people to finish the round which wasn't surprising. Dragon Rulers do not just burn through opponents like Chaos Dragon did. It's actually more about the advantage gaining like Monarchs.
Also if Super Rejuvination is to be hit then Dragged Down goes with it. Same fucking issue. Bad card design that eventually gets abused.
Round 2 - vs Fire Fist (2-1)
Game 1 - Same guy that I faced the last time I used this deck. Forced out the backrow then started making some pushes for game.
Game 2 - He opens with Prohibition calling Dracossack which does hurt. I have the option to Scrap Dragon it by popping a Tidal but I get greedy and go for the attack first and run into a Mirror Force. I don't draw into Reborn or a means of getting Redox + Earth monster so I scoop it up.
Game 3 - No prohibition this time. Better yet I have Forbidden Chalices and Veilers for every one of his big plays and.
Round 3 - vs Cyber Dragon OTK (2-0)
Game 1 - I open with a Dracossack which gets sent off for Chimeratech Fortress Dragon. After explaining to him why Tokens don't count towards attack gain I proceed to not lose to Limiter Removal because that and I'm able to storm back to take it.
Game 2 - I Blader lock him for a turn but I end up losing it or something. I just remember staring down a field of Tokens before I get the idea to summon Red Dragon Archfiend to nuke them all then make a push. I win shortly after.
Top 4 - vs Ben Kei OTK (2-0)
...What is this, 2005? Oh shit! This is the year Batista wins the Royal Rumble and proceeds to face GOD (ugh) at Wrestlemania. I should use this knowledge to make money somehow. The inner Bender in me demands it.
Game 1 - I make something and it gets taken with Creature Swap. Then I put Scrap Dragon and Dracossack on board and get plusses.
Game 2 - He Creature Swaps again but it ends the same.
Finals - vs Dragon Ruler (2-0)
This was an inevitability as Megamonkey was playing the deck as well (since the time I played Dragon Rulers he has been and won every Tramps since meaning the deck as a whole has gotten 1st place in Regina Locals every week since its release. Scary) and this was the matchup he was dying to have since I'm kinda good with any Dragon deck I touch and would give him a hell of a fight seeing how we were playing equally matched decks and unlike random DN scrubs I actually knew what I was doing (most of the time). I think his build was 40 cards to my 42 with about 6 cards difference in the main so yeah...this was going to be a really tight game and both of us knew it going into this. Because the two best players in the city were playing a Mirror Match involving the best deck in the game all of the other players gathered round for a duel to see who was Greatest of the Four Dragons.
Game 1 - We both open with awful hands. Hands full of Big Dragons bad. He goes first and makes a Dracossack after banishing 2 Big Dragons from hand to summon a Big Dragon and I end up doing the same...except he's got Maxx "C." Now normally I'd be forced to either stop or try to go balls deep in an attempt to kill him or proceed to die on the next turn from probable Big Eye on Big Eye on Big Eye rape which is what everyone around us were constantly yammering (along with other backseat dueling nonsense). However I happened to have Forbidden Chalice in my hand which allowed me to do the still obscure but quickly becoming well known play of Synchroing into Colossal Fighter while the opponent has a monster of 2500 attack or more on the board and you're under Maxx "C". What you do in this situation is attack into the monster and Chalice it so that it becomes at least 2900 attack and have Fighter die in battle but revive itself over and over again, forcing the opponent to draw until you ultimately deck them out. You'll take about 6000 damage in the process if they're at 30 cards in deck but there is virtually no counter to it and not surprisingly I caused several brains to melt after doing this. Its not very often that a deck is able to turn one of the few things that hard counters it AGAINST the opponent and OTK them for it.
Game 2 - He opens with Dracossack after having a much better hand. I open with Wiseman's Chalice which I use to steal his Tidal from the Graveyard and drop my own tidal to make Abyssgaios, negate Dracossack's effect and make a Thunder Charger to punch over a token. Those 2600 points matter especially in the early game post siding, by the way. He makes a Red Dragon Archfiend and a couple other monsters but unfortunately makes the mistake of forgetting about Abyssgaios' attack lock effect and is forced to bait out the negate with Big Eye in Main Phase 2 before losing his entire field to RDA's end phase effect. On my turn I make Scrap Dragon and he doesn't have the Veiler for it so I take it.
Not a single Big Eye was summoned.
After this we go to Robins for some after dueling. I get some games in with my Vermillion The BLOOD and Constellars then Megamonkey and I spend like 4 hours talking about 100 card Traditional Dragon decks, cartoons, some video games and wrestling before calling it a night. I think I ended up falling asleep half an hour later.
Props
-Winning Locals in glorious manner. That's two straight 1st Place Finishes in a row with Dragon Rulers. I r teh grtst.
-Getting a Vermillion The BLOOD mat. FINALLY I have a Vanguard mat.
-Pulling off the Forbidden Chalie + Colossal Fighter under Maxx "C" OTK. Now people are more likely to summon Dracossack in defense if they have the Maxx "C" in hand. But then the opponent knows you have Maxx "C" and will try to play around it which means you won't be able to get that surprise and...jeeeeeez. This Mirror match IS retardedly strict.
Slops
-Losing a game to an awful player because I got reckless.
-Winning because of a misplay. I know that's usually how Dragon Ruler Mirrors end but still kinda crummy.
Gonna do this now while its fresh on my mind and not three days later. Seems legit.
ANYWAY.
So for this locals I was going to play Disaster Ruler or Monarchs depending if Totally Legit Extra Deck Guy was around so I could mooch his Dracossacks and Big Eye. He couldn't make it until later on so I opted to go with Monarchs due to their favourable matchups against many things. I also did some trades and bought packs of Plasma Storm and pulled a Shiny Charizard. Bitchin!
Round 1 - vs Evols (WW)
Game 1 - I bait out a Laggia after taking some hits and drop Obelisk the Green Slayer and proceed to torment him.
Game 2 - He opens with Najasho/Evo Force and hits me for 4000+ but doesn't end his field with a Laggia like the last time. Same result. I drop Obelisk and attack with his FISTS OF FURY.
Round 2 - vs Chaos Dragon (WW)
Game 1 - Pretty bad player, not going to lie. I mean who fucking banishes Red-Eyes Darkness Metal Dragon for a Chaos Summon when there's other shit in the grave? You had damn well believe I schooled him for his misuse of an inferior Dragon deck, motherFUCKERS.
Game 2 - He goes ham really early while I Maxx "C" or something. All I know is he comes at me with BLS, Pulsar and REDMD but I've got a Fader and Veiler to stay in there. Come my turn I E-Con BLS, remove something then sack off my three monsters for Obelisk and he scoops it up. Better yet he calls me out for playing a deck as derpy as this that can drop an Obelisk with ease. What can I say?
You don't mess with this motherfucker
Round 3 - vs Constellar (WLW)
Game 1 - This shit was LONG as I have to work my ass off to get around the Rank 5 in order to secure a LaDD drop, force out his backrow and eventually grind out the win through advantage.
Game 2 - Much the same. I am able to drop an Obelisk but he has the Honest to get over it. I eventually fall down to 100 LP to his 8000 but drop a Vanity's Fiend to lock him down and start poking. It gets Evac'd, he forces out his own Starlight Road and gets Honest back to his hand through Pot of Avarice. I'm unable to kill him before he's able to draw another creature.
Game 3 - Opened nutty and am able to drop a LaDD or a Vanity's Fiend. I forget which. He's got no answer to it as time is called and scoops it up.
Top 4 - vs Shock Master.dek (LL)
Game 1 - Shock Locked.
Game 2 - Shock Locked AND I get my shit stolen with Big Eye. I was NOT happy with this at all. Didn't even get to fucking play Yu-Gi-Oh! AT ALL. It was literally pass turn every turn because I couldn't do jack shit. I got horribly crushed and left furious to the point that I had to get out of the building and vent my frustrations away from the group.
Yes this is the second locals in a row where I've snapped. This is not a good thing at all.
After clearing my head and patching things up the tournament was over. Megamonkey won with Dragon Rulers but I ended up being the true master by pulling a Super Gem Spark. We all went over to Robins (as usual) and had games of YGO and Vanguard while talking about the stupidity that is WWE before calling it a night.
Props
-After nearly 10 years I at long last summoned an Obelisk monster. This took a surprising amount of time given that I've associated myself with an Obelisk character since 2003 and thought I'd have made a deck to summon the Tormentor much sooner.
-Using Obelisk's monster nuking attack.
-Getting a good laugh out of my round 2 opponent who is a long time Dark World player. Monarchs are even derpier than Dark World? BITCH PLEASE.
Slops
-Losing my cool. Again
In regards to Monarchs the deck is very good. Obelisk the Tormentor is an amazing card this format due to his ability to dodge targeting effects. With Dark Hole, Torrential and Bottomless largely out of the picture he's really difficult to kill without going out of your way. This deck will be amazing next format.
As the title alluded to I really can't keep doing this. The whole getting super butthurt over the game. Its just not dignified and I should be better than this. Don't give me the "its just a game. Don't take it so seriously" lingo because its really difficult not to when that's all you've done since playing. Do I want to be a try hard? No! I want to have fun in my games but at the same time I hate to lose and therefore try my best to win even with something that's not tier. Thus I try hard and become all the more upset when things don't go well. I'll keep trying to scale it back but at this point it's going to be a really long and difficult journey. Honestly I might just stop competing at locals and going specifically to just talk with everyone for a few hours.
Way to go Derrick. Now we're all dead. Worse yet I still haven't finished telling my story and now I have to do it as a ghost. I hope you're happy.
Now where was I? Oh right. Cube Draft. Stuff happened then I ended up taking part in the next one. I was able to draft a somewhat decent Dragon deck while making some hard choices (my one pack had Monster Reborn AND Pot of Greed in it. I went with Greed but my god, having to pass up Reborn was hard...) and I did meh. My first round had Victoria in his deck and I just died to that thing. I did summon original Red-Eyes B. Dragon in the first game though and therefore earned the most style points of the second draft. HAH!
My second round I was able to do some stuff though he got heads on Fiend Comedian when I was trying to Debris into Black Rose and if there's anything that will get me upset its Fiend Comedian. I have NEVER seen anyone call it wrong. Fuck that card. After paying him back in spades with BLS we decided to play Normal Yu-Gi-Oh! where I got my revenge and smacked his Evilswarm with Hunders in all but one or two games where he YOLO'd and it paid off. Notably I made a Number 69 and stole Lavaval Chain's effect and dropped a HUGE Trag.
Then we played each other's decks and I beat him down with Evilswarm. Had Bahamut take a Constellar M7 and I Shock Locked him after hearing him say "Shock Master isn't good against the Meta."
I am like Crapcom. Your tears make me stronger.
I also did some trades, got a FF Bear for Constellars and an OTT deck for a really good deal. That someone makes up for the fact you blew up the Earth, Derrick.
Wednesday
So after my two fillings were thawed I realized I could go to Pokemon Locals and get some trades/games in...assuming things went well. They did and while I traded for a whole couple things the important thing was that the resident competitive player was there. Turns out he's going to Worlds to compete for the Last Chance Qualifier since Worlds is in Vancouver this year. See Pokemon likes to hold major events, like Nats or Worlds in Canada because they appreciate the Canadian player base.
TAKE A FUCKING HINT, KONAMI.
Thus I offered to have him some games with his deck "complete" (he was using Proxies for his missing stuff) and point out any things that I could help with because apparently despite having jack shit for credentials in the game of Pokemon some people regard me as one of the better players in the city, if not one of the best. That weird moment where a judge is asking for your opinions on rulings.
Rayeels vs Plasma Box WLW
Game 1 - He makes the mistake of playing Virbank first and I win the Stadium War as the result. Not having to deal with Virbank is HUGE when Plasma Box relies on that extra Poison Damage to get quick KOs. Thus I was able to grind him down while setting up my Rayquazas and I start picking off his key guys (Deoxys-EX) and win after some time passes.
Game 2 - I start pretty bad but work my way out of it. Unfortunately he's able to get a huge Scramble Switch into Lugia-EX play off and I just can't fight out of it.
Game 3 - Oh dear god one of my Eels are prized. He takes the lead in knockouts and I have to do scrub plays like use Switch to get my Rayquaza cycle going but I start clawing back into it after finally getting a 1 Fire 3 Lightning setup going and taking down his guys after Ning him down to 1 card in hand to my 6. I complete the come back by Dragon Bursting a Lugia-EX for 300 damage.
Props
-Completing Disaster Dragon
-Getting a new Vanguard Deck
-Summoning Red-Eyes B. Dragon in draft and attacking with INFERNO FIRE BLAST! NYEH!
-Making up for one of my slops
-Avenging my Pokemon losses in glorious manner. Dragon decks rule.
Slops
-Getting sacked
-Losing my cool
-Getting killed by the apocalypse. Dammit, Goku! Hurry up and wish the Earth and all of the people on it back already!
I've learned that if I don't post on a weekend that I go to Locals that potentially bad things happen. Well okay not really but the puppy dog eyes I get can crush souls so I'll share my tales from this weekend and Wednesday then.
You know who you are.
So I had my once a month weekend off that I only get once a month because once a month I get Saturdays off. Figuring competing at the good locals would be a nice change of pace I decided to run Dragunity with Imperial Iron Wall to stonewall the two good players present who would be playing Dragon Rulers because Iron Wall is kinda really good and I was toying with the idea of running Iron Wall Dragunity at Nats. Techs like that which can singlehandly get you blow out wins and steal those crucial Game 1s in this format are great and being able to build decks that can take advantage of said cards can really help you go the distance in an event.
Ultimately the build ended up being about 5-6 cards off of PhoenixFlareX's recent build which is okay. He's one of the best NA Dragunity players so this just means I had the right idea. I also noticed in last video how he felt Cards of Consonance was becoming less and less useful and would be better off not main decked. Finding this intriguing I decided to try playing without CoC but still main decking Garuda.
Round 1 - vs Constellars WW
Game 1 - I don't recall much of this but I'm able to play around his Pleiades and ultimately kill him in one giant turn.
Game 2 - I opened up with all the answers. Warning, Mind Crush, Negation. That kind of stuff. He couldn't do anything.
Round 2 - vs Dragon Ruler WW
Game 1 - Opened with Maxx "C" which is godly against the deck and I was able to resolve 2 Gold Sarcs. He ended up leaving a Tidal on the board I think and I power through 2 Effect Veilers (I had a hand of Dux and 2 Mystletainns) in order to make a Blader and lock him from there.
Game 2 - We both throw Maxx "C" around but he starts Blader locking me. I'm forced to pass with an open field but I'm able to stave off an OTK and on the next turn I go off and kill him.
Round 3 - vs Samurai LWL
Game 1 - He has all the answers to my plays and I just die after he Enishi's my Mystletainn and goes ham.
Game 2 - I bait out a Musakani with Stardust before sitting on Thought Ruler.
Game 3 - Sams do what Sams do. Open with the Shi En and Double Edge plus additional backrow. My no monster hand was no match for a Shi En + Nat Beast lock. I'm utterly disgusted.
I end up bubbling as the result despite having the same 2-1 record as people that did top. I end up playing Evilswarm on the side with Dragunity and Hunders for testing purposes. Dragunity ended up winning the first match but I lose the next two with Hunder after getting repeatedly lucksacked which outright pisses me off. What's the point of playing when my opponent is able to open the fucking nuts ALL THE TIME and has ALL THE ANSWERS no matter what I do, I ask myself. I had to get away from there and everyone, go home and sort out my thoughts and issues.
So overall it was not a k day. Frankly it was from this I realized that going to Nationals would be a complete waste of my time. Why drop 1400 dollars to fly to an event JUST so I can get sacked by someone opening with 2 Super Rejuvinations? Given that I'm notoriously pissy about getting sacked I just don't see myself having a good experience. It's a shame because I really wanted to meet the players I knew would be there but my wallet and my patience cannot afford it at this time. Maybe next year? But that would require me to top a Regional and I'm honestly not sure if I have it in me to keep going like this.
Megamonkey suggested that I should consider taking a break from competitive play (while still hanging out at Locals when I can since we're all brotherbanded and such. Yay Star Force reference that only I will get!) and honestly I may do that after this upcoming weekend. The one positive thing that came from this trip was that I FINALLY got the 2 Redox I needed to build Disaster Dragon so I threw together "Sandstorm" and decided I would get some games in the following day.
Sunday
I ended up not going to locals because A) it was my mother's B-Day and I didn't know if we were getting together for dinner. We didn't. B) I also NEEDED a haircuit. Seriously I was starting to look like this guy
THE VORLD VILL BE MINE!!!
After all ended up being well I did visit Tramps and chummed with Megamonkey and Totally Legit Extra Deck Dude (we will find a nickname for you yet!) before heading to Robins where lulz were had. Lots of Lulz.
RayEels vs Darkrai Hydregion L
This was cloooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooose. Both of us got down to the point that a Knockout would win the game. Sadly he got to it before I could. I lost 2 Eels to Night Spear's splash damage.
Narukami vs Aqua Force - A bunch of wins, I think.
HOLY SHIT I DIDN'T OPEN WITH ALL TRIGGERS IN MOST OF MY GAMES WHAT THIS THIS AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!
Yeah I was pretty happy. My deck worked like it was supposed to! Do you realize what this means, Cut Man!? It means I win!
Disaster Dragon vs Evilswarm WW
Game 1 - He goes for the turn 1 Ophion...but runs into an Exploder Dragon. I take it from there.
Game 2 - He opens with Ophion again but read my set monster as an Exploder so he ended up sicking another monster after it....and into a Masked Dragon which got Exploder who got bounced. I played around it and started making Synchro and Xyz plays. Despite having proxies of the Rank 7s I never needed to use them. Randy.
Then the cube draft came up which I didn't take part in. I filmed it. Lulz were had including Zombies vs Stun and Shapenatch getting summo-
