"Good Stuff" Tournament Report 11/19/11

So, I went to a "Good Stuff" Tournament at a card shop I have never been to before. By "Good Stuff" tournament, I mean that the prizes were "Good Stuff," like Tour Guide from the Underworld, Wind-Up Zenmaines, a 1st Edition Pot of Duality, Dark Smog, and a Duel Terminal Trishula, Dragon of the Ice Barrier. Good stuff, yo.

This card shop is known to have regulars who have all of the expensive top tier decks, so I chose to go with my T.G. Zombies. I really liked the idea of using Scrap Worms, since Worm Yagan deals with Evolzar Laggia like it dealt with Legendary Six Samurai - Shi En in previous formats. But, Laggia can negate Worm Xex's summon, and Scraps need their Normal Summon too much. T.G. Zombies would be able to make explosive plays using only Special Summons, and they can more easily dodge Dark Smog.

There were 15 players, with the decks including at least one Tour Guide Tengu Plants, one Infernity, one Machina Gadgets, one Gladiator Beasts, one Rabbit Laggia, two Dark Worlds, one Lightsworn, and one Tour Guide Agents. The format of this tournament was four rounds of Swiss and a cut to Top 4.

Round 1: vs Tour Guide Tengu Plants

-Duel 1: He wasted a Solemn Judgment, so I just beat him down in a few turns with T.G. Rush Rhino and such.

-Duel 2: He combo'd off after Heavy Storming my back row, beating me down with Reborn Tengu and Caius.

-Duel 3: This duel went into time, with me getting the last turn. I was down over 4000 LP, but I made a desperate push with Brionac and Utopia on my last turn to reverse the LP count and win.

Round 2: vs Machina Gadgets

This was my Round 5 opponent from this tournament.

-Duel 1: I OTK'd him with Gorz, Brionac, and his Utopia, courtesy of Creature Swap.

-Duel 2: I got OTK'd by Limiter Removal.

-Duel 3: I summoned Rai-Oh and Set a bluff Creature Swap. He used Heavy Storm and ended his turn. I summoned T.G. Warwolf and attacked, but declined to attack with Rai-Oh to prevent Gorz from coming out. I Set my real back row (Dimensional Prison and Bottomless Trap Hole) and ended. He Set one and ended. I attacked with Warwolf, but not with Rai-Oh, fearing Dimensional Prison. That's what happened over a series of turns, until he decided to summon a Gadget, then flip Torrential Tribute on his own summon. From there, I had so much advantage, and he was so low on LP that I was able to push through his Gorz and kill him.

Round 3: vs Gladiator Beasts

This was my Top 8 opponent from this tournament.

-Duel 1: I drew an all-Monster hand, and it's hard to beat Gladiator Beasts with all Monsters.

-Duel 2: I drew a Trap for each of his Gladiator Beasts and beat him down fairly easily.

-Duel 3: He invested all of his resources into a Heraklinos and Set the last card in his hand to his back row. I topped Dark Hole with Caius in hand and made the obvious play (playing Dark Hole...). He drew and Set a back row. I drew Book of Moon and Set it. He drew and Set a back row. I drew and Set Effect Veiler. He drew and Set a back row. I drew Torrential Tribute and Tribute Summoned Caius. He Chained Mystical Space Typhoon and Bottomless Trap Hole to the summon. I flipped the Book of Moon he targeted with MST to save Caius from the Bottomless Trap Hole, and Caius' effect removed one of his other back rows. He drew and summoned Rai-Oh, and I had to use Torrential Tribute. I drew Mezuki and attempted to summon it. He had Solemn Judgment face-down with 1800 LP, but if he negated the summon, I would use Mezuki's effect to revive a Zombie and attack for game, so he declined to use the Solemn. I attacked, he drew and Set a back row, and I attacked once more for game.

Being 3-0 going into the last Swiss round, I was guaranteed a spot in the Top 4, so that was cool.

Round 4: vs Infernities

This was my Round 4 opponent from this tournament. Revenge time.

-Duel 1: He started with a slow hand, pushing for a little damage with Stygian Street Patrol. I Normal Summoned Sangan and he flipped Solemn Judgment. Okay...? I Set a bluff Creature Swap because I knew a little about his play-style and that he wouldn't combo off if he didn't know that it was safe. He could've OTK'd me that turn, but he decided to just make a Catastor with Infernity Avenger and the Stygian Street Patrol and Set a back row. I made Brionac with T.G. Striker and Goblin Zombie, grabbing a Mezuki and pitching it to bounce his back row. I used Mezuki's effect to revive Goblin Zombie, Creature Swapped it to him, then bounced it back to my hand with Brionac's effect. That left his field open, letting me attack with Catastor and Brionac for game.

-Duel 2: I controlled him with Rai-Oh, Chaos Trap Hole, Compulsory Evacuation Device, and Maxx "C" so that he couldn't complete his combo. He was left with a Utopia and two Infernity Necromancers. I drew a Monster to pitch with Zombie Master, stealing his Plaguespreader Zombie. Then, I Mind Controlled one of the Necromancers and Synchro Summoned Trishula to banish the other Necromancer. Compulsory Evacuation Device bounced the Utopia, and I attacked for game.

So I went undefeated in Swiss, meaning that I would play against the 4th place players in the Top 4.

Top 4: vs Dark World

-Duel 1: He went first and summoned Tour Guide, which I Veiled. He then Set two Mind Crushes and played Dragged Down into the Grave. I lost my Bottomless Trap Hole, and chose to discard his Beiige (better than throwing his Snoww...). I lost Mystic Tomato to the first Mind Crush and summoned Armageddon Knight to pitch my Plaguespreader Zombie and run over the Tour Guide. He played Gates after grabbing it with Pot of Duality, removing the Tour Guide to discard Grapha and destroy my Set Torrential Tribute. Beiige ran over my Armageddon Knight, and he ended. I drew, and he flipped the second Mind Crush on my Caius. I Set the MST I drew and a T.G. Warwolf. It got killed by Grapha's attack, and I continued to search T.G.'s to stall. I was able to Creature Swap his Grapha after a bit and beat him down with it. He destroyed it with another Grapha's effect, though, and revived a Grapha on his next turn to kill another Set Warwolf. I searched T.G. Striker and drew Goblin Zombie. With those as the only two cards in my hand, I made the usual Brionac/Mezuki play to bounce Grapha and go for game. It's pretty hard to lose when you open Dragged Down and double Mind Crush, but apparently, it's possible.

-Duel 2: He didn't open nearly as well as last game, but I didn't have an answer to his Grapha this time after I lost a Chaos Trap Hole. I was able to Creature Swap one of them, but it died to another Grapha.

-Duel 3: I went first, but opened with a subpar hand of Spells and Traps, so I passed without making a play. He Set a back row and passed, not wanting me to drop a Gorz. I drew another Trap and Set a Bottomless Trap Hole. He used Fabled Raven to discard Snoww and grab The Gates of Dark World to discard Grapha and destroy my Set Bottomless. I drew and summoned Mystic Tomato and Creature Swapped it with the Raven, attacking over my Tomato and grabbing T.G. Warwolf. That let me make T.G. Wonder Magician to destroy Gates. With that, I Set three Traps, now that they were live (Crevice Into the Different Dimension, Call of the Haunted, and Torrential Tribute) and ended. He summoned Beiige, and I used Crevice to banish his Grapha and Snoww. I attacked over the Beiige, and he used his Set Reckless Greed, then Gates to discard Grapha and destroy my Torrential Tribute. He then revived Grapha and attacked over my Wonder Magician, letting me draw a card. I revived the Wonder Magician with Call of the Haunted on my turn and summoned Sangan to make Scrap Dragon. I searched T.G. Striker and used Scrap Dragon's effect to destroy Gates, letting me attack over the Grapha. He proceeded to stall with the Grapha, as he couldn't get over my Scrap Dragon. After a while though, I was able to destroy his field and go for game.

So it turns out that my Round 3 opponent was my opponent in the finals. We decided to split the top two prizes (Tour Guide and the DT Trishula), him getting the Tour Guide and paying me the difference. My Top 4 opponent and Round 4 opponent played for 3rd/4rd; the Dark World player got 3rd and the Wind-Up Zenmaines, while the Infernity player got 4th and a 1st Edition Pot of Duality.

So yeah, I ended up going undefeated, walking away with a Duel Terminal Trishula and a bunch of other cards that I got from my Round 3 opponent, in accordance to the split we agreed upon. We didn't end up playing the second time; I was pretty tired and didn't really care, since I had already beaten him earlier.

I'm planning on trading the DT Trishula, but I don't even know what cards I would need. Maybe I can get a set of Infernity Barriers or something cool like that...? I really don't need anything at the moment...

Tournament Report 11/12/11

It's quite sad that I've only been able to make blog posts for tournament reports recently. I just haven't had many ideas of what to write about, and school work has been taking up most of my time.

Either way, I was able to go to locals today with a new version of my T.G. Zombies. I dropped the Reborn Tengus for Mystic Tomatoes and some tech choices.

There were about 20 people there, with only a few little kids.

Round 1: vs Newbie Gravekeeper's

This was my Round 1 opponent from this tournament. Splendid Rose helped me OTK her in the first duel, so that was cool.

Round 2: vs Six Samurai

This was my Round 4 opponent from this tournament.

-Duel 1: I had to pull through a horrible hand after he used Irou to kill my Mystic Tomato. I was able to deal well enough with his swarm at first, but he used Monster Reborn on Shi En, and I couldn't deal with it the second time.

-Duel 2: He used Rivalry of Warlords against my Gorz so that I wouldn't be left with the Kaien Token, but I tributed Gorz for Caius to remove his Utopia and attack over Grandmaster. Later, he had cleared my Monsters out, and pushed for a little damage with a Kizan. I took it with Mind Control to go with my X-Saber Pashuul and Synchro Summon Gaia Knight. Quite convenient, I'd say. Rivalry doesn't hurt me as badly as I thought.

-Duel 3: He swarmed me with Shi En, Enishi, and Grandmaster, and I didn't have any outs, despite drawing a bunch of cards with Maxx "C". Quite sad.

Round 3: vs Newbie Blackwings

Trishula banished all of his cards in the first duel, and I OTK'd with Splendid Rose in the second. Splendid Rose put in a lot of work, even on the first day that I put it into the deck. It's pretty good.

Round 4: vs Six Samurai

This was my Round 2 opponent from this tournament.

-Duel 1: Spirit Reaper swung for some early advantage, but I took a lot of damage from the resulting swarm before I dropped Trishula to take control of the duel.

-Duel 2: He made a Naturia Barkion, which I was able to kill with Dark Hole. Then, he Synchro Summoned Shi En, but he couldn't get through my Spirit Reaper. I forced Shi En's negation with Mind Control, then played Creature Swap. He scooped.

Round 5: vs Hero Beat

-Duel 1: He used Torrential Tribute against my field of four Monsters; two of them were Gorz and its Token, and the other two were Sangan and Goblin Zombie. That let me make a Trishula play on the following turn, and he couldn't recover.

-Duel 2: He had control of the duel with his big beaters, whereas I had three Goblin Zombies. I Set one against his D.D. Warrior Lady, just wanting to get rid of the Warrior Lady so that I could Set something I really needed in the Graveyard. But, he summoned Doomcaliber Knight and tried to remove my Goblin Zombie with D.D. Warrior Lady's effect. I reminded him that Doomcaliber Knight's effect negates D.D. Warrior Lady's effect, and that completely cost him the duel. From there, I was able to build up advantage and finish him off with Trishula.

So yeah, I ended up going 4-1 and getting 3rd place. With the store credit that I won, I got a couple of Bottomless Trap Holes so that I don't have to keep switching the only pair of English Bottomless Trap Holes that I have between my decks. Now I can have a full Scrap deck and a full T.G. Zombie deck at the same time. Cool stuff.

There's not much else to talk about. Perhaps I should start siding more heavily for Six Samurai, since there are so many regular Six Samurai players at my locals. We'll see.

Tournament Report 11/4/11

I decided to go to the Friday tournament this weekend, since there would be no tournaments due to the Sneak Preview today and tomorrow. By the way, I didn't go to the Photon Shockwave Sneak Preview because the only cards I needed from the pack that I could plausibly get are the Wind-Ups (minus the rarity-jacked Zenmaines...).

I had no time at all to change my deck since last weekend, so I went with the lackluster Scrap variant (I really want to be able to use the Worm engine...). I went with sickpenguin and his friend evilhamsdwch. They were playing Junk Doppel and Agent Fairies, respectively.

Round 1: vs Newbie Six Samurai

I could tell that he was a newb because he searched for Hand of the Six Samurai instead of Kagemusha when he had Kageki in hand...

Round 2: Blackwings

This was my Round 2 opponent from this tournament.

-Duel 1: I opened with a pretty awkward hand and just stalled out with Gravekeeper's Spy (Worm Xex would've been able to do lots of damage here...). He made a Stardust Dragon and Set his hand to his back row, and I worked to bait out all of his Traps before I made a Scrap Chimera play. Once he ran out of back rows, he couldn't do anything about my Scrap Dragon.

-Duel 2: He made Brionac with Blizzard to bounce my Scrap Dragon. I had to wait a few turns before making my own Brionac with Cyber Dragon and Effect Veiler to bounce his Brionac, but I lost my Brionac to a Dimensional Prison. From there, we were both top-decking, but he drew a Monster to kill me with.

-Duel 3: We both opened with pretty Trap-heavy hands. I destroyed his whole back row in a turn with Mystical Space Typhoon and Dust Tornado before I summoned Scrap Chimera to make a Scrap Dragon. It got hit by Compulsory Evacuation Device, but I was able to make another one to keep control of the duel with.

Round 3: vs Junk Doppel

I was paired up against sickpenguin. How sad.

-Duel 1: I opened pretty crazily with two Scrap Chimeras, Scrapyard, Scrapstorm, and two Traps. I made the obvious Scrap Beast/Scrapstorm play to grab Scrap Orthros. He didn't draw any Effect Veilers to deal with my Scrap Chimeras, so I won fairly easily.

-Duel 2: He opened with Trap Dustshoot, seeing my hand of Effect Veiler, Gravekeeper's Spy, Chaos Trap Hole, Dimensional Prison, Mind Control, and Reborn Tengu, the latter of which he sent back. That left me to Set Gravekeeper's Spy and Chaos Trap Hole. He searched Ryko with Charge of the Light Brigade, but he didn't want to Set it because I had Mind Control. I lost my Spies to a Torrential Tribute when I flipped the Set one, and I Chaos Trap Holed his Caius, so we just sat there for a while. I drew into a Tengu and beat him down a little bit with it. He made Catastor with Junk Synchron to kill my Tengus. I had Cyber Dragon in hand, so I was okay with that. However, I had to consider whether or not to fuse it with Catastor or steal it with Mind Control and overlay. I wanted to keep Chimeratech Fortress Dragon in my Extra Deck, considering I had Monster Reborn in my hand, so I overlaid for Adreus, Keeper of Armageddon. Adreus died to Ryko, so that was sad, but that was okay; I finally was able to summon a Rank 5 Xyz Monster. And, it worked out pretty well when he summoned Card Trooper on his next turn and I topped a second Cyber Dragon. After so long, I was finally able to draw a Scrap Beast and make Scrap Twin Dragon using it and the Monster Reborn. He couldn't deal with it (I had two Effect Veilers, ha ha), so I won.

Round 4: vs Lightsworn

This was my Round 2 opponent from this tournament.

-Duel 1: He opened with Recharge and Charge, but he milled Lumina with Charge, so he had to settle on getting Lyla. Without that momentum, and seeing as how he milled all of his Judgment Dragons, I was able to take control of the duel with Scrap Dragon fairly easily.

-Duel 2: He gained a bunch of pluses off of Wulf, Celestia, then Judgment Dragon, and I couldn't do anything about that.

-Duel 3: I was doing fairly well with an early Scrap Dragon, be he milled four Lightsworn names within a couple turns, then dropped two Judgment Dragons on me. I killed the first, but couldn't do much about the second. I stalled out for a while, then made Black Rose Dragon using Reborn Tengu and Scrap Goblin to destroy the Judgment Dragon and push for a little damage. Unfortunately, he drew Lumina and chucked a Necro Gardna to revive Lyla and break my Set Forbidden Lance. With Glow-Up Bulb, he made Catastor and destroyed my last Tengu. I topped Cyber Dragon to fuse with Catastor and force out one of the two Necro Gardnas. He was able to rid of it, though, and I topped Dark Hole to clear the field. He topped Monster Reincarnation, so he was able to kill me with Judgment Dragon the following turn.

Round 5: vs Scraps

This was my Round 4 opponent from this tournament. We agreed to a split, and I had much higher tiebreakers than him, so he would give me the win regardless of the outcome of the match.

-Duel 1: He opened crazily with Reborn Tengu, Scrap Beast, Scrap Chimera, Mind Control, and Monster Reborn, so he killed me by the fifth turn of the duel.

-Duel 2: I was able to control the duel with Utopia, then Scrap Dragon.

-Duel 3: I opened pretty badly, and he drew Scrap Chimeras so I lost. I really hate how the Scrap mirror match can often come down to who draws more Scrap Chimeras...

And that's part of why I'm considering switching up decks for next weekend. Either way, I went 3-2, but technically got 2nd place with a 4-1 record. With my half of the store credit that I got, I was able to buy a Number 10: Illumiknight tin at a good price. I pulled Gladiator Taming and Legendary Six Samurai - Enishi from the packs, so that was pretty good.

sickpenguin ended up going 4-1, getting 5th place; evilhamsdwch had a lackluster record (*cough* 1-3 plus a bye *cough*).

So yeah, I'm not sure if I want to run the same Scrap deck next weekend. I might want to switch to a Worm variant (as least I can do something if I clump-draw Worms, Tengus are useless), or I might want to switch to a different version of my T.G. Zombies that doesn't lose as hard to Rai-Oh. We'll see...