Limited Edition Constructed Deck Tournament
Bowling Green, KY -- July 27, 1996

Hi, everyone.  Here's the semi-monthly tournament report from Bowling 
Green.

To start out with, I thought this was going to be an awesome tournament.
I've given away free decks and gotten some local gamers interested in 
the game (we're a rather distant #2 to Magic right now), so I was 
expecting a good local turnout.

I lent all my disarm stuff and one PG Darius to one guy for his Connor
deck.  I held my Richie and Xavier stuff for deck-building for two other
people.  Since I rarely play Amanda, Nefirtiri, and Luther, this left 
me with one immortal: Slan.  I built a fairly standard Slan denial deck
(2 Wargames West via PG Darius, Renee Delaneys, etc.) and showed up 
early to help our newbies build.  I figured it wasn't much of a deck,
but I was getting a bit tired of cracks about me always winning my 
tournaments.  I played with my "see hidden attacks" Quickening as well.

So I waited... and waited... and waited.  Unfortunately, a game shop in
Nashville was holding a MtG type II tournament for a Black Lotus, so I
knew we'd lost our local Nef Battle Rager.  And the guy I lent all my
disarm stuff to went down as well to play without bothering to tell me
or give my stuff back (washed out in two rounds; serves him right =).
And the owner of the other game shop in town went, too, which meant
our Richie player had to work in his stead.  And our Xavier player 
disappeared along with his girlfriend a week before (he oughta play
Luther).  And our Duncan player overslept...  Sigh.  Oh, well; their
loss.

Anyway, we had Johnny and Hank Williams come in from Cub Run, Chip and
the Indy crew from Indianapolis, Ben Davis and Buddy Dowdy from 
Murray... and me, Jeff Barnes.  Nine players in all.  The deck matchup
looked like this:

     Jeff Barnes - Standard Slan denial
     Hank Williams - Slan with some direct damage
     Johnny Williams - Connor tower
     Scott Jones - Slan challenge deck
     Dave Eckard - Nefertiri "War and Peace" deck (more below)
     Matt Turner - a borrowed Xavier control deck
     Chip McMann - Slan Sedarius/Blade 
     Ben Davis - Richie Sedarius
     Buddy Dowdy - Xavier "Slaughter You With Situations" deck

The optional Pre-game Darius rule was being tested (you may only 
increase any card title by one), but I don't feel that it was that great
of a factor.

At any rate, I set up a 16 player bracket, meaning everyone but two would 
have a first round bye.  The initial draw was that Dave and Matt would 
play each other, but since Johnny and Hank were paired up secon round 
and I figured that everyone hadn't driven this far to play locals, I'd
see about swapping it around a bit.  Everyone seemed agreeable to this,
so the non-bye game wound up being (by random roll) Dave vs. Johnny.
Eventually, Dave ran him out of time and won.

Next round saw the following pair-ups:

     Chip won over Dave.
     Buddy downed Scott.
     Matt faced off against Hank and won.
     And I played Ben.

Since I took notes on my games, I'll describe them in greater detail.
Against Ben, I played an early Wargames West after a few Renees.  He 
didn't rip a Thunder Castle Games card to stop it (I was holding 
Delusions if he had), so it went into play.  When he tried to police 
it, I did rip a TCG to cover it.  From there, it was pound, pound, 
pound, and I came out on the better end (though he did get in a 
couple of shots on me).

Next round saw a lot of loser's bracket byes and:

     Ben head-shotting Johnny in the loser's bracket (ouch).
     Buddy overcoming Chip.
     And me playing Matt. 

Matt's a newbie to Highlander and had borrowed a Xavier control deck 
from Chip.  He was able to stop both my WGWs, so I had to pummel him.
He got in a couple of Alliances and a Stalk against me, but eventually
he ran out of dodges, and I knocked him down to one.  I played a Head
Shot on him, thinking Chip built the deck well enough that an exertion
would get a dodge. =) That's what I get for thinking, I suppose.  The 
HS went through, and Matt was out of the tournament.

Side note: what do y'all think about Head Shotting in general, 
especially with regard to newbies?  One of the reasons I like my points-
based round robin system is that, while you are penalized heavily for 
having your head taken, you still get maximum play out of it.  To be
honest, I'm of a split mind about it.  On the one hand, my pragmatic 
side says, "You pays your money, you takes your chances"; on the other,
I always kinda feel for the less experienced player who gets put out
after one or two rounds via a Head Shot.  Thoughts?

Anyway, the round after that:

     Ben faced off against Scott and won.
     Dave triumphed over Hank.
     and I played Buddy.

Buddy won the roll and went first.  He decided to do a Divine 
Intervention on one of my TCG cards.  My turn, I plonked down a WGW.
After teasing Ben about not ripping a TCG against me, Buddy then forgot
to do it as well.  I ripped a TCG to protect it and locked him down.
He evntually ran out of defenses (though he drew enough of his blocks 
to keep me from doing full damage with any of my attacks), and I played
a Head Shot, making him rip a TCG to protect his Kurgan Quickening.
Divine *my* TCG, will you. =)

Next round in the loser's bracket:

     Ben fell to Chip's evil ways.
     Dave had a bye because of my head shotting Matt.

Then, Chip and Dave faced off.  I knew Dave was playing a bit of a 
slow deck, but wasn't sure what else was in it.  I saw it work like
clockwork in this match as he downed Chip and moved on to do the
same to Buddy.  Both by concession.

So, it was Dave vs. me in the finals.  Let me try to describe Dave's 
deck for you.

First of all, he used Chessex.  Then, he PG Darius'ed in an extra 
InQuest and an extra WGW (yes, Ben Durbin, I know: "They don't go 
together!").  After he got the Chessex down, he used Renees and 
Charlies to keep you from playing specials, and Desperations to allow 
himself to play situations (WGW, Master, Collect, Ped-2).  His whole 
strategy was based around you runnning through your deck and never 
playing specials.  It wasn't having a hand full of specials that 
killed you; it was having a hand full of defenses that you couldn't 
use.  It was, to be completely frank, a truly twisted deck.  I loved 
it.  I nicknamed it "War and Peace" -- WGW with no attacks; Chip 
suggested "Chessperation."

I was expecting to get beat by it after seeing it defeat both Chip 
and Buddy.  Even so, I had a bit of an advantage in that my deck was 
made to play under WGW.  The first game went rather uneventfully; he 
established the early Chessex/WGW lock and ran me through my endurance 
three times.  I managed to get in one partial hit on him.  It was at 
this point I started figuring out things to do with the PG Darius, which 
was second prize. =)  I'd had a great initial draw and first play, and 
still he beat me rather easily.  It would take a god draw for me and a 
bad draw for him for me to have a chance.

Next game, I win the roll again, look at my cards, and... god draw. =)
I use Divines on first his remaining TCG, then his WGW, then his InQuest
(for good measure).  Dave took several turns before he drew his Chessex,
and several turns more before he got his WGW.  I ripped my remaining 
TCG to stop the WGW, and he eventually ran out of Renees and Charlies.
It also helped that the bottom card of his endurance was his Nexus. =)
I got down my WGW and commenced hammering away.  I got some of my shots
through and got him down to 1.  To stop me from trying to Head Shot 
him, Dave first played his WGW; I policed it.  Then he dropped an 
InQuest and the game basically ended.  Couldn't try for the Head Shot. =)

So, I came away with a Quickening -- and having to put up with a lot 
of teasing and semi-serious complaints.  I argue (quite validly, I think)
that it's not my fault I won; I played what I consider a weak deck.  Had
either Ben or Buddy been dead set against stopping my WGWs (i.e., ripped 
TCGs), I'd have probably washed out very quickly.  But my luck held this
time and I pulled it out.  My good luck is probably just giving me a 
final gift before deserting me at GenCon. =)  However, it is getting a
bit uncomfortable, so I won't be playing in any local tourneys I run 
for a while.

The date for our next event is tenatively set at September 7; I'm 
hoping for it to be ME sealed deck -- if TCG sends out ME like it has
LE for sealed deck tourneys, it'll be completely free.  Hope to see some
of y'all there!

Best,
-Jeff