Last week i mentioned how proud I was of my five year old sons performance at our local tournament. He had bagged a second place finish in a fairly strong field.

This week he went 1 better. No he didn't finish first, he managed only third, with the same 4-1 record. However what he did do was play to a much higher level with new found confidence. Mistakes were still made and an opponent error helped him to his third win of the night, but nevertheless he showed a lot of the players there that the previous week wasn't a fluke and he was a player that would no longer be considered an easy notch in the win column, despite his age.

I can't describe how proud his performances have made me and going in to round 5 he was unbeaten and effectively playing for a tournament win. All of his opponents tonight were 15 or over so this really has to be considered quite something.

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HI. Earlier this evening I put up the winner of my first Customer Challenge, for which I'm awarding a prize of 6 different EA cards.

Here is the second competition in the series.

Running a comic shop a number of the new VS players we have recruited have come from a comic reading background rather than a gaming background. These players tend to have real issues with mixing up DC and Marvel in the same deck. So just for annoyance factor I'm looking for people to e-mail me decklist featuring characters from both affiliations. I'd also like to see some of the more obscure teams, those that traditionally don't get much love.

The rules are as follows
Decklist must contain only two teams, one Marvel, one DC
At least 12 characters must be included from each team
Extra Marks will be given if the PT's and locations are split roughly 50/50 DC/MArvel
Extra Marks will be given for clever use of less prominent teams/characters

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A little while back in one of my Blog entries I asked if folks that checked out my blogs could help me build a deck for a newcomer to the game who is an out and out comic nut.

Rather than build a set team or team up deck Cameron had a number of characters that he wanted to feature.

The list was as follows.
Manhunter, Paul Kirk
Deadshot
Deathstroke the Terminator
Anarky
Azrael
Creeper

As I had come up with a fairly mundane, predominantly GK build I was hoping that someone could come up with something with a little more originality.
Although he never sent me a finished version Wiiman sent me the following by email, for which I'll be sending him half a dozen EA cards if he'd kindly email me a postal address.

3 Rann
2 Thanagar
1 Leslie Thompskin's Clinic
 
4 Manhunter Clone, Clone of Paul Krik
4 Anarky, Lonnie Machin
4 Deadshot, Dead Aim
1 Deadshot, Floyd Lawton
2 The Creeper, Jack Ryder
1 Satanus, Colin Thornton
4 Donna Troy, Born Again
4 Ra's al Ghul, Eternal Nemesis
2 Fastbak, Sky Scorcher
4 Annihilation Protocol OMAC Robot, Army
1 Azreal, Jean Paul Valley
3 Deathstroke the Terminator, Wolf in Bat's Clothing
3 Mark Desmond Blockbuster, Mindless Brute
 
1 Crisis on Infinite Earths, Team-Up
4 The Illuminati
4 Flying Kick
4 Finishing Move
4 Nasty Surprise
 
 
Ok here's what the deck does.
 
1) It KO's opponent characters like crazy.
2) It uses Illuminati as it searcher, mix with Manhunter Clone, and it's a good mix.
3) Manhunter Clone fills your KO'd pile, you can exhaust a character you control to bring Deadshot into the hidden area, then use him for Finishing Move or Annihilation Protocol's effect.
4) Anarky can keep their only character left exhausted, or he can be used as Deadshot is.
5) The other Deadshot is very good also, with Manhunter Clone to help trigger his effect.
6) Thanagar, Rann and Crisis on Infinite Earths are your team-up cards, Donna Troy can search out Crisis, even if you only have 1 copy.
7) Nasty Surprise ensures stunned characters to target for KO effects.
8) Once you have some board control,  you can use Fastbak with a Flying Kick to cause serious direct damage.
9) The Creeper for card draw, Satanus to take annoying little characters from rush decks.
10) Azreal's loyalty can be broken by any of your team-up cards in there.
11) Mark Desmond can swing for 18 with No stunback thanks to the Manhunter Clone.
 
This deck also demontrates simple learning of Vs System. It has Cosmic, team-up, loyalty, breakthrough effects, vengeance, concealed, army and evasion. Leslie's clinic to help gain endurance and teach about how characters won't be KO'd if they are targetted.

Now Cameron never actually got to use this deck as he got so hooked on the game he now spends huge swaths of time deckbuilding. He has so far produced a decent rare-free GL Curve deck, a deck called SHAGLAM! (Shadowplact, Green Lantern, Anti-Matter) and a straight Shadowpact deck each of which has had a run out in recent tourneys, with mixed results. None the less it is nice to see a newcomer to the game putting the effort in to come up with original builds.

However can I extend my thanks to Wiiman as I think I might actually run something very close to this at my next GD Invitational, just so I can play it against Cameron.

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On the Yugioh site there is a regular series of articles entitled The Binder. In these articles cards set to make a breakthrough within the current metagame are discussed at length. Normally these cards will have been absent from most top tier decklists for sometime.

In this Blog, Hidden Gems, I'll do something akin to the binder articles, with the main difference being that I'll be discussing cards relevant to our local meta in Maidstone.

At the present moment in time Equipment s featuring heavily in a number of the decklists that are floating around. Cameron is running multiple Fate Items, Holly is running Jetpacks and BPRD Signal Devices, Ben and Jacks deck both revolve around Nth Metal, Andy runs numerous Gems for their return to hand ability, David has just purchased the cards for Punisher:Both Guns Blazing and Sue is running FF Equip.

This makes me nervous, up till now the only equipment hate I was packing was a solitary copy of Meltdown. Which leads me to our first two cards in Hidden Gems.

First Up is Misappropriation

Having run a Lost City variant the other day in the form of Big Brotherhood this card is likely to get some airtime in a number of my decks, particularly if they have Brotherhood characters as components. A Migga City build able to steal Nth Metals immediately springs to mind, however Big Brotherhood, TNB or any deck stalling out and trying to minimize opponents damage could benefit.
The biggest downside of this card is obvious, in a matchup where you're not seeing Equipment on your opponents side of the board it is a dead draw. Don't forget however that it can be used to switch equipment from one character you control to another character you control if the target recipient is a Brotherhood dude.

The second card I'm featuring here doesn't suffer from the 'opponent has no equipment drawback'. It is however only capable of dealing with 0 cost equipment and it is situational. Let me introduce you to Justice is Served.

I like this card in off-curve decks. A tidy attack pump that takes down 0-drop equip cards attached to a defender. It is never a dead draw just by the nature of its ATT bonus and if it happens to mash a piece of equipment at the same time well thats just gravy.

I reckon that the next tourney could well see me running some Brotherhood, whether it turns out to be TNB featuring MArvel Legends cards or an old fashioned Lost City build remains to be seen.


 

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Tuesdays Invitational
As I mentioned in my previous blog entry, Tuesday saw me playing in my third tournament in eight days, a six man (or five man and one woman as Holly was playing) invitational event which thanks to my wife agreeing to TO is now a weekly fixture for us here in Maidstone.
Although I had originally planned to play Brave and Bold, I finished up having to play Bats and Spiders as I didn't have time to put the deck together. However this turned out quite well for me as I managed to post a 4-0 record with wins against Cameron, Rob, James and Andrew.
So the end result was, 1st = me, 4-0 (Bats and Spiders), 2nd
= James Warrener, 3-1 (IG Burn), 3rd = Andrew Palmer, 2-2 (Hrealds Curve), 4th = Cameron Macgregor, 1-2 drop (Shadowpact), 5th = Holly Humphrey, 1-3 (BPRD), 6th = Rob Mills, 0-3 drop (X-Stall)

Youtube
After checking out Steve 'Kamiza' Garretts Youtube Vs progs, entitled the Watchtower, the Maidstone Vs community has decided to go with making our own monthly broadcast. We are hoping to put out the first prog of the Lazarus Pit early in November.

End of the Season
After an injury plagued season my Oakland A's limped off with not only a failure to make the playoffs but a losing record to boot.
With 22 DL visits losing them over 1000 games worth of starter time this is hardly surprising for a team without the bankroll to have depth to cover those kind of losses.
The season was one of positives though, with the emergence of Daric Barton, Kurt Suzuki and Travis Buck, signs of real promise in Chad Gaudin although he faded towards the end of the season and a trimming of the payroll providing more options for 2008. If we can add some right handed pop we should be in for a good season next year, as long as we can stay healthy.

Feeling Guilty
I was going to go on a bit of a UDE bash session in this Blog as we had been running a number of events without any kind of support from UDE. Now, being in Europe, I wasn't expecting the same support as in the US, but 6 weeks after our first event (with 10 entrants - quite respectable for the UK) and our City Champs (with 12 entrants) no support had been forthcoming. So it was my intention to get on my soapbox and start whingeing.

However, this morning a beaten up parcel, containing the Legends release and City Champs EA's arrived. All I can say is, beautiful, the guys will be well stoked as some of these are glorious, my particular favourite being the EA Crackshot.
So I'm forced to change my tune and say a big thankyou to UDE, particularly Rob Hooley (I'll stop hassling now)

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Noticing over the last few days that Vs is not getting a good crack of the whip with regards the number of Blog entries. Apart from myself, with my inane ramblings, Wiiman, T-Man and Guglio, there aren't many Vs Bloggers shooting a breeze on the pages of my.tcgplayer.com

I've got the excuse that I've been too busy playing the game to Blog. With three tournaments in eight days I've played as many tournaments in two months as I did in the whole of 2006.

Was a bit dissapointed with my 4th place finish in our recent City Championships. I had decided to go with my Bats and Spiders deck, which is loosely based on Jason Scudders 10K winning deck.
I posted a 3-1 record but my tiebreaks were dire as I lost my first round match to the eventual winner, Jack Rutter, who also went 3-1 with his Good Guys (JLA/JLI) deck. Second place went to Vince Newman, 3-1 piloting Brotherhood Reservist and third went to Rob Mills, 3-1 running X-Stall.
What made Jacks win more impressive was that his GoodGuys build was highly original due to the fact that he owns no copies of BWAHAHAHA! or Kooey Kooey Kooey.

In the 6-man invitational the night after I went 3-0 running Big Brotherhood. Second was James Warrener, 2-1 with Injustice Gang Burn. Third was Andrew Palmer, going 2-1 with his Heralds Curve deck.

The fact that I've got my third tournament in eight days tomorrow is just astounding. I've decided to run Brave and Bold mainly because I'm trying to let the guys, who are all new players, see as many decks as possible and this will be my fifth deck in as many tournaments. Although this doesn't help with my play quality it does give the guys an insight into numerous decktypes as I've run control, curve beats, off curve. I've also designed decks for some of the newcomers to cover the other key decktypes, burn, stall and even lone wolf.

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In a previous Blog I mentioned my son, Cameron, and his exploits within the world of Yugioh tournaments.

Have to say that today he made me one hellishly proud father by coming second in his local Yugi event in a field of 26 players.

Now some may be wondering why a second place finish is getting me all stoked up, but when you take into consideration my sons age you'll understand why. Cam is only five years old.

He memorizes all the cards and effects from his tuition with me as he is unable to read well enough as of yet to be able to understand them himself.

The field of 26 was predominantly filled with younsters aged between 10-18 although did contain a number of adults, two of whom he beat. A number of these players are ranked in the top 450 in the UK.

In his only defeat he reduced his opponent to 100 life but couldn't quite finish the job.
The deck he was playing was new to him and he did make a number of play errors, however he also made some great plays and I have to say I couldn't be prouder.

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Holly
Holly is a regular in our shop, an avid comic reader and a newcomer to CCG's. In our first tournament Holly borrowed a Squad Supreme deck I had lying around and finished up with a 1-2 record. Holly and my wife Jayne have a tendency to 'pick on' Brendan in a good hearted banter kind of way.
Most likely to say: "I still haven't got up to date with 52"
Probable deck: BPRD

Jack
Jack is another of the regulars from Yugioh. One of only three of our Vs players to be under 18. Jack has improved from being a mid field finisher to regular top 4 positions at Yugi and seems to be taking Vs on with equal dedication. Jack went 1-2 with a Morlock deck at our first tournament.
Most likely to say: "I don't know any of the characters on these cards"
Probable deck: X-N-R-G as I built him a copy of T-Mans deck from his article.

Sue
Sue is Jacks mum and will be playing in her first tournament on Monday.
Most Likely to say: "Graham, its Sue, Jacks Mum, can you get hold of a (insert card name here) for me?"
Probable Deck: Fantastic Four Equip

Jordan
Another one of our three youngsters and Vince's son. Despite his age Jordan is an accomplished Yugioh player, bagging a tournament win just last week. Jordan didn't fare too well in the first Vs event, but is running a deck he is more comfortable with this time.
Probable Deck: X-Men

Harry
The youngest of our competitors and again another regular from our Yugi tournaments. Harry tends not to fare too well at our Yugi events, regularly finishing in the bottom quarter of the field. However he turns up week after week and I genuinely believe that his dedication will eventually pay dividends and translate to tournament success.
Probable Deck: ?, Whatever Vince builds him

James
An unknown quantity re Vs as has only played in practice against Dave as of yet. James is running an Injustice Gang Handfill Deck that I built for him. He also writes the manga reviews for my website.
Probable Deck: IG Handfill

Cameron
Cameron is most definitely not a ccg player. An big time comic fan with an extensive knowledge of the genre, Cameron has picked up the Vs game solely on the back of the cast of characters available within the game, rather than the game itself. Looking to put together decks with his personal favourite characters rather than what works best means we'll definitely see some interesting decklists from him.
HIs first deck creation is SHaGLAM, a Shadowpact, Green Lantern, Anti-MAtter Deck thats name is a play on both the word Shazam and the first two letters of each teams name. Personally I preferred GLAM SHock but what the hey.
Most likely to say: "Have you read Preacher?"
Probable Deck: SHaGLAM

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Vs has only just taken off in Maidstone. While the rest of the UK might find be finding interest in this CCG diminishing we're definitely on the up here in Kent. We've gone from one player to about 16 so here is a run down on the crew.

Brendan
Brendan works for us (my wife, Jayne and I) at my comic shop in the town centre. An avid reader of the Vs websites since his introduction to the hobby. Brendan is yet to make a deck of his own creation having run Doom at the inaugural tournament and Chicken Supreme at the second.
Most likely to say: "Is there anything that needs doing, boss?"
Probable deck at City Champs: Common Enemy
Brendan turned 19 yesterday. A belated Happy Birthday Bren.

Ben
Ben was the first convert to Vs, by means of the Marvel Vs CCG Game for the PSP. He ran Sentinels at our inaugural tourney. Ben has been a mainstay of the Yugi scene in Maidstone since we started the Yugi club up, missing only 1 week in 18 months.
Most Likely to say: "Thats not a problem"
Probabale Deck at City Champs: Good Guys

Andrew
A regular lunchtime visitor to the shop and massive Wolverine fan. Andrew has been the biggest customer with regards new cards, buying them by the boxload. Andrew played X-Men/Heralds at the first tournament.
Most likely to say: "What time is it" - gauging how long before his lunch hour is over
Also Likely to say: "Whats this card doing in my deck"
Probable deck: X-men/Heralds, Underworld/Crime Lords or Morlocks

Rob
The player who has fared the best other than myself in the first two events, going 2-1 in each. Rob has been running Spiderfriends Evade with some success. Rob is also a convert from Yugi, having missed only 4 or 5 weeks in 18 months.
Most likely to say - to my wife: "I wouldn't have put you at anything over 30" - crawler.
Also likely to say: "That is a seriously pink bathroom"
Probable Deck: X-Stall

Vince
Vince is the dad of one of our younger Yugioh players. He also plays Yugi every week we have an odd number so as to avoid us having players getting byes. Vince played a makeshift X-Men/LofA deck at the inaugural tournament, going 2-1 with it.
Most likely to say: "Do you know what that does" - as he explains a card effect to one of the younger Yugi players.
Probable deck: ?

David
The second of the new players to be buying Vs by the box. David has played Hellfire Club at the first two events and has been tweaking the deck over the last few days. As a Yugi player David has stuck with the same deck for quite a while, posting numerous consecutive top 8 finishes by virtue of knowing the ins and outs of his deck. Hopefully he can develop a similar understanding of his deck of choice for Vs.
Most likely to say: "Have you got a box of ..........."
Probable Deck: Hellfire Mental

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