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When I came into the convention center
it was nearly empty aside from a door greeter dressed as the Captain of the Love
Boat. Over the weekend I would lovingly came to refer to him as ‘Skipper’. Sitting on a bench near the WoW room was a
group of vagrants slumped against the wall, looking rather haggard. As I got
closer I saw my buddies, road weary Heroes, Dave Hunting, Jeremy Jensen, and Amy Daves Long suffering
Girlfriend, who embodies the ideal of perfect patience. They had just driven in
from a 10 Hour Tour from Utah. We decided to get some lunch while we waited for Gazedan
Challenge to begin.



On our return the doors to the World of Warcraft had
finally opened revealing a strange mixture of technology and unstable looking
wooden structures draped with colorful banners. A giant full breasted Guardian
Steelhorn greeted us. I immediately gravitated towards my favorite two drop and
hid behind the bovine protector for awhile as I peered around.



A player lounge was beginning to fill up along with the sounds
of tone death music from the next evolution in Guitar Hero; Rock Star. Now
gamers every where can not only play guitar poorly, but also stumble over drums
and vocals. The weekend would be filled with the sounds of mediocre garage
bands. I knew I had made our guys play test under the drone of a blaring
television for a reason.



The sealed event got underway at an epic crawl. Nick and
Jeremy had a slow start with poor deck options, while Dave and I finally
dropped after a few rounds having only lost one or two games. I stuck it out
for another round until I finally got my second loss, all too happy to go get
some much needed sleep.



At the hotel, everyone was fairly sleep deprived and
laughing manically. Jeremy still did not know what to play and wanted to play
test. I insisted that he just go with what he knew and get some sleep. Far more
important. I made a number of changes forgetting my rule of only making one
change before an event. Jeremy finally talked us into a few games before sleep
and we all took turns pounding Ona. I explained that our decks were built to
beat hunter. Discouraged Jeremy settled on a fairly basic version of the
Original Hamburger Hunter deck he did well with in Vegas. I thought it was a
fine choice but warned him that everyone would be ready for hunter.



As we all got ready for bed, I blew up an air mattress,
while looking jealously at the comfy bed Nick and Jeremy got to share, nestled
closely together. I was proud of Nick and Jeremy for finally getting past the
idea of two guys sharing a bed, being gay.



They made a cute couple and even bickered lovingly. Nick
made some idle threat about foreign objects in his backside. As Jeremy and Nick
began to deliriously snore, and randomly grope each other, I was suddenly quite
happy with my airmatress I occupied, tucked beneath the sink. If I only had
Guardian Steelhorn to protect me..I went into a restless sleep with dreams of
stealing a life sized Guardian Steelhorn.



WORLDS

The tournament was packed, and I scouted the event for
last minute sideboard changes. I was surprised that there were only about 500
players. Most of the good players had their decks securely hidden from view,
and I only saw a number of rush decks. I considered putting my Consecrations
back into my sideboard but then realized I was 12 cards short. Somehow I had
left my quests at the hotel room. I rushed to the vendors and dropped ten
dollars of some Draney’s Junk and Chasing Aimee 01, along with a three dollar
missing diplomat. I was still sleeving my deck while our lists were collected.
Fortunately I knew the guy across from me. He was one of the better players
from the regionals we went to at Idaho. I
always forgot his name and tried to peer at his deck list. I knew his last name
was States since we were at the same table for Nationals. (His name was Brody) Idaho guy
helped me sleeve my deck and I was ready, although a bit off balance about
losing my quests.





Round 1 Rapid Fire

I thought I would get a first round win. Time had started and the three minute
mark hit right as my opponent game rushing through the auditorium indicating I
had a game one win. I did not press the point though I probably should have
asked for a time extension.

I was surprised to see I was paired
against Eldinril. I suspected I was playing the rapid fire list. I had talked
to someone about his teams list they were all playing and asked him if he were
on Team Tao. He said ‘not really’ and I knew it was probably the same deck. I
spent much of my first game dealing with enormous Steel Smith’s while keeping
three open for a rapid fire. On the turn he was going to go off I Hammered him
to which he responded with Silencing shot. I play Blessing of Freedom and he
plays Silencing Shot again. I blew a second Hammer. Unfortunately I essentially
lost three cards to this exchange and could forgot about his hero flip. There
was a one point discrepancy, and since I am horrible at math I went with his. Unfortunately
this barely took me to lethal. Game two
I went turbo beats but he was taking soo long time was called the turn before I
could win. I had also made a key mistake running a king Makula into his hero
thinking he could not strike back but forgetting about the Band of the Ranger
General’s benefit. I had I been able to
squeeze in a second attack with King I win. One more turn and I win and we get
at least three more turns for game three. My deck should almost always win on
time.



Round 2: Rapid Fire Take Two

The next round was another rapid fire deck. We had both
been in contention for top 8 at Nationals, and were both pretty upset about
scrubbing out in our first round. Fortunately I got the early beats, and he had
no answer to Latro, Kulvo, and Avenger’s Shield. I played “Chipper” and Moria
Darkheart about ten times this game before I finally broke through for the win.
With 20 mins time was called and I knew I had won. I had hopped that playing
Paladin would not come down to who wins game one, and then go to time, but it
was starting to seem that way. Unless my opponent has a nuts draw on the final
game they simply can not beat me. I kept his hero and Steel Smith’s tapped down
with Avenger’s Shield. I also played Righteous Vengeance of a few on them as
well as a random Fury. Another Hammer and he finally conceded and dropped from
Worlds, disgusted. Even though I was only 1-1 I was feeling I had made a pretty
good metagame call.



Round 3: Mezar Control



This was actually a pretty good deck. I was glad to see a
'normal' deck. My brain was already starting to hurt. In theory Warlock is not
the best match up for me. I had never seen a Warlock deck that was so
consistent and able to go aggressive. Fortunately Sarmoth dies to Mass of
McGowan, and an Avenger's Sheild and my opponent was left trying to beat me down
with Marshal Reginald Windsor and Vindicator Brovan. I knew he was saving his
Hero Flip for Magni or Greench so I just rowed Magni. I think it helps when you
know what they are playing better than they seem to. Granted he was a great
player but Dave is the best. Holy Shield was huge in this game, and it really
came down to who had tempo. Warlock can not deal with Weapons very efficiently,
and as long as you put pressure on them, and deal with random protectors right
away you should win. Chipper and Moria basically skip a turn while you continue
the beats. Shadowfury was nuts, really a better Avenger’s Shield, however, that
also set him back a turn.



Game two he started out very strong with Triple Korthas,
Sarmoth, all the way up to Marshal on Turn five. I was starting to regret my
smack talking about Korthas being bad from the night before. When you get them
in multiples and go first there is no better one drop. Turn four I played
Avenger’s Shield just to tap down the Korthas, killing one with one damage on,
while butt poking into the other with a two drop. On my Turn Five I took out
the Marshal with a Holy Shield.



Unfortunately he played a Kulvo and Played Lost. I was out
of Shields, and could only missing diplomat for King Makula. He drew a card
with Ringo Token from Lost and dropped a Parvink, and Medoc. Between the Lost
token and the Medoc normally I should conceded as things were getting out of
control. However I realized I could steal the Lost token with Makula and force
him to try to take it out as it sat behind a Kulvo. Otherwise I get to draw two
each turn. I was pretty please with this play and even my opponent thought it
was pretty cool. He had just gone from not being able to lose to having to suicide
Parvink into my Kulvo, Ram Medoc into the Token and dropped Marshal Reginald
Windsor. Vera Nice!



Unfortunately Marshal was going to take out my Monkey
before he could get to Medoc for a Little Jungle Loving however I was starting to steal the
tempo back. Since it was his turn 8 I Hammered Medoc, making him return
Parvink, and then Manhunted for King Magni, forcing the discard. On his turn,
he played Parvink, and Kulvo, Shadowbolting, my Kulvo, and forcing me to
Discard Magni. I held onto Redemption. On my turn I played Redemption on my
King Makula, Snagging his Parvink, and Played Avenger’s Shield on his Medoc and Kulvo.

With everything tapped down my opponent could only play
Chasing Amy on Marshall to kill Makula. I simply played Mass of McGowan to finish off Medoc and my opponent
Conceded.





Round 4, Gorebelly Twig



This should be a good match up for me. Not one I had
tested to be honest, my only experience playing the deck was in Nationals at
DMF Philly. However all you need to know is that they can win on turn five and
burn you out with Morlug Twig.



My opponent was Corey Jones, and he had all these amazing
EA’s like Scout Omereta. I asked him how he had done at Nationals and he said
he took fourth. I guess that is pretty good. He won the die roll and got off to
a great start, with Twig Replacing PBlade on Turn Four making me think he had
the win on turn five. I played another Kulvo to match my 1^st Kulvo
and Corey Groaned. He took out a Kulvo and then played some guys. I played
Moria on my turn and passed. Corey played Blood Rage, and Wazluk and Passed. I
took out Wazluk with Moria, and played Kerig Soulguard to get rid of the
Bloodrage. Corey, tried to attack and I considered it. I told to him that once the
attack is legal I would kill the Twig with Morias. Corey, said he would still
get to swing. We called the judge over and he confirmed that once the attack is
legal, you still get to strike, and can not stop it by killing the weapon. I
said that I thought you swung during the defend step and said maybe we should
get the head judge over. The judge said that might take awhile as he was in the
middle of a ruling. I said how does destroying the weapon make the attack
illegal? They said he still gets to respond and can play another weapon. WTF?

I
was going to win anyway and my brain was starting to get fried. After watching
the last ruling take 30 minutes I went with it even though this was weird news
to me. I killed the Twig. Corey Dropped another
weapon. ( I think a PBlade) and swung for two.

I Manhunted to see what was in his hand. He had nothing. I
played Chipper and Passed.



Corey played a Gellrin of the Gallows and made me pop
Chipper swinging with his weapon. I played King Makula on Gellrin and Corey let
me take it. A minute later Corey said oh wait I will sac it. I considered that
and said well he's been on my side for awhile but…

Corey shuffled up and we went to game two. I felt bad and
normally would have let him take it back. But it was Corey Jones, and the game
was over anyway. Plus I was bitter he had cool EAs no one else could get yet.



Corey got off to a quick start of Allies but I got some
Protectors.



Cory had a Twig in play. Since it was turn four, I could
not play and pop Moria so I played the Manhunt I had been holding, and got a
Rak. Sure enough, he had Rak, Rak, Heroic Strike, Mortal Strike Mortal Strike
along with a Crushing Blow. Rak went to the graveyard, and I said, “And I
draw”. Corey called a judge over and said since I did not draw upon resolution
of the card it is too late. The judge read the card glared at Corey, and ruled
that since I had a human hero you could safely assume I chose to do both.



On Corey’s turn he gets me 7 away from lethal with Stupid
Gorebelly tricks and I Blessing of Freedom the Mortal Strike to stay alive.



Corey played Morlug with one card in hand. If it was a
twig I should lose if I pop Moria in response. I take a chance and use Moria,
and Sure enough, Corey Plays a second twig. I hammer his Hero and have one
open. Corey Passes. With 7 resources if he sacs them all I die. I can flip and
prevent one and prevent another one with Holy Shield. But that is still not
enough. I go ahead and play another Moria. No response. I consider and go for
it. I sac Moria and am shocked that he does nothing. I realize he probably has
a Third Twig or Faesha in hand and figures that I can not kill Morlug with only
two open on my turn. He will just wait till my turn to kill me. Holy Shield
says other wise. I play Holy Shield on his Morlug and swing into him with my
hero. Apparently Corey does not know this Stupid Human trick, and Morlug goes
to the graveyard. Corey extended his hand. Apparently he thought I had Lay on
Hands in hand not Holy Shield.



I am starting to climb back into this thing.



Round 5: Timmo



I am fairly happy to see that my next round is Timmo. In
fact two Timmo decks are at our table. Apparently this is the father and son
team that stormed Nationals with Timmo. I was pretty excited to play the
creators of the legendary deck.



The deck starts out as expected and he begins drawing with
the Onixia Hide Backpack. I “chipper’ the backpack first and my opponent seems
surprised by this. I know that backpack makes the deck run. He gets in some
early beats but I stabilize, while trying to focus on keeping the 8/8 Steel
smith’s under control. My Draconian Deflector is huge in this match, and I know
from an early Manhunt that he is holding onto a Mutilate, either waiting for me
to tap out or tap my shield, or draw another mutilate. On turn 9 with three
cards in hand my opponent plays Jackknife on my protectors. I decline to save
them with the two Blessing of Freedom in my hand. Timmo swings for two. I leave
my Shield ready, going to 21.



Timmo plays Mutilate for 8. I play Blessing of Freedom.
Mutilate for 8. Another Blessing of Freedom. A third Mutilate! Ouch, but still
not quite enough. I prevent three. The game continued for a long time after
this but that was pretty much all she wrote for the little gnome, since he blew
his wad with no success. Game two I just keep him tapped down until the round
is over, and stabilize at five with a Lay on Hands and a Divine Shield in hand.
I never needed to play them.





Round 6: Human Pally

The next round I am called to the feature match area. I am
pretty excited since this is about my fourth feature match, and I no longer
have nerves going into it. I really want my build featured since I think it is
better than both Nathandan and ‘Seraph Graccus.’ I had tested Seraph Since it
came out and I assure you its only good against a control deck or if you are already
winning. I told him I was glad to play him as I had played all of his friends
at Philly. He looked at my blankly. I told him that they were all great guys,
and had jokingly called me the Québec Killer. He shrugged and said something
about not thinking that would happen. He also said that he had split the last
VS PC.



I realize this probably will not be a very fun match.
Fortunately I win the die roll. I have not played this match up, but I know
that the only way for him to beat me is to go first since Seraph and Medoc are
horrible going second. I will just tap down any protectors and smash Seraph and
Medoc. Apparently the reporter did not think that Graccus on Graccus action was
very hot for some reason and it was not on the event coverage. The crowd
watching seemed to think otherwise, expecting, a ridiculous hour long game one with
neither deck doing much. I was pleased to disappoint them as I went turn one
Teep, Turn two Latro, Turn three Kulvo, Turn four Mass of McGowan into a Kulvo
and Swing. My opponent Consecrated my board on 6, and Played Kavi the Wanderer
on my Weapon on turn 7, but I just replaced it and kept the pressure on,
killing him on turn 8. A turn 8 win with Pally on Pally is like a turn four win
with a Rush on Rush.



My opponent seemed pretty stunned as was the audience. I
knew that game two would be much more difficult as he would likely get to do
his Stupid Human Tricks with Medoc and Seraph. I got off to a quick start but he dropped Draconian
Deflector on turn four. Apparently I was not the only to discover how good it
was in the format. On turn five he got out Seraph and I could only hammer her
for a turn and play chipper to get rid of deflector. Eventually he got Seraph
active and was putting out Vindicator Brovan and Medoc Spirit Warden’s on the
end of my turns. His Stupid Human Tricks took a ton of time to actually kill me
and we only had ten minutes left on game three. I got off to a slow start, but
kept the board under control with Mass of McGowan. Unfortunately, this put a
ton of damage on my hero. Ideally you want to go to end of time with less
damage on your hero even though I did have the Lay on Hands. I figured my
opponent had one as well as well as he was playing pretty slowly I thought. As
such I was not as aggressive as I should have been. On turn four my opponent
played Manhunt for Kulvo, and hit, but seemed pretty upset about the Lay on
Hands in my hand. With two minutes to go I had 15 points of damage on to his
two, even though I had board control. My opponent had just put out a Vindicator
Brovan to match a Kavi the Wanderer. All I had to do is stay alive for four
turns. An easy feat against Graccus. I consider playing junk but realize I would
be better off getting a Panda or a King Mukula. I drew into my Panda. Now I had
to decide if I wanted to ram into Vindicator with Mass. Normally a no brainier.
I decided to just tap him down and let him eat my Deflector. While swinging
into his hero. Kavi would only do four to me or else eat one of my weapons. My
opponent complained to the judge about me taking too long and said that I was
just waiting to use my Lay on Hands. I said of course I am, Unless there is
some way he can kill me in the next 5 turns. I still can win straight up . I have Weapons,
Kulvo, and a Panda ready to play Pandemonium. The only think I am worried about
is if he has a lay on hands too, which I am fully expecting. I don’t think that
the judge liked that I thought I would probably win with Lay on Hands. On the end of my turn I was considering whether
to Manhunt to see if he had the Lay or to leave it open for Panda. I guess I took too long because the Judge gave me a warning for slow play,
even though this was the first turn I had even taken more than a minute on. I
explained that I assumed my opponent had the Lay on Hands as well, but from the
look on his face I could tell he did not. I guess I should have played Man hunt
earlier to see. That is the problem with going to time, it does effect how you
play.



Time was called, and on the last turn I just said I was
going to play Lay on Hands, and asked if he had an answer. My opponent angrily
scooped and said something about that being the worst sportsmanship conduct he
had ever seen. Of course I had seen he and his friends get wins from lay on
hands all day long at Philly. It had happened twice to me, but fortunately I
had been holding onto the burn for it.
Oh well. The Québec Killer strikers again!



Round 7: Gorebelly Twig



Why can I not get a normal Solo deck? There are like 50
Rouge decks at the top tables. At least if I lose game one it will take only
ten minutes top. Apparently winning on Lay on Hands is bad Karma. I only needed
one more but completely punted my next game against an opponent who managed to
take almost all of the time getting to turn 6 playing Gorebelly twig. Michael
Dalton I have played before. I am not sure if he is ‘slow’ or what, but I have
a hard time understanding anything he says and on top of being the slowest
player on earth, it seems like he slows down even more when he thinks he is
winning. Now this is the horrible thing. Based on the early Twig ruling I took
four straight up to see if he had a Rak in hand rather than Sack Moria and them
make him use a Rak and play a twig. Those four points was the clincher. Michael
squeezed out the win and even though we had 14 minutes left to play I knew we
would have no time to get to turn four let alone for me to win based on how
slow game one took. I mean seriously. We
had played two games if Graccus VS twig with 30 mins to spare earlier.

Of course I had the game locked when
Time was called but I needed to win right then. Rather than keep quest open for hammer and
holy shield I just tapped out, and threw
lethal on the field. I had zero on, and if he did not combo me out he loses
next turn. After ten minute Michael combos me out on turn five. As much as I
like Michael if you ever play against micheal dont' be suprised to fined yourself punching him in the nose. At least you won’t lose your mind and you will have time to get something
to eat. Fortunately Brad Watson did this for me in the top 8.

http://entertainment.upperdeck.com/wow/en/events/article.aspx?eid=25&aid=3611

Even during the match above I was
watching the judge with his head in his hands near tears because of how long Dalton was
playing. The match was untimed, but somehow winning three games on the part of
Rotund vs. Twig took like four hours.



Round 8: Timmo AKA TIMMYYYYYY I played a Timmo rush deck that used massive
Slice and Dice and all one drops. Kyuski was running it and was pretty proud of
his baby. I could not draw Avenger’s Shield and he seemed to have three Lupos
on Board every turn. My choice to leave out Consecration main was only now
coming back to haunt me. This guy played almost as slow as the Dalton. At
least he was pleasant though. Luppo was both horrible and a night mare. They
just basically sat there doing noting while I sat there with my weapon and
shield doing nothing. I should have dropped magni but I knew he was saving his
slice and dice and flip to kill him, but at least the game would have gone
faster and I could have chased him back and gotten some tokens. He was also
playing with 3 not there yetis which really did nothing but enable defies brother
hood. My Kulvo and Parvink's just ate them for lunch. I could not see how it
could possibly beat mage or even Rotund. ( Kyuski later was complaining about
how bad it sucks that an unpumped Escaknder’s claw just ears all his one drops.
That was how he got his last lost. Yeah. I guess that’s the problem with one
drops. Not expecting much Rouge? I know I was. Just not Timmo. Please give me a
freaking Rotund!)



Final Round: Win or Go Home

TIMMYYYYYYYY!



Only one more win but it’s against the same Damn deck! I
think this deck was probably winning on surprise factor. (I know I was surprised)




Unfortunately this
is apparently somehow my worst match up, and 3-4 Lupos are kind of bad against
a Pally who left his consecrations in at home. Fortunately my opponent plays
much quicker than the last one and we get to game three. Unfortunately we are
going to time however I think I have a lock in Lay on Hands and Divine Shield.



Unfortunately I am pretty distracted when the whole 30
foot wall falls down in the hall right in front of my eyes. Imagine the Great
Wall of Chain as a Row of Dominos and you will get an idea. After this I was
having a tough time making a decision on what looked to be one of our last
turns. Our opponent called a Judge over to watch the game and I commented you
could have just asked me to speed up. He was trying to act all cool about it.
Oh nothing personal. Normally I have no problem with a judge watching me but
this guy is a little much. He is standing over the table and rhythmically
bumping it with his leg.

I was still a bit freaked out about falling wall incident,
wondering what else might fall down. I was in no danger of dying unless the ceiling
fell on me, so I put down a card face down, and then realized that I just put
down my win condition. Not my Lay on Hands. Worse. My Divine Shield. Against
Rouge you know they will kick the Lay on hands so Divine Shield will negate it
and make you untargetable. I wanted to pick it up or ask if I could, but the
judge was burning holes into my head and making weird comments.



Of course time ends on my turn so my opponent gets the
last turn. And of course he Kicks my Lay on Hands. Even then he barely manages
to get me one damage above him. Had he attacked I could have played Holy Shield
to tie it up, but he played it smart and held back. I showed him the Divine
Shield I had just rowed and his eyes got wide knowing he should have lost.



Wow. I don’t think I have ever made mistake that cost me
thousands of dollars. I don’t think Nick had ever seen me so pissed, he seemed
a bit worried I could only hope that I was still in the top 100 even though I
would not make day two. Of course I ended up 105th. Damn.



Everyone was pretty down from their performance, but Dave
and the guys had been diligently playing Gunslinger all day and won a bunch of
Leeroy shirts, while more importantly testing against the Gauntlet of decks
R&D had made with the new set and getting cool tech insight. We got some
Denny’s and headed for bed planning on taking out our aggressions on the Dream
Machine Championship in the morning.

Jeremy Jenson, Dave Hunting, and I went to Vegas over the weekend along with his long suffering wonderful Girlfriend Amy.The main idea was to get closer to Qualifying for Worlds on Rating. I had no idea what to run and really did not want to spend the weekend sleep deprived playing cards and turning back around. I decided that if nothing else it would be one last chance to play test before DMF Philly (and possibly help Dave out if we got matched up. )

The more I play Pallidin the more frustrated I get with Namasius the Implacable. Rescue the Survivors is not reason enough to play the Dranei, and since you are always exhausting to Blessing of Wisdom it seemed pointless after turn five. When I finally tried the deck it was not quite as bad as I thought, but I still never used my 'Rescues' except to enable Defias Brotherhood. By then I had about ten cards in hand anyway. So I decided to try Gracius as my hero. I wanted to try the protection hero to try out Avengers, and Holy Shield but some of my Red Pally stuff had not come yet. I cut ten allies from my Namsius deck, and threw in some of the Protection cards and called it good. It was much more allie lite than I liked, but it felt good. Normally I won’t play a deck unless I have tested it for a few weeks to a month, but I had done a similar thing with switching from Dizzy to the Human Warlock in Idaho regional and went undefeated until the top 8.

Jeremy needed a deck so I gave him the Hamburger Hunter Deck, Dave had been helping me tune. (Red hunter with aimed shot)

Unfortunately I forgot to borrow Blaster Shot Launchers from a friend, as I had thought he was going to come with us. Jeremy ended up playing with only two of the best card in the deck.

We got in about 2 am. When we were all in bed, we heard a knock on the next door and then a periodic, rhythmic pounding on our wall, followed by a twenty second pause every five minutes. This went on for exactly an hour before the TV immediately came on and the door opened once again and shut. Sounds like some one knew how to get their moneys worth.

The first round we were all matched up against pretty good players. All of which had made day two at Nationals. Dave won but Jeremy lost. I won a fairly hard fought match against Hoot and Shoot. The deck was pretty slow and I probably should not have even wasted cards dealing with Hootie, Korthas, and CO, early. He did not concede as he should have even when I had four protectors on the field and was drawing three cards per-turn to his one in hand. Finally he figured out that he was wasting his time(literally) and scooped. With only ten minutes left in game two all I had to do was draw a couple of protectors. He got off to an amazing start, but time ended on turn 6. My opponent was clearly going to win that game as he said, however I was just playing to stay alive not to win so who knows what would have happened. This was pretty upsetting to my opponent. I guess he had never played against Pallidin. If you lose on time because you refuse to concede game one you deserve to lose. I know I have had my share of loses because of being too stubborn.


I was matched up against a pretty good Telerander Deck for my next match. Jeremy played a Senzir Deck and Dave played the Gore belly deck that would eventually go undefeated.

I kind of felt bad because they both lost hard fought games while my opponent never got to untap his hero once thanks to Hammer of Justice and Avengers Shield. I also called the judge over because he was playing with out sleeves and some of his cards were really worn. But mainly he had four Leeroy Jenkins in his deck and I just wanted him to put some sleeved on them! The judge said since they were all so screwed up they were not really marked. I offered to buy my opponent some sleeves later but he declined.

After the game, my opponent told me he had never gotten crushed so badly in his life. He had been playing Telerander since Heroes fist came out and was considering giving it up after playing me. I felt horrible and I tried to explain that this was probably his worst match up. He didn’t really seem to understand that.

Jeremy started getting the hang of the deck and made some great plays that I had never seen from him in past events. I think it was a combination of having a deck that suited his style and the Nationals experience starting to sink in. I see that happen all the time where a month or so after going to a big event a player starts to raise his play to another level.

While we watched Jeremy play a group a small herd of Gothopotomi* had gathered around us. The Gothopotomi continually asked us questions filled with not so vague innuendo, and wished aloud that we lived in Vegas. As flattering as it was our male competion was some what lacking. One particularly well endowed Gothopotumus was prone to having her resource row completely covered with her enormous breasts, plopped down on the table.

*( Goth-o-potumus: A rotund female who likes to dress in dark clothing, and wear gothic make up and accessories. Often can be found at gaming and comic conventions listening to depech-mode on their Ipodes and displaying copious amounts of cleavage.

Goth-o-poto-mi: Plural. The Gothopotomi frolicked with each other at the back of the club.)



One particularly funny game was when Jeremy spent most of his time Re-curring confessor Mildred to keep his Hero from being covered with DOTS. His hero looked like a diseased cow. One of the dots was doing two per turn but would deal 4 if he destroyed it. He made the smart play and killed it anyway as in the long run it would do 6-10 damage in a few turns. Jeremy had been reluctant to put Two confessor Mildred main and two side but I am sure he will never play with less than four after that game.

Dave did not really have any trouble the rest of the day as he bent the Gnome Warlock to his will. Most people have no idea what to do against the deck even if they have a better deck. Dizzy could be the worst deck in the format (an may well be) but Dave will always get many wins in spite of the fact just because he can play it blindfolded.

I had a couple of close games against Shamman, but as Dave said before even if he got a god hand I should still win just because I know how to play Shamman so well. He was right. The first game my opponent had a god draw. He went 1-2-3, 4, turn five moria for my Hellreaver, turn 6 Kali. I just took it and went to four health left. Played consecration after the attack and my opponent kind of laughed as nothing died. On my turn I play Halberton of Smiting targeting and killing Kali and about 6 guys. For good measure I attacked into Moria since he was tapped out and killed her as well. That was pretty cool.

We all made top 8 with me as the only undefeated. I was matched up against my first opponent a very bitter Hunter player. I usually hate to bitch about opponents, but this guy was clearly looking for pay back. He seemed to be playing ridiculously slow and I finally conceded the first game. Even though I had zero damage on, I did not have an answer for his Magni in my hand and knew that it would take another 4-5 turns to draw into it. I could last that long, but could not risk taking the time for that with how long he was taking. I figured we would be ok as we had 40 minutes to go. I took out my Lay on Hands as I needed to win quickly.

My opponent was taking even more time game two. I called the judge to watch for slow play. Even though my opponent took about 5 mins per turn the judge never told him to speed up. I lost on time having a Halliburton of Smiting a Panda and 5 small guys in play to his face up Perfect Stout. He was able to Stout my Panda and stay 6 away from lethal damage. I was pretty pissed, but Dave had won his match and got to play the Hunter Deck.

Pallidin is a bad match up for Hunter, but Warlock is just a Gnomish Gang Rape. Dave even let him have an active Modoc just for fun. It was pretty pointless and a rather anti-climatic finish. The only time it was close was when Dave made a mistake on turn 6. Fury was in play along with Moria Dark heart with one damage on her from Dave’s now dead Sarmoth. Dave had a Shred Soul and a Shadow bolt. He Shadow bolted Fury and Shredded Moria. If addmited he was pretty bored or he might have realized that Moria is not usually a threat to Warlock, but a Fury can be.

Next turn he dropped a master of the Hunt and a Teep, to making things a bit exciting, then chased for Fury and swung for 8 on next turn. I thought that could cost Dave the game but he brushed it off, dropped a Parvink and drew another Shred Soul. There was no Finals play off as apparently you are not supposed to play the top two against each other. We had been doing a finals locally.

Jeremy lost to the Gorebelly deck that ended up splitting 1-2 honors with Dave in a close 3 game match. Gorebelly is Hamburger Hunters worst match up but Jeremy had him to 1 left in both loses.

In the end ‘mission accomplished’. Jeremy got his honor points and another top 8 berth. I got the record I was hoping for to boost my rating. (all be it the one loss I wanted happened in the top 8) and Dave should have his rating invite or close to it. We went to Excalibur’s buffet to stuff our self after our long day. Dave and Jeremy pilled various forms of carcass on their plates while I tried about twenty different things until I found something good. I was pretty happy when I found the Veggie Egg rolls. I probably ate about twenty of them and three different pieces of cheese cake. We all topped it off with some soft serve ice cream. I have decided people always end up at the soft serve machine at a buffet because you have just eaten all these different things that look really amazing but are fairly disappointing once you actually taste them. The soft serve ice cream is the one thing that consistently never disappoints. It tastes exactly like you expect it to.

We were pretty late after the buffet and Dave did not want to stop to see Strippers. (the only reason I really came to Vegas) How disappointing to go to Vegas and not see strippers!