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Rj's Deck Garage
By: Ricky
Welcome back,
loyal Pojo.com readers! I've been busy with lots
of things that have nothing to do with Yu-Gi-Oh!
Lately but I'm back with this piece of work
that's based on my recollections of SJC Houston
07.
The loyal readers probably know that I am a member of Team GG (More information available at http://TeamGG.com), and you also may know that we hardly attend as many large scale events as we'd like. Between crazy work schedules for most of the members, self included, we were finally looking forward to an event we could sink our teeth into -- SJC Houston 2007. The weeks leading up to the event were filled with high hopes of another great showing for the team, as well as tinkering with lots of ideas we had -- deck wise. I had no idea what I was going to run, but I had great team mates like Duy Bui and Ryan Goff, who you may know as blueD and Kill_switch on the forums helping me make my mind up in time. I eventually settled on a black burn-ish deck that was testing quite well for Duy. The days before the event were filled with disappointment -- things fell through for most of the team. Between car engines blowing up and last minute loans, it left just my team mates Duy, Shawn, Ray, and Joe and myself all alone for the big event. The pressure was mounting with odds stacked against us. The other notable southern teams, Hpnotiq (containing studs such as Ryan Cerda, Chris SoRelle, and James Naughton) and Outphase (Lead by Jake McNeely, my personal favorite Texan :D) now had not only a home field advantage on our group, but now a statistical advantage. Fast-forward to the event! Many people doubted Jerome McHale, Metagame.com's lone reporter at the event, but he came up clutch with another great events worth of coverage. He's a true champ in every sense of the word -- after arriving extremely late the night before the event due to airline troubles, he worked his tale off all day long Saturday and Sunday to provide us wonderful coverage -- great effort by Jerome. I was able to cruise through the first few rounds to a 3 - 0 overall match record until I sat down with Ricky Luu, a Texas native who me and my team mates have some history with (He bubbled out Duy at SJC Arlington and beat my team mate Shawn just the round before this). The games were brilliant, I was able to secure the first game while Ricky stormed back to snatch the next two, supported by strong hands containing Cyber Dragon / Don Zaloog / Mystical Space Typhoon both game two and game three. At this point, I was already on the bubble before round five, and needed to win out. Round five I was paired up with a player I recognized from Louisiana. I know him to be a shady player, with dismal skill. After pile shuffling his deck before game one, I noticed his deck was sleeved in approximately twenty white Players Choice sleeves and twenty white Dragon Shield sleeves. Knowing the information I did about this player (particularly that he is a shady player), I called the nearest floor judge over -- Ally, a moderator on our very own Pojo.com forums! She inspected the sleeves and noticed what I noticed, and went for help. She got another floor judge and the head judge for the event, the stunning Simon Key, and they all talked privately. Despite the obvious differences in sleeves, they agreed to let my opponent desleeve his deck and resleeve them, then gave us a time extension. We played out the match (after I asked Simon Key privately if I could have a judge spectate our match just to avoid any discrepancies) and I dispatched my opponent 2 - 0 and moved on. I would later meet up with my opponent from this round in the hallway, as he was coming out of the bathroom. He walked past me, on my right, and drove his shoulder into my own with noticeable force, which indicated to me that it was no accident. Being the polite stud I am, I quickly turned around and said "Hey man, watch out!". He turned around, walked forward to me and turned, as if to stand up to me, and kept repeating "What?" to me. Because of his aggressiveness, I repeated myself once, shrugged it off and walked off. I won out to a 5 - 1 record and that stud Jerome set me up with a feature match against a young man sporting a Elemental Hero deck. The games were admittedly sloppy on my part as I didn't know what a lot of the Elemental Hero cards did, I certainly didn't expect to see this type of deck six rounds into a Shonen Jump Championship. However I kept my promise to Jerome(I promised that if he gave me a feature match I'd either win big or lose in one of the most ridiculous ways possible), and I won in stylish fashion -- with only thirteen (Yes, two digits, the number "1" immediately followed by the number "3") life points remaining on the last turn in the end of time procedure. After this, I would win out, defeating amazing opponents such as Alex Martinez and Adam Powell -- both of which I have an immense amount of respect for, and enter day two ranked 7th. In Top Sixteen I would be playing against Steven Arias. I played against his brother (Peter, I think) at SJC Arlington, and I got to admit, both of these guys play a good game of Yu-Gi-Oh! I would lose my first match on day two to Steven, despite winning the first game I couldn't overcome his strong hands game two and three. Great match, wonderful player. I would finish in 10th place out of 440 people overall, which is fine in my book. I'm grateful that I made it to day two and got to meet a lot of new people, and catch up with some old friends, too! The prize support was obviously the best its ever been, 9th through 16th place receiving eighteen packs of Strike of Neos and a iPod Shuffle, which I was fortunately able to sell for $75.00. Dolla dolla bill yall~ I'll give you guys a peak of my decklist for the event.. Monsters: [2] Mobius the Frost Monarch  [2] Zaborg the Thunder Monarch [3] Cyber Dragon [3] Des Koala [3] Gravekeeper's Spy [2] Stealth Bird [2] Mystic Tomato [1] Sangan [1] Spirit Reaper [1] Morphing Jar [1] Strike Ninja [1] Mask of Darkness Spells: [3] Wave Motion Cannon [2] Smashing Ground [1] Snatch Steal [1] Heavy Storm [1] Swords of Revealing Light [1] Book of Moon Traps: [3] Solemn Judgment [2] Sakuretsu Armor [2] Bottomless Trap Hole [1] Magic Cylinder [1] Mirror Force [1] Ring of Destruction Side Deck: [3] D.D. Survivor [2] D.D. Assailant [1] D.D. Warrior Lady [3] Dimensional Fissure [2] Reinforcement of the Army [1] Ceasefire [1] Asura Priest [1] Return from the Different Dimension [1] Sakuretsu Armor I saw a lot of Hydrogeddon, but even more Gravekeeper Spy, which kinda balanced things out in that area. Dedicated Monarch decks, such as Steven Arias' weren't as popular as I would have thought. A lot, and I mean A LOT of people side decked Dimensional Fissure / D.D. Survivor -- self included. My deck won a lot of games just because the obvious advantage I have over most decks running things like D.D. Assailant in multiples, and Hydrogeddon. Some decks even ran recruiters, such as Mystic Tomato and Giant Rat, which gave me even MORE of an advantage, as I got to sit there and let them bounce off of my Des Koalas, then just wait for Zaborgs, Smashing Grounds, and many other things that allowed me to often just "go off" and win the game in one turn. The Ceasefire, Asura Priest and Return from the Different Dimension in the side deck were particularly useless all weekend, but not many people can say that their side deck won them as many games as mine did that. Overall the deck performed quite well. I don't want to make this much longer, its already pretty huge, so I'll leave you now until next time, where I'll give my thoughts about where the game is heading in my opinion. This Shonen Jump Championship was without a doubt one of the best I've attended and it was great meeting a lot of people from the forums. Also, thanks for the support to all of the people from the forums coming up to me, shaking my hand, and telling me good job. I appreciate it, you're the best. God bless, Ricky |
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