Deck Name: Scorched Earth Name: Voltaire Abaya(thunderv11@yahoo.com) Location: A World of Books, San Leandro, CA Date: 22/06/03 First of all, if any of you have read similar tourney reports... i.e. by me, then you probably know that it's been a while since I've sent any reports in. Meh. Well... that's because, along with the release of LOD, came my Yata days. Yata. Not proud of that time. I registered very few wins... Yata is a skill deck, but is not quite complex. Hell, it'd be easier to play a Yata in a simple deck than make a big complex strategy that can't be played... so after a few weeks, I tore apart my Yata deck. This coincided with the final days of my High School career... as a Junior in High School, ;P. Anyhow, so I wasn't really proud of what I had done: I sold out to the Yata crowd. So last week, the 15th, I sold my Yata for $25 and ran with a very incomplete warrior deck. In a stroke of luck, it defeated 1 player in tourney play. But then, after the tournament, I started trading and crap to make a full-on warrior deck, with Reinforcements and crap. But through the week, I got bored of thinking about strategies with that deck... instead, I wanted something new... original, perhaps? And so was born... Scorched Earth. Like the armies in many classical stories of war and crap... we raid and pillage the village, then we BURN IT!!! Scorched Earth. Anyhow, the 2nd part of this overly-long intro is my rant about Beatdown and Anti-Beatdown. Beatdown... is obvious. You use power to overwhelm your opponent. That means using Geminis, Goblin, Jinzo, Lily, and sometimes, Bazoo. Then, at least here at World, came the wave of Anti-Beatdown. Like... hand control, gravity bind... those kind of decks. I like to call them Tech-Decks, because they use Technique to overpower even the strongest beatdown decks. At first, I used my metagaming skill to create an Anti-Beatdown deck... like my Yata deck. But then, I got killed by other, better-suited Anti-Beatdown. Great examples of this are the top ranked duelists at our store, Donald, Brandon and Steffon... and guys like Edmond who are great at making strategies. So I developed this: My Anti-Anti-Beatdown. So... let's see what happens. Deck List: Monsters(17): 2x Goblin Attack Force 2x Gearfried the Iron Knight 2x Amazon Archer 2x Marauding Captain 3x Dream Clown Witch of the Black Forest Sangan Exiled Force 3x Princess of Tsurugi Magic(10): Raigeki Harpie's Feather Duster Dark Hole Heavy Storm Monster Reborn Pot of Greed Change of Heart Snatch Steal Swords of Revealing Light Heart of Clear Water Traps(13): Mirror Force Call of the Haunted Imperial Order Ceasefire Magic Cylinder 2x Torrential Tribute 3x Just Desserts 2x Waboku Fairy Box Vital Stats: ~Total: 40 Cards ~Deck Name: Scorched Earth ~Deck Theme: Warrior/Burn Look at that. Warrior/Burn. If it's been done before, just shoot me. Oh, and let me know, too... see, I'm not quite skilled enough to play burn, so I'd like to learn from you if you've played Warrior/Burn before. Anyhow, there are some choices in there which are not so obvious, and I know some obvious mistakes right away. First of all, I don't have some of the major protection spells that make decks filled with weenies like this great. What I mean are cards like Messenger of Peace and Gravity Bind. Meh. I have 0 of those. That's why I don't play them. Really. Also, I'd like to have put some other burn cards, like Temendous Fire, or Attack and Recieve... especially A&R, since it's got pictures of warrior-esque people on it. Also, the original deck list had 13 monsters in it, and it played Reinforcements of the Army. I chucked those 'cause I not think that I have no space for them. And plus if I draw them at endgame, they're dead weight. Fairy Box is a strange choice, but personally, I think it's great. Heart of Clear Water + Marauding in defense mode = almost-permanent Swords of Revealing Light. Also, 2x Marauding Captain = almost-permanent Swords of Revealing Light. Anyhow... that's... the deck. Oh, and I also have 13 traps, including 5 restricted traps. Whoa-AGE. $6 to enter TP3 pack for entering, 3 for the championship. Round 1: Voltaire vs. --- Meh, I stole someone's strategy. *COUGH*Donald*COUGH* Bribe them with Tournament packs. I felt around my pack for a holo... (holos are a little bit slipperier) and felt nothing. So, I gave it to him in exchange for a free ride to the next round. Well, anyhow, since you're here anyway, and since I took this time to duel Froilan, I'll tell you about that one. Froilan's a cool guy, and he's a great player. A bit inconsistent, but he's a great player. So we exchange blows, as I'm playing him with my beatdown deck... I hit him, then he clears the field and hits me. Then I clear the field and he hits me back. The fun kind of playing that I liked so very long ago. He plays Gemini, I trap hole it. The I reborn it and attack. Few turns later he gets a Spear and Airknight on me. He attacks with both of them. Smacking me... smack dab in the face. ;P I change of heart his Airknight and attack. Then he's facing a Dark Elf. He takes it out and whacks me. OUCH! Meh... not... giving... up... Well, this is the point when we are interrupted by Brandon. HERE COMES A NEW CHALLENGER!!! ;) Round 2: Voltaire(Eternal) vs. Brandon(The King of Hearts) Brandon is a top player. Number 2, actually... right behind Donald. Evilness. Anyhow, this is the tournament debut of Scorched Earth... my heart races... I can smell smoke like the inside of a burning wooden house. Will the Anti-Anti-Beatdown take down an Anti-Beatdown? We start the first game by exchanging a few hits. I hit him fast and swarm him down with my Captains. Then I get 2 on the field and he can't attack. My Sealing Swords in monster form are giving him a hard time. Boom! Swish! *slurp* A void of matter so dense not even light can escape engulfs my warriors. NO! Attack with White Hat. Damn. Bust out with Goblin. Thwap! He attacks me back. I get Dream Clown out and reborn my Captain. He tributes for Jinzo and tries to attack my Clown. But, like magic, the Captain jumps in front of the blow and I take 1200 damage. But my Clown lives! And it destroys the beast that is Jinzo. He takes it out with a Goblin. I set 1 monster, Sangan, and 1 trap, Just Desserts. I peek at his calculator and see that he's only got 1100 life left. He sets another monster. I pass. Next turn, an army of goblins, and his mystery surprise card... they could charge right into me. He draws. At this point I can hear my heart beating. I look at Steffon, who's sitting next to me. I look back. He plays the card... Graceful Charity. I don't know what's up. He looks pleased. He tosses 2 cards and plays a Witch in attack mode. JUST DESSERTS!!! Game. Phew. Determined to take me down, Brandon starts out strong. He hurts me with something for an overflow of two. Then he depletes my hand with a White hat, and I'm down a little. Not wanting to be outdone, I use my Archers and Princesses to cause a burndown. Slowly, I'm whittling his lifepoints. He may have hand/field advantage, but I have life advantage. He busts out with Jinzo and shuts me down. He has a White Hat still, and they take out what I have left. With no hand, I draw. It's Goblin. WHACK! An army of Goblins swarm the little wannabe thief. He takes 1300 and my life is protected. Another white hat comes out and whacks the Goblin and the Jinzo takes a chunk out of me. Half my head is gone because of the blow. And my lifepoints aren't doing so well either, at 4400. A couple more hits and I would've been gone. Come on Cyber Ja--... ah, crap, I took that out of my deck. What can save me? Pot of Greed leading to Monster Reborn and Dark Hole? Low chance, but maybe... and that's when it happens. I draw... Snatch Steal. Snatch. Attack. Game. Whoa. Lucky. Again. Round 3: Voltaire(Eternal) vs. Kevin(???) Kevin's the brother of Jake, the guy I lost to almost every week that I played my Yata deck. Meh. MEH! MEEEHHH!!! I try to take the early lead, but drew no Just Desserts. Mostly just monsters. MEH! Then he got the early Jinzo out, just when I started drawing my damn traps. That AND Airknight. So I stole his Jinzo and ran with it. Till he beat me to a bloody pulp for stealing, that is. Oh well. Well, that's a dead game right there. Meh. This is Anti-Anti-Beatdown. There's nothing in here to beat down a beatdown. Well, this game he takes me by storm, getting rid of my defense position monsters. My Princesses were the only ones that hurt him. So he mounted an offense I couldn't crawl out of, and then when he tried to Crossout my Princess, he just killed it and ran me over. FWEH! Anyhow, I'm gonna run with this another week till. Then I'm debuting my new light deck... meh, I'll think of name later. ;P Tournament Highlights: -I have a win!!! I guess Anti-Anti-Beatdown works, huh? Maybe? Cons: -What happened to Jeff, Alan and all of them? Guess they're busy again... -Voltaire Abaya(Eternal) -Thunderv11@yahoo.com -Note: Shout out to all you duelists at A World of Books. Hope this season ends... or not.