PHSW Sneak Peek Report 11-5-11; Lightning Comics

Last night I hopped on DN to test some Karakuri, but all I could get matched against were decks like Cloudians, this weird lifegain deck, so I was like screw it I'm just wasting my time. Zach and I talk a bit about what he should run for the Sneak and I tell him I got the majority of Plants, and Karakuri minus the Merchants, and that I was running Agents. He has "Jankents" (Jank-Agents) and asks me what his options were since he doesn't have Tour Guides, I was like "well you could play Pure or TG", and he talked about how he liked Danny's Gallis deck but wasn't going to borrow it.

So this morning I make breakfast, take a shower, and throw my backpack in the trunk while my wife takes a shower since I have to drive her in to work since she was going to be hanging out with her friends afterwards. Drop her off, drop the dog off at daycare, and I go to pick Zach up. I have to drive to the ATM since I needed to give him money from selling his stuff, and the night before I looked online to see if there are any ATMs that don't charge a fee. I wrote down the address and GPS it, we get there, I go to withdraw the money, and it asks if I'm OK with the $3 ATM fee. I'm like "what the f, the website said this ATM doesn't charge a fee! I shoulda just gone to Wal-Mart since I know they just charge $1.50!" So much for that crap, what a waste of time lol.

We pick up Burger King on the way in, walk in to Lightning, set our food and drinks down on the table, and Zach's bag falls on top of his drink and it spills everywhere. Smooooooth dude, lol. Way to make an entrance :) Lightning was pretty much packed with people, and apparently they allowed people to get packs all the way from like 11am (we got there around noon). I was like "god damnit, I bet people have sniped the good stuff already", but the tournament hadn't started so that was a plus. I eat my food real quick and ask Kim if he knows what people are running. He gives me a pretty good low-down so I make my side accordingly. Then I help Zach build his Agent deck and make the best 41 that I thought he had. He picks up a set of T-Kings from someone and buys 2 Maxx C from Kim so that helps his deck tremendously. I give him an Earth, let him borrow 2 Warnings and an Orient Dragon. I convince him to take the Pot of Duality's out, cut the Book, and cut random crap like Jupiter, Return from DD, and have him play 3 Earth and 3 Venus (I think it's pretty much mandatory). I pick the best 15 cards out of the cards he's got for his side and he's good to go.

I get in some trading with some peeps, and ask Big Mike if anyone pulled Rescue Rabbit but he shakes his head. I finally got rid of my extra DW structure deck to this guy for a few lower-end holos and a bunch of common staples. I'm soo glad I was finally able to get rid of that deck. Epler shows up for like 5 minutes and I was like "wtf dude, where've you been? I've won the past 5 tourneys" and he's just like "oh I didn't know you've been coming out here I would've if I had known". The whole point is to come out because I don't want to anymore, lol. Round 1 pairings get posted, and I notice that basically half the people in the room had disappeared. I was shocked that so many people just straight-up didn't want to play.

Total attendance for the tourney is 16.
Zach and I get paired against each other Round 1, we're like "wow this is stacked we should be playing each other in like the 4th round." Oh well.

Round 1 vs Zach (Agents)
Game 1 he stops my Venus play with Maxx C, he Dustshoots me later, but I'm able to bring out Kristya and maintain control.
Game 2 he opens with T-King, I draw pretty poorly, and the T-King shuts down the Earth I have in my hand. I get Dustshooted, he brings out Venus + Gachi, I Dark Hole, but he has Hyperion for anything I can get going. Too little too late.
Game 3 more or less the same but I try to put up a better fight. He Dustshoots me again when I have a hand of Sangan, Ball, Hyperion, and I think Storm. He obviously picks Sangan and it's pretty much all downhill from there for me. I think I get Trish'd and Kristya'd lol.
Record: 0-1
Maxx C shuts me down more than it does for him and I just drew too poorly games 2 and 3. Getting Dustshooted each game don't help either lol.
At this point I'm like "great, I gotta win out the rest to make sure I make the top cut" but I'm confident that I can manage that.

Round 2 vs Ross (Gishki?)
Game 1 I summon Earth, and he summons this 1800 Gishki guy, I have no idea what these cards are or do but I guess it's based on this lackluster Ritual guy. He's ahead of me in life for the majority of the game, but I just outright win in card advantage. He has the 1800 guy and the 2500 ritual dude so I Dark Hole then double Hyperion for the last of his 4800.
I go to my side and put in 1 Pulling the Rug (since that's all I had) and he whines about me siding. I'm just like whatever kid.
Game 2 I don't really let him get anything going since I figure out what the goal of his deck is. Veiler, Pulling, and Warning pretty much stop him from doing anything.
Turns out most of his deck was from the new DT set which isn't legal yet since the Hidden Arsenal for it hasn't come out. Oh well I honestly didn't give a crap since it was terrible lol.
Record: 1-1

Round 3 vs Eric (Chaos? w/ D-Alchemist)
Game 1 This ends up being a pretty good game, he Judgments a Tour Guide when he was at 7300, and I think this is what cost him the game. Between BLS and Hyperion I have too many boss monsters to take advantage of how much life he lost.
Game 2 Another good game, he brings out DAD and tries to blow up but I Torrential, next turn I bring out Kristya and he just can't deal with her.
Record: 2-1

Round 4 vs Kim (Sams)
Game 1 I summon T-King which basically shuts his whole deck down, at least whatever he had in his hand. All I take is 100 damage from attacking into a set Kageki. I Venus + Gachi so T-King can run over it, and next turn I swing in for 4300 on his last 42.
Game 2 He goes pretty aggro and we both use a bunch of cards so we don't have much by the mid-game. His field becomes Irou and Shi En, I set Sangan and he attacks it, I search Birdman since I have Puppet Plant in hand. He attacks w/ Shi En bringing me down to 700 (him at 6100). I Puppet Plant Shi En, summon Birdman and synch for Stardust and run over Irou. Get 2 more attacks in with Stardust and he's down to 300. He ends up Reborn'ing his Irou and has 2 facedown S/Ts. My turn I'm just totally confused as to what he could have face down, so I summon T-King, attack Irou with Stardust, he Cunnings to get Shi En back from the grave, but I just suicide and then swing with T-King for game.
That was a very close and good game.
Record: 3-1

I squeak into the Top 4 by getting 4th, and Top 4 ends up being me, Zach, Nelson, and this guy running Diva Zombie Plants (I guess?) with Lost Blue Breaker. I get paired against Nelson which I'm actually quite relieved about since he was running X-Sabers. Nothing against him personally in terms of his skill or anything, I just don't feel that that deck can beat Agents.

Top 4 vs Nelson (X-Sabers)
Game 1 It's pretty back and forth, and Maxx C puts in work. Late game I'm just poking at him with 2 Earths that were at 1200 cuz of Gachi w/ 1 material. He Reinforce Truth's for Pashuul, and his field ends up becoming Stardust, Urbellum, and Faultroll while I have Gachi and 2 Earth with 4 in hand. He swings Urbellum into Earth so I Honest. He gets rid of my other Earth and 1 more Gachi material. I summon Venus, special my 3rd ball, synch Earth and Ball for Armory Arm, equip, and swing at Stardust for game (he was at 800).
Game 2 He sets an Emmersblade. I set Sangan and Bottomless. He Mind Controls, summons Fulhelm, synchs for Hyunlei, which I Bottomless. I take the hit from Emmersblade and I Trag out. Activate Maxx C, attack Emmers, he specials Darksoul so I draw a card. I did this play cuz I had 2 Tour Guide in hand and I knew he'd go Darksoul, so I pitched to take control of it, make Trag level 3, and make Leviathan out of them. I later Debunk his Emmersblade and with the help of Maxx C it's pretty much a textbook finish from there. Pretty much just out-advantaged him.
Record: 4-1

So I wait for the other guy and Zach to finish, it looked like it was a pretty good back-and-forth match but Zach ends up taking it. I tell Zach that I'd like to just split so we could leave and grab dinner. He whines a little but in the end accepts. We both get a whopping $16.50 store credit and we buy Galaxy Eyes tins (I pulled crap) and I also get a pack of sleeves to empty out my credit. He pulls a Debunk and Wind-Up Factory so not bad. Danny explains his store credit situation with the worker guy but he can't help him, so Steve Sr. and Danny went to Big Mike about it and reminds him of the time they didn't write down their credit, so Danny ends up getting $14 and buys a Galaxy Eyes tin as well. I lend Danny 2 Warnings and a T-King he needs for tomorrow's Sneak event.

So Team O takes the Sneak, I guess technically my streak is still good since we split for 1st :) We say our goodbyes to everyone at the store and head to Top of China Buffet for food. We had one waiter guy come up to us and start sputtering random sounds to Danny while Zach and I are just quietly cracking up. He was trying to ask us if we came up from Spokane which we said yes to. Then he says like "Ta yu fo" to me and I'm just like what? He wanted me to keep my fork while he took my plate lol. He walks away a little then Danny goes like "Do you got any trades?" and we just bust up laughing. We talk some Yugz and then they talk sports while I think about Yugz, I was randomly like "wait is Elder (of the Six Sam) a tuner?" since we talked about the OCG playing 2 in their Agent builds. I thought it was, so you could synch it with Shine Ball, but it's not, and Danny reminded me that Earth was a tuner lol. I was like ohh that's actually kinda sweet. Eh, I think Shi En's attack is just took weak to be viable this format when Leviathan, Utopia, and Hyperion are just so easy to bring out. We say our goodbyes and call it a day.

I thought I could be finally done with going to Lightning, but turns out that Uncle's won't be running tournaments between now and like January since Christmas shopping will be picking up and they need their space. Soo looks like if I want to play on the one day I have free, Saturday, then I'd have to go to Lightning. I'm not sure what I'll do. I have grown to really enjoy playing at Lightning, but it's just such a long drive. However, our offer on the house that we wanted was finally accepted by the seller, so looks like we'll be moving to the Valley in the near future. This will be incredibly convenient for playing, since Board Game becomes even closer and the drive out to Lightning becomes not nearly as bad. Basically cut by a third, and I'm OK with driving that distance. Between now and then though, I'm not sure. I may not even really have time to play since we will undoubtedly be busy packing up.

Speaking of which, I now have to prepare selling off a good portion of my cards. I have decided to pick Karakuri as my secondary deck, so that means I can sell my Plant stuff. The only things of value are the Bulb and Tengus though I guess. If anyone wanted to buy them, I'd sell my 1st ed Bulb for $35 and the Tengu (Ultra) set for $35 as well. Leave a comment if interested. I need to order 3 Karakuri Merchants since Jeff didn't have any *sigh* :(. If I do well enough with Karakuri and/or Tour Guide becomes a solid $200, I will be selling those off as well.

All in all I had a very fun day of trading, playing, and hanging out. I didn't really buy anything, which I'm fine with. I didn't buy into the 5 packs + promo, primarily because Alexandrite sucks, until they make some broken Rank 4 requiring 2 Normal dragons or something (if ever). No one pulled Rabbit and I don't think anyone pulled Zenmaines or Dolkka either. I saw 1 D-Boyz, 1 Dark Smog, and some other bad secret I think. I had the opportunity to buy an Ulti Laggia for $50 but ultimately passed on it. I literally picked up no cards from PHSW, but am satisfied enough with the trades I did, and with our case coming in I think we will have our fill of PHSW. It was nice seeing some more competition and people coming out for the Sneak itself. 16 is a disappointing number for the tournament attendance, but what can ya do when people are too scared to play? I had a feeling that would happen; good turnout for packs but everyone leaving once the tourney started.

M: 28
3 Hyperion
3 Venus
3 Earth
3 Ball
3 Guide
1 Sangan
2 Maxx C
2 Veiler
2 T-King
1 BLS
1 Gorz
1 Trag
1 Kristya
1 Honest
1 Birdman

S: 6
1 Hole
1 Reborn
1 Heavy
1 Mind
2 MST

T: 7
2 Bottomless
2 Warning
1 Torrential
1 Force
1 Dustshoot

Side:
1 MST
2 Breaker
2 Debunk
1 Shadow-Mirror
2 Puppet Plant
2 Leeching
2 Gemini Imp
2 Cydra
1 Pulling