Cactus Game Design Message Boards

I was excited to attend, as this was my second legitimate tournament appearance ever, and first in about two years.  I was coming in Friday night and leaving on Saturday, since I was only playing the Saturday events.

I arrived at the tournament at 10:15 pm Friday night.  After dropping off my stuff, I played basketball for a few hours, then a game of Smallworld, then we talked Redemption.  I finally got to meet a lot of the members of the boards in person, including Jerome and Josiah Beers, Matt Sinclair, Jordan Alstad, Alex Olijar, Dayne Maust.  Everyone pretty much headed off to bed around 2 am, so I started brainstorming and assembling my deck.  I had it finished and sleeved just after 4 am, when I went to bed.

T1 2P

Game 1 – Andrew Crowther

Andrew was playing Prophets/Angels with a Babylonian defense.  He was actually playing a deck that Blake Maust had built.  I got a great starting hand – Benaiah, Astrologers, Divination, and Forest Fire.  I play Astrologers/Divination to get my deck rolling and start attacking with Benaiah, knowing a Bab is in play for Forest Fire.  Benaiah walks in for two before meeting Christian Martyr.  An in-battle Spiritual Warfare gets Andrew a Redeemed Soul before I rescue a 3rd and play SoG/NJ.

Final score: 5-1

Game 3 – Jerome Beers

I had the pleasure of meeting Jerome and Josiah Beers for the first time in person this tournament.  Now I got to play Jerome, who I know that from playing in ROOT (and from his success at past tournaments) is a terrific player.  At this point, there are 6 undefeated players – Alex Olijar, Josiah Beers, Jerome Beers, me, Gretel Coverdale, and Matt Stupienski.  We all have 6 points except Matt, who has 5.

I got a good draw to start.  Once again I had an early magician/Divination, and I also started with AUTO/Jair to D4 each turn.  However, Jerome Mayhemed after my second D4 attack (when I had 13 or 14 cards in hand) and set my card count back a ways.  Fortunately, I grabbed Mayhem on my D6, so I played my hand out and dropped it after Jerome’s D3.  My Mayhem turned out to be more painful to Jerome than his was to me.  He suffered from an overall poor draw as well. 

I made a crucial block early in the game.  Jerome attacked with a 4/4 hero, so I blocked low with Astrologers.  I played Desecrate the Temple and discarded Son of God from his deck.  Knowing that I am passing initiative and that he surely has a negate, I played Angel of the Lord on Astrologers and relinquished a soul.  I don’t draw much D, so he gets 2 more, but I draw my deck quick and relaxed knowing he doesn’t have SoG anymore.  I play SoG/NJ for the win.

Final score:  5-3

Game 5 – Matt Stupienski

This is the game I was dreading was going to happen.  Matt is running a 154 card deck that one of the other players affectionately named the “Troll Deck”.  With a deck that size, there’s no predicting what will happen.  And my defense is not built to endure a long game, even if Matt’s deck is mostly defense.

Matt has two outright wins and two timeout wins for 10 points.  The only way he wins is if he rescues 5.  Knowing this changes how I play; even though I draw Nazareth in my opening hand, I never play it so that I can abuse Nebuchadnezzar, who is also in my starting hand.  Matt gets an opening draw that all 154ers dream of:  Gates of Hell, Bronze Laver, and 4 demons.  He attacks with a large OT hero, so I check the scripture references of his demons.  All NT.  I block with Nebby, search out Chaldeans, and add them to battle to discard Bronze Laver.  I was hoping Matt would have nothing to play on his hero, so I wait for initiative, which he grants me.  I play Desecrate the Temple to discard SoG (now that the artifact is out of the way) for the third consecutive game.  This also wins me the battle by the numbers.

My first successful attack required Sword Against Sword, Forest Fire (played in side-battle to negate and discard Gates of Hell), Sam’s Edict, and Angel of the Lord (to discard my own Nebby) to break through.  Even so, Matt just taps a 2-Liner.  Later I set Aaron aside with Provisions (ideally this would have been Ezekiel, to get a safe recursion, but I wasn’t patient enough to think it through).  When he returned, I didn’t use him immediately.  A few turns later, Matt attacks with Zaccheus.  I block, he plays Deborah’s Directive and bands to my offense, including my Aaron.  I have nothing to stop him even if I wanted to discard my own offense (which I don’t), so I relinquish a soul with my Provisions wasted.  Matt stops drawing his offense at this point.  He does make another rescue with Zaccheus, and I block with Damsel for a D3; Damsel is converted with Repentance and Restitution.  I actually consider letting the rescue be successful so I get a D4, but I decide against it and play CM on Zaccheus.
 
Then I draw CWD, and once again it turns into a game-changer for my offense.  I break through once more for another tap to a different 2-Liner.  With CWD up, I try to sneak in some attacks with Ezekiel to recur Forest Fire and Drawn Sword; I actually get 2 attacks with him without dying, and I underdeck both Forest Fire and Drawn Sword.  But at this point we are about out of time, so I drop SoG/NJ on the two tapped 2-Liners to get to 4.
 
Time runs out on Matt’s turn, and Matt went first, so we each get one more turn.  Matt’s turn passes without a successful rescue, so it’s my turn.  At this point, even if I make a successful rescue, I’ll just get a tap on Matt’s 3rd 2-Liner.  My attack ends in a stalemate, with me discarding Matt’s last Gates of Hell with Forest Fire.  Afterwards, Matt checks his next 3 cards, and finds Falling Away awaiting his next D3.

Final score:  4-1

I won’t comment on the TEAMS games, as Jordan already put together a commentary for them.  It was ironic though, the way they played out; our first game, we had our combo of Gates of Hell and Chamber of Angels out by turn 1.  That game ended in a 3-3 tie.  In the second game, we only saw the lesser half of our combo (Chamber) due to intro-prep Nazareths, and that wasn’t until halfway through the game.  We ended up winning that one 5-2.