My PAX 2007 Experience

[johnny]

All,

I had a great time at PAX! Before attending PAX, I was a bit apprehensive about all the limited games. I have always enjoyed constructed, because I was comfortable with it. I like the control I have over building my deck any way I want. At PAX, I played in a draft and four sealed events. I must say that my impression of limited is completely different. It's great!

It was fun to meet so many new people. I learned a lot from the pro's, and enjoyed helping some newer players also. A few times, the friends I went to PAX with would yell at me because they just got beat by someone that I was giving tips to. Heck I was even beat by someone that I gave tips to during our previous game, he went on to take second place in that tournament (good job Dave!)

The last tournament was a lot of fun for me. I played two new people, those games were pretty quick, and two advanced people, those games were intense and very close.

Dave with a mohawk chopped one of my legs off on turn 3. He had an elbow dropper, brash basher and a dragon juice - used elbow dropper ability to prevent my character from blocking, and drew first blood by hitting me for 11 damage. The next strike he attacked with elbow dropper. I let it through, so he remembered that dragon juice and hit me for 8 - chopped of my other leg and maybe a little more than that. I was at 6 influence on turn 4. I had to put him on defense for the rest of the game. It was time for me to stop dropping resources and get some beef on the table. I a varied speed range of beef on the table. Martial artist, Costly Filcher, Dock Sentinal, Face in the Crowd, Hasty sarcophyle, a blodcurdling bulldozer, and I think a plodding brute. Basically I had everything from a speed 2 through a speed 4 character on the board. He tried to pay 6 to skewer my artist. Remembering that he can't pick the artist, it didn't work. Now that I knew he had a skewer, and the resources to take out almost anything else on my board with it, it changed the way I played. I forced him to decide to take large hits, lose a character by blocking, or get that skewer into his discard pile. He was on defense the rest of the game.

Eventually I got him down to 6 influence too. We were tied at 6, and time was up. next turn was his, and the last. I had 5 resources on the table, a rage, and an elite in my hand. He had three characters, and 3 unspent resources, and a few cards in his hand. I was convinced it could be a draw, if I didn't attack. But he had about 12 resources and could have drawn into almost anything. I paid 3 to draw, and wouldn't you know it top- decked a scrag, and had only two resources left to use that scrag. I went all in and attacked with all 3 characters. I forget what I had, but they were varying speeds. unless he had something tricky to play in his hand that cost 3 or less, there was nothing he could do. He didn't want to use his brash basher to block with because it was his only chance of finishing me next turn. ( he would have lost it) Due to my varied speed range, there was nothing he could have done. He blocked, I played scrag for the win. Awesome game.

Games 2 and 3 I played some new people to the game, and had some fun giving out some tips and helping them become better players.

Game 4 was another doozy. Basically, Tim kept me on my toes. Each of us played a bipolar sarchopyle, and won our coin flips. It was each of our first times winning the coin flip on that card. Sort of ironic. What was worse was the fact that he had a skimping ecto manipulator, and a clockman pickpocket out too. He started dropping tokens on the bipolar, so I dropped subversion matrix on the manipulator. I left some resources open to pass the matrix around a couple times and attacked with my bipolar sarchopyle ( 3/3/4 with a token on it), I thought he would block with his bipolar (6/6/4 with 4 tokens) to kill mine, I would pay two to handoff the subversion matrix onto his making it a 2/2/4 again. No, he didn't go for it and let that through.

His next turn, of course, he attacked with his clockman pickpocket, which would have been unblockable and he would have gained control of my subversion matrix. So I paid two to handoff that matrix onto the clockman, and let it go through. That was my first major mistake. I should have blocked the clockman at that time, but I let it go through for 1 damage to my faction for some reason. He attacked with his beefy bipolar, and I handed off the subversion on to it, so I only took two. Now he was aware that I could hand that off and prevent him from attacking with that bipolar. The problem was that, I had to keep at least 4 resources available each turn to intimidate him from attacking with that combo. It worked, but it prevented me from dropping characters. I only had expensive charachters. I didn't have any chump blockers to drop that would allow me to start dropping resources. Basically, I had to start drawing like mad.

Finally drew into a catastrophic betrayal, and attacked with a little covert guy. planning to take something from his discard pile, for whateve reason, he decides to play somethign that let him go through my hand and discard a card. (guess what he discarded?)

In the end Tim and I pecked away. Time was up on my turn. which gave me one more and him two more. Long story short, We had a draw, I was at 1 influence, he was at about 7 I think. If I had one more turn, I could have attacked with my face in the crowd, and played a dragon strategy to presumeably win.

Tim and I had identical records (3 wins and a draw) now. I was at the tournament for points, and he was there for prizes. On paper he conceded to me. I won the tournament, gave Tim the Nintendo DS, and took the points. As it ends up, He finished 3rd place, so it would have been okay for me to submit the draw. I would have taken home the points and the DS. I have no regrets, because I was there for points, and to have a good time. I accomplished that!

I had 3 STE points going into this weekend (from a local Invitational that I did poorly at), and should be at 26 after this weekend. My player profile still shows 0, so I will give it a week or so to get caught up.

I'm half way to getting on the boat now. I hope there are enough events around that I get the chance at winning more. Unfortunately, tonight there is a local 10 point event, I think the bus event, but I will not be able to make it out there.

Limited is now my favorite format, sealed specifically. I learned a LOT about building limited decks, and which cards are good/bad in limited, to check the time left in the game when they are running long, and the importance telegraphing behaviors in the game (poker face). fun fun fun.

Thanks for reading,
Johnny

[jty3]

Thanks for the write up! Sealed is quickly becoming one of my favourites as well.

[Doomguy 2000]

The expierence for me at PAX was great. I learned a lot form the pros about the sealed format and have been playing better ever since. Of course I still need practice in the sealed format so I can get better. Thw Wii sealed event I played after the $13k was great because I made the top8 and got myself a couple of points.

[Brad Meine]

I had a good time and I faired well.

[Baeleth]

I had a lot of fun myself & really learned a lot. I've been playing since april, but have only really been able to play against the same 4 or 5 people. I got some great advice & suggestions for making my constructed deck more effective. I have to say that I'm very impressed with how friendly everyone was to someone who is new to the whole tournament end of things & how welcome they all made me feel. Thanks for the great experience & hopefully I'll see some of you again at the next tournament I attend.

[RicklessAbandon]

yes, pax was very awesome! come to think of it, the best game i played there was against you in the fifth round of one of the sealed tournaments friday. i gained a new found respect for the epiphany ball

good times!

[Warhammer00]

Hey, who won the 13k by the way? My son and I left right before the top 8 finals began. We had a great time as well, it being our very first tourney.

Although I had the misfortune to play the #1 ranked player in the first round, I actually came close to beating him if I'd have lasted one more turn. (Darn that blasted skewer.lol) I did get some good advice from Hans and it was a pleasure to play him. Hope to be able to play again in a big tourney soon.

[doc8466]

Glad everyone had such a good time and it's great to see y'all join the fourms.

The $13K had a split between Dakota and Andrew Wang (I think), with Dakota officially winning (getting the 50 points).

[Dapuma]

We chopped the 1st/2nd place prize

Then we played for the fun of it, I won the match we played

Was great meeting you Johnny, GL getting on the boat. You have a pretty good foundation for being a newer player. Was nice meeting alot of the other players there, had a good time.

[jpviper]

I was 2/2 at PAX in one of the iPod tournaments. Which says a lot about my skill.