Hey everybody, I’m back after an exciting weekend in New Jersey with a tournament report after placing in Top 32 with Infernity. In this report I’ll talk about why I chose to play Infernity, my individual card choices, and a rundown of my matches throughout the weekend. Let me start out by going ahead and giving you my deck list:
Monsters: 14
3 [ccProd]Infernity Archfiend[/ccProd]
3 [ccProd]Infernity Necromancer[/ccProd]
1 [ccProd]Infernity Avenger[/ccProd]
1 [ccProd]Infernity Mirage[/ccProd]
2 [ccProd]Summoner Monk[/ccProd]
2 [ccProd]Stygian Street Patrol[/ccProd]
1 [ccProd]Armageddon Knight[/ccProd]
1 [ccProd]Dark Grepher[/ccProd]
Spells: 14
3 [ccProd]Upstart Goblin[/ccProd]
2 [ccProd]Instant Fusion[/ccProd]
1 [ccProd]Reinforcement of the Army[/ccProd]
1 [ccProd]Heavy Storm[/ccProd]
2 [ccProd]Pot of Duality[/ccProd]
1 [ccProd]Card Destruction[/ccProd]
1 [ccProd]Monster Reborn[/ccProd]
1 [ccProd]Infernity Launcher[/ccProd]
1 [ccProd]Foolish Burial[/ccProd]
1 [ccProd]One for One[/ccProd]
Traps: 12
2 [ccProd]Trap Stun[/ccProd]
2 [ccProd]Bottomless Trap Hole[/ccProd]
2 [ccProd]Mirror Force[/ccProd]
3 [ccProd]Infernity Barrier[/ccProd]
1 [ccProd]Infernity Break[/ccProd]
1 [ccProd]Solemn Warning[/ccProd]
1 [ccProd]Solemn Judgment[/ccProd]
Extra Deck: 15
2 [ccProd]Diamond Dire Wolf[/ccProd]
2 [ccProd]Lavalval Chain[/ccProd]
1 [ccProd]Maestroke the Symphony Djinn[/ccProd]
1 [ccProd]Abyss Dweller[/ccProd]
1 [ccProd]Leviair the Sea Dragon[/ccProd]
1 [ccProd]Infernity Doom Dragon[/ccProd]
1 [ccProd]Void Ogre Dragon[/ccProd]
2 [ccProd]Hundred-Eyes Dragon[/ccProd]
1 [ccProd]Stygian Sergeants[/ccProd]
1 [ccProd]Armory Arm[/ccProd]
1 [ccProd]Darkfire Dragon[/ccProd]
1 [ccProd]Fusionist[/ccProd]
Side Deck: 15
3 [ccProd]Infernity Randomizer[/ccProd]
3 [ccProd]Mystical Space Typhoon[/ccProd]
3 [ccProd]Offering to the Doomed[/ccProd]
2 [ccProd]Dimensional Prison[/ccProd]
1 [ccProd]Reinforce Truth[/ccProd]
3 [ccProd]Soul Drain[/ccProd]
It seems like the most logical place to start is with the question, why Infernity? I’ve never been one to stray too far off the beaten path when it comes to deck choices. Generally speaking I find that the meta is the meta because it is the most consistent deck or group of decks and consistency is exactly what we should be looking for when going into an 11 round tournament. So why did I decide to go against the meta for this event?
In my testing I haven’t found the Water mirror match to be very skill intensive. While it might be slightly better than flipping coins, it’s not really the way I wanted to approach a large tournament with roughly half the expected decks to be Water.
While I found the Fire mirror to be slightly better than the Water one, I found the problem with Fire was that the deck was too fair. It was essentially incapable of doing unfair things when every other deck in the meta could. This meant almost sure defeat for Fire game 1 when playing against Water. I didn’t like the idea of having to rely on shaky side deck cards like [ccProd]Banisher of the Radiance[/ccProd] to beat a deck like Water.
When Chancy Wigglestove won the online tournament with Infernity I immediately took an interest in the deck. His build greatly reminded me of how Wind-Ups played last format. They had the Magician Shark plays that allowed for absolute blowouts the first turn of the game, but they also were an XYZ toolbox deck that could call on any monster for any given situation.
The problem I had with his deck was all they [ccProd]Mystical Space Typhoon[/ccProd]s and [ccProd]Night Beam[/ccProd]s that he played. I realized that this would not be a reliable strategy to count on. Let’s say that I open Typhoon to their two backrow. I play Typhoon before going off in hopes of hitting the right trap card, but a fair amount of the time I was either missing or there was not a right one to hit and I needed to hit both ([ccProd]Fiendish Chain[/ccProd] and Torrential set for example). I decided that unless I was able to fix this problem, I couldn’t take the deck into a 1600 person tournament hoping to consistently draw perfectly balanced hands of Typhoon, [ccProd]Night Beam[/ccProd], and a way to go off with the remaining 4 cards. While searching for ideas I remembered a regional that I had topped right after Launcher had gone to 1 and went to find the tournament report. In it, I talked about how I decided to drop 3 [ccProd]Mystical Space Typhoon[/ccProd] for 3 [ccProd]Trap Stun[/ccProd]s the night before the tournament. I realized how similar the situation then was to now. In that format, [ccProd]Heavy Storm[/ccProd] had just been banned and everyone was setting multiple cards without fear of being punished. This is when I decided to completely forgo the idea of [ccProd]Mystical Space Typhoon[/ccProd] and [ccProd]Night Beam[/ccProd] for [ccProd]Trap Stun[/ccProd]. I originally started with three copies of it, but eventually dropped it to two. This helped solve another issue as well. S/T removal cards aren’t particularly good against Water and I never really want to draw multiples of them. Cutting down the overall number of removal cards I played decreased the chances of drawing multiples. Additionally, [ccProd]Trap Stun[/ccProd] is a card I only need to draw 1 of to beat any other deck by insuring my combo goes off.
The next thing I want to talk about is why I played the Synchro version over the XYZ version. One of the biggest determining factors for this choice was time. This YCS came directly after two weeks of studying for finals and finishing up my course work for the semester. Because of this, I didn’t have time to properly test both versions of the deck. The Synchro version is actually a lot simpler to play. Most of the combos may start out differently, but they end up relatively the same. The XYZ build is appealing because it doesn’t have as many bad draws early game like Avenger or Mirage. It’s entirely possible that if I had been able to test more and felt comfortable with the other build, I would have played it instead to have had better draws.
I also found that the Synchro version complemented my choice of [ccProd]Trap Stun[/ccProd] over Typhoon and [ccProd]Night Beam[/ccProd]. A lot of the time you may [ccProd]Trap Stun[/ccProd] their four sets and do your combo, but you would then wind up using all the Barriers on cards that you locked off for the turn, but they in turn still had. With the Synchro build, a lot of the time you can actually just win the game. Let’s say your opponent had a monster on the field. Just about any time you can do a standard loop, you can make [ccProd]Armory Arm[/ccProd] with [ccProd]Stygian Sergeants[/ccProd] and attack for 7200 damage. If you made a [ccProd]Lavalval Chain[/ccProd] first, a normal occurrence, you can attack for 9000 damage (even allowing for an [ccProd]Upstart Goblin[/ccProd]) over up to 2 monsters for game.
The next thing I want to talk about is [ccProd]Pot of Duality[/ccProd]. It compliments both [ccProd]Trap Stun[/ccProd] and the side deck. Often times I would have to set [ccProd]Trap Stun[/ccProd] and wait a turn before going off, so [ccProd]Pot of Duality[/ccProd] let me maximize that turn when I wasn’t comboing. It also helped when I sided in Randomizer as I wouldn’t be doing a lot of special summoning. Then I put into use the Upstart theory that I talked about last week. 37 cards allows for me to draw my combos even more!
That brings me to the most unusual part of the deck; the side deck. The idea for this side deck came from my friend Matt Cashiola. I had tried several other side decks. Everything from [ccProd]Mystic Tomato[/ccProd] with [ccProd]Snipe Hunter[/ccProd] to [ccProd]Gravekeeper’s Spy[/ccProd] with [ccProd]Gravekeeper’s Descendant[/ccProd]. For one reason or another, none of them proved to be effective. When Matt told me the idea, I loved it! The idea behind it is that you side out all of your combo pieces such as [ccProd]Summoner Monk[/ccProd] and Mirage and side deck in Randomizer and lots of one for one removal cards. Then they are siding cards that don’t affect you like [ccProd]Maxx “C”[/ccProd] or [ccProd]Dimensional Fissure[/ccProd] while you take a plus 1 every turn and 1 for 1 away their cards. To compliment this, I decided to main deck 2 [ccProd]Mirror Force[/ccProd] since they were good against every deck in the meta.
Now that I’ve explained my deck and card choices, let’s get into the actual tournament report. I finished my last final on Tuesday and left to go to my locals. Desmond Johnson and I were to be riding up to New Jersey with Ben and Zach Leverett and their mom on Wedneday. After a long car ride and a trip to New York City on Friday, we were there and it was time to duel!
Round 1
vs. Fire First
Game 1: I won the dice roll, but didn’t start with any combo. I set double Bottomless and passed. He played Tenki for [ccProd]Reborn Tengu[/ccProd] and attacked and set 3. I set [ccProd]Trap Stun[/ccProd] and passed. He attacked. I passed. He attacked and set a fourth. On my turn I flipped [ccProd]Trap Stun[/ccProd] and then played [ccProd]Heavy Storm[/ccProd]. Then played [ccProd]Instant Fusion[/ccProd] and summoned [ccProd]Infernity Avenger[/ccProd] to make [ccProd]Stygian Seargents[/ccProd] to attack over the Tengu. He had drawn the other Tengu so I swung for 3000 directly. I set two Barriers and a [ccProd]Mirror Force[/ccProd]. The next turn I drew Upstart which got me Archfiend. It misses timing, but I was able to Normal summon it and make my Barriers live and ride that to victory.
Game 2: I side decked in the Randomizer side. I got Randomizer pretty early and it worked exactly how it was supposed to. Every monster he summoned was caught by a removal card and I was slowly building advantage with Randomizer until it became overwhelming.
1-0
Round 2
vs Fire Fist
Game 1: I opened with 5 monsters and a [ccProd]Reinforcement of the Army[/ccProd]. Luckily for me he was playing Fire Fist, which meant he couldn’t win the game very fast. He took an early lead with plenty of searches from Bear, and my life points dropped quickly. I draw 2 more monsters in my next 3 turns, but my 4th draw was [ccProd]One for One[/ccProd], which allowed me to combo off. I summoned Necromancer and he Fiendished on summon so it wouldn’t go to defense. I removed a Stygian for a second Necromancer and played [ccProd]One for One[/ccProd] to special Mirage from hand. I double Diamond Dired both his sets and continued comboing. I was the game with a lot of advantage and few life points.
Game 2: I side decked in the Randomizer side, but didn’t see Randomizer the entire game, which made it difficult to win when trying to out advantage a deck like Fire Fist.
Game 3: I sided back into the combo and opened a rather weak one with no Synchros and only two searches, but it proved to be enough as he conceded on his first turn.
2-0
Round 3
vs Water
Game 1: He won the dice roll and started with Teus Dragoons to search Diva and Linde. My 6th card was Archfiend and I ended up having a strong combo because of it when he didn’t set any backrow and won easily.
Game 2: I saw [ccProd]Fiendish Chain[/ccProd] game 1, so I knew he was playing real traps. Usually against Water I side out Heavy and both [ccProd]Trap Stun[/ccProd]s, but I kept in the [ccProd]Trap Stun[/ccProd]s since I saw the traps. He ended up siding [ccProd]Shadow-Imprisoning Mirror[/ccProd]. When he flipped it, I was still in a strong position because I had [ccProd]Void Ogre Dragon[/ccProd] as a beater with [ccProd]Soul Drain[/ccProd] up. I had just drawn [ccProd]Trap Stun[/ccProd] for my turn, so I could still negate a spell or trap if need be. The following turn I topped Archfiend and flipped Trap Stun to win that turn with an [ccProd]Armory Arm[/ccProd] play through Leed and Linde.
3-0
Round 4
vs Galo Orbea, Fire Fist
Game 1: Galo’s a friend of mine and a strong player. He won the dice roll and started with Gene Warped and 5 sets. I had a strong hand which allowed me to pick off the sets 1 at a time over the next couple of turns through multiple Diamond Dires and eventually take the game.
Game 2: I sided in the Randomizer side and it worked just like it should. His monsters were met with removal and I got a plus every turn.
4-0
Round 5
vs Water
Game 1: He said he had come from Australia which I thought was neat. He started the game by setting a monster and setting a spell or trap. I did a combo that let me Diamond Dire his set backrow which was MST before going off. I didn’t want him to be playing Water with a set Linde and an Infantry in hand to pop Archfiend before my Barriers were live, so I just passed without attacking the set. He thought for a few moments and conceded so I didn’t know what he was playing.
Game 2: I decided it was better to side against every deck other than Water than to hope for Water so I sided the Randomizer side, even though I wouldn’t had I known he was playing Water. Ironic the only three cards I didn’t side were 3 [ccProd]Soul Drain[/ccProd]. It ended up working out despite a rough early game. It took a lot of damage to his strong opener, but Randomizer’s pluses kept me in it. He made a crucial mistake when he forgot he sided out Squal and made a subpar play to search it. I activated Randomizer a final time to put me at 100 life points to his 11000 after 3 [ccProd]Upstart Goblin[/ccProd]s, but I finally had full control and he knew it and just conceded.
5-0
Round 6
vs Dan Kitsko, Inzektor
Game 1: I start off with the combo and after stopping his Centipede, he concedes.
Game 2: I decided it would be better to not side Randomizer, but I couldn’t get anything going and he beat me down with a Ladybug equipped with Gigamantis.
Game 3: I start out with the combo and it was enough.
6-0
Round 7
vs Dino Fist
Game 1: I won the roll and had the combo in my first 5 cards, but my 6th card was an additional monster that made it so that the combo was not possible. I had [ccProd]Heavy Storm[/ccProd], so I decided it would be best to simply set a monster and lead him to believe I was playing Mermail. He started the game with [ccProd]Rescue Rabbit[/ccProd] into Dolkka and Tensu into Gorilla with Gorilla attacking my set [ccProd]Summoner Monk[/ccProd]. I thought for a few moments and decided that there was no way I was going to win the game through Dolkka so I conceded before even seeing my 7th card in order to keep my deck a secret.
Game 2: It turns out it worked, and he had sided for Mermails. This gave me a huge advantage game 2 and I won with some small mid game combos.
Game 3: I sided into the Randomizer side. This was the first time this side had gone in game 3. He gained more advantage than I would have liked, but eventually the pluses with Randomizer took over and I was able to win the game through control.
7-0
Round 8
vs Jesse Kotton, Water
http://www.konami.com/yugioh/blog/?p=13687
These two games I drew better than I had all weekend. Before this round a friend of mine who had already played Jesse told me what he was playing and that he didn’t main deck any real traps. That’s why I decided to go for it into a backrow. He scooped game 1 to keep his deck a secret, but unfortunately for him I already knew what he was playing and sided accordingly only to draw a very similar hand game 2.
8-0
Round 9
vs Paul Levitin, Water
Game 1: I started this game with the good combo that ended with Void Ogre and triple searches. I tried to discard Infantry for Teus and pop Archfiend and make it so I couldn’t chain Barrier to Infantry, but I played Barrier on Teus in hand and Barrier on Infantry to get around that and won the next turn.
Game 2: He started off by discarding a Bottomless with Leed and making Gaios first turn, which ended up winning him the game.
Game 3: I started off by setting Launcher and playing [ccProd]Card Destruction[/ccProd], but missed off [ccProd]Card Destruction[/ccProd]. I set a Warning and Force and he discarded Dragoons, Marksman, Marksman for Leed and got back the Sphere I discarded off of [ccProd]Card Destruction[/ccProd] for an absolute blowout.
8-1
I finished day 1 in fourth place. Afterwards, we went and ate at Chilis and headed back to the room to sleep.
Round 10
vs. Jay Quick, Gadgets
Game 1: I’ve known Jay for years and I was glad to see him doing so well. He started the game with Gearframe into Fortress and multiple sets. I specialed Archfiend and he Bottomlessed, but I searched another Archfiend off its effect. I played [ccProd]One for One[/ccProd] and got Mirage and made [ccProd]Lavalval Chain[/ccProd] with Archfiend. He Booked on the summon and I wasn’t able to detach and I only had one in grave so I couldn’t Mirage. The next turn I played Warning on something, which I probably shouldn’t have done. He then MSTed my other set which was [ccProd]Mirror Force[/ccProd] and attacked over my field and took it from there.
Game 2: I started off with a weak combo with no Synchros and 2 searches. He set a monster and a backrow and flipped Macro when I drew. I Diamond Dired the Macro away and then used a second Diamond Dire on Dyna and took the game from there.
Game 3: I sided in the Randomizer side and he started with Tinplate Gadget into Gear Gigant. My opening hand was Randomizer, Bottomless, and some other summon stoppers, but no way to get Gear Gigant off the field. My 6th card was Archfiend and I wasn’t able to use Randomizer’s effect because I drew the monster. The next turn I drew another monster and was again unable to use the effect and watched the Gadget pluses take over.
8-2
Round 11
vs Robby Boyajian, Water
Game 1: He wins the dice roll and starts with Diva into Infantry summoning Marksman and making Gungnir with no backrow. I open the combo, but when I go to discard for Monk, I Veilers which caught me off Guard. I had double Archfiend, [ccProd]Card Destruction[/ccProd] and another card in hand. I think for a minute and decide to activate [ccProd]Card Destruction[/ccProd] since I can draw Launcher, Reborn, or [ccProd]Instant Fusion[/ccProd] and be in a good position. I wind up drawing [ccProd]One for One[/ccProd] and Avenger and FTKing him with Stygian [ccProd]Armory Arm[/ccProd].
Game 2: This game I have to work through a couple of sets and a Veiler before getting anything going. He tries to push with Catastor, but I draw Necromancer and recover and eventually take the win.
9-2
After swiss I finished in 10th place. I soon found out I would have to play my good friend Andrew Fredella in top 32. A couple of years ago, we used to stay together at every YCS. He’s a good friend and an excellent player with 8 tops, one of which was a win.
Top 32
vs Andrew Fredella, Water
Game 1: I don’t start with any combo. My opening hand was Armageddon Knight, Stygian, Trap Stun, Bottomless, Judgment, and another trap. I summon Armageddon and send Archfiend and set everything. He discards Dragoons for Teus and searches Gunde and Diva. I don’t Bottomless, hoping to catch a Gaios. He summons Diva and gets Marksman. Everything attacks and he sets 3. I draw Archfiend for my turn and summon Stygian and run over Marksman. He tries to Sphere, but I [ccProd]Trap Stun[/ccProd] and he MSTs the Judgment (since he wouldn’t be able to play spells after that). Next turn he attacks and I draw something and set it. I remove Stygian to try to special Archfiend and he has Warning for Stygian and I concede.
Game 2: Once again I don’t open the combo and I have a hand of [ccProd]Soul Drain[/ccProd], [ccProd]Mirror Force[/ccProd], and Warning. I decide that I don’t have the kind of hand to win if he Heavies 2 of the 3, so I set 3 to hope for the best. He has the Heavy and Diva to follow it up. When he flips Sphere when I try to end my next turn I just scoop it up. Congratulations to him for going so far.
That wraps up my tournament experience in New Jersey. I’d like to give a big congratulations to Tyree Tinsley for winning his second YCS this weekend and I hope you’ve enjoyed my report. Until next time, play hard or go home!
Patrick Hoban
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