Going into YSC San Diego, I had never played Battle Pack, nor did I think I had too. One of my greatest strengths is my knowledge of cards and rulings, and this knowledge reaches into not just cards in our meta, but all cards in general. I figured this would all I needed to take the Sealed event and make day 2, and I was right, mostly. Because I decided to not worry about the whole draft aspect, I spent the last few weeks leading up to San Diego messing around and fine tuning my Mermail deck, because all that mattered to me was winning once I made day 2 (Yes... in my mind there was almost no possible way for me to not make day 2 outside of opening the worst).
So after testing for a few weeks, I ended up coming up with this; You can watch my deck profile on ARG's Youtube channel
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65WsCoOIiY0
And here is a link to what I got from my Battle Pack draft.
Either way, I went into this event fairly confident. After getting to California, I played my first Battle Pack and ended up winning, so that was a great start Then, after driving down to San Diego, we decided to have our own Battle Pack tournament between friends for some practice. In this 8 person tournament was Frazier Smith, Billy Brake, Paul Clarke, Steven Silverman, Alex Reynolds (Who got 3rd place at the previous YCS), Aaron Furman, Oran Messica, (one of my best friends who also got his first top this event, making it to top 8! Congrats again buddy!) and myself.
Of course, as fate would have it I was paired up against none other then my bff Billy Brake (Who did a lot of bragging about how good he pulled) but nevertheless, I was able to defeat him. Next up, was Oran, who I also defeated, and in the end was paired up against Paul Clakre who apparently got [ccProd]Treeborn Frog [/ccProd](Go figure...) and a ton of Monarchs... BUT again, I was able to win, again winning my 2nd ever Battle Pack. This made me feel even more confident about the following day.
So the day finally comes, and we all get our cards and this is what I was given
I had Gorz, the card I wanted most. The rest of my stuff was just okay, but Gorz... He was single handedly going to win me games (and he did).
So going into specifics over the 9 rounds is kind of daunting, but after the very long day one, I went x-1 and made day 2.
Next up, is the most important thing, the 5 rounds of swiss.
Round 1 I was paired up against Samurai's. Great. Love playing against this deck (sarcasm). He went first, made a Shien, set 3 back-rows and passed. I started off trying to pick off his back-rows one by one with things like Marksman... but it just so happens his 3 back-rows were [ccProd]Solemn Judgment[/ccProd], [ccProd]Solemn Warning[/ccProd], and Matagama. Oh, okay. I lost game 1. Game 2 my opponent had [ccProd]Dimensional Fissure[/ccProd], LOVELY... But I was able to make a Black Rose Dragon, kill everything and quickly take the game from there. The finally game he had [ccProd]Soul Drain[/ccProd] and lots of Samurais, but no Shien, eventually my opponent had Kizan and Enishi, and when he attacked with Enishi, i turned his Kizan to defense mode and dropped Gorz (yay!). Gorz was able to get me back in the game, a long with a Typhoon for the Soul Drain, winning me game 3.
My round 2 was a feature match against Julian Wong, you can read that here
http://www.konami.com/yugioh/blog/?p=13150
Round 3 was against the eventual winner Angel, game one I made turn 1 Gaios and Dweller, because I knew what he was playing... and the card he fliped off the top of his deck, of course, is [ccProd]Dark Hole[/ccProd]. I lose after that.
Game 2 I tribute for [ccProd]Vanity's Fiend[/ccProd] turn 1, and it attacks directly 4 turns in a row for GG. Vanity Fiend OTK ftw.
Game 3 all I remember is my hand is decent, but... not great, I think about Diva > Gachi Gachi so I can tribute for [ccProd]Vanity's Fiend[/ccProd] next turn, but I have a Sphere so I decide not too. Well, he ends up Megaloing, Marksmaning my Sphere so I chain it, dropping a Glacia, and Mind Controling my Linde and OTK'ing me... oh... well, I lost.
Round 4 was against someone running Elemental Hero. It went by really fast, I feel like I OTK'ed him both games.
Round 5 was the finally round and I play against Chris Hentz, no offense to him, but I was really happy because he was playing the Electrum deck, in which my deck has a much better match up then other decks game 1, as I could use one of my 3 [ccProd]Enemy Controller[/ccProd]s to steal his Railcannon and then he cant win.
Either way, none of the games did he even activate [ccProd]Chain Material[/ccProd]. Game 1 I go big, making Gaios, Gachi, and Zenmaines turn 1 and I quickly take the game a few turns later.
Game 2 he opens with Banisher and [ccProd]Macro Cosmos[/ccProd], I can't really deal and he wins.
Game 3, he attacks into my [ccProd]Snowman Eater[/ccProd] with his Banisher, and I'm able to kill him in a few turns... he reveals his opening hand of what I believe was 3 [ccProd]Banisher of the Radiance[/ccProd], and 3 [ccProd]Fusion Gate[/ccProd]. What. Rough beats.
So I go X-1 and make top 32 getting 8th place, and get paired up against none other then... the deck no one wants to play against... Allen Pennington's Gishki FTK.
Well, there really isn't much to say about this match. It either happens, or it doesn't.
I roll a 10 and my heart does a mini back-flip as I get to go first... until he rolls an 11. Oh God, how you love to toy with my existence.
He of course goes first... and fizzles turn 1! Yes! I get a turn, and I'm able to OTK him.
Game 2, I get to a point early game where if he plays Dark World Dealings I can discard Abyssgunde to bring back my Spike, which will ditch Infantry and kill his [ccProd]Royal Magical Library[/ccProd], meaning no extra cards for him,
but he plays it too late during comboing off and I eventually scoop game 2.
Game 3 I open really bad for the Gishki Deck. No Vanity Fiend in site for the instant scoop. My best play is too Spike > Dragoons, search Abyssleed, discard 3 to Summon Abyssleed, pop a random card from his hand and hope I can win from there... and everything ended up working out. He wasn't able to combo out, and I ended up winning. Scariest match of the whole weekend.
My top 16 match was against my first Dino Rabbit of the weekend. Game one started off really well for me, but eventually things just started going down hill. I decided to destroy his [ccProd]Macro Cosmos[/ccProd] with Zenmaines, leaving him with 1 card in hand and a Dinosaur on field, but he topped another Dinosaur which put him back in the game and ended up losing game one for me.
Game 2 I thought I was going to lose. He top decked back to back [ccProd]Rescue Rabbit[/ccProd]s, but someone I was able to power through with Diva and Sphere plays, taking game 2.
Game 3, he didn't draw Macro Cosmos, or Rabbit, I was able to Megalo and Marksman his backrows, getting early advantage, putting him in a spot to where he couldn't deal. Eventually when he drew a Rabbit, all he could do was sit on Laggia and hope I didn't just crash my Megalo into it, which I did.
Finally, my journey ended in top 8, as I got destroyed by the soon to be YCS Champion in a feature match.
You can read this series of unfortunate evens here
http://www.konami.com/yugioh/blog/?p=13287
So my third win alludes me again, but mark my words, I will get it eventually! Hopefully I'll be able to break some cool deck for Nationals and be able to go to worlds... Well... Until next time duelist... Thank you for reading and supporting me. Play hard, or go home.
LMJeffJones
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