YCS Providence Top 32 Report

October 22, 2012

by Ellis Maddalena

Hello Duelists! I hope everyone who went of YCS Providence has a good time supporting Dan Green and competing in the tournament! For everyone who didn’t get the opportunity to go, I hope to see you all in Seattle! Just a quick question before I get into my article, do you think the release of abyss rising will make a gigantic splash on the Meta or just flop? Remember to post your response in the comments!

I played a deck I call Eltanin Beat, which is basically my take on monster mash, using a machine based engine to push out massive amounts of damage and clear the board. I was able to pilot this deck to Top 32 where I lost in single elimination and I finished 4^th overall in swiss with a 10-1 record. Before I get into how the deck works and my tournament report I would like to give a shout out to my friend George Ashi who helped me test and come up with the idea of the deck. Without him this deck would have never have been as successful as it was or even exist. This deck has a ton of boss monsters whose damage and effects can quickly reduce your opponent’s options and life points down to zero. Without further a due here is the list I used at Providence, Rhode Island.

Monsters 36:

3 Machina Gearframe

3 Machina Fortress

3 Cyber Eltanin

3 Ghost Ship

3 Genex Neutron

3 Genex ally Birdman

3 Gallis the Star beast

3 Cyber Valley

2 Witch of the black rose

2 Light ray sorcerer

2 Tragoedia

1 Cyber Dragon

1 Chaos Sorcerer

1 Honest

1 Black Luster Soldier

1 Gorz the emissary of darkness

1 Machina Force

Spells: 4

1 Monster Reborn

1 Mind Control

1 Dark hole

1 Heavy Storm

Extra:

1 Stardust Dragon

1 Scrap Dragon

1 Black Rose Dragon

1 Ancient Fairy Dragon

1 Gaia Knight of the earth

1 Mist Wurm

1 Leviar the Sea Dragon

1 Wind-Up Zenmaines

1 Maestroke the Symphony Djinn

1 Adreus, Keeper of Armageddon

1 Tiras, Keeper of Genesis

1 Wind Up - Zen Mai-Oh

1 Photon Strike Bounzer

1 Number 11: Big eye

1 Chimeratech fortress Dragon

Side: 15

3 Royal Decree

3 Maxx “C”

3 Ryko, Lightsworn hunter

2 Gemini Imp

2 Jinzo

1 Closed forest

1 D.D. Crow

Now, after you all figure out what some of these cards do, because I’m sure there are a couple you aren’t familiar with you still might be a little confused as to how I would win other than summoning Machina monsters.

The Goal of the deck is to reduce your opponents life points down to zero as quickly as possible using a flurry of overwhelming moves that leave your opponent confused as when to use their traps or Veilers always fearing that the next card or effect you use will be more devastating than the last. This is easily accomplished with Gallis the Star Beast and Genex Ally Birdman easily doing thousands of damage a game. One of the easiest ways to score quick damage in this deck is to special summon Gallis, then bounce it for birdman and then special summon him again, and then either going into a Gaia or a rank 3. This allows you to use one gallis two times per birdman you have in your hand. The damage off this combo can put your opponent so low that every card you drop, even if its not that strong of a card puts pressure on your opponent and if they have used Solemn Warning or Solemn Judgment that game they can get very low, very quickly or even die to burn damage. If you have a cyber valley removed before you do this combo you can make Leviar and essentially do this combo for free wasting no cards or your normal summon. But this is just one of the cool tricks you can do with this deck and if I tried to explain every combo this deck is capable of I would be here writing a book, and I still might miss some!

Every card in this deck combos with at least one other card if not more in some way. An example of this is one of my boss monsters Cyber Eltanin, this guy can send all of the face up monsters on the field to the graveyard for free merely by removing all the light machines on the field and graveyard and it gain 500 attack for each monster removed in the process. This is not only an awesome answer to wind ups, when they go shark magician and call spells, or any big problem monsters your opponent has but also a great way to remove light monsters from play to get Lightray Sorcerer ready for action. One cool play with this card is to remove a light machine from your graveyard, preferably a summoned genex neutron, to special him and wipe your opponents field then to bounce him for birdman and then proceed to pitch him from your hand to special summon machina fortress from your graveyard. From here if you have gallis the starbeast and a removed from play valley you can make leviar and draw two cards!

I’m going to stop giving hypothetical combos because the only way to see what this deck is truly capable of is to plays some games yourself; however, I must warn you that this deck takes a lot of practice and you might not even realize some combos you may be able achieve even after playing with the deck for weeks. It happened to me.

Now I’m going to get right into the tournament report.

I got into Providence right before midnight on Friday and met up with my friend Robby Boyajian. I Showed Robby the deck and he had absolutely no idea how I won games or even what it did and was pretty uncertain about how I would do in the tournament. He later jested that if someone gave him the deck and told him to go 50/50 in wins and losses with it he might fail, but that didn’t alter my decision. I was super confident going into this tournament that I would top, the most confident I have been with any deck I have ever played. Robby and I then found some random sandwich place close to our hotel and grabbed a bite to eat. We then finally headed to bed after some catching up around 2:30 AM. We had to wake up at 6:30 the next day and my mind was racing thinking about tomorrow and had issues sleeping. I doubt I received two hours of sleep that night.

The next day comes and I frantically search for the mist wurm, big eye and two cyber valleys I need to finish my deck. I eventually find them. I then turn in my registration sheet and hang out with all my friends , I haven’t seen since Indi, and catch up with all of them – and hear some wild stories in the process. Round one begins quickly.

Round 1:

I sit down and lose the dice roll, my opponent takes out his deck backwards by accident and I see a gravekeeper spy. My heart sank. This match up is almost impossible. I have 8 monster cards that get special summoned by removing a card from the graveyard and a reborn. It didn’t look good for me, and if he tributes me he is going to hit 5 almost every time. Sure enough G1 he tributes me two times and wins because of it. Game two I side in closed forest and rykos and jinzos hoping to combat his traps and necrovalley. It works! I was able to make an ancient fairy dragon early and pop his Valley and camp on my closed forest until I could push for game. Game three I make my fairy and pop his valley again and place my closed forest down again, pretty happy that I didn’t get royal tribute’d for basically game again. He then dark holes my ancient fairy dragon and reborns it popping my forest and adding Necro Valley to hand. My heart sank again, I was first in absolute awe to who would play reborn in grave keepers and then I decided that I would not lose this game. I make a flurry of plays that ended up in me taking back my fairy dragon with Big Eye and popping his valley again and then killing him.

1-0

After that match I knew I was ready for anything.

Round 2: I sit down for my next round and lose the dice roll again, but its nothing I’m unused too as I rarely ever win dice rolls. She then first turn Vensus and I just wish I was playing against DW, heros or wind ups instead of agents -- a pretty hard match up due to krystia. I Don’t really remember too much from this game except that I was worried the whole time that I was going to krystia’d so I played super aggressive game one and realized she was playing the trap version of agents. She used torrential tribute on me, but I still was able to drop enough monsters after that to kill her. Game two she had one back row and I had game staring at my face baring any card but torrential or mirror force and one torrential was gone. I decided that even if she has it I feel confident that I would be able to take game three so I just go for it and sure enough she has the second torrential. Game three I go first and establish a field of stardust and machina fortress first turn with 5 cards still in my hand. I decided out side of hyperion she wouldn’t be able to deal with that field and even if she had Hyperion she would have to have earth as well because I had Maxx “c” for the Venus and I would be able to steal the hyperion the next turn with big eye anyways. She doesn’t have the hyperion and I kill her quickly.

2-0

Round 3:

My opponent wins the dice roll again and starts going HAM with dark worlds. He starts off by using all 3 gates turn one and drag downing tons of cards and not knowing which card to drag down. As soon as I see that he decided to use all three gates in one turn I knew he wasn’t going to have a chance in winning even though he opened nutty. He ended with a face down monster, a grapha and like 2 backrow. I summon witch draw a monster and then proceed to blackrose off a gallis. He then judgments my black rose and I proceed to drop a bunch of other cards in order to kill him, attacking through sangan. Since I won game 1 against dark worlds and I have four cards to side in against them game two I felt pretty confident. He ends up trying to card destruction but I use Gemini imps and then he sets a few cards and gets a grapha on board. After a back and forth match I get him down to near 2000 life points with one back row, no cards in hand and no monsters. I have a Fortress in hand and a chaos sorcerer with no darks in graveyard, but plenty of lights. I end up drawing gallis and deciding to try to either mill him to death or get the dark I need in the graveyard for his effect. I mill tragoedia and the game is over. My opponent was salty to say the least.

3-0

Round 4:

I Lose the dice roll again and my opponent quickly opens up with three back rows and no monsters. He keeps using his traps to keep me at bay but he couldn’t draw a monster he wanted to summon and eventually runs out of steam after I black rose for two and kill him. I assume based on the trap line up and the fact that he refused to play a monster he was playing wind ups and I assumed correctly. Game two he opens up with magician + shark + factory combo and I maxx “C” He stops and I draw 1 card – Another Maxx “c”. I then try to kill his magician and succeed and drop a fortress just so he can’t game me. He then trys magician shark again and I maxx “c” again ;however this time he keeps going and calls spells at the end and attacks over my fortress with his 2600 shockmaster (giga brilliant pumped him) and I pop his back row then drop tragoedia. I then make tragoedia level 7 and drop big eye and take his shock master and call traps. I proceed to wipe out his field. Then he top decks avarice and re loops me ending with Tiras and Maestroke. I then use cyber eltanin and wipe his field and because Eltanin sends and not destroys Maestroke and Tiras couldn’t stop it. I then proceed to win the game.

4-0

Round 5:

I sit down across a little girl named Nicole Tipple, at first I wonder how she made it this far into the tournament undefeated. Until she started to seem to be pretty decent just from talking to her, about her dragon duel history, and since she knew a few other people at the top tables like Simon. She also was also wearing an ARG shirt and I heard a story about a little girl busting up one of Robby’s friends in some high stake duels multiple times in a row, which I asked her about and she admitted to doing. I wasn’t really intimidated though because I have never lost to a girl in a tournament before especially one this young. She wins the die roll and summoned an agent with two backrow. I end up killing her game one and she doesn’t quite understand what I’m playing, but she gets that it is monster mash. Then game two I have game in my hand and no way for her to stop it outside of gorz or tragoedia, which wouldn’t have meant I lost, as long as my witch of the black forest didn’t die due to his own effect. I had a reborn in my hand and with only 3 spells left in the deck and 34 cards still in the deck I didn’t think it would happen, but low and behold heavy storm comes off the top and I proceed to lose the game. There was a 8.83% chance to hit a spell and I hit it, oh well its yugioh! Game three she krystia’d me turn 2 and I had no out because I already was forced to use honest or lose the game. I was pretty upset that I lost to her, but I decided I would not go on tilt and that luck played a huge factor in the game. I really enjoyed playing against Nicole because she was a very nice person and a friend I made through out the tournament.

4-1

Round 6:

I sit down against another girl and I remark about how I have never played this many girls in a single Yu-Gi-Oh tournament before. I win the die roll for the first time that day and proceed to summon Gearframe, search fortress and summon him. She space typhoons my gearframe, dark holes the fortress and proceeds to snap down rabbit like its hot. She makes a Laggia with a few back row swings and passes. I then have dark hole, heavy storm and another gearframe and a few other cards I can’t remember. I Dark hole her laggia which she negates and then heavy her backrow. I then summon gearframe and search force and swing over laggia with machina Fortress I special summoned off force. She then proceeds to set a monster, which later turns out to be reaper, and another backrow. I attack with fortress into a D-Prison and proceed to summon neutron and pass adding birdman to my hand. She then snaps down the second rabbit like its hot and proceeds to attack with both saber saurus’s and I drop tragoedia, she makes dolkka with a couple backrow still. We pass back and forth until she has 5 back rows, but nothing to deal with my huge tragodia and eventually I decided its time to push. I make her waste her negates on some monsters that she had no choice but to negate and eventually I pop her reaper with tragoedia’s effect by sending gallis. Then I summon a bunch of monsters carefully grinding out her backrow, pretty certain that some of them are spaces. Eventually I amass enough monsters that she can’t do anything about to kill her. Game two she draws all monsters but she does draw rabbit followed by guide. I was able to come back and battle through the double evolvosar but then there is a timely dark hole followed by a dyna I couldn’t stop. Game three started right as time was called and I was going first. I summon Gearframe add fortress, special fortress equip gearframe and then use gallis’s effect to special him in defense and do 1200 damage. She couldn’t get enough offense going to do enough damage to beat me.

5-1

Round 7:

I sit down next to Robby Boyajian and Billy Brake to the right of me and we all laugh about how lucky we were to sit next to each other. My opponent wins the dice roll and summons some machina monsters. I then do the same and we end up trading fortress’s for a little while ;however, I gain the advantage because mine were able to pop his back row when his popped nothing. I eventually decide its time to try to kill him and summon the cyber dragon I was holding since turn one to plus massively. I then wipe him out with fortress. Game two I summon valley and pass, which he attacks. I then force out his back row through the summon of cyber dragon which he bottomlesses and discarding neutron to special fortress where he used torrential tribute. Then I special summon eltanin and he warnings. Putting him very low. I then decided to gallis into birdman into leviar getting back valley and drawing two cards. Then I drop chaos sorcerer, fortress and lightray sorcerer to game him. Looking back I should have made photon strike bounzer.

6-1

Round 8:

I sit down versus Cesar Gonzales and I mentally decided to show this old pro that his time may have passed. I start off with summoning neutron and adding birdman to my hand. He then goes and summons a gadget, then double summons another into Gear Gigantic X and attacks at which point I drop tragoedia. Then I special summon a fortress off another fortress and use tragoedia’s effect to make him level 7. I overlay for big eye and take his gear gigantic X. Then I use its effect to add gear frame to my hand and I normal him getting machina force. I Then discard eltanin and force to get back both fortress’s and swing for game. The next game he double summons into gear giant again and I summon valley and pass. Then he double summons another two gadgets into another gear giant and swings into my valley which I remove. I then special summon gallis off birdman and into leviar and draw two cards. I then activate heavy storm on his two backrow and special summon cyber eltanin to clear his board. I then summon gearframe and get a machina fortress and discard both fortress’s again to special one. Then I discard another eltanin to special the other fortress and drop Black luster soldier and swing for game.

7-1

Round 9:

I finally get a feature match, which you can read here.

http://www.konami.com/yugioh/blog/?p=11252

I go for game against the guy early and get punished for because I know he is playing bubble beat and assumed he wouldn’t want to play tragoedia or Gorz because he wouldn’t want them to clog his hand when he went for game with bubbleman.

8-1

I finish day one 8-1 needing to win the next one to almost be guaranteed a top spot and the one after to be certain I top.

Round 10: I play against a person from Columbia who apparently has won a national championship. He was playing geargia with birdmans. Game one I defeat him using the power of gallis and by overwhelming him with fortress’s. Game two he defeats me after my gallis mills a spell when I have 3 birdmans in hand, which if gallis never hit a spell would be game by itself usually. The next game I end up going for safer push for game instead of the biggest one I could have done and me and my opponent have a discrepancy in life points which I realize was in my error. If I did the other move it would have been game. Because of this he ends up coming back to wipe my field and get me in a tough spot and left top decking. I draw back to back gallis which end up killing him. He was the most angry I have seen a player the whole event.

9-1

Round 11:

I got another feature match which you can read here!

http://www.konami.com/yugioh/blog/?p=11339

After these rounds everyone congratulated me and I waited for my name to be called. 4^th place overall in swiss.

I proceed to top 32 where my opponent is playing wind-up and I am almost certain I knew his entire deck and side deck because he used the same list two regionals in a row and posted them on Duelistgroundz. Game one he opened well with thunder king and 2-3 backrow and I didn’t have heavy storm and couldn’t get anything going offensively before he magician sharked me and called monsters sealing him the game. Game 2 was pretty much the same situation except I used Maxx “c” to stop him the first time he went off except he had factory so he won the next turn anyways by compulsing my stardust. He was a really good duelist. If I had played Thought Ruler Archfiend who is definitely getting added to the extra deck I would have won the second game.

All in all I am very happy about getting my first top, although I would have gotten one at Indi last year if 30 more people entered making the cut go from top 16 to top 32. I am very happy with the deck I played and throughout the tournament found a few changes I wish I had made to the extra, side and main that could have helped me out in top 32 and some of my matches in swiss. The deck is very good and after a few dozen matches or so you’ll start to have a really good understanding of how to play the deck. I doubt ill play the deck at Seattle because the deck is already out of the bag kind of like psychics so people will know how to combat it more, especially wind up players who I hoped to take by surprise. I hope you guys enjoyed my article and I will be writing more in the future.

-Joseph Ellis Maddalena