Regionals 2013: the Aftermath

(Note: Google helped me fix the problem I had, the post should be visible work now.)

What can I say: Regionals were awesome!

Just want to say congrats to our Regional Champion 2013: Jono Ritzao

Anyway, for those of you who want to see the top 20, here they are:

1st	Jonno Ritzau
2	Scott Modra
3	Tom Harrison
4	Andrew Johnson
5	Patrick Diaz
6	Brad Nyburg
7	Zac Duce
8	Chris Hanson
9	Lex Estella
10	Craig Stern
11	Tommy Nguyen
12	Michael Wang
13	Khadn Kennedy
14	Jarod Wiseman
15	Ash Webster
16	Jesse Stewart
17	Chris Welsh
18	Dylan Singh
19	Matt Nyburg
20	Dan Nellar

Let's me be the First to say that there are a lot of names I don't recognize. Who are half these people? "They took our Jerbs (Oceanic) Invites!"

Still good luck to them, they obviously were able to exploit the hell out of the metagame win them on their own merits.

Anyway, you probably noticed that "Chad Manning" is not in first place, or on the list... Just checked it twice, I'm not there...

As a Silver Lining, here is 3 things that contributed/lead to my failed Regionals '13 campaign. Hopefully my stuff-ups can serve as reminders to those Lucky Bast- Gentlemen who are heading to Oceanics.

1. Limit your Main Deck to Forty: Okay, I admit it; I thought Darkworld's draw power would allow me to have a few extra copies of 'staples' like MST and Dark Bribe. Unfortunately, AJ's Atlanteans first up managed to lock down my drawing, and then I drew nothing but those extra copies of MST and Dark Bribe.
2. Leave your Siblings/Friends at Home: After losing to AJ's Atlanteans, I was paired up with Fallon, My sister using my own "Troll-face" Final Countdown deck. I lost to that deck. They were grounded due to them being messier slobs then what I am, until I managed to talk our mother down to a more 'Reasonable' Punishment. Big mistake.
3. Prepare for Everything: I prepared for Wind-Ups, Mermatlanteans, Dino Rabbit, and like an idiot, I had nothing set aside for the Stall Decks I would face if I managed to screw up and lose my first two duels. So I drew to Watts, got beaten by an 'Effect deck', and was only redeemed by a Bi

Now to Sportsmanship, I want to give an Honorable Mention  to AJ. On the Competitive->Aggressive continuum,  he was calmly competitive. Able to play the game and still exchange pleasantries, offering the customary "Good Game" and otherwise being a gracious winner.

Dishonourable mention to Jackson, who uttered profanities in a torrent that would even make a sailor shake his head. When he won, he sung his Victory Song of "You suck...", when he lost, he sung his Sourpuss Song that had the same lyrics as the first. No-one should act like this IRL, but for computer gaming it's all good.

SUMMARY:

I discussed the Regionals, congratulated the champion, did a postmortem on my results, and acknowledged good and bad sports. I don't know about you, but I had a fun day, and look forward to next year!

Can you write/video?

Chad here once again, and I've been thinking... While that usually gets me into trouble, I was thinking; The Cardhousian experience is more then just Yugioh. But I am but one man, with limited time. Goddamn it, I loved playing in the Cardfight:Vanguard weekly tournaments, but Fallon and Blake, don't like the game, drag me off to get them lunch.

Likewise, Thursday Night Magic has conflicts with my schedules, and Pokemon... well, when are events on for that?  I can't do these games Justice on my own.

Here's the deal; I need Cardfight:Vanguard, Magic:the Gathering, Pokemon TCG players and Yugioh TCG players to write articles or post Vlogs for their respective expertise/game.

It so happens that if I accept and post your articles/Vlog, I will give you a booster pack of your choice. You choose the game, and the booster pack, and I reach into my own pocket and buy them as a Thank You for sharing with Everyone.

Then you can bring your friends, show them that you are a bonafide freelance blogger/vlogger and we can build this blog into something Epic!

If we can increase the readership, average 25 unique posters on an article, I'll add a draw for commentators, but it's still early days ATM. Time will tell:

The Chad is out.

Ban-List March 2013 - Chad's wild speculations.

Just thought I'd make a post on what changes I'd expect to see on the the Ban Listing Starting March 2013:

Please note that while it may 

Banned

    Wind-Up Carrier Zenmaity - Konami needs to sink Wind-Up OTK. When they do, the praise will be sung to the Duel Spirits! Seriously, this is why I bring origami paper with me: If I'm to sit for 20 minutes, I want to be able to amuse myself, or create an origami knife and deliver a player 'death by 1000 paper cuts" after they are done...
 
Limited

    Wind-Up Magician - Too fast for konami's Desired Metagame. Also too fast for my desired Metagame as well. Konami has done what all non-Wind-Up deck-players have prayed for: Killed the Wind-Up (Solitaire) OTK. Said it already, this is why I bring origami paper with me.

    Rescue Rabbit - He isn't as broken as Rescue Cat was, but people using abusing this card to instantly special summon Laggia/Dolkka. Dino Rabbits can still run 3 "Gold Sarcophagus", 3 "Jurrac Guaiba", "3 Jurrac Velo", and 2x "Tour Guide of the Underworld" to spam Leviair anyways. Also abusable in Evilswarms, Dragons, Machines, and Warriors.

    Tragoedia - He's pretty splash-able, being able to Special Summon himself whenever you take battle damage, then borrow steal an opponent's monster, and xyz/synchro just about anything you want. He'll be better at one, like his close cousin Gorz, than at 2.

    Atlantean Marksman/Heavy Infantry/Dragoons - Atlantean-Mermails are starting to annoy me tbh. tbh, they will probably leave them be so we can have something to bitch about. DCM, I'm looking at you when I say this.

    Torrential Tribute - Like "Bottomless Trap Hole" (no immature bum joke here), Torrential Tribute is more powerful now that Ignition Priority is revoked. Konami seems to be trying to slow the Meta-game for Old-Tooth sods like myself. No Butts about it, Torrential Tribute is the most likely to be hit due to the mass clearing effect.

    Miracle Fusion - If this isn't limited it should at least be semi-limited. Summoning or Elemental Hero Shining Neos from your extra deck by banishing monsters from your grave makes no sense; what did the heroes do in life to deserve a post-humerus banishment/expulsion from the Elemental Heroes? Then there is  Shining's second effect, which allows you to take those monsters back to your hand, and then use polymerization to recreate Shining Neos if it's destroyed and sent to your grave.

    Semi-Limited

Tsukuyomi - With Wind-Up OTK rendered as impotent as the residents of a Retirement home, it should be safe to re-introduce this card back into the Metagame. Wind-up decks need something to fill the hole that the -2 x Wind-Up Magicians will leave.

Thunder King Rai-Oh - It will be cut down to 2. Konami will most likely want one last format dominated by Six-Samurai (and revive Harpies too) so they can sell more of the upcoming "Lord of the Tachyon Galaxy" Booster sets. Then they will hit them in the next banlist so everyone will buy more cards for a new deck. How do I buy shares in them? After Six-Sams are cut down in September, they will re-instate this anti-6-sam/effect monster to 3.

No Longer Restricted:

Shien's Smoke Signal - Konami will most likely want one last format dominated by Six-Samurai so they can sell more of the upcomming "Lord of the Tachyon Galaxy" Booster sets. These Sci-fantasy badasses are a major scam from Konami favoured archtype amongst the Weeabo sub-fanbase.

Summary:

Konami will ban to maximize profits March 2013: They kill Wind-Ups, and allow Six-Samurai, Atlantean Mermails and Harpies to rule the game. Konami profits, Kev profits, and the wind-up players rebuild or ragequit.

That's the Chad's picks, what are yours?

Regional Anti-Meta Strategy Ideas

The time is slipping away: Regionals is less then 2 weeks away, and every Yu-Gi-Oh player is getting ready for it! The 'Friendly' duels the last few weeks have shown us the 3 top deck types that players are currently using: Wind-up OTK, Atlantean-Mermail OTK and Six-Samurai Anti-Meta. They are not unbeatable, and I thought I'd share some of my ideas on how to beat them.

'Effect Veiler' - is amazing against Wind-ups. It can be played from the hand, particularly on "Wind-up Magician" before he plays "Wind-up Shark" that turn. This makes Wind-Up Shark miss the timing for it's Special Summoning effect. You give yourself one turn to lay down a 'Breakthrough Skill' / 'Black Horn of Heaven' / 'Solemn Warning' / 'Solemn Judgement'.

Atlantean-Mermails can be slowed by using it on 'Atlantean Heavy Infantry', and then destroy it next turn in the Battle Phase. 'Atlantean Heavy Infantry' has o Attack, so attacking it will do damage to their LP! Obvious, yes, but still worth remembering.

[EDIT: there was a paragraph that was moved from here, back to it's proper place back under 'Breakthrough Skill', Cheers to Ben for pointing that out.]

'Breakthrough Skill' - is almost as good as 'Effect Veiler', and while it can't be played from the hand, and can be destroyed before activating the 1st time, it allows you to to use the effect of 'Effect Veiler' twice. Set and use in  the same way as Effect Veiler.

Six Samurai's lock-down can be broken by using this on 'Legendary Six Samurai - Shi En' or 'Naturia Beast' so you can dispose of them using 'Dark hole' or 'Lightning Vortex'.

Black Horn of Heaven – Just about every deck should have 2 of these in the side deck. Use these on the XYZ's with nasty effects and Effect Monsters that are SS in a loop. 'Legendary Six Samurai - Shi En' and 'Naturia Beast' in Six Samurai decks are especially vulnerable here, as Spell Speed 3 Traps cannot be negated by Spell Speed 2 Monster Effects. [EDIT: Ben brought up a great point that while 'Solemn Warning'/'Solemn Judgement' are Staples in most people's decks, it is still an idea to have more anti-Special Summon cards within the current Meta-game.)  

Hopefully I've given you some ideas on how to slow/stop the meta-game long enough for you to break your opponent's strategy into a million pieces, breaking their hopes of Regional victory and making it easier for me to drive to top-spot.

Anyone have some other ideas on how to beat these decks, let's get a discussion on it going in the comments.

Let's Continue Playing

   The Chad