Harley thinks I'm bad at pre releases

After today, he couldn't be more wrong.

Today, myself and Warren went down to Guf Brisbane for the pre release of the latest set for the My Little Pony CCG, Canterlot Nights. There were quite a few familiar faces down there as well for a Magic tournament, though I didn't hear any of the details. I'm sure if you're interested you could ask Harley how things went and he'd be happy to vent about how badly he did tell you all about it.

People tend to refer to pre release tournaments as great equalisers, but no other pre release I've been to has given such a vibe as this one did. For starters, every participant was given one of the two theme decks and required to use that for the day. Naturally many a mirror match was in store, but everyone was on the most equal ground possible by using the same decks. That mean the results came down to equal parts skill and luck, and not who has the best cards.

I myself chose to use the Princess Luna/Rainbow Dash deck, more for the fact that my pre ordered Princess Celestia/Rarity deck showed up in the mail yesterday and I didn't want two copies than any actual tactical choice (admittedly some of the more competitive players there believed Luna was better anyway). I used Luna herself as my mane character in the first round and switched to Rainbow Dash for the second, deciding that RD seemed to fit my play style better and opted to keep her in charge for the remainder of the four rounds.

By the end of the day, I had three wins out of four. Lady Luck didn't want to give Warren the same treatment though, unfortunately seeming to prefer a swift kick in the nuts with four losses. In true Cardhousian spirit though he kept up the sportsmanship, having fun regardless of results.

Lady Luck seems to want me to play this game more though, at least in comparison to other games. Not only did I manage a solid 4th overall for the day, one of my prize boosters contained an ultra rare Granny Smith card (pictured above) and I even won the prize raffle for a bag of extra goodies. Now if only Primal Origin would behave in a similar manner and give me that last Galaxy-Eyes Prime Photon Dragon instead of my umpteenth Bujinki Amaterasu...

All in all a great day was had by every participant, including several newcomers to the game. I'll admit that it didn't seem to run quite as smoothly as if it were a Card House held event, but that's only a small matter. Remember if anyone is interested in learning how to play you can always ask me, and I'll be happy to show you.

On that note I'll probably not have to say much about ponies for a while now (and I'm sure most of you are tired of me waffling on about it anyway), so I'll leave this post here. I don't expect too many people who are gonna be at the Card House tomorrow for the Pokemon event at 11am are reading this anyway, but anyone who is I'll likely see you all there if work doesn't decide to call me in.

The Pokemon Professor, Troy

Pre releases, pre releases everywhere!

Pony warning for those of your who simply can't stand the sight of diminutive technicolour equines. If you can, you're welcome to read on.

As I said about this time last month, May was going to be big for card games. Late April saw the pre release of Journey Into Nyx for Magic, while early May saw both Flashfire for Pokemon and Primal Origin for Yu-Gi-Oh! pre release events. Finally, on the very last day of May we will be able to see a pre release event for Canterlot Nights, of the My Little Pony CCG.

"But hang on Troy, the Card House isn't running a pre release for Canterlot Nights!" I hear you cry. Well, this is true. However, that doesn't mean that there isn't going to be one anywhere. Saturday 31st May will see Guf Brisbane in Fortitude Valley host two pre release events for Canterlot Nights. If you're keen to go, both the 11am and 4pm events still have places open and you can see the details here. Don't worry Kev, we still have something special here.

The Premiere set laid the groundwork for the game, and Canterlot Nights will add quite a bit more to it. Not only will brand new variants of the Mane 6 Mane Character cards be added to the game, Princess Celestia and Princess Luna are also given Mane Character cards as well as their own theme decks to come. Celestia will be a yellow card the same as Fluttershy, sharing her deck with Rarity and her white colour while Luna is a purple card just as Twilight Sparkle and comes with Rainbow Dash and her blue support.

Canterlot Nights will also see a few new keywords added to the game. Magic players will be familiar with the use of keywords, but in this case keywords are usually given to a colour which allows it to behave differently to other colours. I'll give you a quick rundown on the current keywords and their uses:


Blue - Swift (You may move this card for 1 fewer action tokens)
Orange - Stubborn (This card can still apply its power during faceoffs and the Score Phase even if exhausted)
Pink - Random (During a faceoff involving this card, if you flip a card with 1 power, you may ignore it and flip a new card)
Purple - Studious (When you wind a faceoff involving at least one of your characters with this keyword, gain 1 action token)
White - Inspired (At the start of your Main Phase, look at the top card of an opponent's deck and put it on either the top or bottom of that deck)
Yellow - Caretaker (+1 power while at a Problem with at least one of your Critter friends)

Canterlot Nights has given us the addition of a few generic keywords, which can be on any friend of any colour. The first one is mentioned above on the Twilight Velvet card, called Supportive. What it does is give the Supportive card a bonus equal to the number next to the keyword when that friend is at a problem with a Mane Character that shares its colour. In Twilight Velvet's case, she would gain that bonus while at a problem with either Twilight Sparkle or Princess Luna.

The next keyword to mention is Pumped. This one is rather interesting, as it doesn't give a constant bonus like Supportive but rather access to a cost ability that could definitely change how a game goes. If a character with Pumped is involved in a faceoff, you may choose to banish a card you flipped during that faceoff underneath it rather than put it on the bottom of your deck. Once you have cards underneath a Pumped character, you may then spend those cards at certain times to trigger an effect such as Chief Thunderhooves frightening an opponent's character. This can give you a great time advantage as it costs a further two action tokens to unfrighten a friend, which will slow your opponent significantly.

Unique is a concept that Magic players will recognise again. Unique works in the same way as Legendary does, in that while you can have multiple copies of such a card in your deck you may only have one of such a card on the field at any given time. There really isn't much else to say about Unique, so onto the last word.

Epic is the final new keyword, and it is used to denote a much more powerful troublemaker. In fact, two troublemakers from the Premiere set have been errata'd to have the Epic keyword (Nightmare Moon and Ahuizotl), most likely due to their Villain status. So far the only card that has made any use of this status is a new card in Canterlot Nights called Soothe the Savage Beast, which will cause an opponent's non-Epic troublemaker to lose all of its abilities and cannot gain further abilities during your Troublemaker Phase. While Epic doesn't seem to do much at this point, it is possible that further sets will build on that.

What cards am I looking forward to getting? At this point I am definitely liking Princess Celestia, Protector of Equestria as well as Sunset Shimmer. Princess Celestia is a great way of getting rid of an opponent's low powered troublemakers simply by playing her to a problem with a troublemaker there, paving the way to moving forward in the game as well as scoring extra points. On the opposite end, Sunset Shimmer is a troublemaker with the ability to banish an opponent's friend or resource beneath her until she leaves the field (at which point that card is returned to the opponent's hand). She is an excellent disruptive card as well as a high powered troublemaker with a power of 5. There are plenty of other cards that also add to the the current strengths of each colour, and I'm definitely wanting to reshape my deck to accommodate them.

That's all I have to say about Canterlot Nights. If you read through it, I really appreciate you doing so since I know not many people will enjoy this topic. Canterlot Nights will see its proper release on the 6th of June. Myself and Warren will be headed down there for the pre release, and we'll be sure to show what we call the Cardhousian Spirit and doctors insist is a mild form of intestinal cancer!

The Pokemon Professor, Troy

8 days and counting... No seriously!

Alright my fellow Cardhousians it is that time of year again... What time you all ask.... Well my birthday of course.

This year is nothing more special than the last but i have decided that for this birthday (especially as i am taking time off work for some RnR) I will be spending a few days at the card house building some new decks and testing them out. For that to happen however, I will need some opponents. So anyone interested in handing me a few losses i will be more than happy to be the looser as long as i get to play some cards >.<

With all the games i play, i will be looking to get in a few living card games as well (android: netrunner and StarWars LCG). These are two games that, along with patience, you need to actually read a small manual to learn how to play effectively. So todays blog will actually be an introduction to these two game (for anyone interested).

Lets start of with Android: Netrunner
.

So being an updated re-release of a game produced in 1996, many people would automatically just shrug it off and go back to their staple card games. Well I decided to pick this little beauty up and give it a shot (well i actually won it so it was sort of fate i guess). Set in a futuristic setting where big corps run the world, and the "underground" is run by hackers of every variety, Netrunner takes the age old war between secret agendas of the corps and the free thinking hackers to a new level.

The main goal of this game (depending on which side you choose to play hacker or corp) is to outwit your opponent and take control of his/her corporation (hacker), or to prevent your secrets falling into the wrong hands (corp).

My experience in this game is little (due to lack of interest in my friends group, or inability to play on my part), but what I have learned and come to love about Netrunner is that no matter how locked out you may be, there is always a back door into a system. You can probably tell i love playing as a hacker :)

A little complex to explain in full, this game is one you MUST play to get a feeling for. The use of viruses and hacking tools is amazingly accurate and the artwork leaves nothing to be desired. This is a perfect combination of new meets old and for many, this game presents a new challenge to overcome.

Shall we start the countdown to destruction now?



Star Wars, our old friend, and mentor. This amazing series of books, movies and everything has been brought together into one HELL of a card game. Choose your side, the force may be strong but the dark side has cookies :D

Once your side has been decided, you then can organise your troops. Be the lowlife of the universe and control the scum and villainy of the dark side or rise in the light and support the smugglers and spies. With everything you could want from the Star Wars universe, this game provides you more.

During my brief few games of this, I have come to love the intricate battle system and the unique draw style of the game. Using your opponents hand against them is always fun in a card game.

These two games are available through Kev and I will be bringing mine along for some dusting off and testing over the next few weeks.

For those who love a new game (and yes these are two player only (for now)), and also like a challenge, come on down and give these two amazing games a go :)

Well back to my countdown and back to the kitchen I go.

From all of us here in the universes of Cray, Star Wars, Netrunner and everywhere else, we wish you happy gaming and many wins and losses. For every win is good but every loss teaches us something and is much more valuable :)

AJ out!

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Carefree-Celebi/1386146921611857#

Simple Side-Deck-Building for Simple Duelists

Alright Boys and Girls, after a long break due to medical issues, I am back with my side-Decking Tutorial. I also have pre-release articles for both the Theros MTG and tomorrow's Yugioh Primal Origin Pre-release.

Thanks to Troy, Max and Aaron for covering for me for the last 5 weeks, and I will have to do a bumper month draw for next month.

Anyway, I'll get through the backlog, but first-off the promised;


Part 7 - Side-Decking

It's a week after you needed it for Nationals, but as the case may be, luck of the draw.

I was also disappointed because I rang ahead and the organizers told me that the wheelchair wouldn't fit with their seating plans at the venue... I wrote a very strongly worded letter by hand and via email expressing my disappointment.

Oh, where was I? That sounds Right; For your side-deck, you want to add cards that will foil your opponents, but not you (too much).

Let's go through the 2 hardest Decks I have faced with my Blue-Eyes Deck (while my Hazy Flames sat on the Shelf), why they managed to make my experience hard, and what options I can add to the side-deck to stop it from slowing this cripple down!

 Kaiden's  Spellbook Prophecy - His decks have 3 x advantages: Spellbooks are a fast toolbox deck (using spells to search and recycle their deck),  they can lock down your ability to use spells unless you have a spellcaster on the field, and thirdly, The Priestess of Prophesy can target-remove anything on the field using her effects that discard spells.

For this, I'd need to counter spell lock-down by adding some side-able spellcasters, cards that counter deck searching, and traps/monster effects that counter his monster effects.

I believe Effect Veiler would work to stop 1 and 3, helping as a spellcaster and tuner like Maiden with Eyes of Blue as well as being a great hand-trap. Deck Lock-down would also buy me up to 3 turns each of Kaiden not searching his deck, (provided he hasn't locked down my ability to play spell cards). Last day of Witch and Breakthrough Strike are also alternatives that can help break the lock-down and stop priestess' effects respectively.

Totally Wish Tribe-Infecting Virus wasn't banned...

Fallon's Exodia Deck - I created that monster of a deck, and week after week she reminds me of the monster I created.

Exodia Decks rely on drawing the 5 pieces, or cards to help them get all 5 pieces like Card-car D. They can negate damage, and often use cards like Winged Kuriboh, Kuriboh, Kuribon, Waboku, Scapegoat and Marshmallon to stall me like nothing else. I would side Morphing Jar, but that's banned.

I need discard ability, to try and force her to discard a piece of Exodia from her hand, a means to negate card effects in the Graveyard. I already have the means to negate/destroy many of her draw cards, with the dark bribe for spells, and MST for any traps she may have set. Azure eyes also makes my dragons immune for a turn to trap effects, so that's another boon.


Breakthrough Strike can stop monster effects in the grave, like Card-car D's draw ability, Kuriboh's and Winged Kuriboh's damage nullifying effects. Effect Veiler would work against Marshmallon and as bonus protection from her counter-traps, I will chuck in a 3rd Dodger Dragon into the side deck.


What Will be side-decked?

3x Breakthrough Strike
3x Deck Lockdown
1x Dodger Dragon
3x Effect Veiler


Of course, as you face more opponents that trouble you, the side deck may eventually hit the maximum of 15, which means tough choices as to what to cull for more diversity, vs targeted counters for your opponent's deck. Finding the balance isn't easy, but it could mean the difference between 2nd and 9th or lower. (I am planning on the Top any time I want it. Mwahahahahahah!)

I'll see you all when I see you!

Chad.

Crash and Flashfire

First thing's first. If Harley tells you anything, don't listen to him. He's a damn dirty liar.

Not really. At least there was no way he could've really known what I would get in my boosters for the Flashfire pre release. Six boosters, and not one really nice card. The picture on the right is indicative of my face both before and after opening my boosters.

Anywho, let's keep going. As far as a set goes, Flashfire isn't a bad one. In my personal opinion there aren't a whole lot of really good cards in it, but then again I'm not seeing any that will do much for my own decks so I'm a little biased. If you want my picks for it, they would have to be M Charizard-EX (Y Version), Protection Cube, Trick Shovel and Lysandre.

Mega Evolution pokemon come with great power, but also have a few tough downsides to bring them into line. First off, once you evolve one of your Pokemon-EX into an M Pokemon-EX, your turn is finished. Second, they generally come with a high cost attack or require a great deal of specific energy to use these powerful attacks.

M Charizard-EX can circumvent most of these relatively easily. To combat its high energy cost, one of its base Pokemon-EX versions comes with a one cost attack that, on flipping a successful heads, will attach three energy from the deck to itself. Combined with cards like Blacksmith which attach energy from your discard to a fire pokemon on your field, and getting this powerhouse swinging is relatively simple.

Now, for something that hits so hard you'd think having it deal 50 damage to itself with each swing is a serious drawback. But...

Protection Cube is a thing. It's a pokemon tool so it can be attached to M Charizard-EX, and simply by being there your powerful pokemon will no longer take damage from its own attacks. So now you have a fully charged pokemon dealing 300 damage with each hit with no downside. That's all well and good for the person playing it, but what about if you have to try and take it down?

The first thing to do would be to try using water pokemon to take it down. As long as your water pokemon can deal a minimum of 110 damage, M Charizard-EX's weakness to water will finish it off for you. Even better would be if you can bring out Suicune from Plasma Blast. While it won't be able to one hit KO Charizard, it's Safeguard ability will prevent it from taking any damage from Charizard at all. Alternatively you could try for moves that paralyse or put it to sleep, or even a combination of conditions that would keep it from attacking while sapping its strength. Or, if you only have one prize card left...

I'm sure more than a few people miss the old Pokemon Catcher and how it didn't require a coin flip to work. As I've mentioned before in a previous blog post, the makers decided to meet you half way with Lysandre. Lysandre functions as the original Pokemon Catcher does in that it switches out your opponent's active pokemon for one of your choice on their bench, and doesn't require a coin flip (also I don't want to talk about coin flips as those things hate me). So if you only have to take a single prize card and you're staring down a M Charizard-EX that's raring to go, why not do the minimum amount of work for the maximum pass? Switch out something weaker and give it a beating it won't forget!

The final card I'm going to talk about today is Trick Shovel. This handy item card will allow you to look at the top card on either player's deck, and then decide whether to return it to its original position or discard it. I'm sure that I don't have to go to any great lengths to tell you how useful that card is, given that you can potentially deny your opponent a good draw or avoid a dead draw yourself. The only question is which deck do you use it on when?

Well, that's all I really have to talk about as far as Flashfire went. Despite my terrible luck in opening boosters, flipping coins and drawing useful cards I really should have just stayed home in bed it was a fun day out with a good crowd of people. I'm feeling cautiously optimistic about the Primal Origin pre release for Yu-Gi-Oh! on this coming Saturday, but by that day I will have some money and fully plan on buying myself at least one booster box if Kev is selling them on the day. If you're after anything from the set scram you vultures you'd be welcome to ask me about it, but be aware that I'm looking pretty much only for things in the set itself and I'll have a list with me. There's a decently high chance that if you don't have anything on that list then you won't have anything I want, but as long as you leave me some space to breathe there won't be any issues.

I'd offer Don Thousand my soul for the cards I want, but chances are he'd probably give me several copies of Don Thousand's Throne and be done with it. I guess that's what you get if you want to deal with a god wielding the power of chaos.

The Pokemon Professor (maybe this is why Gary Oak quit being a trainer), Troy