HERE IS MY SJC AUSTIN REPORT "Why Gearfried should have AT LEAST top 4'd SJC Austin '06"
First off, this is going to be a very long report. If you don't have a lot of time to read this, then come back later. I am going to be stating my whole experience from the week.
Monday, I think about how the creator of Team Icon (my friend Eddie) was running a Gearfried+Blast with Chain deck with Dark World monsters and how it was doing. It needed another edge. So I duel this one guy online and he reminds me of Smoke Grenade. Then it hit me, Smoke Grenade is a FREE CONFI (that is Smoke Grenade's nickname for me now). Gearfried is an 1800 beatstick that can run over Monarchs, Cyber Dragons, and Lily in def mode. It also doesn't die to Hydrogeddon because of its 1600 def. So I run a variation of the deck that I top 8 with at my local. Instead of Lily I was running a tech Goldd and instead of 2 Mobius I was running 2 Blowback. The deck went 4-1 and made top 4 at the local, beating 2 pretty good players in the process and losing the rematch of round 1. So I decided to run Mobius over Blowback and make the side deck a bit of a Machine side deck. I also was going to main Stein until Kevin Salyer talked me into maining Lily instead.
So, Friday morning comes and I head over to Kevin's house. We are taking Jake's Aveo LS down to Austin for the 16 hour drive. It's a stick shift, so I get to be chauffeured all the way to Austin because I only know how to drive automatics. The drive down was very long. We get into Austin at 3:30. We almost get lost trying to find the Red Roof Inn North. We finally get to it and it has no vacancies (we were an hour too late). So we go across to the street to Super 8 Motel North and it costs about $5-10 more a night to stay there. I go to bed around 4 AM and we ask for a wake up call at 8 AM. Kevin and Jake decided to run Tom Warren's (from Team Betrayal) deck card for card. I decided to run my Gearfried deck. Mobius, Gearfried and Lily were my MVP's of the Jump. I just want to let everyone know, I should have made at least top 4. I made 2 misplays in game 3 of the top 8 against Mike Gonzales; he didn't lucksack me. I lost that match. However, I am not talking about game 2 at all. I will explain it all in detail later. So we get up at 8 AM and go to a gas station. I get a thing of Chocolate doughnuts and eat them on the way to the Jump. I just sit around talking with Kevin and Jake until they announce the seating for Player Meeting. Then the announce the pairings.
Round 1: Matt Stille (me) vs. Aaron Trimble Table 64
He was running a Macro Cosmos deck with Helios, Monarchs, and at least one Kaiser Glider. He tended to get really bad hands. He was running no Fusion deck so I wasn't worried about Stein at all. I don't remember very much of this match except that I 2-0 him in like 10 minutes or so.
Record: 1-0 Matches (2-0 Duels)
Round 2: Me vs. Joseph Hutchinson (11 yr. old kid who top 8s) Table 14
He asks me if I am sure I am at this table. I said of course. I expect to go at least X-2 or better. Game 1 I go first and set Torrential; got a decently bad hand. His turn he storms, bring's out Stein, and attack with Twin and Stein to knock me down to 1700 LP. I draw a Blast with Chain, have no Cyber Dragons in hand, have RotA, and I have like 4 monsters (I misplayed here, should've summoned Gearfried and attacked Stein; even though he had a back row, then set Blast if attack was successful; then I had a better chance to win; but I also didn't want him to see Gearfried yet so I took the chance of popping Twin with Exiled and hope he couldn't do 1700 damage; so it was a lose lose situation for me most likely). So he wins game 1 quick. Game 2 I eventually pull off after a big of back and forth attacks. Game 3 I made one mistake that probably cost me the match. I forgot to attack a Nimble with Lily and instead attacked it with Gearfried; because he had another face down that was Don Zaloog. Later he ends up gettting Premature back to get Stein back to hit me for game when we were both basically topdecking.
Record: 1-1 (3-2)
Round 3: Me vs. Juan Serna Daniel Table 54
I'm sorry Juan, but I don't remember very much of this match. I believe he was running Zombies and I think we went to game 3. I know I won game 1. That's all I can remember of this round.
Record: 2-1 (4-3)
Round 4: Me vs. Sam Tackett Table 52
This guy was a pretty good little kid with a pretty good deck. I win game 1 pretty quickly. Game 2 he wins pretty quickly. Game 3 I win not as quickly but I don't remember much of the match. Except that I know he was running warriors with Gravekeeper's Spy as well.
Record: 3-1 (6-4)
Round 5: Me vs. Marco Escamillo Table 49
I really didn't see much of Marco's deck. I pretty much owned him game 1 and game 2 with the Gearfried combos and Gearfried attacks. He had to call over a judge to make sure that the Smoke Grenade+Gearfried combo was ligit making him the first person to question it.
Record: 4-1 (8-4)
Round 6: Me vs. Tony Hunter Table 30 after repairings
Tony is at least a good player. He ended up Top 8'ing the Regional on Sunday. However, I get him good with Smoke Grenade and Blast with Chain both games. This match actually lasted around 20-25 minutes though. I win 2-0.
Record: 5-1 (10-4)
Round 7: Me vs. Giovanni Guida Table 15
I met Giovanni earlier and he had on a cool team shirt. It said "What would Yugi do?". I told him "Yugi would topdeck Pot of Greed, then Graceful, discarding Frog and Goldd". We both laugh. I pretty much own him game 1. Game 2 he tells me to go first. He Steins me his first turn and takes me down to 300 LP. I draw into nothing and he gets the win. Game 3 I finally decide to sidedeck; I side out Mask of Darkness and the Blast with Chains for 2 Waboku and Stein. Game 3 I start and activate RotA to get Gearfried and summon him to the field. I equip Smoke Grenade and see his horribly bad hand. He had 2 Trunade, Cylinder, Crossout, and one other magic card. I discard Cylinder. Gearfried gets him to 4400 by turn 5. He has 2 set cards and I active Storm. I flip summon DDWL and normal Breaker to attack for game. What a bad hand Giovanni had game 3.
Record: 6-1 (12-5)
Round 8: Me vs. James Naughton (
SJC Arlington Champion) Table 9
I knew James was a well known player when I read his name int he pairings. I could only remember that he top 8'd a SJC but I couldn't remember how well he did. I sit down and we talk for a bit. He tells me he won Arlington and then the lightbulb goes off in my head. Game 1 I go first, play Graceful, discarding Frog and Night Assailant. I activate RotA getting Gearfried. I summon him and set Blast with Chain. His turn he sets 1 back row and 1 monster and at his End phase I activate Blast and target his monster. I draw into Smoke Grenade and forget what I get rid of. Then attack with Gearfried and set some monster and 1 M/T. Eventually I own him after a few other turns with my aggressiveness. Game 2 I don't remember much. However, I had no trouble at all beating him again. I 2-0 him pretty quickly. After he loses his gets up and says this verbatim to his friend "You would not believe what he drew his first hand against me."
Record: 7-1 (14-5)
Round 9: Me vs. Chris Stegall Table
Feature Match
You can read how quickly my aggressiveness owned him 2-0 in this match. It lasted like 10 minutes. That's how my deck ran all day long.
So I find out that Kevin gets 19th place after losing to Jason Holloway. He was so close, and his round 2 loss should never have happened. However, I won't get into it because judges were involved and that's about all I can say online. However, I will say that the kid he played ended up getting DQ'd 2 rounds later (or so I thought he did until Simon told me he didn't). Sorry about that Simon, but Kevin tends to lie about situations that don't go his way a lot of the time.
So we go to eat at Wendy's and I call a few people. However, I forgot both of my phone chargers; so I don't talk as long as I wanted to. We go back to the hotel and I fall asleep around 1 AM. We get up at 7 AM and get to the Jump at about 8 AM. They finally open it up at like 9 AM. I get the top 8 decklists and just glance at them. I find out I'm the only one in top 8 not running Reaper. I also find out that 3 of the top 8 (myself, Jason, and Abel) weren't running Scapegoat.
Top 8 Round 10: Me vs. Mike Gonzales
It's a feature match, and discarding Mirror Force was a mistake in game 2; but I still should've won the match. I knew I could win game 3. I never side decked. I made 2 misplays in Game 3 though. I should have discared Heavy Storm with my Smoke Grenade instead of Brain Control. Then I could've set both Ring of Destruction and Mirror Force. However, I still could've won even though I made that misplay. All I had to do was Ring my Lily and not my Gearfried because I topdecked Premature Burial. Which means I would've won the duel the turn before he topdecks Mobius because I would have 2900 LP left instead of 500 LP left. I will be kicking myself for a while about my misplays; however, I just guess it wasn't meant to be. So I sell my Nintendo DS to Kevin for $80, open my packs and pull 7 rares and a Double Dude (worst pulls in a while). I also get the cool Shonen Jump hat.
Record: 8-2 (15-7)
About a half hour after losing in top 8, a parent comes over to me and talks to me about his son. He offers me $50 to tutor his son for half an hour. I go ahead and say yes. I come to find out that his son is Sam who I beat in round 4 of the Shonen. I end up finding out that he is running 3 Smashing Ground. I told him he should only run 2 of those at most; 3 never works for me. His deck was pretty solid but it had a few questionable cards. I told him he should just run what works for him and gave him my suggestions. Then we started dueling and he won the first game. However, he had to go play in the Regional because the pairing were up. I believe he ended up going X-2 at the Regional, but I'm not sure. I ended up playing like 20-30 matches during the Regional and only lost like 3. So the deck was running great for me.
So after Kevin goes 8-0 and top 8's the Regional and gives the kid a win so the kid he played could get his Nationals Invite; we go to leave. We get to Jake's car and it has a flat tire due to a nail. So we are stuck in Austin for another night because all the tire places were closed. I have to call work and let them know I can't work Monday and I'll be in Tuesday morning. The drive back lasts only like 13 hours because of less construction and most of the driving being at night. I played Jake's Pokemon Emerald on Kevin's Nintendo DS for like 3 or 4 hours on the way back (maybe more).
Props:
-My Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, our father the Lord, and the Holy Spirit. They were with Jake, Kevin, all the YGO players, and myself the whole weekend. I prayed for safe travels, look what happened. I prayed for noone to get their stuff stolen, look what happened. I prayed for Jake, Kevin, and I to play our best and not make mistakes; look what happened for the most part. If you don't believe in God; that's fine, let's just agree to disagree on religion. I have my belief and you have yours. Please don't make any comments on it that will lead to an arguement or debate about religion. This is just a tourney report; I'm just trying to exalt God the only way I know. He deserves the most credit for letting me be able to be so good at this game and think of this deck concept 2 days before the SJC.
-The variety of decks at the SJC.
-Getting top 8.
-Kevin winning a heck of a lot at the SJC and Regional.
-Jake for letting us use his car.
-The car being a stick shift so I didn't have to drive.
-I only heard of one theft during the whole SJC.
-The whole trip only cost me like $25 in the end.
-Only losing 3 duels (not matches) to Stein. Only losing 1 match to Stein.
-Only making 5 misplays in only 2 matches of 10 matches during the SJC.
-The judges kept the spectating down to a minimum all day.
-$50.00 for tutoring a cool kid.
-Mask of Darkness for letting me reuse Ring at least 40% of my duels. I'm glad I decided to keep Mask in the maindeck; almost thought about not running it.
-NTB fixing the tire at no charge.
-Dale Bellido for teaching my team founder Eddie Turks how to shuffle like a madman. Thanks a lot Dale; it has made all my decks run so much more smoothly. I think it showed at this Jump or maybe it was just the Meta.
-To the Mexicans who I talked to a heck of a lot on Saturday night and Sunday explaining the deck to them. One of them went x-2 and got like 14th place. On Sunday he sits down and plays me and beats me 2 matches in a row; mostly because Blowback got its effect off like 90% of the time. However, I didn't use Dale Bellido's shuffling method on Sunday (except in top 8) and I still won like 27 of 30 matches. Those Mexicans were cool and spoke English really well; I just wish I didn't forget so much Spanish for taking it 3 years in High School. That reminds me, High School was 5 years ago for me; I feel old.
-The deck is now nicknamed "Smokies and the Bandits". Gearfrieds=Smokies and Bandits=Smoke Grenades. LOL
I hope you all like the name.
Slops:
-Some of the judges didn't know some of the easier rulings that almost any player and definitely any judge should know; but it was pretty well judged other than that. I would say there were about 2 really good judges.
-Me not making at least top 4 and at least winning a PSP and iPod Nano.
-The meta seemed a lot easier than the St. Louis area Meta.
-Making 3 of my 5 misplays in the top 8.
-The flat tire.
-Losing 2 rounds because of my misplays. I didn't lose when I didn't misplay.
Questions or comments. Please let me know.
