We really got back into the swing of things this week. We got to 2 armories and had our highest value card pull so far! Check out the Cardboard section for that.
Also we had a really successful armory so read about that below as well.
News
I think that LSS are having an extended festive break as there’s not been much news. There has been an announcement about how you receive any monetary prizes but let’s be honest I’m not going to be winning any of those anytime soon. But my daughter…..
Emptying The Wallet
There was a question on Reddit asking how people sort their cards. I noticed someone had these coloured dividers. Until now I’ve been using coloured paper which is floppy and not that secure. I was pointed to Ultimate Guard Flex Card Dividers and bought 6 packs of 10 from Goblin Games for $43.94.
On the event entry side of things we had $15x2 for Card Merchant Hamilton Armory and $6x2 for Gateway Games Armory for a total of $42. Meaning we are $43.94 + $42 = $85.94 for the week.
Also $131.70 on a Pokemon deck, sleeves and event entry but that’s not part of a FAB Journey. Or at least the main path….
Armory
First up was Card Merchant Hamilton on Tuesday night. After 2 weeks of no armories who would I get matched up with first?
My daughter, back playing her Ira deck after playing Slippy towards the end of last year. She really enjoyed playing her main deck again and I predictably lost. I was made to go first and had no auras to setup so a bad start. I got behind on life and never could claw it back. Even when I could deliver 15 damage she was able to take it all and maintain momentum.
Next up I was against Ettie playing Fang. Ettie is someone that I have had several draws against and we very nearly ended up there again! I managed to land some big hits and also a Tear Asunder/Thump combo making Ettie discard 3 cards. In the end we got the time warning and I was able to get the win with the last turn of the game with me down to 2 life.
Finally I played Karl with his Bolton armory deck. It wasn’t until afterwards chatting that I realised it wasn’t a tuned deck. He’s only been playing a few weeks and has cards in the post to build his first proper deck. I was surprised when he threw all his armour in the way of my first big attack! It did allow him to stock up his soul though and go again wasn’t going to be a problem for the rest of the game. I had some bad all red and all aura hands which didn’t help matters and I ended the night 1-2.
On Friday night it was Gateway Games. First up it was Matt playing Arakni and things were going ok at first. A couple of rounds of Thump being boosted just the 1 point by The Suspense Is Killing Me. This is a suspense aura that I’ve added back in recently and these little pumps to activate Thump really showed it’s worth. I was all setup to destroy his Flick Knives with Colossal Bearing when an untimely banishment of the Blue card from my hand ruined everything. From there the disruption got to me and I lost the game.
Next up it was James with Gravy who I’ve faced a few times now. Turn 2 I had an Act Of Glory, Edge Of Their Seats and Tension In The Air all pop for +15. Unfortunately James had Chum on the board meaning that I had to attack his ally and not him directly. All that setup wasted. I did try to keep killing his allies with the aim of wearing him down but I wasn’t able to do it quickly enough and kept taking damage. He won with 31 life. Hammerings don’t get much bigger.
Finally I played the other James (who’s leaving party it was) with Prism. It became very apparent why people say that a necromancer is just a shadow illusionist. When you’re playing them Dead Threads does feel very much like Celestial Kimono. This was another game where I lost it a longtime before the game actually ended. We weren’t playing with time limits so I think I’d normally have got the draw. Early it looked ok as I quickly got him down to 22 but from then on he didn’t take any damage. I spent the whole time killing auras or heralds with him getting the occasional damage getting through. It’s that occasional damage which is why this game took soooo long.
I end the night 0-4. My daughter on the other hand won her first armory!!!! Yup that’s right she went 4-0 playing Ira. Hence why we might need to be setting her up for cash prizes way before I need to worry about it :)
Cardboard
At Card Merchant Hamilton we chose The Hunted for our packs as usual. We pulled a Blood Splattered Cloak but not just any Blood Splattered Cloak but an extended art cold foil version!
We already have a Rainbow Foil Blood Splattered Cloak that we traded for at the Rotorua Christmas Party. The question is do we upgrade and trade the RF or trade the CF?
The aim is to trade the new EA CF which on Collectr has a value of $183. We’re looking to getting (all None Foil):
* Mask Of Momentum $101
* Ancestral Empowerment $16x2=$32
* Tarantula Toxin $20x3=$60
* Kiss Of Death $18x3=$54
Clearly we can’t get all of those but some sort of combination of the above would be good.
The other packs didn’t yield anything else really of interest. There were a few extended art cards from the GEM packs but nothing more than a little bling for ordinary cards.
Meta Matters
I forgot to record the meta for Card Merchant Hamilton. There were only 7 of us and between my daughter and I, the heroes we remember are:
* Pleiades
* Ira
* Fang
* Bolton
* Teklovossen
* Rhinar
* Florian
So a very diverse meta and Karl on Bolton is planing on building a Dorinthea deck so more variety.
Gateway Games was 11 heroes across 12 decks:
* Pleiades
* Ira
* Gravey
* Arakni Marionet x2
* Osilio
* Fai
* Visserai
* Florian
* Puffin
* Prism
Across 17 decks that’s 15 different heroes with only Arakni Marionet and Florian doubling up. I still maintain that the meta at the local level at least, is in a great diverse place.
What’s Coming Up?
Next week we probably won’t be making any armories due to family commitments. However on Saturday it is our first RTN (Road To Nationals) at Card Merchant Hamilton and the following weekend on the Sunday we have RTN at Gateway Games.
At the end of the month it’s the big one!!! C*lling Taihape (which isn’t in Taihape but why let details get in the way of a good name?).
