Post by BioLogIn on Dec 9, 2008 5:48:25 GMT -5
Disclaimer:
I was going to make a good overview of all my tourney games and draw some interesting conclusions from it ) Unfortunately, it proved to be more time-consuming then I considered it to be, and I have more work then I expected to. Text editor crash that killed descriptions of games 10 and 11 didn't helped either. So I decided to post it 'as is', hoping it would be and interesting reading nevertheless. However I'm not quite sure Warlocks game overview may be interesting reading at all ))), and I'm not confident about my ability to write good reports in English, so... please give your feedback if you liked it or if it was total waste ) Of course, tactical and in-game discussion are very welcome, since I was really in hurry when I wrote some parts of this text.
====
Okay, let's get going. I didn't manage to attend Tourney 2007, founding Refuge a week later then it has started. I participated in "secondary tourney", only to be knocked out from the first round by Vermont (who vent on to win this thing). I was only like 1650+ back then, however.
I approached 2008 Tourney dropping like 70 ELO from 2020+ down to ~1950, losing games left and right. I wasn't worrying too much, because (as some of you might know already), I have to play some games half-hearted to be able to concentrate on important games. I was sure I can beat every tourney contestant, be I also knew there are at least 5 players that can beat me. But I really wanted to give it by best and try to enter top2.
With all that in mind, I approached pairings for round one: therealest, rasteroid and awall.
01_therealest_66936.htm
Well, basically that was the only opponent my that was below 1750. He was using D/P in all previous games, and I was sure I'll be able to handle D/P mirror. However, I noticed that he used to DPP self quite a lot, so I decided to act a little weird, and gave up on the initiative with DPW/PSD. He didn't DPP self after all =) And lead into double charm faking first into DSFW. However, he totally lost the tempo with consecutive WW/W instead of going offensive with DFF, so I had some time to stabilize. Goblin worth 3 HP for me, and my opponent decided to go invis at cost of being charmed... I was preparing some cures\counters, but suddenly my opponent decides to storm, laying his spellflow open and bringing life totals to 10-9. Since I already had PWP at hand, I had no reasons not to follow with paraFoD, which could have been single 50-50 should my opponent reacted timely... he didn't.
02_rasteroid_66937.htm
Rasteroid was quite on fire for a while before tourney, getting a few games over xade, succat and myself, so I wasn't taking him lightly at all. He was using F/P quite a lot, and I knew a few tricks for F/P mirror, so I decided to open with F/P as well.
He opens with F/P, and seeing my FP/PS he makes some strange play like FFF/PWP with T3 para at nobody... probably to have a shot at para my F on T4. However, this is fine with me, as I have 2 F's on T4... which leaves me with DFF and initiative. He assimes I'll go for DFFDD, which results in me breaking his parachain with my own. He summons goblin and I summon an ogre, and then he commits to try and kill ogre with goblin and stab... overly expensive for him as I para goblin and ogre survives. I outguess him with targets a few times (possibly the key moment of this game), as ogre deal 2 damage and kills goblin, leaving me with para and monster. He finally rids of ogre with another para a turm before my charm... sweet free bolts.
Another judgement call comes on turn 24, when I go goblin+invis allowing him to resolve a haste. He has to move into double SFW facing my fear, which hits him on second turn. When dust clears, he is left with a goblin, but accepts my charm. I'm not willing to part with my HP advantage, as he fires a number of disruption (including double SWD) at me, so I just carefully dance with W's and P's. He decides to move to offence with DSFFFc... clearly a misplay as I charm him again and remove it, meanwhile killing a goblin and bringing life totals to 12-7. Another gobling trade for my WPFD and it is 11-4... after which it was just a matter of turns before he surrenders.
03_awall_66939.htm
Awall wasn't at the top of his game lately, but he was the winner of 2007 tourney, so he wasn't an easy opponent either. I guessed he was going to open with F/S, and again chose to mirror it. But I'm not quite sure why I decided do act weird with LH:FPP... not really proud of that one =) It all results in goblin war (everyone died). However, Awall doesn't fell like keeping para string for some aestetical reasons, so he aborts it on T13 with double D. We both fake invis a few turns later.
He nicely clears his own gobbie on T22 just to pull out an ogre a few turns later. Combined with his parastring is could get very nasty, but I was able to convert a WWP into an ogre of mine, when... awall paralyzes his own ogre!
A few turns later awall deals with my ogre, but not before I have WWP and life totals are 12-6 in my favor. I've gone totally defensive for quite a while, awall streaming threats from both hands. He doesn't use DSF's or FoD, so I just wiggle until I get a clear shot at ogre. I considered throwing wounds at awall, which would lead to 10-2 and him up an ogre, but that was leaving things up in the air. awall gets in position from where he can troll\bolt with me having only one counter... possibly leading to me going down to 7. But suddenly he moves into FFFF/PSDP... WTF? There was no threat in this parachain. After that, it is all down to having 7hp advantage and playing around wounds and storms... hard to get out of it, and awall didn't.
So I managed to clear first round perfectly, but I wasn't all excited. I knew that rounds 2 and 3 would be tougher.
Round 2 pairings were much tougher: 12, tchichi and xade
04_12_67142.htm
Next was 12, who was shaking off his rust pretty fast. But be appeared to be unready for D/P vs F/S, and made some T4 misplay, resulting in him being C-paraed and them charmed. I move to classic DFFDD\FPSFW vs his lone counter, and he decides to counter bolt... I'd have countered the troll. Yes, he had WWP to play around and move to double charm, but I had time to build defences in form of counter+parastring... and still he tries to take troll twice. Oh well, that's a troll+parachain. I have plenty of time to fake a FoD to get him out of his defence. After heavy wounds and another failed attempt to steal troll, he surrenders.
05_tchichi_67143.htm
Master Tchichi opened with D/P... so did I, because I had some ideas about D/P loop mirror. However, I wasn't destined to test it here, because he moves into D-invis. I respond in a "classical" way descibed by Slarty (double ogre+charm), he insists on banking antispell, I'm going invis with ogre and being 6hp up. I keep him occupied with SWDSF, while other hand fakes FoD (he sees PxPF). But it appeared to be PSPFP, so he is hit with anti-spell while going for S/S. Trying to recover he aims for the ogre and faces double wounds... surrender in 22 turns. I guess we wasn't reading up on the Refuge.
06_xade_67130.htm
This was what I expected to be one of the toughest games... And I was not mistaken.
He uses DS/PS opening VS my F/S, so we quickly fold to turn 5, where I have to abandon para to protect self from DFFDD. xade decides to cast decease, which I promptly cure. xade doesn't follow with dispel (which was right thing to do), so I meet it with FFF/PWP. I follow into some crappy double 50-50 FoD and guess first coinflip. I 'lose' the second, but xade decides to make it BIG and throws SWD at me... 6 hp down from FSSDD. A few DPP's and tons of para later, it is his turn to threat me with paraFoD. He doesn't target para at nobody at the right moment, and I go for SPFP, so that was a short story.
So we're back into game with life totals 13-7 in my favor, but xade pulled an ogre out. But he was fast to assume I was going to storm us down, and prepared stab+storm on his own to take us down. The problem was I wasn't going to storm yet, and cast WWP instead, taking the ogre down in next few turns. From there on, it was a matter of time before xade surrendered.
So I approached Round 3 without losing a single point. I knew that if I'll be able to play it well, I'll guarantee myself getting a slot in top-4. But I knew I'll face Toyo, and he always was one of my toughest opponents.
07_redspectra_67336.htm
Well, it was quite short. He really summoned an ogre off Dxx/PSFW, I was glad to take it from FFF/SPSDD. He defended in quite passive way (off PSDDWPP), so I just took slow and 100% FoD.
08_vermont_67338.htm
Both chose D/P as an opening... however, Vermont found it too boring, so moved into trading blindness for Troll. Troll got PDWP'd two turns later, and I had to guess what Vermont has in store for last blindness turn. I called Magic Mirror right, faked DFFD into DSF+WPFD in the other hand, and coupled with a hit from troll it was an uphill battle for Vermont.
09_toyotami_67337.htm
Well, my krypto was kinda last obstacle between me and top-4 =) Not to mention that Toyo is probably the most skilled and experienced of all recently active players. So this was going to be a hard battle indeed.
I knew he would start with S/P. I decided to stay classic and opened with D/P.
He moves into SFW/PWP, and blocks first missle only to let me steal the gobbie. Gobbie was short-lived indeed, and died a few turns later. I tried to force disruption exchange on turn 7, but Toyo didn't accept it. I'm not quite sure T8 RH:S was a strong play for him, but I guess he wanted a monster out really bad. I abandoned parachain as soon as I saw an opening for it, but I already lost 2HP to random goblins. Toyo decided to amplify his life advantage and wounded me for another two, bringing life totals to 15-11. Seein his defensive position on WW/P, I promptly jumped on disruption to grab initiative advantage... which worked in a way - I've got shot at single 50-50 FOD, but lost another 2 HP. I've lost 50\50, but I had built-in FSSDD, and Toyo decided it is not worth risking dying to FFFC/FoD, so by turn 21 we're even at 9 HP with me having slightly better spellflow.
We fake a few charms here and there, until I manage to pull an ogre on T37, and I was facing Toyo's charm having only one counter to protect my and my ogre. Classic play would be to counter at ogre and let Toyo's charm through. However, I had WW on the other hand, and ogre was down to 1 hp already. I figured that even is Toyo will charm ogre, my WWP and upcoming double charm will deal with Toyo (his spellflow damaged by possible PSDD). But Toyo elected to play 'safe' and tried to charm me... only to meet my counter. From here on I tried to walk extremely safe, trying to break Toyo's spellflow on all occasions (he blocked like two charms). Eventually I got parachain going, and got him off balance with another faked FoD. Which works in a way - he takes 5 on turn 51 while attempting to stab me into 5hp zone... only to surrender a few turns later.
So, after Round 3 I was 9-0-0, and basically guaranteed myself a slot in top-4. I still had to play succat, but I was sure that I'll be able to win at very least one of three games to make it in.
(to be continued?)
I was going to make a good overview of all my tourney games and draw some interesting conclusions from it ) Unfortunately, it proved to be more time-consuming then I considered it to be, and I have more work then I expected to. Text editor crash that killed descriptions of games 10 and 11 didn't helped either. So I decided to post it 'as is', hoping it would be and interesting reading nevertheless. However I'm not quite sure Warlocks game overview may be interesting reading at all ))), and I'm not confident about my ability to write good reports in English, so... please give your feedback if you liked it or if it was total waste ) Of course, tactical and in-game discussion are very welcome, since I was really in hurry when I wrote some parts of this text.
====
Okay, let's get going. I didn't manage to attend Tourney 2007, founding Refuge a week later then it has started. I participated in "secondary tourney", only to be knocked out from the first round by Vermont (who vent on to win this thing). I was only like 1650+ back then, however.
I approached 2008 Tourney dropping like 70 ELO from 2020+ down to ~1950, losing games left and right. I wasn't worrying too much, because (as some of you might know already), I have to play some games half-hearted to be able to concentrate on important games. I was sure I can beat every tourney contestant, be I also knew there are at least 5 players that can beat me. But I really wanted to give it by best and try to enter top2.
With all that in mind, I approached pairings for round one: therealest, rasteroid and awall.
01_therealest_66936.htm
Well, basically that was the only opponent my that was below 1750. He was using D/P in all previous games, and I was sure I'll be able to handle D/P mirror. However, I noticed that he used to DPP self quite a lot, so I decided to act a little weird, and gave up on the initiative with DPW/PSD. He didn't DPP self after all =) And lead into double charm faking first into DSFW. However, he totally lost the tempo with consecutive WW/W instead of going offensive with DFF, so I had some time to stabilize. Goblin worth 3 HP for me, and my opponent decided to go invis at cost of being charmed... I was preparing some cures\counters, but suddenly my opponent decides to storm, laying his spellflow open and bringing life totals to 10-9. Since I already had PWP at hand, I had no reasons not to follow with paraFoD, which could have been single 50-50 should my opponent reacted timely... he didn't.
02_rasteroid_66937.htm
Rasteroid was quite on fire for a while before tourney, getting a few games over xade, succat and myself, so I wasn't taking him lightly at all. He was using F/P quite a lot, and I knew a few tricks for F/P mirror, so I decided to open with F/P as well.
He opens with F/P, and seeing my FP/PS he makes some strange play like FFF/PWP with T3 para at nobody... probably to have a shot at para my F on T4. However, this is fine with me, as I have 2 F's on T4... which leaves me with DFF and initiative. He assimes I'll go for DFFDD, which results in me breaking his parachain with my own. He summons goblin and I summon an ogre, and then he commits to try and kill ogre with goblin and stab... overly expensive for him as I para goblin and ogre survives. I outguess him with targets a few times (possibly the key moment of this game), as ogre deal 2 damage and kills goblin, leaving me with para and monster. He finally rids of ogre with another para a turm before my charm... sweet free bolts.
Another judgement call comes on turn 24, when I go goblin+invis allowing him to resolve a haste. He has to move into double SFW facing my fear, which hits him on second turn. When dust clears, he is left with a goblin, but accepts my charm. I'm not willing to part with my HP advantage, as he fires a number of disruption (including double SWD) at me, so I just carefully dance with W's and P's. He decides to move to offence with DSFFFc... clearly a misplay as I charm him again and remove it, meanwhile killing a goblin and bringing life totals to 12-7. Another gobling trade for my WPFD and it is 11-4... after which it was just a matter of turns before he surrenders.
03_awall_66939.htm
Awall wasn't at the top of his game lately, but he was the winner of 2007 tourney, so he wasn't an easy opponent either. I guessed he was going to open with F/S, and again chose to mirror it. But I'm not quite sure why I decided do act weird with LH:FPP... not really proud of that one =) It all results in goblin war (everyone died). However, Awall doesn't fell like keeping para string for some aestetical reasons, so he aborts it on T13 with double D. We both fake invis a few turns later.
He nicely clears his own gobbie on T22 just to pull out an ogre a few turns later. Combined with his parastring is could get very nasty, but I was able to convert a WWP into an ogre of mine, when... awall paralyzes his own ogre!
A few turns later awall deals with my ogre, but not before I have WWP and life totals are 12-6 in my favor. I've gone totally defensive for quite a while, awall streaming threats from both hands. He doesn't use DSF's or FoD, so I just wiggle until I get a clear shot at ogre. I considered throwing wounds at awall, which would lead to 10-2 and him up an ogre, but that was leaving things up in the air. awall gets in position from where he can troll\bolt with me having only one counter... possibly leading to me going down to 7. But suddenly he moves into FFFF/PSDP... WTF? There was no threat in this parachain. After that, it is all down to having 7hp advantage and playing around wounds and storms... hard to get out of it, and awall didn't.
So I managed to clear first round perfectly, but I wasn't all excited. I knew that rounds 2 and 3 would be tougher.
Round 2 pairings were much tougher: 12, tchichi and xade
04_12_67142.htm
Next was 12, who was shaking off his rust pretty fast. But be appeared to be unready for D/P vs F/S, and made some T4 misplay, resulting in him being C-paraed and them charmed. I move to classic DFFDD\FPSFW vs his lone counter, and he decides to counter bolt... I'd have countered the troll. Yes, he had WWP to play around and move to double charm, but I had time to build defences in form of counter+parastring... and still he tries to take troll twice. Oh well, that's a troll+parachain. I have plenty of time to fake a FoD to get him out of his defence. After heavy wounds and another failed attempt to steal troll, he surrenders.
05_tchichi_67143.htm
Master Tchichi opened with D/P... so did I, because I had some ideas about D/P loop mirror. However, I wasn't destined to test it here, because he moves into D-invis. I respond in a "classical" way descibed by Slarty (double ogre+charm), he insists on banking antispell, I'm going invis with ogre and being 6hp up. I keep him occupied with SWDSF, while other hand fakes FoD (he sees PxPF). But it appeared to be PSPFP, so he is hit with anti-spell while going for S/S. Trying to recover he aims for the ogre and faces double wounds... surrender in 22 turns. I guess we wasn't reading up on the Refuge.
06_xade_67130.htm
This was what I expected to be one of the toughest games... And I was not mistaken.
He uses DS/PS opening VS my F/S, so we quickly fold to turn 5, where I have to abandon para to protect self from DFFDD. xade decides to cast decease, which I promptly cure. xade doesn't follow with dispel (which was right thing to do), so I meet it with FFF/PWP. I follow into some crappy double 50-50 FoD and guess first coinflip. I 'lose' the second, but xade decides to make it BIG and throws SWD at me... 6 hp down from FSSDD. A few DPP's and tons of para later, it is his turn to threat me with paraFoD. He doesn't target para at nobody at the right moment, and I go for SPFP, so that was a short story.
So we're back into game with life totals 13-7 in my favor, but xade pulled an ogre out. But he was fast to assume I was going to storm us down, and prepared stab+storm on his own to take us down. The problem was I wasn't going to storm yet, and cast WWP instead, taking the ogre down in next few turns. From there on, it was a matter of time before xade surrendered.
So I approached Round 3 without losing a single point. I knew that if I'll be able to play it well, I'll guarantee myself getting a slot in top-4. But I knew I'll face Toyo, and he always was one of my toughest opponents.
07_redspectra_67336.htm
Well, it was quite short. He really summoned an ogre off Dxx/PSFW, I was glad to take it from FFF/SPSDD. He defended in quite passive way (off PSDDWPP), so I just took slow and 100% FoD.
08_vermont_67338.htm
Both chose D/P as an opening... however, Vermont found it too boring, so moved into trading blindness for Troll. Troll got PDWP'd two turns later, and I had to guess what Vermont has in store for last blindness turn. I called Magic Mirror right, faked DFFD into DSF+WPFD in the other hand, and coupled with a hit from troll it was an uphill battle for Vermont.
09_toyotami_67337.htm
Well, my krypto was kinda last obstacle between me and top-4 =) Not to mention that Toyo is probably the most skilled and experienced of all recently active players. So this was going to be a hard battle indeed.
I knew he would start with S/P. I decided to stay classic and opened with D/P.
He moves into SFW/PWP, and blocks first missle only to let me steal the gobbie. Gobbie was short-lived indeed, and died a few turns later. I tried to force disruption exchange on turn 7, but Toyo didn't accept it. I'm not quite sure T8 RH:S was a strong play for him, but I guess he wanted a monster out really bad. I abandoned parachain as soon as I saw an opening for it, but I already lost 2HP to random goblins. Toyo decided to amplify his life advantage and wounded me for another two, bringing life totals to 15-11. Seein his defensive position on WW/P, I promptly jumped on disruption to grab initiative advantage... which worked in a way - I've got shot at single 50-50 FOD, but lost another 2 HP. I've lost 50\50, but I had built-in FSSDD, and Toyo decided it is not worth risking dying to FFFC/FoD, so by turn 21 we're even at 9 HP with me having slightly better spellflow.
We fake a few charms here and there, until I manage to pull an ogre on T37, and I was facing Toyo's charm having only one counter to protect my and my ogre. Classic play would be to counter at ogre and let Toyo's charm through. However, I had WW on the other hand, and ogre was down to 1 hp already. I figured that even is Toyo will charm ogre, my WWP and upcoming double charm will deal with Toyo (his spellflow damaged by possible PSDD). But Toyo elected to play 'safe' and tried to charm me... only to meet my counter. From here on I tried to walk extremely safe, trying to break Toyo's spellflow on all occasions (he blocked like two charms). Eventually I got parachain going, and got him off balance with another faked FoD. Which works in a way - he takes 5 on turn 51 while attempting to stab me into 5hp zone... only to surrender a few turns later.
So, after Round 3 I was 9-0-0, and basically guaranteed myself a slot in top-4. I still had to play succat, but I was sure that I'll be able to win at very least one of three games to make it in.
(to be continued?)
