Tournament Reports of EM 2010
Posted: Wed Jul 21, 2010 3:59 pm
Hi guys,
following my tourament report from the EC 2010 in Rom.
Semifinal on Saturday:
Because we where not enough players for 5 rounds semifinal was for the first time ever a 4 round tournament (i guess).
I played a balrog deck with bolg and buthrakaur Gathering information, allies and items in the lands around rohan.
Due to power enhancers deck likes to burn borderholds if possible. Meanwhile Balrog and friends do what the do in most balrog decks
(orks of moria, stinker, great shadow and than the final trip to the underleas for aiglos and black ancient axe).
Doeths only task is use voices of malice while make elevator traveling between moria and undergates.
1 Round:
I had some pairing luck, I faced Lucio from Italy who restarted playing Middle Earth again just some weeks ago.
He played a hero deck with cirdan, the elrond brothers and analena. Not really sure what his deck idea was, never saw it, I killed annalena and cirdan quickly, the final results was 45 to 12 or something like that, easy 6-0 start.
2 Round:
Next round the tournament got serious, I played against my buddy Antonio from spain, a good player, who played a Mordor squatter deck with hormurath (may be because of the extra card and the canceling unleashed cards, I would prefer Ren probably).
The game started better for me so he had always to catch up with my points. Futhermore he did a mistake with his agent cards (playing them not at hormuraths side, because he was not already in play at that turn I guess?!) and I played aiglos before him. SO without the faithless stewards and
the missing aiglos he fighted the whole game for a 2-4 defeats. I the end he was successful, I won only 37-25, 4:2, 1 point missing for a 5-1.
3 Round:
Wow, my german buddy and upcoming middle earth champion (we will see?!) Dominic (he just started 2,5 years ago playing middle earth) managed to
get 11(or 10?!) Points after 2 rounds. He played a very save but therefor quite slow freehold based Fallen Gandalf deck. In turn one I managed to
kill Dror but that was more or less the only hazard that really hurted him. At least I was able to slow him down and his draw wasn´t to strong.
My deck was running really good, little problems I had with getting a faction, but i managed it. In the end it was a 5-1 for me, did not remember
the concrete points, but it was nearer to a 4:2 than to a 6:0. Dominic wasn´t too disappointed and showed great fighting spirit in the last round
(which gave him a seat in the final 4!!!)
4 Round:
Last round started with following ranking: 1. Jordi 16 p. 2. Me 15 P. 3. Wolfgang (?) with 12 P. 4. Dominic and some other players with 11 points.
So a 4-2 or 2-4 would be enough for jordi and most probabbly for me as well. World Champion Jordi played his well know Fallen Alatar deck. Our last three
tourament games ended with a tie so we where both very confident to reach the finals. But during the game it became obvious that this time it would be no tie again.
I got a good start and Jordi had some problems with his drawing (no short rests) and my hazards ( I killed 2 characters at the beginning) as well. So I was clearly in the lead for the entire game (about 5:1, near to a 6:0). But in champion style he managed his problems and finally was able to reduce the result to a 2:4 defeat, what was good enough as said before.
Final Result semi final:
1. Heiner 19 P.
2. Jordi 18 P.
3. Wolfgang 17 P.
4. Dominic 17 P. or 16 P. do not know
Final on Sunday:
For the final on Sunday I adjusted my deck.
First I guessed that Jordi and Dominic would play Fallen again, so I throw out some nice hazards (Uvatha, Daelomin, Adunaphel Saruman, Pallando and two unexpected outposts) to put 2 eire, 2 blinds, 1 mask torn and 2 more foolish words directly in the deck. I thought that would give me 2 more or less sure wins over them.
So I expected Wolfgang to be my strongest opponent for the title, because he 1. is meanwhlie a very good player 2. has a very good hero deck (he beat me at german nationals with 4:2 it 3. would play hero, what means I had 5 completly useless hazards against him directlly in the deck.
On the ressource side I changed my deck to a Arthedain burner deck with 3 bold trusts, tempest of fire, rick burn..., a greater item for the stones
and people diminshed in the side board. This would gave me extra options for the games against jordi and dominic (espacially attacking and burning sides, where they played factions).
Unfortunately my meta game proved to be complet nonsense, all my opponents played hero deck, so I started with 5 useless hazards in each of my final games. At least Jordi did not changed his playing area Eriador, which got him into trouble as you later can read.
1 Round against Wolfgang:
At dinner the day before I oraceled to Wolfgang that our would be the deciding game of the final (if the other 2 will play FW)
and it proved that it was nearly right?!
Wolgang played a aragorn hobbot deck with To Fealty Sworn and return of the King. The game started good for me, in turn 1 I was able to kill Fatty with an Assasin.
Pitty that that was more or less the only thing that work good. My 2 Great Shadows in the deck did not want to show up so I had influnece problems for more or less the entire game and some nice hazards hit me quite hard (e.g. Landroval). So in few words both of us had our problems, what finally gave me a 25 - 21 (?!) lead before our both last turn.
The turn before Wolgang stopped me with 2 rivers at Amon Hen, where I could now play only 3 mp (makers map and regiment of crows). Balrog and company could move up to mount gundabad and play a mayor item (that i had to draw before)
My third company/doeth could primarly backup the playing of makers map and reginment at dimril dale what seams to risky in my eyes (because doth getting killed meaned also loosing stinker).
At Isengard I could play the warg king for an other 3 points (map, warg king, regiment and few recruits and additionally draw 2 more cards (to get a whctc and/or a major item).
It was more or less sure Wolgang would at least play an item (sam was nearly unstoppable) and Return of the king (no beorings in hand), probably a faction and may be some chance meatings I was afraid 28 points would not be enough for victory.
Futhermore I saw 2 rivers teh turn before so I thought that it was not to risky to move to isengard (big mistake as it proved later!).
So first I moved my amon hen company (Buthrakaur/Bolg and a hill troll). Hazard limit potentially 6 because of daelomin and power build !.
first Saruman (possible at amon hen as well), bolg and hill troll got tapped, buthratkaur untapped, than one Veils Flung away
(not possible when i did not moved!!!), a 10 against bolg dicarded and again an other Viles (lucky no serious damage happened).
Did not now where I played 2 points (either with the balrog or with buthrakaur, I ended up with 25 because I did not draw a whctc which would
have given me 4 extra points (Azog and warg king at Isengard). However 25:21 still after my turn.
On Wolfgangs turn nothing too spectacular happens, things developped as i guessed. My assasin stopped Aragorn by the costs of 2 kill points (forwarned was on the table) sam played his 2 point item and finally aragorn played return of the king. This made a 28:25 for Wolfgang, an earned victory for sure, may be he would have still won if I did not move (saruman was than still playable.
A whctc would have been the key for victory but i had still 8 cards in the deck and only 1 whctc in it, so chances where not too good.
In the other game Jordi and Dominic tied. I was not sure what me worried more, the news that they both play hero or my 2-4 defeat against Wolfgang ....
2 Round against Dominic:
I needed a win against Dominic in order to stay in the race for the title that was for sure, the higher the better! Dominic played a Thranduil/Gimli/Galdor deck that I played against WC 2009. Nearly 2 years ago it wasa n more or less easy 6:0 but this time it was different.
Dominic got a much more experienced player and this time I was not so lucky like 2 years before to kill thranduil in turn 1 !
I draw a great starting hand (balrog, moria orks and great shadow) but had a bad 1 turn. I missed the orks because foolish was in dominics starting hand and he put it of course on guard and my company was only was able to play a makers map at weathertop with whctc and weak ill fav. fellow (what gets lost during the game if he gets killed). Like the game before i face hard hazards (Cave worm and landroval if I remember right)
and it became clear my opponents did better meta game than me the night before . Next turn I got warg king but i missed few recruits needing a 4 and i was in trouble for that (lady was lying and no foolish in hand . Even worse was I had no ressources in hand to play in turn 3 so i decided to attack gimli at eagles ire what was complet rubish and very bad play because he was untapped and could choose attacking character!!! I was very lucky not to loose the warg king he was only wounded. oh man I played that turn really like an idiot.
The only good thing was that i was able to stop dominic quite good from playing mps and in my last turn I managed to play orks of moria, few recruits, aiglos and black ancient axe for 11 points. Dominic made a mistake allowing me playing both items, he could hindered me playing the black ancient axe. So finally it was 30 - 20 for me exactlly a 5-1. To be honest, Dominic deserved at least a 2-4 defeat and if could have stopped playing me a faction
(he did until last turn!)he would have won! So a bit lucky i won 5-1.
In the other game Wolfgang won 4 - 2 against Jordi (both sides where leading during that game as I heard). so before the last round every body had still chances to win the title
1. Wolfgang 8 P. 2. Me 7 P. 3. Jordi 5 P. 4. Dominic 4 P.
3 Round against Jordi:
In that game everything went against jordi from the beginning. I colleczted very quicklly mp and was able to wound his radagast and his main character train and kill gloin.
Except turn 1 where he was able to play the arkenstone with train and turn 2 where he played Tom he played more or less no mps.
Meanwhile I burned here and there attacked him with Hill Trolls and mountaiun Maggots (funny but not too sucsessfull, I lost 2 Killing mp and wounded only lobelia.
But as I said I was in a very comfortable lead during entire game (about 5-1 to 6-0). In the last turn radagast went alone for the elves of lindon, needing a 9 or higher to survive a rain drake (he made it!!!) but
than missed the influence check (needing a 4 or more). If he would have made it would have been only a 4-2 for me, because train survived the cc with the arkenstone at the council.
But even a 4-2 victory would have been enough for the title because, wolfgang lost against dominic 4-2 (there was a mistake last turn by wolfgang, but he or dominic should write about that??!!!).
So in the end I got EC, it was as tough as I thought to win the title, against to possible upcoming champoins like wolfgang and dominic and the actaul WC Jordi
(I think his hero deck was not good enough to win the title, but that may be only my impression because of our game).
Thanks to Bruno for the organisation of the event, Rome was great but as well a little bit (too) hot
Final result:
1. Heiner 12 Points
2. Wolfgang 10 Points
3. Dominic 8 Points
4. Jordi 6 Points
Hope to see a lot of players at the next important event the Worlds in Argentina!!!!
Sorry for the lots of mistakes that might be in the report, I just wrote the report top down and be too tired to check it before submiting (fear it would cost me an other hour , it is still too hot in germany for correction work .
Cheers
Heiner
following my tourament report from the EC 2010 in Rom.
Semifinal on Saturday:
Because we where not enough players for 5 rounds semifinal was for the first time ever a 4 round tournament (i guess).
I played a balrog deck with bolg and buthrakaur Gathering information, allies and items in the lands around rohan.
Due to power enhancers deck likes to burn borderholds if possible. Meanwhile Balrog and friends do what the do in most balrog decks
(orks of moria, stinker, great shadow and than the final trip to the underleas for aiglos and black ancient axe).
Doeths only task is use voices of malice while make elevator traveling between moria and undergates.
1 Round:
I had some pairing luck, I faced Lucio from Italy who restarted playing Middle Earth again just some weeks ago.
He played a hero deck with cirdan, the elrond brothers and analena. Not really sure what his deck idea was, never saw it, I killed annalena and cirdan quickly, the final results was 45 to 12 or something like that, easy 6-0 start.
2 Round:
Next round the tournament got serious, I played against my buddy Antonio from spain, a good player, who played a Mordor squatter deck with hormurath (may be because of the extra card and the canceling unleashed cards, I would prefer Ren probably).
The game started better for me so he had always to catch up with my points. Futhermore he did a mistake with his agent cards (playing them not at hormuraths side, because he was not already in play at that turn I guess?!) and I played aiglos before him. SO without the faithless stewards and
the missing aiglos he fighted the whole game for a 2-4 defeats. I the end he was successful, I won only 37-25, 4:2, 1 point missing for a 5-1.
3 Round:
Wow, my german buddy and upcoming middle earth champion (we will see?!) Dominic (he just started 2,5 years ago playing middle earth) managed to
get 11(or 10?!) Points after 2 rounds. He played a very save but therefor quite slow freehold based Fallen Gandalf deck. In turn one I managed to
kill Dror but that was more or less the only hazard that really hurted him. At least I was able to slow him down and his draw wasn´t to strong.
My deck was running really good, little problems I had with getting a faction, but i managed it. In the end it was a 5-1 for me, did not remember
the concrete points, but it was nearer to a 4:2 than to a 6:0. Dominic wasn´t too disappointed and showed great fighting spirit in the last round
(which gave him a seat in the final 4!!!)
4 Round:
Last round started with following ranking: 1. Jordi 16 p. 2. Me 15 P. 3. Wolfgang (?) with 12 P. 4. Dominic and some other players with 11 points.
So a 4-2 or 2-4 would be enough for jordi and most probabbly for me as well. World Champion Jordi played his well know Fallen Alatar deck. Our last three
tourament games ended with a tie so we where both very confident to reach the finals. But during the game it became obvious that this time it would be no tie again.
I got a good start and Jordi had some problems with his drawing (no short rests) and my hazards ( I killed 2 characters at the beginning) as well. So I was clearly in the lead for the entire game (about 5:1, near to a 6:0). But in champion style he managed his problems and finally was able to reduce the result to a 2:4 defeat, what was good enough as said before.
Final Result semi final:
1. Heiner 19 P.
2. Jordi 18 P.
3. Wolfgang 17 P.
4. Dominic 17 P. or 16 P. do not know
Final on Sunday:
For the final on Sunday I adjusted my deck.
First I guessed that Jordi and Dominic would play Fallen again, so I throw out some nice hazards (Uvatha, Daelomin, Adunaphel Saruman, Pallando and two unexpected outposts) to put 2 eire, 2 blinds, 1 mask torn and 2 more foolish words directly in the deck. I thought that would give me 2 more or less sure wins over them.
So I expected Wolfgang to be my strongest opponent for the title, because he 1. is meanwhlie a very good player 2. has a very good hero deck (he beat me at german nationals with 4:2 it 3. would play hero, what means I had 5 completly useless hazards against him directlly in the deck.
On the ressource side I changed my deck to a Arthedain burner deck with 3 bold trusts, tempest of fire, rick burn..., a greater item for the stones
and people diminshed in the side board. This would gave me extra options for the games against jordi and dominic (espacially attacking and burning sides, where they played factions).
Unfortunately my meta game proved to be complet nonsense, all my opponents played hero deck, so I started with 5 useless hazards in each of my final games. At least Jordi did not changed his playing area Eriador, which got him into trouble as you later can read.
1 Round against Wolfgang:
At dinner the day before I oraceled to Wolfgang that our would be the deciding game of the final (if the other 2 will play FW)
and it proved that it was nearly right?!
Wolgang played a aragorn hobbot deck with To Fealty Sworn and return of the King. The game started good for me, in turn 1 I was able to kill Fatty with an Assasin.
Pitty that that was more or less the only thing that work good. My 2 Great Shadows in the deck did not want to show up so I had influnece problems for more or less the entire game and some nice hazards hit me quite hard (e.g. Landroval). So in few words both of us had our problems, what finally gave me a 25 - 21 (?!) lead before our both last turn.
The turn before Wolgang stopped me with 2 rivers at Amon Hen, where I could now play only 3 mp (makers map and regiment of crows). Balrog and company could move up to mount gundabad and play a mayor item (that i had to draw before)
My third company/doeth could primarly backup the playing of makers map and reginment at dimril dale what seams to risky in my eyes (because doth getting killed meaned also loosing stinker).
At Isengard I could play the warg king for an other 3 points (map, warg king, regiment and few recruits and additionally draw 2 more cards (to get a whctc and/or a major item).
It was more or less sure Wolgang would at least play an item (sam was nearly unstoppable) and Return of the king (no beorings in hand), probably a faction and may be some chance meatings I was afraid 28 points would not be enough for victory.
Futhermore I saw 2 rivers teh turn before so I thought that it was not to risky to move to isengard (big mistake as it proved later!).
So first I moved my amon hen company (Buthrakaur/Bolg and a hill troll). Hazard limit potentially 6 because of daelomin and power build !.
first Saruman (possible at amon hen as well), bolg and hill troll got tapped, buthratkaur untapped, than one Veils Flung away
(not possible when i did not moved!!!), a 10 against bolg dicarded and again an other Viles (lucky no serious damage happened).
Did not now where I played 2 points (either with the balrog or with buthrakaur, I ended up with 25 because I did not draw a whctc which would
have given me 4 extra points (Azog and warg king at Isengard). However 25:21 still after my turn.
On Wolfgangs turn nothing too spectacular happens, things developped as i guessed. My assasin stopped Aragorn by the costs of 2 kill points (forwarned was on the table) sam played his 2 point item and finally aragorn played return of the king. This made a 28:25 for Wolfgang, an earned victory for sure, may be he would have still won if I did not move (saruman was than still playable.
A whctc would have been the key for victory but i had still 8 cards in the deck and only 1 whctc in it, so chances where not too good.
In the other game Jordi and Dominic tied. I was not sure what me worried more, the news that they both play hero or my 2-4 defeat against Wolfgang ....
2 Round against Dominic:
I needed a win against Dominic in order to stay in the race for the title that was for sure, the higher the better! Dominic played a Thranduil/Gimli/Galdor deck that I played against WC 2009. Nearly 2 years ago it wasa n more or less easy 6:0 but this time it was different.
Dominic got a much more experienced player and this time I was not so lucky like 2 years before to kill thranduil in turn 1 !
I draw a great starting hand (balrog, moria orks and great shadow) but had a bad 1 turn. I missed the orks because foolish was in dominics starting hand and he put it of course on guard and my company was only was able to play a makers map at weathertop with whctc and weak ill fav. fellow (what gets lost during the game if he gets killed). Like the game before i face hard hazards (Cave worm and landroval if I remember right)
and it became clear my opponents did better meta game than me the night before . Next turn I got warg king but i missed few recruits needing a 4 and i was in trouble for that (lady was lying and no foolish in hand . Even worse was I had no ressources in hand to play in turn 3 so i decided to attack gimli at eagles ire what was complet rubish and very bad play because he was untapped and could choose attacking character!!! I was very lucky not to loose the warg king he was only wounded. oh man I played that turn really like an idiot.
The only good thing was that i was able to stop dominic quite good from playing mps and in my last turn I managed to play orks of moria, few recruits, aiglos and black ancient axe for 11 points. Dominic made a mistake allowing me playing both items, he could hindered me playing the black ancient axe. So finally it was 30 - 20 for me exactlly a 5-1. To be honest, Dominic deserved at least a 2-4 defeat and if could have stopped playing me a faction
(he did until last turn!)he would have won! So a bit lucky i won 5-1.
In the other game Wolfgang won 4 - 2 against Jordi (both sides where leading during that game as I heard). so before the last round every body had still chances to win the title
1. Wolfgang 8 P. 2. Me 7 P. 3. Jordi 5 P. 4. Dominic 4 P.
3 Round against Jordi:
In that game everything went against jordi from the beginning. I colleczted very quicklly mp and was able to wound his radagast and his main character train and kill gloin.
Except turn 1 where he was able to play the arkenstone with train and turn 2 where he played Tom he played more or less no mps.
Meanwhile I burned here and there attacked him with Hill Trolls and mountaiun Maggots (funny but not too sucsessfull, I lost 2 Killing mp and wounded only lobelia.
But as I said I was in a very comfortable lead during entire game (about 5-1 to 6-0). In the last turn radagast went alone for the elves of lindon, needing a 9 or higher to survive a rain drake (he made it!!!) but
than missed the influence check (needing a 4 or more). If he would have made it would have been only a 4-2 for me, because train survived the cc with the arkenstone at the council.
But even a 4-2 victory would have been enough for the title because, wolfgang lost against dominic 4-2 (there was a mistake last turn by wolfgang, but he or dominic should write about that??!!!).
So in the end I got EC, it was as tough as I thought to win the title, against to possible upcoming champoins like wolfgang and dominic and the actaul WC Jordi
(I think his hero deck was not good enough to win the title, but that may be only my impression because of our game).
Thanks to Bruno for the organisation of the event, Rome was great but as well a little bit (too) hot
Final result:
1. Heiner 12 Points
2. Wolfgang 10 Points
3. Dominic 8 Points
4. Jordi 6 Points
Hope to see a lot of players at the next important event the Worlds in Argentina!!!!
Sorry for the lots of mistakes that might be in the report, I just wrote the report top down and be too tired to check it before submiting (fear it would cost me an other hour , it is still too hot in germany for correction work .
Cheers
Heiner