# Torrance 'Fist - March 1999

by Stefan Vincent
March 14, 1999

Coastal Games, Saturday, March 13th
Multiplayer, Sealed Deck, booster draft

### The Cast:

`Tim McCann, drafting Dragons, Lotus and Architects`
`Matt Widmann, "Big Gay Al's Big Gay Deck" drafting Hand and Lotus (like last time)`
`Ray Clouse, drafting Dragons and Architects and a few Jammers`
`Stefan Vincent, "Strange Bedfellows," drafting Ascended and Lotus`
`Victor Luk, drafting a lot of stuff`
`Lissa Vincent, "Homo Horror," drafting Architects and Lotus`

As usual, everybody started with a sealed Standard deck to check out before the drafting - a couple of rare feng shui's showed up (Sacred Heart, Fox Pass) and three people got rocks - only one rare. We drafted the 6 standard boosters next and saw a very odd thing (that came back to haunt us later) - every one of the rare feng shui sites showed up except the Red Lantern (I think - maybe somebody even got that), sometimes in multiple. Matt got a Kinoshita House, City Square and a Fox Pass. I got a Turtle Beach and a Fox Pass. We also saw Hanging Coffins :) What we didn't get was a wide variety of medium-large hitters or interesting events. Tim ended up with 3 Flying Guillotines but he made up for that with a King of the Thunder Pagoda. Ray got a Zheng Yi Quan. I got a Power of the Great. Yay. The Flashpoint boosters were also productive - out of the 12 boosters, Ray got a Little Jim (!) and Lissa got a Rhys Engel. I don't know who ended up with the Arcanotower... We busily put our decks together and were ready to roll by about 2:30 (we started late, of course).

### Round 1

First round sat randomly as usual, two groups of three. Table 2 finished on time, with Tim's Lotus assault force finally overwhelming Matt's weenie horde and Lissa's architects. Table 1 timed out after much back-and-forth between Ray and Stefan, unfortunately timing out as Victor was about to mount an assault that would have gotten 1 or even 2 of Ray's sites. Stefan got the win on the tie break by virtue of the one burned-for-victory site. Scores after round 1:

`Stefan (1) 6 Tim (1) 8`
`Ray 5 Lissa 6`
`Victor 2 Matt 4`

### Round 2

Round two sat by score, with Tim and Lissa moving to table 1. Ray powered his way to victory at table 2, overwhelming Matt and Victor. Table 1 saw the quick burn for power by Tim (darn Hallowed Grounds are too small), followed by the stealthy Gruff Lieutenant + Explosives combo for payback as Stefan burned one of Tim's for victory. Lissa suffered extreme deck stall and didn't actually get in the game for the first five (!) turns. Ugh. Game slowed a bit for the building phase, but then Stefan's Monkey King popped out and ruined Tim's and Lissa's day. Eventually the Shadowy Mentors and Killdeers turned up at the right time and Stefan got the win. Scores after round 2:

`Stefan (2) 14 Ray (1) 13`
`Tim (1) 13 Victor 7`
`Lissa 9 Matt 8`

### Round 3

Round three saw Ray move up and Lissa move down. Stefan's Monkey King again showed up to rain on Tim's parade at table 1 (but also had the double-use of saving his own good Lotus cards), again with the Shadowy Mentor plus the Tooth of Snake and Walker of the Purple Twilight able to grab the win. Table 2 timed out after a long brutal game, which saw Lissa get her Homo Omega out (!) only to be promptly Natural Ordered by Matt... At the buzzer Matt got the win by virtue of his one burned-for-victory counter in what otherwise would have been a dead three way tie. Scores after round 3:

`Stefan (3) 22 Matt (1) 14`
`Ray (1) 15.5 Lissa 13.5`
`Tim (1) 15.5 Victor 11.5`

Ray and Victor needed to leave, but after much discussion they decided Ray had time to stay and play the finals (doh!). With Lissa and Victor out, we settled in for a four player final that (thanks to all those denial feng shui sites mentioned earlier) dragged on an incredible two hours before we all got sloppy. Now I know what it feels like to play a game in New York or London...

### Finals

Game started oddly, with Stefan revealing Matt's first-turn Proving Ground. Matt had planned ahead and saved a power and managed to put down another feng shui site behind it. Stefan tried the quick grab with Gruff Lt. + Explosives, but got denied by Matt's new Fox Pass (!) Game turned into a slow build for a while, then when Ray tried to assault Matt's Proving Ground again, he revealed his other feng shui site - Kinoshita House (!). That basically locked up the game, since no one could get past both sites with enough left to hit anywhere, and people started piling up defenders for lack of anything else to do. Folks sometimes grabbed a non-feng shui site or two, but everyone just built up to four sites and held on to their limited denial while Matt built up enough to try for a win. About 45 minutes later, he was ready to try it. He Lodge Politic'd Stefan's Shadowy Mentor that was controlling Ray's 10K man + Disintegrator Ray, and Tortured Memories Ray's PubOrd Office in the Aircar to flesh out his team, then came after Stefan's exposed Hallowed Ground (darn!) with 3 body remaining. Tim's entire armada, less the Walking Corpses, valiantly threw themselves in the way, taking out most of the cheese, but his Silver Band got Killdeered. Stefan tried to Killdeer Matt's opposing Fist of the Bear in return, but Matt Confucian Stabilized that (his only mistake! little did he know that he really wanted to keep that...). The big hitters were still on the way through, and we had to fail the attack because he had saved two Shaolin Warriors and two Military Commandants for follow-up. Stefan's Might of the Elephant (at 14! in sealed deck! that tells you how long we built up...) took out the 10K man, and the Liquidators+Demon Within took the PubOrdAircar, leaving Matt with what looked like a win - except for Stefan's Suicide Mission. Doh. Pop goes the target, leaving Matt with a failed attack instead. Ray then took a shot at Stefan's weakened Inner Sanctum, after double Napalm Sunrising Matt's Kinoshita House off the table (yay!) but didn't have enough to get it. Stefan had been accumulating power for too long, and was going to deck soon, so he of course took his best shot. He played a new feng shui site, Kun Kan had a Faked Death, Mr. X entered play and grabbed one of Matt's Military Commandants, and joined the Might with a Shadowy Horror and a couple of other weenies in an assault on Ray's exposed Jagged Cliffs with 7 body remaining. Tim and Matt's remaining forces jumped in front, of course, almost killing Kun Kan courtesy of the Silver Band's Golden Comeback - except that good old Monkey King bounced him back to Stefan's hand first. Matt's fox pass rerouted Might, leaving Stefan to hit for 6 points. Kun Kan came back into play and ran for the remaining one point, but Ray's Booby Trap blew up the Cliffs first (doh!). The actual win, of course, came for Tim, since everyone had used up all of their cards by that point. Tim put down a couple of generic characters, and with his remaining Walking Corpses, had his choice of sites for the win. A bit anti-climactic at that point, but that's the name of the game sometimes. Congratulations to Tim!

`Tim 1st`
`Stefan 2nd`
`Matt 2nd`
`Ray 2nd`

Last modified: April 1, 1999.
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