Report by Benimoto
I played in, and won the Archfiends Release Tourney in Detroit. Thanks, Wizards for setting up these tournaments! I had a great time. Perhaps unfortunately though, only 6 other players showed up.
My band, which went 4-0 in some very close games was:
- Vampire Aristocrat
- 2x Red Samurai
- Orc Champion
- Cursed Spirit
- 4x Orc Warrior
Since the tournament was all quickstrike, my strategy was to go after the soft spots as fast and as hard as possible. And um, that's what all of my guys did.
In the first match I fought an LE band with a Gauth, Mind Flayer, Bone Devil, Wraith and some filler. The Orc Champion made it next to the Gauth on the third round, and routed it with a single hit. The samurai went after the Mind Flayer, and with a little bit of cleanup, I won with the Bone Devil untouched on the board.
The next match, I fought a Hill Giant, a Ravager, the Drow Cleric of Lolth, a Cultist of the Dragon, and two opposing Cursed Spirits. While the spirits slugged it out in the middle of the map, my Orc Champion sacrificed himself to bring down the Cultist, and thus, his summoned maws. One of the samurai was routed off the map by the Hill Giant, and with two giants and a drow facing down my last samurai and my vampire, things looked grim. Switching strategies, my samurai and vamp took a turn to run around to the other side of the battle. Between the two of them they took down the vulnerable drow, and then the samurai landed two hits on the ravager, routing it. The Hill Giant, who was spending his time missing the vampire, was left alone.
The third was even closer. I faced LG, with a PDK, a Gold Champion, and an assortment of halflings. My band took out the halflings quickly, but then the battle bogged down against the two knights. Near the end, I had my Orc Champion, 4 Orc Warriors, 1 samurai, spirit and vampire, all heavily wounded, facing down the PDK, GC and a Healer. The Gold Champion took out my samurai. The PDK killed my vampire with his first attack and then swung against the Cursed Spirit. The spirit's incorpreality saved it, and my Orc Champion killed his golden collegue in vengeance. Tallying the points, we discovered that if the PDK had attacked a nearby Orc Warrior instead of the spirit, I would have lost, with 59 points on the board. Instead, I stayed narrowly undefeated.
The last match was against my friend Josh, who had gone 0-2 and taken a bye in the second round. Sadly, I had to hand Josh his third defeat. His band, with Urthok, Snig, a Mind Flayer, and a Blackguard, just had too many commanders and not enough hitters, IMHO. I suffered quite a bit of damage, when the Mind Flayer stunned both my samurai and then Goblin Sneaks swarmed, hitting for 15 each. Eventually though, I killed the flayer and enough of the goblinoids to win.
Since the first 8 places got prizes and there were only 7 contestants, everybody went away happy. I was particularly happy. I just hope the lackluster attendance doesn't jeopardize future tournament plans.