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Minnesota State Championship Report
by Mike Harrington Yeah, well, we finally got it over with. The anticipation was kind of big, and in the end the tournament was pretty eventful. I think 22 players showed for it which was not bad, but I thought the turn-out would be a bit better since we have seen more players at normal tourneys in the past. However our friends from Iowa and North Dakota, South Dakota, Wisconsin couldn't show up so that may have been one reason. Anyhow, I got there late, unfortunately. I had a basketball commitment in the morning until one, so I got there about an hour and a half late. On a side note, I played b-ball Friday night for 4 hours (including midnight until 2), and with that added on to Saturdays work-out - I was kind of tired so I may not have caught everything that happened at the tourney.... But I got there in time for the second round, and the results of the first round were quite predictable. Kris (top-rated player at the tourney) Sonsteby, Nat Kirton, Chris Lieske, Mick Resse (our ambassador) and other top rated Minnesotans had breezed by the first round 100-0. For (G)Nat, that only meant a half win however because of Q's Planet (the bane of Borg). The next few rounds proved that the leaderboard was pretty stable. The only person that came up from a first round loss was Steve Nelson, who won his next four games. So after 5 rounds, the top players were:
Quite predictable. They happen to be the top 3 ranked MN players that were playing. Now things got interesting. Nat and Kris had already played with Kris winning, so Kris was paired with Steve. They have played numerous times before and it is always a toss-up to who wins. In the meantime, Nat cruised to a quick win with his Borg Queen Swarm deck and was assured second place barring a full win by Steve. Kris was using something I am quite familiar with....lets just call it a PNZ deck. Steve was using (as always in big tournies) a multi-Space mission Black Hole/Hunt for DNA Program Ajur and Boratus deck. Each year it seems the deck gets modified a bit.... This year it was Romulan with Deep Space Nine on Characterize Neutrino Emissions to get card draws. I'm not too sure how this worked now that I think about it, but somehow he used the station just passively with a couple personnel at Guest Quarters and Promenade Shops. The game got off quickly, and Steve got his DS9 Guest Quarters and Promenade Shops going quickly. Kris got off well too, and quickly mustered a couple Power-Boats at DS9. Kris damaged the station killing one random person, and the next turn Steve got out the Jovis to get people away. They went a ways away....Kris wormholed them to the middle of the Neutral Zone. Steve already had played a Black Hole in the Neutral Zone, so it had began to suck missions. Steve finally got going afterwards, and relied on his other intact facilities - his Rom and Neutral outposts. Now, Steve had a Balancing Act on the spaceline but he decided to put it under one of the PNZs which may have cost him the game... had he self seeded it and hit it earlier he would have put Kris in a huge hole. Kris' possible mistake - Not closing the Black Hole with Examine Singularity which would have given him easy missions at the end of the game. Anyhow, Steve's hidden strategy finally showed up - Rogue Borg Mercenaries. He had mustered up 4 of them along with a Crosis... when Kris moved all of his people to one ship and wormholed over to battle Steve's only ship - the Jovis w/ lots of personnel, Steve played the intruders and Kris was in trouble. The RBM picked off a personnel and Kris got unlucky in not getting the Sisters of Duras flipped in the battle. The next turn Kris got 'lucky' and pulled the Sisters. It proved huge because Kris' personnel defeated the Rogue Borg and he got his ship back. More petty battling went on for more turns, and both players were very careful. Eventually the time ran out, and it ended 0-0. A great game indeed. That put Kris in first (qualifies...ooh boy!....insert sarcasm...), Nat in second with his over-achieving Borg Swarm deck :), also qualifying for Continentals, and Steve in a disappointing third. Congrats guys! A few more observations:
Deck breakdown:
by Mike "T'Kar" Harrington |
