There were 31 players that came from all around NY, PA and NJ. All of whom where cramped into a small banquet room in a Raddison Hotel in Buffalo. The only real annoyance was that the tables were very thin, so there wasn't much room to play. When I arrived I made sure to ask the Major what the release date of TwT is :-)

Anyway, I was playing a Federation Space AMS deck with lot's of runabouts. I planned to have six mission specialists out on the second turn, and to start doing missions around the 5th or so. The deck was full of lots of scans (to see what I could sacrifice a runabout too :-), lots of Amanda Rogers to nullify other people's scans, and lots of Palor Toffs to bring back my Assign Mission Specialists. I went after Re-ignite Dead Star for 50 points w/AMS, and Study Nebula for 45 w/AMS then self seeded a Nanites for 100 points. I seeded Hunt for DNA and Pegasus Search to suck up all the good dilemmas, dead ends etc, I never did either of them :-)  

First Round: J.J. Stillhard

Well, JJ is fun to play but doesn't normally do all that well at tournaments. First Turn I stole his mission that required Astrophyiscs and Stellar Cartography for 35 points. Then I just took the next few turns to play some people and just did my missions faster then him.

2 (+100)  

Second Round: John Petrilli

John moved away to Ohio last year, but has recently moved back into the region, so it was great to see him. He was playing a fed AMS deck also, and we were going about the same speed. Things changed though, when I scanned Re-ignite dead star: it seems that he thought it was a planet mission, (it does look like one) so all the dilemmas were planets, and misseeds. So, I quickly got my 55 points there, and then he got most of his people killed by a Chula/Alien Parasites/Armus: Stick Situation combo, so I just took my time to finish my last mission.

4(+200)  

Lunch Break (disgusting crusty sandwiches I made earlier in the morning :-)  

Third Round: Butch Malec

Well, it was obvious during the seed phase that Butch was playing Borg, he was playing a combination SFC/Assimilate all your people w/Assimilate Counterpart. When he put the TNG at the end with my outpost and not the end with Espionage Mission, I knew he was going to try and kill me first. So, I played my people, he downloaded drones, then he targeted Enrique Munez, and killed all my people. So then, I decided I would play Anti-Time Anomaly (from the Tent) to kill all his drones. He brought them back to his hand before the countdown expired then played all of them next turn on a scout Vessel! So, I regenerated, and played one person per turn (He put the one Rule of Acquisition on the Queen to nullify all my Palor Toff's, so I couldn't download my AMS people!) I slowly did missions while he slowly did objectives (He assimilated Data somewhere along the way scoring 25 points) and he edged me out 89 - 80 when Time was called. Great game, lots of fun ;-)

4(+191)  

Fourth Round: John Gallo

John is tops in the region, and basically always uses the same deck, Service the Collective with lot's of Awakens. I beat him about every other time I play him, this time, he was just a little faster, I could only do 1 mission before he won 100-55.  Funny thing was, he was calling my scans cheesy, when he loads his draw deck up with 20 Awakens..........

4(+146)  

Fifth Round: Sorry, don't know the name

He wasn't from my area, so I didn't know him. He had a pretty good Klingon Headquarters Soong Type Android deck. He got stopped by Chula: the Chandra/Friendly Fire/Scientific Method for about 3 turns, giving my runabouts enough time to clear out Re-ignite Dead Star. He did his mission for 45 points w/AMS, then I won next turn at Study Nebula.

6(+201) or so  

Sixth Round: Josh Carey

I gave him the ride up to Buffalo, and he's one of the people I play on a normal basis, so I knew his deck. (although he hadn't seen mine) He was playing an unbalanced 6-0 planet Rommie Headquarter mission solver. Basically, I was just faster then him, He got stalled for a while when I gained control of his ship with Alien Parasites, then STP'd back into his hand :-) He did one mission before I won I think. 100-35.

8(+270) approximate

So, I finished 4th, and did quite well, but didn't make it into the playoff. Had a lot of good games though. In the final confrontation Sean Weidemann's Fed VCM beat Rick Solman's (spelling?) Romulan Hail attack deck. Congrats to Sean for going to worlds for the 3rd straight year.

Some things to note: Josh Browns annoy you to death joke deck that wasn't supposed to win any games, won 3 games! Sean O'Reily finished 3rd for the second year in a row. The Major ran a good tournament, and was running around all day :-)