OMG super happy fun times. This is gonna be short and to the point cause I'm sooooooo drained right now.

First off, Norb (BlindProphet) hosts a BADASS regional. This regional has been one of the best events I have ever traveled to.

We had 20 players and 4 rounds of swiss.

My swiss rounds were:
2-0 1st Round vs Leo Martinez (All Sakura backing Zangief)
2-0 2nd Round vs Jim I think (Water Chun-Li)
2-0 3rd Round vs Trane (Void Ukyo)
2-0 4th Round vs Magnus (Evil Ibuki) but I gave him a draw cause I didn't want swiss champ curse

So my overall record:
3-0-1

Top 8 - TT = Team Tapout | MD = Maryland | NY = New York | VA = Virginia
3-0-1 (MD) Chris Cruise - Air/Water Chun-Li
3-0-1 (TT) Shane Duckworth - Evil Hanzo
3-0-1 (TT) Bryan McDermott - Order Gill
3-1-0 (TT) Chubbzinator - Air Olexa
3-1-0 (TT-MD) Bob Wagner - Fire Akuma
2-0-2 (NY) Magnus Carrena - Evil Ibuki
2-1-1 (TT) Dan Hughes - Air Mignon
2-1-1 (VA) Craig Roberts - Good Morrigan

So Chris Cruise ends up getting the swiss champ curse. I totally overlooked it. It couldn't have gone any better anyways. I'm glad he got that curse.

Top 8:
Chris Cruise (Chun-Li) vs Craig Roberts (Morrigan)
Shane Duckworth (Hanzo) vs Dan Hughes (Air Mignon)
Bryan McDermott (Gill) vs Magnus Carrena (Evil Ibuki)
Chubbzinator (Olexa) vs Bob Wagner (Fire Akuma)

Having to play against my own teammate in top cuts really sucked.

Top 8 results:
Chun-Li over Morrigan
Hanzo over Mignon
Gill over Ibuki
Olexa over Akuma

Top 4:
Chris Cruise (Chun-Li) vs Chubbzinator (Olexa)
Shane Duckworth (Hanzo) vs Bryan McDermott (Gill)

Having to play against ANOTHER one of my teammates really sucked.

Top 4 results:
2-1 Olexa over Chun-Li
2-1 Hanzo over Gill

This is where swiss champ curse took effect. Chubbs and Cruise were on game 3. They both set up their Air spreads and Cruise goes for the kill. He ends up only needed to check a 2CC to kill Chubbs. What happens? Checks a Feline Spike and Chubbs goes in for the kill.

Thank God top 8 worked out so much. Chubbs and I were talking ever since NOVA on how I needed to win a regional because Chubbs would feel so awkward there without any other Tapout members eating with him. Just like we dreamed, it was Chubbs and I in the finals.

Finals:
Chubbzinator (Olexa) vs Shane Duckworth (Hanzo)

Results:
2-1 Hanzo over Olexa

So I finally did something. My days of -3rd place is finally gone. I couldn't be any happier with the way things turned out.
They only had 4 different life counters:
2x Water
2x Chaos
2x Death
2x Life

Chubbs and I both picked the Water counters. MickyD and Cruise both got the Death counters. Hughes got the Life one and I forget where the others went to.

Norb kind of called out the results fast cause we had to pick up, so a lot of people thought they got places that they didn't, but here are the real results going by points and strength of schedule:
1st Shane Duckworth
2nd Chubbzinator
3rd Bryan McDermott
4th Chris Cruise
5th Dan Hughes
6th Bob Wagner
7th Magnus Carrena
8th Craig Roberts

Props:
-Team Tapout for another dominating performance. I love you all like brothers. Thanks for everything you have done.
-Norbert for hosting one badass regional. It was totally worth it. Thanks a lot, man!
-Bartender for letting Tapout and Magnus stay at her house. Thank you very much for the shower; I was sweatier than Chubbs on a picnic haha
-Magnus for playing his mind games on me and making me give him the draw, which led me to win haha j/k bud, I'd never go back on my word. I got yo back, homie! Thanks for the badass trades, too!
-Whoever pulled Chubbs' name out of the hat. Thanks for the free ShadoWar box!!! THAT made the whole trip worth it.
-Hughes for making top 8 after not playing UFS for 8 months (since Gencon).
-Chubbs for being my blood brother and hooking me up. I can't be any more grateful. Thanks for everything, bro.
-MickyD for deciding not to bail out. Thank you homie
-Bob for finally making top 8. 6th place ain't bad, bud!
-Virginia crew; always my homies. Good catching up with you guys again, and I'll see you soon.

There are tons more. Thank you everybody for making my tournament experience a blast. It was the most fun I've had since NOVA

Slops:
-First time that Craig and I have not played a game in a tournament we've been to together. This regional broke that trend
-Philly Cheese for not scrambling up $20 within 4 days to go with us!!!
-Getting stink-faced by Hughes. That sucked...

No real slops. The regional was very well set up, controlled, and ran. Props all around!

Huge congrats man, about time ;P

Yeah that curse totaly sucked. TWICE I had two 1 checks in the deck and BOOM got Chubbs on the ropes BAM one check BAM one check. Oh well next time I will get around my kyrptonite which is chubbs.

All things considered it was a blast. My games against Hughes and Craig both awesome especially the first round in top 8 that game was crazy..to many lynettes and to much commiting in one attack..but wow man wow.

Norb awesome event all around man.

Team Tapout always a pleasure guys

Bob special grats for helping me represent MD in top 8 for the first time

Chubbs just for being my Kyrptonite one of these days I'll get ya

Sure I am forgeting some people but just a bit worn out from the event and the fact that a lady decided to back into the front end of my car on the way home....curese of the swiss champ got me good

Yeah dude, congrats on swiss champ, but with that luxury comes a curse.

I seriously thought I was swiss champ, but thank god I decided to draw with Magnus. It worked out perfectly.

Yeah but it didn't have to be the Trans Am

oh joy, now i will have to deal with Magnus in diversity later this month.

yay. =p.

Hanzo kick? The hell man, where be the mina?

Shane, you have finally won what you've deserved

Major props, mon frere =D

Top 8 consists of seven 7+ hand size characters, and one 6 HSer. Yet more proof.

HolyDragonCloud said:

MarcoPulleaux said:

Shaneth said:

He loses to Tag Along, and my Inhuman Perceptions make your KFTs look like garbage =P

I respect your victory, but I can't respect a character who only has 1 win condition, and loses if it fails.

Shaneth said:

shane I love how you try to claim that victory but i guess dats wat happened when people agree on something first and then one of them decides to do sumthing else next time we play i will be playing things straight out, just like we did first time at east coast......But it was fun playing you and everyone else even that 9 hand size Gill deck lol.

Unorthodox_Style said:

I wish I gave Shajir the win at our regional so he could have the swiss champ all to himself :-P

Shaneth said:

WHY ARE PEOPLE STILL RUNNING THIS CARD?

This is getting filled under "Perfect examples of spike being over rated".

Protoaddict said:

Because it's still one of the most consistant win conditions this game has, as it has no true counters (apart from No Memories, which who the Fxxk plays that card?), and unlike Combo doesn't have a requirement (apart from momentum, which it alwasy has when it hits the table).

Checking low happens. It doesn't change the fact that you win more because of Feline than you lose.

MarcoPulleaux said:

Ok Lads lets not bring F spike to aweome victory thread.

That can have it's own thread y'know?

Anyways CONGRATS SHANE Finally Hanzo wins a regional! I have Uber respect for you now, you're God!

Mad props to Shane for winning with Hanzo. I totally scrubbed out at this regional but i think i did ok for not playing for about 7 months and playing LIfe XD.

@Magnus: We found the cards you needed and I think I'll be able to ship them out on monday or tuesday, duty days suck.

@Chubbs: Its sad that I couldnt do my final 2 or 1 damage in our games. Who said life sucks? LMAO

@everybody else I didnt get to see or talk to: The regional was a total blast. Glad I woke my lazy body up to go saturday.

I thought about posting my own tournament report but I played life..and..ended up playing against everybody i came up with besides Chubbs lol. I'm still gonna go on this whole "Life doesnt suck, I'll prove it somehow" rage but geez...its not even worth looking for cards to combat evil/order/anything thats better than life >.>

this regional was awesome! i almost got ukyo back into top 8. if craig had lost, or if i had checked a six on my last turn, i would have been in. I just have to say that void is back in a big way(i got ninth place with pure void). I also thought it was awesome that only one order deck topped, i think it was the only order deck in the tourny. Maryland finally top eighted, next time it'll be me (hopefully). props to norb on an awesome regional.

Unorthodox_Style said:

Bloodrunstrue said:

Jet Enduro said:

trane said:

Didnt you know Shane? Life is the win at giving your opponent games. In all honesty though, I dont know why people stay away from it. I think that if you stop trying to find answers to most of the problem cards and just the ones you NEED to worry about then it becomes alot easier to play.

Congrats Shane, don't believe in the swiss champ curse, I broke that curse at the montreal regionals hehehe.

sir_shajir said:

and I made my team slogan lie.

Congrats on the win shane too bad you had to stray away from aggro and go to evil.... But I hope you can come up with a insane fire deck for nats and try to bring aggro back in full force.

Scubadude said:

I dunno what you would consider Hanzo. He's like a blend of everything.

Aggro = tosses 7-15 attacks at you on turn 2/3/4
Hybrid = can set up randomly and kill off of weird stuff
Control = goes long game and locks everything down to Kick

So I guess I'll be playing an aggro deck all season.

outside of mina, hasn't that been your forte all along, shane?

I can play any deck on any playstyle. However, my favorite style to play is aggro.

I had to make the switch to control because of the metagame. I promised myself that I would start playing for srsbusnss and take some tities, because I know I am a good enough player to do so. In the past, I played decks that I knew I would have fun with and I knew were good, but they weren't good enough to win a major title. I was mainly a guy who played for fun, but his player skill is what took him to the top many times despite what jank deck he ran.

Yun-Seong for Worlds and Team Worlds 07 was really unexpected for me. That deck did not run Start Over or Infiltrating, two cards devastating to that format, and mainly no 4CCs. A single Mortal Strike shut it down. Akuma for all season last year was really jank too. I still can't believe it 2-0ed everybody I played in Team Worlds except for Olexa.

Worlds last year was an awakening mainly to me. After all, how did CHUBBS beat me to top 16?!? I realized that aggro had no chance in the metagame unless it played off the dominant symbol in the format (ie. Ukyo and Ibuki). Right now, Evil is the best symbol again and I will be forced to play it as aggro.

Hanzo is the perfect deck for me, and I'm playing it all season.