Thanks for getting these posted up. We had a crazy number of first round byes with all of the Store Championships. I went ahead and used mine, as I had a rough night's worth of sleep. I think in some ways that helped Ryan out to the Driver's seat since he pulled a 10 in the first round. With no other 10s or 9s, one of the 8s played him, leading to a 9 for 19 points. I pulled a 10 in my game for 18 total points.

Ryan joined the Austin community last summer and has really dug into the game. We've worked hard together on theory-crafting and he's learned quite a bit between the games and some online conversations and absolutely has come a long way. I was quite happy to play him in the last round and knew we'd have a real fight for the entirety of it. Although I was one point off, I knew from reviewing the MOV that I really needed to pull a 7-4. If I only scored a 6-5, he'd win on the MOV tie-break. I figured that you come to a regional to win the whole thing, and so I deployed to go right after him. In the end, the game hinged on one very key shot that just barely killed my Liberty. A slightly worse roll of the dice and it would have lived. Or alternatively, I had a moment earlier where I could have moved/regenerated a shield to the exposed hull zone and didn't foresee well enough. Consequently, I put a shield on a different hull zone. We discussed after the game that this might have been a 230-50 point swing when all was said and done. But those are the breaks in the game. I feel like I did the best I could in the circumstances. Ryan played a great game and rightfully earned all the spoils and bragging rights.

21 hours ago, Vergilius said:

Thanks for getting these posted up. We had a crazy number of first round byes with all of the Store Championships. I went ahead and used mine, as I had a rough night's worth of sleep. I think in some ways that helped Ryan out to the Driver's seat since he pulled a 10 in the first round. With no other 10s or 9s, one of the 8s played him, leading to a 9 for 19 points. I pulled a 10 in my game for 18 total points.

Yeah this is why I am not a fan in taking a bye in a 3 round tourney. I can see the merit in it for a 4+ round one but not a 3 round. Even if you get a bad matchup in the first round you’ll just get matched up against a weaker opponent in the second round and you are likely to make up for the points you lost in the first and be on track as if you had that 8-3. This usually results in getting to the top table and it is that matchup you have to win ultimately to win the tourney. There is also the merit of having that first game sort of helps you get into the mental mode of flying your list. Shakes off those loose ends and minor mistakes, this will help you play better in the second round.

Plus I just like keeping my Bye card. It’s like a trophy I suppose!??

On 3/2/2018 at 2:27 PM, ripper998 said:

Doesn't appear to the rest of us. Just the usual "3rd Party Hosting disabled" image.

It was visible earlier but has disappeared in the last 24 hours

On 3/2/2018 at 4:27 PM, ripper998 said:

Try imgur or google docs

20 hours ago, Brikhause said:

Yeah this is why I am not a fan in taking a bye in a 3 round tourney. I can see the merit in it for a 4+ round one but not a 3 round. Even if you get a bad matchup in the first round you’ll just get matched up against a weaker opponent in the second round and you are likely to make up for the points you lost in the first and be on track as if you had that 8-3. This usually results in getting to the top table and it is that matchup you have to win ultimately to win the tourney. There is also the merit of having that first game sort of helps you get into the mental mode of flying your list. Shakes off those loose ends and minor mistakes, this will help you play better in the second round.

Plus I just like keeping my Bye card. It’s like a trophy I suppose!??

You can get the bye card back. They cut the corner to show its used.

1 hour ago, ripper998 said:

You can get the bye card back. They cut the corner to show its used.

Why would I want to damage my trophy!??