Please join us this Sunday at the Compleat Strategist, 11 East 33rd St. (btwn 5th and Madison).

Melee (multi-player) event.

Starting 10:30 AM. All paid pre-registrations get a set of special Power Tokens! Call the Strategist (212) 685-3880.

Door prizes, Kingsguard (final table) get all kinds of cool prizes, and even the Broken Men (runners up) will get stuff.

Reminder, the tournament is this Sunday!

well after looking like we weren't going to be able to make this, we should have 2 in attendance.

quick question, are all the pre-paid slots taken? I might call up anyway to save time, but wondering if I have extra motivation

Great to hear you are coming! There are still pre-paid slots available, call the Compleat Strategist (212) 685-3880 to make sure you get your special wooden Power Tokens!

done, see you there.

Any updates on who broke to finals?

finitesquarewell (martell), RedTerror (martell), stark guy (forgot his name), and I (bara) got to the final four. In extremely odd and misplayed fashion on all our parts, Erick (finite) made it to 15 power in the second round. Paul (Red) finished in second, me in third, and stark guy in fourth.

Overall, I had a blast. I'll probably comment more later today when I'm not so wiped out .

Congrats to Erick. Sounds like Martell is quite speedy these days in Melee. I look forward to more details.

and thanks to the organizers for a particularly well run melee tournament, especially given that this was their first shot at running a high-level event very well and timely done!

Had a lot of fun, nice to see a new (to me) store, meet new players, see familiar faces, and get home by 8....

Though slightly disapointed LGR couldn't make it as I wanted to rub a little salt in the wounds (though a 6-0 game 1 win might have done it) and Stag I thought you thrived on melee???!!!!???

Before giving my report of the tourney, I'd like to thank the organizers of the event for allowing me to have a great time. Thank you! I don't have all the facts and figures on me, so I apologize if anything is inaccurate/incomplete. The following is simply what I saw/remember:

12 players entered the tournament:

5 Martell

2 Stark

1 Lannister

1 Baratheon

1 Greyjoy

2 Unknown (I think the last two were Martell and Stark, but I'm not sure)

I played Baratheon. We had 3 rounds that ensured 90 minutes of play plus one more round after 90 minutes was called. This system worked out really well because it was possible to fit a whole game in that time; if you didn't, you still had one more round to plan out what actions you were going to take. I remember the last Melee tourney I was in, when time was called you had to finish the round and end the game. It was unfair for those that already made their challenges or played or didn't play certain cards.

Round 1 (Bara - 12, Stark - 12, Martell - 11, Stark - 9ish)

First match was definitely a tough one. While Baratheon is known for getting big in a short amount of time, Stark is capable of doing the same (perhaps even more so), which in turn allowed for The Red Viper's ability to kick in. I had the lead for most of the match due to Bara's ability to power grab here and there, but I never felt secure the entire game. The Martell player kept on using Lost Oasis on the Red Viper, which is really killer. I tried shutting it down one turn (played Martial Law on one and used Eddard's cancel ability on the other), but he played He Calls it Thinking to cancel Eddard's effect. I think one turn I was able to shut off Lost Oasis with Eddard, but I'm not sure. Anyway, the last round (4th or 5th?) I had the lead, but the Martell player was going to take the game with Mr. Viper. Fortunately, I had a Milk of the Poppy in hand, and was able to shut him down. The Martell player wasn't able to make the winning-push, and one of the Stark players made enough of a push to catch up to me. The Stark player would have actually won, but I had The Iron Throne and took dominance to tie for first with 12 power.

Round 2 (Martell - 15, Bara - 9, Stark - 7ish, Martell Kingsguard - 5ish)

The Stark player was the 4th place Stark from my first match. The other two Martells were new. One was one of my best friends and Black Friday Champion, Paul Tapias (aka RedTerror, who should post on the forums more often), and the other was Mike (aka BrooklynMike), one of the tourney organizers (thanks again!). Mike was playing the Kingsguard deck. Both Martells got out The Red Viper early (uuggggh, I know), but I made sure this time I never had more characters than either Martell or if I did, he supported me. I was able to stand my own with Bara power grab, but had to be careful with Renown as Paul had Ellaria out. In the second to last round we were able to bounce back Mike's Red Viper to his hand. The Stark player played that plot that returns a kneeling character or location to it's owner's hand at the beginning of the Standing phase, and Paul was able to kneel the Viper with Lost Oasis.

From the beginning of the game I knew one or both of the Martell players would dominate the game with The Red Viper. My plan was to make sure I fell victim of the Viper's wrath as little as possible and grab enough power to stay in the game. Then when I had enough power I would play my Fury plot and steal a Viper for the win. At the beginning of the 5th? and last round (time was called in the previous one), I was going to do exactly that. I had 9 power and Paul's Red Viper had 7ish power on him. Everyone had played their Fury plots so I was guaranteed to win initiative, and the only character reset was played earlier in the game. The game was going to be mine, but then a mistake happened. Mike revealed the Red Wedding without realizing what Lords and Ladies Paul, who was to his left, had. Paul had 13 power and two Lords and one Lady, with one Lady and Lord having no current power on them. Mike accidentally gave Paul the game. Just shows how what happens in a Melee can be completely out of your control!

Because Paul won, I became concerned and rather disappointed that there was a good chance I wouldn't make the final table, a table I would have made if The Red Wedding wasn't revealed. Perhaps my Melisandre called to R'hllor because after spending about 15 minutes minutes on working out point standings and resolving a 4-way tie, I squeezed into the final table

Round 3 (Martell - 15, Martell - 7ish, Bara - 4ish, Stark - 2ish)

The final table featured Erick (aka finitesquarewell), Paul, the Stark player that I tied with in my first match, and myself. The game only lasted two rounds, but it was a very long two rounds. Within those two rounds the Stark player got huge, Erick got the Viper, Ser Arys, and Ellaria out, Paul got the Viper, Ellaria, Darkstar, and Aero Hotah out, and I got CS Robert, Melisandre, and Brienne of Tarth (not the CS one) out. We had more characters, but those characters stood out the most. In addition to those characters, Erick placed a Taste of Blood on the Viper and Ser Arys. I got dupes on both Melisandre and Robert, and had a Bannerman on Robert (although I probably should have put it on Brienne). Second round Erick went first and placed A Pinch of Powder of Melisandre, despite having intrigued one from his hand first round. He wound up reaching 13 power before his challenges came to an end. His effective power count was less because Melisandre was in play, but if she wasn't that's what he had. I really didn't think anyone else would attack Erick because of Ellaria and the two Tastes of Blood. I planned on powering him using Brienne so he wouldn't gain power from losing the challenge, but Paul did a military challenge against him, which Erick lost. Then Paul intrigued or powered him. I should have redirected the attack with the Crown Regent (when is the last opportunity to use Crown Regent?), but was kind of tired at that point and not paying full attention. I figured Paul knew what he was doing, but alas, Erick was able to win the challenge by 3 strength and trigger A Pinch of Powder to return Melisandre to my hand and win the game. I had a dupe on her, but wasted it after losing a military challenge because I (and seemingly everyone else as no one yelled at me to not do that) forgot you can now use dupes to save characters from going back to your hand. That was something I didn't realize until way after the match was over though.

Erick was the champion! It would have been nice to win the tournament, but I was still pretty satisfied with my deck and how I played. If I was a little more focused during the last match, I feel I had a pretty good shot of winning. Hopefully my experience in this tournament will help me in the future.

Martell is pretty strong in melee right now. Their "I win when I lose" theme helps a lot, and cards like the Red Viper fuels another important theme "I win when I win." Despite their strength though, they are beatable. One thing I like about Melee over (current) Joust is that there isn't necessarily one deck build that will flat out dominate. A strong deck helps, but wits, endurance, timing, experience, and events out of your control often play a more important role than your deck does. Those things are true of Joust too, but I feel they resonate more so with Melee.

Rewards/swag: Erick got a plaque trophy, a champion playmat, $25? gift certificate to the store, first choice at uncut sheet cards (I'll spoil some good ones soon), a pin for the invitational tournament, and the title! Rest of the top four got playmats, $10 gift certificate to the store, 2nd-4th choice of the uncut card sheets, and a pin for the invitational tournament. Everyone got at least 60 Jamie sleeves, a clear dragon shield card coffin, and wooden power tokens.

Sorry if this was a bit long and a bit too focused from my perspective. I also apologize if there are grammatical errors or incomplete thoughts/sentences. If you have any questions/comments feel free to add them!

FATMOUSE said:

+1 more on stark and lannister

Lars said:

If I'm not mistaken, Jason had to be with the family (~I know, worst excuse ever). Stag told me that "10:00 AM on a sudnay just isn't going to happen for me very often." (~another worst excuse ever). In their defense, they both did really want to be there.

10:00 AM on a sunday is the middle of the night for me. Sorry.

Nice Tr though - and glad you gusy had fun. I was half and half on this event all week (if ti was a Joust it wouldn't even be an issue - no wya would i go)- i really do love melee, just the time and the day didn't work for me.

FATMOUSE said:

That's my favorite deck theme!

Lars, as much as I would have thoroughly enjoyed having you regale me with stories this weekend about the pleasant rollercoaster ride the Flyers put you through at the expense of my Bruins (and perhaps three years of my life expectancy), Fatmouse is correct --my daughter had a big event which brought about fifteen family members descending on the house afterward. Since I can't root for the Canadians, it's pretty easy for me to get behind the Flyers despite them ending the B's season, so good luck to them this round.

Fatmouse, thanks for the account of the day. I hope others will chime in with their own.