Saturday was the Fresno Regional.
I don't have all the restricted card or agenda breakdown, but it is out there and should be reported by mathlete at some point.
I want to thank the Crazy Squirrel Game store for hosting this event. Jennifer, one of the store owners, was amazing! Pretty much everyone came away with something for the day. Random raffles, etc. The event was awesome and the members of the growing Fresno meta were great to meet!
House breakdown:
5 - Stark
4 - Martell
4 - Targ
2 - Greyjoy
2 - Lannister
1 - Baratheon
I was running Lannister PBtIT. Lannister had been deck I wanted to make work for a while, and had slowly been making adjustments over the course of the last month. It started out as Lannister/Shadows. But I stripped that all away about a week before the tournament. And started working with PBtIT. I made some final adjustments right before the tournament.
First, I had 1 copy of all the good Lannister locations for kneeling (Tourney Grounds, Brothel, The Iron Throne, Alchemist Guild Hall), but with those AND GTM and Lannisport Treasury, my setups had been kind of slow 2-3 cards. I dropped The Iron Throne and Guild Hall for River Row and Street of Sisters.
Second, I knew a number of people in our meta would be running KOTHH, and that John Bruno's regional winner from KingdomCon had been making appearances, so I dropped Search and Detain. And instead ran The First Snow of Winter without RBD, just in case I faced a weenie deck wanting to play FoW first turn.
Round 1 - Ken K (Fresno) running Martell KOTHH
Ken had been playing the game since about Christmas time and had constructed his deck the night before the tournament. The game didn't last long. I had Cersei out on the first turn with Retaliation. Ken went first, and searched for Black Raven. It was obvious to me Ken was unsure about his deck. In my first 2-claim Intrigue challenge, I discarded a Red Vengeance. Got him down to 1 card in hand. And then the game was mostly wrapped up from there.
Win 1-0
Round 2 - Chris S (San Diego) running Martell Maesters
This is a deck that has been bumping around in our meta for a while. It has never been a fun deck to play against. It's all rush. Forgotten Plans to stop first turn delay tactics, either First Snow or any of the stall plots. Normally the deck then likes to Art of Seduction on turn 2 or three, and in the reprieve plot phase play To the Spears! followed by Outwit to stop the inevitable Valar. I tried my best to disrupt the clockwork of the deck. But my lack of draw VS the Valaryian Steel Link pretty much was going to end me. We got to plot 5 or 6 and if I could hold out one more turn, I'd be able to Valar as the Outwit had missed, but a Game of Cyvasse stopped me. Chris went on to win the tournament, so what can you do, really?
Loss 1-1
Round 3 Ken L (Fresno) running Baratheon (no agenda)
Ken Summoning Seasoned the Laughing Storm on turn one and added Lightbringer to him. I searched for Cersei given the option and played Retaliation. I played YKtWD on the Laughing Storm and took 4 cards from his hand. I was able to kneel the Laughing Storm each turn by the time I wanted to do an Intrigue challenge. With Cersei out, I won by turn 4 or 5.
Win 2-1
Round 4 Angela S (Sacramento) running Targ Maesters
I knew this was going to be tough. Angela is a big fan of the recursive burn. Maesters using Bronze Link to get Flame-Kissed back. Nasty. She was able to keep my board clear for the first couple rounds. I had Cersei in hand from turn 1, but refused to play her until I could try and slow down the burn. On the 4th turn I had to Valar. In my hand, all I had was 3X copies of Cersei. Angela went first and only played Jhogo. I told myself if I drew into YKtWD, I'd play the 3 copies of Cersei and hope for the best. I drew it. Two turns later Angela Valar-ed. And then played Rhaeny's Hill. But with 0-claim I wasn't too concerned. On the last turn, she had 6 characters on the table, I had 10ish. She got to 14 power, but in doing so, knelt herself out. I swooped in an took the last 5 power I needed with Cersei and Intrigue challenges. It was a **** close game.
Win 3-1
Round 5 Mark (Fresno) running Stark Knights of the Realm
Mark had shown up late and took a first round loss because of it, but since then had gone a 3 game tear to become 3-1. But in a similar fashion to the other winning rounds, first turn Retaliation to reduce his hand to 1 card. A First Snow of Winter and Art of Seduction later, I was cruising to 15 power.
Win 4-1
I had the same SOS as John Bruno going into the final 4, so we rolled to see who would face the top seed and who would face the second seed.
Quater finals
James S (San Diego) running Stark Maesters
James is a stand up guy. He played this same deck at KingdomCon and went 2-4 or 3-3. But he had great success with before and chalked it up to the large number of Stark mirror matches he played. And boy was he right. He used Meera Reed first turn to knock off my Pyromancer's Cache. And then I tried a bold 2nd turn Valar. I still had enough draw to hit the cap for the next round. And then disaster struck. For the next 7 cards I drew, they were all locations, attachments and events. The odds were not in my favor. Couldn't keep characters on the board. Or hold out long enough to force him to Valar himself. James won on turn 6.
He went on the face Chris S in the finals were Chris won. Congrats to Chris!
If there is interest, I can post the decklist. Just don't have the time now.