Written by Daaneskjold
Hello once more my fellow Destiny players. If you read my previous article, you know that I am passionate about this game. I am at that point where I am trying to improve as a player and as part of it, achieving better results when playing, and keep having fun.
I think it is an interesting moment for the game. The competitive scene is paused with Worlds happening soon and people focusing on optimization. The meta, as varied as it is, has pretty much stabilized – even after the holocron updates – and we have an idea of what the contenders are. The next expansion has been delayed so some people are already in a hiatus until it is out, or pretty much quitting. There is a bunch of turmoil at the moment with the whole #RallyAid stuff and the general concern of the state of the game. All of these are topics in an on themselves that other creators have covered.
In any case, I am writing for you today to report on a local tournament, which gave me a very nostalgic feeling. Around 3 months ago, when I started playing this game, I went all in in a eQui-Gon/eKanan deck, only to get blown away by the newer, better stuff that Legacies brought to the table, which made me reconsider and move on to other decks.
I recently saw this article on the Hyperloops showcasing a deck, I had thought about at some point but never brought myself to fully crystallize and try, and thus never seen in action eQui-Gon/eYoda.
After watching playtesting videos I was fascinated by it. It has a lot of things that I like:
- My 2 favorite characters in Star Wars: Destiny game so far.
- A battleground that is pretty much neutral/beneficial to you in Obi-Wan’s Hut
- Great odds of rolling damage. Sticks are damage, shields are damage, specials are damage.
- Versatility in the strategy, being able to switch between defense and aggression.
- The holocron updates weakening non-interactive decks a bit. This is still weak to Sabine but not so much to OTK (eSeventhSister/two partners) or eObi-Wan2/Maz, anymore.
- Exploiting the capabilities of Yoda, either ramp, survivability, dice fixing, and the fact that Yoda at some point becomes ‘Do 2 damage and do something else you like’.
- My fanciest promos / cards are Blue 😀 we are talking spot gloss Yoda, full art Guards/Lightsaber Pulls, Ancient Lightsaber, Force Speed. Feelsgoodman!
I spent one week checking lists, playtesting and tinkering on TTS before bringing this list to the local tourney:
Characters (30 points, 4 dice):
eQui-Gon Jinn – Ataru Master
eYoda – Wizened Master
Battlefield:
Obi-Wan’s Hut
Upgrades (15 cards, 13 dice):
Ancient Lightsaber x2
Chance Cube x2
Force Illusion x2
Force Speed x2
Force Wave
Heirloom Lightsaber
Obi-Wan’s Lightsaber x2
Rey’s Lightsaber
Shoto Lightsaber x2
Events (15 cards):
Force Misdirection
Guard x2
Lightsaber Pull x2
Mind Trick x2
Overconfidence x2
Rend
Synchronicity x2
Trust Your Instincts
Unbreakable x2
The list is really close to the Toronto regional champion one. A few changes I made:
- Added Force Wave which is a favorite card of mine vs 3 character lists, good synergy with Yoda and if anything you can use it to ramp for your cost 3 sticks.
- Replaced one Heirloom Lightsaber for a Rey’s lightsaber – gives you one shield when played, sides have a tiny bit more damage and
- A single Rend instead of 2 cause I only have one :D, more comments on this later.
Cards present on the 6-0 GQ list that I did not make the cut for me:
- Ataru Strike. This has always felt awfully conditional to me. Best case scenario, you have to spend 1 extra action and 1 resource for (maximum) 3 extra damage. But consider the following. A faster turn with a potential claim on your battleground and a ping for 1 reduces this to only 2 extra damage for an action, which is still not bad. But then add the variance to the number of shields you have. When I play Qui-Gon decks I am usually at 1-2 shields, and the opponent will probably go for those shields to avoid getting the pings, so you have to spend even more actions in the build to take full advantage of this card. Initiative matters when you are running Guard and Force Misdirection.
- Caution. Yoda’s die is way too valuable to use for this, which means you pretty much want to use a Qui-Gon die to shield Yoda. I am going to go ahead and add Heightened Awareness here as well. In my mind, these are cards aimed for the long games, when you have enough upgrades to have the loss of your character die not matter as much. Given that I like using this really aggressively both these cards did not make the cut.
- Riposte. As with Ataru Strike, you have to change the way you sequence your plays to fit this card and hope your opponent does not get rid of your shields. Personally not a fan. Even if the prospect of trading 3 HP for 3 damage for 0 cost is too good, the conditional factor, the loss in aggression for the rest of my plays and the fact the rest of the cards in the deck are better than this are a no no in my book. Also we already have unblockable damage from the hand with Synchronicity!
- Deflect. This one came to pure lack of space. It is a really good card, a bit situational but a good mix of removal / damage. Comparing to the other mitigation cards we have this has less range (Overconfidence, Mind Trick, Guard, Force Misdirection have potential of affecting at least 2 dice) or is less versatile (Unbreakable in most cases will remove at the very least any 1-2 value cards).
Down to the matches!
MATCH 1, VS. NICK (eAAYLA/eREY2)
Apparently Nick was coming back from a small Destiny hiatus and just put this deck together for this tournament. I mentioned this in my previous article, and other authors have as well, about the importance of getting reps with a deck before taking it to tournaments. Since this was a small tournament it doesn’t really matter, but I really advice against this approach for larger events.
In any case, I started with a Chance Cube (which after using for a bit, I think it is a really broken card in decks with dice manipulation) and I was able to ramp really quick thanks to Yoda into an Ancient Lightsaber/Shoto Lightsaber powered Qui-Gon. Killed Rey in round 2. From there on Aayla was able to survive thanks to timely Hidden Motive/Guard plays, but sadly he did not draw any of his upgrades in time and I won on round 4.
WIN 1-0
MATCH 2, VS BRIAN (eBOBA/ePHASMA2)
One of my best friends, former roommate, the person that got me into Destiny, I had not played him in any actual events that we attended together until this day. He did not roll very hot, round 1 allowing me to pretty much do what I wanted without having to spend resources on mitigation. Chance Cube paired with Yoda came big and on turn 1 I had Force Wave & Ancient Lightsaber on Qui-Gon. It was disgusting. Round 2 I max rolled 7 natural damage plus the Force Wave special to pretty much seal the deal.
Overall, I think the main point in all our matches is the difference in experience. Since the time we started I have played way more than him. As I always tell him after our matches, he is always on the edge of victory but it is just small decisions that you realize with repetition – sequencing, and one particular example from this match, always, ALWAYS playing Friends in Low Places first.
WIN 2-0
MATCH 3, VS JORDAN (ePOE2/eHONDO)
Jordan is a new player in the area. He was really serious and we got into a bit of an argument early on. I was a bit salty by the fact he actually reshuffled my deck on mulligan instead of cutting without asking. In any case, this was by far the toughest match of the day. We were both 2-0 so this was pretty much the match that decided who got to pick tokens or promos 😀 . I won the roll, I rolled really hot in the determining roll. All 3 games I won the opening roll, I did not lose once.
This was pretty back and forth, I don’t remember the turn by turn on detail but here are some interesting things that happened with added flavor thoughts 😀
- Round 1 was brutal for me. He played Vandalize on my Force Speed, got a Fast Hands on Hondo forcing me to spend my resources because of fear of the disrupt (which he rolled) and take a Hondo special to Qui-Gon’s face, AND Easy Pickings my double Yoda special roll on top of it. Damn I thought I was done. The plans were fairly clear from the onset, he was aiming for QuiGon, I was aiming for Poe.
- Lucky for me, his Hondo/Fast Hands did not really take over, as his rolls in Hondo were mostly terrible for the rest of the match. I did Rend one Fast Hands but he equipped a 2nd one later on.
- Round 3 he discarded a Cunning to reroll and try to avoid getting too far behind which I didn’t really understand. Cunning is one of the best cards in the deck and I’d rather discard mitigation or Hit and Run to get the added consistency/versatility. Specially in Poe or Hondo where the hit and run plays are not really that powerful until late, late game.
- After the Cunning discard into a good reroll, I played Mind Trick. This was an interesting scenario, in one side I had a Poe special and a hondo discard side, on the other a the 2 dmg from the blaster, a poe resource, and a hondo special. I decided to keep the 3 dice pool because of tempo purposes. If I gave him the less damage option he would have initiative next turn, and since I had a Guard in my hand I was not about to let that happen. So even if my QuiGon got hit with 2 more damage I think in hindsight it was the better play, as I was able to resolve my shields & stick faster and claim for a bit more damage
- Poe died from a thousand cuts early in round 4. Qui-Gon with double Shoto Lightsabers is really, really scary. It is pretty much what Kylo2 aspires to be.
- After Qui-Gon got the 2nd Shoto I always switch to activating him first to maintain the pressure, specially against decks that can somehow cheat their damage – like Hit and Run in Poe decks.
- Late game ePoe/eHondo decks can be really scary with Second Chances paired with 1 or 2 Planetary Uprisings. You get 2-3 really fast turns where you roll, resolve, claim and do damage in the meantime which can close games. I had to do 21 damage to Hondo and let me tell you, it was stressful. Planetary Uprising is such a good card.
Overall, a great match. After it was done and actually engaging in conversation it turned out he is a really nice guy. Hope to play him again in the future.
WIN 3-0
The turnout was kind of small for the tournament which really makes me worry about the state of the game right now. I had a lot of fun, and I had the tough choice of picking between tokens or the Holdout Blaster promo. It came down to how amazing the promo art looks, and the fact that I already have a lot of tokens. Promos all the way!
Hope you guys enjoyed the report, until next time!
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