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Lasombra's Remembrances of DragonCon 2000

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The Lasombra

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Jul 4, 2000, 3:00:00 AM7/4/00

Lasombra's Remembrances of DragonCon 2000

I will start of with saying a great THANKS to L. Scott Johnson and Joe
Churchill for running the tournaments this year. Without their self-
less devotion to this great game we would have been without a great
weekend.

Apologies here for any and all name mis-spellings.

Their were 3 tournaments, Thursday's was Constructed Deck, Friday's was
Jyhad Booster Draft, and Saturday's was Sabbat Rochester Draft.

On Thursday, the Austin contingent flew in at the last minute, our
flight was delayed an hour in Houston, and we almost missed the start
of the tournament. We arrived at the hotel at 6:00 straight up, called
Todd Bannister on his cell phone, ran with him thru convention
registration, and then ran down to the game.

There were 36 players in the constructed tournament, noticably missing
the Los Angeles players, and Sorrow, all of whom had requested a re-
scheduling of the constructed event to make their attendance possible.
We did have people from Quebec City, Austin, Las Vegas, Seattle,
Lafayette Louisiana, North & South Carolina, Georgia, and New Jersey
that I know of.

We played at 9 tables of 4 players each, with Steve Wieck playing in
the first round, and someone else taking his place for the next two. I
played my Lasombra Voting deck, and took victory points every round,
making it into the finals. The Austin contingent took 11 victory
points in the first round, so we started strong, but I was the only one
to make it to the finals on Thursday.

The finals consisted of Steve Coombs (Charlotte NC - Marijava Ghoul
Misdirection Bleed), David Tatu (Atlanta GA - animalism dominate),
Jeffrey Thompson (Austin TX - Lasombra Voting), Mike Perlman (Atlanta
GA - weenie presence bleed), and Jason Dawson (VEKN Prince of Seattle
WA - weenie presence bleed).

Mike and Jason contested vampires throughout the game, and
unfortunately, I was not quick enough to oust them both, Mike was able
to oust Jason before I got him. Steve was able to oust David without
many trips to torpor, and then it came down to the two of us, and he
was able to oust me.

Steve Coombs 1st place 3 vp in final
Mike Perlman 2nd place 1 vp in final
Jeffrey Thompson 3rd place 1 vp in final
Jason Dawson 4th place 0 vp in final
David Tatu 5th place 0 vp in final

On Friday, we had 25 players in the Jyhad Booster Draft event, 5 tables
of 5 players each. Everyone enjoyed the booster draft format, and that
portion went fairly quickly as we didn't start for almost 30 minutes
waiting for people who were expected, and because we wanted even tables
if at all possible.

Unfortunately, after the drafting I went upstairs and had a hotdog
which was handled with the same tongs they were using to put Cheese on
the hamburgers. I played the first round poorly, and went to the White
Wolf merchandise booth, found that they were giving away promotional
copies of Lucita, took one, ran back to the hotel the gaming was
happening in, ran back with 4 people to get them copies of Lucita, then
ran back to attend the second round. All that running had caused me to
sweat, and that provoked an allergic reaction to the Cheese that had
touched my food. I ended up flat on my back for the next three hours
and can't really report much about the rest of the Jyhad Draft
tournament beyond the following:

Ethan Burrow (VEKN Prince of Austin) and Greg Faulkner (Austin Gangrel
Newsletter Editor) both made it to the finals so Austin was again
represented in the finals. Greg ended up sitting as Ethan's predator,
so Ethan didn't do too well. Remy from Quebec City in Canada did an
excellent job of making up for no victory points on Thursday with an
excellent win in the finals.

On Saturday, we had 40 players in the Sabbat Rochester Draft event, 8
tables of 5 players each. We had 4-5 people drop out over the course
of this event, causing L. Scott no end of trouble in having to
rearrange tables again and again to prevent Predator-Prey relationships
from reoccuring. Evidently, the $10 for 4 boosters of Sabbat was too
powerful a purchase to pass up the opportunity to pick the best cards
from 20 boosters and leave, to keep people committed to playing.

Everyone had a great time at my table doing the draft, as people saw
cards they didn't have, wanted to have, wanted to deny others, and it
was simply enjoyable. I drafted very well, as no one else noticed
exactly how much presence I had managed to pick up. I drafted 8 Social
Charm, 4 Media Influence, 2 Pulse of the Canaille, and 2 Computer
Hackings (which I didn't end up using). Pool management is key in
draft, so I also took 1 Blood Doll, 2 Short Term Investments, 4 Hunting
Grounds (only 1 of which I could use), and an Art Scam. For vampires,
I was able to draft Jost, 3x Lachlan Noddist, Matteus Flesh Sculptor,
Lambach, Donatien, Victor Revell, Dodd, Sarah Brando, Frederick the
Weak, Angela Decker and 7 other vampires I didn't use. It ended up
being a very strong deck. I took 1 victory point against the people
who knew what I was drafting, 3 victory points in the second round, and
4 victory points in the fourth round.

Throughout both draft touraments, contesting vampires and locations
were frequent happenings. Contestation pretty much decided the third
round in my favor as my prey, his prey, and my grand predator all
contested at one point or another, and when my grand predator became my
prey, I was able to contest Dodd with him and win the contest. In the
final round, contesting the Amusement Park Hunting Ground allowed me to
determine who would take the last two victory points on the table, and
so ensure my victory.

At the finals we had two Austinites again, Ethan Burrow and myself. We
also had Matt Heslin (now moved to Pennsylvania, formerly of Charlotte
& Dallas), James Moe (Seattle, WA), and Conor Key (VEKN prince of
Raleigh NC).

Ethan was once again prey to another Austin player in a final round,
and he was not able to take Matt out before being ousted. I ousted
Ethan and Matt, then Jost got sent to torpor by a Black Spiral Buddy
controlled by James. Jost got diablerized by one of Conor's many
minions, and Sarah Brando wasn't far behind. Eventually, all of us
were down within ousting distance. I knew that if Conor was able to
take me too quickly, he would oust James as well and win. I also knew
that if James took Conor out and I was out of the game, I would win. I
stood up to Conor as long as I could, but I stopped taking actions
against James, and eventually ousted myself. After a long drawn out
process with many of Conor's minions visting torpor, James was able to
oust him due to his Blood Doll - Amusement Park Hunting Ground combo.
James was more easily able to gain pool every turn, just through that,
and it was able to offset the majority of what Conor was able to do.

Jeffrey Thompson 1st place 2 vp in final
(8 going in, 168 tournament points)
James Moe 2nd place 2 vp in final
(8 going in, 150 tournament points)
Conor Key 3rd place 1 vp in final
Matt Heslin 4th place 0 vp in final
Ethan Burrow 5th place 0 vp in final

In general, a great time was had by all, with few problems erupting
from misunderstandings of rules, all of which I believe were ably
resolved by LSJ and Joe Churchill when appropriate.

These remembrances are by no means exhaustive, and others that attended
are invited to add to the information above.

I hope you all have an opportunity to participate in an event of this
magnitude sometime in the near future. Remember that Origins has 5
VTES tournaments from July 13th - July 16th in Colombus Ohio
(http://www.wizards.com/origins/) and Gencon has 5 VTES tournaments
including the US National Championships (Saturday August 12, 2000
12:00pm - 8:00pm) from August 10th - August 13th in Milwaukee Wisconsin
(http://www.wizards.com/gencon/).

Carpe Noctem.

Lasombra

http://members.tripod.com/~Lasombra

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