A Game of Thrones Regional: Columbia, Missouri - Part 1

Sorting out trips to gaming events has become a bit of an art - controlled chaos, as people juggle their schedules, budgets, and expectations as the event approaches. I spoke with a few weeks ago about catching a ride down with him, and left it at that. In the intervening weeks, a shifting roster of other interested parties from Iowa coalesced on Friday morning into the final group of Dave T and Jerod.

Dave would drive himself and Jerod down, while I rode with Luke. Dave had to be back sometime Saturday night for an important Sunday event, and I have a lot to work on with the wedding, so it was decided that the three of us would come back that night together, with Luke staying until Sunday. Take off time was scheduled for Friday at 1 pm, so that we could make it down for the booster draft that evening. Kristin dropped me off at the store, ready to go, at 12:30.

Steve, Jerod, Luke, and Gigi were at the store. Steve hadn't eaten lunch yet, so we decided to run down to Subway to grab some grub. The buzz around the store, lately, has been about the aptly named BMT or Big Meaty Treat. With a name like that, I couldn't resist. A few minutes later, Steve and I were chomping on stacks of salami, ham, and cheese, with peppers and garlic spread, when Teagle arrived. The conversation turned, of course, to Teagle himself being a "big meaty treat," or, as it were, a "big meaty Teagle." This led to Dave being referred to as BMT all weekend, which was certainly exponentially funnier for us then than it is to you now...

Lunch consumed, it was time to hit the road. Luke and I headed off down 215, enjoying the beutiful weather and the geeky sounds of MC Chris, whom I've been binging on a bit of late, after seeing him at The House in DeKalb last week. Luke particularly enjoyed (aside from the classic "Fett's Vette," of course) White Kids Love Hip Hop and Geek. We had some laughs, and good discussions about the current state of the game and upcoming card sets. Particularly noteworthy in the light of the upcoming tournament, we discussed the state of Baratheon power rush decks, and debated the merits of having decks that can win that quickly (1st or 2nd turn) in an environment where there are not really a lot of possible answers at that point in the game. We missed a turn, and got a few miles off track, saw a confederate flag flying in a yard in Missouri, and other small adventures. Finally, we pulled into the Valhalla's Gate parking lot in Columbia, apparently about five minutes after Dave and Jerod.

I had been looking forward to visiting the store, as I had managed a small gaming store in Columbia many years ago, and was looking forward to seeing what had become of gaming in the area. VG is really a very nice place, and obviously a real benefit to the gamers in the area. They have a pretty decent stock of boardgames, a fairly extensive rpg area, and quite a bit in the miniatures department. They had an especially extensive selection of Warmachine. They were a little lite in the CCG/CMG deparment, at least in the areas of singles and variety. Things that really shone about the store were the amount of playing space (although most of it was obviously meant for miniatures gaming) and the numerous, friendly staff.

They actually close at 7pm on Fridays, so we waited for two guys to make massive D&D purchases, and for the store to be locked up, and got the draft underway. The decision was made to draft Winter/Winter/SON/SON, as people were anxious to get ahold of new cards. We had 17 people, and only time for three rounds, so we split into two pods. My table was, if I remember correctly, starting with me and running clockwise, Sam, Matt, Jerod, Casey, Kevin, Justin, Thad, and Jeff.

I first picked Northern Heir. I never mind going Stark in draft, although sometimes there's a lot of competition. This pack didn't give me a lot of choices, though. I was quite happy, then, when the second pack came and I saw that Jeff had decided to ship me an Arya's revenge. Oddly, I was a little unhappy, as this pack also had a Northern Champ in it, and I had to send it down the line. Third pick I grabbed a nice Stark army, fourth pick a random neutral character, and fifth pick another Arya's Revenge! Things were shaping up nicely. Noteworthy, though, is that both times I picked an Arya's Revenge I passed a Dothroki Sea. I think, earlier in the draft, I would value DS (can be played out of house, doesn't have a high influence cost) over AR. However, already into Stark, AR was the way to go. In pack two, I honestly can't remember my first pick. I think it was Fallen Brother. I picked up Huntress in the Swamp second, and then took my first real non-Stark card with Warlock's Servitors. This pack wasn't as good, just picking up random filler in Stark, Targ, and neutral, and an out of house Enemy Informer. Third pack I agonized over my first choice, looking at the rare "A Better Offer" and the uncommon "Dreadfort Captain." I ended up taking the out of house attachment, due to rarity and the possible power of controlling someone like Student of Subtlety. I ended up getting a Captain third pick, along with a second pick Shackled Defender. Things went OK the rest of the pack. Final pack first pick was another agonizing choice, with a great common wight, a very good uncommon Targ character, and the rare Robb's Sworn Swords, a huge army with deadly and renown who can eliminate a neutral character when entering and leaving play. Again, I went with the rare. Other noteworthy pickups included two each of Wolf Stalwart (common, four cost & strenght, str 3 or lower don't count strength) and Dragon Parisan (smaller, targ version, Str 1 don't count).

Overall, the deck was pretty good. Here it is:
Characters (24)
Stark (12)
Robb's Sworn Swords
Northern Heir
Dreadfort Captain
Greywater Watchmen
Greatjohn's Elite
Shackled Defender
Lookout
Wolf Stalwart X 2
Keeper of the New Gods
River Rider
Huntress in the Swamp
Targ (7)
Illyrio's Guard
Quartheen Tax Collector
Warlock's Servitors
Dragon Partisan X2
Eastern Mercenary
Ser Jorah Mormont
Neutral (4)
Mammoth Rampager
Ruthless Defender
Fallen Brother
Crazed Doomsayer
Lannister (1)
Enemy Informer

Events (2)
Arya's Revenge X2

Attachments (1)
A Better Offer

Locations (13)
Eastern Fiefdoms X1 (for influence)
Minor Fiefdom X3
Crossroads X3
Recruiting Hall X3
Recruiting Grounds X3

Plots (5)
Taxation
Counting Coppers
Called by the Gods
Filthy Accusations
Alliance

First Round - They did the pairings at our table randomly, for some reason, while the other table went cross-table, as we normally do in Iowa. I was supposed to play Sam, but he felt bad that he was running the tournament and someone would have to get a bye, so he basically dropped out of the tournament after drafting. I ended up playing Matt, who had been sitting to Sam's left. Matt was apparently a fairly new player, and was playing single house Martell. This is usually a cue that the person is not that good at drafting, as most players are not usually fortunate enough to get the number of in-house/neutral characters necessary to make single house work. However, this wasn't apparently the case here. Matt had a decent start, with a lot of gold off the flop. The first turn, he had two Martell characters, one of them being Arianne. Second turn, I knelt Arianne, but he got out a Dornish Lancer and some fodder, and put +1 str and renown on Arianne, then cancelled my Enemy Informer's attempt to kneel the Lancer. The Lancer also got an attachment that said he could gain a power every time he lost a challenge. Well, the Lancer attacked, Arianne got to stand, and he claimed a bunch of power. Third turn I discarded the attachment on the Lancer with Ser Jorah, but he just played another! I did a military, he copied the ability on the attachment, and I was locked out of the game, as I lost if I won any challenge or lost power. It was frustrating to be done that quickly, but oh well.

Second round - I got paired with Jeff this time. He was sitting to my right, which is not commonly great in draft, as he got to see most of the first pack before I did. Jeff is a really new player, though, and this was a learning experience for him. He was also playing single house. I'm somewhat ashamed that I can't remember what house it was, although I'm pretty sure it was Lannister. Either he or Casey had Lanni, that's for sure. Well, this game, no offence to Jeff, was sort of just going through the motions it seemed, as my deck and draw were better than Jeff's, and he was still learning. We played a nice, friendly, easy-going game, through five or six plots, I think, and I won. We had a little talk after about drafting and deck building, and it became clear that nobody had informed him that he could add 3 each of Minor Fiefdom and Crossroads. He made some adjusments to his deck which, I think, helped out, as he won the next round.

Third round - I got to play Casey, who sat accross from me and hence probably should have been my first round opponent. He was also single house, and this time I really don't remember what house it was. Casey was a somewhat experienced player, who hadn't played in a while, who just came out for the draft. I think he made decent choices, but his deck just didn't show up, and mine did. That's one thing about drafting a lot of characters - you can usually at least play. This was another game that lasted a few plots, but wasn't too much of a game - Casey just didn't get cards. After it was over, we shook hands and chatted about the game and Columbia for a bit. It's too bad he didn't want to play in the constructed event the next day.

In the end, I was 2-1, losing first round, Jerod was 2-1, losing 2nd round, and Dave was 2-1, losing in the last round of the other pod. They had arranged the prize support for one tournament, so they rolled off between people from the different pods for each place, which was kind of weird. In the end, Dave ended up third, Jerdo 5th, and me 7th, I think. In all honesty, the prize support was a little wimpy, too, with not much thrown in aside from what the company sent (I think Boen maybe threw in some stuff from his store). This was especially so in light of the fact that we were charged more than retail ($16) for the packs for the draft. Some places have different philosophies about this sort of thing, though, and not everyone is as generous as Jerod (or, of course, as AJ), who charged only, I think, $12 or $14 for his drafts and threw in product for prizes for everyone.

After the tournament, we needed to find a hotel. We drove out to the place where Lucas was lodging and scored a sweet deal on a smoking room, as they were out of non-smoking. Not having eaten dinner, we decided to run out to Wendy's for some burgers and stop at a gas station for some beers. The Wendy's drive through line was an unbelievable wait, but we had some laughs chatting and listening to MC Chris.

That night, I worked on tuning the Lannister-Greyjoy deck I'd made after our regional. While I did that, the others hung out in Luke's room while Luke built a deck for Dobbler, a guy from Missouri who didn't have any cards. Luke went to drive Dobbler back to the place he was crashing, and Jerod kindly agreed to test against me with his characterlite deck. I had a pretty good start, but I was missing an intrigue icon that would have really helped. I also messed up my order of play in one round, and Jerod won.

We chatted and chuckled for a few minutes like kids at a sleepover and then it was lights out, with the prospect of the big event, last chance for a trophy this season, looming on the morning horizon.