u/JustAModestMan

Brace yourself. This post is like 6000 words long.

TLDR: Played Irelia, went 9-3-1, came 56th, had an excellent time, zero controversies in my matches, had a match that had a 30 minute judge call and ended with me killing Baron to win the game, 10/10 tournament experience, meta is surprisingly great, I hate Aurora, time rules need further scrutiny.

Having had an amazing experience over the weekend, I wanted to share my story before I forget all the details.

Despite usually preferring to play off meta, I landed on Irelia, for a few reasons:

I was getting sick of playing into decks with high levels of interaction and negate effects without having access to my own.
Irelia is a very fun Legend to play, with (IMO) a very high level of skill expression.
Irelia as a champion is one of my favourites (she was the first Champion that came out after I started playing League).

My list was:

Legend:

1 Irelia, Blade Dancer

Champion:

1 Irelia, Fervent

Battlefields:

1 Abandoned Hall

1 Targon's Peak

1 Zaun Warrens

Main Deck:

3 Boots of Swiftness

2 Charm

3 Defiant Dance

3 Defy

3 Discipline

2 Edge of Night

3 En Garde

1 Fizz, Trickster

2 Guardian Angel

2 Gust

3 Lonely Poro

2 Rhasa the Sunderer

1 Ride the Wind

3 Stellacorn Herder

3 Tideturner

2 Traveling Merchant

1 Zhonya's Hourglass

Rune Pool:

5 Calm Rune

7 Chaos Rune

Sideboard:

1 Adaptatron

1 Disarming Rake

1 Rebuke

2 Sneaky Deckhand

2 Star-Crossed

1 Vex, Apathetic

My version of Irelia is much more aggressive than usual, utilising Gear very heavily (Boots of Swiftness, Guardian Angel, Edge of Night) and trying to push for double point scores every turn from Turn 2.

You have Merchant, Rhasa, and Zaun Warrens in Game 1, and then in Game 2 you usually take Rhasa and Merchant out for Sneaky Deckhands + Vex as well as other randomly useful things.

Gusts are in main for LeBlanc matchups, but were generally useful for the more aggressive plan anyway.

There were many, many rounds where I had 1-2 Runes in play at game end. In one round, I remember going to 0 Runes midgame and constantly resetting to zero every turn from then on.

I've tried to highlight some of the more interesting moments from my matches, as well as give a bit of an explanation about how my opponents journeys went overall too.

Every person I played against was lovely, demonstrated great sportsmanship, and I had zero issues the entire weekend.

Day 1, Round 1 vs AltGU 2-0 (Ahri)

I distinctly remember AltGU sighing loudly when I flipped over my Irelia Legend after I saw his Ahri. He explained that he was mostly just playing for fun and trying his luck at going for best of Ahri, and would likely drop as soon as he lost a round. Apart from me missing Ahri’s ability once in the early game which forced an additional En Garde out of me for no real reason, I just kinda blitzed through these games and scored very quickly.

True to his word, after a quick 2-0 here, he did exactly that, finishing in 1229^(th) place, and went on to play and enjoy some side events over the weekend. I ran into him a few more times, and several of his friends were also on Irelia in the main event and doing well.

Day 1, Round 2 vs Nonamegohst (Midrange Yi) 2-1

Midrange Yi is one of my least favourite matchups to play; the combination of spooky 8 Might Rengar and a very difficult to answer pump in Punch First make this a tough one. I managed to bum rush him Game 1, and then Game 2 was looking good until Rengar showed up and I just lacked the pumps to actually get over the top of him.

The most defining play that I can remember was from Game 3.

The Battlefields were Vilemaw’s Lair and Abandoned Hall, and my opening hand had Sneaky Deckhand, Lonely Poro, and Defiant Dance in it. I led with Lonely Poro, which was answered by First Mate. I then sent Lonely Poro to Abandoned Hall and played my Sneaky Deckhand to Vilemaw’s Lair. Nonamegohst attack Vilemaw’s with First Mate (I had intentionally left the Poro at the stronger battlefield as I expected he would feast on Sneaky instead of Poro), and as predicted, slammed Rengar onto the Poro. I played Defiant Dance, and in combination with Abandoned Hall, Poro won the combat 5 vs 4, and I think that huge momentum loss was what ended up winning me the game.

Nonamegohst had a solid run for the rest of the day, but narrowly missed Day 2 with a 5-3 record, finishing 307^(th).

Day 1, Round 3 vs TheRiftingTurtle (LeBlanc) 2-1

I was pretty ready for this matchup having played it many times, and when I opened with a Gust in Game 1, things were feeling pretty good. Once again, Game 1 was a fairly quick affair, and Game 2 was looking like it was going to be another stomping. However, I simply lacked a draw engine, and eventually Rift Herald showed up, Ashe ripped my last card from hand, and a Watcher came in next turn and cleaned me out.

Game 3 had another extremely memorable play. The Battlefields were Abandoned Hall for me and Forbidding Waste for him. I opened with Lonely Poro, followed by his LeBlanc from Champ Zone. I had En Garde, Tideturner, and Charm in hand. The easiest line here would have been to move Lonely Poro to Abandoned Hall, play En Garde, play Charm, and call it a day. However, I saw a much better line.

I played Charm on LeBlanc, choosing to move her to Forbidding Waste. The intention here was just to gift LeBlanc 1 point, then move my Lonely Poro to Abandoned Hall, play Tideturner, use Irelia to ready Poro, and come crash into LeBlanc. I score 2 Battlefields, leave LeBlanc with no unit in play, and threaten to hold for two more VP next turn. Plus, I keep my En Garde in hand (while I also still have one Rune up).

I felt like a genius.

Then my opponent said “Okay. So LeBlanc conquers and…”

Uh-oh.

I had forgotten about the legend ability being usable on my turn.

So instead of my Charm line being a genius play, I had instead given my opponent a point, allowed him to “filter” a card from hand, and now I was staring down a shadow clone Leblanc and a normal LeBlanc that I had to kill.

As such, I had to play my Tideturner from hand, play En Garde on it, ready it with Irelia, send it in to trade with LeBlanc’s clone, and then crash my Poro in.

So compared to the original “simple” line of En Garde + Charm to kill LeBlanc at Abandoned Hall, I had cost myself one additional Rune, one point, and a Tideturner.

“You can see how the line was ALMOST smart, right? I asked.

He laughed.

I thought I’d thrown the game entirely here, but I managed to keep up with LeBlanc for most of the game. On what would effectively be the final turn of the game, he marched an accelerated Thousand-Tailed Watcher, Karthus, and Watchful Sentry into my now 1 Might Irelia at Abandoned Hall. I had two Runes and two cards in hand.

En Garde + Defiant Dance + 2 Abandoned Hall procs took Irelia up to 11 Might and the opposing Trio down to 9, so Irelia survived, wiped them out, and took the game next turn.

Although he’d had a fortunate start to the tournament (a bye from a Showdown, and a no-show in Round 2), TheRiftingTurtle had a dreadful run for the rest of the tournament, finishing 2-4 in 861^(st) place. We caught up a few more times over the weekend, with him wishing me luck between some of my matches on Day 2.

Day 1, Round 4 vs Blackbird9 (Draven) 2-0

A fellow Ken Behren (person from Canberra; it’s a local joke), Blackbird9 on Draven had two quite unfortunate games where I simply did not allow him to win combats. Across both games, I think he managed to draw a single card off Draven Legend. Irelia simply ran through his forces during both games, and he failed to find a Rebuke in either game to deal with her.

After starting 3-0 and looking very solid, unfortunately Blackbird9 narrowly missed Day 2 with a record of 5-3, finishing 256^(th).

Day 1, Round 5 vs Sw2588 (Sett) 1-2

A friend of a friend from my time in Hamilton, Sw2588 was on a deck I was admittedly less familiar with; Midrange Sett. After running him over in Game 1 extremely quickly (I think I ended the game on 1 or 2 Runes due to all my power use), I was unable to repeat the performance in Game 2, and Game 3 came down to a final turn, where a Repulse for my Charm prevented my Poro from stealing the game.

I think the lesson I took from this later on was that I had played far too aggressively in Game 3, to the point where I couldn’t even play Irelia because my power was so low. Against Midrange decks, I needed to make sure I got Irelia into play before I went to town with power.

Sw2588 and I were seated near each other often throughout the rest of the tournament, basically following each other around with near identical records. In the end, however, Sw2588 lost his final round to a Midrange Yi when Defy stopped his Showstopper and ended his Top 64 chances, leaving him 8-4-1 and in 111^(th) place.

Day 1, Round 6 vs dunkMATTic (Midrange Yi) 2-1

The second Midrange Yi of the day did not start well. In Game 1, despite mulliganing two cards, I could not find units or GA/Zhonyas in the early game. dunkMATTic got strongly established early, and not wanting to risk having Irelia get destroyed by a Charm or a surprise Rengar on the following turn, I had to pass T2 with 5 Runes up and nothing to do. After another draw provided no gear and no units, I simply played Irelia with 2 Runes up. My Defy for a Charm met a Defy in response, and Defiant Dance was bested by Punch First, and thus we were quickly onto Game 2.

Game 2 was an absolute slog back and forth, and the only major detail I can remember here is that I held onto Amateur Recital long enough to get massive value out of it. I think there was a turn where my opponent could have moved Rengar home and been more threatening, but with him simply opting to wait at the battlefield, I was able to setup more strongly and utilise all my gear in the late game to crash in for the win.

Game 3 started much like Game 1; I simply had no units early, though at the very least this time I did have some protection for Irelia. This game once again got extremely scrappy, with both of us down to virtually zero cards in hand at one stage. dunkMATTic tried to go for game by using Charm on Irelia to move her home.

"Conquer with both for game?" he asked.

"Play out the turn" I said.

He realised what that meant.

Master Yi went for the conquer, and I used Ride the Wind to move Irelia in to defend. Rengar jumped in as well. I thought I’d lost, but we simply bounced off each other (11 to 11) and Irelia was left with no Guardian Angel. On the next turn, Irelia headed on over to Targon’s Peak, killed a Scuttle Crab, and I had to show Yi the Defiant Dance I had just topdecked. Yi went to the other Battlefield, conquered, drew a card, and passed. I drew for the turn, and with no other options, Irelia had to fight Yi for the game. Yi showed the Punch First he’d drawn, I showed the Defiant Dance, and Yi showed the Defy…

…to which I responded with my fresh Defy off the top to win the game.

dunkMATTic did manage to qualify for Day 2 from here, but unfortunately had a rough second day, finishing 144^(th) with a record of 8-5.

Day 1, Round 7 vs PKPikmin (Diana) 2-1

This match has perhaps the most wild final game in my entire 20 year history of playing TCGs.

I won Game 1, and I got smashed hard by Hwei in Game 2.

In Game 3, I thought I’d finally wrested control of the game back under control when PKPikmin slammed Baron Nashor into play. On the turn he came in, I completely forgot about Baron Pit providing pseudo-Ganking (I think I was tricked by my own Ganking Boots, honestly) and thus missed an opportunity to kill it. On the next turn, PKPikmin went to 7, dropped Hwei and Ravenbloom Student on Baron Pit (23 Might), and passed the turn.

In play, I started the turn and ticked on over to 7 from a Hold. At the moment, the board situation was as follows:

Abandoned Hall (Empty)

Baron Pit (Baron, Ravenbloom, Hwei (23 Might)

Rockfall Pass (Sneaky Deckhand + Boots of Swiftness + Edge of Night)

My Base (Irelia, Stellacorn Herder)

My Runes: 9

PKPikmin’s Runes: 3 + Diana Legend.

The fate of this game has come down whether I can kill Baron or not.

I started the turn assuming that, at some stage, Irelia was going to eat a Star-Crossed, and I was going to lose to it. I had a Defiant Dance in hand, though I can’t remember the specific other cards. As such, I figured I should try and draw some cards to help with the combat math (and hopefully find a Defy to help seal the deal). I sent Stellacorn Herder to Abandoned Hall and passed priority to PKPikmin, who also passed. I confirmed that the conquer was going ahead, and PKPikmin agreed.

This is where things start to get wild.

I realise that Abandoned Hall was the ONLY other Battlefield where I would be able to ready Irelia (Legend), and I was about to conquer it and lose out on readying one unit. Stellacorn Herder was now exhausted, and the Conquer + the Stellacorn draw had not yielded me Defy, so I PKPikmin DID have the Star-Crossed, I would now be down a unit (as I would be unable to ready both Stellacorn Herder AND Irelia). I realised I could have simply played Defiant Dance in the Showdown, used Irelia Legend to ready Stellacorn then and there, and there would have been no issues. Unfortunately, that opportunity had passed.

I thought through my options, and I found a way forward. I called a judge to confirm it.

My question?

“Can I activate Irelia Legend’s “When I conquer” text to try and ready her if she is already ready?”

It probably didn’t help that I was using the Lunar New Year version (this slowed things down as they had to get an English version to reference the rules), but the judge believed that I could not do so. I think there was a misunderstanding here though as he thought I was trying to get a “double ready” out of her, but that was not the case. I simply wanted to place her “When I conquer” ability on the chain.

The judge was a bit confused. PKPikmin was also confused (he told me later he had no idea what was happening). Bystanders chimed in to say that it wouldn’t work.

The judge stood by that they believed I could not. I appealed, which was accepted. The judge left to go grab the head judge. At this point, we were in Overtime, but it didn’t really matter for our game as this was definitely the final turn.

By the time the Head Judge came over, we were now approximately 15 minutes into this judge call. More people had come to see what was happening.

The Head Judge went over the situation, making sure to confirm what had happened, making sure to determine whether a conquer at 7VP is still a conquer (it is), going through the wording of every single card involved, and asking for clarification as to why I wanted to try and put the Irelia trigger on the chain given she was already ready.

I explained that if I had a card like En Garde, I could then respond to my trigger, target my own unit, use Irelia Legend’s OTHER triggered effect to exhaust her and then ready the unit, and then finally, when the trigger I had paid for in the first place resolved, she would then ready.

Basically, I was trying to find a way to STILL use her twice.

The head judge simply said “Honestly, I’m not sure. I need to go check with the Riot Rules Guru we have here”.

We’re now 25 minutes into this judge call. I have apologised about 25 times to PKPikmin for trying to make this weird edge case play.

The head judge comes back, and confirms what I had suspected all along. You can put the ready trigger on the chain, and then react to it.

Having now explained and played through the scenario here about 25 times. I start to execute everything. I’m almost certain I’ve got it this turn, even through a Star Crossed.

“Watch me lose from here,” I joke.

I put Irelia’s ready trigger on the chain, and then respond with Defiant Dance from hand, giving Stellacorn +2 and Hwei -2. I then use Irelia Legend’s other trigger to ready the Stellacorn. Finally, Irelia Legend readies.

I play a Tideturner I just drew to swap players with the Stellacorn and draw a card (still trying to find Defy or anything else that may help seal the deal, just in case I’ve missed something). I draw another Tideturner.

I move Irelia to Abandoned Hall and play Charm on Ravenbloom Student. Irelia gets picked by the Abandoned Hall for +2, taking her to 7 Might (4 base, 1 for readying at start of turn, and 2 for Hall). Ravenbloom Student comes in, and PKPikmin exhausts three Runes to play a….

Eclipse on Irelia.

This takes her down to 3 Might, and the Ravenbloom trigger + Abandoned Hall takes Ravenbloom to 6. That’s now big enough to kill Irelia AND Tideturner AND therefore also Conquer Abandoned Hall, giving PKPikmin an extra card.

I freak out for a moment, but realise that the end result is still basically the same as Star-crossed (except he drew a card). He’s now out only 1 Rune up. Stupefy is a potential problem here, but he’s already played two this game, so chances of a third are low. Existential Dread is a problem I cannot solve.

Stellacorn Herder and Sneaky Deckhand march to Baron Pit for 12 Might. I draw a card….Vex – Apathetic.

I pass focus.

As does PKPikmin.

Baron dies, and so too do Stellacorn Herder and Sneaky Deckhand, leaving me with no units in play, Boots of Swiftness, Edge of Night, and four Runes.

Thankfully, Irelia is still ready (thanks to the judge call).

I exhaust my final four runes, show the Vex, rapidly throw the Boots, Edge of Night, and Irelia trigger onto her, and then march into Baron Pit for 8 Might vs Hwei’s 3 (He was 7, but Defiant Dance gave him -2, and Baron’s death shrunk him as well).

I pass focus.

As does PKPikmin.

After playing a Charm, a Defiant Dance, a Tideturner, drawing four extra cards from Stellacorn + conquering, a 30 minute judge call including basically two levels of appeal, and using Irelia Legend twice, Baron Pit finally falls to Vex, and I win the match and my slot in Day 2.

I apologise to PKPikmin for the 30^(th) time.

Somehow we still weren’t the last match to finish that round.

PKPikmin and I caught up a few times over the next day. He had thankfully won his bubble match, and ended up finishing in 55^(th) place on 9-3-1. I’m sure by the time I’d finished talking to him on Sunday I’d apologised to him 55 times.

Day 1, Round 8 vs Day (Irelia) 2-1

This was honestly a much more relaxing match than the previous one. Day was a friend of AltGU’s (I found this out much later), and we played an interesting back and forth match. I won Game 1 off the back of hard and fast aggro, but Game 2 I simply ran out of gas far too quickly. In Game 3, I managed to land Vex – Apathetic early, and the rest of my game became “Protect Vex”. It was a very successful game plan.

Day had a reasonable run on Day 2, going 3-2 for an end score of 9-4 and a placing of 93^(rd).

Day 2, Round 9 vs TSS KnightinGale (Vex) 1-2

I always feel a little more nervous when someone appears to have a team name at the front of their username. KnightinGale reported that Riftbound was his first in person card game, and he'd previously won Best of Ahri at another Regionals; pretty good for his first card game!

In both games 1 and 2, I played EXTREMELY aggressively, Charming his units multiple times to keep him off the board for as long as possible. This worked well in one game, but not the other, where two Sand Soldiers backed by two Kha'zix from hand came and devoured my board, and I simply couldn't overcome it.

Game 3 was a very close affair. I was again aggressive, having struggled against Shadow and other stun effects for a lot of the game. TSS KnightinGale was on 7 points, meaning I had to clear both Battlefields that turn. I had Irelia with GA and Edge of Night and Fizz, with two Defy in hand. TSS KnightinGale had some random 2 Might unit on Abandoned Hall, and then Vex - Cheerless and Vex-Apathetic on the other Battlefield. Not ideal, but we would see what we could do.

Fizz went to conquer the 2 Might unit, but Discipline forced a Defy from my hand.

With little else to do but try and get Irelia big enough to smash through, I moved her to Abandoned Hall, played Tideturner to swap places with her and ready her (bringing her to 9). This drew out a Star-crossed on Irelia in response, to which I played my second Defy (and my final card in hand). Irelia crashed in, hoping to trade (9 vs 9, and Irelia goes home), which would hopefully leave Fizz and Tideturner behind to hold the other Battlefield, but the final card in TSS KnightinGale's hand was Existential Dread.

"Good card" I said as I extended my hand.

TSS KnightinGale had an overall solid run, finishing 10-3 and in 27th place, the first (but not last) of my opponents to finish within the Top 32.

At this point, it was unlikely I would make Top 8, but there was still an outside chance that 11-2 could make it (though unfortunately my tiebreakers were very weak). Still, I could strive for as high a placing as possible.

Day 2, Round 10 vs Meluseek (Kha'zix) 2-0

This was a super pleasant round, despite it being quick. Game one saw me blitz through Meluseek's defences with Irelia and a ton of gear. Game 2 had a very interesting moment where Meluseek played an Investigator to look at my hand (he saw Edge of Night, Lonely Poro, and a Guardian Angel), but didn't have enough XP to discard anything. He had two Irresistable Faefolk at home, and retreated Kha'zix there too.

On the next turn, I double conquered after playing Lonely Poro, putting some boots on it to ready it, then conquering the other Battlefield with Irelia. I then recycled my last two runes (going to zero) to hide two cards (one Edge of Night, one topdeck).

Kha'zix and the Investigator came in to try and fight Irelia. I showed Edge of Night to him, bringing Irelia to 8 Might (4 + GA + Edge + Pick). After that all resolved, a Switcheroo from hand tried to turn swap Irelia's Might with the Investigator's. If that went through, she would not only not be able to kill anything, but would certainly be eaten alive by the Irresistable Faefolk dragging her back in.

Luckily, my second hidden card was a Tideturner, which let me swap Irelia over to the other battlefield BEFORE the Switcheroo resolved. Not only that, but it also chose Irelia, boosting her to 9. This meant that if the Irresistable Faefolk dragged Irelia in, she would still be big enough to takedown Kha'zix, even after his trigger had resolved twice AND the Legend had buffed him. Meluseek shipped the turn back to me. I channeled two Runes, topdecked a GA, sent Irelia home, played the GA and restood her (back to zero Runes), and crashed into Kha'zix and the Investigator, which effectively ended the game.

Meluseek had an unfortunate run after me, only managing to win one of the next three rounds, and finished 8-5 and in 136th place.

Day 2, Round 11 vs Duncan (Lilia) 2-1

Duncan was one of the loveliest opponents I had played against. He was quite softly spoken, and I think he got a bit nervous in the first game when I called a judge to clarify something (he thought he'd done something wrong; he hadn't). He missed a few minor triggers throughout the game or noticed them late, and was very apologetic.

"It's fine, mate. I'm not gonna shark you on them".

I'm not in the business of punishing people for missing triggers. I'd much rather win the game because of good play than my opponent "forgetting" things, especially when it's something very obvious (e.g. OF COURSE you're going to trigger Mask of Foresight every time, OF COURSE you're going to draw a card from Vex).

After that, I think Duncan relaxed a lot more, and we had a very pleasant match. Game 1 he came out early with Sprite Fountain and pushed points very strongly, but I was able to stabilise through it all and slow him down enough while holding one Battlefield for dear life to eek out the points I needed to win. In Game 2, Duncan cleverly baited me to exhaust all my runes, and then Charmed Irelia to a Battlefield and ate her with a Watcher.

Game 3 saw me open with Vex - Apathetic in hand, and a Sneaky Deckhand at Abandoned Hallway + Charm took out Lilia before she could do much. The rest of my gameplan, much like in Round 8 on Day 1, became protect Vex, and I don't think Duncan scored a single point for the rest of the game.

Duncan managed to win his final two rounds, narrowly missing out on Top 32 at 10-3 (33rd). He did, however, manage to secure Best of Lilia. He posted a summary of his deck here: https://www.reddit.com/r/riftboundtcg/comments/1tgguf4/comment/omg9vdy/

Day 2, Round 12 vs Shizuno (Vex) 1-1

Shizuno was a lovely and chatty opponent. I like chatty opponents.

He was also playing Vex. I do not like Vex (well, playing against it at least).

After losing Game 1 due to spooky triple Discipline from Shizuno, I managed to ride Stellacorns to victory in Game 2. The first two games had run long, and we were running out of time. I had a strong opening in Game 3, and a big early battle involving a Poro and Vex ended in both of them dying. By the time overtime had begun, it was clear that Shizuno could not possibly win (but he could draw). Unfortunately for me, overtime started on my turn, which meant that Shizuno had three major advantages over me:

He had started first in Game 3.
He would play the final turn of Game 3.
He would play an entire extra turn over me in Game 3.

At the start of his final turn on Game 3, the score was 5-3 my way. Had the game ended on even turns (e.g. ended on my last turn), I would have won. Unfortunately, it was not the case. Shizuno held to 4 points, and asked if the game was a draw.

"Maybe?" I said.

Shizuno moved his Scuttle Crab onto the Battlefield that I had vacated last time. I tried a Ride the Wind, hoping to cheese the final point, but a Defy meant the game ended 5-5 (rather than 6-4), and we naturally reached a draw.

Shizuno was apologetic, feeling like he played a bit more slowly during our match. I didn't feel that was particularly the case and wished him luck for the final round. He unfortunately didn't win the final round, but still ended in the Top 64 (58th) at 9-3-1.

Day 2, Round 13 vs Dhawally (Diana) 1-2

I had randomly run into Dhawally at Starbucks a few days prior, where he and his friends were playing RB at the table. To have my tournament weekend end facing the person it started with was a nice bookend.

Unfortunately, Dhawally seemed quite down (perhaps something had happened in the previous round). Apart from inquiring to make sure he was generally okay, I didn't pry any further, and we both agreed to hopefully play a "chill" final match.

Game 1 had me unfortunately not find much gas to cook with; I found a ton of units, and despite rummaging (discard 1, draw 1) with Merchant three times in one turn (utilising a cool trick enabled by the change to battlefield control rules and a hidden Tideturner), I simply found nothing much that I could push the issue with, and Hwei took over the game. On the final turn, I tried to find a line around Vex - Apathetic, but unfortunately could not, and it sealed the deal. Game 2 was far different, and I established some strong early control and, from what I recall, killed Diana off quite early.

I had a strong opening in Game 3 after Dhawally missed a 2 drop and I opened with Sneaky on Targon's. However, once again, I bricked and was drawing almost no Gear and few combat tricks. As Dhawally started to establish control, I once again found myself in the same position as last round: at a massive disadvantage due to overtime. Dhawally had started the game, the game would finish on his turn, and he would play an additional turn over what I had. This turned what would have otherwise been a draw for me into a loss (though admittedly I was going to lose this game quite badly).

Dhawally's win here put him into 14th place at 10-2-1, finishing in the Top 16.

My Tournament Result

In the end, I finished 56th (just behind PKPikmin) and won a playmat (which I gave to a friend who finished 129th after an unfortunate ID in the final round), a qualification for Regional championships, and 40 tickets (which I converted into a metal card, which then became a good amount of cash for me).

I was very happy with my deck overall, and many opponents commented on a few interesting inclusions in the deck (Rhasa, Merchant, Edge of Night, fewer spells, etc). I was a bit more susceptible to gear hate (meaning I did get clipped by the Aurora hate) but the deck's fast speed and high pressure meant I could easily stabilise against other fast decks (like Lilia) and had lots of access to pumps in the late game thanks to all the gear.

I had an amazing time at the tournament, and the combination of tight gameplay, pleasant opponents, and my overall success makes this probably the best TCG tournament experience I've had in my 20 year TCG career.

Time Rules Musings

My last two rounds made me more aware of the problems with the current time rules. Many card games have the players play X number of additional turns, much as Riftbound does, but if not conclusion is reached in that time, the game always ends in a draw. I do like that Riftbound has a way to determine a winner, but I think there are far too many advantages that the first player gains if they are also the final player of the game.

For example, suppose that my game in R12 was a total of 6 turns for my opponent and 5 turns for me. That means that my opponent could, theoretically, score a maximum of 12 points, whereas I could only score 10. On top of that, they draw one extra card over me by default, and end up channeling one extra rune too. Making it even worse, they don't have to worry about defending on the final turn and can simply go balls to the wall on offense.

So a running tally of advantages:
-Natural first player advantages.
-No need to hold back interaction for the crackback.
-Additional scoring opportunities over me (12 vs 10)
-Additional 1 card draw.
-Addition 1 rune channel.

If you also wanted to include "total Energy available", assuming no power being spent or Runes being channeled:

Player 1 would have a potential total of 42 Energy available to them throughout the game (2 + 4 + 6 + 8 + 10 + 12), whereas I would have 35 (3 + 5 + 7 + 9 + 11).

I now strongly believe that, when time is called, the number of extra turns should change depending on whose turn it is:

A: If the current player is second player, the second player should finish the current turn, and then both players should play only a single additional turn (i.e. 0-1-2 instead of 0-1-2-3).

B: If the current player is the first player, then time rules as they currently are would still work. (0-1-2-3).

If it turned out that one single turn was too few in A, then it should be finish the current turn and then each player plays two additional turns (i.e. 0-1-2-3-4).

I think this would go a significant distance in weakening all the various advantages that the first player gains if time is called during the second player's turn.

Meta Thoughts

After initially feeling LeBlanc was going to be absolutely insane (and writing a whole post about how stupid all the interactions she has are, an opinion which I stand by), testing showed me that LeBlanc is, weirdly, a mostly fair deck. Although she has some absolutely ballistic high rolls, and can engage in some unfair interactions, she has many weaknesses, and her overall performance was not as strong as predicted.

Aurora was teched out against HARD. Every single person that I know of had prepared for Aurora, either in main or side deck (myself included). I somehow dodged Aurora all weekend (much to my chagrin, as I was VERY ready for it). That being said, I remain convinced that Aurora as a card still needs to go, purely because of how warping it is, both in demanding other players play specific answers to it (e.g. Star-crossed + Gear Hate), as well as demanding that Orange players find a VERY good reason NOT to simply play an Aurora shell (many Orange Best ofs were simply Aurora). It is a card that is only going to get more difficult to balance as new sets come out. If we get another unit of similarly high impact to Elder Dragon, things will get out of hand even faster.

Irelia, as I suspected from testing, is still very strong, despite the downplaying of her at the start from various corners. She is far and away the most unfair "fair" deck; by that, I mean that she still plays a game of Riftbound involving movement and combats, but she just does so very effectively, perhaps moreso than many other champions.

I am of the opinion that Defy is the most defining card in the meta (outside of Aurora). Many of the strongest and most impactful combat tricks (Rengar, Kha'zix, Punch First, Rebuke) are thusly so because they dodge this insanely powerful 1 Energy Green card. The looming spectre of Defy haunted many, many matches I played over the weekend. I sometimes wonder if Defy may be similar to Fight or Flight, in that it may end up copping a ban at some stage simply for being far better than any of its competition.

Closing Comments

Big shoutout to you for reading this far!

Shoutout to every one of my opponents over the weekend. You were all a pleasure to play against, and I enjoyed every match.

Shoutout to my friends, who I had a blast hanging out with all weekend.

Shoutout to LPG for running a (mostly) smooth event.

This tournament really reinvigorated my passion for Riftbound, and I am now very much looking forward to whatever form this Regional Championship takes!

Time Rules Musings

A Much Too Long Recap of My Regionals Sydney Run (Top 64)