04/01/2023 GamesHaven Jurong (CC) 2-1

 

Another day, another armoury report! For January I’ll be playing almost everyday, in preparation for PQ Season 3 (actual reason is wife and kid are out of town :P).

Decklist remained the same as the last one, still feels good about it so no changes were made.

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Round 1 Fai

Equipment used: <Crown of Providence>, <Courage of Bladehold>, <Braveforge Bracers> and <Refraction Bolters>

Opponent was a rather recognised player here in Singapore, he and his group of players are rather devoted into Fai and have been performing well in armouries and local tournaments. When he saw the pairing we were sitting next to each other, he proclaim: “Ah fxxk, there goes my CF Arakni”, I responded: “It’s not decided yet” and the results really shows. :(

I lost the die roll and opponent chose to go second. I had a <Singing Steelblade> in my starting hand that allowed me to chip in 4 damage and scoring a counter on my <Dawnblade> to begin the game with which felt good. From there, the game went into the state of opponent having a life lead but I was building counters on my dawnblade. Opponent didn’t crack his <Mask of the Pouncing Lynx> and just deals damage with his flurry of red cards. The critical turn came when I drew <Glistening Steelblade>, <Out for Blood> and 2 blues. I used my <Crown of Providence> on his attack hoping to get an attack reaction or even better <Singing Steelblade> but drew a third blue. My <Dawnblade> was swinging for 6, opponent blocked with all his equipment for exact, I played <Out for Blood> and opponent played <Sink Below> in reaction, stopping my momentum and getting rid of all my <Dawnblade> counters. From there, tempo was lost and opponent made quick work of me.

Key decision points in the game feels like opponent not cracking his <Mask of the Pouncing Lynx> and used it for block instead which got him the swing back compounded by me drawing bricks.

I don’t want to sound like I’m complaining, but in the 8-10 turns of the game, I saw none of my <Steelblade Supremacy> or <Twinning Blade>, 1 each of <Glistening Steelblade>, <Singing Steelblade> and <Glint the Quicksilver>, which is statistically lower than expected. Don’t think there’s too much I could have done to win this particular game, maybe blocking a bit more. Anyway, no CF Arakni for me this time.

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Round 2 Fai

Equipment used: <Crown of Providence>, <Courage of Bladehold>, <Braveforge Bracers> and <Refraction Bolters>

This time round, my opponent was on <Harmonised Kodachi> and <Mask of Momentum> which honestly feels a lot less threatening compared to <Mask of the Pouncing Lynx> and <Blazing Emberblade>.

The game went without too many critical turns, I was presenting <Dawnblade> counter threat each turn and blocking every third hit from my opponent while my opponent chose to block very lightly and was trying  to get tempo the whole game. The game ended when I drew my <Glistening Steelblade> and <Singing Steelblade> to present triple swing.

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Insert: Nicholas Loh praised the <Dorinthea Ironsong> play mat I was using in between the rounds, cheers to you buddy~

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Round 3 Rhinar

Equipment used: <Crown of Providence>, <Courage of Bladehold>, <Braveforge Bracers> and <Refraction Bolters>

I won the die roll, chose to go first and drew the worst starting hand I’ve ever seen with this deck, it was <Energy Potion>, <Ironsong Determination>, <Twinning Blade> and <Command and Conquer>. There's just no good way to pitch or play. My play was <Command and Conquer> pitching the <Ironsong Determination> reason being I almost certainly need the <Ironsong Determination> in the second cycle to finish the game or get to a dominating position. By the end of turn, I arsenal-ed the <Twinning Blade> keeping a blue in hand is important in my opinion and I was ok with having non-blocking cards in the early game. The game proved me right because on the second cycle, it was that very <Ironsong Determination> that got me my second <Dawnblade> counter and sealing the game. I might have considered just playing out the <Energy Potion> and pitching the <Ironsong Determination> in turn 2 but the drawback to that is if opponent present a must block situation and I need to block with my <Ironsong Determination> it’ll be really bad.

No surprisingly, opponent cracked back with a <Bloodrush Bellow> turn and I took 12 damage in that turn. My first couple of hands were decent enough in that when my opponent blocked exact I could always go over it and threaten a second swing to get a counter. Having been punished by “Reprise” so much, my opponent decided not to block. And the same play will go on for another turn getting me a second <Dawnblade> counter. The third turn I would see my opponent blocking with her entire hand for 14 (2 x 3 blocks and 2 x D-react) to drop my counters. This exact play pattern continued to 2 cycles. Yes, my opponent drew double D-react twice in this game! 

Deciding moment came when I drew my pitched <Ironsong Determination> along with a <Warrior's Valor> and securing 2 <Dawnblade> counters together with <Ironsong Pride>, from there my opponent was no longer presenting equal damage each turn and the game ended when I could go over even a 9 block plus D-react.

After the game, me and my opponent had a discussion about the end game where I feel like she should block my <Dawnblade> swing to try and drop the counter unless her hand was very threatening with some “Dominate” effect to really push through damage, but her thought were to pull cards from my hand to force block and reducing my threat that way. To me that’s not a good decision as I still had my <Courage of Bladehold> and <Braveforge Bracers> on full durability so I could block and threaten <Dawnblade> swing with 4 or 5 card hand which was very difficult to deal with when your life total is just slightly higher than the swing itself.

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In conclusion, it’s a 2-1 and both the wins were somewhat due to opponent not being very familiar with how to play against “Dorinthea Ironsong” so overall I didn’t feel great. But what made it fun was the chatting between the rounds and the friends you meet at the game stores and that’s how positive the community of Flesh and Blood is~~

Need to up my game definitely! Onward, Dorinthea!!