Supreme Kai Tournament Report
This is my first tournament report, so be gentle. Also, you can see my disclaimer below but my memory is garbage so don’t expect every detail to be in here.
My brother and I left Newnan, GA about 3 hours or so before the tournament was supposed to start since it was about a two and a half hour drive to get to Birmingham, AL for us. The whole way we discussed some simply strategy and fully expected to get our asses handed to us all day since we don’t really have a lot of opportunities to playtest with anyone else ever since Panini dropped the game. None of our locals picked up FanZ to our dismay.
We’d be playing the same decks we’d been playing since they were available to us, Adaptive Yamcha for me and Dynamic Broly for him. I considered bringing my Retribution Drawku deck but I was afraid of going up against any Michievous and / or Android 17 decks (which I ended up not seeing at all) so I went with Adaptive Yamcha, which is honestly the deck I’m most comfortable with anyway.
So anyway, we get to the venue about a half hour before it opens and I was kind of surprised at how many people showed up. There were only 14 so I don’t know why that surprised me, but I was glad we got a decent showing for the tournament. When the store opens, I have to do some last minute switches in my deck, especially with set 10. We had just printed out the paper proxies earlier that morning. I ended up making some cuts to put in a couple Orange Separating Shots and a couple Energy Tosses. I think the last switch I made was for Yamcha, Suited Up – the new level 1 – as I was expecting more energy attacks than physical and his higher power levels actually helped quite a bit during the day.
After we fill out our deck lists, I double and triple checked my list to be sure since I was messing with a lot of cards last minute, but finally bring it to the counter and register.
As far as our combined memories served us, Cody and I remembered 10 of the 14 MP / Mastery combinations. Apart from my Orange Adaptive Yamcha and his Saiyan Dynamic Broly there were:
Orange Retribution Goten
Orange Retribution Yamcha
Orange Retribution Garlic Jr.
Saiyan Oppressive Cell
Saiyan Oppressive Broly
Blue Tag Team Drawku
Blue Resolute Krillin
Namekian Radiant Gohan
I believe there was also a Black Supreme Kai and a Namekian Piccolo but I don’t know exactly which masteries they were using.
When Round 1 Pairings go up, I was excited and nervous to see I was playing Joey DiCarlo first. I know he’s one of the guys developing FanZ and he topped JingleBellZ just a couple months ago with the same deck he was using today, Orange Retribution Goten. I was able to keep him on Level 1 for most of the game, I believe, which I was surprised at because Retribution is a leveling machine. He hit me for 10+
stages several times throughout our match but I was fortunate enough to flip over Yamcha’s Rescue a couple times when I needed it most and escape combat. It was a super close game and the last combat I entered with Blinding Energy Move in my hand. I think he had 2 or 3 cards left in life deck after he drew for combat, so after thinking for perhaps longer than I should have, I used BEM. I think he tried to Orange Juke and rejuvenate a drill to keep him alive for one last combat but there were no drills left in the discard pile so I won round 1 by the skin of my teeth.
W 1-0
Round 2
I was matched up against a Retribution Garlic Jr. I remember his first name was Alex, but I don’t think I got his last name. If I did and I just forgot, sorry!
I hadn’t played against Garlic in a hot minute, so I was a little rusty on his abilities but they aren’t complex and I mainly worried about the MPPV victory. Game starts and I think I entered on him first combat. I couldn’t say what was in my hand but I think I won that combat by just a little bit. He was worried about me angering up, as he kept asking what my anger was. At some point during the game, I played Unleashed and I think that surprised him. I forget most of the rest of the match, but I remember looking over at one point late game and he’d amassed five Dragon Balls, which worried me due to past experiences that I don’t want to talk about…
I think Yamcha’s Spirit Ball kept him low on anger and finished him off the combat after I noticed the amount of Dragon Balls on his field.
W 2-0
Round 3
My next match was against the new Krillin stack under Blue Resolute Mastery, piloted by Solomon. Again, don’t know last name but I’d played him before a couple years back at the Alabama ARG State Championship. I was using Adaptive Yamcha and he was using (I believe) Protective Android 17. This was my first experience with Krillin’s Kamehameha. All I can say is that card is amazing against Orange Adaptive. Fortunately it wasn’t enough to keep me down, as I think I leveled up so all my energies were costing 1 less to throw. The final combat he entered on me and I believe I had Unleashed in hand but I drew into 2 energy attacks and Time is a Warrior’s Tool. He knew right then that he’d lost the game (since he could see my hand because Blue Mental Drill) and we GG’d and cleaned up.
W 3-0
Before Round 4 began, I asked to see how many rounds we were playing because I was pretty sure that if we were only playing 4 or 5 that I would at least get a playmat, which is what I was aiming for coming into this tournament. I was informed that we’d be playing 4 rounds with a cut to top 4.
Round 4
Oh boy. Pairings go up and I’m matched up against my brother and his Dynamic Broly. Obviously we’d played many times and it’s just a coin flip on who wins these matches. I don’t remember a whole lot about the game other than he got a few good combats and beat me down pretty well. I ended combat and Orange Meditation’d him once but it wasn’t enough to stop Broly from doing Broly things, especially banishing all my good levels due to him starting on level 2…
L 3-1
I finish watching the match next to me, still in pretty good spirits about my 3-1 record. I think the match next to me was Ret. Goten against Ret. Garlic. Goten wound up coming out on top and so the top 8 were announced. We took pictures of top 8 and 5-8 got their prizes and hung out. The 9th place person actually got a playmat and promos(?) since Joey was in top 4 and his prizes were grandfathered down. I noted that the rest of the top 3 were all opponents I’d played against earlier: Dynamic Broly, Retribution Goten and Retribution Garlic Jr.
I’ll be honest, I was nervous as hell about deck checks. Even though I’d triple checked my deck against the list, I remember fiddling with a lot of cards and I noticed I was running 3 Orange Devouring Drills and I thought I had taken one out for something so I was about to get super bummed if I got a DQ. Fortunately, John (the other judge / TO) came over and said my deck was good to go, which was a huge relief as you could imagine, especially after the multiple DQs at other events lately.
Top 4
My first match in top cut was against the Garlic Jr. deck. This game was more frustrating for me because he entered on my first turn and I drew at least one dead card and he angered up pretty much at will. I think I did make level 2 at some point myself but I was still nervous and kind of bummed because I had to keep passing while he seemed like he had a dozen actions. At some point I say to myself that I just need to let him hit level 4 to get the +3 buff to my attacks, which was probably going to happen whether I wanted it to or not. One of the final combats, I played Orange Sweeping Blast and rejuvenated a drill which he later told me killed his turn because he was holding 6 anger in his hand but it was all non-styled. I think the final combat came down to a flurry of energy attacks along with me getting another Sweeping Blast from the discard pile with Yamcha level 2.
W 4-1
After our match was over – which is was in a hurry – we watched my brother play against Joey. Holy crap that was such a close game. I had kept looking over throughout my match just to see who was winning and both life decks remained almost tied in card count. When it finally came down to the last few combats, Cody finally hit level 4 Broly and hit Goten with an attack that ended up being 11(?) stages converted to life cards, no endurance and banished due to Broly 4. I thought he may have wrapped the game up right there but Joey, being the player he is, rejuvenated and shuffled in enough to barely inch out a victory over Cody. I wasn’t even in that game and it was the hardest my heart had beat all day.
So the final was set: Orange Retribution Goten vs Orange Adaptive Yamcha. Before we shuffle we both agree to just split the winner’s purse 50-50 and agreed to a one game final. I think I was basically guaranteed 1st place winnings as far as the mat and the create a card go but I still wanted to be the true #1 so as to not tarnish my “Champion” playmat lol
My biggest memory about this game was Joey Sphering my Unleashed, which he said he’d been sitting on for a bit because he remembered Unleashed from our first game. I can’t say it was super unexpected. I hate that I don’t have more details on this match, but we traded blows back and forth, but Yamcha was able to prevail with a flurry of energy attacks.
I was somewhat in disbelief that I’d won a Kai event. I’d been in top cut in a few other events, but I always got booted first round. Last time was against Black Roshi in Tennessee (I had no clue what to do against that deck until it was too late). I was excited about the day’s haul, coming away with 2 Hi-Tech FanZ foil stacks, a foil Android 18 FanZ level 2 Hi-Tech, 3 I’ll Dig Your Grave Awesome Sauce Promo foils and 2 Time is a Warrior’s Tool Awesome Sauce Promo foils. Looking at my deck now and seeing how it played throughout the day, there’s a few changed I’d make, but I think the deck is almost optimized for my playstyle.
If anyone is interested in the deck list or asking me questions about it after Joey posts it on the Dead Zone blog, feel free to PM me.
Now it’s on to figuring out what to play in the Tournament of Power.
DISCLAIMER: If any of the details I mentioned in this report are inaccurate, please don’t hesitate to speak up. The day was a blur for me and I only really remember the bigger moments.
