Garou Rim: Night Moves

Garou Rim: Night Moves
Joensuu, Finland
July 20, 2019
3R + F
20 Players
Tero Aalto
Event Calendar

Huge tournament this time around! Thanks to everyone for taking the time to come to Joensuu!

Games were super hard this time. A lot of wall and combat decks. And the few aggressive decks were super nasty and super punishing type.

We were not using the alternative time limit in the finals this time around, as most of us wanted to play things normally. Finals game timed out. Finalists can say something about the game if they want to. I don't want to get too deeply into it, as I was not playing. The game seemed like a really tough one in any case.

Finals Seating:

Lasse Pöyry (Tupdog Fiendish Tongue Bleed) --> Reetta Rautiainen (Giovanni Shambling Hordes) --> Antti Penttilä (Nana Animalism + Aksinya) --> Tero Aalto (Unnamed) --> Esa-Matti Smolander (Huitzilopochtli + Baali bleed)

Final Rank Target Rank # Name Prelim GWs Prelim VPs Final VPs TPs
1 1 4 Tero Aalto 3 9 1,5 180
2 2 3 Lasse Poyry 1 6 1,5 132
2 3 7 Antti Penttilä 2 9 0,5 162
2 4 15 Reetta Rautiainen 1 4,5 138
2 5 18 Esa-Matti Smolander 1 6 150
6 6 17 Aapo Järvelin 1 3,5 120
7 7 5 Mari Tiippana 0 3 120
8 8 19 Petrus Makkonen 0 2,5 114
9 9 1 Timo Tahvanainen 0 2 120
10 10 14 Jani Malmi 0 2 114
11 11 8 Samuel Mäenpää 0 2 108
12 12 2 Katja Jauhiainen 0 2 102
13 13 11 Emma Takkunen 0 1 90
14 14 13 Petro Hirvonen 0 1 84
15 15 6 Simo Tiippana 0 0,5 78
15 16 16 Jaakko Nurro 0 0,5 78
17 17 20 Jyri Puhakka 0 0,5 72
18 18 9 Julius Jämsen 0 0 72
19 19 10 Antti Martikainen 0 0 66
20 20 12 Lauri Salmi 0 0 60



Winners Deck List:

Deck Name: Äitini on mäyrä (My mother is a badger)
Author: Tero Aalto

Description:

I totally wasn't expecting to win two tournaments in a row, especially with the same deck. I was going to play something completely different but it turned out I wasn't happy enough with anything else I was brewing.

Even though a lot of people who play regularly in the capital region attended, the eastern meta game is still always quite different. Somehow, the deck felt more consistent than ever, producing a GW and 3 VPs each preliminary round, and 1,5 VPs in the final.

Very slight changes compared to the previous version. The most interesting one I would say is getting rid of Veneficti who, in the current ally-steal heavy meta is more of a liability (and can even end up stealing my own Servitors).

Crypt (12 cards; Capacity min=1 max=10 avg=6.92)
================================================
1x Anarch Convert 1 Caitiff:ANY
2x Arishat 6 DAI OBF PRE Baali:6
2x Horde, The 3 dai obf pre Baali:6
2x Xeper, Sultan of Lepers 7 ani dai pro OBF PRE Baali:6
5x unnamed, The 10 CEL DAI OBF PRE PRO Baali:6

Library (66 cards)
==================
Master (11)
1x Dreams of the Sphinx
1x Giant's Blood
2x Perfectionist
3x Tend the Flock
1x Vessel
1x Villein
1x Wash
1x Wider View

Event (1)
1x Narrow Minds

Action (13)
1x Contagion
4x Entrancement
5x Flurry of Action
3x Unleash Hell's Fury

Ally (4)
4x Infernal Servitor

Retainer (2)
2x Homunculus

Action Modifier (22)
4x Elder Impersonation
3x Enkil Cog
2x Faceless Night
4x I am Legion
6x Instantaneous Transformation
3x Lost in Crowds

Reaction (1)
1x Delaying Tactics

Combat (4)
4x Form of Mist

Combo (8)
5x Sense the Sin
3x Swallowed by the Night

I wonder how Antti felt with animalism combat going into the 2R aggravated permanent ability of the Unnamed + Unleash Hell's Fury. Both cards seem to be a nightmare for the girls' deck.

Few things about not using the alternative finals time limit system.

First of all, I personally think that it is great that we can test different systems for finals, as I believe the system is not perfect as it is, and its good that there is something happening in order to change that.

The problem is that the issue with the finals system is not that straight forward, and not only about the time limit. This is something we have talked about a lot in Finland. Earlier this summer, in the 10th Hiekkaharju Nightmares tournament, there was a situation in the finals, where the top seed could have back ousted his predator, who already had a VP, just to get 10 more minutes to play, and secure his VP. And get 10 more minutes to play etc. After long discussion about what happened there, we came into a conclusion that this change can be ultimately very unhealthy for the game, as it can change the dynamics of the game hugely. The thing is, that with each oust giving more time to finish the game, it becomes a viable strategy for the top seed, to start giving VPs to his grand predators one by one, and winning the tournament like that. It is true that this is not possible with every deck, and has been a strategy that could have been used before too, longer time just makes it actually viable in some cases. Even as a possibility this seems very abusive and can break the game totally in the finals. Making the most important game of the tournament kind of a "non game" in the first place.

There is also other problems with the system. Getting more play time for ousts makes decks and cards that slow down the game considerably more rewarding, as if you can slow down the game, and be consistent, it can become really hard for anyone else to do anything relevant. And when the time is getting low, you can just start ousting people and getting more time to get more people down. So this doesn't really even solve the issue of top seed playing slow just to win by time. The change even makes it more viable strategy, as there is less of a risk of losing to some one else lunging successfully.

Both of these examples favor same kind of decks. Decks that are consistent and can play slow, and have the possibility of some kind of table control. Namely wall decks, MMPA decks and combat decks in some cases.

Other than that, in most cases the system haven't had any impact on the result of the finals. So we felt that its just unnecessary to use it.

Short and sweet version: It was a blast of a tournament.

See you all in Ropecon!

Khormag, I STRONGLY urge you to take these well thought musings on the alternative time limit to the actual alternative time limit thread (that MUST be somewhere).

Here they will do little good...

Ah, and event approved.

Congrats to Tero!