Soontir of a Thousand Faces:
Game Kastle Regional Battle Report
Three red dice fly out carelessly, hit, hit, and Focus. The Emperor cackles as the focus is forced into a crit. The Slaver’s single green die is not enough to prevent its destruction.
“Good game,” I say, already thinking about what I could have done differently to not have lost my stealth device earlier.
“Your in medias res intro feels forced,” he replies.
I am three days until my first tournament. I am also finishing up my first year as a special education teacher. The finishing teaching bit makes the first tournament bit hard to prepare for. But, I read up on x wing when I can find the time, decided on my list early, and tried to play against every type of list I could find before the tournament. I took:
- Palp Quiz
- Omicron Group Pilot
- Sensor Jammer
- Emperor Palpatine
- The Inquisitor
- Push The Limit
- TIE/v1
- Autothrusters
- Soontir Fel
- Push The Limit
- Royal Guard TIE
- Autothrusters
- Stealth Device
The goal of this list is to throw the emperor up the middle toward a debris that will be placed roughly in the middle. I slow play it on the 2nd and 3rd round to maximize shots with the Cow before trying to fly past the joust. Sensor jammer is my hope at making this initial joust safer for the cow. The Inquisitor should be right behind the Cow. This will ensure that it will be a range three shot for the enemy and a range one shot for Quiz. Soontir will fly far off to a side and try to gain a flank around turn 3/4. I have practiced this list and opening 5 times in the two weeks before regionals. Not nearly as many plays as I would like, but it will have to do given how time consuming my job is (not complaining, I love my job, and that is why other interests often go on the back-burner).
ACT I:
I woke up early, found that no one had burned my apartment down to force my quest, and started my drive. Game Kastle is a nice shop that seemed to attract some very friendly players. I was going to meet up with Jay and Taylor. They will serve as my Obi-wan, since they are the ones who taught me the game a couple months back. Taylor taught me how to play Han and Poe, and Jay showed me Palp Aces about two weeks ago. I hope nothing bad happens to them in the next act, because I have a lot I still have to learn.
ACT I & II: Time to start the trials
My first round was against Randy. I felt like I recognized his name from a podcast or something, and was pretty nervous about his potential fame. I planned for this feeling of being outclassed. I had an opening. In every sport I've ever played, all my games of chess, and everyday teaching, I always had an opening plan. Something that would set me off on the right foot. It was so simple, I would be crazy to deviate away from it at the last minute.
But, like a hero on his first trial, Instead of following my plan, I got nervous and charged in for the initial joust with all of my ships. Randy was flying 4 Scyks with mindlink and mangler canons. I've never played against a Scyk before, so I wasn't sure how to approach them. The joust went terribly, and the Cow exploded before anything substantial happened. Sensor Jammer is effectively useless when mind link gives every Scyk a focus every turn. I fly Soontir and the Inquisitor out of town to try and figure something out.
Randy is an excellent player. The kill boxes that he set up were super interesting and precise. I will try to draw one and link it. He chased down the inquisitor and eventually got him. I took out two Scyks, and time was called with my soontir and two Scyks, one with one hull remaining, on the board.
Lessons I learned: Jay and Taylor watched the end of the round, and he noticed that I'm so focused on arc dodging that I don't always take the optimal actions. Instead of taking a boost/barrel roll to get out of arc, maybe I should have boost/barrel roll a different direction to still give my opponent a shot, but give me better position for the next turn.
Lessons I should have learned: stick to my opening plan.
As any hero will encounter as you start your quest, your father figure or mentor will die to Darth Vader. In my case, I watched my friend, Jay, who taught me to Palp Aces, died while flying Vader. His match was really good, and I got to watch two Palp Aces fly at a much higher caliber than I can manage.
Taylor also went down. His loss came as a result not feeling well.
Now I need to just go down to hell to gain the tools required to defeat that which killed my teachers.
ACT IV: Time to go to hell
The next match was against a man named Daryl. He flew two jump masters with a Hwk support. U boat are the only lists I haven't been able to practice against, so I knew I was going to get beat pretty soundly. After watching the U boats line up, I got nervous and moved my Inquisitor and Soontir both onto an open lane with little cover. They were also placed very close to each other. I have never practiced this opening, and I got absolutely wrecked on the opening joust.
Because of the low variance of the U boat lists, and my lack of playing against them, I do not see a way I could have won without a major user error from my opponent. I will also say that U boat list is the only game I have played where I did not enjoy any aspect of the match. But, that is a personal thing I will have to get over.
Lessons learned: follow my opening plan!
I cannot for the life of me remember the name of my next opponent. He was flying Space Cow with Palp, Whisper with something weird like sensor jammer, Rebel Captive, the rest of her standard build, and a juke/comm relay Omega Leader.
I stuck to my opening, and it worked out! The slow roll Cow was able draw positions from his cow and omega leader in such a way that the Inquisitor and Soontir could flank. The rolls weren't going totally in my favor, but I was so comfortable with where my ships were at, that I was able to have consistently good position. I took out his Cow and Omega leader without losing a ship. I did have a fair amount of damage on all my ships. The game was mine to lose. And, well, I lost. Whisper did whisper things and killed Inquisitor and my cow.
The dueling between Soontir and Whisper was a little sketchy, though. My opponent and I were not paying close enough attention, so he definitely cloaked while stressed, and I definitely didn't stress Soontir after a shot against him. He wasn't being malicious, and neither was I. More likely, we were both not used to playing so many matches in a row.
Lessons learned: know your opponents list as well as you know your own. There is no point realizing that someone didn't do something they were supposed to after the round is over. It was my responsibility to fix the problem when it happened.
The force ghosts of my dead mentors: I heard their ghosts speak to me as if they were sitting in the chair right next to me, “stop flying like a scrub.” Their words, as well as the lessons I learned from the belly of the whale, gave me the tools I needed to leave elo hell (we are talking about LoL right?).
ACT V: Return of the Palp Quiz
My next opponent was Kristen. She told me she was new and that last game she flew off the board. She was flying a weird Deci/Vader and a standard Soontir. I stuck to my opening, and started on the Deci. Deci got a Crit off against Soontir, but was too low health to ever really want to do that again. I took out Deci and Soontir soon after. It was a fun game, and it reminded me how much fun it is to stick to my opening moves.
Lessons learned: Having a bid for your aces cannot be understated. Because her Soontir moved first, I was able to fly mine right behind him the entire match. I also learned that you can fly casually and consistently. I never did anything but the best moves I could think of, but I made sure to offer help or assistance with any questions she had about the game and what was happening.
My next opponent was Jonathan Liu? I can't quite remember exactly. He was flying a Major Rhymer loaded out with fun things like adv homing missile, standard Soontir, and a standard Carnor. I knew that I had an advantage because his list looked a lot like a potential counter to the jumpmaster. I stuck to my standard opening, got a great flank with Soontir on the 3rd turn, and got Carnor off the board really quickly with a lucky roll and good positioning. We traded Inquisitors with some really intense fighting/really lucky rolls on my end. I ended up getting the win with some consistent flying. I had a lot of fun this round.
Lessons learned: Jonathan was super nice, and he seemed to hold the same belief as me about playing. I shamelessly asked a couple questions about best ways to barrel roll/boost to get a shot. I was expecting him to laugh it off, but instead he talked me through how he would approach it.
My last opponent had to bow out because his friend locked his pieces in his car or something. But, the guy next to me had a similar situation, so we had a fun match to end the day. He was flying a Lothal rebel, Biggs, and two prototype a wings. I flew my standard opening, blinked down the ghost and Biggs. I won the match, and I would go into more detail, but this post is already getting long. I will say that my opponent was super nice, and we spent part of the match showing a kid who sat down at our table how the game worked.
I ended up getting 35th place at 3-3. My matches were fun, and I learned the importance of getting points ever match. I know some other people had the same record, but got more in the 50-60s place.
Also,
for the love of God,
Stick to your openings!
Thanks for reading!
