Our First Planetary Qualifier: Making Top Cut at Pasadena PQ
Pasadena Planetary Qualifier Deck & Experience
tl;dr: I went 6-1 in Swiss, got eliminated first round of Top Cut; Alyssa went 4-3 in Swiss. https://melee.gg/Tournament/View/152902
Table of Contents:
Some pics and prizing
(Before the Pasadena PQ had started, there was about ¼ of the play space behind me)
(Top 8: Left->Right: Dylan, Jeremy, Jerry, Jeff, Sean(front), Jeff(back; 1st Place), Ezra, John)
(Some packs, Legal Authority promo, a Token mini box, and an Initiative Token not shown)
Quick side note of the event itself
Very well run, kudos to the store (Odyssey Games), Justin (Event Organizer/Head judge) and the other judges that were there. Pizza and refreshments were provided. I didn’t notice long lines for any of the three clean bathrooms. Maybe the SoCal community is that good, but I witnessed/heard no major issues.
Let’s talk about the deck
https://swudb.com/deck/view/MBbUkPbngPL
Credit to Linque, my deck is based off of https://swudb.com/deck/view/zzNXghbfAT with some changes.
Quick rundown on how the deck operates
ISB Agent/Daring Raid + TarkinTown combo means on Turn1, you can kill opponent’s Turn1 unit(s) while also playing up three units (ISB Agent/Daring Raid + Tarkintown kill -> resource refresh -> play Greedo/Death Star Stormtrooper OR play a two drop)
Very space heavy
Triple Dark Raid is meant to cheat out Ruthless Raider/Fett’s Firespray.
Changes in the main deck from original list
-3 Punishing One
-2 Force Choke
+2 Disabling Fang Fighter
+2 Sneak Attack
+1 Bazine Netal
Because a lot of the original list’s sideboard became part of my main deck, I was looking for cards to fill it. I saw a Kylo Yellow list running Kylo in the sideboard , so I decided to adopt it (ended up actually playing it once in total at the event, but it got nullified by No Good to Me Dead).
Sideboard thought process
Vs heals: side in Wolffe
Vs upgrades: side in Confiscate and Disabling Fang Fighter
Vs aggro: side in Bazine Netal and maybe Sneak Attack
Vs midrange: side in Bazine Netal and maybe Sneak Attack
Vs control: side in Bazine Netal, Sneak Attack, Kylo Ren, and Change of Heart
Reasoning on the deck changes from Linque’s list
To preface, I’m expecting a lot of Bobas, Sabine ECL, Han2 Blue, and Bossk Blue in the meta.
I main deck Disabling Fang Fighter mostly to combat Sabine’s Darksabers and Bossk’s bounties. Sneak attack is there for the extra damage push. Bazine is there for hand disruption and as a smuggle card (didn’t end up utilizing this, but there were moments when I could), because this deck can run out of gas very quickly and one would basically be top-decking every turn after Turn4.
This deck list is very tight; there are not a lot of flex cards. While Punishing One is a solid space unit and the effect doesn’t go off most of the time, I cut it because there are plenty of 2 or 3 cost 3-4 attack power space units already. There are still enough space units to not cause Triple Dark Raid to miss. I cut out two Force Choke, because I felt that it’s really only good vs killing the Sabine leader and that’s it. I feel three copies is too many given that I already have so many answers vs Sabines (upgrade hate and No Good To Me Dead), so I wasn’t sure on whether to cut down to two or one copies.
My prep with the deck
Tbh, I didn’t get that much reps in with this deck as I would have liked, only started toying with the deck list two weeks before the Pasadena PQ. I brought the deck out to two weeklies; played irl on 9/28 & 9/29 for ~8-9hrs total with some friends and randoms (not in an event). I also played against Alyssa, who only plays Sabine ECL, a lot, so I knew this deck plays well vs Sabine, but there were a lot of other matchups I wasn’t familiar with. Throughout this time, I was making changes to the list, even up to the morning of the PQ event.
[Disclaimer: just going off my memory after the event]
Matchups:
Vs Sabine ECL 2-1
Lost the first game. After losing the first game, I was losing confidence in my deck changes from the original list, because I feared I may have tilted the matchup favorability too much vs Sabine. Sided in the Bazine and more upgrade hate.
Throughout the next two games: I ended up Bazine’ing their Turn1 play, a Bright Hope, and a Wrecker.
Vs Boba1 Green (30hp) 2-0
Even with the ramping, they couldn’t handle the aggro. All I remember is in one of the games, he just took initiative and played Resupply on Turn2.
Vs Rey Tarkintown 2-0
[Tangent - My opponent was Andrew, who I played against in a CBG Set1 case event (but scaled down to 32->20 players). He played Luke Green and I was playing Palpatine Blue. He 2-0 me in Swiss, and we played against each other in the semi-finals where I 2-1 him. Very strong Luke Green player, so lots of respect for him).]
Before the game, my opponent said that this was a bad matchup for them. I would’ve guessed otherwise, but, again, I didn’t get as many reps with this deck as I would have liked, so I was kinda going in blind with the matchup favorability. We did one turn of stealing my Mercenary Gunship, and while that does move the game state forward for Rey’s favorability, he couldn’t handle the aggro. In Game2, I played a Wolffe before Rey could attack, to secure the win.
Vs Han1 Yellow 2-0
[Tangent - My opponent was Troy, a very strong player. He was one of the players who I played irl on 9/28, so he already knew of the deck’s Turn1 gimmick play. On that day, I only won the first game, and lost about 3 games afterwards (including sideboarding).]
Game1: I had initiative and I Bazine’d his Liberated Slaves over Millennium Falcon. My reasoning was that it was much easier to Tarkintown a 4 hp unit vs a 5 hp unit.
Game2: I topdecked a Surprise Strike for lethal in a base race. [Edit: maybe this was Game1, don’t remember].
Vs Kylo Jedha City 0-2
Super hard matchup, despite me knowing this deck. When I was playtesting Boba Tarkintown for PQ, I was looking into this deck and was considering playing it, but I thought it was too big-brained for me to learn in the short timespan. I was trying to play more control, because I knew I couldn’t outaggro him.
A Dr. Evazon in Game2 just wrecked me as I had no efficient way to remove it.
Vs Palpatine Blue 2-0
Tbh I wasn’t even mentally prepared to face a Palpatine deck as I was surprised to see such a control deck in this meta.
Despite the ramp, I was faster in finishing before the Palp flip became relevant.
Game2: Opponent double ramped via two Superlaser Technicians. The last turn board state was my Ruthless Raider and Boba Leader. My exhausted Ruthless Raider ended up getting stolen by Palp flip, but the opponent wasn’t able to answer my Fett’s Firespray with their three resources up (I dodge Power of the Dark Side, because I still have Boba leader up).
In one of the games, I Bazine’d a Rival’s Fall (the other notable choices were Power of the Dark Side and Make an Opening; my board state had about two small space units, an ISB Agent, and Boba Leader).
Vs Boba1 Tarkintown 2-1
[Tangent - My opponent was John H, a fellow CBG’r. I wasn’t aware that he was bringing Boba Tarkintown until the day of the event, so that’s a cool coincidence. We were also the only two Boba TT at the event and we both made Top Cut.]
I kind of just drew better and was able to topdeck for lethal in base racing.
In Game2, I tried to Sneak Attack + Kylo Ren, but he No Good To Me Dead’d it.
With my 6-1 record in Swiss, I made Top Cut.
Vs Sabine ECL 1-2
Won the first game followed by two losses.
Horrible draws across all three games as I wasn’t able to pull off the Turn1 ISB Agent/Daring Raid combo and I wasn’t able to answer Sabine leader. I couldn’t establish board control for Game2 & Game3 and just got outaggro’d.
Conclusion
Overall, I was pretty proud of myself, as this confirms that I’m actually decent at this game. But now my imposter syndrome is shifted more so if I’m actually good or if I’m simply being carried by the deck. I did dodge the Boba Yellow matchups, where my deck should be unfavorable against.
Stay on the lookout for my upcoming post(s) of our Las Vegas PQ experience where Alyssa made Finalist and I made Top 8 :)