Ascension - June league

[Dave Perkins]

Congratulations to prolix, champion of the June league!

The proper finals
Game 1: Ananab Tilps 97, prolix 79
Game 2: prolix 77, Ananab Tilps 72
Game 3: prolix 81, Ananab Tilps 64

The donnybrook

Game A: prolix v Dave - not needed
Game B: Dave v ddtibbs - Dave wins
Game C: ddtibbs v prolix - prolix wins

Qt3 name         GC name            W   L   Pts  

Boojum           Hadrosauron        4   3   +23
Tim James        tooler975          3   4   -27
prolix           unprolix           5   2   +57
Dave Perkins     Ananab Tilps       5   2   +59
wilykat          padingtun          3   4    +5
soondifferent    soonanother        1   6   -61
Tyjenks          Tyjenks            2   5   -91
ddtibbs          CFDEngine15        5   2   +11

Here is how the league ended:

Boojum is the Arch Nemesis of Mark Gray
Tim James is the Arch Nemesis of Mark Gray
Mark Gray is the Arch Nemesis of Tyjenks
Tyjenks is the Arch Nemesis of Tim James
Tim James is the Arch Nemesis of Sinnick
nkoan is the Arch Nemesis of bigdruid
Tim James is the Arch Nemesis of soondifferent

Qt3 name           GC name            o = win, x = loss     Nemesis  

Boojum             Hadrosauron        ooooooooooooooooooooooooo
> Tim James        tooler975          oooooooooooooooooooooo
prolix             unprolix           oooooooooooooooo
Dave Perkins       Ananab Tilps       oooooooooooooooo
wilykat            padingtun          ooooooooooooooo
soondifferent      soonanother        oooooooo
Tyjenks            Tyjenks            oooooooo
ddtibbs            CFDEngine15        oooooooo
> Dave Weinstein   ** See below       ooooo
nKoan              nkoan              oooo
Josemas            Josemas99          ooo                   Mr Swee
bandidoquest       gutenbergn         o
Lantz              HHPre              o
ColonelT           TimothyS           o
Sten Friberg       Congestion         o
bigdruid           bigdruid           o
RainRaven          RainRaven11        
Diddums            Diddums128         
aeneas             harry_horse                              Josemas
Chris Gwinn        MNGwinn            
Mark Weston        MarkSWeston        x
Brakara            Brakara            x
sinnick            SelfMadeSinnick    x
gringokidd         gringokidd         xx
Squirrel Killer    Squirrel_Killer    xx
Christien Murawski dingusX            xxx
Vincent19          Mageical           xxx
> godhugh          godhugh            xxx
> G-Man            The Phantom Blot   xxx
> Lord_pall        Lord_Pall          xxxx
> Joe Bolt         josephbolt22       xxxx
warthurton         warthurton         xxxx
triggercut         triggercut1        xxxx
> Lord_Twilight    Lord_Twilight      xxxx
dannimal           mrdannimal         xxxx                  sinnick
fuzzyslug          fuzzyslug          xxxxx
Slainte Mhath      SlainteGC          xxxxx
Larsen B           Larsen B           xxxxxx
DeForrestation     DeForrestation     xxxxxx
Ephraim            Ephraim            xxxxxxx
nixon66            nixon66            xxxxxxxxx
> Nixxter          NixxteR            xxxxxxxxx
Justin Fletcher    Justin Fletcher    xxxxxxxxx
Jorune             Jorune2112         xxxxxxxxxxx
ducker             ducker_3           xxxxxxxxxxxx
Mark Gray          Mr Swee            xxxxxxxxxxxxx

_________________________

> indicates that the player is a neener who doesn't own or play with Storm of Souls

[Dave Perkins]

FAQ

Q: What's this about a nemesis?
A: If a player defeats you at least two times in a row, and you do not currently have a nemesis, then you can immediately declare that player to be your nemesis. If your nemesis defeats you again, then the player becomes your arch-nemesis, and you may not challenge that player for the rest of the month.

If you defeat your nemesis, you score a double win (although your nemesis merely suffers the normal single loss). At that point, the player is no longer your nemesis -- although a different player may eventually take his or her place. If you have a nemesis, you may freely challenge him or her without regard to the rules of challenging.

While you have a nemesis, you should not keep track of strings of losses against other players.

Q: How do rematches work?
A: Whether you win or lose a match, feel free to rematch your opponent without regard to the rules of challenging. If your opponent decides to refuse your challenge based on the fact that you are, strictly speaking, unable to challenge him or her, then so be it.

Q: Is it too late to join?
A: Nope! Send me a PM that includes your Game Center name if you'd like to join.

Q: Are we using the expansion?
A: Yes, but you can challenge someone using any combinations of decks. Look for the $ by the player's name before using the Storm of Souls expansion in your challenge.

Q: How are people ranked?
A: I'm only keeping track of how many games above or below .500 each player is. This means that someone who is 10-8 will be ranked the same as someone who is 7-5, even though the 7-5 player has a slightly better percentage.

Q: What is the horizontal line for?
A: The people below it have zero results so far. They can challenge anyone in the entire list.

Q: Can we play in 3 or 4 person games?
A: Sure thing! If you do, then here's how the scoring works. For a 3-player game, the winner scores 2 while the two losers score -1. For a 4-player game, the winner scores 3, second place scores zero, third place scores -1, and last place scores -2.

Q: When does the league end?
A: Let's suspend league play on June 28 at quarter-to-three in the night, and commence with a six-player playoff for league champion. Ties for the sixth spot will be broken by looking at the result of the most recent game(s) among the tied players. The playoff will be of the usual style: each of the six plays a game against the others, and the top two (by wins, with ties broken by point differential) play a best-of-three for the championship. You must have played at least 10 games to qualify for the playoffs.

The last day on which challenges that must be completed may be issued is June 25. After that date, challenges may be completed.

[Dave Perkins]

FAQ

Q: What's this about a nemesis?
A: If a player defeats you at least two times in a row, and you do not currently have a nemesis, then you can immediately declare that player to be your nemesis. If your nemesis defeats you again, then the player becomes your arch-nemesis. You have one final chance to beat him or her. If you fail, then you may not challenge that player for the rest of the month.

If at some point you are able to defeat your arch-nemesis, you score a double win (although your nemesis merely suffers the normal single loss). At that point, the player is no longer your nemesis -- although a different player may eventually take his or her place. If you have a nemesis, you may freely challenge him or her without regard to the rules of challenging.

While you have a nemesis, you should not keep track of strings of losses against other players.

Just want to highlight this change to the rules. I made this change because we had so few nemeses last month, so now, if a player defeats you twice, you can declare that player as your nemesis, but your next game doesn't count double. The rule above explains the rest.

[Brakara]

The FAQ about the expansion probably needs a small update now that SoS is out.

Also, who was last last month? I so challenge him. Actually, scratch that, I challenge The Phantom Blot and nixon66 on the original + RotF.

[Dave Perkins]

Thanks! Fixed.

[Tyjenks]

So is the jury still out on SoS? It still feels more random and I am still unsure if I approve. ;) It is certainly fun. Don't get me wrong. I am just not sure if the multitude of new options has not added more luck to the game. I feel like the amount of luck was already just about right.

Still accepting all SoS challenges, of course. I will probably just make my league challenges in cranky "I hate change" old man mode.

[wilykat]

here are my minor insights on SoS; take them with a smallish grain of salt.

1) it's harder to kill constructs but mechana constructs are also much less good; however the other constructs aren't noticeably worse so I think they are relatively more valuable. Dreamer's Glass, Eye of Destiny, Treasures of the Study, and even Everbloom and the power-producing ones are all somewhere between decent and amazing. Mechana isn't much worth thinking about unless you get a bunch of pieces that work together (usually Brazer Drone and Scrap Flinger).

2) replacing the good power-producing cards (Demon Slayer, little Emri, Shade of the Black Watch and his bigger brother, Spike Vixen, etc.) with questionably useful ones (Scrap Flinger, Soul Assassin, Nihilmancer) means that you don't accidentally back into being able to kill monsters, which can be very bad. If you're not killing monsters or using Lifebound effectively, it's hard to keep up with someone who is. I lose a lot more games against the computer than I ever did with the other sets, and that's largely because I'm used to completely ignoring monsters and that just doesn't work well in SoS.

3) Avatar of Aiyana is very good but not as ridiculous as first thought. I think this is what happened in my playoff game with Josemas. When you play Avatar, it's easy to look at the board and think "look at all these guys I can get for huge discounts! this is awesome!" But afterward, you end up with a 28-card deck that has absolutely no coherence, and you end up drawing 4 runes and 3 power and a random Brazer Drone and Scrap Flinger with no constructs and enh. I think the overall hero quality is maybe a bit lower, or at least the Mechana and Void heroes are all pretty uninspiring to me.

4) Lifebound is really really good.

[sinnick]

I challenge everyone.

What do you mean everyone?



Also, feel free to send me SoS invites. If I'm going to play in the tournament I don't want to be a spoilsport, even if I'm bad at it. But I'll be sending matches using all kinds of decks just to mix things up!

EDIT: Okay yeah, so I'm not gonna challenge everyone at once because it's too onerous to go through my friends list that much. But instead, it's challenges to these guys, who were just the first ones I found on the list: padingtun, fuzzyslug, Congestion, HHPre, unprolix, mrdannimal, SpaceInt... , harry_horse, Tyjenks, Hadrosauron, Ananab Tilps, Josemas99 and DeForrestation.

[Tim James]

All right dammit, add me to the league this month. We'll see how it goes.

I don't have SoS.

[nixon66]

Tyjenks let's make this next game official. I'll get more invites out later!

[wilykat]

first result!

padingtun defeats SelfMadeSinnick 59-55. Lots of monster killing but I got to Avatar for Samael while he had a bunch of turns with 6 power.

[krayzkrok]

Just to reiterate from the end of the last thread, I'm not participating in the June league due to overseas work. Dave, please remove me from the next leaderboard update.

[Dave Perkins]

Done! Thank you for updating us, kk.

[DeForrestation]

Hey everyone, it's June! Sixth place then failure here I come!

To all the glorious new combatants from last month, send me a challenge! I'll soon be far in one direction on the list and may lose my right to challenge you. So get your whack in while the gettings good ;)

[Dave Perkins]

OMG I forgot to start by challenging you, deF! Here it comes.

[Tim James]

OMG I forgot to start by challenging you, deF! Here it comes.

You forgot to add me to the list, even though I posted and sent you a PM as well. :(

The only way to answer this disrespect is by challenging you to a game of Ascension.

[DeForrestation]

OMG I forgot to start by challenging you, deF! Here it comes.

*biggest smile I got*

[Dave Perkins]

You forgot to add me to the list, even though I posted and sent you a PM as well. :(

The only way to answer this disrespect is by challenging you to a game of Ascension.

Ha!

I just now got off the pad and on the puter, so I will add you pronto.

deF, our game seems like it might be a fun one.

[DeForrestation]

Ha!

deF, our game seems like it might be a fun one.

There's only two BWE in the entire deck and you and I draw them every game. A vision. My sculpture need 4 lbs of mashed potatoes immediately.

[Dave Perkins]

I get that!

[Jorune]

well, I can in dead last in May, but it was my first month in the league and playing the game. I'm ready to go and will start sending challenegs out pronto. Though I think I will limit myself to 5 concurrent games.

Jorune

[Tim James]

Send me a game so I can play a turn with someone before bed. I forgot how early Dave goes to sleep!

[soondifferent]

Mass challenges to everyone already on my friends list. Just going to do Vanilla/RotF for now since I'm too lazy to refer to the list.

However, I'm game for SoS though -- Dave, can you add that fancy $ next to my name?

[Justin Fletcher]

Challenges to:

$ Boojum Hadrosauron
$ DeForrestation DeForrestation
$ Diddums Diddums128
$ Lantz HHPre
$ Mark Weston MarkSWeston
ddtibbs CFDEngine15
$ Tyjenks Tyjenks
$ fuzzyslug fuzzyslug
$ Ephraim Ephraim
$ nKoan nkoan
$ dannimal mrdannimal
$ bandidoquest gutenbergn
G-Man The Phantom Blot
$ nixon66 nixon66
$ aeneas harry_horse
$ warthurton warthurton
$ Slainte Mhath SlainteGC
triggercut triggercut1

Friend request to:

Tim James tooler975

[Tyjenks]

Tyjenks let's make this next game official. I'll get more invites out later!

Done!

[Dave Perkins]

Send me a game so I can play a turn with someone before bed. I forgot how early Dave goes to sleep!

Tim, I declined your challenge only because of the 1 day timer, and then rechallenged you with a longer timer.

[Tim James]

Okay. I didn't know what to set that to.

[Dave Perkins]

Usually we use 7 days or more, just in case, but rarely do games take anywhere near that long.

[ducker]

FAQ

Q: What's this about a nemesis?
A: If a player defeats you at least two times in a row, and you do not currently have a nemesis, then you can immediately declare that player to be your nemesis. If your nemesis defeats you again, then the player becomes your arch-nemesis. You have one final chance to beat him or her. If you fail, then you may not challenge that player for the rest of the month.

If at some point you are able to defeat your arch-nemesis, you score a double win (although your nemesis merely suffers the normal single loss). At that point, the player is no longer your nemesis -- although a different player may eventually take his or her place. If you have a nemesis, you may freely challenge him or her without regard to the rules of challenging.

While you have a nemesis, you should not keep track of strings of losses against other players.

THIS --
While you have a nemesis, you should not keep track of strings of losses against other players.

so if you declare an nemesis you no longer rack up losses??//??/? but can get wins against other players. must utilize exploit! who wants 2 free wins!

[Dave Perkins]

You're a silly willy pants!

I just mean that you can't keep track of strings of losses against other players in order to immediately declare them as your nemesis once you've lost an old nemesis.