Hey everyone, thanks for checking in to hear about my Crystal Cup experience!
Because of the time difference between Toronto and Vancouver, I woke up at 5am (8am Toronto time) daily, and I got home Sunday night at 2am Vancouver time. Going to work on Monday was pretty rough, but make no mistake, it was 100% worth it. This weekend was a total blast, and if I could get the price of plane tickets down, I would say I am going back again for sure. In Canada, two airlines have a monopoly on cross country trips and prices are much higher than US cross country. The First Hiccup I should mention the night before my flight I went 1-3 at my Vancouver Locals with my planned Crystal Cup Deck (Earth Wind, click here for an FFDecks link). I was pretty choked afterwards, and I didn’t know what to think. I had practiced so much with this deck and had undoubtedly become a better player. I started to second guess my deck. Should I change my deck list? Maybe I should switch to Mono Ice? I went home feeling very uneasy that night and needed to reflect on my matches. In the end I decided to go with the exact list I had prepared. So what if one Locals hadn’t gone well. This was the deck I knew how to play, and the deck that I thought I could do the best with. I had chosen not to play Mono Ice for a reason (I figured there would be a lot of it and people would want to counter it). After the tournament I can say that I am happy I stuck to my gut on this one. Was my deck the best one at the tournament? No. But I worked hard on it and wanted to test my abilities as a player. Packing I packed a backpack and a small drawstring bag for this trip. Just my clothes, some granola bars, dried mangos, and my cards. I brought two decks (Earth Wind and Mono Ice) just in case something happened to one of them. I also brought a small trade binder in case people were looking to trade. I also printed deck lists off ahead of time and double checked the decks and lists, this way signing up at the tournament was a breeze. The Day Before In case you didn’t read the first blog post, this was my first ever big tournament in a TCG. When I arrived in Toronto around 2 pm, I could not have been more excited. I registered for the convention and checked in to my hotel. Afterwards I went back to the convention halls and scoped out the place and started making a bucket list of all the merch I wanted to buy! Later on in the evening I met some players from the US and others from Ontario. I watched them play some matches and started to get very nervous. All of a sudden, my prospective opponents had faces. As I watched them play practice matches and I started to doubt myself and my deck. I am not sure why it happened, but I needed to relax. When I got back to the hotel that night, I started to read the articles on Magic: Level One about playing in a major tournament, and soon enough, I calmed down and realized why I was there. I also decided to set my goal for the weekend and planned when I would reflect on my matches. My Goal: Play to the best of my ability and avoid making mistakes in my matches. Day 1 I arrived 2 hours early on the first day (10 am). At 12 I filled out my deck list and triple checked it. I had brought a printed deck list with me, which I had double checked, so it was very easy to make sure my list was correct. After noon they posted the first-round matchups and had a players meeting. They basically told us to make sure out lists were correct and that they would spot check random decks in-between rounds. They also told us to leave our end game state alone when reporting the match to a judge. After each match was finished, the players would call a judge, record damage done, and sign their names. The judge would sign their name as well and take the score sheet. In the case of tie breaking, damage dealt would be used to rank players. As I sat down for my first match, my heart was beating so fast I could feel it throughout my body. Luckily, my opponent was a super nice dude. We talked about how we got into FFTCG, and it turned out he started around the same time as me. I started to calm down, but when I went to draw my cards and start the game, my hands were visibly shaking. I drew into an average hand, and my opponent played first. He played a Dycedarg and a back up that I can’t remember. However, I do remember thinking, he is setting up a knights deck. I played a Guy, which he then hit with Al-Cid and Onion Knight before swinging in for some damage with Dycedarg. The damage turned over was Shantotto, and my other copy was in the break zone after I discarded it for Guy. This turned out to be decisive as I drew into mostly back ups (drew and played one Zidane but it wasn’t enough) and lost in two turns. And that was it! People around me were starting their second or third turn and I had already lost. I was completely shell shocked. I just sat there staring blankly, I think my opponent realized this and asked me to play another match. It ended up going a lot better for me and really helped me relax. We didn’t have time to finish but I was in a very competitive spot when we stopped. After that initial scare, each match became easier and I felt less nervous. By the end of the day my nerves were almost completely gone, and it felt like I was playing at my regular old Vancouver weekly. One major factor that helped me settle down was that all my opponents were friendly people. Overall, I have been so impressed by the Final Fantasy Trading Card community. We rock! My Tournament Matches: Round 1 vs Water Lightning Knights: Lost 7-0 Round 2 vs Mono Lightning: Won 7-5 Round 3 vs Mono Earth: Lost 7-3 Round 4 vs Mono Ice: Won 7-5 Round 5 vs Lightning Wind: Lost 7-6 Round 6 vs Cadets (Tri-Colour): Won 7-? (unfortunately I forgot to write down his score) Day 2 On the second day I woke up much more well rested since I wasn’t nervous about playing. I did, however, go out for drinks with some of the players the night before and had a bit of a headache! I arrived around 10 am again and was first in line for the side events, which I will describe below. Gunslinger: This was the coolest side event. You waited in line to play against Square Enix employees, one of them being Kageyama-san, the creator of the game. If you won, you got to pick two cards randomly out of a huge selection of Japanese foils. If you lost, you only were allowed to pick one prize. These guys cycled through a ton of decks and played from 10:30 am til almost 5:00 pm with pretty much no breaks. In general, Kageyama was such a cool guy. He always said yes to signing cards or other things. He even took photos with a ton of players. I was lucky enough to play a match against him and he beat me with mono-wind (it was close though!). I can say from that match that he is a very efficient player. His sequencing was perfect, but I suppose that makes sense when you created the game and play a ton! Wolves Den: Six spots at a table were set aside for three matches. The winners of these matches stayed in their chairs and played again, the losers went back into line to eventually get a match again. We had sheets to record our matches (which you gave back to the judges if you weren’t at the table, no cheating!), and there were a ton of prizes based on different criteria. -If you were last on the table when the day ended you got a prize -Most wins and most losses throughout the day got prizes -If at any point you had the most Scions, or Standard Units, YRP combo etc, you would call over a judge and they would record the biggest amount in that category. The winner at the end of the day got a prize. (Sad note: I was playing a Y’shtola in my deck and no one ever claimed the Scion prize, if I had told the judge I had played a Y’shtola at some point I would have set the record at 1 Scion in play and won some swag) Draft: At any point on the second day, players could make groups of four and pay $20 to draft a set of their choice. Then they would play a round robin tournament with the winner getting a free draft or $20 store credit. At the end of the day, while the convention was closing, a bunch of us gathered around the featured table to watch the finals. It was super exciting! Overall, I had such an amazing weekend. I wish I could tell you more about the tournament and convention, but I have already typed way too much. I highly recommend you check out a Crystal Cup if you can, I will most likely be going to Seattle! Finally, I just want to say how great it was meeting everyone in the community, it was very cool meeting people you have watched online or have seen post on Facebook or Reddit. P.S. Let me know if you have any questions about my experience in the comments below or on Reddit! I am happy to answer. Cheers! Alex K
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November 2018
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