Duel of the Fates - April 6, 2018

The Emperor's Throne Room
(Mustafar)

As if the tension and stress of a 12-Way Duel isn't high enough, we've found a new way to torture our participants.

Play the song "Duel of the Fates," from Episode One, on repeat for four straight hours while the Duelers play the Duel of the Fates match.  It's hilarious!  Some folks can ignore it while others just pretend to ignore it.  The weak lose their composure and demand it be turned down, or worse yet, attempt to turn it down themselves.

But there's no escaping it!  The music plays until the Duel is over, bwahahaha!  BWAHAHA!!!

Anyway, thanks to JD for introducing that new mental warfare tactic.  We can't wait to do that again next year...

The most anticipated moment for Duel of the Fates was the board selection.  Ryan worked overtime over the last week to ensure we would have three 3D playing boards to pick from for the Duel.  We already used his Kamino Platform for the New Hope battle in January, but since then, he's made two new boards for Geonosis and the Emperor's Throne Room.  Except...he made them look like the ice planet Hoth and Vader's dreaded backyard, Mustafar, instead!  They're absolutely fantastic.  We'll hold off on showing Hoth for now, but take a look at Mustafar.  Be careful where you place the figurines, because I swear that's real lava!  If you look very closely you'll find an Episode Three-era Anakin Skywalker on the board.  The "extra crispy" version.  With every board Ryan has created eligible to be selected for Duel of the Fates, it was only fitting that Ryan selected the number one chair.  So Mustafar (The Emperor's Throne Room) is what he picked.  He also did everyone the favor of picking his all-time favorite character, Luke Skywalker.  He must have a magnet in his hand that calls out to young Skywalker.  Ben also picked his personal favorite character, Han Solo.  You could see the heartburn kick in as soon as he opened the envelope.

They're all smiling because the guy taking the picture would be
the first one dead in about 15 minutes...

The board and characters were selected so the cards were shuffled and the game began.  Ian's Super Battle Droid immediately dropped a five point kill on Rob/Obi's Clone Trooper.  That piqued the interest of Curtis' Vader and Daniel's Emperor Palpatine.  They immediately began raining down Force Lightning, Debris, Wraths, and even a Force Drain from Ian's Count Dooku.  It was a total beat-down and Rob was gone in last place, winning the Golden Jar Jar.  That's not what he had in mind for his fourth trophy.

The coordinated attacks from the dark side spooked Ryan's Luke Skywalker, so he took the position as first flipper of the game.  That really put the remaining light side in a tough spot.  Joel/Yoda, JD/Mace, and Toby/Anakin were stuck in the back row.  Ben decided Han and Chewey would look good coddling the Sith and skipped out of town.

Kerri knows they're out to get her!

Nobody realized it at the time, but Toby (replacing an injured Grant in the Dueling lineup) was playing his sixth Duel, making him our newest professional!  Congrats Toby!  Unfortunately for him, the dark side wasn't in a mood to celebrate it.  To his credit he went out guns and light sabers blazing.  He pulled off a stupendous double Wrath, killing Greedo and maiming Ethan's Zam.  Then he dropped an Anger/Calm combo.  That was enough to scare the dark side into killing him next.  Kaleb's Darth Maul dropped the final shot, killing him in eleventh.  But Toby is now a professional, bringing the current total of pros to nineteen!!!

Though it looked like JD/Mace or Joel/Yoda would be the next logical choice, that's not what happened.  Ian was feeling nervous about the mix of remaining players in his alliance and wanted to thin the herd.  In a shocking move he swooped in against Kerr's Boba Fett.  In an even more shocking move, JD moved into the heart of that alliance to make new friends with Chewey and attack Kerri too.  Boba managed to drop a Deadly Aim and Rocket Retreat on Ian before peacing-out to the opposite end of the lava pit.  Unfortunately for her, she was still within shooting range of Ryan's Leia, and Kerri was out in tenth.  She's one Duel away from going pro too!

We see you JD!

That left nine Duelers on the board (can we even still call it a board when it's three-dimensional?).  Again, the obvious choice looked like Joel/Yoda or JD/Mace, but Kaleb had other plans.  He thought Ryan's Luke Skywalker was playing weakly, and he's Darth Maul, so those "I Will Not Fight Yous" were a big concern.  That was enough for him to drop the hammer and target Ryan.  He did the heavy lifting while Ian dropped a Taunt to kill him in ninth.  That low finish actually resulted in Ryan sliding from second place to fourth in the Dueler rankings.

At that point JD was still deep in the original dark side territory, pretending to be friends with everyone and willing to attack anyone, especially Daniel's Emperor.  The general confusion of who was exactly on each other's side continued, but when the dust settled, JD became the target.  He couldn't believe it, or at least that's how he pretended to feel.  He begged and pleaded but Ben's Chewbacca, who moments before was holding Mace's hand, delivered a five point attack.  The remaining Duelers hoped JD would leave and take his Duel of the Fates playlist with him.  He was happy to disappoint them!

From there the rest of the Duelers finally turned their attention to Joel's Yoda.  He had a couple of skirmishes with Ethan's Jango and Zam, but for the most part, had evaded the majority alliance's detection.  With so many of their minor character shooters still in play, they began to pepper the diminutive Jedi with laser blasts.  He held out for as long as he could but Yoda finally crashed in seventh.  It wasn't a bad finish considering how his allies fared.

That left six Duelers, and the paranoia was ratcheted as tightly as the string section of the Duel of the Fates orchestral accompaniment.  Rather than strategic, logical conversations with each other, the remaining combatants looked wildly for a sense of cohesion and acceptance.  The group finally stumbled forward by turning on Daniel's Emperor Palpatine.  He was geographically isolated on the board, so it took the remaining Duelers a minute to close in on him.  Meanwhile, a secondary murmur about Jango's continued existence began to form.  Curtis' Darth Vader finally got the drop on Daniel, who had to bow out in sixth.  That left five Duelers:  Curtis/Vader, Ian/Dooku, Ethan/Jango, Kaleb/Maul, and Ben/Han.

A pensive Ethan

There was yet another prolonged pause in the action as the remaining Duelers tried to figure out what the heck they were doing.  Ethan's Jango took an initial hit but Rocket Retreated over to his good, trustworthy, would-never-turn-on-him friend Ben. 

You already know how this goes...

Ben's Han hung his head in shame as he laid down an attack card.  It was a controversial strategy given the proven methodology of shooters working together late in a game.  Ethan was stunned, and then dead, when Han delivered the final kill shot.

From there the remaining Duelers were consumed by the uncertainty of how things would roll out from there.  At one point it looked like three of them would all turn on Curtis' Vader, but Curtis successfully argued for the combined effort it would take to eliminate Kaleb's Darth Maul, who was still quite healthy and loaded with cards.  Kaleb was trying to defend and repeat as champion of the last Duel of the Fates, and was blessed to have Darth Maul to win back his Darth Maul trophy.  But alas, the remaining alliance turned on him and he ran out of gas in fourth.  Still, that strong performance has shot Kaleb back up in the rankings, as he's now up to second.

Ben's face says it all...

And then there were three.  Ben was in great shape, as Han was nearly full health and so was Chewbacca.  Curtis' Vader was chewed up after his tussle with Darth Maul, and Ian's Count Dooku was beginning to show signs of weakness.  That's when Ben used Wookie Instincts to pull the Bowcaster.  But, in a controversial move, he didn't use it right away!  Ben was hoping Curtis would join him in an attack on Ian's Count Dooku.  Instead, Ian and Curtis aligned to kill the Wookie before his 11 point card could be played.  In a really slick move, Ian used Give Orders and Force Push to trap Chewbacca behind his last remaining Super Battle Droid.  That trapped Chewey who was subsequently Choked and Wrathed without playing the Bowcaster.  It was a devastating turn of events for Ben.

With Han now exposed and unprotected by his walking carpet, Ian no longer saw the need to keep Curtis around.  Instead of advancing on Ben's Han Solo he moved Dooku in on Vader.  Ian dropped an attack to end Curtis' night in third place.  It was a good scramble finish for Curtis, who at multiple times during the night looked like he was sure to die next.

That left two - Count Dooku and Han Solo.

They began to dance around the Mustafar lava pools and Ben got the early jump by dropping some shots and running away.  But Ian had stored up a Give Orders or two, and used one to move into attack position to drop a Taunt.  Surprisingly, Ben didn't have any defense left as he was stuck with mostly useless Wookie cards.  It was a heartbreaking end for Ben, who nearly secured his first ever victory.  But it was also a masterful performance by Ian, who navigated his favorite character through a lot of chaos to bring home the bacon.  Congrats to both!  This marked Ian's fifth win, which brings him into a tie for second place on the all-time list.  Here is the final order of finish:

12.  Rob/Obi-Wan Kenobi
11.  Toby/Anakin Skywalker
10.  Kerri/Boba Fett
9.  Ryan/Luke Skywalker
8.  JD/Mace Windu
7.  Joel/Yoda
6.  Daniel/Emperor Palpatine
5.  Ethan/Jango Fett
4.  Kaleb/Darth Maul
3.  Curtis/Darth Vader
2.  Ben/Han Solo
1.  Ian/Count Dooku

This means there's only ONE Duel left on the season - May the 4th Be With You!  That will take place on...you guessed it, May 4th!  That will probably be a matinee game, more details to come.  Also, for those of you still around Waco later in May, we'll do a Duel on the evening of the Han Solo movie premiere. 

Thanks to everyone who continues to keep this league fun and vicious.