Preview: The Doubleheader - August 31, 2018

The CL Training Duel marks the official kick-off for the 2018-19 season of 12-Way Dueling, but historically speaking, the Doubleheader always feels more like the real start of the madness.

Once the halls are open and training is over, our league of Duelers have an itch they need to scratch!  And that relief comes in the form of food, fellowship, and two cracks at  victory!

And let's not forget...this is our FIFTH season of doing this!  Our FIFTH Doubleheader in August!  Our FIFTH time gulping YODA SODA hand over fist!  How did this little corner of the Star Wars universe thrive for FIVE years???

The answer, of course, is you...THE DUELERS!  So thank you each and all, whether this is your first Duel or your fifth year playing.  There are no 12-Way Duels without the yahoos who commit to the insanity.  This Thermal Detonator is for you!

*BOOM!*

HISTORY:
2017 Game #1 - Rob and Jango Fett win on the Kamino Platform
2017 Game #2 - Nathan and Jango Fett win in the Emperor's Throne Room

2016 Game #1 - Grant and Count Dooku win on the Kamino Platform
2016 Game #2 - Stephen and Jango Fett win in the Emperor's Throne Room

2015 Game #1 - Ryan and Jango Fett win in the Geonosis Arena
2015 Game #2 - Grant and Yoda win in the Emperor's Throne Room

2014 Game #1 - Alex R. and Darth Maul win on the Kamino Platform
2014 Game #2 - Curtis and Yoda win in the Geonisis Arena

Grant is the only repeat winner of a Doubleheader match while Jango Fett has won a whopping four games in this annual twin contest!

MEET THE DUELERS:

Alex C - Alex played in the Twin Sun Slam Doubleheaders this past summer and walked away with his first career victory, so you know now he loves to play twice in one night.

Ben H. - Ben is the highest ranked professional Dueler without a career victory, a fact that gnaws at his subconscious.  He might seek revenge on Rob after a brutal 11th place finish at CL Training.

Ben P. - Rookie Dueler alert!  Ben P. got a taste of the Dueling glory at the side-table during CL Training and is ready to swim with the sharks.  These will be his first two career Duels.

Chris K. - Chris has only played twice in 2018 - both matches at the Twin Sun Slam - but fared quite well with both Fetts, finishing 5th with Boba and 2nd with Jango!

Chris W. - Chris had a wonderful rookie Duel at the CL Training match, finishing in fifth place with Jango Fett in his debut performance.  What will his follow-up look like?

Grant - Grant is on a strong run in 2018.  Over seven Duels he hasn't finished below seventh place and he's picked up two wins to boot.  He's now the top ranked Dueler!

JD - It seemed the Dueling universe was stacked against JD as he suffered a months-long drought of success.  But the rains of victory poured at CL Training, where he claimed victory with the Emperor.

Joel - You could argue Joel is exploring Daddy issues this year, as his last three Duels were with Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker.  But those Duels include a victory and a third place finish.

Kayla - Rookie Dueler alert part two!  Kayla is a former padawan from Rob's leadership class.  She's eager to prove her mettle in the world of Duels and has two shots to stake her claim.

Luke R. - Not the Skywalker, the Dueler!  Luke enters the Doubleheader with four career matches...which means he goes professional after the second game.  Congrats Luke!!!

Rob - The Godfather of the Duels league is coming off the most putrid three-game stretch in league history.  His two last places at the Twin Suns and tenth place at CL Training  knocked him to fourth in the rankings.

Ryan - After winning the Valentine's Duel back in February, Ryan only played twice since then, both disappointing ninth place finishes.  He's hoping to knock off the rust again at the Doubleheader.

??? PREDICTS THE WINNER:

Rob:  Alright - I've gathered the "predictors" from the past three
seasons of preview posts on this blog to tell you all one thing.
YOU STINK!  YOU'VE DONE A TERRIBLE JOB!

Jar Jar:  Heesa bein' right Obi, our picks'a'bein BOMB bad!  
Dontcha thinkin' dat too???
Obi:  What's that, Jar Jar?  I wasn't paying attention.  I was
admiring this fine portrait of my winning battle against Jango Fett...

Rob:  Obi-Wan, you continue to be the worst.  Listen up folks, we need
to brainstorm here!  Who should pick the winners this year, 'cause the
Force KNOWS it can't be you knuckleheads!

Lego Ackbar:  We aren't capable of predicting
picks of that magnitude...unless we have Legos!

Pez Vader:  The new pick expert should be
fun-sized, like me.  Search your sugary feelings,
you know it to be true!

Obi-Wan:  Honestly, you all are a bunch of imbeciles.  The prognosticator
should be somebody of proper size, stature, and grace...such as myself .
Jar Jar:  And meesa too, right Obi!?!
Obi-Wan:  Jar Jar, would you mind holding my light saber on the shiny end?

Rob:  How are we supposed to satisfy so many...
holy bantha fodder, who are they!?!?!

A CHORUS OF STERN, FEMALE VOICES:  SILENCE!!!

A CHORUS OF STERN, FEMALE VOICES:  WE ARE...TREY REY!!!

Rob:  It's...it's...three different Reys!!!

Lego Ackbar:  It's a trap!!!

A CHROUS OF STERN, FEMALE VOICES:  ALLOW US TO INTRODUCE OURSELVES!

Lego Rey:  i'M LeGo REy!

Lil' Rey:  i'm lil' rey.

Big Rey:  AND I'M BIG REY!!!!

Trey Rey:  TOGETHER WE ARE...TREY REY THE DUEL PREDICTOR!

Trey Rey:  WITH OUR COMBINED MIGHT, WE PREDICT...
JANGO FETT AND OBI-WAN KENOBI WILL WIN THE
DOUBLEHEADER MATCHES!  IT WILL BE SO.

Obi-Wan:  They predicted me - I like them already!  Tell me Big Rey,
have we met before?  Are we possibly...related?

Big Rey:  STOP TRYING TO SPREAD RUMORS ABOUT MY LINEAGE!!!

...TO BE CONTINUED!

Well folks, just when you think this blog couldn't get nerdier...  Good luck to all the Doubleheader combatants, if you aren't playing but want to come out and watch feel free to!  We start at 6PM!

CL Training - August 7, 2018

The Emperor's Throne Room

Well, here we are.

The FIFTH season of our 12-Way Duels League.

They said it wouldn't last.  That it was just a fad.  A flash in the pan.  No potential for staying power.

They were wrong.  So very, very wrong!  This is year five, baby!  And that means it's no holds barred!  Anything goes!  Chaos reigns!  There ain't no stoppin' us now, we're on the move!  Why do I keep using so many exclamation points!?!

Your combatants for the 6th Annual CL Training Duel

As fate would have it, Rob drew the #1 chair, so he let Brianna, a rookie Dueler sitting in the second chair, pick the board.  The Emperor's Throne Room was the venue selected.  If I'm not mistaken, we haven't played on Kamino since this past January.  The drought continues.

Brianna was also kind enough to give Rob Yoda, though in the Throne Room, that's not always good.  All the other characters were distributed and we were off and running, though not before Ben nearly had a panic attack as he had a 50/50 shot at being stuck with Han Solo again.

The dark and light sides stayed clustered for the first couple of cycles around the table, but Joel/Luke Skywalker decided the dark side was more promising and began his evacuation procedures.  Didn't he see Return of the Jedi???  That's not what he's supposed to do on this board!  That also left poor Brianna, piloting Obi-Wan, alone on the front lines, fighting multiple dark side characters all by herself.  Through no fault of her own she was slowly whittled down into last place.

JD and Kaleb, plotting and scheming.

That turn of events was all Luke R./Anakin needed to also high-tail it over to the dark side.  He popped Kat's Han Solo on his way out the door.  From there JD/Emperor and Kaleb/Vader (yes, you read that right, Kaleb got hired over the summer so the Hall of Famer is back in the league!) started using their distance attacks on Rob's Yoda.  It looked bleak for the remaining light side.

Rob tried a Hail Mary maneuver when he Force Lifted and then Force Pushed Ben's unsuspecting Mace Windu into the middle of a dark side viper pit.  It was a brutal betrayal and Ben died in eleventh.  The distraction proved fruitless for Rob, though, because after a Thermal Detonator Kaleb's Storm Trooper shot him off the board in tenth.

Hi Luke!

Kat's Han Solo was still bleeding out on a corner of the board when the dark side in-fighting began.  Ian/Maul and Joel/Luke weren't too excited by Katie's fully healthy Count Dooku on the board.  The rookie Dueler was playing well but she was caught on the wrong end of the first inner-alliance fight.  That made it ninth place for her, which isn't bad for one's first 12-Way Duel!

It looked like the board was going to converge on Han before continuing their weeding process when Mason, also playing in his first Duel, made the aggressive decision to pop off a couple of shots on Ian's Darth Maul.  Mason didn't have the support from his fellow fighters and soon found himself on the wrong end of multiple attacks.  Chris W.'s Jango Fett landed the final blow and Mason was sent to the rails.  After that, Kat, who at one point looked like she might be first out, finally succumbed to her wounds.  It was one of the coolest seventh place finishes I've seen in a long time.

Joel will not fight JD.

With six to go all the remaining light sabers and blasters started pointing at Luke R's Anakin.  He was loyal to his alliance but it was that point in the game that hard decisions had to be made.  His sixth place finish matched his current average.  #math

At this point it appeared JD/Emperor, Kaleb/Vader, and Chris/Jango were solid while Ian/Maul and Joel/Luke were loyal to each other.  In a mildly shocking move, though, all four Duelers not named Chris decided the Fett's services were no longer needed.  Chris didn't have a chance after that, but he deserves a big congrats for doing so well in his first 12-Way!

Things got awkward with the final four.  JD and Kaleb were together, and Ian and Joel were together.  But Ian and JD didn't want to fight each other, which meant JD and Kaleb wanted to take out Joel's Luke while Ian and Joel wanted to eliminate Kaleb's Vader.  If you were confused by that sentence imagine being there live and watching it play out!  There was a lot of nuanced play I can't recall well at this point, but I know Joel started playing "I Will Not Fight You" cards and that Ian's Darth Maul nearly killed Kaleb's Vader.  Joel and Ian were particularly scared of the fabled "wombo-combo," when Emperor plays "You Will Die" and Vader follows up with "All Too Easy."  Eventually Kaleb couldn't protect himself and he retired in fourth place.

With three Duelers left JD's Emperor was clearly the healthiest.  He still had the You Will Die card as well as both of his Royal Guards.  Those observing the Duel assumed Joel/Luke and Ian/Maul would start to work together, but there was an undercurrent of respect between Ian and JD that muddled the situation.

And that's when one of the weirdest moments in league history occurred.

As JD tried to talk Ian into attacking Joel's Luke Skywalker, Joel pointed out that if Ian attacked him it would leave JD free to play the You Will Die on Maul, essentially guaranteeing victory for JD.  Ian could see Joel's point.  That's when JD promised to play the You Will Die card on Joel instead.  Except...when JD's turn came up Joel didn't have any cards in his hand!  He used both to attack Ian!  But JD had promised to play the card...and he did!  He played the card that dumps a player's entire hand on a player who did't have a hand to dump.  Nobody would have blamed Ian for betraying JD and immediately attacking him, but he honored their deal and finally finished off Joel in third.  With two to go JD was in perfect position to take down Maul in second, which he did.  Congrats to JD!  That was his first win after a long streak of unhappy finishes.  He's also just the third Dueler to ever win with the Emperor.  Here's the final order of finish:

12.  Brianna/Obi-Wan
11.  Ben/Mace Windu
10.  Rob/Yoda
9.  Katie/Count Dooku
8.  Mason/Boba Fett
7.  Kat/Han Solo
6.  Luke/Anakin Skywalker
5.  Chris W./Jango Fett
4.  Kaleb/Darth Vader
3.  Joel/Luke Skywalker
2.  Ian/Darth Maul
1.  JD/Emperor Palpatine

This was an exciting start to season #5!  Our next Duel is actually our next TWO Duels - that's right, the annual DOUBLEHEADER will be on Friday, August 31st.  Stay tuned for the official invite!