Arvala-7
It was a history-making night on many levels. The first time in league history officially playing with the new characters, the first time a non-original character would win a Duel, and the longest...Duel...ever...
We picked Arvala-7 because it's nice and spread out and would give the new characters some options, but good gracious, what a disaster. We've played Arvala-7 twice, the first time clocking in at 8 hours, and the second time...NINE HOURS!!! Do we need to deep-six this board and never play it again?
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| The first to ever play with the new characters! |
Enjoy the pic above because...Rob forgot to take pictures during the match! This was just about it. C'mon Rob, get it together next time.
There wasn't even a kill in the first two hours of the game, but that wasn't because nobody was doing anything. It was quite the opposite in fact! One of the most dramatic moments came when Ryan's Moff Gideon had a Dark Trooper Kidnap Grant's Rey and bring him/her back to a dark side kill box! Grant has NEVER FINISHED IN LAST and it looked like his card was finally going to be pulled...except...Duncan/Mando broke the new cards with a daring move. He wanted to use a combination of Rising Phoenix (fly around the board during your turn) and Grappling Line (bring somebody to a spot near you). The wording on the cards were murky, and we even consulted outside sources, and the ruling was made that...it was a legal move! Snatched from the jaws of death!!! How does Grant do it???
During that same turn Duncan used Whistling Birds, which ended up killing one of Rylie's Knights of Ren, marking the first minor character death of the new decks. With Rey disappearing from their grasp, the dark side started to infight, aided by Ben's Jar Jar throwing the Oopsa Bombad and injuring a bunch of them. Rylie got especially twitchy, fearing they'd go after her Kylo first, so she made a play to take out Elliot's Krennic. Ryan/Moff Gideon and Kaleb/Beckett joined in, but Elliot and Delaney/Snoke returned fire on Kylo, aided by Ian's rogue MagnaGuard. In the end it was the MagnaGuard who would send Kylo out in last. Brutal!
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| Underestimate at your own risk! |
Despite Hannah's Jyn Erso siding with the dark side, Kaleb thought the best path forward was to eat their own, so he and Ryan continued by taking down Elliot's Krennic with Beckett's Trust No One. The light side stayed strong together (with Ian's General Grievous, who followed Ben's Qui-Gon to that end of the board). As the light side started to penetrate the dark, Delaney made a deal with Grievous to Force Lightning Moff Gideon to the light side of the board. Despite Ryan really playing well with Gideon, he wasn't prepared for the true terror before him...WICKET THE EWOK!!! David's Wicket had already thrown Whirling Rocks at Snoke for four points of damage before he sprung the furball on Gideon. Ryan chose not to defend, but it was a Surprise Attack! That resulted in eight points of damage and Gideon was dunzo!
The light side was torn a little bit on how to proceed, largely because Kaleb's Beckett was making some very compelling arguments. Rob's Lando, though, feared Hannah's Jyn Erso staying on the board, especially after Cassian assassinated poor Jar Jar. David's Princess Leia agreed, and he would get the final shot on Hannah, who in ninth place, finished outside of the top six for the first time in her career.
Ian's Grievous had been eyeing Leia for the whole game, though, and it was a Make Them Suffer that dumped her hand and led to David dying in eighth. He played a heck of a game from the back line, though, everyone was impressed.
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| You would not believe the day she had... |
That left seven to go! Kaleb tried to swing a four-person alliance with him, Delaney/Snoke, Ian/Grievous, and Duncan/Mandalorian. However, Rob/Lando and Grant/Rey talked Duncan and Ian into staying loyal with them and Ben/Qui-Gon. Beckett was still in scramble mode, so he offed Snoke in seventh to try and buy himself some more time. Despite his best efforts, he couldn't turn the tide and it was Grievous who finally bounced him out of the game in sixth. Delaney played great with Snoke, and watching Kaleb in last-stand mode is always a delight. He's very convincing!
That made it five to go, and though Grant had lost his nerve and attacked Rob's Lando once earlier in the game, the attention on who to attack fell on one of either Grant/Rey and Duncan/Mando, or Ian's Grievous. You couldn't blame Grant for sticking with the Mandalorian - he saved his hide from last! But when he and Duncan agreed to go after Grievous, Duncan didn't fully commit and that caused concern from Grant, which Rob gladly highlighted! Grant decided to partner with the other three to take down Duncan, who was offed by Rey's The Last Jedi. But this was Duncan's sixth game, meaning he's turned professional! And with yet another fantastic finish, he debuts as the top ranked Dueler with a SICK 4.00 average and 33% win percentage! That is mind-blowing, well done Duncan!
From there Rob's Lando waited to see what Ian/Grievous and Ben/Qui-Gon wanted to do. They decided Rey was the scariest character left, much to Grant's annoyance after going against his former alliance partner. It was even worse for him after Lando played Hello What Have We Here to discard Rey's Rise of Skywalker for the second time of the game!!! Lobot landed the last blow with a four point Activation shot.
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| Final Two |
With three left, Ben/Qui-Gon tried to get Ian to join him against Rob's Lando, but Rob said he was all in on attacking the last Jedi left in the game. Ian saw Rob prove it with a couple of attacks and they joined together to take down Liam Neeson. But Ben went into BEAST mode, continually using Jedi Meditation, Chance Cube, and There's Always A Bigger Fish to out-card Lando and Grievous. It took no less than TWO HOURS for Rob and Ian to finally whittle him down, with Lando's Altered the Deal landing the kill shot. The 2020 Champion almost pulled off a victory, with his real life minor character in his arms at the end.
And then there were two! Ian and Rob had both exhausted their hands battling Qui-Gon, so their cat and mouse game began as they traversed Arvala-7. Twice Rob put big hits on Ian, only to see Spare Parts played and the damage erased. After almost an hour, Rob caught Ian with low defense and comboed a Battle of Tanaab and Altered Deal to win the game by one attack point! Ian played outstanding, but inexplicably, he has now finished in second place in the last FOUR GAMES!!! That's amazing. And for Rob, he gets to win the first game with the new characters, making Lando the top ranked character in the league. You know it baby!!!
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| Your first two-time A New Hope winner! |
Here's the final order of finish again:
12. Rylie/Kylo Ren
11. Elliot/Orson Krennic
10. Ryan/Moff Gideon
9. Hannah/Jyn Erso
8. David T./Princess Leia
7. Delaney/Supreme Leader Snok
6. Kaleb/Tobias Beckett
5. Duncan/The Mandalorian
4. Grant/Rey
3. Ben H./Qui-Gon Jinn
2. Ian/General Grievous
1. Rob/Lando Calrissian
The Dueler and Character rankings have been updated, and they both look a lot different!
For the Dueler rankings, the handicap points (points that favor you if you play with a bottom-ranked character) have drastically changed since new characters occupy five of the bottom six characters. You'll notice just about everyone's average took a hit as a result. Once the new characters have played a few more games we'll see that balance out.
On the Character ranking side, we've now got all 24 listed. Starting next month, we'll randomly choose six light and six dark from the pool of 24 - any combo of new and old!
And speaking of next month...it's February, and so that means the VALENTINE'S DUEL!!! We'll have a date for that soon, stay tuned. And we'll be debuting yet ANOTHER new board! This one is the most chaotic yet...the Eravana Cargo Hold from The Force Awakens. You do NOT want to miss this one...
Until next time...as Lando might say, stay beautiful!
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