Labels: Gencon, Little girl, tsu, Zero

As some of you may or may not already know, we were tasked with covering GenCon 2010 via the Live Stream. However, sadly, GenCon does not come equipped with Wireless Internet so there was no LiveStream coverage and for that, I'm sorry. Next year, we will attempt to cover matches with a high quality camera and, if possible, wireless internet. Plenty of time in the coming year to make upgrades to our event coverage and the way we do things.

In the mean time though, enjoy some of the highlights of the trip that we took with our backup camera since we were not able to get our Live Stream up and running. Click any of the images below to see them in higher resolution.

Day 0

Our form of transportation, Nick Botchis



Myself, Patrick O'Neill, stuffing my face along side Mr. Botchis



Our Staff Writer, Andrew Kardis



Andrew and Nick, getting their game faces on to prepare for this trip



Youtube Video of our car ride there (Part 1):



Youtube Video of our car ride there (Part 2):



GenCon 2010

Matt Low, the man who made many things possible at GenCon, hanging out with Nick Botchis



Naruto Shippuden Live host Chris Kovaz @ the Bandai Booth teaching new players the basics



Gary "The Law" Lawson carrying out his work shift at the Bandai booth



Part of the Bandai Booth display, Sasuke Uchiha



Pro Player Brandon Sherlock gets into the game by dressing up as Sasuke Uchiha! (Hey! Who is that in the background trying to act all tough?)



DeMarcus and some players relaxing in between rounds at the Shonen Jump Championship



As impressive as Bandai's Booth was, the Magic The Gathering displays were a site to behold!



The Curse has been broken!!!



Now that that's all wrapped up. . . a fitting end to a terrible format



BONUS!!!

As some of you may have overheard from Mike Alpers, when the trip was all said and done, we realized there were 10 people staying in our hotel room, just like the 10 Members of Akatsuki. So we got bored and decided to assign people to be different members of Akatsuki based on the events of the weekend. Who is who? Let's find out!

Kakuzu - Thomas Cao
Reason: Thomas was carrying around a large roll of $2 bills that left a very distinguishable bulge in his pants (courtesy of Troll & Toad. Kudos for the biggest "troll"/Marketing campaign ever). Pretty much, he was in charge of all the money and was constantly making tabs of who owed who what. Money, Money, Money is all you need! (Read: Let's make some money!)

Hidan - Matthrew Low
Reason: The one with the most devout faith of everyone in the room. On top of that, his Cube deck was based around Hidan and ways so that he could never mill out, creating for tediously long games that never ended. He doesn't die. Not even when you squish him into the back of a truck and try to crush him to death. (Read: Religion mostly)

Deidara - Amir Abboushi
Reason: The over the top/loud one. More concerned with fancy/artsy things (Read: Cooking Match/Bad Combo decks) than taking seriously. His goal is to be greater than Itachi secretly, but in the end all he does is just make a huge explosion. Also "Bomb Combat Attribute" fits him perfectly. (Read: lol Semi-Joke character)

Itachi - Josh Lu
Reason: The one all the little kiddies love because he's supposedly some uber powerful ninja. Also, he's going blind. (Read: lol can't see without glasses)

Kisame - Andrew Kardis
Reason: The Troll. Think he's dead? Nah. He's just trollin' ya. Also, always wants to go get something to eat to keep his chakra full. Usually prefers Macaroni & Cheese and/or terrible hotwings.

Sasori - Patrick O'Neill
Reason: Has a flare for artsy/fancy things rather than the practical route sometimes. Also, was defeated by a little girl despite him being supposedly "powerful." (Read: In denial about losing to a 12 year old girl. . . still)

Pain - Mike Alpers
Reason: The man with the plan. Often referred to as "God." Despite being all powerful, loses for terrible reasons (Read: Alpers scrubbed at SJC)

Konan - Nick Botchis
Reason: Despite being really cool to be around, doesn't do much of anything. Follows Pain around aimlessly. (Read: Followed Alpers around all weekend and they partied together. Nick scrubbed at SJC)

Zetsu - Willie B
Reason: The most mysterious. We didn't know anything about him all weekend. . . he would disappear and reappear later with some food or drink for us. Our reconnaissance man. (Read: How does he do that?)

Tobi - Laurent Jarra
Reason: He's a good boy! He fetches things for us and is the butt of everyone's jokes. Secretly, he's probably better than half the people in the room. . . at everything. (Read: Josh and co. abused him all weekend)

Labels: bandai, Chief Tsuzumiya Haruhi, Gencon, Main Character Tsu, tsu

Or There and Back Again, a short novella dedicated to my ego.

4 of us made the trip from sunny California to just-a-bit-too-sunny Indianapolis - ex-mothafucking Sannin Thomas Cao, alcoholic bad player Mike Alpers, token black guy WillieG, and your beloved hero... me!

Building on my past experience from last year, where our layover in Las Vegas had resulted in the loss of our hotel money to Thomas Cao's gambling habit, we decided to take the much safer route of booking a flight with a layover in Milwaukee. I mean, it's Wisconsin. Absolutely nothing can go wrong in Wisconsin, unless you are wearing a Brett Favre jersey.

Aside: speaking of Wisconsin, if anybody finds my Respective Dreams deck (black Dragonball deckbox) at Gate 41B of the Milwaukee airport, I would appreciate it back. Thank you very much.

In any case, we made it to Indianapolis on Wednesday morning, picked up our badges, and then proceeded to rampage through a local K-Mart in search of food to stock the hotel for the weekend. I have never seen a sadder cashier in my life than the young lad who was confronted the sight of our mega-mountains of frozen food and alcoholic beverages.

30 minutes of scanning and a total of just over $100 later (or, approximately $0.03 per pound of food)...

*fast forward through boring bits*

Midway through those boring bits, new challengers had arrived in the form of first class noob and all-around ginger Nick Botchis, ultra-noob Pat O'Neill, and king of the noobs Andrew Kardis. Luckily for them, they had arrived bearing offerings of Smash Bros. and Wii and so were allowed to prostrate themselves in the temple of me.

We ended up cubing (so much fun, btw - every group should have someone with a cube) and I felt so sorry for Alpers that I graced him with a victory in the finals. Considering this was the one and only time that he had ever won anything in his entire life, I decided I had done enough good deeds for the day and disemboweled a kitten before heading to sleep.

zzz...

zzzzzzzz...

zzzzzzzzzzzz...

Crono! Wake up!

zzz....

My electric travel razor doesn't work! Curse you and your inferior products Remington!

(That was why I was unshaven the whole weekend, in case anyone cares.)

*fast forward through more boring parts*

We partook in a variety of adult beverages on Thursday night - vodka and Sierra Mist, vodka and cranberry juice, vodka and coke, vodka and diet coke, and of course, Thomas Veazie's favorite of vodka and vodka.

Pop quiz!

What did Pyrot do/say while drunk in our hotel room?
A. Attempt to hook up with Alpers.
B. *in high pitched girly voice* "Woah! Laurent! You're... BLACK!" *extends fist* "Knuckles?"
C. Attempt to gift various members of our hotel room with an iPod touch, his virginity, and a small quantity of weed (ironically stored in a Naruto deckbox).
D. Drink all of our vodka, the fucker.
E. Get punched out by Amir (lol).
F. All of the above.

If you answered anything but F, you're an idiot.

*fast forward through fuzzy parts*

Watching Pat play Blazblue drunk against a completely sober Andrew was hilarious. The amount of Jack Daniels left in Pat's cup corresponded inversely with the savagery of the annihilation he was dishing out to Andrew. By the time he had none left he was perfect-ing Andrew in 3 seconds flat. Drunken fist ftw?

*fast forward through parts not for public consumption*

I ordered the same thing at Steak and Shake the 4 times we went there over the weekend (Western BBQ Bacon Double Steakburger) - it got better each time.

...

Plus: getting humped by Ari's girlfriend
Minus: getting humped by Ari

...

If you would like to hear someone rage more than Thomas Cao using Multi-Shadow Clone Jutsu, please ask Andrew Kardis about his experiences in 2HG MTG Draft at GenCon.

...

Dude, I swear I thought it was a Negate.

...

Oh, the actual tournament. Because nobody actually likes reading about matches, I have condensed each game into one sentence.

Round 1 - Kelvin Smith - ANBU
Game 1: Sealing Barrier on Dispatch elicits the insta-scoop.
Game 2: No Sealing Barrier, I insta-scoop.
Game 3: Time is called when I have 9 BRs and a Sasuke/Oro + Sasori/Deidara, and he has 0 BRs, 0 cards in hand, and 0 ninjas in play.

1-0 (SoCal players faced: 1)

Round 2 - Juan Romero - Taijutsu
Game 1: Chidori Stream!
Game 2: Chidori Stream (after a mulligan to 4)!

2-0 (SoCal players faced: 2)

Round 3 - Colin Mitchell - Dreams
Game 1: Lots of yelling, and he sacks the shit out of me.
Game 2: I sack the shit out of him (after attempting to ambush a platoon - this is what happens when you don't play the game for a year).

In all fairness, I was, as Zero puts it, "playing to my outs."

2-0-1 (SoCal players faced: 2)

Round 4 - Mynor Del Aguila - Taijutsu
Game 1: Chidori Stream!
Game 2: I get buttfucked.
Game 3: Snake Waves!

3-0-1 (SoCal players faced: 3)

Round 5 - Nick Brady - Earth
Game 1: Chidori Stream (eventually)!
Game 2: I am the Prince of Persia!

4-0-1 (SoCal players faced: 3)

Round 6 - Steve Aragon - Dreams
Game 1: Pillars! Pillars! Pilla- oh wait, I died.
Game 2: You can't miss drops against the Prince of Persia and expect to win.

4-0-2 (SoCal players faced: 4)

Round 7 - Michael Cano - Dreams
Game 1: Chidori Stream!
Game 2: Sasori/Deidara!

5-0-2 (SoCal players faced: 5)

Round 8 - Joe Colon - TBM Earth
Game 1: I Sealing Barrier his Yamato, which lets me set up for... Chidori Stream!
Game 2: I mulligan to Oro, Oro, mission, mission, and proceed go: drop, drop, drop, Oro, Snake Waves on time.

This "playing to your outs" thing is pretty effective.

Saul: "Hey Josh, how does it feel to have god licking your ballsack?"

6-0-2 (SoCal players faced: 5 out of 8 rounds)

...

We go to some horrible wings place and watch Anderson Silva get the shit beaten out of him (and not care) for 23 minutes, only to make the other guy tap out in the 24th minute. Best fight ever.

...

Top 16 - Ari Kathein - Concentration Water
Game 1: Chidori Stream! Oh wait, he's not dead... Chidori Stream!
Game 2: Snake Waves! ...holy shit Ari, what is with you and not dying to game-ending jutsus? Chidori Stream!

Ari bestows upon me the title of "Master of Water." He also mentioned someone else, but I don't really care about them.

Top 8 - Mike Cancelleri - OneWingedToads

Ok, fine, I'm going to go longer on a sentence in this one. But that's because I made my only good play of the tournament in this game.

Game 1: I get a Sasori in play while getting beaten down by turn 2 Gamabunta. I know he has a Shika U in his hand after seeing it with Temari WS, so I organize a Shino into Sasori's team with my only ninja being a bug coin. He takes the bait and deploys Shika U, uses it on my Shino, then organizes into Naruto Reliance/some random 1 drop, Gamabunta/Lee, Choji/Shino, ShikaU/bug coin. I give him some BRs, then Invasion for Freezing Eyes, ambush it, activate Sasori, hard charge to give me more chakra than him, organize, activate the squad...

Boom!

His 1 card in hand was not enough to make a comeback.

Game 2: I see Oro/Snake Waves in my opener. He doesn't get Bunta out on turn 2.

Top 4 - Thomas "Knuckles" Veazie - Dreams
Game 1: Tragic Destiny does WHAT?!
Game 2: I go all in with my trips Stream and trips Wind Scythe. Unfortunately, there is only one person playing poker at this table, and it isn't him.

I put the same curse on him that I put on Brandon Thieben 3 years ago and he draws horri-bad in the finals and loses. Revenge?

Mmmmm... noodles...

They really need one of those places in Cali.

We go to the arcade and Mike Alpers tells me he's good at MvC2. I have never played in my life. I beat him by repeatedly slamming my hand down on all 6 buttons at once.

Victory!

I also crush Andrew 7-1 in air hockey but fail to draw Snake Waves against Joe and lose my air hockey king title. I blame my ignominious defeat on button-mashing related fatigue.

Back to the hotel, more cubing...

THERE ISN'T ANY BOOZE FOR SALE IN INDIANAPOLIS ON SUNDAY. EPIC FAIL.

Monday was mostly Fogo de Chao and raging.

Overall, not a bad way to go out.

...

Hello Hello (Good to be Back)

3 Sea Monstah [Monstah of the Sea]
2 Anko Mitarashi [Pupil of Orochimaru]
2 Cursed Warrior [Ubiquitousness]
2 Shino Aburame [Insect Warriors]
1 Sakura Haruno [A Double Personality]
1 Kiba Inuzaka [Keen Nose]

3 Temari [Wind Scythe]
1 Kabuto [Database]

3 Konohamaru Ninja Squad [Successors to the Will of Fire]
1 Shino Aburame [Silence]

2 Orochimaru (Childhood) [Shown Signs of the Legends]
1 Naruto Uzumaki [Reliance]
1 Sakura Haruno [Reliance]

1 Sasuke Uchiha [Severing the Bond]
1 Sasuke Uchiha [Freezing Eyes]

1 Sasori [Creating the Masterpiece]

3 The Second Hokage [Supremacy]
1 Sasuke Uchiha and Orochimaru [3 Years Later]

3 Sakura's Decision
3 Loss
2 Invasion of Akatsuki
1 Sealing Barrier
1 The Next Target
1 Tragic Destiny

3 Chidori Stream
3 Wind Scythe Jutsu

3 Tobi [Man of Mystery]

Sideboard:
1 Shino Aburame [Insect Warriors]
1 Shino Aburame [Parasite]
1 Kigiri [Smoke Screen]
1 Shimon Hijiri [Keeping an Eye]
2 Yakumo Kurama [With a (Sea) Monstah Within]
2 Make-Out Tactics
1 The Next Target
1 Ten Thousand Snake Waves

Labels: Gencon, josh, reports

For our final preview for Set 18, we have for you another Super Rare.



Well here's that +1/+1 for Toads Naruto I jokingly was asking for before. Sadly, it isn't on a turn 0 body, instead on a turn 3 body. This card is a most interesting one for the Toad deck indeed. Most toads have 2 support, so dropping him on 3 will most likely net you a bunch of 3 supporters as well as give your Gama 5 combat. While I would have liked for the card to add the Combination jutsu to your hand (and then force you to discard a card from your hand after you use it) I guess that would be too much to ask for since you could bombard the field with Jutsu in one EOJ. As of right now, like Gamariki, the card probably won't see any play upon release but with Set 19 and other future sets, this card has SERIOUS potential based on the Combination jutsu in those sets. Just imagine playing a team wiping Combination Jutsu on the block, resolving it, and your opponent knowing full well that you'll just draw into another one next turn. This card's design is nice in that respect because depending on what other cards come out for the deck, it can have some nice combo potential.

Here's to hoping it actually makes the cut one day.

Labels: Chief Tsuzumiya Haruhi, Fangs of the Snake, previews, tsu, Tylar

Andrew came over last week. And Otakon happened. And we partied hard. And amongst the partying we got a phone call that was like "So when are you going to post the previews?" And I looked at Andrew and was like ". . . You never sent them to me."

And he looked at me and was like "Well you never asked nor did you water mark them."

Then there was silence for about 30 seconds.

Then we threw our hands up in the air and ran around in circles screaming for we had no way to access the internet to provide you with these previews.

My good friend Adam then offered us his laptop to get the job done. And then we had a brief snaffu that almost got us all in trouble due to other's incompetence. And then it happened again. And again. So please forgive us for being idiots and not getting this to you on time. At least we're delivering from home though, rather than jail. *grumbles*



This one is for all you Efficient Training nuts. The card effect and chakra cost are rather cheap but I will tell ya though, not being able to change the target is kind of aggravating. What holds the card back is the "Clone Status" requirement. Once again, please see the Efficient Training article posted on Bandai for necessary improvements to that deck type... I fear without some of those changes this card might get tossed by the way side, which is a shame because this seems like a fun combo card where you could string together multiple Jutsu. Byakugan spam anyone?

And for our other preview, we provide you again with yet another Toad~



Isn't it just beautiful? :D

Seriously though, Gamiriki is a strange fella. The stats aren't particularly outstanding but the effect more than makes up for it. When it comes into play . . . well you can read the card. Being able to pick up a Combination Jutsu with his effect is pretty good because for the most part, the Combination Jutsu are worth playing post rotation. The problem? There's not that many, and they're only for the Toad arch type. As time goes on, depending on the quantity, quality, and types of Combination Jutsu we'll see I can definitely see Gamiriki being a highly played card. For right now he probably ain't gonna see much play ... but he has amazing potential depending on what else is in Set 18 and/or Set 19 and beyond.

Labels: Chief Tsuzumiya Haruhi, Fangs of the Snake, previews, tsu, Tylar