What I Did on My Summer Vacation (Part 3)

By Dave Gerspach (dgjedi), WCA Co-Chair

July was certainly a hot month for Buffy.  In California, eleven players showed up for a tournament in Norwalk.  It was a good mix of new and experienced players as John Bruno continues to show them how to play.  This time using a Drusilla deck.  Congratulations on holding the largest Buffy tournament reported in 2004!

In the Midwest, it was a Buffy doubleheader with a Slayathon fund raiser in Chicago followed up by a tournament in Niles, Illinois.  First, at the fund raiser, there was a lot of buzz about the Buffy CCG.  Aly Greaves and I gave a presentation of the game to several fans, starter decks were given away and booster boxes were auctioned off for the event.  Aly followed it up by winning the next day’s tournament using her Angel deck.

Then it was off to San Diego for Comic Con.  Buffy and Comic Con certainly go well together.  Over 6,500 people turned out to hear Sarah Michelle Gellar talk about her upcoming movie The Grudge (although there were as many questions about Buffy).  Eliza Dushku spoke in front of a couple thousand fans about Tru Calling (but was also asked numerous questions about Faith).  Throw in Amber Benson (check out her movie, Chance), Robia Lamorte, Iyari Limon, Robin Sachs, Danny Strong, George Hertzberg, James Leary, Tom Lenk and Joss Whedon and you have an extremely strong lineup of Buffy alumni.  It’s safe to say that no series (current or past) was as well represented.  Although that’s no surprise to the Buffy faithful, it hopefully tells some companies out there that there’s a market for Buffy products (CCG anyone?).

And yes, there was a Buffy CCG tournament in San Diego.  Seven players participated and Ryan Green (several times Big Bad) brought his Drusilla deck to teach everyone how virtual cards weren’t needed to win.  While I hate to think of all the Dru decks I might be facing at upcoming tournaments, it seems that Spike’s former love is piling up several tournament wins this year from several different players.

So now we turn the calendar page to August (on my calendar that means going from a picture of Sarah to Nicholas Brendon.  Guess I can’t stare at Sarah every month.).  The local paper reported that many times August turns out to be hotter than July.  That’s no closer to the truth than when discussing the Buffy CCG.  The Arizona group is holding a tournament on August 7 in Tuscon (check out the Tournaments forum for any posted results) .  Wizard World Chicago will be the site of three Buffy tournaments on August 13, 14 and 15.  Not to mention appearances by Amber Benson and Joss Whedon.  There’s a Summer Mystery Camp being held in Germany on August 28 and 29.  (Check out the details in Carsten’s article in this very newsletter).  And then there’s the amazing lineup of Buffy stars at the San Francisco Slayer Con from August 27-29 (Check out the details in Don’s article in, you guessed it, this very newsletter).  Then it’s back to Norwalk, CA on the 28^th, where John will be hosting another Buffy tournament at Comic Cult.  Can they top 11?  If you want to peek ahead into September, look for Mike’s (the-big-bad) post on Conquest in the Tournament Forum. 

Oh yes, and then there’s Gen Con.  For gamers in North America there is no bigger gaming convention.  So what better way to celebrate the resurgence of the Buffy CCG, than by holding our very first North American Championship.  Unlike most Protectors, Big Bads, Grand Patrols and other tournament winners, the North American Champion will need to combine deck building and play skill over a number of tournament formats and a strong devotion to the game.  The winner will be that individual, who over the course of four grueling days and four very challenging tournaments, will have won the most games.  Throw in a special Sealed Deck tournament the day prior to Gen Con and if you attend WW Chicago and Gen Con there’s possibility of playing in eight Buffy tournaments in a ten day period.

Did someone ask if we were still giving away prizes at tournaments?  Attend Gen Con and you’ll wonder why you ever asked.  No convention has ever given away the number and variety of prizes we have lined up this year.  You’ll have to check out the Tournament Forum for exact details, but we have promo cards, foil ultra rares, non-foil ultra rares, the “novelty” black card, starter decks, booster backs, autographed cards, action figures, RPG Corebooks, a D’Hoffryn bust, foil expansion sets, a non-foil expansion set and AC plastic essences.  It wouldn’t even surprise me if I forgot something in that list.

***Special Prize Announcement***  This message will only apply to those players who’ve read this newsletter and play in a Buffy tournament at Gen Con.  From time to time people have been looking for the Angel’s Curse plastic essences.  I’ll have a number of them with me at Gen Con.  But how can you get one?  Well, we’ve always been eager to report the amazing plays made by players to win a game or tournament.  We still are.  In this case, however,  when you turn in your scoresheet, record on the back of it your most embarrassing play made during the tournament.  You know, those “Doh!” moments.  Warning, you may find it printed here, but as a reward for sharing, you’ll get a full set of Angel’s Curse plastic essences.  Limit one set per person, but feel free to share more than one “special” moment.

Next month I’ll devote an entire article to Gen Con coverage.  The Summer Vacation series will wrap up with the remaining August Buffy CCG events and possibly even announce a special event or two for the fall.  Until then, stay cool.

Buffy Comes to the Bay

By Don Tresca (Tarafan), WCA Member

San Francisco Slayer Con is coming this August 27-29 at the Oakland Marriott City Center.  Although there won't be a tournament (unfortunately), I will be there on Saturday to hand out some promos to any interested
Buffy fans to try and get some interest generated about the game, and there will be plenty of other Buffy fun to be had for any of you Buffy fans living in Northern California. 

The guest list is extensive.  On Saturday, James Marsters, Alexis Denisof, Anthony Stewart Head,
Nicholas Brendon, and Clare Kramer will all be there, giving brief talks, followed by autograph sessions for
those lucky enough to get the special tickets (which, unfortunately, are all sold out).  But there will be
plenty of up close and personal contact with other Buffy and Angel stars in the special guest room.  Among the these special bonus guests are Camden Toy (who played the Ubervamp, Gnarl, and one of the Gentlemen), Iyari Limon (Kennedy), Adam Busch (Warren), Danny Strong (Jonathan), Tom Lenk (Andrew), George Hertzberg (Adam), James Leary (Clem), and Brian Thompson (Luke and The Judge).  For you Angel fans, there will be two special guests:  Brigid Conley Walsh (Virginia Bryce) and Jenny Mollen (Nina).  Also on
hand in the guest room will be Lee Stringer, one of the special effects artists on Angel.

There will be lots of stuff to purchase in the Dealer Room and lots of other fun stuff. 

Mystery Camp

By Carsten Freining (cfreining), WCA Co-Chair

What would a Super Hero be without the people backing her up?

Well, guess what would she be without her mother?

Kristine Sutherland in Germany at Mystery Camp (http://mysterycamp2.united-conventions.de/) from August 28^th to 29^th 2004.

Sounds interesting, right, yeah exactly my first thought too, but what the heck does this have to do with the Buffy CCG? There is not even a Joyce Summers Essence Card. Well, Heidi and I will be there! Running a lot of tournaments with new and advanced players. Oh, now you expect a time table, but there is none! As soon as there are enough players to start a tournament, we will begin. So if 4 players are waiting, we will wait half an hour and the tourney starts. If a lot of players show up afterwards to play, another one will start.

Since we don’t want to use all the time the visitors have, we will have tournaments for 4-8 players. After 3 rounds (3 hours) it is over. This means a better chance to win one of the top cards, like St. Du Lac Mausoleum, Angel’s Curse Premium Essences, Defective Weapon, and so on. There will be prizes for participation and the first and second (only from 6 players on) of the tournament, the first to ascend his main to Lv.3 (doesn’t matter if Villain or Hero Main), the first park victory and the fairness prize. The fees for the tournaments are 5 Euro for the Sealed (no multiplayer final this time) and no fee for Constructed. We will bring some constructed decks along, so new players can play, even without having the cards yet….. We are only taking starters and boosters for 24 players, so there will be only 3 to 6 sealed tournaments depending on the number of participants.

Very Important: The price hasn’t been increased as announced on the web site. it is still 125 Euro, and there are day-tickets available (55 Euro for Saturday, 50 Euro for Sunday).

Have I already mentioned that the Welcome Package includes a Pergamum Prophecy starter? Yes a starter with a Joyce Summers card to be signed in the autograph session. Don’t forget that you can be pictured with Kristine Sutherland on Saturday…..

See you there,

Carsten.

How to Rank the Buffy CCG Tournaments

By Carsten Freining (cfreining), WCA Co-Chair

Since it has already been announced, I want to write a bit about what we want to achieve and how far we are with our master plan to conquer the world and take over world dom….. no wait that wasn’t to be announced before it was done!

I first want to start  with the ranking system itself. We want to use the ranking system that is well known from Chess, Magic and most other games that rank the players. It is called the ELO Rating System. It will calculate the new rating of a player after a game depending on the rating difference between him and his opponent. If the difference is negative (he has less points than his opponent), he will gain more points in case of a win and lose less points in case of a loss. On the other side, if his rating is higher then the opponents then he will gain less points in case of a win and lose more points in case of a loss.

The formula looks like this:

Rn = Ro + K(W - We) 

·        Ro: Pre Game rating

·        Rn: Post Game rating

·        K: Rating Point Value of the tournament

·        W: actual Game Score (1: Full Win, 0.66: Timed Win, 0.33 Timed Loss, 0: Full Loss, 0.5 Tie)

·        We: expected Game Score from following formula

We= 1/ (10^((R2-R1)/400)+1)

R2, R1 are the ratings of the 2 players.

So far it is not difficult to implement the ranking calculations. We have to discuss 2 things within the WCA:

1.      What will be the starting rating of every new player. This should be chosen that no player will ever have a negative rating. It doesn’t matter for anything else.

2.      How to calculate the K value of a tournament. The options we have are:

Ø      Depending on the number of players so a tournament with 4-7 players will have a lower K-Value then one with 8 to 16 for example.

Ø      Special tournaments will have a higher K-Value (example: German Open, tournaments on conventions like Gen-Con)

 Example:

2 players compete in a tournament with K Value 16:

Player 1 has 2200 Points, Player 2 has 1950 Points:

We check all 4 cases, of Full, timed win and Full, timed Loss:

The Expected Score We= H: 0.81, L:0.19

We are actively working on these questions and so far we have a bit of software to take over the calculations for rankings.  As well, we are working on a program to help judges record a tournament. The Tournament Master will create a file that can be sent to us and then will be included and ranked. But the tournaments could be entered over the internet as well. In a password secured area judges should be able to enter tournaments as well.

With this we want to give players a bit of a feeling of how good they perform without taking away the fun. The ranking of the players should be updated every month depending on the amount of tournaments played. Perhpas we can even have an update every day. To the left you can see how the Tournament master will look. It is not yet completed, I still need to include a procedure that nobody plays twice against each other or has a second bye. Then the players should also have the option to drop out of the tournament.

What else do we need to calculate the rankings? We still need to implement the interface to the database to store the tournaments for the calculations. This will be easier then saving all tournaments to a file every time. The calculation works already with a simple example.

We hope to be done by the end of September. Then, all tournaments we have the results from will be entered and you will be able to look up your current standings worldwide! The next step would be to check the possibilities to include the virtual tournaments into the ranking as well…. But these are only visions, nothing solid yet.

To the right you can see how the internet entry form might look like.

We’ll keep you updated as we progress.

Greetings,

Carsten

Slayer Strategies

By Dave Gerspach (dgjedi), WCA Co-chair

Sincerely, next month you may get a real strategy.  However, until someone else steps to the plate, consider this more “slayer tips”.  Many old, but possibly one or two you haven’t used.  The theme this month – How to slow fight decks.

Last month took a look at several ways to enhance a deck’s card drawing.  This month we take a few swats at the Buffy CCG version of the mosquito, the fight deck.  They’re annoying, they draw blood and occasionally can make you sick.  They’re Buffy CCG fight decks that can turn some tournaments nasty.  But you can take preventive measures to minimize their effect.  Honestly, I’ve played in 59 Buffy tournaments since the game was released and only once have I seen a true fight deck win a tournament.  I still see complaints from time to time in the forum, but here are techniques I’ve observed.

Sunnydale High School Auditorium.  Because of The Talent Show Must Go On challenge, this is a must location for many good decks.  Since it’s a school location it works well with Bad Eggs, Spring Madness and One Man Army.  Not to mention it provides a good block against evil fight decks.  They can’t move into or out of it without fatiguing.  If your deck has a fair number of characters with Butt-Kicking, but really isn’t built for fighting, throw a Run Fast or two into your deck.  That way, even if your opponent doesn’t want to move through the Auditorium, you can run them there against their will.

Clumsy Fingers.  One of the most effective weapons of the fight deck is a Compound Bow.  It pretty much lets them attack at will by just moving into the park.  Nothing is more frustrating to fight decks than to be forced to discard the bow.  And Clumsy Fingers works very well in numerous decks.  I know many players shy away from it because you can get burned drawing it during a fight or challenge, but being able to make your opponent lose a key item at the wrong time (for them) helps against many decks.  To make matters worse, after you make that fighter drop their bow, follow it up by attaching Chains to them.  Then watch your weakest fighter take them out without working up a sweat.

Drive Like Crazy/Proactive With Pep.  These cards drive fight decks crazy for so many reasons.  Many fight decks employ these cards to make sure they can get to a location to start a fight.  Guess how many fights they win against fight decks that don’t use these cards.  None.  There’s no BK boost on these cards and fight decks that don’t use them will almost always win against fight decks that do.  But fight decks that don’t use them can get stymied by non-fight decks because of their lack of movement.  This dilemma can drive fight deck owners crazy.

How else do they help against fight decks.  Many challenge based decks can use the SM and WE boost these cards give, but you can also lure an opponent away from your true target.  Move your main character to the park or a location next to where you’d really like to be.  When your opponent moves there or uses their own Drive Like Crazy to move there, you play your card and move away.  I love the look of the fight deck player who now realizes you’re in a better position to solve a challenge and they have no one to fight.

Old Madison Body Switch.  Then you have the fight deck that doesn’t mind a little back up support from Wesley, Jonathan, Darla or a few other minions or companions.  When their main fight character finally makes it over to your location, body switch them with one of their weaker support characters.  Now you’re probably facing someone you can actually fight.  Destiny point for you and lack of support for them.  This card also works well when facing Kakistos or someone that can snag your main character to their location.  You can easily body switch with someone more expendable.

Ken.  For any evil deck that would prefer to face challenges, multiple copies of Ken is not a bad thing.  His stats are wonderful at Hell, but if someone comes over looking for a fight, simply drop Ken when they least expect it and send them packing back over to their side where it could take them two turns to make it back.  Plenty of time to win the game.

Bizarro Sun Cinema.  You either hate or love this location.  Usually based on whether or not you can get it in play.  However, consider this.  If you’re going up against a known fight deck, consider not playing this location, even if given the choice.  One of the fastest ways for a fight deck to infiltrate your locations is to use Dragon’s Cove Magic Shop and move straight to your Sun Cinema.  Unless you can protect the location by fighting, you’re not only going to lose it to your opponent, but they’re now in the middle of your territory, outdrawing you and with more Butt-Kicking cards to spare.  This alone can send you into a downward spiral.  On the occasions when I do play a fight deck, I’m counting on my opponent to play this location.  If they don’t, it can slow me down considerably.

Bad Alcohol.  Again, many people worry about only the one WE boost on this card, but it can be useful against challenge and fight decks.  Against fight decks, make sure to play this during the fight, fatigue your opponent, lower their stats, and your opponent won’t be able to use Been There, Killed That.  Again, whether you win or lose the fight you’ve slowed them down.  Once they’re fatigued, they won’t even be able to play Ambushed on you while you complete that winning challenge.

Then there’s the standby talent changers; Book Learning, Hair Flip and Creep Factor.  Sometimes, they’re you’re only hope.  But wait, you know this, but usually the fight deck counters with Testosterone.  What you want to do here is supplement with Manacles.  Take a peek at your opponent’s hand and get rid of any Testosterone they’ve been holding.  They may try the same thing to get rid of your talent changers, but sometimes they’re so busy holding a Compound Bow, they have no room for Manacles.  Good decks, especially, can use Wesley and Jonathan to recycle their talent changers more often and eventually wear down the fight deck.  If you’re playing a virtual deck, the Once More With Feeling episode can also work wonders.

Those are some of the most common means I’ve seen or used.  Feel free to share your thoughts and together we can survive mosquito season.

The next Newsletter (Volume 1, Issue 7) will be released sometime in September, 2004.J

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