When I first started visiting the local Battlegrounds I wasn't quite as enfranchised in the game as I am now - I wasn't spending more than about 50p on a card, I was sticking to one class and one deck, and was generally losing quite a lot of games. After struggling along with blue Priest for a while I took a peek at the Shaman cards I'd got knocking around, and after a short while, I started to get a taste for Totem Control, along with a shocking inability to build a deck that contained less than 70 cards.
This was back in the days before Core was even a thing, so I was revelling in the delights of Fire Nova Totem, the Fire and Earth Elemental Totems, and hoping that my Mana Tide Totem would go off, which was generally the turning point in any game. After a short while I splashed out on two Gorehowl to add to the Sparks I played as finishers.
Everybody hated playing against the deck; it was slow, awkward and clunky, and if drew enough ways of recurring my Totems, games would often stretch on for a very long time in an awkward, sludgy quagmire.
One person - let's call him Andy, because that is his name - was particularly displeased with the repeated appearances of Phadalus and his planks, and was probably pretty glad when Core rolled round and removed some of my favourite cards from the deck. Eventually I branched out into other decks but Totem control was always a deck I intended to go back to, for better or worse.
With the new Totem rules changes I was itching to get back in the saddle, so I took the shell of the Zaritha DMF-winning deck I had lying around, took all the good cards out, and replaced them with Totems. I took it round to Steve's house on Monday and got utterly thumped by his Worgen Warlock that I'd built for him. Nevertheless, I trimmed a few underperforming cards out and ended up with this monstrosity!
1 Iravar
2 Gorehowl
The deck is a little flabby at 66 cards, and other than Iravar (who failed to perform at all last night, partly down to me not reading him properly and thinking he did unpreventable damage) I'm unsure what I'd want to remove. Either way it's not that special - it's Zaritha with totems! The singleton Nature Resistance Totem is in there as a searchable kill spell - if you have the Scaled Breastplate in play you can search it out with Ancestral Awakening and kill a lot of common nasties.
Under the new Totem rules, any old Totems printed before Worldbreaker are Abilities AND Allies when in play, and Abilities ONLY when in the deck, graveyard or hand. Totems printed in Worldbreaker and in the future have 'Ability Ally' on their type line, and count as both types of card in all zones, which means that you cannot search out other Totems with Ancestral Awakening. Totems counting as both Allies and Abilities whilst in play makes The Overseer's Shadow a great choice of quest for this deck though!
Scaled Breastplate of Carnage is the big new addition to the Totem archetype - now Totems are classed as Allies, the damage they deal will trigger the Breastplate's power. Primal Totem will wipe the average board once it is destroyed - for the cost of 1. Mikeal will sacrifice himself to do much the same too.
Under the new Totem rules, any old Totems printed before Worldbreaker are Abilities AND Allies when in play, and Abilities ONLY when in the deck, graveyard or hand. Totems printed in Worldbreaker and in the future have 'Ability Ally' on their type line, and count as both types of card in all zones, which means that you cannot search out other Totems with Ancestral Awakening. Totems counting as both Allies and Abilities whilst in play makes The Overseer's Shadow a great choice of quest for this deck though!
Scaled Breastplate of Carnage is the big new addition to the Totem archetype - now Totems are classed as Allies, the damage they deal will trigger the Breastplate's power. Primal Totem will wipe the average board once it is destroyed - for the cost of 1. Mikeal will sacrifice himself to do much the same too.
Marundal is in there largely as a token killer, but he does have some amusing synergies with other parts of the deck - Scrapper becomes a 5/5, Incendiary Totem becomes a 3/3... yes, he kills your own Weldon tokens and makes King Varian a bit useless too but you can't win them all.
So. We played three rounds of Core Swiss, and here's how it went...
Round 1, vs Matt H, playing Yet Another Unholy Death Knight
"This one is a different deck!" I am informed as we shuffle. I take a wild stab at guessing a few cards that are in there - Corpse Explosion, Riveted Abomination Leggings... both correct. I catch a glimpse of Unholy Ground too - maybe this isn't the standard red aggro deck? Matt keeps his hand and plays a resource face down.
It isn't the standard! It's suicide rush - Turn 1 Broderick, Turn 2 Broderick and Onnekra. I have a Mikael to clear the board and the second Broderick gleefully wipes him out. Turn 4 sees Unholy Ground hit the table; I have Chain Purge to get rid of it immediately, and I set about damage mitigation, Wavestorming as much back to hand as possible.
By this point I'm nearly dead, but Matt hasn't drawn a quest all game - I flip to heal a little, drop a breastplate and manage to wipe the board with another Mikael, and cross my fingers as Matt begins to topdeck.
Before you know it, I've dropped a turn 9 Varian and a turn 10 Gorehowl.
1-0
Round 2, vs Jonty B, Not Playing Poison Rogue
Jonty likes nothing more than rush. If you've died in the first few minutes of a game, that's a job well done - so no surprises to see an opener of ferocious red men backed with daggers. We trade weenies, Jonty kills my Voice of Reason before I've even had chance to use it, but a string of Mikeals and a couple of Wind Shears stops him from doing too much damage with Fan of Knives or his daggers.
Eventually I have Varian and Scrapper out, emptying the board of allies and equipment and yet still giving me a not entirely convincing finish.
2-0
Round 3, vs Taro S (age 6) Playing Angry Red Men, And A Truck
Over in Japan, there is a young chap called Gary who has been trying to get the game off the ground in Tokyo. It just so happens that he was visiting his hometown in the UK over Christmas, and decided to pop up and play some cards with us!
His son, Taro, has quite the legacy - winner of the Chase the Can tournament in Tokyo, he'd come along with Gary and had laid waste to all who stood in his path playing a red Shaman deck full of guys with Ferocity. Mentored by Gary, he got off to a blistering start, thwarting my plans by destroying my Wavestorm Totem on turn 2 and forcing me to rely on a lucky topdeck for a Mikael a couple of turns later. I certainly didn't feel too good after he revealed a Boki Earthgaze with The Essence of Enmity either - a turn 5 awakened Weldon, dropped to keep Boki at bay, was quickly thwarted with Squall Totem and Lightning Arc. No matter what I did, Taro had an answer for it.
I eventually managed to land a Voice of Reason which let me stabilise a little, but after yet another turn where I was staring down 8-10 damage from a previously empty board, I was forced to kill the fresh "Acid Hands" McGillicutty that had landed, taking the shield with him. Astral Recall saw Weldon, the shield and a Wavestorm Totem back in hand, the shield was back out a turn later and Taro confidently declared that he was attacking the shield with his toy truck next turn, before driving it over and parking it on the shield, making the sound of metal being shattered...
Shortly after I awaken a Varian, only for him to meet his doom pretty quickly at the hands of another Lightning Arc; Taro had all but run out of cards at this point though and a full complement of Totems along with another Varian killed off what remained of his board, and I Chain Purged my Incendiary, Wavestorm and Squall Totems with a Primal in play to deal the last few points of damage.
I felt absolutely terrible, they'd come all the way from Japan and then I'd subjected a six-year old to that shit - I truly am a heartless monster.
3-0
Another unexpected result on the scale of Diane Cannings then - I was expecting to finish with not a win to my name but it looks like either the deck is better than I thought, or Steve's Worgen Warlock is utterly terrifying.
The worst part is, Andy didn't show up last night.
--
Gary Stevenson is the Champion of the Black Flame for the Tokyo region of Japan - he runs sanctioned tournaments at a cafe in Shinjuku, travelled to Las Vegas to play in the North American Continental Championships in 2010, and probably got in trouble with his wife for buying a box of Worldbreaker while he was in Ripley.
He provides more info on the WoWTCG scene in Japan on the WoWTCG in Japan Facebook Group - go and check it out, and even if you're not in Japan, consider joining the group - awareness is a good thing and the amount of work Gary and friends do is staggering.
Drop by and say hello!
Eventually I have Varian and Scrapper out, emptying the board of allies and equipment and yet still giving me a not entirely convincing finish.
2-0
Round 3, vs Taro S (age 6) Playing Angry Red Men, And A Truck
Over in Japan, there is a young chap called Gary who has been trying to get the game off the ground in Tokyo. It just so happens that he was visiting his hometown in the UK over Christmas, and decided to pop up and play some cards with us!
His son, Taro, has quite the legacy - winner of the Chase the Can tournament in Tokyo, he'd come along with Gary and had laid waste to all who stood in his path playing a red Shaman deck full of guys with Ferocity. Mentored by Gary, he got off to a blistering start, thwarting my plans by destroying my Wavestorm Totem on turn 2 and forcing me to rely on a lucky topdeck for a Mikael a couple of turns later. I certainly didn't feel too good after he revealed a Boki Earthgaze with The Essence of Enmity either - a turn 5 awakened Weldon, dropped to keep Boki at bay, was quickly thwarted with Squall Totem and Lightning Arc. No matter what I did, Taro had an answer for it.
I eventually managed to land a Voice of Reason which let me stabilise a little, but after yet another turn where I was staring down 8-10 damage from a previously empty board, I was forced to kill the fresh "Acid Hands" McGillicutty that had landed, taking the shield with him. Astral Recall saw Weldon, the shield and a Wavestorm Totem back in hand, the shield was back out a turn later and Taro confidently declared that he was attacking the shield with his toy truck next turn, before driving it over and parking it on the shield, making the sound of metal being shattered...
Shortly after I awaken a Varian, only for him to meet his doom pretty quickly at the hands of another Lightning Arc; Taro had all but run out of cards at this point though and a full complement of Totems along with another Varian killed off what remained of his board, and I Chain Purged my Incendiary, Wavestorm and Squall Totems with a Primal in play to deal the last few points of damage.
I felt absolutely terrible, they'd come all the way from Japan and then I'd subjected a six-year old to that shit - I truly am a heartless monster.
3-0
Another unexpected result on the scale of Diane Cannings then - I was expecting to finish with not a win to my name but it looks like either the deck is better than I thought, or Steve's Worgen Warlock is utterly terrifying.
The worst part is, Andy didn't show up last night.
--
Gary Stevenson is the Champion of the Black Flame for the Tokyo region of Japan - he runs sanctioned tournaments at a cafe in Shinjuku, travelled to Las Vegas to play in the North American Continental Championships in 2010, and probably got in trouble with his wife for buying a box of Worldbreaker while he was in Ripley.
He provides more info on the WoWTCG scene in Japan on the WoWTCG in Japan Facebook Group - go and check it out, and even if you're not in Japan, consider joining the group - awareness is a good thing and the amount of work Gary and friends do is staggering.
Drop by and say hello!
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