Going into this year, I had never played a single game in any of the Jedi Challenge tournaments. It was really the fact that I thought that the squads would be boring. Some would play their champs squad others would play a more casual squad, but still I thought the squads would be pretty predictable. Also, for the last 2 years, I had made most of the custom set that was given out (2011 and 2012) so if I wanted some of the customs, I just made myself an extra.
Fast forward to this year, and we had a team of people making customs (for the sealed and the overall JC champ) and the change of the events to a somewhat restricted format. I decided that I really wanted to go out and win the Jedi Challenge.
For the 100 (which was up through TFU) I couldn’t decide on a squad until I remembered that Princess Leia was legal so went with Landspeeder (painted up like the General Lee), Leia, Wookiee Freedom Fighter, Rebel Trooper, R2, 2x ugos.
Rd 1 drew Rich with Force Push. Ran the speeder down and shot him, then used Leia to shoot again. Then won init and Finished off the apprentice, and Luke died shortly thereafter.
Rd 2 Jake K. I don’t remember what he was playing but I lost.
Rd 3 Mike Giles and Bane with 6 uggies. He let me get a long line on Bane to start the game and I crit so dropped 70 on him and he never recovered. Had I not gotten that initial damage, it would have been a much different game, but since he couldn’t just ever run at me and let me shoot him up, he had to try and keep away which didn’t end well for him.
Rd 4 Tim B. with Scoundrel. I set up poorly, letting him kill leia right off the bat, but was able to get the landspeeder up there to base his han and it was effectively over. He lost all the inits and I was even able to JMT Leia two rounds in a row. 3-1 (won the 100pt)
On to the 150. I didn’t want to play what I thought was the best squad (IG86 swarm) because I Didn’t want to play the mirror all day, so I updated Laura’s old 150 Skyguy and Jarael squad to fit the requirements (swap R2 for an R7 and Mas for mice).
Rd 1 Les with NR disruptive. This was tough as my swap and momentum didn’t work most of the match. Eventually whittled down and Killed Kol and Kyle and won on gambit with basically Jarael and a few scrubs left to his Ganner.
Rd 2 Mel and his Lancers. I got in a good swap and could just reach the lancer in round 1 with skywalker so killed one in the first round. Won init and dropped the second one, then just had to play some keepaway from the IG86 for a round or 2 to set up and it was all over.
Rd 3 Tim and his Rebels (ERC, Crix, Bothan, Han Smuggler, DOdonna, etc). Tim used the train station to his advantage and beat me in about 10 minutes. I conceded once he had killed panaka and Skywalker and had gambit and override control.
Rd 4 Alex with Vader and a bunch of 501st dudes. Was a tricky match as his guys all did tons of damage, but managed to whittle him down with Push and GMA, until it was finally over. (3-1 and more importantly 6-2 overall and in the running).
Now the 200. I worked with squads for quite a while finally deciding on Sith with every annoying piece that there is in the v-set that I could fit. Revan (for init control), Kaan, Zannah (luck factor), Dr E (autodamage), Wyyrlock, 4x Sith Pawns.
Rd 1 Alex again the NR pilots. Ran all over killing stuff, and blowing KAan up to kill more stuff and finally winning.
Rd 2 Mel and his OR with Satele. I remember that this game came down to a few parry rolls and LS Defense saves where I made all the rolls and Mel didn’t.
Rd 3 Jake K with Sith and Caedus, Zannah, Atton, etc). I put Kaan out there and Jake manages to get everyone away without taking any damage and then obliterates him . From there it was a very uphill battle that I Couldn’t win.
Rd 4 Tim and his Sith Revan, Atton, Gary, Exar ghost, Wyyrlock, etc. We do some figuring and figure out that the winner of this will for sure be the Jedi Challenge winner. We play on Tim’s death star map and tim makes a small error bringing up wyyrlock and Gary together. I win the key init and Tim fails the bomb save with GARY. I just park Zannah in gambit, with the idea that SSM would just have to be good enough. At the end of the game it ended up being my Zannah, against his Atton at the end and I just sat there building up gambit to win it. My Zannah had taken no damage as his Atton couldn’t roll anything. 3-1 in the 200 and 9-3 overall winning the Jedi Challenge.