Yesterday was Malaysia's last Official Tournament for 2012, and I must admit, its not a big event by any means. Firstly, the prize support is bad and secondly, Comic Fiesta was held on the same day. Quite a number of my friends went to KLCC for the CF event instead of coming to GA for Malaysia Open. I would probably do so myself if I had not already got seeded to top 32. The number of participants barely reached 100 or maybe slightly lower than that. You get a free T-shirt and a pack for entry (unfortunately, I didn't get my pack).

This is one tourney I went without thinking of winning. I seriously told everyone I'm gonna scrub the first round, since this was single elimination. I was pretty much very emo because I don't have the cards to play Hieratics, so I went with HERO. Lately I have issues with control based decks and I really wanted to just play Hieratics and go YOLO on everyone. I registered my decklist an hour before closing, I just netdeck the HERO build that took second place at Singapore Top Shop and Mask Change as the extra card just to troll.

Despite the low turn out, this tourney shows some great improvement over past tourneys. Number 1, we start on time and the scheduling was done rather well for Malaysian standards (the standard is pretty low in comparison to other countries thou). Also, we have feature matches every round. A camera was set up and a wide screen broadcast the matches live, that's a first in Malaysia, where we previously aren't even allowed to watches matches (unless your a friend of the staff crew and Mr.P doesn't hate you). 

Since I was seeded to top 32, I waited at the sides for the tourney to start ... again. I wasn't even in the mood to play, and I kept play testing against people using Hieratics just to show how much I want this deck to be in action. I didn't know Sam would be playing in this tourney beforehand, and when I saw him early yesterday, I knew I really wanted Hieratics to be my deck, just for a chance that revenge kill (despite having a very very bad matchup against Verz). I asked head judge Cookie if it was possible for me to change my decklist (even in the Hanzo build, I would be more confident than playing HERO at this point), but he told me it wasn't possible.

Top 32 vs Zombie-Chaos (that sides into Antimeta)

I've never seen my opponent before and he told me he was off the game for a few years now and just got back very recently. Also, he was playing with clear sleeves, that lead me to believe this would be an easy win on my part, I let my guard down way too much.

Duel 1 : My opponent starts with just a set monster and ended. (Again, how I wished I was playing Hieratics) I opened Thrasher, Allius, Bubbleman, Miracle, MST and Judgment. I special summoned the thrasher and attacked into Pyramid Turtle (I stunned when I saw that) which got him Goblin Zombie. I set 2 and passed. He then set another monster and set 3 backrow. I MST'ed Prison in the end phase but i didn't wanna lose to a combination of Torrential and Solemn, despite having a Miracle. I summon attacked into a Reaper, but my main phase 2 Black Corn was destroyed by BTH. I made Shining so I wouldn't lose Bubbleman to Reaper. He played Dark Hole and summoned Zombie Master, knowing I'm gonna lose a card in hand other wise, I flipped Judgment. He sets 2 more and passed. I drew Super Poly and summon Allius, that was hit by Torrential. He summoned another Zombie Master and brought back Pyramid turtle, hitting me to lethal condition. I topped decked MST. With him having 2 backrows and 2 monsters that could kill me with a hit, Gaia and Escuridao doesn't look good at all. I decided to risked it all and blow my Super Poly with MST and special Bubbleman and draw 2. I hit Dark Hole and Reborn. Sadly, there was nothing delicious in both our graves, so I've decided to play Dark Hole to clear the board and draw 2 with a reborned Bubbleman, but he had Starlight Road. I play Reborn just to make Hope and get rid of Zombie Master but his last card was BTH.

Duel 2 : I started with 2 Maxx C, Rai-Oh, Veiler, Torretial and Gemini Spark. But my opponent sided into anti-meta with cards like Kycoo, Cyber Dragons and also that 2400 zombie from the structure deck. Effectively making my hand traps dead. Luckily, a Torrential was able to go off without triggering a Road and I had Shinings to farm advantage.

Duel 3 : I was really in a dilemma since I didn't know what my opponent is gonna side into now. Since he switched quite a few cards, so his deck could be both the more aggressive build from game 1 or the more defensive build in game 2. I tooked out the a Maxx C (I was playing 2) and Veilers for conventional traps. He started with a set monster again which was a Pyramid turtle into Il Blud (yes, fucking Il Blud), and I blast it with Gemini Spark because I wasn't sure of it's effect and wasn't in the mood to ask a judge for it (NOTE : Don't ever do that!), but I set 3 and passed. He set 2. I summoned Stratos, which got BTH'ed. I searched for Bubbleman, flipped MST on a lone Compulsed, set Miracle and Mirror Force, Special Bubbleman and flip Miracle for a 3500 Shining and attacked (I had Mirror Force, Soul Drain and Solemn Warning set). He sets a monster and passed. I drew Rai-Oh and was very certain I would win at this point. Rai-Oh attacked into Ryko, which he destroyed my Rai-Oh, taking 3500 instead. This lead me to believe he has a Chaos monster to take care of my Shining and didn't want Rai-Oh to be in the way. He draws to 4 and special BLS, I had Warning. He then showed me Sorcerer. He summoned Zombie Master, ditch his last card for Pyramid Turtle. He passed and I drew into BTH. I set that and passed back, knowing I could fend off his attack and destroy his field if he tried to go for game, but he top decks Heavy Storm... Yu-Gi-Oh! 

I packed and found out something, his field had 5300 attack, while I'm still at 6000. Felt like an idiot since 1 of my friend lost because some stupid miscalculation in life back at Top Shop, and I laugh at him. Karma. But I didn't bothered to look at the next card, since I don't wanna feel even worst if it was something good.

Basically that wraps up my report for this event. All I could say, I wasn't in the zone ... at all. Sam won the event, not like that came out of nowhere. Verz easily won the event because the majority of the people playing (myself included) knows how to side against it, some doesn't even know what Ophion does, much less counter it. A Good deck + a Skilled player + no one knows how to counter it = easy victory.

On side note, I've found out yesterday my Hieratic build has an even worst matchup against Dark Worlds than I previously thought. Grapha isn't a problem, viruses isn't a problem; but Dragged down is a very big problem. Since I mained deck a ton of hand traps (3 Veiler and a Maxx C), I tend to have a lot of dead draw against DW. And my deck tends to start slow and snow ball into an OTK, which is easier and more consistent than people give it credit for ... but that's when your hand doesn't get Dragged down every second turn. Need to construct a better side deck for it now. The few games with DW really helped me realize this.