We had our Sealed Release event at ACME on Saturday. We had a total of 15 players, though we broke it down into a group of 16 years old and under (having 5 players) and then the main group of the other 10 of us. Just to give the younger kids more chances at getting decent prize pieces.

My squad was:

Tyranus
Noghri Commando
Imperial Knight
Nyna
Bothan Noble
GA Scout
Twi'lek Scout

Chose Bespin for my map (I like the closed in spaces with the Super Stealth and Tyranus' Lightning)

First game against Matt, and he had Lumiya, YV Jedi Hunter, Imperial Knight, and other fodder. I setup on the inside of Bespin. First couple rounds were mostly advancement, and round 3 was the kicker. I won initiative. After having hit the YVJH twice in the previous round, my Noghri started off by finishing off the JH, and then took a second shot to finish off the Imperial Knight. This opened up a window for Tyranus, and he unleashed a Force Lightning on Lumiya, activating her. To top it off, from that point on, I just pounded him. Nyna's +10 damage bonus against Stealth pieces was just brutal against Lumiya. In the end I killed her and just ate the SD40, becasue the game was won by that point.

2nd game: Against James (who ended up getting 1st place). He had Cade, Canderous, Bothan Noble, OR Scout, and a YV Elite Warrior. We played on his map, Death Star, which really killed me. We basically just met up in the middle, and luckily, I managed to nerf Cade's effectiveness most of the game. I won init in the 2nd round, and hit Cade with Lightning 4, but he made his activation save after the re-roll. I then based Cade and the YV Elite that was behind him with my Imperial Knight, mostly just trying to shield my other pieces from Cade and Canderous' onslaughts. Canderous and the Elite went next, blasting my Imp Knight to smithereens (Canderous missed VERY FEW shots this entire game). I followed with a GREAT shot from Nyna and Spotter 20 on Cade, taking him down to 40 HP left. Instead of attacking this round though, he chose to heal instead. Worked out relatively well for me, since I won init again, and based Cade with Tyranus...and rolled a crit! Followed that with another Nyna/Spotter shot, and rolled another crit! That killed Cade, and at that point, James was quite frustrated. It was short lived though. I think Canderous might have missed one shot on Tyranus after that point, and so the dark lord was dead by the next round. I managed to put a little damage on Canderous, but not enough for Nyna/Twi'lek/Bothan/GA Scout to finish off.

3rd game: Against Jonathan, on Bespin. He had Deliah Blue, Antares Draco, Guard Droid, Human Scoundrel, Shadow Stormtrooper, Twi'lek, Human Scout, Kel Dor BH. I could tell I was tired this game (several late nights this week) as I made several moves that just weren't 100% thought out, and it cost me. Jon made GREAT use of the maintenance shafts on Bespin, and did a great job of flanking my squad. A couple of key moments where I rolled lousy caused me to have to waste extra activations to take out his fodder. But one of the real kickers were when I moved Nyna to a position that only granted cover from some walls, but with some clever movement through the Carbon Freezing room, Jon set up his Guard Droid for a completely clear shot on her, and took her down. A second bad move (later that SAME round I think) happened when I moved my Bothan Noble next to one of the other doors of the Carbon Freezing room, to get an extra attack out of my Imperial Knight, but it left the Noble in a spot where his Human Scoundrel could get a bead on him, and of course, he rolled higher than a 10 to kill the Noble in one shot. Even after all that, I won init the next round, Tyranus used Lightning on Antares and he made his save. The game ended with Antares, the Guard Droid, and the Human Scoundrel chasing Tyranus back to the gambit room. I also missed pretty much every single block save with either Tyranus or the Knight. It was a close game, and I could've won still, depending on his attack rolls, but it just didn't happen. I chose to go after the Human Scoundrel (best chance to hit me w/ Opportunist) as it was the only thing I could kill in 1 attack, but Antares (who had no FPs left by now) hit the 15 he needed to kill me.

4th game: This one against Brandon, on his map, Muunilist. Poor guy, had decent synergy between Nyna and plenty of Stealth pieces, but his other rare was Marasiah, and he just didn't have enough fire power to take me down. If I remember correctly, his full squad was Nyna, Marasiah, Kel Dor BH x2, Cor Sec Officer, YV Elite, YV Warrior, Noghri...and other fodder I can't remember. He way out-activated me, so I knew I needed to eliminate the Cor Sec officer quick. Fortunately, with my own Super Stealth, he had to advance the CSO if he ever wanted to hit any of my pieces. This left me an opportunity that I had to seize. End of round 2 I ran Tyranus 12 squares out to the middle of the fight. Then I won init, and moved to zap the CSO, kililng him. The loss of It's a Trap! and Deceptive for his squad just killed him at that point. My Noghri and Imp Knight sliced through his two Vong. Nyna, the GA Scout, and the Twi'lek took down Marasiah all be themselves. My Noghri finally sacrificed himself to take out both KDBHs (they were based, trying to force me to blow up my own squad, lol). Was a fun game, and the lucky init and killing the CSO made a HUGE difference.

All said and done, I ended up 2-2, with both losses being fairly close. A few dice rolls differently and I definiteyl would have won the 3rd game against Jonathan. I needed a LOT different luck against James, but then again, he had the #1 squad for the day, so didn't surprise me too much. The only Rares left when I got a chance to pick from the prize boosters were lousy ones (I think it was Marasiah and Jag left) so I took an extra Vong Shaper and then got some other C/UCs.

Some of the other squads for the day included one with both Krayt and Shado, which was brutal because Shado could move 10 squares and Triple Attack with Krayt's CE. That squad came in 2nd (couldn't handle the massive firepower of Cade/Canderous in the final round). DM_Lackey pulled Dodonna and Jag, and had to use 13 pieces to reach 150 points. Poor guy, I think he might have won 1 game, but I can't remember. Nobody pulled any Boba's (well, one of the young kids did) or Han's that I can remember. Was great fun though as always!