Trials of the Zodiac Braves

These are the 4 strongest competitors this season! They have earned the most points and have earned the right to a first round bye. Our first seed, Brian Gerbi, has achieved a 2nd place, 1st place, and Top 8 finish all with Mono Water and in 3 out of 4 of his appearances  this season. He finished the season with a Top 8 at Trial 5 and stumbled in swiss and missed Top cut in the final Trial. So while he is still the Sword Saint because of the most points, he has to bounce back and prove he is deserving of the top spot after a shaky finish to the season. Gerbi awaits the winner of the two strong Jo(h)ns. He should have no trouble preparing for his bracket as his skill level and experience are among the best. All 3 have favorite types of decks and there probably won't be many surprises in deck choices. Gerbi should have no trouble navigating a probable grindy 2nd round matchup. Second seed Nghia Tran loves the unconventional. While midrange decks are prevalent, Nghia prefers to...

We reached our final Trial last weekend--a pretty busy weekend for everyone in the community, it seems, with the NA Fire Crystal Cup that was also underway!  But, we still managed to get 19 players to come to Isle of Gamers and fight for their last chance to make it into the Championship. Like our last event, we saw a wide range of decks being played, from Earth/Wind, to Mono Earth, Mono Lightning, Mono Fire, Water/Earth, and even a couple of Ice/X varieties.  Five smooth rounds of Swiss quickly brought us to our Top cuts, with Top 8 as follows: Bryan Lue (1) [Water/Earth] vs John Whitney (8) [Mono Lightning] Phillip Marciano (2) [Ice/Wind] vs Peter Wong (7) [Mono Fire] Jonathan Bauer (3) [Earth/Wind] vs Nghia Tran (6) [Ice/Fire] Jeff Lazzarini (4) [Mono Fire] vs Jimmy Le (5) [Mono Earth] Bryan's Veritas recursions proved to be too much for John's removal-focused Lightning deck and his own Veritas.  Meanwhile, Nghia managed to squeak out a vi...

Milo Mosquera vs. Mike Mamon Our final match preview pits Milo vs. Mike. Both of these players comfortably make it into Championships thanks to multiple Top 8 appearances along with a 1st place finish from Milo and a 2nd place from Mike. Milo has a great record of 15-10 in Swiss which earned him the 6th seed while Mike is a cut under .500 at 9-10 and makes it as the 11th seed. Milo has played the same Mono Water Fusoya deck for most of the season, deviating only in Trial #6 to play a version of Mono Water without Fusoya.   He rode this deck to multiple Top 8 finishes and even a 1st place at one Trial. He leverages his skill and experience over other players to squeeze out advantages for victory. While his deck dominated the early part of the season, he hasn't been able to replicate the same success with Opus VIII in the second half of the season. While Milo has stuck to his one tried-and-true deck, Mike has not played the same deck twice this season. He has played m...

David  Burgos vs. Peter Dan g Both of these players qualify into the Championships pretty comfortably thanks to consistently good performances. They have each made Top 8 twice through the season and have both recorded 2nd place finishes at an event. David and Peter usually make the Top cut, but are always in the bubble range of 9th-11th if they do not. David usually favors decks featuring the Ice element. His playstyle is Tempo/Aggression. Like his SF counterparts, he enjoys playing aggressively and abusing the Mecha Chocobo/Zemus combo. He has enjoyed Ice/Lightning with the FF XIII and FF XIII-2 package.He likes to pressure his opponent early, stall with the Ice Arcanist backup, then close the game out with a big Shiva or Opus VII Serah play. David has also shown he can play other styles of decks by bringing Scions, a Water/Ice Fusoya build, and has recently been trending Mono Earth with FF XV characters in the Opus VIII meta. Like David, Peter can also be a mixed bag. ...

Hello everyone and welcome to our fourth installment of  Removed From Game , where we sit down with the winners of our circuit events from  Trials of the Zodiac Braves  and talk about their decks, the tournament, and the current meta!  If you haven't read the previous articles in this series, you can also check those out below: Removed From Game: Brian Ng Removed From Game: Jeff Migliore Removed From Game: Milo Mosquera Trial #5 - Belias was held at Galaxy Games with a 20-player turnout!  This was our first tournament following the release of Opus VIII and the players were itching to try out the new cards in a new meta!  Anson Quach from San Francisco ran a Fire/Ice deck that went 3-2 in Swiss, landing him in the 5th seed of our Top 8 Cut.  Three best-of-3 rounds later (including a Final Match against Dragoons!) he achieved victory and catapulted himself into 2nd place in our Season Standings!  We've also got a tournament report here if yo...

Bryan "Blue" Lue vs. Peter "Godfather of SF" Wong It's a tale of two different seasons for competitors Blue and Peter Wong. Blue has posted a dominant Swiss record, only dropping 3 games through the season. With 3 Top 8 appearances total and one Trial win to his name, he clinches the 5th seed, but is edged out for a first round bye. On the other hand, Peter actually has a losing Swiss record and one Top 8 appearance. He squeaks into the Championship as the 12th and final qualified player. Blue has always tried to find decks that work for him best and only play that deck to mastery level. He experimented with Mono Lightning, but after a poor performance, he found a home in Mono Water. Once Opus 8 dropped, he saw the power of new Dark Legend, Veritas of the Dark, and built an Earth/Water deck that focuses on it. He has only dropped 1 game in Swiss while piloting this deck. Peter loves to brew his own decks and has a tendency to play decks that feature hi...

John "Mad Scientist" Whitney vs. Jon "Baby Bringer" Bauer Last season it was Peter Dang vs. Peter Wong for the PeterBowl. Now we have Whitney vs. Bauer for the Jo(h)nBowl, and it looks to be an exciting first round! It's been a great season for both of these players and their paths to Champs have been nearly identical. They both attended the first Trial and had losing records. Since then, neither have boasted less than an X-2 record. Bauer has not failed to appear in Top Cuts in any event (4) after the first while Whitney has appeared in 3. Whitney has always played the game his own way. He will always play his own deck ideas that showcase his original choices and off-meta picks. His favorite decks tend to be Wind/Water decks that feature YRP with Opus I 5CP Yuna, and Opus VII 3CP Tidus. He has also been trending removal-focused Mono Lightning decks, but has also shown versatility and the ability to play anything by bringing in Fire/Water and a Mono W...

Drafting has become a part of high-level play in FFTCG. This is the message that Square Enix sent the playerbase with their announcement regarding the inclusion of draft in Crystal Cups this year.  Although it won't be implemented in North America until the back half of the 2019 season, it's clear that their plans moving forward are to make it a pillar of high-level play. Square's plans for Draft at Crystal Cups. The decision and announcement was divisive in North America but regardless of where you stand on the issue, if you plan on participating in Crystal Cups or other high level events in the future you're going to be faced with drafting.  For those looking to compete, that means developing and/or strengthening your skills at the draft format so that you can step into it with confidence and a winning strategy. Practicing drafting is inherently much more complex than working on constructed play as you can work through developing your deck with as little ...

Hello again!  Last weekend, a whopping twenty players attended Trial 5, Belias, hosted at Galaxy Games.  Along with our regular players, we are happy to welcome new player Eric Blake, as well as welcome back some familiar faces we haven't seen in a while: David Corey, Jon Connolly, and Darayl Clemons.  Good to have everyone join us at the first local circuit event of Opus VIII! Being our first event of the newly released set, everyone was itching to bring some new and exciting decks to the table.  This time around, we still saw a good deal of Mono Water decks, but also saw a mix of Fire/Ice, Water/Earth, Ice/Earth, Wind/Water, Ice/Water, Mono Lightning, Mono Earth, tax decks, and a whole lotta Veritas!  ...But surprisingly no Mono Wind... After five rounds of Swiss, our Top 8 came down to: Jonathan Bauer (1) [Mono Water] vs Phillip Marciano (8) [Ice/Earth] John Whitney (2) [Mono Water] vs Jared Walters (7) [Mono Lightning] Bryan Lue (3...