“Wild Bill”, aka “Everytribe”, aka Bill Voigt has held the year’s largest local tournament for several years running now. It’s an amazing event where players travel from across the country, even from outside the US (Canada represent!) for the fun and fellowship of what feels like a “mini-Nationals”. It’s probably no surprise to most of you that I’m speaking of the T2 Only tournament.

If you were one of the 30-ish players to attend the T2 Only this past Friday and Saturday I know you had a great time! If you weren’t able to make it, you missed out on a ton of Redemption fun! But never fear, we will fill you in so that you can live vicariously through our experience. It was a great time for players of all ages and all category types (yes, not only T2 players)!
I spent the weekend assisting the honorable John Early judging both the main events.

T2-MP

Friday night kicked off with T2-MP for all the T2 enthusiasts and “Iron-Man” for all the T1 enthusiasts. Due to out of state travel not everyone was able to make it in time for the Friday night events, however I still counted 4 tables of T2-MP. I’m pretty sure that’s one more table than we had at Nationals last year!

I didn’t get a good look at the decks used during the event but Andrew (Redemption Collector 777 on the boards) took 1st. Second place went to Justin Alstad with JD (kariusvega) taking 3rd.

Play Testing

I spent most of the weekend, both Friday night and Saturday, picking up T1 games with players so I could play test cards we plan to release later this spring. We have about a month left to fine tune the next set and this weekend was the perfect opportunity to get in a lot of games against a lot of different decks and players!

Specifically I was giving the new promos one last push before Cactus Games sends them off to the printer. That’s right, we can expect a new Local, District, State and Regional promo this spring!!! Expect to see all of those previewed here on Land of Redemption later this week.

None of the cards for “Move Over Bacon” are set in stone yet. A lot can change in the next month. However, the response from players that got a sneak peak during my play test games was overwhelmingly positive. There are a lot of really fun things coming to Redemption in the very near future, including one of the biggest and best changes to game play in a very long time!

T2-2P

The “main event” got some quality players to come off of their hiatus. Both Sam Gilbaugh and former National Champion Jordan Alstad were playing their first games of T2 Redemption since Nationals last year.

One thing I noticed from surveying the field is that there was a huge variety in the type of decks being used. For offenses I saw multiple clay variants, genesis, judges, throne variants, musicians, red warriors, N.T. females, disciples and priests. Notably missing (at least from my survey) was an angel offense despite being used to win Nationals a few months ago.

The defenses also had a large variety but I noticed a heavy leaning towards pale green Assyrians. I also saw pharisees, Romans, Greeks, Philistines, brown (looked like a King Saul based defense) and Babylonians. I didn’t notice any defense that used orange demons or N.T crimson despite both being really strong.

This huge variety tells me that the T2 meta is still wide open and no single strategy or group of strategies is dominating right now. In a field like that the player(s) who put in the work to fine tune their deck and get in lots of practice games are going to have a huge advantage!

The top 3 spots were still open to several players going into the final round. When the dust settled Jayden Alstad too first place with what appeared to me to be a BoM offense with an Assyrian/Magician defense. JD (kariusvega on the message boards) took second place with his judges blend offense and greek blend defense. His deck sported a nasty combo which he pulled off on the second turn in multiple games. Rounding out the top 3 was Wyatt Marcum with a Disciple/Pharisee deck. I don’t think many people would have picked Wyatt to place in the top 3 before the tournament started, but he proved he can compete with many of the top players in Redemption. Nice showing Wyatt!

With an event this size that sports current and former National Champions I think it’s only fair to give honorable mention to a few more places. These folks were in the running for the top 3 going into the final round – 4th place Jesse Foresto, 5th place Justin Alstad, 6th place Jordan Alstad, 7th place Nathan Voigt, 8th place Sam Gilbaugh and 9th place Martin Miller. That rounds out the top half, but like I mentioned, any of those players could have made the top 3 prior to the results of the final round!

Final Thoughts

There were several players who hung out and played Iron-Man. I don’t have the results or number for that, but I’m pretty sure it made up about a dozen people, including another former booster draft National Champion Daniel Huisinga and current booster draft National Champion Josh Knitt. Similar to the T2 field, the Iron-Man field was stacked with several quality players who were able to give one another some really good games!

I know I speak for everyone when I offer up a HUGE thank you to both “Wild Bill” and pastor Pat Wester of Autumn Ridge church for hosting this event! They did an outstanding job of making sure things ran smooth, everyone had a great time and all of our needs were met. They did all of this generously at their own expense, making this event almost cost free for the people in attendance.

Stay tuned tomorrow for the first of 4 promo previews coming this week!

To buy singles, sealed product, and other gaming supplies mentioned, please visit Three Lions Gaming!

By Gabe

Gabe has been playing Redemption since early in 2006. While life has changed a lot since that time, his love for Redemption has not. He hosts a playgroup and assists with the design and development of upcoming set releases and even plays competitively on occasion.