After seeing multiple requests for advice on the Epic Digital campaign generally and Mission 11, Zombie Horde, specifically, I streamed myself running through the campaign.
So far I’ve edited together our multiple games against the Epic Digital Campaign’s 11th mission, Zombie Horde. Watch me underestimate it and lose the first game. Then analyze, adapt, and crush it in (most) of the remaining games. [Zannos is a crazy strong card.] Attempt 1: 00:00 Attempt 2: 12:40 Attempt 3: 18:52 Attempt 4: 21:50 Attempt 5: 36:44 Attempt 6: 44:22 Attempt 7: 46:14
Thursday March 26 from 7pm to 10pm CDT. Not sure what specifically I’ll be streaming. Possibly the random 30 arena or constructed testing for the Digital Monthly this Saturday
Saturday March 28 starting at 10am CDT. Digital Monthly (Constructed) Go until we get knocked out (or win)
Sunday March 29th starting at 2pm CDT. No plans for this as of yet
Let me know if there is anything anyone would actively like to see, open to requests!
Streaming today at 7pm CDT. We are going to open by building a deck from this Random 60 pool. I have not yet looked through it (aside from what I couldn’t avoid seeing when taking screenshots of it). So, feel free to build your own version, debate with me on my card choices during the stream, and see how your final version compares with mine.
I plan on running through the campaign for one of them, currently thinking Sunday March 22. Aside from that, let me know what you want to see.
Which format(s)? If constructed,
Any deck requests?
Any cards you would like to see me build around? (my most comfortable archetype is mid-range but I’ve been experimenting with aggro)
Against which players (top level players, direct challenges, queue/arena, etc.) [If anyone actively wants to play some games during any of these times, let me know and we’ll make that happen]
I went a bit overboard in explaining my dark draft picks. For comparison, this is a video from the February Dark Draft monthly tournament with a timed Dark Draft:
I’m guessing most people would prefer somewhere in between these two extremes for untimed Dark Drafts (possibly similar to the remaining three games from the showmatch), but I would appreciate any feedback about this or anything else from the streams. If anyone has any lingering questions or anything they would like me to go over in a future stream, let me know in the comments. Always happy to have an excuse and direct motivation to explain something in detail.
This Sunday, March 15th at 8pm CET (2pm CDT), I am going to stream a best of 5 Dark Draft Showmatch against Christian Kudahl (IGN: Kudahlissimo) at https://www.twitch.tv/tomsepicgaming/
He is Danish, an excellent game designer (I’m looking forward to talking more about this in the future), and a blog reader who’s potentially surpassed me at Dark Draft. I think he has above a 50% win rate against me in Dark Draft right now, and there aren’t many other people who can boast that (Hampus Eriksson and Bill Anderson). We’ll see if I can hold him off or if he will demonstrate his superiority.
In the meantime, I’ve edited out the individual games from the February Dark Draft Monthly tournament. If you only watch one, I highly recommend this one against Atlanta: Best Game
Below are all of the games in order (including the one above):
I will be competing in and streaming this Dark Draft tournament (finally Dark Draft!). This is my favorite and best format (not including Open Draft). It starts at 10am CDT, and I will be streaming it live at twitch.tv/tomsepicgaming I am also streaming my full constructed experimentation games and analysis Monday nights starting somewhere between 7pm CDT and 9pm CDT. It goes until I run out of games and stuff to talk about.
My roommate Paul2520 and I have reestablished a weekly Epic time, Monday evenings. We’ll be focusing on testing the aggro/aggro-combo constructed decks I’ve been experimenting with recently. Afterwards, around 9pm CDT or so (updates through twitter), I plan on regularly doing a stream discussing the results of those sessions as well as potentially playing the app a bit (if there are challenges or an interesting Arena [like Dark Draft this week]).
Finally, I have been working on some more blog content, but I’ve decided to rework my 3 article series from [depicting my failure-filled progression to my “Escorting the Insurgency” human tokens aggro-combo deck] to [3 individual deck techs discussing the 3 pillars of Epic constructed as it stands today focusing on Sam Black’s Midrange Wild deck, The Flocks/The Lad’s Scara’s Gift deck, and my Escorting the Insurgency deck]. Below is the start of the previous progression that I have decided to scrap if curious. (I couldn’t figure out how to/remember enough to effectively make that format work.)
After over a year and a half of no physical Epic tournaments I could compete in, no new cards, departure of two of the most visible employees in the community (Ian Taylor and Andrea Davis), minimal Epic playing in general, and even less official communication from WWG, my enthusiasm for the game was almost completely depleted. So much so that the eventual announcement of the upcoming Kickstarter with a lot of new content and the $10,000 tournaments (to replace the 50K digital tournament which was broken off of the $100k tournament) had little effect on me, which showed in my lack of blog content. I was considering dropping Epic, depending on how Origins went.
All of that helps to inform my prep for Origins, which I began one month out. However, as I prepped, I gradually rediscovered my love of the game, and Origins was absolutely amazing. Playing in person is infinitely better than playing in an alpha app with long queue times to find a game. I’ve even begun streaming again (with plans to edit highlights and put them on Youtube), I’m blogging currently, and I ordered have received my second full constructed set.
“Screw it, I’m playing Priest of Gold Dragon”
While, in the moment, I was (and still am) incredibly proud of myself for making top 8 at Worlds 2017 with Pluck U’s Wild Combat Tricks deck, especially since it created one of my favorite Epic moments which I want to write about at some point, the fact that I played a deck that I didn’t create and ultimately lost anyway, slowly ate at me. I had/have this vision of myself as a clever, innovative jank player that I wanted/want to honor, but at the same time I thought of myself as a weaker constructed player, largely “because I held myself back with that mindset.” So, when my desire to win surpassed my desire to be seen as the clever jank player, and my team (led by Tom Dixon) helped move me past my mental hurdle of not playing the “best deck” and I lost anyway, I couldn’t hide behind that excuse any more.
For Origins, I initially regressed behind that hurdle because my motivation to put the work in, was not there, and I semi-consciously wanted an excuse to explain potential poor performance away. I stubbornly decided just to play the deck that I was going to play at Worlds, my Priest of Gold Dragon [PoGD] deck (despite the fact that I thought it would be even more disadvantaged in a Best of 1 format). To be fair, the matchup against Evil in our testing for Worlds 2017 did seem slightly favored for me. But, the Wild matchup was not. I figured I would test against Sam Black/Mike Sigrist’s list, and if it was anywhere near close, I’d call it good enough.
It was not close.
That’s about as far as I was able to get.
Next article will be explaining how/why Sam Black’s Midrange deck pushes out all other midrange decks (that I’ve tested so far). For a taste of what that will look like, you can check out my deck tech for my 2016 Worlds Pyrosaur Deck.
Planning on doing a lot of brewing, figured I might as stream it if anyone is interested. So, this Saturday (6/22) starting at 8am CDT (13:00 UTC) I will be streaming at twitch.tv/tomsepicgaming.
Due to playing my aggro-combo Human tokens list into 1st seed at the Epic Origins 10k (knocked out in first round of top 8 by eventual winner Hampus Eriksson), my eyes have been opened to the possibility of non-midrange Epic decks. I plan on
Going over the entire card pool and reevaluating it based on my new understanding both from prepping for and playing at Origins
Building lists for at least an Evil Aggro-Combo Zombie Deck and multiple flavors of aggressive Sage decks
Answering any questions (which could theoretically take me down long tangents about things I may or may not have covered before)
I plan on keeping the stream going for as long as my inspiration lasts (to an absolute maximum of 10pm CDT with breaks for food, although probably won’t last anywhere near that long)
If you plan on watching and have any questions/topics you’ll want to discuss, let me know in the comments below if you want me to start thinking about them. Or, feel free to save them if you’d prefer for me to think them through out loud.
I might upload some edited highlights to youtube afterwards at youtube.com/channel/UCPl_lZxUz8-KcpaWfj8KEcQ. (I’m also planning on writing a multi-article series about my Origins Prep, discussing my three stages of that process: Failure, Replication, Revelation)
Brad Minnigh recently revealed the full spoiler of the final two pantheon packs Riksis vs Tarken and Shady vs Valentia on his Amazing Spider-Tank blog. While it has been difficult, I have restrained from viewing the spoilers as of yet (aside from the earlyspoilers). I have done this because I want to stream my first impressions (and potential long tangents) live on Twitch on Sunday, June 24. This will also allow anyone to ask questions about any of the cards, or my tangents, as we go. (I also plan to eventually edit this footage down into one or more videos.)
These times are a bit flexible, so if desired, I can adjust them a bit. I have no idea how long each session will last. I expect I will spend significantly more time talking about some cards than others. Let me know if you have any questions or recommendations.
Tomorrow, Tuesday July 4th, at 10am CST, I will be streaming 1 game of Dark Draft against Noverb from team Brave Squires. My team, The Flash Fire, is currently down 1-0 in the match. Will I be able to start to turn things around? Tune in to find out: twitch.tv/tomsepicgaming
If you want a notification when I begin to stream, you can add me on twitter @tomsepicgaming
The raw footage will be uploaded to: Tom’S Epic Gaming Raw youtube channel
For edited videos check out: Tom’S Epic Gaming youtube channel
(Shout out to Phoenix Gravin for editing)
After the game against Noverb, I’ll happily continue to stream for as long as I have challengers (any format).
After two really fun Random 30 games today, I’ve decided to round out my stream snipe sessions with a Random 30 stream. Currently I’m planning on Thursday June 1st, 2017 from 11am CDT (UTC -5) to approximately 3pm CDT, and 5pm CDT (UTC -5) to approximately 9pm CDT.
Random 30 involves dealing out 30 random cards to each player and playing. Simple as that. It can be done with a single collection, so each player has 30 different cards from their opponent, or each player can use their own collection so both players could end up with some of the same cards. (The app does the latter, intentionally.)
This is usually how I teach the game. However, I initially wrote it off fairly early as not a fun format for players that know what they are doing because it is too random; the better player isn’t as favored to win as they are in Dark Draft or Constructed. Recently though, I’ve been really liking the format because I approach it as just a fun experience where I don’t need to win to enjoy it. In addition, trying to figure out the best plays, using cards you wouldn’t use otherwise, in situations where your opponent is less likely to have the best answers, is exhilarating (and occasionally frustrating).
So, if you want to enjoy some less serious Epic, join the chat during the times listed, and I’ll be happy to play. As always, I will explain my plays as we go and provide a summary at the end of each match. Challengers are welcome to stay in chat with audio and video if they so desire, since it is a nice learning experience and wins/losses have no stakes attached.
Stream Raw Footage
Thank you everyone who played and watched. For those who could not, or if you want to watch your match, below is the raw footage from the stream with timestamps.
