It’s time for a Team-Up!

Ladies of the night and Gentlethugs, I present for your edification and adoration, a joint effort on behalf of Lost Hemisphere and The Brave And The Blog!

In honour of their impending refeature, and their valiant efforts in Lost Hemipshere’s March Madness, this April both blogs will be featuring articles on the greatest team never to reach Tier One, the Crime Lords.

Who’s who on the team? Who’s been printed, who hasn’t been printed? Whose versions are the most thematic, the most out-of-left-field, and why, oh why, does I mourn the lack of a Silver-legal Stilt-Man?

Keep your eyes peeled throughout the month of April, as Lost Hemisphere and The Brave And The Blog take a turn towards organised crime…

Oh, and for those of you goody-two-shoes who aren’t comfortable with the seedier sides of the streets, our regular features will be continuing as well… though we can’t promise that they won’t be affected  

PS: Get those entries in for the contest! It closes Thursday, and no-one’s been able to pin down all thirteen yet…  

March Madness: Round Two Postscript

The bracket has been updated here.

For those making picks at VSRealms, please note that for the remaining rounds, you are to make picks for ALL brackets, not just one. In other words, you’ll make 8 picks this round, 4 picks next, etc.

Also please note, the window of opportunity to make your picks is reduced. Results for round three will be posted Tuesday night with the Hobby League report, round four will go up Thursday night, and the final results will go up Saturday night.

Picks must be in and datestamped prior to the results being posted to be counted.

March Madness: Round Two Results

The big plus about moving on to round two is… there’s only half as many games to play!

With a number of the supposedly “easy” decks out of the way, the games turn more and more challenging… Of course, some of those so-called “easy” decks have turned out to be anything but weak, creating some startling upsets and moving that little bit closer to the finals.

With only 16 games to play in round two, the cards flew hard and fast and thus we have results… enjoy! Caveat: For many of these games, I was either not a player or not even in the room, so can’t give more than a passing comment therein…

Upping the ante: LH’s bounty for the UK Nationals

April 5th will see the UK Nationals for VS! You can find info here. After Kamiza’s announcement here, about the number of EA’s being given out (over 300!!! Including Bamf!, for cryin’ out loud! I love that card!), I got to a-ponderin’.

The format for the tourney is BYOS. All cards in the deck must be from a single expansion.

There are so many cool options out there for single-set decks, it’s a tough call to figure out just which set, let alone which deck, is going to dominate… but I know who I’d like to see there.

As everyone knows, I enjoy a deck that goes against the general principles of the game. Shadowpact WANT to have low endurance. Squadron Supreme DON’T want cards in hand. X-Statix only WANT one guy on the board.

My much-maligned favourite doesn’t even want to attack… it wants to BE attacked!

Yup, Crime Lords.

Thursday 13 #8: Shattered Reflections of CCGs

Those of us who love the VS System come from a myriad of backgrounds, many rooted to varying degrees in geekiness. We all have our interests, we all have our specialties, and for many of us, VS is not our first CCG. The question is, just how many ARE you aware of?

The following message mysteriously appeared in my inbox. No return email address, no subject header, just…

“I’ve been watching you. You scurry from topic to topic, dangling on the precipice of mediocrity at every turn… Is there no hope for you and your cadre of contemptible, cud-chewing card-floppers? Can you be inspired to attain higher levels of lucidity, or are you doomed to forever dwell in the oubliette of your ignorance?

Clearly, something must be done if you’re ever to climb from the depths of your lackluster intellect… thus, I issue unto you this challenge. A teaser if you will, a taste of things to come, the foreshadowing of a more epic cerebral quest.

I send with this missive a shattered reflection; 13 pieces from the childlike games that occupy your days. Identify its components, and the prize shall be yours. Fail, or worse yet, do not attempt to probe the depths of this mystery, and you will receive nought but the scorn and pity you so dearly deserve…

- The Puzzler ”

Attached was this image…

Um… little help?

Clearly this “Puzzler” dude wants us to identify all thirteen fragments of this thing…. and if we can pull it off… prizes!

Here’s the real deal:Your task for this, yes, Thursday Thirteen contest, is to identy all 13 trading card games that make up the above image. - You’ll receive 1 pt for each game correctly identified. - You’ll receive 1 pt for each card identified by name. All entries can be either PM’d to me at VSRealms or emailed directly to gdaybloke (at) cogeco.ca, and must be received by Noon EST, Wednesday April 2nd. First prize (most points): 4 random Modern legal rares (reprints allowed) Second prize: 2 random Modern legal rares (reprints allowed) If all thirteen CCG’s are correctly identified by the winner, one of those rares will be a Mobilize. * All prizes for this week’s Thursday Thirteen contest are provided by the mysterious individual, “The Puzzler”… and if this is indeed a teaser, it just makes me wonder what he or she has in the works…*

Hobby League: Not much to report…

Well, I tell a lie, there’s actually quite a bit to report, with no less than twelve of the sixteen Round Two matches completed for March Madness… but to give those making their picks a chance, we won’t be posting the results until…. well, probably Sunday night…

… needless to say there’s been some more upsets, some blowouts, and some VERY close calls…

When decks are randomly assigned to the participants, you never know just how things will turn out… I’ll tell you now, my first experience of playing a Checkmate deck was rather… intense…

Nothing to see here, go about your business.

How I’d Do It: Episode 3

This isn’t the topic I originally planned to cover this week. My original plan was to write about the whys and wherefores of inventing new keywords, but partway through last week I had a great surge of inspiration on a different topic, and, ADD being what it is, I couldn’t let go of it. So, I’m going to postpone the keywords article until next week, and instead, I’m going to completely gut and rebuild from scratch the central theme of a team that’s always just felt wrong to me.

That team is, of course, the Sentinels.

VS: Getting a handle on the basics

Back in the day I wrote up a quick 3-page summary of VS. It didn’t go to any great lengths to explain the chain, it certainly wasn’t meant to supplant any offial rules document, but it was intended to at least give a basic idea of how the game worked. Some basic principles, if you will. More than anything else, I guess it was meant as a sort-of handout to be given to someone when you’ve played a demo with them, to help them understand just why you told them to put Mystique behind Blob, etc.

For the benefit of the curious, here it is. You never know, someone might be able to make use of it, or at least find a dozen or so errors and correct it for me. Heh.

March Madness: Wrapping up Round One!

You’ve been such good little kiddies this year, gorging on your Easter chocolates and tossing the foil wrappers at each other… and if you haven’t, why not? It’s fun!

Not being the kind of lazy sods to let a weekend go by without squeezing in what gaming we can, we went ahead and wrapped up the remaining games of Round One! See, we’re a totally different type of lazy sod. That’s why my shirts are wrinkled and I’m carrying a spare tire. Bah. Enough! Results!

Easter Sunday

To those who celebrate/commemorate Easter, Lost Hemisphere wishes you a good one.

To those who don’t, Lost Hemisphere thanks you – more chocolate for us!