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Three members of the long-time team, the Kashyyyk Train of Dominance, made the cut to the Top 4 of the 2022 Retro Event, whose format was Decipher Cards Only. Subsequently, Steve Baroni defeated the lone non-member, Casey Anis, to advance to the Final Confrontation where he ceded the event win to Jonny Chu; Chu defeated Justin Desai is the other semifinal. Chu finished in first place in the Qualifying Stage, going 11-1 with a 53% opponents’ strength-of-schedule (SOS). This mark narrowly edged Desai in the SOS tiebreaker. Anis finished as the third 11-1 competitor, while Baroni was the top 10-2 finisher.
Semifinal match-ups among the Top 4 were randomly determined, with the two two-time Star Wars CCG World Champions (and Players Committee Hall of Famers) squaring off in one, as Baroni and Anis were matched up in the other. Chu discussed several aspects of the event, including KToD’s plan for the Top 4 in a recent episode of Star Wars CCG Holotheatre.
(Event Grand Prize)
Since Anis – a two-time Worlds Day 3 finisher – was the higher seed, he chose to play Dark Side (Senate) in the first game of the differential match-play showdown, which took place on May 20th. Baroni, a five-time Worlds Day 3 finisher and four-time Major winner, was victorious by +21 with his Light Side Senate. In Game 2, held on May 22, Baroni chipped away enough with his Hunt Down to capture the match victory over Anis, who played Combat for Light Side.
In the Chu-Desai semifinal match, the players squared off on May 28, with Chu choosing Dark Side and winning by +24 in a Senate vs. Senate clash. Given the large differential to overcome and the inherent awkwardness of playing a teammate, Desai conceded Game 2 of their match, leaving Chu as the winner.
The rest of the Top 8, from fifth to eighth, were Brad Kippel, Chris Kelly, Michael Pistone and the top 9-3 finisher, Matthew Harrison-Trainor.
This was the second year where a Retro Event was held on GEMP, with Premiere-Death Star II being the 2021 format. Over 70 players signed up this time around, and close to 40 players maxed out the 12-games and therefore, will receive participation prizes. Several performance prizes were awarded to the Top 8, with the crown jewel of the prize pool being an uncut sheet of Coruscant Dark Side rares. Certain other prizes were given out randomly to active participants.
As expected, popular decks in the event included Senate, Combat, Hunt Down and Watch Your Step, with several other decks making appearances. Players of various skill capabilities, experience levels and familiarity with GEMP partook in the competition. Since Defensive Shields were a very recent addition to this meta, three sets of the PC’s special shield sleeves were given away to players.
Decklists for all 8 submitted decks for the Match-Play Stage are available in GEMP-importable and list format. Thanks to the work of Technology Advocate Adam Fletcher, several sample decks for the format were made available on GEMP for players uncomfortable and/or unwilling to craft their own decks in this format, which spanned the release of the Theed Palace expansion in late 2001 through the first Virtual Card set in March 2002.
The event was a nostalgic lookback at the time around when the Game transitioned from the stewardship of Decipher, Inc. to Players Committee, Inc. amidst the PC celebrating its 20th Anniversary of its chartering on April 30, 2022.
