My Falco is awesome! (Smash tourny recap)

Note: This entire post is just a summary of the tournament I played last night. I will probably hae another, more varied post up soon.

So, I played in a team smash tournament last night. It was awesome! The organization was a bit chaotic, but things went pretty well. It was Swiss style, triple elimination, so that once you lose three matches, you are eliminated. We started off playing only three stock (I'm used to five stock) since there were a disgusting 48 teams that played (that's 96 people!), including my Falco and Andrew's Samus.

Andrew convinced me to bring my own controller, and I'm glad I did, because when I was warming up on one console, the joystick was pretty shitty and as a result I made a lot of mistakes. Our first matchup was against a Shiek/Marth combo on Jungle Japes. I lost my first life quickly due to the level, which got me worried. Right when I came back, though, I spiked both opponents off the stage. After some battling, I found myself dead, leaving Andrew with the two opponents, everyone on their last life. He pulled out the win after he KO'd Marth, and Shiek made a suicidal mistake, putting us at a 1-0 record.

Our second match was against Dr. Mario and Falco, on Kongo Jungle. Andrew and I didn't play very well. I made a few big errors, one of which cost me a life. This match put us in the middle half of all competitors, a 1-1 record.

Our third match was again on Jungle Japes (previously one of my most hated levels, but now one of my best), this time against a Fox/Samus combo. They both started the match guns blazing, but it didn't take long for Andrew and I (team BRDO) to disarm them. Samus made some good use of the fully charged blast; I reflected a few of these, which Fox almost reflected back to me. Fox fell victim to the fate of most Foxes; his aggressive play got him killed pretty quickly. After that, it didn't take long for us to take down Samus. This win was due to some pretty good team tactics on our part. This put us at 2-1. Due to the tournament structure, 1/8 of the teams were eliminated.

Our fourth match was against another Fox/Samus team on Pokemon stadium. This is usually one of Andrew's best levels, so I had high hopes. I shined the Samus out of the air for a KO once, a feat I'm proud of. Fox and I were playing mind games for a while, often with him coming out on top. I was suprised to hear Andrew ask if he could steal a life (meaning I still had two lives after he lost all his three). His Samus usually lasts a lot longer than my Falco due to his great recovery. He got a few bad recoveries leading to suicides, which gave our opponents enough of an advantage to beat us. Our 2-2 record meant that our next match could be our last.

Our fifth match was against Pikachu and Shiek on Fourside. Andrew and I rarely play Fourside, but it turned out to be great for his recovery and even greater for my spiking. The pikachu spammed his lightning bolt, which I fell victim for repeatedly. We successfully spammed our projectiles for a while, locking down the opponents, until I decided to go show them the bottom side of my boots. After some shine-aerial combos, some spikes, and even some impressive shine-spike combos, we had a two-on-one against Shiek, with plenty of lives to spare. This was probably our most decisive victory, giving us at least one more match to play.

Our sixth match was on Princess Peach's castle (bad for Andrew and I) against Marth and Fox. Again, some impressive combos and spikes helped me along the way. At one point, I thought I had lost my last life, but found that I still had one left. Shortly after that, Andrew was knocked out, leaving me with a 2-on-1. They both had 50%+ damange, and I had none. Of course, I thought I was terribly screwed. I played some mind games, and tried to separate the opponents. I knocked Marth out with a well placed b-air. I noticed all match long that Fox had a bad habit of coming in with an aerial, so I punished him with a shield-grab. A few of those, and another b-air sent him reeling, securing another victory for team BRDO.

At this point, 31 of the 48 teams had been eliminated. Our next match was on Corneria (which I mistook as a blessing). We were up against Dr. Mario and Luigi, the latter being controlled by the famed GOD?, who placed second with Luigi in the singles tournament. I made a few poorly timed mistakes. My real undoing came when Dr. Mario caped my recovery when I was at a low percentage, wasting a life. Had I sweetspotted the edge, we might have stood a chance, but once I was gone, Andrew was left to take out a total of four lives from the two players, a difficult task for any player. Thus, our tournament life was extinguished with a 4-3 record for the night, putting us somewhere in the top 17 teams.

The tournament was really fun, and even exhilerating. The feeling of winning a match that ended with me facing off alone against both opponents was great. Though we didn't win anything, I think that placing as high as we did is a pretty good result for our first tournament. I'm sure that with more practice against humans, we could fix our mistakes and do even better. Unfortunately, this is my last term, so I won't be attending anymore tournaments.

Listening to... Division of Laura Lee - I Guess I'm Healed
Link of the moment... I hope they're able to post detailed results, and some videos of the top teams.