"Shoulda chose evil." GenCon "Evil is a Choice" 8th place LD

I'm a little late gettin' this to the party, but I present to the world the list for my T8 "Test Arsenal Deputy - Gadgets (3 difficulty)" deck.

I orca'd (Win-Loss-Win-Loss-Win), ending up at 3-2 for the Swiss rounds. All matches were in time, however, and I faced down some formidable opponents to survive the dreaded cut before exiting gracefully in my T8 match against the ultimate winner.

Deck Design Notes:

As a quick peruse of the decklist doubtless revealed to y'all: this is a theme deck. I took "Evil is a Choice" as a challenge to find a way to not choose evil. Specifically, since servitors were required, I would pick a servitor that did not benefit my deck in any way. This quickly narrowed my choice of servitors to one, as Ezekiah Grimme had the lowest cost: 1gr and no other negative effects on a deck that doesn't run spells.

I didn't just want to play my Law Dogs deck both days: while I love playing the deck, and think it could have done well even with a -1 gr 'penalty', it is derivative of my Euros deck and I wanted to try something different in proper competitive play. Since spells were out, that nixed Abram's Crusaders. I hadn't gotten the hang of Justice In Exile before leaving for GenCon. This left The Arsenal and Gadgets.

Constraint Number One: I feel like non-base LD homes are one Dude away from being top-notch choices. Until then, I feel like throwing out bounty reliably is a major hurdle, hence the imperative need for Culpability Scientizer. I also feel like higher-difficulty Law Dogs Gadgets are one Gadget and/or one Mad Scientist 2 away from being very good. This confirmed my focus on lower values.

Constraint Two: since I was building the deck the night before, I needed a package of answers that I was at least casually familiar with. The twos are essentially stolen from my other deck, though I went with bullet reduction from Make the Smart Choice over the sweet, sweet Cheatin' Punishment of Bottom Dealin'. This decision helped solidify my decision to run x2 Bottom Dealin' the next day... .

Since I was running low values, I figured this would be the moment for Legendary Holster to finally shine.

Doomsday Supply would, in theory, enable me to find my Shotgun (to clear pesky low-value dudes) and my Legendary Holster (to clear pesky high-value dudes), then recur Culpability Scientizers.

I like the synergy of Gomorra Jail and The Orphanage (insert timely social commentary on the for-profit prison system here).

Tournament Report:

Unfortunately, my memory is more than a little fuzzy at this point as to which awesome opponents I faced in which order, but I recall facing off against Charles' Hellstromme Gadget Morgan Stables round 1, and Prodigy's Grim Fourth Ring + Showboating in my t8 match. (Coincidentally, I faced the same opponents in the same spots the next day!) I also remember facing off against Laura's Stone Gang deck in Swiss, wherein I was taught a lesson in how to make that servitor work. I'll have to see how much I remember when the KS drops!

Throughout the day, I kept changing up my startin' posse. The deck list is set to the 'original' starting posse. As time passed, I realized that I needed a stronger start (stud bullets are good, who'da thunk?) This left me often ditch'n Dr. Dayl Burnett (since I didn't put out a lot of bounty) and sometimes "Thunder Boy" Nabbe, then trying to mix up the remaining start to include Tommy Harden at minimum. Sadly, this meant I ended up playin' closer to my classic LD deck than I had initially intended.

Mortimer Parsons was a grave disappointment. His trait hosed me royally in one matchup, and his Mad Scientist 0 left his sciencizin' a little lackin'.

I never seemed to have A Slight Modification when I needed it.

Summary Ramblings:

It was a fun deck to play, dude-issues aside: I liked the pressure having unbooted gadgets brought to the table, especially when I could threaten shootouts with booted dudes. I think with the extra rock to play around with that you would get by ditching evil , there is potential here.

I really wish Mutant Cattle had a difficulty of 3, and/or that "Lucky" Sky Borne was neutral or a Law Dog (so I could grab Marty for a starting Mad Science of 2).

Many thanks again to Scott and Heidi for their excellent TO teamwork! I tried to take mental notes so as to improve my own TO'ing skills.