Full Moon Industries (York Abomination Series Winner)

With Too Tough To Die being legal I revisited an old deck idea that I'd previously played in an OCTGN league. The deck's original run saw mixed results, but I liked the idea and I felt it would be improved with the addition of some of the new cards, in particular the new actions on 9s (Curse of Failure and Ricochet. Now with a good Cheatin' Resolution on 9, I had room to drop the off-value Coachwhips and tighten up the draw structure with new 9 dude Skinwalker and a second copy of Fetch. Fetch was instrumental in helping me towards victory in my second game, with a copy showing up early and grabbing me the cards I needed to get set up from lowball hands, so that felt like a really worthwhile decision. I also switched a second Bobo out for Virginia Ann Earp, who is a great dude to flex into starting posses if you suspect an opponent is running lots of hand rank modifications.

Strategy-wise the idea is to build a couple of gadget guns then go hunting. Tag your target with Full Moon Brotherhood and use Black Owl or Pinned Down to ensure they're the one who dies first. React with Darius Hellstromme and get a control point and your choice of cards or ghost rock. If you've got a Corporeal Twist into play, you get to double your control point gain. A combination of Epidemic Laboratory and attack jobs should help out against passive decks and dudes hiding at home.

I definitely feel luck was on my side today, but the deck also worked well and did the things I was aiming for.

The first game went my way I think largely down to Vince's deck stalling and not seeing any Kung Fu. I'd said in advance of the game that I didn't really have a chance against it once it got going so luck was definitely on my side that game. While it took me a few turns to see a gadget, I still went for an early shootout as thanks to the Buffalo Emporium I could still manage 3 stud from Valeria and Freddy and a cheating hand from Vince saw Wei Xu fall victim to a Ricochet.

After a few turns of building up with deeds and finally seeing a Holy Wheel Gun, I began chasing Vince's dudes from my deeds and successfully landed a Curse of Failure on Matthew Rising Sun. We ended up with a town square shootout which ended with the no-win decision of discard Kabeda Hakurei and lose enough influence to be in check, or discard the Corporeal Twisted Henry Moran, giving me enough control points to put Vince in check.

I was worried about Tom's Attrition Abominations in the second game, but as mentioned above an early Fetch combined with his deck constantly throwing out cheating hands in lowball saw me able to grab cards I needed to build up quickly. Though a town square shootout saw me discard my FMB target The Brute, thanks to his Black Owl and Takin' Ya With Me I lost Valeria and my unbooted Holy Wheel Gun so I was unable to also use Darius Hellstromme.

Valeria was replaced by Zeb Whateley-Dupont who soon got another Holy Wheel Gun and a Corporeal Twist. A shootout with an isolated Pagliaccio netted him a couple of control points. Ivor Hawley (Exp.1) showed up to reinforce Tom's side of the board, but Ivor's solo Kidnappin' attempt on Dabney Scuttlesby saw him run into a Pinned Down which cost him the shootout. Tom conceded the game as his Jake Smiley was the only thing keeping him in the game and I still had the use of my home to switch off his trait.

Finally I faced the other undefeated deck, Ste's Toolbox Blessed. While he spent several turns at home building up his dudes with Miracles, I invented a couple of Holy Wheel Guns and started building up control points on the Epidemic Laboratory.

Following some brief scuffles over his General Store that didn't actually result in shootouts, I purposefully kept all my wanted dudes at home to lure Father Tolarios out into town square where I could hit him with a Curse of Failure. Ste unsurprisingly opposed the job (Tolarios had quite a few spells at this point) and booted in lots of backup, leaving "Thunder Boy" Nabbe out to bring in unbooted with Walk the Path. This gave me the opportunity to hit Thunder Boy with a Pinned Down before Onward Christian Soldiers was cast. The shootout didn't quite go my way though, and Ste's Shield of Faith prevented me from using Ricochet against his Cheatin' hand.

The second round went much the same way and I retreated home. Ste opted to send his Blessed back home to safety but kept the unbooted Thunder Boy in town square. After I moved Black Owl over to mind the Lab, Ste sent in a Bounty Hunter with Thunder Boy backup. I didn't have any stud support for him, but Black Owl used his ability to make Thunder Boy the first casualty just in case. I topdecked a Cheatin' Full House against Ste's Cheatin 4oaK, and, wanting to see Black Owl get aced, he played This'll Hurt in the Mornin'. Unfortunately that backfired and gave me a 4oaK too, meaning Thunder Boy got discarded and he was in check with no unbooted dudes to contest the Lab.