Invitational Player Preview - SirLargeness Scorpion Hatamoto
Top Diamond League player SirLargeness first entered the League in the pre-season and after that experiment was out of the way started to rapidly make a mark.
Pre-Season
Initially a reasonable start with a 2-1 record
Wins vs Crab Hida Yama [1500] and Scorpion Azgadil [1500]
Losses vs Crane Daidoji Zorzo [1500]
Season 2 - Start Rating 1601
It was in Season 2 that results became (much) more impressive with a 5-0 record (7-0 with drops)
Wins vs Crab Brendon [1500], Lion Toreadory [1500], Lion Bill.jr [1850], Unicorn Shu Guantou [1500] and Dragon Great Dantone [1185]
This was enough for a high seed leading to an impressive cup run
Season 2 Cup
T64 beat Crane Kakita Minto [1509]
T32 beat Scorpion Calimsha [1635]
T16 beat Dragon nyxnyx [1776]
T8 beat Crab Jokingly [1774]
T4 beat Dragon Kinglsey [1978]
T2 lost to Scorpion Wydwen [1541]
Season 3 - Start Rating 1740
Another strong showing in a pod with lots of drops, SirLargeness took 1st place again going 3-0 actual (7-0 with drops)
wins versus Lion GoblinGuide [1695], Crane Kakita Lenial [1366],
Phoenix Phoenix1 [1142]
Season 3 Cup
T64 beat Crane Erik [1622]
T32 beat Crane Tsuke [1681]
T16 beat Scorpion Yaba [1728]
T8 beat Scorpion Bayushi Nomen[1920]
T4 lost to Scorpion Wydwen [2067]
Wydwen was rapidly appearing a personal nemesis repeatedly knocking SirL out of the cup.
Season 4 - Start Rating 1911
With an impressively high rating and the 5th place out of all players SirLargeness was one of the top Discord players. Therefore he promptly decided to play Zombiecorn and lower the odds of everyone else beating him. This, for those who are unaware, was a madness that infected many, many good players who all decided to play Unicorn to 'prove' that it was actually better than people thought - i.e if enough decent players worked out how Unicorn worked then perhaps it would not 'suck' quite as badly as it had done. Unfortunately almost every one of these elite players stumbled around for wins and not one got past the wild card stages. What does this prove?
2-3 actual (4-3 with drops) making it through to the Wild Card! Perhaps also unfortunate that his pod contained MindsDesire who absolutely had not switched to a weaker clan.
Wins vs Scorpion Athos [1533], Crane Jitawa [1500]
Losses vs Dragon MindsDesire
[1879], Scorpion InsaneManiac [1500], Phoenix Jake [1500]
WC lost to Scorpion Nostred [1422]
Season 5 - Start Rating 1840
(which is a small drop considering)
For Season 5 SirL decided to wash the suck that is competitive Unicorn off and moved to Crane. He did well again going 4-2 actual (5-2 with drops)
Wins vs Crab Sla-dreamer [1384], Phoenix TheScmooz [1645],
Scorpion Yamaneko [1431] Unicorn Renown [1507]
Losses vs Crab Jokingly [1792], Lion bill.jr [1913]
T64 lost to Crane Daidoji Micah [1991]
SirLargeness gets through to the Invitational on an extremely impressive Cup points score due to his impressive consistency (lets ignore the Unicorn stage) at getting deep into the cup.
As a player he can also be considered an envoy for the game. He is a key part of one of the many decent podcasts out there being a key member of the Jade Throne which sounds suspiciously like a marble green toilet instead of the actual L5R throne but perhaps the duel meaning is the intention. He also sometimes runs his own youtube casts covering other aspects of the game. Here is his take on the league itself FroTop Cast.
As a player he is based/from Tulsa, USA. He won the Pax South Kotei outright making him presumably a Hatamoto and is apparently also responsible for the deadly Scorpion AFWTD deck that made so much of the player bases lives a misery for the last few months so 'Yea'.
He also kindly spent the time to answer some questions that all the invitational players are being asked (some will answer and some will not). Which will prove a lot more interesting than my babblings.
Did you play a lot of Original L5R? and if so how long/when
I played during Jade, Gold, Diamond, Ivory and 20F editions
Do/have you played other competitive card games at a high level?
I don't consider myself a high level mtg player as i've never played on the pro tour, but ive played on and off for about 10 years and won a few 75+ people tournaments. Won several regional tournaments in Thrones 2.0 and Doomtown as well.
What were your experiences of the Discord League
The regular players of the league have built a nice community online, which continues to be the major highlight of participation. Also, the meta evolves faster online, so strong online players should have an edge at IRL tournaments
Do you have any advice for the other lower ranked players?
Quit overbuying in the dynasty phase, even decks without heavy conflict character support rarely needs to do more than simply keep board parity with your opponent in the early turns
What is there that you like/dislike about new L5R and what would you like (or not like) to see moving forward.
One of the major selling points of LCGS is getting cards on a monthly basis, while its less overall than CCG you get all the cards and a regularly changing meta.
FFG has moved entirely away from that in the LCG, promoting instead months of inactivity that is very very destructive to local playgroups. The hope is soon we can get back to a monthly release schedule to assist local stores in keeping interest high in the game. the initial 6 in 6 was super fun to start, but as FFG wast able to follow up with a regular release schedule it has proven to be a destructive practice in the long term. I fear L5R cant sustain 2-3 more cycles of a glut then starvation release schedule.
What are your favourite/least favourite matchups?
Crabes
So there we have it. Though I am not quite sure it he dislike Cranes, Crabs or Crabs and Cranes!
Thanks to SirLargeness for taking the time to answer the questionnaire and for all he does for the community. I look forward to seeing how he does in what promises to be an excellent competition.
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