Today was the final day of the Viagame House Cup #3 tournament. After 3 days of play, Lifecoach has claimed first place, which won him $10,000. All of the official details can be found at Viagame’s official site, http://housecup.viagame.com/, where they have all the decklists, VODs, and highlights.
The final match was between EU’s Lifecoach and NA’s Strifecrow. Both are very skilled and well known players, and the best of 7 finals round went for all 7 matches. Strifecrow took an early lead by beating Lifecoach’s Paladin deck with a Flamewaker tempo Mage. However, Lifecoach answered back with Patron Warrior, showing that the deck is a force to be reckoned with, winning 3 games in a row. Strifecrow finally put the Patron deck down with a Demon Zoo Warlock deck which also beat Lifecoach’s next deck, Midrange Hunter.
In the 7th and final game of the tournament, Lifecoach played Druid against that same Zoo deck. It was a very back and forth match where early knife juggles got Strifecrow ahead, only to be let down by a low damage Imp-losion and some bad knife juggles that made him trade into a 4/1 Azure Drake, which gave Lifecoach a chance to get back in the game. Finally, Lifecoach’s beefier minions and the tried and true Force of Nature + Savage Roar combo won him the match.
This was a particularly interesting tournament because of its 1-deck-from-every-class format. The effects of the latest Adventure, Blackrock Mountain, were easy to see in which decks had changed and which decks had fallen behind. The Grim Patron Warrior was clearly a big influence, being banned in most matches and having a big impact on the outcome of matches it wasn’t banned in. The classes that didn’t benefit much, like Paladin, Rogue, and Shaman, were still running pretty much the same set up they have been since Goblins vs. Gnomes was released. This is also a good indication of why these classes are showing up less and less on the ranked ladder.
So, head on over to http://housecup.viagame.com/ for the VODs and check out what your favorite player was running. There’s still a few hours left before the season restart. Maybe one of those awesome decks can help you get a few more ranks!
