2015 Canadian National Championship 9/4/2015

Two weeks ago the 2015 Canadian National Championship for Warhammer 40:000: Conquest took place in Toronto at Fan Expo Canada. We had 21 players sign-up for a full day of Conquest. Two players had byes from regionals events so they went straight through to round 2. There were plenty of temptations on the convention floor, but our entrants were there to conquer the Traxis Sector.

While Fan Expo ended up being a terrific venue for the tournament, the $50 entry fee to the con on Friday had a definite impact on the numbers for the event. I personally know a number of talented players that didn’t play simply because of the cost. We’ve had twenty people show up for local Toronto events, so with travelling players I believe we could have had at least double the turnout had arrangements been better.

But you’re here to read about tournament results. Let’s get to it …

Faction Breakdown

 

Generally we don’t see a lot of Kith in Toronto, but she made up fully a third of the field at Nationals. Cato and Eldorath are also no strangers to high level Conquest competition. But the story of the day was all about Kith. The interesting part was that very few players – most were from Toronto or Montreal – had a lot of experience with the Kith mirror match, so how well players could make the necessary adjustments there factored heavily into their results.

Top 8

Congratulations to Julien Vasquez, Canada’s National Warhammer 40,000: Conquest Champion for 2015!

We asked Julien to share some thoughts on his victory:

Packmaster Kith made up one third of the field at Canadian Nationals. Why do you choose her?

I’ve been playing Kith since Store Championship season, and I’ve yet to find a better deck then her. She fits my style of tempo control. The choking elements also greatly help and she has access to the two best cards in the game right now: Archon’s Terror and Klaivex Warleader. The fact that her Khymera allow you to rush and win planets, she’s just a no-brainer.

Any matchups (warlords or players) that you were nervous about going in?

Nervous? No. I knew my good and bad matchups through and through.
I had a lack of playtesting of the mirror match since there’s only one other player in the Montreal meta that plays Kith, and he’s not part of my core group.

With your deck, what were you looking for in your opening hand?

As many low cost high command units as possible.

I guess Archon’s Palace and Khymera Den are good too.

What was your favourite moment of the day?

Winning?

Meeting Eric Lang was rad.

What was your toughest matchup of the day?

Toughest to me means I had a shot of winning and lost. That would be round 5 versus Michel Corvino playing Eldorath Starbane. Long drawn out game where he just drew better.

What was your biggest mistake of the day?

Semifinals against Stephen when he dropped in a Tactical Squad Cardinis into play for a strike. I couldn’t see any play around getting AOE’d, but then realized a minute later I could have moved away my two Khymera with the Khymera Den. That bothered me.

How were you feeling heading into the elimination round?

If I could beat Michel in Top 8 after losing to him in round 5, I felt I had a good shot. To be fair, I felt in Top 16 at GenCon that after going 6-1 that I could win the whole thing, but I just drew so poorly in that match. I didn’t feel that way with 3-2 at this event.

It was a long day, between 5 rounds of swiss and 3 rounds in the top 8. How did you stay focused?

That wasn’t the long part. That was the six hour drive to Toronto the night before and the six hour drive back to Montreal after the tournament. And then getting up after three hours of sleep before working the next morning.

I thrive on this type of event. I’m used to playing non-stop four days at GenCon or two days of Magic Grand Prix. The size of this event was equivalent to most of my store championship and regional attendances. I wish FFG OP would incentivize tournaments with 1000-2000 players. But staying focused wasn’t a huge issue for me.

How did it feel to win the 2015 Canadian Nationals for Warhammer 40,000: Conquest?

Not winning anything beyond the Store Championship level was frustrating. Not winning at either the World Eater in 2014 or North American Champs in 2015 was really frustrating. I got to Top 4 Canadian Nationals for A Game of Thrones in 2014. Being able to surpass that with Conquest was heartening. Finally winning a title was something I’ve been striving to do since I started playing card games in 1994.

So, I feel happy, rewarded and validated.

Any shoutouts?

I really want to thank the Montreal metagame for enjoying this game as much as I do and supporting us at BD Cosmos with your attendance. I want to thank John Gobeil and his family for hosting us for the night. Thanks to Liz Malette for keeping her end of the bargain. Thanks to Alex Cybulski for a super enjoyable finals match. Thanks to James for always being able to spruce up a conversation. I want to thank my meta mates in the Kool Kids Club for all their moral support: Stephen McNamara, Philippe Paquin, Alex Godlovitch, Peter Wilson, Alexandre Chiappini, Salim Hammoum, Sean Emberley for waking me up. You are all big guys and definitely wear pants that go with it. I especially want to thank Carl Dupuis for driving us down to the event. Couldn’t have done it without you. Next time, we’ll definitely take a ride on the train. Finally, thanks to The Tactical Squad for the interview!

We also have Julien’s decklist to share:

Packmaster Kith (50)

Thank you Julien for sharing your deck and your thoughts on the 2015 Canadian National Championship. It was a pleasure playing against you.

We actually have footage from the event. We’re getting up to speed on production, so we hope to start bringing you video with commentary in the next week or so

See you at World’s in November!