The second week of the Flesh and Blood Trading Card Game (FaB TCG) Road to Nationals (RTN) concludes with multiple members of Team Unbox placing in the Top 4 and qualifying for the National Championships! Here’s the recap of both tournaments that happened last weekend.
FaB TCG Road to Nationals Week 2 – GamersShop (Draft Format)
Saturday was a test for the drafting prowess of National Championship hopefuls as they gathered at GamerShop for 2 separate rounds of draft, followed by 3 rounds of matches each, before another final draft round for the Top 8 determines the winner.
The draft format is very different from the usual Classic Constructed in that players build their decks on the spot. Each player is placed in a pod with seven others and is given three packs. After their first pack is opened, they take one card from it and pass the rest to the next player. This process is repeated until all three packs are opened and all of the cards are passed around. The players then construct a deck from the cards that they’ve drafted and use it for their matches.
The format rewards creativity, knowledge of the set, and being able to deduce opportunities based on the cards that are being passed around. It is very important to practice for this format because the National Championships will also have a draft portion alongside the traditional Classic Constructed rounds.
At the end of 6 rounds of draft matches, two members of Team Unbox were able to make it to the final draft of the Top 8. Unbox Team Captain Justin Cu was able to secure his 2nd Top 8 in an RTN but ultimately fell short of the Top 4 finish needed to secure a National Championship invite. On the other hand, Aaliyah Gozon, the team’s newest member, was able to not only get her first Top 8 in an RTN but was able to win her first match in the playoffs and get into Top 4 to secure her spot at the National Championships.
The tournament was ultimately won by Team Scry Game’s Kevin Pilapil, who faced Donovan Panganiban in the finals. Congratulations to them, and to David Macas for securing their invites! Congratulations as well to the rest of the Top 8 – Ar-j Dimapasoc, Daniel Jacobsen, and Ian Gapuz!
FaB TCG Road to Nationals Week 2 – Block 101 Hobbies Store (Classic Constructed Format)
Sunday was back to Classic Constructed as Block 101 held their Road To Nationals Tournament. 50 players came in to throw their hats into the ring, and after 6 rounds of matches, three Team Unbox members made it to the Top 8!
Justin makes yet another Top 8 appearance with this Victor deck but unfortunately got paired against a teammate and fellow Guardian brother-in-arms Jigs de Asis, who’s piloting his version of Victor as well. After a long, grueling battle, Jigs proved to be the better Victor of the day and secured his National Championships invite, but fell in the next round. On the other side of the field, Christian Agupitan is also having a great breakout performance with his Dromai deck and was not just able to get his invite but make it to the finals.
However, the story of the tournament goes to the eventual winner – Andre See from Team Kachi. After being the only player in the Top 8 of both major events in Battle Hardened Manila, he added yet another historical milestone for both the Philippines and his FaB career by being the first player to earn his Hero, Olympia, his first Living Legend (LL) points. Even more impressively, he managed to do this on the back of a perfect 9-0 run throughout the 50-man tournament!
This is a big deal because the Hero has mostly been dismissed by most of the FaB player base as one of the weaker options in the current metagame. Andre was able to make him work using a unique decklist that focuses on dual-wielding hatchets along with a list of tools that work well with his abilities. Still, the idea of Olympia winning an RTN was such an achievement that even the official FaB TCG Twitter posted his decklist as soon as it was available.
Other than Victor and Azalea, the rest of the Top 8 were a bevy of different Heroes – James Wong from Team Block 101 took the popular Ranger the furthest and will join Christian, Jigs, and Andre at the National Championships. Ar-j from Team Wolves Den claimed his second RTN Top 8 this season, also on Azalea. Finally, Troy Fiel and Jiggz Abrigo made sure that Team Scry Games was represented in the top cut with Kano and Boltyn respectively. Congratulations to all of the winners!
This weekend is a big one for Team Unbox as the team continues to work towards claiming that elusive RTN win this season in the upcoming back-to-back Classic Constructed tournaments at Mage-Ring Hobby Shop in Cavite on Saturday, and Neutral Grounds Alabang Town Center on Sunday. So far the Heavy Hitters metagame has been a revolving door of different Heroes claiming victory each week, and it’s exciting to see who will come up on top this time around.
Check out what happened during Unbox’s very own RTN that kicked off the Road to Nationals season!
