Those of you who don’t know of Ryan Jones are either very casual, have never followed tournament coverage on Metagame.com, or play your weekly Hobby League tournaments under a rock at the bottom of the Marianas Trench. Few people can claim what Ryan can . . . in fact, only Brian Kibler can, and he has retired from competitive play to work as a developer for UDE. That makes Ryan Jones the only active Vs. System PC Champion.
I sat down with Ryan for a brief across-the-net interview/chat to try to learn what goes on in the hamster-charged mind of Vs. System’s reigning champion.
When not playing Vs. System, Ryan is a coder—a database programmer for Kaiser Permanente. They’re the biggest HMO in the United States and a non-profit organization, which makes them, as Ryan puts it, “The Good Guys. They’re non-profit, so they’re not evil.” In his spare time he is a dominant card player, and he set the Vs. world on fire with his recent performance at PC Anaheim. That’s not his only accomplishment, however—he has a very strong record from the many PCQs he’s attended, placing him very high in both the Constructed and Sealed Pack world rankings.
The Line on Ryan Jones
Ryan is currently third in the world in Constructed play and second in the world in Sealed Pack play. Aside from his big win at PC Anaheim, he’s placed:
146th, Origins $10K at Columbus, Ohio
109th, SDCC $10K at San Diego, California
111th, PC Indy at Indianapolis, Indiana
Ryan has come full circle, having entered his first tournament as a curious onlooker with no playtest partner and no prospects for winning a game. Busy as a fairly high-ranked Lord of the Rings player, Ryan viewed Vs. as more of a fun sideshow than as a primary hobby. He’s not a big comic fan—he prefers novels, finding comics too short (although Graphic Novels aren’t too bad), and hasn’t read many comics since he was in grade school. Although he’s not too familiar with the characters and their histories, he does enjoy learning about them. Still, comics have no bearing on his participation in this game. In fact, he fell into Vs. by accident. “I didn’t want to play it. I just wanted to play Lord of the Rings. Granted, all the money was nice, but I didn’t want a new game.” He mentioned that some Lord of the Rings players did initially jump ship for Vs. System, and many more have since done so (himself included). At the beginning, however, he was still primarily a Lord of the Rings player, and would be until Gen Con Indy, when he decided to give up competitive LotR for good.
As for his intro to Vs. System, “A friend brought over a starter one day, and we played it, omitting stun damage accidentally and not understanding why people were complaining that the games were too short (laughs). But it was a lot of fun, so we decided to get a couple of boxes. And then I got a couple more boxes, and a couple more, because when I play a game, I like to have four of everything.”
Ryan’s friend abandoned him when his card pool became so excessive that Ryan was winning every game. Ryan ended up with a ton of cards for which he had no use. “So I did what I did when I wanted to play Lord of the Rings more, but had no one to play with—I found a tournament.” He didn’t win a single match. “I can’t say I really expected to do well at that tournament, as I had no one to playtest with. I didn’t know anyone who played the game.” He harkens back to his early days as a Lord of the Rings player, where he also performed dismally in his first tournament, only to rebound and win a major event less than six months after his debut. “So, when I wanted to start playing Vs. System, I just found some tournaments to go to and wasn't expecting to do well. I actually did win a game, though. However, after winning it, they repaid me in about five minutes.”
That opening tournament was also the place where he met future Realmworx teammates Patrick Yapjoco and Billy Zonos. Billy apparently thrashed Ryan with a Skrull deck. “I met Billy and Patrick at that tournament, and saw them again at the next one, and eventually we started playing together. Billy wrecked me with his Super Skrull deck that first tournament; he was just Longshoting for Skrulls, using Base of Operations and Night Vision and then comboing with Charge!, Blind Sided, and Not So Fast. A typical Skrull deck, if you can call any Skrull deck typical.”
His friendship with Patrick and Billy flourished over the next few months, leading them to become playtest partners before PC Indy. They also tested with Andrew Yip and Carl Perlas to prepare for the inaugural Pro tournament. Until then, he hadn’t prepared much. In fact, he only played in the Origins and San Diego Comic Con $10K tournaments because of missed Lord of the Rings opportunities. “I was only playing Vs. at those $10Ks because I had just missed Day 2 of LotR (tournaments) both times. And at that time, I still had no one to playtest with. That, combined with really bad luck, did me in at each Vs. $10K.”
Ryan’s playtest group put together what he thought was a solid deck—a Mutant Nation deck that had tested well against all builds but one. “Of course, I happened to play against a KnightLight (Gotham Knights/Fearsome Five) deck, which auto-beats Mutant Nation, twice!” After running into two of the only four KnightLight decks that were being played, he ended Day 1 with a 4-3 record, which was just enough to squeak into Day 2. “But having only drafted DC Origins, which is quite the odd draft set, once, I got owned Day 2. Who knew there'd be seven copies of Teen Titans Go! in each pod? The worst part is that I thought I was going to win the entire first game I played, until turn 7 when he dropped Utility Belt right before I dropped my surprise Jean Grey, Phoenix Force.”
Home Field Advantage
The California native’s luck changed at Anaheim, however, as he took Gen Con So Cal by storm. Ryan went on a winning streak that seemed absolutely unstoppable . . . and it was! “When I made Day 2 at 8-2, there had to be at least twenty people who told me I was going to win the whole thing. Every five minutes! And once the draft started rolling, I knew they were right. Then we saw the Day 3 matchups, and they couldn’t have been more favorable.” Incidentally, having Team Realmworx on one’s side never hurts! “It’s always good to have people on your side. I enjoyed it.” Ryan was a late addition to Team Realmworx, the team that represents the VsRealms.com community. He tells me that it was Patrick Yapjoco and Billy Zonos who pestered the team into accepting him into the fold, and that the team “eventually gave in.” It was a Team Realmworx’s decision to use Teen Titans, although a few team members decided to change their decks at the last minute. Ryan, however, stayed with the Titans. “Us Realmworx guys knew that the Titans deck was the best. Billy made a few good changes to the deck, and it was drawing well for me in play testing, which is why I chose the Titans in the end. Even though everyone was packing Overloads, and I had to play a Spider Friends deck, (the Titans deck is) still a great deck.”
After a stellar performance in the Constructed portion of the tournament, it was time for the draft. “My first two draft pods weren't prepared at all, and I got some great cards as late picks. In the Man of Steel draft, I got two Devilances halfway through a pack, as well as an Apokolips. I can understand the team-stamped Apokolips, but Devilance is probably the best 5- and 7-drop in the set! I also saw some late Female Furies, I think, and (in the Web of Spider-Man draft), some people didn’t even know what Mojoverse did.” Ryan used that to his advantage, and was able to pull the vicious Web of Spider-Man draft trick of playing Post, then activating Mojoverse to make Post unaffiliated (and therefore avoid losing Post to his own ability). “In my third pod, I never saw a Mojoverse, so either there were very few of them, or (the others) learned . . . ”
Day 3 came, and Ryan swept through his opponents like a freight train. He made a few mistakes along the way, but pulled through with full force. He claims that winning the die roll was critical for the mirror match finals. “It went exactly as I expected it to. We each won when we had initiative. You always want odd (with Teen Titans). Although, in game one or three I was really in control, and then ended up making it way too close on the turn I won because of a misplay or two. I only ended up winning because I Overloaded his Roy Harper Arsenal, at the end of the turn to win by 1 or 2 (endurance).”
The finals also nearly fell from his grasp in game four, when a judge made what Ryan called a bad call by allowing his opponent (Mark Slack) to use Tamaran to power-up Ryan’s character and then Overload him. “You can't power-up an opponent’s character, which I (told the judge). But (he) disagreed with me, (and) not realizing he wasn’t the head judge, I didn’t appeal it. Because of that, I lost a guy that turn when I shouldn’t have, and then was short one guy next turn, which made me have to Titans Tower the only character in my hand, as well as not clear his board, as well as lose a character. And then, the turn after that, since I Towered my only character, I couldn’t Optitron for anything and had no 5-drop.”
He pulled himself together, however, and rebounded from a game four loss to win it in five. “At that point, I was just thinking, ‘there’s no way I’m losing this over that!’ And yet, if the game (had gone) to (turn) 7, I had three Press the Attacks and might still have won. Either way, if I hadn’t have won the die roll, you'd probably be interviewing Slack right now. In Titans or Brave and the Bold matches, or mirrors, whomever has the initiative first wins . . . barring horrible draws.” Ryan did indeed win that die roll, adding luck to his formidable skill and careening his way to a PC win. “Basically, I was as prepared as I could be, and put myself in a position for Lady Luck to choose me . . . and she did.”
When it was over? “Relief. Basically, I felt relief.”
Think About the Future
Next for Ryan is PC Amsterdam, the upcoming Pro Circuit stop in late April. He hasn’t started preparing yet because the new Marvel Knights set isn’t out, and it may make an impact on the metagame that would inevitably alter plans. “Right now, the metagame is pretty crappy, because you either play something good like Titans or New Brotherhood and try to survive the four copies of Overload in every deck, or you play something with bad matchups or that isn’t consistent. Either way, at the end of the day, it’s all going to come down to how lucky you were.”
I asked Ryan about the other decks that are doing well now at major tournaments across the world, and he wasn’t too optimistic about them. Curve Sentinels? “All topdeck. Not to mention it has trouble with Titans and TNB.” Common Enemy? “I’ve never liked Common Enemy. Too many pieces, too inconsistent, and it’s hard to fit Overload in. Plus, it loses badly to those stall decks.” FF Beats? “FF needs too much tech to have good matchups all around. And even they can be overloaded by the Savage Beatdown/Overload combo that every deck is packing.” X-Stall? “Too topdeck-y. I'd rather play Solitaire, which has the same problem, but at least you can't Ka-Boom! it.” Spider Friends? “SF is kinda fun, simply because it’s slightly new, and it has the 7-drop Spider-Man. But it auto-loses to any Brotherhood deck, and is pretty topdeck for its curve.”
In the end, he concedes that there are some interesting decks out there, some of which are playable. “I guess the metagame's fine, aside from all the Overloads, though a bit stale because Web of Spider-Man offers nothing other than a counter to Titans and an upgrade to Curve Sentinels, which is hardly new anymore. And Man of Steel so far hasn’t given us anything competitive, (at least not) that we've found yet! I'd be happy with the metagame if Savage Beatdown was errata’d to only target a character you control.”
As for Ryan’s future, he’ll be at Amsterdam for sure, although a previous commitment almost made him miss it. He has to skip the Las Vegas $10K and may be forced to miss the Orlando $10K, as well. He’s desperately hoping to make PC New York in May, but may be forced to miss that one for a friend’s wedding. In the meantime, “we're always testing. Choosing a deck for (Amsterdam) will depend on whether Marvel Knights is legal for it and what the metagame looks like.”
The Final Curtain
Before letting Ryan escape, I asked him a handful of simple questions with some not-so-simple answers.
Ryan’s favorite card? “Press the Attack. A powerful card, and it fits in all kinds of jank.”
Ryan’s favorite team? “Teen Titans or Brotherhood, I guess. I don’t really care about teams.”
Ryan’s favorite out-of-game character? “I can’t say that I have one. Like I said, I’m not really a comic fan. But I like the obscure ones, and since I don’t read comics, most of the guys that end up on cards are obscure (to me).”
Ryan’s favorite in-game character? “Unus! No one expects him. Nothing like beating people with the most maligned character in the game.”
Does he prefer the DC or Marvel universe? “They both feel different, but I like them both.”
Ryan’s favorite draft set? “Man of Steel is the best one, but Marvel Origins just has a lot of fun cards.”
What's the best thing about Vs. and UDE, and what do they most need to work on? “The game is well done and the cards are well tested, which is rather impressive. They also throw great support behind the game, and my brief time with all (of) the employees has been enjoyable. However, it'd be nice to have a clearly defined release date for every set. And many people were disappointed in the judging at the last PC—besides a few incorrect calls, I think the judges were far too lenient, allowing some game-altering take-backs.”
Do you like one-game matches, and why/why not? “I do. It gives you more matches, and more matches means each loss is less important. It also means if you play two of four people playing a deck that auto-beats you in a 250-man tournament, you're not that screwed. It’s a more forgiving system; you can lose more games and still be in the running. It’s no fun to have to win every match, or all but one. No matter how much you prepare, you can't control the luck that much.”
What is the best aspect of the current Vs. competitive tournament system, and what needs to be addressed or changed? “Playing in a tournament system that gets so much support and has such well designed cards is great. It makes for a good competitive environment, and the huge prizes are nice too, of course. The judging is again the only negative aspect I can think of. Far too lenient. If someone forgot to do something two phases ago, then they forgot—it’s their fault. Oh, and if they just had lines on the pairing sheets it'd speed things up incredibly . . . it’s such a strain trying to figure out who you're playing, and on what table, when there are no lines! And lastly, I wish the minimum deck size was smaller, or that they’d introduce more searching/filtering cards. I don’t imagine that'll happen, of course. Perhaps that would (even) make things a little more dull and predictable. Although, if the deck size were cut to 50, you'd only have to buy one pack of sleeves!”
Also known by his screen name Kergillian, Ben Kalman has been involved in the Vs. community since Day One. He started the first major player in the online community, the Vs. Listserv, through Yahoo! Groups, which now boasts well over 1200 members! For more on the Yahoo! group, go to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Marvel_DC_TCG.