Grats, Derek. You played great in both of our "real" games. Borderland Keep definitely owned me. Nice inclusion in the deck.

There’s a feeling among some members of the DC meta, myself included, that the ruling of collusion at the final table had nothing to do with the actual gameplay at the table. Rather, FFG was just looking for an excuse to disqualify the players because of what had been happening throughout the day. The main complaint was that 10 of us played decks that worked extremely well together. And for the record, that’s all we did. There was no “I’ll take first, you take second” discussion. Two copies of the same deck at a melee table will almost always positively impact each other. Rush decks tend to do better at tables with other rush decks and control decks tend to do better at tables with other control decks. More specific synergies will usually emerge, depending on the specific deck. For example, I remember playing against two copies of the same deck at Gen Con. The deck ran Narrow Escape. Having both decks at the table meant that there was a greater chance of somebody having a Narrow Escape when I played Valar, to the benefit of both players. With the icon removal deck, the interaction was much bigger than normal. It’s not the fault of the players. It’s a competitive tournament. Players shouldn’t be punished for doing too good of a job at deckbuilding. The design team is ultimately responsible for creating balanced cards that do not create a negative play experience for anyone. In this case, a card slipped through the cracks. If you didn’t have a good time in the Melee tournament, that’s why. We never could have done what we did otherwise. Having gone through the experience of playing the deck, I’m not sure what I would have done differently. I actually would have preferred to play a “real” melee tournament. I enjoy the format. I didn’t find the combo very fun to play. I’d imagine it was even less fun to play against. Still, I knew the deck was out there and it was better to play it than get owned by it. Hopefully, there just won’t be any broken cards available at the time of the next tournament. Supposedly, the decision at the final table had nothing do with the decision to all play the same deck, as that decision did not violate any rules. The players were disqualified for “locking out” the other player at the table. The thing is, I know that FFG received some complaints about the deck, and it’s hard to imagine they weren’t influenced by those complaints. (What other explanation is there for the fact the Rick was included in the punishment?) Really, it’s not surprising that they managed to find a weak argument for collusion, given that they were looking for one. Almost anything could be considered collusion in Melee. If what we saw at the final table is the going to be the standard for what constitutes collusion, then a lot more people are going to be disqualified for colluding. Ultimately, FFG found a way to handle the whole thing in a way that no one would be happy. Everyone still had to play against the deck. Three players were forced to play a three hour final table from which they were inevitably going to be disqualified. Dennis was allowed to think that he was going to win the Melee only to have that taken away from him at the last minute. The wrong person won the melee. The wrong person won the overall. And we’re all left to wonder if every melee tournament will now be decided by the judges rather than the players. Ironically, I benefited from the decision. The disqualifications meant that I finished second in melee. I was playing the same deck as the three people at the final table. They were disqualified because they were more successful with the deck than I was. If I’d managed to beat Erick at our semi-final table, I would have been the one who was disqualified, and he would have been the one to move up in the standings. If Erick had just played a little worse, he would be the overall champion.