Hello everyone! Pozdrav svima!

Last week I won my first ever tournament! I usually don't have much time on my hands so I don't participate in many tournaments, but I couldn't pass on this one. This tournament was a special one because it was made in celebration of @bunsbagsandcaps 2 years sobriety! What an amazing accomplishment, buddy. One more time, big congratulations on this huge milestone. 😎

For those who don't know @bunsbagsandcaps, he's a Splinterlands streamer, he's regularly streaming on SplinterlandsTV Twitch channel and has a Twitch channel of his own (and a YouTube channel as well) and he always streams during his tournaments during which he hosts amazing giveaways. So be sure to check his streams.

I was watching his stream and joined the tournament - it was a Single Elimination tournament with Bronze League level cards and all Modern Sets allowed.

I didn't think I would go very far, but then I won my first match, then 2nd round, and match by match, before I knew it, I was in the finals!

My heart was beating so fast! I was never in the finals before, I didn't know what to expect. My deck isn't build for tournaments, I'm missing a lot of strong cards.

So we head into the battle and I won the first one, but then lost the second. I was so nervous not to make some stupid mistake that would cost me the win and the title. Thankfully I won the third battle and the pressure was now on my opponent.

But the nerves did their thing and I totally messed up the line-up for the fourth match. I had no chance to win.. Or did I?

There was less then 5% chance I would win this match, it all depended on a couple of lucky misses - THAT HAPPENED! Yeah, my opponents monsters missed 3 shots in a row, allowing my tank to get healed up and that turned the battle around and I came out as a winner!

Big congrats to my opponent @krizalid who held his ground strong and deserved to be in the finals (maybe even win the title).

Who knows what would happen if we went into 5th battle, maybe I wouldn't writing this post now...

Winner's prize was 222 DEC (!), 1 Gold Foil Time Mage card (!!) and a Chaos Legion Pack (!!!). Thanks so much to @bunsbagsandcaps for hosting this tournament and having such awesome prizes.

Now lets get into the battles and I will try to point out what strategy I used and why.

1️⃣ Round 1 of 6 (Qualifying Round - best of 1) 1️⃣

I had to play the qualifying round (one match - winner goes into the tournament), and I was pretty lucky with the line-up. I assumed my opponent would chose the similar line-as I did, with heavy ranged attack, because of the Aimless (Scatter Shot) ruleset. I wanted to counter that with Lir Deepswimmer summoner to reflect his attacks with Return Fire and make them miss with Blind. This worked out perfectly as his ranged monsters died from the reflected damage, and melee monsters had trouble with some misses in clutch moments.

Result	Details	Lineups	Battle
✅WIN✅			⚔️Link⚔️

2️⃣ Round 2 of 6 (best of 3) 2️⃣

In the second round I had two seemingly easy battles as my opponent never stood a chance in both battles.
First battle we had Lost Magic ruleset and Aim true, so I used Yodin as summoner for the Blast and extra ranged attack, while my opponent went with Jacek and his Scatter shot, Piercing and additional speed. Firepower was just too strong compared to his team. I made a little mistake, not placing Clockwork Aide in the last spot. I don't know what happened, maybe I forgot.
In the second battle we had Explosive Weaponry that's why I put Venari Marksrat in 2nd position, so when he dies it will buff my tank and the monster in 3rd position, and with 2 resurrect monsters in the team he died 3 times buffing them 3 times. Since that monster will go to 2nd position I put Oshuur Constantia there, for the Reflexion Shield and Resurrect, but I forgot I was playing bronze level cards (so used to silver and gold league) so she didn't have the shield. Since there was a Melee Mayhem ruleset I went with Camilla Sungazer summoner to reduce melee attack of the opponent's monsters and open myself dragon monsters.

Result	Details	Lineups	Battle
✅WIN✅			⚔️Link⚔️
✅WIN✅			⚔️Link⚔️

3️⃣ Round 3 of 6 (best of 3) 3️⃣

In the third round I started strong with a strategy I just love to use. Whenever I face Noxius Fumes or Earthquake and I have enough mana to choose Lobb Lowland summoner and Quora Towershead together with the two Martyr cards on each side of her (earth Fungus Flinger and neutral Venari Marksrat). That makes her almost invincible. Any other cards on top of that is just a sweet bonus. Only weak spot to this is if you block Quora's healing with Affliction.
Second battle in the third round went to my opponent. I tried some crazy mix of melee and magic with Yodin Zaku summoner, but my opponent was much smarted with Possibilus the Wise summoner and much stronger water cards.
Third battle I won pretty easily because I went with my already proven line-up with Dragon and Life splinter monsters lead by Quix the Devious summoner. Agor Longtail is one of the best tanks in the game and whenever I have more then 40+ mana I go with him and one or two monsters with Resurrect and fill the rest of the team with some DPS and/or healers.

Result	Details	Lineups	Battle
✅WIN✅			⚔️Link⚔️
❌LOSS❌			⚔️Link⚔️
✅WIN✅			⚔️Link⚔️

4️⃣ Round 4 of 6 (best of 3) 4️⃣

In both battles of the fourth round I picked the right strategy and left my opponent without a chance.
In first battle I picked Camila Sungazer summoner that allowed me to use Dragon splinter monsters. Since we had Noxius Fumes again, I put the Venari Marksrat in the team to take advantage of his Martyr ability and buff my main card on the team - Void Dragon. My opponent had a great idea with Djinn Chwala and Dax Paragon to increase her Thorns damage, but he didn't expect me to go ranged and magic attack. When Void Dragon got buffed by Martyr and Enrage from poison damage, Djinn Chwala had no chance to hit him.
I won Second battle just because I had more monsters in the line-up. 4 magic monsters buffed with +1 magic from the Obsidian summoner will always beat melee monsters (and even Djinn Oshannus when he's outnumbered).

Result	Details	Lineups	Battle
✅WIN✅			⚔️Link⚔️
✅WIN✅			⚔️Link⚔️

5️⃣ Round 5 of 6 (Semi-finals - best of 3) 5️⃣

I started the fifth round (semi-finals!!!) with a loss. Oh, did I feel nervous. I knew I had to win this next one or it's all over, and I made it so far.
I lost that first battle, even though both of us had the pretty similar strategy. In the end the decisive part was the healing from my opponent's Spirit Hoarder. If I used one healer instead of 2 resurrect monsters I would've won.
With this thought I went into the next battle, and that just increased my nervousness knowing I made such a stupid mistake. I had to get it right this time. And I did! I struck gold with Swamp Spitter and two monsters with armor. That bought enough time for my Axe Master to do damage and pick out opponents team one by one.
Third battle was a walk in the park compared to the first two battle. When I see Lost Magic ruleset and Fire splinter available I usually go with Yodin Zaku summoner to take advantage of Blast. My opponent was expecting that I would go full Melee that's why he chose Mylor Crowling summoner which gave Thorns to his whole team, but that didn't affect me much since most of my team was Ranged.

Result	Details	Lineups	Battle
❌LOSS❌			⚔️Link⚔️
✅WIN✅			⚔️Link⚔️
✅WIN✅			⚔️Link⚔️

6️⃣ Round 6 of 6 (FINALS - best of 5) 6️⃣

The final, sixth, round was here. My heart was beating like crazy, I was totally nervous, my palms were sweating. My first ever finals! I needed to win three matches, oh boy.

First battle we had Unprotected ruleset with Holy Protection, which usually means Yodin Zaku for me. But I remembered how great my strategy with Quora and 2 Martyr monsters worked out few battles earlier, so I gave it a shot. I added a little twist - a Resurrect monster. That monster resurrected the first monster that died, and it was a monster with Martyr. Then that monster died again, thus buffing my Quora two times. Now, my opponent went with Yodin, like I would have, and that Blast killed my second Martyr monster buffing my Quora the third time. And it was just start of second round. You can guess the rest of the battle.
Second round we had Going the Distance ruleset which meant Ranged only monsters. I had no chance here, since my opponent went with Ilthain summoner that gave his whole team Return Fire. On top of that he had War Chaang (I don't know how this card is only Epic and not Legendary). I knew it was over before it even started.
Now my nerves really kicked in, I couldn't concentrate at all. Thankfully next battle ruleset worked in my favor. I saw Explosive Weaponry, Armored Up, 40+ mana and Dragon Splinter. That for me always means one thing - Agor Longtail + Oshuur Constantia! 😎
I went with Sthispa summoner to give my team Phase ability, since I assumed that my opponent will go heavy Magic and that would help my team to evade some of the magic attack. By he went with Conqueror Jacek summoner and heavy Ranged attack monsters, probably hoping for some lucky Blast damage kills. Of course, I put Venari Marksrat in second position between Agor and Oshuur. Almost the same line-up as in 2nd battle of round 2, with addition of Gladius card in form of Captain Katie.
Fourth battle was Ranged only again with Explosive Weaponry, I wasn't sure if I should go with Quix the Devious summoner to reduce opponents ranged attack or Franz Ruffmane for some fancy Gladius cards. I went with Gladius thinking how I will be super smart with Martyr card at first position buffing my Tatiana Blayde in second position with healer behind her and some DPS. But I totally forgot about Ilthain (again)! My only chance was that my Tatiana dodges some attacks so my healer can keep up with the heals. And that's exactly what happened! She dodged THREE attacks in a row giving enough time for healer to heal her up and to get that OP War Chaang out of the way. After that it was pretty straightforward...