LEAGUE REPORT: Level 1 Game Shop – Week 2

Week two is here! After going 1-4 last week, I was excited to see how things would go this week. I was determined to redeem myself. While I wasn’t dead last after week one, I wanted to ensure that I could cement myself into the top four early, ensuring that I get either the tokens or full art Kylo Ren (AW11) at the end of the league. Well, things didn’t go so well, my confidence was shot, and a friend helped me come to an interesting realization that I will mention after my short event report.

This week I only played three games, and two of them were pretty much the same as last week. I played eLuke/Ackbar, and eDooku/Grevious. I ended up losing very close games to both. As with my games last week, both sides only had one character left with one to three health remaining, but I just couldn’t close it out. The last league game I played was against Bala/Trooper/Trooper/Nightsister. My opponent has been playing this deck for the past month and a half, so he really knows the deck well. I barely did much during the game, and wasn’t in the best mindset going in.  My opponent even tried to give me an out by asking if I wanted a practice game, but I wanted to get as many league games as possible. So my overall record is 1-7, and I’m not exactly thrilled.

If it was a problem with the deck, I’d just change decks and keep going, but the deck is solid. I even got in my hands on the second Cunning (AW65). So I tweaked the characters a bit, and ended up with eDooku/Bala/Trooper, and took it into a test game, and lost a close one against another eDooku/Grievous deck. It was the same story, I was just one damage short of winning. I asked my opponent what he thought was missing, what he thought was the reason I kept coming up short. He said just that, it wasn’t the deck, but me, he figured I was stuck on a “skill plateau”.

Skill plateaus are something I know well, just forgot about for a time. When it finally clicked after he explained it a bit, it explains the past eight months for me. While playing Magic, I was doing really well when I first came back last summer, I did really well, placing second in back to back tournaments, then I slowly seemed to slip farther and farther behind. What I didn’t consider was that I wasn’t the one who was changing in skill, it as everyone around me. I had stalled out while everyone else continued to improve, and I’m still in that spot. This is a skill plateau, where you stall out in your overall skill level, and it is one of the most frustrating things in the world. The concept has been applied to just about every skill you can possibly have; a quick Google search showed me stuff from tennis, to running, to rock climbing, and even a bunch of general articles about skill plateaus. It’s a very common thing, and the consensus seemed to agree on three or four things necessary to get over the plateau.

• Get out of your comfort zone! I’ve been thinking about this one a lot over the few days since league night. I decided before this league started to try out new and interesting decks and character combos. Though I also said that if I lose too much during the first few weeks, I’ll just switch back to my old eJango/Trooper/Trooper deck that I took to 5th place at Level One’s first tournament. I’ve now realized that is a bad idea, because my natural play style is aggro; it’s what I played most in Magic, and what I previously played the most games with in Star Wars: Destiny (until I started running eKylo/eJango). I need to play different stuff, even with the limited collection that I have now, I can still make something that isn’t all out aggro.

• Take it easy. This one is quite a bit tougher to do, you pretty much have to get over being frustrated easily. You can’t let losing get you upset, you have to stop caring, even during a tournament. This is hard, because you want to win! There are usually prizes on the line, you want to win something, so you feel like you wasted your time. This one takes a ton of work, but I’m getting there. How did I do it? One word: Hearthstone. It’s weird recommending a different game in this article, but it’s really helped. That game has just as much random chance, and has some really maddening effects. I started playing again about a week ago or so, and I already don’t get as mad about losing to random chance. I’m actually enjoying every game I play, and I’m hoping it’ll translate to playing Star Wars: Destiny.

• Don’t give up! Giving up is the worst thing to do. You can be on that plateau for months(like I have) or even years! It’s incredibly frustrating, but you have to keep playing, you can’t give up. Practice more, take notes on every game, watch videos, read articles, anything! All of this can help you improve and get you to break out of the plateau you’re on now, so you can keep climbing!

• Get back to basics. This is a weird one for Star Wars: Destiny. Since we’re one set in, this is pretty much the most basic this game will be. You can still work on it though, a good way to do that is to play a game alone, set up two decks and play out the entire game. Take your time and think out every play for each player, while not using the knowledge you have of the other deck’s hand. This can help your decision making as well as keep your overall gameplay tight. The dice may fail you, but practice with playing the right cards at the right time can help overcome that.

So after thinking over my own list, I think I know the first step to getting myself off this plateau! Since day one of playing, I’ve played mostly villains. I started playing Jango Fett (AW 21) decks during my second week playing, since I pulled a second die. Well, now it’s time to change that, and luckily I made some trades to get things going. Next week, I think I’ll try building an eRey/eFinn deck! I still think Blue/Yellow is a good base for mid-range decks. Finn (AW 45) allowing red vehicles and weapons gives me some good cards, like First Order Tie FIghter (AW 6) and F-11D Rifle(AW 8). Though I haven’t given up on Jango Fett (AW 21) yet, I plan to revisit him once Spirit of Rebellion is released. I am very excited about next week, as well as the rest of the league. I guess reinvigorated is a better word for it. I’ll have a deck article about eRey/eFinn after I’ve tested it, as well as more articles about game theory concepts as well!

Have you found yourself on a Skill Plateau for a long time? Leave a comment below with your story and how you got off of it, I’d love to hear about it.

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