Just got back to Austin from the Durotar Realms in Dallas and what a weekend! DJ David, from Austin, is the Durotar Champ pounding down the competition with Prophet Velen and the blue twin Phads! Congrats go to the Champ as he played a major amount of competition and came out on top successfully!

By and far, Lady Vashj builds were the biggest thing seen against today. More Haruka's hit the field, and even a Omedus as well. Pretty much, Vashj was with Bloodscale Wavecaller with an additional freind. The usual suspects were either Blindlight Murloc or Frostmane Troll, both builds finding success.

Of the top 8 teams, 6 had Epics. 2 were packing Lady Jaina and Phadalus, with one seeing Savin as the third and one seeing Elendril as the third. 3 Packed Lady Vashj, Blindlight, and Wavecaller. One packed Omedus, Haruka, and Thangal. One packed Ryno the Short, Elendril and Irana, and finally, one packed Velen and double Phad, the eventual champ.

Your truly went with the team I playtested for a long time before the realms, which is what I qualed with yesterday, the Prince Kael'thalas, Razaani Nexus Stalker, and Enraged Fire Spirit. This teams packs a serious punch if you haven't tried them out yet. It's tricky for meneuvering, and benefits greatly from this map. Plus, 3 flames strikes, plus the Kael'Thalas's Flamestrike to deal with is a massive amount of damage. I piloted it to a painful 9th place finish. I only lost twice, both to Vashj teams. The first loss was a tremendous match up, where he won 29 (needing 26) to my 25 (needing 26). We went back and forth and back and forth, and if it weren't for the last shot he got in, I could have killed my final 4 VP on the next turn and taken it. Hands down to JJ in that match, as he was having a "hell" of a day and still played a great game.

The other Vashj match was over when Kael whiffed on his 7 dice attack for 2 and flamestriked for 1. That horrendous of a roll on the outset put me so far in catch up mode it was painful.

It held up against Harukas and against Daxins though so I was very happy with it's results, even if it had some tough breaks.

Overall, the event was a blast. Everyone here was very nice, great to meet in person, and if you were there, I don't think anyone will forget the discussions of Saturday night in the Hotel Bar of "No, seriously, Hitler is a Walock and Napoleon would be a gnome, hands down." Great times!

Congratulations to David again on the Prophecized win! Good things happen to good people and David definitely deserved some good fortune after losing his AC for a few days in the wonderful Texas heat!

We'll get some pics up asap!

PS - To Kusig... hope all is as well as can be my friend! We were thinking of you on the way back and hope it turned out as best as it could given the circumstances.