Report for 4/14 VF4 Tournament, Roanoke, VA

Well, though only six people ended up showing up, we had a blast. Here are the results:

1st: D - Lau
2nd: Fireballtrap - Jacky
3rd: Gndalf007 - Pai
4th: Josh - Lei-Fei/Aoi
5th: Fenixx223 - Kage
6th: Justyn - Kage/Lei-Fei

My observations:
I came in not knowing what to expect; it was my first VF4 tournament. The pre-tourney exhibitions said that we didn't know who was going to end up winning, so that made things much more suspenseful. All I can say about the tournament is that Lau kicks butt. Ultrafast combos, leaving no room to throw, then add in mad stagger, and we saw some D Domination. D was a very good Lau player, as even when some of us started catching on, he changed up his attack to compensate. A tip: Don't underestimate stagger. From FBT, some good Jacky action involving well-timed evades and good airjuggling. Gave me a big run for my money, and then he came out on top in the last ROUND of our final-four best of 7. From Gndalf007 (me), I played mainly a counter game, but the relative speed of all the characters really hindered me. No Wolfs or Jeffrys for me to eat alive. Techrolling kept me out of a lot of trouble, as well as a bit of evasion, reversals, and just plain prediction of my opponents' actions, which was all that saved me in the final four match vs. Josh. Speaking of Josh, he would change up from Lei-Fei to Aoi when necessary, and that was always a good call. In the aforementioned match between him and I, it was best-of-seven, and I destroyed Lei-Fei in Match 1 and 2, then he came back the next three with Aoi, but then my psychic move-predicting skills came in and let me come out on top. Really had me sweating. The other two got some rough deals, especially Fenixx223, who just couldn't get his game on during the tournament, though he was rocking the exhibitions.

All in all, 'twas a lot of fun. There were a lot of close matches, and we all came out better players. We're having another one next month, and we want all of you to come in and throw down. If we get eight people, we can have cash prizes (yes, CASH!).