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Hearthstone8 years agoMatthieist

Cydonia wins Americas Spring Championships

After a tense finals against Rosty, the Canadian player took the #1 place in the tournament.

Today the Americas Spring Championships concluded, and with it the entire Spring Season in the Hearthstone Championship tour. After yesterday’s top 8 matches were played, today the four remaining players battled for the title of Spring Champion, as well as $25,000 and a ticket to go straight to the World Championships later this year. After facing Napoleon and Deerjason, it was the Canadian player Cydonia who managed to successfully grab the title and join Winter Champion Amnesiac to represent the Americas region at Blizzcon, after defeating Rosty from the U.S.A.

For a full summary of day 1 of the Americas Spring Championships click here, whilst on this very page you will find a summary of the matches on the second day, including the Grand Finals.



Cydonia vs Napoleon

Day 2 started off with Cydonia bringing his Midrange Hunter against Napoleon’s Tempo Warrior. Though generally in favor of the Hunter deck, Napoleon had the fortune of being able to coin out a [card]Bloodhoof Brave[/card]. Hiding behind the Tauren with taunt, Napoleon built a strong board, and seemed to have this match under control. Cydonia managed to find a board clear however, using an [card]Unleash the Hounds[/card] and [card]Kill Command[/card] combination. When this was followed up by two [card]Call of the Wild[/card]s the situation looked dire for Napoleon. Keeping his head cool, however, he stalled out the game long enough to regain some tempo over the back of [card]Cairne Bloodhoof[/card], and still take the lead.

Looking to further extend his lead, Napoleon then picked his Freeze Mage and luckily queued into Cydonia’s Zoolock – a match heavily in favor of the mage. The Zoolock struggled fort he board in the early game because of two consecutive [card]Doomsayer[/card]s, but a [card]Crazed Alchemist[/card] took care of one of the suicidal Blood Elfs. From there on Napoleon had a lot of trouble dealing with the Zoolock’s board, and against all odds lost the game.

With a tied score the players entered their third game, which brought forth a clash between Cydonia’s Midrange Hunter and Napoleon’s C’Thun Druid. Although Napoleon contested the board early with an [card]Innervate[/card] into [card]Druid of the Claw[/card], the Shaman’s board still took over. After two reduced [card]Thing from Below[/card]’s and [card]Flametongue Totem[/card]’s had been played though, there was no way left for Napoleon to save the game.

As much as the third game was in favor of Cydonia the fourth match was in Napoleon’s favor. It was now Cydonia who faced an Aggro Shaman, who quickly built a strong board that could only be cleared by Cydonia’s [card]Unleash the Hounds[/card]. After that had been done, however, the Shaman just carried on playing strong minions and a combination of [card]Doomhammer[/card], [card]Rockbiter Weapon[/card] and [card]Lava Burst[/card] once again tied the score: 2-2.

In what had now become a Best of 3, a C’Thun Druid was twice victorious. First up Napoleon’s version of the deck managed to take a win against Cydonia’s Midrange Hunter, and in return Cydonia defeated Napoleon’s Freeze Mage after both his [card]Ragnaros the Firelord[/card] and [card]C’Thun[/card] had shown themselves.

The seventh and deciding game of the series consisted of Cydonia’s Midrange Hunter and Napoleon’s Freeze Mage. As it generally fares in the match-up, the Hunter deck continiously put pressure on the Mage. For Napoleon this pressure seemed to become too much. Waching the camera on the computer, it was noticable that he was extremely frustrated with some of his plays, resulting in him even taking off his headset. Cydonia on the other hand did not give in to the pressure, and just played out the game, securing his spot in the Grand Finals.



Joster vs Rosty

In the second semi finals it was Joster and Rosty who had to decide which one of them would take on Cydonia. Rosty started off strong with his Hybrid Hunter against Joster’s Reno Warlock, putting on an incredible amount of pressure. Fortunately enough for him Joster had not found effective ways to deal with all the pressure, nor had he found his [card]Reno Jackson[/card], which allowed Rosty to take the first game.

In a one-sided second match Rosty further extended his lead by defeating Joster’s Miracle Rogue with his Dragon Warrior. Using a lot of aggression in the early game with [card]Alexstrasza’s Champion[/card] and [card]Faerie Dragon[/card], Rosty came to notice the lack of board control in Joster’s hand. With this knowledge Rosty put on even more pressure and easily took a 2-0 advantage.

Joster struck back, however, using his Renolock. Playing against Rosty’s Freeze Mage he managed to control the game until the point where he was able to play his [card]Ragnaros the Firelord[/card], a card Freeze Mage has a hard time dealing with. After more pressure was applied by the Reno Warlock’s [card]Alexstrasza[/card] and [card]Lord Jaraxxus[/card], the Freeze Mage had no further ways to turn the game around.

The defeat of his Freeze Mage turned out to be just a slight bump in Rosty’s rampage, as his Zoolock put him on match point. Joster had opted for his Aggro Shaman, but the card draw let him down immensely. He had neither a turn 1 or clean turn 2 play, which allowed to Zoolock to fill up the board with small minions. From there on the Zoolock controlled the game, buffed up the smaller minions and sealed the victory with burst damage from [card]Leeroy Jenkins[/card].

With a 3-1 lead and only his Freeze Mage left, Rosty had to first face Joster’s Aggro Shaman. Hoping to reverse the roles Joster had chosen this deck as it generally is heavily favored against Freeze Mage. Generally. In this instance Joster was not able to put enough pressure on his opponent, who was slowly gathering burst damage whilst safely sitting behind an [card]Ice Block[/card]. Eventually the Shaman’s board became weaker and weaker, which is when Rosty slammed down [card]Alexstrasza[/card] and started to reverse the pressure. Joster had no way of dealing with the red dragon, and combined with two [card]Fireball[/card]s Rosty took the ticket to the Grand Finals.



Grand Finals - Cydonia vs Rosty

In the Grand Finals Cydonia started off with his C’Thun Druid and Rosty with his Aggro Shaman. The game had no serious moment of tension, as the Aggro Shaman completely dominated the game. Putting on pressure with early [card]Tunnel Trogg[/card]s and [card]Feral Spirit[/card], followed by a [card]Flamewreathed Faceless[/card], Rosty left Cydonia helplessly looking for answers he couldn’t find.

Sticking to his C’Thun Druid Cydonia then came across Rosty’s Hybrid Hunter. The Hunter did start off quite aggressively, but in the shape of [card]Disciple of C’Thun[/card] and an [card]Innervate[/card]d [card]Sylvanas Windrunner[/card] the Druid turned the game around. Hoping the Sylvanas would act in his favor Rosty hid his [card]Stranglethorn Tiger[/card] on board, but a topdecked [card]Swipe[/card] by his opponent made it so that the Sylvanas could cleanly trade with his [card]Argent Squire’s[/card]. The game came to an end when Cydonia played his [card]C’Thun[/card], which the Hunter could not deal with.

It was then Cydonia who put his trust into Rexxar, while Rosty called upon Jaina’s help. A match-up generally in favor of the Midrange Hunter, Cydonia did manage to quickly take the lead in the game. Rosty tried to take back control by playing a [card]Doomsayer[/card], but Cydonia’s [card]Stampeding Kodo[/card] thought differently about that. At this point the Midrange Hunter continued to play big threats with [card]Call of the Wild[/card] and two [card]Savannah Highmane[/card]s, and the Freeze Mage’s situation turned more grim each turn. Rosty, however, found a lot of freezing effects in double [card]Blizzard[/card] and [card]Frost Nova[/card], which enabled him to find his [card]Alexstrasza[/card] as well as [card]Fireball[/card] and a [card]Forgotten Torch[/card]. Cydonia still popped Rosty’s [card]Ice Block[/card], but using [card]Arcane Intellect[/card] Rosty still found enough damage to take a 2-1 lead.

In the fourth game it was an Aggro Shaman from Cydonia versus the Hybrid Hunter from Rosty. The game went back and forth for a while, but eventually the Shaman picked up its [card]Doomhammer[/card], and that’s when the tides turned in Cydonia’s favor. Combined with a [card]Lava Burst[/card] the windfury weapon was something the Hunter could not deal with, and the score was tied once more.

In a quickly decided fifth game Cydonia’s Zoolock faced Rosty’s aggressive Dragon Warrior. The game seemed to start in favor of the Warlock, but it all changed when Rosty put a [card]Frothing Berserker[/card] on the board. Hoping there would be no [card]Ravaging Ghoul[/card], Cydonia played his [card]Forbidden Ritual[/card] to create four 1/1’s. His hopes were crushed however, when he saw Rosty dropping the Ghoul, buffing his Forthing Berserker to 11 attack, and sealing the game.

Only one win stood between Rosty and his title, but Cydonia was not willing to give up the fight just yet. He had to defeat Rosty’s Hunter twice - once with the Zoolock and once with his own Hunter. First he chose to go with his Zoolock, and the game’s finish was spectacular. The first few turns nothing exciting happened, until Cydonia played his [card]Dark Peddler[/card] and had the option to go for a [card]Young Dragonhawk[/card]. Now this alone might not be too enervating, were it not for the fact that Cydonia had two copies of [card]Power Overwhelming[/card] in his hand. Not realizing the immense threat the Young Dragonhawk posed Rosty let it live, only to be smacked in the face for 18 damage a turn later which, when adding the Flame Imp and Dark Peddler’s damage, was enough to bring the game to a 3-3 score.

In the final game of the series both players’ Hunter decks remained. Cydonia with the more standard Midrange version, and Rosty with his Hybrid version. The latter deck started off strong, and started to quickly drop Cydonia’s life total to only 8 health. Cydonia managed to stall the game by using his [card]Unleash the Hounds[/card] to clear the board and hid behind a [card]Misha[/card] to avoid further burst damage. Rosty continued to put pressure on his opponent using [card]Call of the Wild[/card]. In the meantime Cydonia had gathered enough burst to kill his opponent, were it not for Rosty’s pesky Misha that stood in the way. A 50/50 [card]Deadly Shot[/card], however, decided the match in Cydonia’s favor by killing the Misha, allowing Cydonia to finish off his opponent and take the championships.


 

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