Memories
by Drew “Darth Weasel” Barton
Raw Deal Staff Writer
darthweasel@hotmail.com

As I look back at the last handful of years there are a lot of Raw Deal Memories that come to mind. Most of them have to do with games with the Starving Crazed Weasels, but not all. Some of the memories really reflect on the diversity of experiences available with Raw Deal

Early on there were the “Pay Per Views” where we would compete for our own created titles. Those were usually concluded with Royal Rumbles of various rules. We quickly determined the standard Tag Team rules were not well suited to our style so we created a Tornado Tag Team format that brought hours of pleasure with 4, 6, 8 or more people in the Ring at the same time.

I remember when we first became aware of a broader Raw Deal scene and attended our first sanctioned Tournament. 3 of us made the Top 4 and in a best of 3 finals I won the middle game but lost the next 2 to finish 2nd in my first official tournament. It would be quite some time before we got another shot because the tournament organizer at the time promptly moved the tournaments away from the shop. At the time we did not know how to fix that so we just did without.

Some of the things I remember are great decks. I had a Rock deck back in the time of turtle, turtle, turtle, Turn the Tide, Half Hour Suplex that in one frenetic 2 day run where every match was for our Intercontinental Title (at the time the 2nd highest our little group of 13 people had) won 45 consecutive matches. That deck was fun to play as.

Another fun deck was the Brothers of Destruction deck I built when people were saying it could not be done. I managed to fit in 2 each Irish Whips, Throw Into Corner Turnbuckles, and Gut Wrenches. Combining them with Atomic Back Body Drops, Big Splash in the Corner, and Tilt-A-Whirl Powerslams it was devastating. Between the Gut Wrenches, Throws, and Little She Devils it could win by plunge or by hard to reverse Maneuvers. It was one of the first times a deck worked better in a way I did not design it (plunge was an afterthought) than it did the way it was designed…simply hitting hard to reverse Maneuvers to build Fortitude.

In fact, that deck factors into one of my favorite memories when fellow Starving Crazed Weasel Kevin “K-Pasa Man” Bissell and I spent about 2 hours waiting for the concert doors to open playing Raw Deal on the sidewalk outside the Salem Armory.

That is one of the best parts of Raw Deal is memories of playing it in random places with friends. We have played in Taco Bell, McDonalds and Burgerville after church services, in various homes, and even once or twice in a church building.

That was the first place I saw anyone get hit by Big Show’s Final Cut. That was a moment that lived on in infamy for quite a while as the victim was teased unmercifully about it. After all, at 35 Fortitude it seemed an unusable card at the time…though of course it turned out to be fairly solid.

Another great memory was a title defense Phillip “Fullur” Barton had with his beloved RVD deck. We had elaborate rules allowing “run-ins” and early in the match he had a commanding lead. I did a run-in that made it look as if he had no chance to win the match but he somehow miraculously survived to win it. The excitement he had when the game was over and he pulled it out still brings a smile to my face.

He also features in my favorite game ever. I was playing as the Hurricane and he was playing as Kurt Angle. On my first turn I had almost a perfect hand and got off both the Hurrislam and the Eye of the Hurricane. My goal in Raw Deal has never been to win…it has always been to hit Character Specific cards, particularly the Trademark Finishers. Well, after hitting them both I was pumped. Then, he having survived, he took his turn. Turn the Tide, Olympic Slam, Angle Lock, he won….and I did not care because that was the coolest games ever. It also showed that you are never out of a game and that miraculous comebacks are possible.

That anecdote leads to another fun game. This one was with Casey VanHooser. He was playing a Mankind deck. I pounded on him for quite a while, walking through his hand-destroying reversal and getting him down to 2 cards in Arsenal when he played the Three Faces of Foley to restock his entire Arsenal. He had about 58 cards in Arsenal at that point but could not spin a Reversal to my humble Superkick…and the Victory Roll then beat him when he had essentially an untouched Arsenal.

I am sure a lot of people have felt the pain of thinking they had a game in hand only to see it change in a heartbeat. Wrestlemania has won so many games for me when they pinned me once only to see their Hand disappear and the game slip away just like that.

Other great memories include conceiving of, building, and using my first (and last) deliberately designed “Scoop Deck”, a deck that lost only a couple of games in my hands and won over 80% of its games in the first 2 turns. The ability to build a variety of decks is one of the great features of this game. I am terrible at building “control” decks so the challenge of building an effective and efficient one led me to build a Nidia and a Christy deck that were both great fun and, as is my wont, more closely resembled Aggressive decks…including Christy often throwing her Trademark Finisher every turn starting on Turn 2.

I had a lot of fun with Team Justice League. We were a group of people that lived in various parts of the country. We would take turns building a deck and presenting it to the group. Then, each member of the group would build that deck, take it to our local tournament and play it. We would then compare notes on how the same deck performed in different parts of the country. This is a great experience I can happily recommend to anyone.

Overall I have won a lot of games, lost a lot of games, and thoroughly enjoyed Raw Deal. I have met some great people through it (including my current roommates). Sadly, though, like all great things, sometimes things you love have to come to an end.

This is a busy, busy year. My little sister just had a baby and there are some assistance related things going on there. Phillip is getting married in 2 months and I myself am getting married 7/7/7, so wedding plans (and finances) are taking away playing opportunities. My other brother just moved into a new place and as a result can’t play much anymore. Eric is working more and more often on Saturdays so he struggles to find time to play. I myself also am closing in on the completion of one of my more important books and am working to get it published. This is a sadly time consuming project. On the bright side…if any of you read fantasy you might encounter my work again in the not too distant future.

Between time and money the chances to play Raw Deal have been relegated to tournaments only. I have always enjoyed the tournaments on some level but vastly prefer playing numerous games where I can switch decks after every game. Due to time it was not until today that I built my second ever Revolution era deck. I love the era and wish I could play more but sometimes reality gets in the way.

So I am taking this opportunity to thank everyone who has been involved in the game over the past few years for the hours of enjoyment I have received. I would like to thank everyone who has read these articles and hope you received some entertainment from them. And I would like especially to thank everyone who gave me feedback, good or bad, because it helped me as a player, as a writer, and hopefully allowed me to extend some of that to others.

So it is with regret that I sign off for the last time, at least for a while. Hasta luego.

Note from Barron:
Drew has been such a terrific asset to our site: a phenomenal writer who has an interesting perspective on this crazy game of ours. It’s sad to see him go but I understand the multitude of personal things he’s got going on now. Whether it’s later this year, 2008, 2010, or 2020, the door’s always wide open for more great articles from Drew. Best wishes, “Darth Weasel,” thanks for the memories … and I look forward to new ones in the future.