Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA | March 17, 2018 | Burst Format
Event Thread | Results Spreadsheet

While this might have only been Philadelphia’s fourth tournament in recent years, after Philly Phreeze, Deathscythers Destroyed, and Double Standard, and the region still lacks a consistent tournament schedule (partially my fault because I’m away at college half the year),  Jimmy Zeutron: Blast Zone Jenius was not only the region’s largest tournament, but the largest Burst tournament to date with a total of 68 players (and it also had the best name of probably any WBO tournament ever ).  

Prior to this, the largest tournaments I had ever competed in were Beyblade North 2017 (41 players) and BEYBLADE COLOSSEUM (48 players), both of which were held at conventions and had a large number of experienced players to help out, so the degree of organization they had was a lot to live up to. It would be a bit of an understatement to say that I was nervous about making sure everything ran smoothly.

The drive to Philadelphia was actually pretty stressful as well – For the longest time my arrival time was stuck between the 1 hour 50 minute mark and the 2 hour 10 minute mark, just because the traffic and construction kept pushing me back. However, at some point, Google Maps decided to tell me that it had found an alternate route that would shorten my travel time… to 31 minutes haha.  I arrived at the park a little before 10:30. YamiPoyoChan, flazburger09 and his mother showed up soon afterward and helped me set up the tarps and stadiums. I only had a few minutes to test one minor matchup I had overlooked before everyone else decided to show up all at once – thankfully I was more prepared than I was last time and brought a table with me, so people at least knew where to line up. I closed registration at 12:15, and after taking roll call, introducing myself and the judges, and explaining the rules, I was able to start the tournament at around 12:30.


(Credit to @[DocOne] on Beyblade Animo for the photo)

The Tournament:


The way I ended up having the tournament organized was that there were four main stadiums, one each for the four people I had appointed to be judges ahead of time. I ran the bracket and called out matches (Thanks again to SparerSquash and his dad for letting me use their megaphone for this – it was a huge help!) from the table I had set up, only stepping away to judge a match involving one of the judges or to participate myself. After each match had concluded, I had the judges report back to me with the result. We got through the Double Elimination stage in about 5 hours, so all in all I think it was a pretty well-oiled machine.

As for the actual tournament itself, on an abstract level I was excited about the amount of BeyPoints I could potentially gain from performing well at this big of an event, but also nervous because losing would also mean I would take a huge hit points wise… the size multiplier can be a double-edged sword sometimes, especially with a crowd this large where there are so many new, unknown players and it’s impossible to keep track of every match and what combos everyone is using while also running the tournament. However, I anticipated seeing a lot of Spriggan Requiem and Garuda G3 combos, and because of this, I leaned pretty heavily on Deep Chaos 7 Bearing in the first stage, also making use of MGC Maximum Garuda 7Cross Atomic and Ark Bahamut Knuckle Revolve when appropriate. While I ended up going 4-0, there were a few things about the first stage that struck me as pretty surprising:

• Rather than Spriggan Requiem or Garuda G3, Drain Fafnir/Fafnir F3 seemed to be the popular pick of the day – two of my opponents used F3.Y.Nt and dF.0B.At, and there were a lot of other players who were using it dF/F3 combos as well.
  
• For some odd reason, Destroy was almost completely absent, though Atomic saw a ton of use despite being more expensive to obtain. I believe aside from myself, the only person I saw use Destroy was Clockwork02 – and his Destroy did not spin very freely at all. He discovered this after going down 0-2 against AndyHG’s Deep Chaos 7 Revolve with Spriggan Requiem 0Bump Destroy… and unfortunately I had to make the tough decision to rule it as not malfunctioning, and to not allow him to swap it out. Even players that owned Destroy, like Ardmore Bladers and Common Pickle, used Atomic over it instead.
  
• Along with Destroy, Nightmare Longinus was almost completely absent. I thought more players would think to exploit all the Fafnir combos going around, but I also understand playing Attack in Double Elimination being a risk not a lot of people are willing to take.
  
• Left Spin non-Bearing setups were consistently having success against mG/G3 combos. I saw Sr.0B.At outspin mG on Orbit/Yielding on several occasions, and I believe Ethan el crack was able to defeat AndyHG’s G3.7B.N with F3.8C.Nt. I also think that someone (it may have been Jimmyjazz39) was able to defeat mG on Orbit with Drain Fafnir on Guard.
  
• I also did not see as many Garuda G3s as I was expecting, so maybe they aren’t as widely available yet as I expected them to be. I know at least AndyHG, phoenix613, and RedPanda2 all used G3 combos, though they were ultimately shut down by Spriggan Requiem on Atomic and Bearing, respectively.
  

The other three people who went undefeated in the Double Elimination stage were phoenix613, Bey Basher, and Ardmore Bladers. I don’t remember seeing any of phoenix613’s matches, but based on his Deck composition in the finals, it seemed that he relied on Garuda G3 7 Atomic for most of them. Bey Basher somehow made it through a pretty tough schedule (Vincen, RedPanda2, and CodeNora, who was also using Sr Bearing I believe) basically undetected using primarily Spriggan Requiem 7 Bearing. Ardmore Bladers qualified for the finals coming out of what was probably the most intense battle of the whole tournament – he was up against his brother Common Pickle, and it was Sr.0B.At vs gZ.P.At. I only caught the end of the match, but from what I saw it was 2-2, they had just tied, and then Ardmore Bladers won by KOing Galaxy Zeus in the last round. From the losers bracket, eli11192006, AndyHG, Common Pickle, and Beygearshift7 qualified for the finals.

Between the first stage and the finals, AndyHG and Hyper xeno had generously donated a few prizes(a Dual Threat Laucnher, red mG Layer, Yegdrion, and a tackle box) to be raffled off to people who didn’t qualify – unfortunately there were only 10 non-finalists remaining at the time, since the majority of the participants had either left due to being eliminated or because the weather had gotten worse.  Since Hyper xeno and King a had shown up too late to participate, I included them in the giveaway as well – Hyper xeno actually ended up winning the Yegdrion.

The Finals:

With the weird way Challonge seeds the finalists coming out of a Double Elimination first stage, I ended up as seed 2, against Beygearshift7 for a second time after just having defeated his Sr.0B.W with dC.7.Br in the first stage. I had a feeling he would change things up on me, but didn’t know what else he had besides what he had used against me earlier. So I went with a basic deck of Spriggan Requiem Polish Destroy, Nightmare Longinus Under Variable, and Deep Chaos 7 Bearing which I had decided would give me coverage against most common threats. His deck included the same Sr combo, but in right spin, along with Drain Fafnir 4 Atomic and Twin Nemesis 2Meteor Hunter. Managed to win 5-2 using only Sr.P.Ds. Ardmore Bladers and Common Pickle both advanced by defeating G3 with Sr Atomic, along with Bey Basher, to make up the top 4.

In the next round, I was up against Common Pickle. From what I had seen of his match against phoenix613, I knew that Sr.7B.Br could beat all his combos, so I felt a little safer including nLU.V and tN.0.Rb in my deck. To my surprise, he actually switched his nL from Destroy to Variable to match mine, but aside from that he had the same mG.7F.Y and Sr.0G.At in his deck. Spiced things up a little with nL and tN, but eventually fell back on Sr Bearing to win 5-3. In the other match, Bey Basher won a 5-0 sweep with Spriggan Requiem 7 Bearing, making the 3rd place match an Ardmore Bladers and Common Pickle rematch (which Ardmore Bladers won thanks to Bump having better Life After Death than right spin Glaive) and advancing to face me in the final match.

From what I had seen, Bey Basher had used the same all-left spin deck the entire time – Sr.7.Br, aB.0B.At, and dF.2C.O – so dC.7.Br and nL.U.V were obvious choices on my part. I wasn’t quite sure what to use for my third combo, so I went with Sr.P.Ds again in case he decided to change things up on me. Turns out, even after balance tuning it, dC.7.Br wasn’t as consistent at outspinning Sr.7.Br as I had hoped – in the first round, I outspun him by a small margin, then he sniped me in the second round. The third round was a tie, and in the fourth round he outspun me by quite a bit. Switched out to nL, but wasn’t able to KO or Burst him and got outspun, so I switched back to dC again. The next two rounds were basically burst/outspin ties due to me launching a little too hard – the judge decided to give me the outspin the first time, but the second time I definitely bursted first, giving Bey Basher a 6-2 win. After letting first, third, and fourth place pick their prizes, I gave away what was left to the only other remaining player, MrCaberbalefish.

Overall
Overall, I thought that the tournament was pretty successful. The size of the event definitely felt overwhelming, but not unmanageable, and Double Elimination was incredibly helpful in speeding the tournament along. For the most part, using DE seemed pretty fair (though this is kind of hard to judge from my standpoint) and with the recent surge in popularity Burst has had in North America, I’m glad the WBO re-legalized it when they did. Thanks again to everyone who came out!

Combo wise, while dF and F3 were popular choices, it ended up being Spriggan Requiem on Bearing (and also Atomic) that were the big players that day. A little worried about Sr.7(B/G).Br being a bit overpowered –  it also looks like Kei swept the final match of To Burst Or Not To Burst 2 with Sr Bearing as well - especially if Deep Chaos Bearing can’t consistently outspin it and has a higher risk of bursting, and nL/lS Xtreme/Variable can’t KO or burst it very reliably. My next instinct would be to throw Nl Orbit against it, but aside from that (or right spin Sr.7(B/C).Br) I don’t really know…. Hopefully the Super Z Beys will change things up a little more, or at least provide a consistent answer to Sr Bearing. Videos will be going up on my channel over the next month and a half or so.

Top 4 and Winning Combinations:

1st Place: Bey Basher (Prize: 3 on 3 Booster Set)
Spriggan Requiem 7 Bearing
Legend Spriggan 7Vortex Xtreme
Drain Fafnir 2Cross Orbit

2nd Place: Wombat
Deep Chaos 7 Bearing
Ark Bahamut Knuckle Revolve
MGC Maximum Garuda 7Cross Atomic
Spriggan Requiem Polish Destroy (Deck Format Finals Only)
Nightmare Longinus Under Variable (Deck Format Finals Only)
MGC Twin Nemesis 0 ReBoot (Deck Format Finals Only)
Spriggan Requiem 7Bump Bearing (Deck Format Finals Only)

3rd Place: Ardmore Bladers (Prize: Twin Nemesis, Rising Ragnaruk)
Spriggan Requiem 0Bump Atomic
MGC Maximum Garuda 4Star Revolve (Deck Format Finals Only)

4th Place: Common Pickle (Prize: Acid Anubis, Dual Threat Launcher)
Spriggan Requiem 0Glaive Atomic
Galaxy Zeus Polish Atomic
Maximum Garuda 7Flow Yielding
Nightmare Longinus Meteor Variable (Deck Format Finals Only)

Deck Format Finals

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Ive noticed that the hasbro Garuda is super good. From my testing, G3 7M At is easily able to take out fafnir F3 7G H/At, doomscizor G/H R/O/At, and even destroying Xcalius X3 7M X/O/At. Maybe G3 7G At would be better.

One thing I was surprised about but happy to see was a return for Yielding , how many matches were won by aB K R?

Great report, Wombat!

Great Report to the world of beyblade

Ive noticed that the hasbro Garuda is super good. From my testing, G3 7M At is easily able to take out fafnir F3 7G H/At, doomscizor G/H R/O/At, and even destroying Xcalius X3 7M X/O/At. Maybe G3 7G At would be better.

Yeah, at this point I'm pretty certain that G3 outclasses mG in most cases now, since it's significantly more difficult to burst. Interesting that you're getting it to outspin Doomscizor though, during the brief period where mG was legal and before dC was released Deathscyther was a pretty consistent counter to mG since it didn't have to worry as much about bursting against a perfect circle.

One thing I was surprised about but happy to see was a return for Yielding , how many matches were won by aB K R?

It was actually RedPanda2's post that tipped me off to mG Yielding - at least for me, Yielding makes mG as tight as G3 Orbit. Not quite sure which one is better objectively, especially with Hasbro people not having a Yielding to use with G3, though the cone-shaped Yielding was definitely more vulnerable to my tN Smash Attacker in my testing. I didn't feel very comfortable using either Garuda that day though, since I couldn't get them to outspin opposite spin combos as consistently as I thought they were supposed to...

I used aB.K.R for my first match against ElectraBey's Roktavor Heavy Accel.

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awesome write up. we met so many nice people and had such as great time.

This Tournament was so fun even tho I lost ? I can't for the next one.

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TheBeybladeGuy

I hope another one in philly or around that area is soon. I only do metal fight and cant find any tournaments where I could attend. if theres a burst tournament in philly, I might go but I don't even have any burst beys.