Greetings and salutations my fabulous FAB folks! Welcome to yet another coverage review article here on FABREC, penned by yours truly. Real life got in the way of me getting this to you with my normal turnaround time, but I hope you enjoy it anyway.

Today, we’ll be looking at the feature matches from Calling: Tampa!

A Champion Made in “Champa Bay!”

Calling: Tampa featured the World Premiere of Flesh and Blood‘s latest set Rosetta, and was unique in the approach it took. No one outside of Legend Story Studios offices had full knowledge of the bombs in the set. Previews were very limited, and this made for a great experience for everyone who managed to get there in the flesh and blood.

Before we get to the numbers and the game play, I want to start with the usual shout out to the casting team. ManSant and Savage Feats maintains the gold standard for Flesh and Blood event coverage and we’re lucky to have him working for our entertainment. (Ethan, if you’re reading this, thanks for the time stamps in particular.) Sam O’Byrne, Elly Bird, and Michael Feng were the stars on the other side of the camera for the weekend and all did great work.

Seriously, I don’t want to take anything away from the wonderful job that Elly and Michael did in the booth, but Sam just rocks every time I see him. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: I think Sam O’Byrne is the best caster Flesh and Blood has right now. Every single time he’s behind the mic, his non-stop energy, enthusiasm, professionalism, and well-developed game knowledge keep me invested from start to finish.

But that’s probably enough nerding out about the casting team. Let’s talk numbers now, shall we? (Or, what numbers I could find…)

The Numbers We Always Want to Know…

Sorry to disappoint, but it seems that this is the second large event in a row where there wasn’t a live blog to go along with the action. At this point, I’m wondering if there’s a position at LSS that needs to be filled. (If so, I might know a guy that likes writing about these sorts of things and would love to discuss…ahem. Anyway.)

Unfortunately, despite scouring both days of the live stream I couldn’t find any actual numbers this time, other than what we have for the Top 8. The casters gave viewers their takes on standings between rounds, but I couldn’t find a hero breakdown for Day One or Day Two.

Calling: Tampa consisted of 14 rounds of Swiss total – eight rounds of Rosetta Sealed on Day One and six rounds of Rosetta Draft on Day Two, followed by a final pod of Rosetta draft in the Top 8.

Top 8 Cut

With no ado whatsoever, here’s the Top 8 breakdown for Calling: Tampa:

1. Michael Hamilton (Aurora)
2. Michael Dalton (Verdance)
3. Lucas Oswald (Florian)
4. Andrew Lorenz (Aurora)
5. Shawn Dhaliwal (Florian)
6. Ignacio Villasuso (Oscilio)
7. Noah Clark (Aurora)
8. Eric Dauernnheim (Florian)

In the final pod, there were six Runeblades and two Wizards, with a balance between the elements.

Feature Match Highlights

Day One – Eight Rounds of Rosetta Sealed

Round Three – Noah Beygelman (Verdance) vs Andrew Rothermel (Aurora)

To keep it interesting, I’m going to bounce between heroes as much as possible. Round Three between Noah Beygelman on Verdance and Andrew Rothermel on Aurora is where we’ll start. Both players had full equipment suites and Noah went first, trying to leak some damage through with a weapon swing followed by a Trailblazing Aether.

Andrew cashed in his Sanctuary of Aria and the ability of Trip the Light Fantastic to not start the game with too much pain. On Andrew’s turn, he started with an Arcane Cussing and immediately popped it with his chest piece, the Bloodtorn Bodice, gaining a resource and three Runechants. Despite a solid turn from Andrew, Noah finished the turn still at 20 life thanks to his Arcane Polarity.

It took most of the time in the round, but Verdance eventually outlasted Aurora. Gaining a critical life point from Fyendal's Fighting Spirit kept the new Earth Wizard in the game long enough to take the last of Andrew’s cards (and the fist bump) from him.

Round Seven – Matt Muus (Florian) vs Erika Forslof (Oscilio)

Matt Muus and Florian came under pressure immediately from Erika Forslof and her Oscilio. The new Lightning Wizard started things off with a Comet Storm // Shock, threatening six arcane damage immediately. Matt tried to gain a few life in response, and weathered the storm, ending the opening turn at 19.

Florian swung back just as hard, and smacked Oscilio down to 13 life as Erika decided her cards were better spent on offense. Erika brought it down to the wire, with both heroes ending the game at one life and three-for-sevens everywhere. But eventually Florian won the slug fest and took the game with the final few cards left in his deck.

Day Two – Six Rounds of Rosetta Draft

Round Eleven – Michael Hamilton (Verdance) vs Lucas Oswald (Oscilio)

In Round Eleven, Michael Hamilton on Verdance faced off against Lucas Oswald on Oscilio. These players had met before on camera in Round 8. Michael took the win then, so Lucas was looking for redemption now.

This was a definite “outlast or outblast” game between two of FAB’s newest heroes. Lucas started things off with Overflow the Aetherwell and a shot from his lightning rod (Volzar). From there, it looked like Lucas was trying to stack a massive arcane damage end game like he had in Round 10. Michael and his Verdance had to turn on the Earth beatdown to finish the game before then.

Lucas tried to keep some pressure going and both players traded life totals for aggression during the early turns. Fortunately for Michael, his deck seemed to be full of beefy attacks like Fruits of the Forest and Fyendal's Fighting Spirit.

Once both players hit single digits, things began to favor Verdance’s efficient attacks, reminiscent of the game play that Michael used to win the first Flesh and Blood World Championship a few years ago. Unfortunately for Lucas, it was just as effective for Verdance in this round as it was for Iyslander way back when.

Round Thirteen – Yuki Lee Bender (Oscilio) vs Andrew Lorenz (Aurora)

Superstar Yuki Lee Bender on Oscilio met Andrew Lorenz on Aurora in Round 13. Andrew is a constant threat at the top tables for these marquee events and has been the “end boss” around Atlanta for longer than I’ve been playing the game. Yuki already has an impressive resume of top finishes and was looking to add another by locking in a slot in the Top 8.

Andrew’s Aurora came out of the gate swinging, immediately establishing tempo with premium red after premium red. Andrew had found himself in the only Aurora seat for the pod and his deck seemed to be extremely powerful. The critical point for this round seemed to be when Yuki took a large amount of damage to keep two cards.

She went down to two life, only for Andrew to cash in his equipment to threaten lethal with a red Meat and Greet. Yuki managed to cover the four damage, preventing the trigger, but was at a huge life deficit with no real comeback. The pressure never stopped, and Aurora completely dominated the rest. Yuki ran out of options and defenses eventually.

Top 8 Cut – Rosetta Draft

Quarterfinals – Noah Clark (Aurora) vs Lucas Oswald (Florian)

First things first, I want to shout out the awesome Goat Dad hat that Noah was wearing. Those were limited edition from Card Culture Apparel, a clothing brand created by the founders of The Card Guyz (#freead, #noshame). Clearly, Noah has great taste in cardboard related fashion, but the real question was if his Aurora draft went as well as Andrew Lorenz’s from before.

The short answer is no. Because there were six Runeblades sharing seats in the pod, no one was able to horde a large amount of the card pool. Lucas had found a good Florian seat though and both players seemed to be allergic to blocking until things became lethal. Once Noah had to start blocking, Aurora wasn’t able to trade efficiently with Florian and Noah offered the fist bump.

Semifinals – Michael Hamilton (Aurora) vs Shawn Dhaliwal (Florian)

Michael Hamilton’s Aurora had an equipment disadvantage compared to Shawn Dhaliwal’s Florian, who had a pair of Four Finger Gloves. That didn’t stop him from cashing in his Twinkle Toes on turn zero though. However, the next turn Shawn used up three of his equipment on Michael’s crack back, so Michael ended up on the positive side of equipment quickly.

He also seemed to have found more of the red Lightning attacks for his deck than Noah had in the Quarterfinals and Fyendal's Fighting Spirit is a bomb in this format. Even so, this game wasn’t the flash in the pan that Aurora probably hoped for. Shawn and Florian gave a good effort, but the former World Champ eventually closed it out with a Flittering Charge.

Finals- Michael Hamilton (Aurora) vs Lucas Oswald (Florian)

For the third time in the same event, Michael Hamilton and Lucas Oswald sat across from each other for a game. Twice in the Swiss, Michael had defeated Lucas and just had to do it a third time to claim his fourth Calling trophy. Lucas, on the other side, was looking for revenge and his first Calling win.

Michael as the first seed had the choice of first turn and had Lucas start the game. Lucas started things off by sucking a few cards from Michael with Malefic Incantation, dealing no life total damage, but thinking ahead to the end game. That was a theme that the casters pointed out throughout the game. Lucas always seemed to be thinking a turn ahead and into the late game.

Arcane Cussing came down for Lucas and seemed to stall the first few turns as Michael tried to play around it.  He blocked out with three cards and attempted to pop the Arcane Cussing with a Burn Up // Shock. On his podcast, he explained that he made a mistake here and forgot about the Sanctuary of Aria on Lucas’s side of the board.

Lucas was able to cash in the Arcane Cussing and seemed to hold control of the game all the way to its end after that. Lucas Oswald and Florian eventually put it away with Condemn to Slaughter, taking his revenge on the former champ in their only game from the weekend that really mattered.

Final Thoughts

Even though real life kept me away from watching the World Premiere live, watching it after the fact was worth it. I always wonder if these streams still get played after they end. The quality of the stream, the game play, and the casting means I still feel like I got my money’s worth, even if I already knew who won, so I feel like the streams should be.

Lucas Oswald finally claimed a tier-three event trophy, firmly cementing himself as one of the brightest young minds in FAB. And, now that Calling: Tampa is behind us, we can all focus on what comes next…..brewing with all of these new heroes!!

What cool stories have you heard from friends that went to Calling: Tampa? If you went, what was the best moment you had? Do you want to listen to my buddies holding down our podcast while I’m covered up with real life shenanigans? Feel free to find me on Twitter (X) or Discord as Dracohominis87 and let me know!