Origins Open 2019

Dates	June 12, 2019 to June 16, 2019
Series	Organized Play
Location	Greater Columbus Convention Center, Columbus, OH
Format	Constructed
Card pool	Waves 1-2
Banned	Swap Parts
Entrants	Over 150 unique players across the week; the top 32 met in a single-elimination final
Winner	Steffon Pinckney, with 3W OPBL
Event page	Origins Open @ Origins Game Fair 2019

Standings

Place	Player	Deck
1	Steffon Pinckney	3W OPBL
2	Daniel Arnold	3W OPBL
Top 4	Matthew Brower	Insecticons
Top 4	Brian Theurer	Firewheels
Top 8	Jacob Zimmerman	3W OPBL
Top 8	Adam Bixler	3W OPBL
Top 8	Kent Summerour	3W OPBL
Top 8	Nick Blandin	Insecticons
Top 16	Skyler Tipsord	Dreadwing
Top 32	David Pang	Aristocars
Top 32	Bug Catcher Sam	Blue Bugs
Top 32	Joe Baiocchi

The Origins Open opened the only official organized play season the Transformers TCG received, four days of Constructed play at Origins Game Fair in Columbus from June 12 to 16, 2019. It was the first stop on the circuit Wizards had announced two weeks earlier, and the first chance anyone had to qualify for the Energon Invitational that December.

How it ran

Entry cost $26 and was open to any Origins attendee with a valid Organized Play account while seats lasted, with a booster pack for each preliminary event entered. Four preliminary events advanced the field to a 32-player final on the Sunday, and players could pay into as many preliminaries as they liked. Qualification never stacked: a player who had already earned a seat in the final passed the next one down to the highest unqualified finisher.

Over 150 unique players took part across the week, around 30 of them in the Thursday preliminary alone, and the top 32 met in single-elimination rounds on the Sunday.

Pastimes Inc. ran the event, as it would run the whole season. Matches were best two of three on 50-minute rounds, with 25-star teams and a 40-card minimum deck.

The prize structure is what made the weekend matter beyond the money. The Top 8 took home a pre-release booster box of War for Cybertron: Siege I, a set that would not reach stores until June 28. The Top 16 earned something scarcer: an invitation to the Energon Invitational and a three-day PAX Unplugged badge. The Top 32 split a $10,000 pool, paying $1,500 down to $125.

The card pool

Only two Waves were legal, and the decklists bear that out: every card across the published Top 8 lists comes from Wave 1 or Wave 2. Siege I was still a prize rather than a format.

One card was already gone. Swap Parts had been retired from Constructed on April 19, 2019, the game’s first competitive ban, roughly eight weeks before the doors opened here.

The result

Steffon Pinckney won the inaugural title, with Daniel Arnold second and Matthew Brower third on Insecticons. Wreck ‘n Rule’s Brian Theurer also reached the Top 4, on the Fireflight and Wheeljack build he called Firewheels.

Pinckney and Arnold split the first and second prizes rather than play them out, taking $1,250 each, and Pinckney added the title, an Invitational invitation, a PAX Unplugged badge, a box of Siege I, and a signed crystal cube etched with Transformers artwork. Brower took $750, a badge, an invitation, and a box of his own.

Three of this Top 8 returned to the Energon Invitational Top 8 that December. Arnold won it, Pinckney took third, and Adam Bixler sixth.

Insecticons were the story of the opening day, taking half of its Top 8, and the hate that followed shaped the rest of the week. By the Sunday Top 8 the picture had inverted: five of the eight were on Three Wide Prime, the Optimus Prime // Battlefield Legend, Flamewar and usually Autobot Hot Rod build, which Brower identified as the worst matchup his Insecticons could draw.

Full lists for all eight finalists are preserved in Origins Open: Top 8 Decklists. The field was narrow: five of the eight ran Optimus Prime // Battlefield Legend, two fielded Insecticon swarms, and Theurer’s Firewheels was the only deck doing anything else.