Riff-Raff’s Guide to Busting Freshman

Posted: Sun Jan 25, 2026 12:05 pm

October 2025, my 2 Freshman warriors achieved the rare feat of earning both the Tournament Champion and the Runner-Up in the same tournament. There were a lot of factors outside of my control that led to this result, but this article is about those few things within my control, what I did and why.

The actual TC’ing of Freshman with your warrior is left as an exercise for the reader.

1. PHILOSOPHY 204

When and how to bust a Freshman warrior is a personal choice, and you can tell a lot about a manager based on who they bust, when and how. There are many ways to bust a Freshman warrior, but this way is mine. The focus of this article is on Freshman busts, but I do include basic notes on later tourneys, as well as sandbagging. There is a glossary of terms at the end.

If you’re new to the advanced tourney game (or want a refresher), the next part will be of use to you. If you’re an experienced player, skip to Section 3: “I Like Big Busts and I Cannot Lie”.

2. TRUST THE PROCESS

For me myself personally, I want to bust a warrior as early as possible; the longer you wait, the better your competition will be. This is certain; what is not certain is that MY warrior will be better. In my experience, supplemented by conversations over the years with various managers, here is how I think of each class.

Freshman: Everyone has flaws. Physicals and FE can get you to a deep run, but don’t guarantee success. 21 WL/DF AB’s rule here. Otherwise, I’ve found big Damage (Trem+) and high Attack (Advanced Master+) rating can overcome FE. Regardless, you need HP and Carry because everyone swings back.

Common End Game Bosses: High FE TP’s, Big Physical BA’s, and TMM.

What to look for: 21 WL/DF ABs. Barring that, low starting overall skill base. High WL, preferably 21. High starting ST, or a lucky damage roll. Some history of success; a bad Rookie is probably still a bad Freshman.

ADM: Blood Gamers and mode WT/WL 21’s are common foes in a deep run. You’ll still see a variety of styles, but there tend to be fewer ABs. The styles least likely to TV are Bashers, Slashers, Strikers, Pikers, Plungers, Rippers, and Wastes.

Eligibles: Former TC’s. Prized Warriors, especially when facing an “off style” like Piker. ABs galore. You name it; you’ll see a variety here. If you’re thinking of busting a guy in Eligibles simply because you can’t get all his ST and CN trains in under the ADM line, you might be spending an additional 2-3 years for the same 3-3 result.

Contenders: Everyone is 25-25-x-25-25-x-25. Warriors sit here forever because they don’t want to get pulled into Primus. It is very difficult to have any stats left to bust here, so most of the warriors are sandbagging.

3. I LIKE BIG BUSTS AND I CANNOT LIE

I had 2 warriors I considered ready:

DON'T @ ME (43-5308) of YUPPIE SAY WHAT? (2309) [59-44-2,210,122FE], will fight Freshmen.
He is a lunger with ST=24(7) CN=18(5) SZ=12 WT=20(3) WL=20(3) SP=5 DF=3.

Don’t @ Me is a Longsword fav who TV’d Rooks back in the day and went 6-3 as a Freshman in a trial run. Not a great rhythm (MOD/VH) or learn (Init), and not particularly blessed (+2 Attack) but for Freshman big damage and high Attack might him a chance. I burned 2 Attack to make sure he stayed under the line and started training stats.

While preparing for the tourney, D@M trained ST to 24 and bumped to Devastating damage one train earlier than expected (ST 24 unlocks Devastating damage for a SZ 12; ST 25 guarantees it). On the very next turn he trained CN to 18 and sat at 147 skills and 18 stat trains. In my experience 150/18 is dangerous territory, and I didn’t want to risk him going over so I sat him, planning to wait for the freeze and a 50/50 WL train.

AIR BNB (45-5564) of YUPPIE SHELTER (2507) [63-46-0,199,112FE], will fight Freshmen.
He is an aimed blow with ST=13(6) CN=24(7) SZ=7 WT=12(1) WL=21 SP=4 DF=20(3)

Air BNB looks a lot better on paper than Don’t @ Me. He’s a Fist fav, with a LO / LO rhythm, and Defense learn, but with a starting 17 DF. He was an also-ran on a contest team who I intended to retire upon graduation but continued to develop him because of his favorites. You never know when it’s going to happen.

AB’s get a 15-skill penalty for their tourney class; Air BNB was at 135 skills and 18 stat trains prior to his bust.

4. THE PLAN (PRE-TOURNEY)

Air BNB: Air BNB’s plan was to train DF to 21, then WL to 23. This is straight forward, and once the DF 50/50 roll was made, I was feeling pretty good about Air BNB’s tourney as both WL trains were at a 100% chance. The 16 skills helped, as well as the fact that while WL 22+ nets 0 Defense, the 21 DF gave 2.

Don’t @ Me had a different problem: no natural 21’s to train. This made his best possible train a 50/50 proposition. If he made his first 50/50 WL train, he’d have another 50/50 WT train to achieve and even worse chances at his 3rd train. D@M could conceivably go for 0 for 2 and be behind the other busts. This is just another reason why a natural 21 WL is always preferable.

For a successful run, you need some luck to augment a good plan. Don’t @ Me made his first 50/50 WL roll (huzzah!), and the bust was on. Train #2 I went for WT 21 and made that too; WT 22 was made on Turn 3 and Don’t @ Me went in with WT 22 (4) WL 21 (5) and 21 shiny new skills, including 5 more Attack and Defense. A good start.

5. THE PLAN (IN-TOURNEY)

TC’ing is hard, my friends. There are 2 key decisions to make:

a. Tourney training
b. Which styles to use an alternate strategy against.

Don’t @ Me: As tourney training comes at half the success rate of normal training, I wanted to maximize my chances at making stat trains, especially early. While a natural 3 DF isn’t usually counted as an asset, the fact is there are a lot of skills achieved with almost any DF trains so that’s where I started, saving the WT and WL trains for later rounds.

Effect: Trained DF 4 times in 9 rounds, raising it from 3 to 7. Trained WT rounds 10+ and never made a train. Pfft.

Don’t @ Me’s favorite weapon is Longsword so that decision was easy, but his rhythm was only partially useful, with a Moderate Offensive Effort and Very High Activity Level. He ran hot in APM/S LO backup LO against everyone except TPs and WS, where he ran on favs in ALE/S.

His only loss was to a Howlin Wolf Parry-Strike. Go figure.

Opponents: 3 PS; 3 TP; 1 WS; 1 SL; 1 LU; 1 ST; 5(!) BA; 1 PL;1 AB

Air BNB: Since I still had a max WL train available to 24, I spent the first 3 turns on WL hoping to make both trains to WL 25; I got one to 24. Turns 4 through 9, I went for DF (achieving one train to 22) and rounds 10+ I trained the natural 11 WT, making 2 trains to 13.

As an AB, Dodge tactic minute 1 is de rigueur. Air BNB was able to run on his favorite Offensive Effort against everyone, and his Activity Level versus TP PR and WS. Heavy armor because even a FI AB gets hit sometimes.

Opponents: SL; WS; 2 ST; 6 (!) BA; PR; 2 AB; PS; TP; LU

6. RESULTS

Air BNB started 16-0, by far my best tourney run ever. Then he ran into Don’t @ Me and finished 16-3; it happens. I never would have expected the LU to come out ahead in that matchup. It goes without saying that having 2 warriors start 31-1 is the best I’ve ever done, and likely will ever do.

There will always be a Howlin Wolf Piker around to drop a fly in the ointment.

7. GLOSSARY

50/50 TRAIN: There are 3 turns run between the Freeze and the Tourney. A common practice is to attempt a 4th train at 50% chance of success (assuming 20+ WL) and if you make the train, you continue with the bust (moving on to training a natural 21 stat, or a 2nd 50/50 try). Otherwise, you go with Plan B, whatever that may be (usually complaining on Chatzy, but also going back to training CN, sitting the warrior until the next tourney, giving up, etc.)

ADM FREEZE: 6 weeks prior to the tourney run date, Lee “freezes” all ADM warriors in their current class. You can request that RSI email you the mini overviews for your warriors, and you can see if your warriors changed classes (hint: they typically only go up, not down).

BURNING SKILLS: Raising stats like ST to gain specific skills (i.e. Attack and Parry) even though you have not learned all 20 skills in that area. These skills can be learned back once you reach the Primus arena, but for lower tourneys they are essentially gone, lowering your warrior’s skill ceiling in that area.

BUST: Deliberately training your warrior beyond the tourney stat/skill limit to gain a first-turn advantage in a specific ADM tournament. The success of the tourney will depend on how successful you are in achieving successive stat trains, so a high WL is advisable.

MINIS: Shorter versions of your warriors overviews that can be requested at any time from csr@reality.com but are most useful to get immediately after the tourney freeze, and prior to executing your first turn of trains.

SANDBAGGING: The fine art of developing your warrior right up to the tourney “line” and sitting them there. You prevent your warrior from improving by training a 25 stat (often ST, but frequently CN or even WL) on repeat. Useful for harvesting style master awards for other developing ADM warriors of the same style. Requires patience, and typically a relatively large roster of ADM warriors.

ArchMaster Poster Joined: Mar 10, 2008 Posts: 2033

Very very nice write up! Kudos! I will use some of the wisdom here for sure.

Posted: Mon Jan 26, 2026 7:22 am

Nicely done, Riff Raff. Kudos.