Playing pretty consistently while I was awake over the course of the event (alarm set for every 30 minutes during the day) netted me just over 700 shards with only the N slayer. Having just one of the better slayers would have allowed me to get more than one card out of the event. There's actually a wide range between having SECs and not having them. You're right, you probably don't need all of the SECs, but you definitely do need some of them.

What's somewhat confusing to me is that even with this pathetic showing I'm placing below 700th. Did the defense trolls just set and forget their decks?