Subject: PT ROME (9th) Date: Tue, 01 Dec 1998 11:40:44 EST From: David G Humpherys To: fkusumot@ix.netcom.com PT ROME (9th) Let's just start with the basics: ****************************** Deck list: Recur Whale "Free Whaley" 4 Whale 4 Recur 4 Force o will 2 Counterspell 1 Priest Gix 1 Attunement 4 Intuition 4 Shield Sphere 4 Impulse 4 Merfolk Traders 3 Duress 1 Triskelion 1 Stroke of Genius 4 Underground Sea 3 Underground River 10 Island 4 Swamp 2 Mishras Sideboard: 4 Chill 1 Giant Tortoise 3 Ophidian 1 Counterspell 1 Duress 3 Arcane Laboratory 2 Energy Flux *********************** Testing/Advice (Darwin Kastle, J. Frank, Tom Guevin, Manning, Bregoli, other Your Move-rs). Play vs Darwin showed me general importance of duress and then later on provided key academy testing for tuning (counterspell config). T. Guevin's advice kept me focused on combo (e.g. impulses)...getting rid of lame creatures I had...so I searched and found better ones: sphere and factory. ********************** What the deck does? The ideal: Turn 1: Lay land here (and on next three turns). Turn 2: Merfolk Traders (discard something ... preferably whale) Turn 3: Intuition for whales (+/- gix if I don't have two black sources) Turn 4: Recur trader (or drop shield sphere if they blew up trader) to whale... ...whale to whale...etc for lots o'mana then recur whale to trader and back drawing your deck until you get stroke or triskelion (do infinite stroke or recursive trike). Tossing Forces "at will" to surive til turn 4. Otherwise: 6 land, a trader, a whale, a recur and ....swap til 2nd whale then as above. Backup: Whale, Merfolk, Factory beatings! Most likely after turn 2: trader toss whale, turn 3: recur whale. It can happen otherwise too. *********************** Sideboard thoughts: Academy must die. Must beat sligh. Nothing really works vs Necro: hope I don't play it or top-deck combo. What else will there be? First 8 listed vs sligh Last 10 vs academy (snakes vs both) That's what I'm expecting to face. Tune vs other decks...ophid against discard, counter&duress vs combo/control, etc. *********************** Why I chose this deck: I won two straight tourneys with it right before Rome. It had quick kill, forces, counters, and duress = good vs academy. Plus, it has good sideboard possibilities vs academy = I can win without my combo, hence arcane laboratory; and I have no artifacts .... flux. It seemed to do well vs sligh before sb. It was okay vs necro. It seemed to do well vs other misc stuff. Hoped not to see WW/x. Most importantly, I had worked on it alot but not on much else. Tom had convinced me it was a better combo deck than Academy although guess what he played? *********************** On to Rome: All from memory...somewhat accurate I hope. Round 1: vs Jon Finkel (feature match 1) I'm jet lagged, I'm not super confident in my deck, and now I must play Finkeltron. Nice Start. At least we chat abit and ... well last time I played him in the first round of a PT (Atlanta) I beat him :) Game One: On my turn three I lay attunement with an entirely blue hand including two forces, two whales, and recur. I just need a fourth land. I draw no land. I attune the whales away, no land, I impulse, no land. He plays thrull surgeon, I force, he plays recur, I force (he's already survivaled his inf. combo). I draw...no land. He plays tradewind. I draw no land, I lose. I'm pretty frustrated and also have decided to ignore survival in sideboarding. Game Two: He plays an early order sacred torch!! I play recur. A few turns later I draw whale and play merfolk in hand...recur whale. He plays eater of the dead. Crap! On turn seven I topdeck whale, I play whale, attack. Attack with two whales, play trike, to finish him (he took 2 pts somewhere, cities or early merfolk?). Game three: I duress recur. I see baboons, two pyros. He plays baboons to kill my only black on turn three (via bird). I force. He recurs it next turn. He gets out tradewind then eater (removes my whole graveyard). I don't have much of a chance ... I later intuition for a duress to take recur but his two cards in hand are both recurs. 0-1; Games: 1-2 (Surv-Recur) Round 2: Nobuaki Miyagawa Game One: I think I force a Pandemonium and combo him at six land. Game two: I draw into lots of permission, trader, factory. He intuitions for Lion's eye and two naughts. Not sure what's up, I give him naught (a mistake?). I later duress a yawgmoth's will leaving him two pande, and and the previous naught. It doesn't even occur to me that he still has the combo with two pandemoniums. I play ophidian. I go to town but he draws hymn or duress for like 4 straight turns. He plays a pande, he may have just gotten 4th land. I top deck duress, hitting the other pande. The factory, phid, and merfolk finish him. Three game wins, only one by combo, wtf???? 1-1; Games: 3-2 (Pande-Naught) Round 3: Gordon Benson, this was a fun/friendly match Game One: His pups roll in but I stall long enough to combo. Game Two: He plays first turn patrol, tormod's crypt. I play island. He pays echo, attacks and plays 2nd crypt, but not second land. Looks like I'll take this in a quick two as I can see my next two turns will be chill, ophid. And they are. Unfortunately his next three turns are mtn; mtn, blast ophid; blast chill. I play tortoise and trader and things still look okay. I play a second chill which he later blasts. I play a third chill. He later blasts. I intuition for two whales and my fourth chill (in retro I might have just gone for land to thin???), he lets me have the chill. I successfully cast my fourth chill of the game. I get out trike but then he gets to seven land and just goes sandstalker (forcing me to use trike to kill an oncoming swarm), ball, ball. Game Three: Island. Mtn, done. Hmm no 1st turn drop or is he holding a blast for chill. Well I play turn two trader with whale and recur in hand. He blast the trader. Ooops. He plays pup, scroll. Then ball, then another blast. I can't get whale in my grave. I lose. 1-2. Games: 4-4. I'm pretty despondent now. Darwin is 3-0 with (Sligh) academy and I feel like I'm letting him down. Wish I had started testing the best deck early enough to play it here. I'm just looking to enjoy myself now. Round 4: Andrea Vitali : super friendly guy. Game one: He busts out a quirion and I avoid laying land number 4 since I know how bad geddon is for me. Unfortunately the turn I play a trader or something not laying a land for a counter like I could, he plays a tradewind. Argh. Now I have to overextend on land or I'll get locked. I'm forced to tap out again or else I get locked. He geddons. Next turn I top deck force. Sigh. Game two: Wow, I'm screwed...here come his blasts, lobotomies, and whatever else I can only imagine: I bring in a massive duress and counter. Whooppee. Maybe two ophids to go with forces? We both come out slow ... but I combo him following a duress...trike him out. Game three: He plays an early null rod, does he really think this is gonna cut it? I duress him, go for it ... search through library...hit trike... look at his null rod sadly...sigh...then keep "jaluming" to the stroke. He asks me afterward if I could get rid of enchantments. Nope. Ah, I should of brought in this planar void. That's an understatement. Hmmmm.... 2-2; Games: 6-5. (5cg/Tradegeddon) Round 5: Dario Parazzoli Game one: Forest, elf. LLL, 10land green, stompy, or??? Didn't exactly seem to be any of the above. Green weenies abound but I believe I combo him. Game two: He plays t1: elf, t2: tracker!...my only creature in hand is a trader and I kinda want to slow him down and I'm a bit overconfident and well sure I'll force that. He plays spectral bears! Hmm, I've used these in PT1 and PTDallas not so bad but now I make arguably the worst play I've ever made in a PT. I guess I'll play this priest and recur to shut those bears down ... if he has a way to kill recur, oh well. Gotta shut down those bears. He plays choke. Ooops. What's with choke for this environment. Oh well he attacks with the bears. Next turn, he untaps bears and I'm like, "nope, they don't untap". I think I probably then turn a very bright color of red. 3 top 16 PTs, other top 32s, just made 9th in GP Boston...maybe I am all washed up??? How humiliating!!! Where's my F%&^@#* head. Adrenalin abounds and I think I wake up abit while armor of thorned bears pound me. Game three: He gets out several elves and a scroll. I recur a quick whale, trade it for a couple elves and giant growth. Force a night soil. Then go off. 3-2; Games: 8-6 (Green weenie, scroll) Round 6: Andreas Cermark Game one: I think I comboed him this game. He seems pretty impressed by the trader tech. Game two: My hand gets destroyed and I get lake drained. At least I duressed what would have been a turn two lobotomy. Game three: Not much time here. Game one was long. Lots of pondering here. I foolishly don't force a necro early since I decide I'd rather protect my early whale with the force and let him try to survive under the necro. I force or duress a disk. Then I lay an ophid even though I could try to combo....but fear a contagion, spin, blast, bolt, etc would leave me with a crap hand. He drains whale, spins ophid. Crap! I get ophid back. He lays two factories and b-gnome. Time is called. Extended time leaves me with two ophid and around 8 life. Him with two factories and gnome at one life. Draw. 3-2-1; Games: 9-7 (Necro w/ heavy discard; splash red and blue). Round 7: Jeremy Baca Game One: He comes out with a mediocre academy start. I combo him. Game Two: He combos me turn 3. I don't have the force. Game Three: This is how I made day two and yet I don't have the foggiest how I won. Lab or combo????? 4-2-1; Games: 11-8 (Academy) Just happy to make second day. DAY 2: Feeling a bit more alert. Round 8: Peer Kroger (Feature match 2) Game One: A fairly drawn out game especially since he makes me go all the way through the combo. I had forced away my stroke so I had to do the more time-consuming trike-route. Kinda amusing since I loop a couple times generating 2 black, one blue each time then say can I just have 100,000 of each and Bethmo say no it has to be 2:1 ratio and Peer says no that's okay and then I ask if I really need to keep track of my mana now and she says I still do...I explain I won't use all of it to kill him and then I will just pump factory, in response pump factory, etc, with whatevers left. And that's what I do. Just seemed kinda ridiculous (I can see the flip side though). He's clearly playing academy. Shoulda drawn earlier maybe. Game two: He only drops an early rack. I play a flux with force backup. Didn't figure it was worth holding out for more artifacts. At some point he taps out to play MoMa with one card in hand. I draw my sixth land with a whale already on the board, and recur in hand a trader in graveyard. I think is there anyway I can be stopped. Hmm... well I better attack just in case to bring him to 8 or something. Well that was the one way I could have lost; if he had tapped a land during my attack phase. While he realized this plan, confusion about his life total caused him to space out. I combo him. 5-2-1; Games 13-8 (Academy) Round 9: Cristino Luca (Feature Match 3) Game one: I remember he intuitions for turnabouts turn 3. Turnabouts me at the end of my turn on my following turn. Not much point in using my counter or force. Then he takes his turn and says done. Hmmm. Not strong. He later tries to go via tide and I use counter and force. I combo him. Game two: I draw all permission and no creature or combo cards. I counter virtually everything he plays, many at two for one (high tide, spiral, etc). I believe I get out arcance lab and whale him out...not really sure. He was very friendly and supportive the rest of the day. I was very impressed by this nature in my two italian opponents. 6-2-1; Games 15-8 (High Tide) Round 10: Ryan Fuller Game one: My opening was like 2 duress, intuition, and 4 land. I have no clue what he is playing. He plays turn one pup. Crap!! Not drawing into any of my combo I intuit for spheres. THEN I topdeck recur, I recur sphere to sphere to buy time...boy did this seem lame. Two turns before I would likely die I top deck trader, top-deck whale, toss whale, go off. Game two: He plays turn one pup which I shoulda forced by my game plan but I space. I play turn two trader. I force a bolt on it. Again right before dying I manage to do an impressive top deck or two and go off. 7-2-1; Games 17-8 (Burn/Sligh) Round 11: David Bachmann Game one: I know he's playing tide and I like this matchup. We have a very long game with both of us coming very close to going off a number of times but I'm the one who finally manages around 35 minutes into round. Game two: I force through a phid and arcane lab. He gets out MoMa. He's definitely trying to rush me. He intuitions during one of my discard phases for spirals. He asks if I have any effects, I don't believe I said anything, he quickly untaps and starts to draw...I say, "Wait I want to do something, during my turn." The judge agrees that he's rushing and I haven't ended my turn. I impulse, get a force. He then takes his turn taps both my islands (I did have a counter), attack phase, spiral, I force... he has no cards. I have a huge advantage and win. 8-2-1; Games 19-8 (8-0 in games day 2) (High Tide) Round 12: Terry Tsang Unfortunately he watched most of my match versus Ryan Fuller. Game one: He has a pretty standard sligh opening. I draw three recurs and a river as my only black. He has waste on board and wastes it when I recur a whale. I duress him having a small chance to win next turn. He topdecks a fireblast to kill me. Game two: Turn 2,3,4 Chill. Should be game. His pup just keeps coming and I have no creatures. I finally draw a trader. He succesfully scrolls it with 7 cards in hand. Crap! I draw an ophidian and he misses scrolling it twice. I forget if I bother to combo him. I think I just killed him with whales. Game three: My opening hand is Force, Impulse, Recur, 4 Island. I ponder a long time and keep it. I force a first turn pup. I draw a chill but fear a blast and hold it as the board is empty. He plays turn three ball. I play chill while he's tapped out. I draw two more recurs. I never draw a source of black. I'm out of the top 8 in all likelihood. 8-3-1; Games: 20-10. (Burn/Sligh) Round 13: Jakub Slemr (Feature Match 4) Game One: I force a survival. I trader/whale. He Nekrataals trader but I then recur a sphere to whale and he has only two cards in hand so ... I decide to drop recur again so I can try to start combo next turn. He had monk in hand!! He plays several creatures and a recur, but no creature in graveyard to recur. He has a Nekrataal in play so I can't attack or block. On my last turn if I draw my last recur (I intuitioned earlier for them...maybe making my earlier gamble a poor one) I would win but chances are I won't and I don't. Game Two: I draw a factory as my only land. I chose to let him play. I decide to keep. I don't like my odds in this match after boarding. So I just hope for the best. He duresses me turn two which is pretty embarassing in a feature match when you have a factory draw. He takes impulse. I topdeck two straight islands and attunement my way to victory. That's magic for ya. Game Three: He plays turn one carrion beetle. T2, he lays a fetch land. On my turn two I play trader and toss whale. I cross my fingers. I don't think he had third land. He may have played blossoms here. I recur whale. He's a bit on the defensive now at least. I duress a recur leaving him with vampiric tutor (I have a force of will). He eventually tries to cast recur for blossom to blossom action but I cast force with 5 mana. He pyros. I draw my 6th land and play recur. He starts to count my sideboard. I guess that's a good sign. That's game. 9-3-1; Games:22-11. (Survival/Recur) Preceeding Round 14 it looks like the following has to happen for me to make top8: two of the people ahead of me by 2 points have to play AND amongst those tied with me there must either be a draw or whoever gets paired down (if not me) has to lose. Before the round we all have a meeting with the head judge and say if we want to ID. I see Justin Gary shake hands with his opponent during this episode so it looks like top 8 isn't going to happen unless there is now a draw AND a pair-down loss. Sigh. Round 14: Jamie Parke (Feature Match 5) I know he's playing high tide which bodes well. Game One: I mana stall pretty bad but I have 3 forces. My only other blue card is an attunement. I finally draw a third land. I finally draw a 4th land (swamp, still need two blue) but hold it to attune away. I wait a draw or two hoping for another blue card. I get impatient and play the attune. He force spikes. I say done. He tide spirals, I force, he spikes. Crap shoulda laid the swamp after the other spike. Don't think it mattered here. I draw no forces (one out of game anyway) off spiral. Games two and three: I unfortuately can't separate the two in my mind now. I believe they went much the same. Duresses were big. Arcane lab was big. Factories went the distance in both. One game highlighted an intuition for duress, lab, counter after he had just boomeranged an ophid. He gave me lab. He countered ophid. I drew a duress. Next turn lab goes thru.....The other game I couldn't find a second source of blue even though I have two counter and force...he tries tide spiral. I counter off my lone tided island. Lab and factories. 10-3-1; Games:24-12. (High tide) Finish 9th as only 31 pointer not to make top 8. With some pretty lackluster plays (at least none of them really came back to haunt me), this didn't seem so bad. The fact it was my second 9th place (Paris the other) stung a bit. I finished 9th in GP Boston. Darwin finished 9th in Chicago. Tom 9th in NY. We have to kick this habit. "Paris all over again." That's what I'd been saying all weekend due to the dominant combo deck, Europe, etc. and now I finish 9th again on top of it. Summary: Round: vs Opp. Deck Type Games Matches 1 Finkel, Jon Survival/Recur LWL 0-1 2 Miyagawa, Nobuaki Pande-Naught WW 1-1 3 Benson, Gordon Sligh WLL 1-2 4 Vitali, Andrea Trade-geddon LWW 2-2 5 Parazzoli, Dario Green weenie WLW 3-2 6 Cermark, Andreas Necro WL 3-2-1 7 Baca, Jeremy Academy WLW 4-2-1 8 Kroger, Peer Academy WW 5-2-1 9 Luca, Cristino High Tide WW 6-2-1 10 Fuller, Ryan Sligh WW 7-2-1 11 Bachmann, David High Tide WW 8-2-1 12 Tsang, Terry Sligh LWL 8-3-1 13 Slemr, Jakub Survival/Recur LWW 9-3-1 14 Parke, Jamie High Tide LWW 10-3-1 Props: -My opponents: pretty casual games, no warnings, etc. -Darwin for making top 16 again and for being my only constant playtester through my 13(?) PTs. -Your Move Games -C Senhouse,J Frank,M Bush,C Manning,T Guevin for support -LePine for a New England representative in the top 8 Slops: -None for now. Dave Humpherys (yes that's "er" not "re") dhumpher@mit.edu