Subject: PA Tournament Report
Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 23:19:00 -0500
From: "Brenda Carrier" <bcarrier@velocity.net>
To: <fkusumot@ix.netcom.com>

Hello Everybody,
Evan Carrier here with a PA Tournament Report

The PA State Championship was a great time! I believe that there was 108
players in attendance.  The tournament was a Type 2,  with 7 rounds of
Swiss.

We (The Guys from SubAtomic Comics) did quite well.  Rob did the best from
what I can remember.  He was playing an Academy deck and was 5-0-1 the last
time I talked to him.  I went 4-2 with my deck, which is called "Elf-Nad"
(Elf-ball seemed so boring).
The decks at the tournament were the best I' ve seen in a while.  We saw
everything from sligh, to draw-go, to of course Tolarian Academy decks. I
think we counted 13 players with the same or nearly the same form of
Tolarian Academy.

Though I didn' t do as well I would have liked, I did acomplish one thing,
 I took on an Academy deck and WON!!
My deck has a simlple answer to drawing a lot of cards.
Abundance

Just call lands until all of your lands are in your hand and keep calling
land.  The other cards you have to draw are diverted because you don't have
anyland in your deck.  It worked perfectly.

My deck went something like this:

1x Child of Gaea (Big, Green, Mean)
1x Fyndhorn Elder
3x Elvish Lyrist
3x Seeker of Skybreak
2x Overrun (Makes my elves big and mean)
1x Disintergrate
4x Fireball's
3x Killer Bee's (Our unoffical Team Leader Jon helped with this one I have
to give him the credit for these.  They work GREAT!)
2x Mirri's Guile
2x Argothian Elder
2x Abundance (YEAH take that Academy Decks!!)
3x Sphere of Resistance (I have to thank Gibby for this one.  They worked
Great also,  the slowed every deck I played against down.)
1x Verdant Force (Lots of little green creatures make my Cradle happy)
4x Llanowar Elves
3x Skyshroud Elves
1x Mirri, Cat Warrior (She rocks!)
4x Priest of Titania ( One of the best cards from Urza's Saga)

4x Gaeas Cradle
2x Mountains
11x Forests
2x Thran Quarrys
2x Wastelands

SideBoard (This is the Part that hurt me the most
2x Whirlwinds
2x Altar of Demetia
2x Fogs
2x Scalds
2x Streams of Life
2x Scragnoths
2x Meltdowns
1x Disorder

Here's a summary of how I did Round by Round

Round 1

I played a young lad playing a weak form of black rush.  He was bent on
using breach.  About turn 5 a 15/16 Killer Bees finished him.

Then the next game turn 5 a 23 point fireball ended him
so I'm 1-0

Round 2

I played ,of course, a Tolarian Academy deck.

First game I got lucky because he was using ancient tombs to much and I got
a Fireball of before he could go off.

2nd game he went of before I could do anything.

3rd game I got my Abundance out and he tried to Stroke of Genius me for 65
card but Abundance put an end to that.
This was the best game of my Career so far. I felt so proud to win against
that deck.

So now I'm 2-0

3rd Round

I played against a really good black rush deck.  All he did was drop black
creature after black creature and beat the junk out of me.

Same thing second game.  I was really upset by this.  I don't know what to
do about black rush.  (If anyone can help me email your thoughts to
"heavye@hotmail.com"

So now I'm 2-1

4th Round

I went up against some form of a Arcane Laboratry/Ertai deck

First game he plays a bottomless Pit,  so I lost 2 elves before my hand was
emptied and he lost 3 (Yes 3) of his Laboratrys to his pit.
Then a couple of turns later I Fireballed him and he died.

Next game was slow thanks to an early Laboatory.  But another Fireball did
the trick for him.

So now i'm 3-1

5th Round

I played against a very rude and cocky kid.  I didn't like him in the least
bit!
Anyway he was playing a very strange Merfolk/Counter deck.  All he would do
was counter my more important cards and kill me with mefolk that had
Islandwalk thanks to his Lord of Atlantis and he would use his Tidal
Warrior to turn my Cradle into an Island.

I lost to twice.  My deck was helpless to his counterspells.  And I
couldn't draw a Scragnoth to save my soul.

So now I'm 3-2

6th Round

I played a strange deck and I never got to what it really did.

First game he thought it would be cool to put a Shackels on my untapped
Killer Bees.  So a few turns later a 22/23 Killer Bees with Shackles on
them killed him

Next game was pretty uneventful until a 28 point Disintergrate killed him

So now I'm 4-2
and dropped because I had no chance of making the cut.

Well hope to see everybody at the Next Tournament,

                    Heavy E (Tri-Captain of Team Smooth)