From: csivils@blkbox.com (Craig Sivils)
Subject: OK City ptq report
Date: Thu, 10 Jul 1997 22:20:30 GMT

I wasn't supposed to post a tourney report :)

But since more than one person has posted reports containing the deck
arch-type I played, I figured what the heck.

Back when WL first came out, I threw together a hideous creation.  A
deck I called "bruiserford", a deck with 40 creatures.  I had showed
it to some of my friends and a couple people on the internet.

One of my friends, Roy knew it had potential, so when someone else on
IRC started describing the deck that won a very early PTQ and it was
similar.... Roy took it and ran with it, resulting in his own version
of it.

The thursday night before the tournament, Bryan and Roy are talking at
Empire comics about maybe going to OK on the 5th for the ptq.  I tell
them they just have to see my deck first.  Turns out they are both
playing stuff very similar (sigh, the whole world had the same idea I
did).  I'm encouraged somewhat though that their decks are somewhat
different from mine.

I get to thinking about it, and since I have the friday off, I decide
what the heck and me the wife and children all drive to OK city so I
can give the ptq a shot :) (quite a drive from Houston with 4 kids).

I meet up with Bryan/Roy there and it turns out that Bill Macey from
Austin is also running a version of it.  Bill and Roy had been talking
the deck over and ended up with very similar versions of it.

In play testing, my deck had been rocking the house.  I signed up for
the tournaments with high hopes.

Round 1 vs David
David is playing a mono-black deck.  Game 1, He rituals out a
dirtwater wrath, I can't draw a man-o-war.  David plays a land every
turn and uses a ritual or two to finish me off.  Argh.  Game 2, I have
two islands and a hand full of black cards.  I've got the wind
completely knocked out of my sails :(  But both games, the only
offense David had was the dirtwaters, I shut everything else down.

Round 2 vs Margie
Margie is playing a green/red deck.  In game 1, she uses her forest to
play a turn 2 rogue elephant.  After I man-o-war it, she never sees
another forest (with a hand full of green).  In game 2, I had a slow
start then all of a sudden she torches me two turns back to back and
follows up with a fireblast (yikes!).  In game 3, My deck deleivered
up the goods with two man-o-wars (one on the green pitch a discard a
land creature) a mind harness (on the re-cast pitch a land creature)
and two nekretalls.

Round 3 Vs Adam
Adam played a red/black ld deck.  In game 1, I'm having trouble since
the LD is keeping me low on mana.  Eventually I get just a little mana
and then the flood of creatures just swarm Adam.  In game 2, early
merfolk traders get me a solid mana base and a pair of mind harnesesd
talrum minotaurs help my cretures finish him off.

Round 4 vs Matt
Matt was playing prospbloom.  In game 2, he had such a mana-glut that
I couldn't figure out what he was playing till he finally played a
forest.  I thankfully finished him off before he could make use of his
mana.  In game 2 I got a slow start (no blue) and all of a sudden it
was game.  In game 3, he has mana trouble and my creatures don't grant
him time to recover.

Round 5 vs Ron
Ron was playing red with black splashed.  In game 1, I just poured out
creatures and overwhelmed him.  In game 2, I played a turn 2 Ertai'
and felt like I was in good shape.  Ron dropped a turn 3 fire diamond
supported aether flash!  Things would have looked quite bad, except my
deck happily delivered up the 4/4 thinks the flash tickles beatdown.

Round 6 vs (forgot his name, sorry).
At this point, I'm actually beginning to think I have a shot.  Bad
move.  In game 1, I sit looking at two nekretalls and one black mana
as I'm on the receiving end of some red nasty's.  In game 2, I'm about
to put him away on my next turn when he draws the incinerate to result
in "incinerate, fire blast, fire blast".  I look down at my life....
11.  That's game, set and ptq for me :(

I stayed in on the long shot that since it's a small ptq, who
knows....  But since I lost in round 1, my opponent win% is really
really really bad. 

Round 7 vs Jeff
Jeff is playing a u/w phaser deck.  In game 1 I get in mana trouble
and it's over quickly.  Game 2, I have the too many grave yard gobbler
glut draw, but in a stroke of stupid genius, I start playing a barrow
ghoul/vulture every turn.  Every next turn, the barrow ghoul I can't
support happily pays the upkeep for the other after having held off my
opponents offense.  My opponent, I guess didn't think I could keep
this up the whole game playing at such a huge card
disadvantage........  He was wrong :)  Game 3, Jeff can't find blue
mana and I get a quick sage owl/ertai's.  Now I had drawn my lone
desertion from my sideboard, and I hadn't seen it all day.  Since I
had 5 mana, I kept the familiar in play and pounded him for 3 a turn
waiting to use my desertion, just so I could say I used it.  Well
eventually Jeff played a flash knight, MINE!  Having acheived moral
victory, I dumped 3 creatures a turn for the next two or three turns
and ended the game :)

After all was said and done, I ended up 14th.  Roy lost in semi's and
Bill lost in finals.  I didn't do bad, but no where near the invite.

BRUISERFORD
9 Swamp
8 Island
4 Bad River
4 Ertai's Familiar
4 Man-o-War
4 Merfolk Traders
4 Fog Elemental
4 Waterspout Djinn
4 Fledgling Djinn
4 Nekretall
4 Barrow Ghoul
4 Circuling Vultures
4 Sage Owl

The foundation of the deck is two principals which have existed in
magic previous to WL, but have gone largely unexploited at the t2
tournament level (at least not among "popular" decks).

The first as Roy was quoted, is "grave yard superiority".  It's the
use of the graveyard as an asset.  The Ertai's just plain rocks as the
graveyard pumper.

The second, is in the use of creature/land utility cards.  Even though
the deck has only 40 creatures and 21 land, it still has 16 library
manipulation cards, and 8 creature targeting effects.  (I also tended
to use the fog's as creature removal).  The traders were usually used
as a late game card to dump a useless land for a useful critter.

I'm doing this from memory almost a week after the tourney, so I don't
remember much of my sideboard other than what was in the report.

The funnest moment of the tournament was when we were outside in the
hall, and I pointed out to my friends that Ertai's familiar was a
"pre-sideboard" card vs sandsapoise.  It was amusing to see how long
it took different people to figure it out (or not).  I think the
Ertai's is the quirrion ranger of this set.  It didn't look that good,
but it just keeps getting better and better.

Craig