From: David Goodnuff Newsgroups: rec.games.trading-cards.magic.misc Subject: PTQ Wichita, KS (8/9 - long) Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 18:27:03 -0400 Chicago PTQ Witchita, Kansas 8/9/97 Once again the five of us made the trek 5 1/2 hours out the way to go play a magic tournament. George Baxter, Charles Wolfe, and Regan Reece didn't have to work Friday so they left to drive up before Cary Darwin and myself left (working sucks). Well Cary calls me and tells me that his battery has died again and he can't get his car started so I need to drive us this weekend. I'm a bit paranoid about this as my car has 99k miles on it with the original alternator and I *know* it really really wants to up and die on me. But I suck it up and drive anyways. Cary and I are both hungry but can't agree on which crappy fast food we want to stop for so we just keep pushing on getting more and more hungry until we find a Wendy's we can agree on about 2 hours into the trip. Once again, I subject Cary to the pain and torture of my 80's music collection. At any rate, we were supposed to meet the others at the tourney center at midnight but the car switch cost us about an hour or so. So we arrive there about 12:30 and the organizers give us the message from George and co. where they found a hotel room. There are 5 of us in the room, 2 per bed and I got the couch alone to myself. After threatening severe bodily harm to Cary numerous times I think someone finally just suffocated him until he died so we could sleep that night. We wake up in the morning and I grab the first shower (correctly assuming that there will be a dearth of clean towels...). We're just about ready to leave when this elderly lady comes and starts pounding on the door asking where her grandson is. We tell her that he ran away but she didn't seem amused *chuckle*. She then realizes *gasp* that she's knocking on the wrong door! :) Well we get to the tourney and find out there are 79 people playing for just one slot. Round 1 I play vs a mono-red. I was playing blue-white that was *very* anti-red. Let me just say that I won quite easily. I spent most of the match watch Cary sitting next to me getting mana screwed something fierce. (1-0) Round 2 I play vs a u-w player from Dallas. I saw a freewind falcon 2nd round first game so I assumed that it was a maro-skin/falcon deck and held an afterlife the whole game. I guess he just got rotten draws as I really didn't have much trouble winning in 2 games pretty easily. An ophidian first game netted me huge card advantage and I never did see a maro-skin. (2-0) After this round another Team Dallas guy (Dave) comes up and asks me to critique his deck so I offer some comments on it and the sideboard. Round 3 I get paired up with him of course. Well first game I die to 2 early potatoes while holding 4 white removals in my hand the entire game and drawing no plains. The next game he gets a bit mana screwed and I manage to win. In the final game he played a plains at one point rather than an island which prevented him from being able to dissipate my manowar and I was able to win with the manowar beatdown. (3-0) Round 4 I play vs a black-red fervor speedy black deck with 17 land only. He's playing 17 land and two colors. He's 3-0 and hasn't lost a game yet today so I know either he's the luckiest magic player alive or he's stacking the mana. I shuffled his deck pretty decently both games but he managed to not get mana screwed and smushed me pretty hard. (3-1) Round 5 is vs a black-red beatdown deck. We played this match in almost total silence if I remember right. It was pretty eerie how neither of us would really say anything. Well he won the first game and I won the second and in the third I was down to 1 life while he was at 6 or 7 I believe. I had a waterspout on the table and cast a second one. He had only land in his hand... He top-decks a crypt rat and casts it and rats for one. I use my honorable passage to prevent the damage to myself and win. (4-1) Round 6 I play vs an identical u-w. We get deck checked before the match and once again it mana screwed both of us. Luckily I was hosed a bit less and managed to pull out the win with I think 3 land first game and 4 land the second. It wasn't very pretty on either part...I *hate* mana screw. (5-1) Round 7 I look at the standings and there are 2 people with 16 points, 6 with 15 points and 2 with 13 points. The 8th person (Charles) has horrible tiebreakers...much below anyone elses so he has to play which means that if the rest of us draw we will have 1 18, 2 17, and 5 16 pointers (4 from draws and 1 from the victor of the two 13 pointers). So I draw in to the finals and Charles wins I believe 2-0 to make the finals as well. I'm not sure of the exact breakdown of the finals but I believe it was something like this: 1 u-w 1 mono black 2 b-u 1 mono-red 3 b-r Quarter-finals is vs another b-r beatdown deck. First game I'm a little mana shorted and manage to pull it out by playing very slow and controlly. I made him slow down and play against the style of his deck which was huge. Second game I get a much better start and play it beatdown style while he is still in a slower control mental state. The games took a while but it was a pretty easy win. Charles manages to win as well. Semis I play vs a 12 year old kid playing b-u and charles plays vs the mono-red deck. First game I was a bit short with only 3 land I believe and only one of it was blue. His necromancy's were what did me in, however. We both had waterspouts but he had nekrataal as well and necromancy to bring them both back. He won when he top decked a necromancy just as I was gaining control of the game. Game 2 I side out one of my quicksands going down to 7 non-blue lands and those are the 7 lands I get. *sigh* I hate mana-screw. I find out that the mono-red has defeated Charles as well so if I had won I would have almost certainly won the tourney as mono-red is the easiest matchup for me of any I can imagine. Well the 12 year old went on to win and qualify. It was a rather weird environment actually. There were several mono-green decks built to hose blue. One in particular *started* meerkats, boas and tropical storms! None of them did well at all, however, as green just loses to nekrataal hard. David Goodnuff goodnuff@ix.netcom.com Nuff on irc #mtg