Date: Mon, 18 Aug 1997 18:20:40 +1000 (EST) From: Stephen Edney Subject: Sydney PTQ Report I had done a bit of playtesting for the PTQ, and had tried out the various decks including, burn, various control, even Mono-green. I have particularly liked Opidians ever since I first saw them in WL. I tried out a U/w Ophidian deck, but eventually decided that U/b with Neckrataals was a much stronger deck since I could force the Ophidians to be able to attack more often, although the deck was was weaker against burn than the U/w version, and couldn't sideboard disenchants against Sands of Time/Equipoise. Despite the fact that I had seen Ben Seck playing "Sandsipoise" I wasn't particularly worried as there would probably be no more than 1 or maybe 2 in the field due to the extremely high number of rares needed to make it if nothing else. I feel this was the right decision but as I was to see later had the wrong outcome. The deck I played. Sideboard 4 Ophidians 2 Mindstones 4 Phyrexian Furnace 4 Man o` Wars 2 Undiscovered Paridise 2 Ebony Charms 4 Waterspouts 2 Gemstone Mines 2 Amber Prison 4 Neckrataals 2 Bad Rivers 2 Dark Banishing 3 Shadow Guildmages 6 Swamp 3 Builders Bane 2 Serrated Biskelion 9 Island 2 Mind Harness 4 Dissipate 4 Quicksands 4 Powersinks 3 Impulse 1 Torch If I played this deck again I would probably drop the Mind Harness from the SB and replace them with Dark Banishing which are much more useful against the Mono-Red decks. Maybe touchstones instead of Builders Banes? Rnd 1 Stuart Fyfe - It good to see Stuart playing in a tournament rather than running and sponsoring them. He was playing a straight black deck which didn't really make me happy because my Neckrataals become a liability. First game I win when a Waterspout breaks loose. He eventually kills it but at this stage there are no other creatures in play and we both have empty hands except for the Neckrataal I've been holding since the start of the game which I play and kill him with. 2nd game I can't stop a Fallen Akari, (no quicksands, not even a Man o' war) for much of the game and then a crypt rat followed by a Dk ritualled Drain Life finish me off. 3rd game Stuart is Manascrewed. He tutors for a dk ritual to bring a creature into play and then I man o' war it back. This is then basically game, as I beat him in short order. games 2-1 match 1-0 Rnd 2 Nick Hamilton - Nick is playing a Mono-red Burn, although it's a bit more creature oriented than the versions I play tested. 1st game he gets me down early, I managage to get a few things out and start to hurt him, but it is too late and I die to burn. 2nd game he gets a fairly good start, but I also get one. He does me some damage, but Neckrataals hit the table and clear his creatures away and 2 quick sands keep the Sandstalkers at bay. A cruical moment in this game was when he played an Orcish settlers. I had a shadow guildmage in play but no red mana and 2 quicksands. I know he has at least 1 sandstalker in his hand because it has already hit me once with it. I have no red mana do I can't ping the settlers with the guildmage, so as well as attacking with the Man o` wars etc I also attack with the Guildmage. To my relief he takes the trade and blocks the guildmage and my quicksands stay intact. He realises after the match that this was a crucial mistake. 3rd game he doesn't get a particularly good draw, but still manages to knock me down to 1, the turn before I kill him. This is Nicks only match loss in the swiss, and only other loss besides the final games 4-2 matches 2-0 Rnd 3 Nick Spratt - Nick is a good friend and we have playtested the decks a bit together. Nick and I both have Ophidian decks, his is U/R, Incinerates and Hammer he also plays Snake Baskets which I probably should have had in my deck. He is also using the Wand of Denial/Memory Lapse/Foreshadow routine which my Ophidian deck used before I switched to the much more straight forward method of gaining an advantage by using Black and Neckrataals. I had just seen him last round tear someone open with Ophdians ending the game with all 4 on the table and using them for damage. The 1st game he lays down a 2nd turn Wand. I already have a hand of mostly land, and that wand is not going to help me, we both play cautiously with nick denying many spells and causing me to draw more land with the Wand and Foreshadows. This takes a *long* time as we are waiting to have mana so we can cast and then counter also. Eventually the loss of card economy due to the wands and card advantage due to Foreshadow was too much. 2nd game we play an early Ophidian/Man o` War game. He manages to force an Ophidian through once. I have 3 Waterspouts in hand, I get one on the table and start hitting him with it, eventually we trade, and then I play another. He plays a snake basket and makes 5 or so snakes but it's too late, as the Waterspout continues his work. There's only about 10 minutes left now, and we side board and start the 3rd game we are only a few turns in when time is called. I probably could have won that one as Nick was slightly Manascrewed. Oh well. games 5-3 matches 2-0-1 Rnd 4 Ben Seck. - I get paired up against an undefeated player. I know Ben is playing Sandsipoise. 1st game he locks me in about 5 turns. I conceed. I have a dissipate but no double U when he casts Equipose. It's then pretty much all over as phased out land doesn't tap for U so I can't counter the Sands of Time. 2nd Game I have a fairly good hand against him. He coercions me, I could counter here but decide not to possibly a mistake, as I could have maybe protected my impulse and hopefully got out a dissipate. Next turn he casts a Equipose and leaves a W and B Mana untapped. I smell Dk Ritual strongly, as he knows I have powersinks, and I'm one short of being able to counter for enough even if he does have a Dk Ritual. I sink, he rituals. Next turn he phases out my U mana, drops a Sands. I then play a Phyrexian Furnace which I had sideboarded in for the Neckrataals. If Ben is stupid enough to try and win only by Paridigm shift then this might work. Unfortunately Ben isn't as stupid as that and plays a Misers Cage. 20 turns later I die. games 5-5 matches 2-1-1 Rnd 5 Paul Ross - I need to win this round to make top 8. after 4 rounds I have the highest resistance on the whole standings so I'm fairly confident that I will win any tie-breaker, and I already know that based on Pascal triangle and the number of players there should be at least one person on 3-1-1 who will qualify. Paul is a "fairly solid player from Newcastle" who I think may no longer actually reside there. He has been on the table next to me for the last 2 rounds, being undefeated until the previous round. Both of us need a win. 1st game I get a mediocre starting hand, a neckrataal kills some things and a biskellion and waterspout stops him from attacking (since all his Wspouts will be smaller than mine). The game stalemates with me on about 10 life. Paul is trying to build up enough fliers (Cloud Elementals and those 1/3 things you can pump) to overlap me and kill me. Fortunately I draw a guildmage, and during my next turn I return the Neckrataal to library, draw it and begin chomping through his flyers. Paul is in a bit of a problem here because he only uses memory lapses the only way he can stop this combo is afterlife. He attacks and plays more flyers for the next couple of turns some of which die to my waterspout, the rest killed by the neckrataal. He knocks me down to 4, but my this stage I had regained total control and the waterspout finishs him off. Next game he again gets some early damage through but eventually after twice getting my nectrataal memory lapsed I kill and bounce some blockers and send my Ophdian through. This continues for a few turns and I begin to gain total control. Counters and more Man o' Wars ensure I keep sending the Ophidian through and the 2-1 drawing proves too much for him. I torch him from about 8 life to death. games 7-5 matches 3-1-1 The finals pairings come up and I've snuck into the top 8 as 8th seed as I expected I would if I won. Bad news is no.1 seed is Ben Seck which means I play him again. 1/4 Finals Ben Seck - I play as cautiously as possible leaving my mana untapped so I can counter. Ben gets an early Wand of denial and between that and 3 Vampiric tutors does himself 10 pts of damage. I counter 1 equipose and I'm forced to counter an Abeyance. I drop a biskellion he plays equipose. I'm hoping there is something good on top of my Library that Ben will want to Wand as I have a torch in hand and 7 Mana on the table which with a hit from the Biskelion this turn will be a kill. Unfortunately there isn't, and next turn he drops a sands of time and I conceed. 2nd game does not go well. He gets a plains, plays a crystal vein, and then plays another. Drops a Equipose I can only Powersink for 2. Next turn he plays a swamp and rituals to play a Sands of Time. I conceed. I'm a bit disappointed to be knocked out, since my only 2 losses were to the one deck type and there was only one in the field. Oh well I knew that Ben's deck would beat me and I took a risk that I wouldn't meet it. I'm fairly happy to have made Top-8 at a PTQ again. Thanks to the organisers for a well run tournament. My only slight gripe was with it being only 5 rounds. I'm not saying the organisers did anything wrong by that, but just that I think it would have been better with at least 1 more round. Congratulations to Darren also. Steve Edney