Subject: Osaka PTQ Report, part 1 (Mirage block) Date: Tue, 23 Sep 1997 17:32:54 +0900 From: David Low Hi all, The first Japanese PTQ outside of Tokyo was held in Osaka over the weekend of September 20-21. The last Mirage-block PTQ in the world, as a matter of fact, barring some backwater in New Zealand on the 30th (assuming the WotC homepage is right!) :-) About 300 people showed up, including maybe twenty of the top Tokyo players (Tsukamoto, Nakamura, Goro, Komiya, Funakoshi, etc.), competing for two spots (one airfare-paid). Nine 50-minute rounds of Swiss changed the metagame somewhat, since slow decks would have a few problems. Unfortunately for some serious players, though, they ran into some people who were just there for the games and playing things like "stall-Hammer" (Gerrards, anti-critter, Blessing (both types :-)), winning by Hammer recursion or decking two days later) which had trouble finishing one game, let alone two or three! Alternatively, if two control decks ran into each other (UW-spout, mono-U Illusionist, etc), a similar problem could occur. Given that anything worse than 7-1-1 would not have made the cut for the second day (top-8 only), an early draw could pretty much put you out of contention. It might well have been better for them to run like they did in Tokyo, with a much larger cut through to the second day (32-64 or whatever), but time and space requirements won out. Last weekend in Takamatsu, I'd shown a mate of mine, Fukui Kunimasa-san, a mono-U Illusionist deck. Untuned, it ran through his favourite ErTog deck (and he's a good player :-)), and he was captured by the concept. As I'm sitting in the tournament hall wondering what deck to register, Fukui-san has arrived, and shown me what he was going to play: the Illusionists :-) Eventually, I decided that fun and originality had to win out over power, so for what might be the last time, I tried another variant of the "Spectral Red". Besides, Ron and I had been chatting until 5am in the morning, and my brain just wouldn't have been up to a control deck :-) As it turns out, it wasn't even up to a burn deck!! R: Incinerate(4), Thunderbolt(4), Hammer of Bogardan(4), Fireblast(3), Kaervek's Torch(3), Viashino Sandstalker(3); W: Abeyance(3), Afterlife(1); Multi: Kaervek's Purge(2), Delirium(2), Savage Twister(2); Artifact: Mindstone(3), Cursed Totem(2), Bosium Strip(1); Land: Undiscovered Paradise(2), Gemstone Mine(2), Rocky Tar Pit(3), Mountain Valley(2), Grasslands(2), Mountain(9), Swamp(1), Forest(1), Plains(1); Sideboard: Delirium(1), Savage Twister(1), Forsaken Wastes(2), City of Solitude(2), Elephant Grass(2), Afterlife(1), Disenchant(3), Honorable Passage(3). Metagaming against 'tog and Ophidian and Illusionist, pretty much, and prepared to die a horrible death to "lower-order" decks :-) The versions James Jenkins took to one PTQ top-4 and another #9 were: (Dallas, late August, 9th): R: Incinerate(4), Thunderbolt(4), Hammer(3), Torch(2), Fireblast(4), Viashino Sandstalker(4); G: Elephant Grass(2); B: Vampiric Tutor(1); Multi: Delirium(4), Kaervek's Purge(2), Savage Twister(2); Artifact: Phyrexian Furnace(4); Land: Rocky Tar Pit(4), Mountain Valley(3), Swamp(2), Forest(2), Undiscovered Paradise(2), Gemstone Mine(1), Mountain(10); Sideboard: Coercion(3), Stupor(3), City of Solitude(3), Kaervek's Purge(1), Savage Twister(1), Elephant Grass(1), Emerald Charm(1), Touchstone(1), Vampiric Tutor(1); (Oklahoma, early September, 4th): R: Thunderbolt(4), Incinerate(4), Hammer(4), Fireblast(4), Torch(3), Talruum Minotaur(4), Suq'Ata Lancer(4), Viashino Sandstalker(4); Multi: Delirium(3) W: Abeyance(2) Land: Rocky Tar Pit(4), Swamp(1), Plains(3), Gemstones(2), Undiscovereds(2), Mountain(12) Sideboard: Delirium(1), Kaervek's Purge(2), Honorable Passage(3), Disenchant(2), Forsaken Wastes(1), Coercion(2), Stupor(2), Abeyance(1), Vampiric Tutor(1) One day, I'll get the incentive (read: "learn how") to turn a B-deck into an A-deck :-) Anyway, the field was heavily ErTog and Uw-Ophidian/Waterspout (probably making up 20% each), with a large pool of RG and smatterings of others. I, of course, ended up playing against the latter category, and hence will detail them :-) DAY ONE ======= 1) Nakagawa Hiroshi, RG (G-weenies, Briar Shield/Armor of Thorns, burn). Despite being hit for a lot by one rather well-protected Guildmage (with one Armor and two Shields) in one game, his Veteran Explorers ended up being more use to me than they were to him :-) It gets a lot, lot worse from here, folks :-) 2) Takyo Takihide, GWu (Ranger, Elves, WoRoots, Wildebeest, Maro, Empyrial Armor, and Aura of Silence - a *very* popular card on the day, BTW). Three very tight games, where the results were decided by whether I drew a Delirium/Purge or not - the bad option happened twice :-( 3) Kawashima Nobutaka, Bur Ertai-Stairwell (B flying weenies and the graveyard stuff, Ertai, MOW, Song of Blood, Stairwell). With the Grasses in the sideboard rather than the main deck in this version, I hate Ertai-Stairwell :-/ That being said, the burn nearly got him in time....horseshoes and hand grenades were not in attendance, though, so close doesn't count :-) 4) Higashino Kuninori, Rb celerity-burn (B for Deliriums, included Diamonds and Hulking Cyclops as signature cards). *Bad* matchup for me :-) Interestingly enough, at this point in the tournament I haven't suffered mana problems at all. The Mindstones and assorted fetch-stuff were working very nicely, the problem was not drawing useful stuff at the right time. Sigh. Some days you lose, some days you lose :-) 5) Ando Kazuhiro, mono-R celerity. Those who read my last report from the warmup will recall I played Ando-san there - when we've found we're paired again, there's been the "Same deck?" question, with "Pretty much" the answer on both sides :-) I decided a while back this was a bad half of the field for my deck to be playing in...this match confirmed it :-) Hmmmm. There doesn't seem to be another row of tables behind me for my next match....is that a bad sign? :-) 6) Nishikawa Fujuki, Sandspoise. Two rather drawn out games, where I managed to complete a second win right on the time call. His trouble was that I had too many things for him to Wand away, and still keep up with the burn because my Mindstones keep working :-) 7) Nagao Hakari, RG (Striped Bears, Barishi, Preferred Selection, plus the standard assortment of burn/G-weenies). Mandatory mana screw of the day for me finally happens, and I spend the first game looking at a single Undiscovered, and the second with lots of mana and Thuderbolts but no way to deal with a rampaging Boa :-) 8) Takahashi Seiji, interesting deck :-) First game, I've seen four Falcons, a Zhalfirin Crusader, Tithe, and Gerrard's, and some U-mana, capped off by an Empyrial. OK, I think, no worries, Falcon-Armor. Second game, pretty much identical, but faster as I can't get an answer in hand. After the match, I'm congratulating him on his "nice Falcon Armor deck", only to be told rather indignantly that it was Phasing-Sandspoise! After expressing a little confusion, he takes his deck apart and shows me. I'll be damned, he only *had* four falcons, one Armor, one Crusader, and the rest was Breezekeepers, Sandbar, Reality Ripple, Equipiose and Sands :-) Some days I'm just good luck for my opponents.... 9) Miyanoshita Shigeo, Br (B graveyard/weenies, Morinfen, and Sapphire Charm/Fervor). A few Purges and Deliriums in the right place (my hand, rather than my deck) for a change help :-) Ron, playing his favourite Uw, had a good early start, but got hit by the draws problem early then had what he referred to as a brain-fade, forgetting to recheck his sideboard and leaving just 14 cards in it. Even worse, as the best English-literate certified judge at the event, he had to write his own Warning Report to the DC :-) At the end, he found himself on my table, to his eternal shame, but he blames the draws for that :-) Fukui-san went 5-1-2 with the Illusionist deck, also suffering to the draw problem (he withdrew after drawing for the second time, in the 8th round, which put him out of contention), with his one loss being against eventual finalist (and current Japanese Champion) Komiya Tadayoshi-san. Komiya was also playing Illusionist, but with W splashed for Abeyance and Sacred Mesa (plus some sideboard stuff - Passage, from what I saw). Fukui's Illusionist deck (near as I can remember, making the changes from mine) ======================== U: Ophidian(4), Vodalian Illusionist(4), Man O' War(4), Waterspout Djinn(4), Flooded Shoreline(1), Impulse(4), Dissipate(4), Power Sink(2), Memory Lapse(2), Abduction(3), Artifact: Serrated Biskelion(3), Wand of Denial(1); Land: Winding Canyons(1), Quicksand(4), Island(17), Flood Plain(2); Sideboard: Wand of Denial(1), Ray of Command(2), Floodgate(2) Disrupt(3), Power Sink(2), Undo(2), Boomerang(2), Shimmer(1). He only had one Canyon and one Shimmer, because he'd traded his others to me last weekend, and was under the impression I was going to use them at the Qualifier :-( This was very bad of me - I didn't find out until afterwards, otherwise I would have given them back to him. Some people are too nice to ask, though, since that might have been considered as putting me in a bad position ("forcing" me to choose the burn deck). A lesson I will learn from, in terms of cultural nicities. To keep all the Mirage-block bits together, the final 8 (who played on the next day) were as follows (I *think* the order is right): 1) Ishida Itaru (Tokyo, BU discard), 1793 2) Fujita Tsuyoshi (Kyoto, RU djinn-burn), 1750 3) Komiya Tadayoshi (Tokyo, Uw Illusionist-Mesa), 1636, National Champion 4) Itadani Aeysaku (Okayama, ErTog), 1915 5) Arita Ryuichi (Osaka, Uw Illusionist-Abeyance), unrated 6) Nakamura Satoshi (Tokyo, Uw Ophidian-Spout), 1921 7) Nakamura Masako (Ishikawa, RG), unrated 8) Tawara Takashi (Shikoku, ErTog), unrated The Japanese ratings are difficult to intepret, because of the lack of rated events outside Tokyo. Results were: Ishida 2 - 1 Tawara Itadani 2 - 1 Arita Fujita 0 - 2 NakamuraM Komiya 2 - 1 NakamuraS Ishida 2 - 1 Itadani Komiya 1 - 2 NakamuraM Ishida 1 - 2 NakamuraM Ishida could not have gone to Chicago because of school constraints (graduating next March, and four days off in October would jeopardise that - wonderful Japanese school system :-/), and Nakamura Masako-san managed to take the (non-transferrable) paid spot after Ishida neglected to play a "safety" Drain Life while within Torch range late in the 3rd game. Very Japanese: "I end" - "I Torch you" - "I die" :-) Continuing the Osaka PTQ festivities, while the top-8 played off for the Chicago spots, the rest of us were invited to play an Open T2 event. This was very good of the organisers, given the lack of sanctioned events in the region, and provided everyone the opportunity to get their ten sanctioned Standard matches in the one weekend :-) The thought of playing my Mirage-block deck in an environment that featured Circles *and* FOW *and* Passage was just too scary, so I had to shelve my dislike for playing non-original stuff, and put together pretty much the only other thing I was carrying the cards for: a mono-G high-power-weenie/WOrb deck (very Stompy) that had no problems with Ron's T1.5 deck "Dumbo" - Elephant Graveyard, Wings of Aethsir, and you can guess the rest :-) Never played it before, two games of playtesting, no worries mate :-) Maybe I should learn something from this: about 4am on the Saturday morning, Ron and I have played three or four games with my Spectral Red against his UW, and I've lost (comprehensively) every time. However, I was satisfied with this performance, and used it unchanged in the main event :-) Similarly, the next night (morning :-)) we've played one or two games of the mono-G, it won, and wasn't changed. This implies to me that playtesting has no effect, because I don't change regardless, so why bother playtesting :-) G: Fyndhorn Elves(4), Llanowar Elves(1), Rogue Elephant(4), Ghazban Ogre(4), Harvest Wurm(3), Jolrael's Centaur(2), Whirling Dervish(2), Spectral Bears(4), Quirion Ranger(4), Stampeeding Wildebeests(2), Giant Growth(1), Bounty of the Hunt(3), Briar Shield(3), Hurricane(1); Artifact: Winter Orb(4); Land: Forest(17), Heart of Yavimaya(2); Sideboard: Tranquil Grove(2), Uktabi Orangutan(3), Whirling Dervish(2), Jolrael's Centaur(1), Karoo Meerkat(2), Unseen Walker(1), City of Solitude(2), Lhurgoyf(2). Play tips: attack, but use the Hearts defensively. I don't think there was a game I was afraid of playing the Elephant first turn, although I did have to pause momentarily in the couple of games I started with just one land in hand, but no Elf/Ranger made the decision easy :-) At the very least, making such a play makes your opponent damn certain you *aren't* mana-screwed, because what sort of idiot would Strip themselves in the face of StP/Incin/...? %-} I wanted a totally critter-based sideboard, but I only own one Walker and two Meerkats, and the Grove/CoS fill an important hole. If I went with less critters in the side, Emerald Charms would be a shoo-in inclusion for all-round utility. The Osaka T2 scene is habitually CounterPost-dominated, with black weenie (including Buried Alive, recently) and burn (Rg, RG, Rg) following a little way behind. So those thoughts were in mind, as well as the fact that five hours sleep in three days might catch up with me by Sunday :-) Unfortunately, I discovered as I played the tourney that this deck is not as simple to play as it appears, or indeed as it was advertised. You do have to spend a bit of time weighing up options about how much to commit, and how much to back it up, with risk-versus-reward, *far* more than many other decks, basically because you have no defense to fall back on :-) But, I gradually worked out how to play it as the day went on. 1) Fujishige Mitsuhiro, BW (weenies, Sacred Mesa, critter control). He was new to the tournament scene, and of course a series of Dark Banishings, StPs, etc... are annoying from my perspective. However, the WOrb managed to lock him up enough to get the win in two. 2) Fujimori Shunsuke, UW (counters, Icy, Wisdom, Wrath, Worb, etc...). This might have been a Prison variant :-) I managed to get some early damage in, lost a Ghazban after a Wisdom, but snuck in both games because *both* of us having WOrbs on the table was hard for him to control when he wanted to Icy critters as well. 3) Takyo Takahide, GW (MaroGeddon): the guy who started me on the "elevator to Hell, going down" on Saturday :-) WOrb after the first Wrath each time locked things up well both times, and me playing with just one or two lands in play for most of the match made Geddon a bit pointless. Snuck out for a bite to eat, to clear the head. I was falling asleep around now, and was re-discovering how matches get harder when you keep winning - brain hurts :-( It's not as much fun at this end of the field :-/ 4) Fukuda Koichi, BR ('taal, Knights, burn, and Pyros). Things are starting to get complicated here, as I have to weigh up Hearts and how much to risk on the table to a burn-related sweeper. Things all fell the right way, though, except for the second game where of all things I was mana-flooded :-) 5) Kuroda Masashiro, mono-U (counters, MOW, Rainbow, Waterspout, Boomerang, Floodgate). Kuroda-san is one of the local "dedicated" players, who travels to events in the region to play (and go well :-)). This was one of the most involved matches I've ever played, and ended up timing out after 1-1. I was mana screwed to some degree in all three matches (first game, one Forest; second game, two Hearts; third game, one Forest and three Rogue Elephants :-)), but luckily he didn't get the fast Spout in the second game, being mana-flooded instead. I had the forces on the table to win the third in the end, but we were both taking a long time on our turns because of a rather tricky situation involving Rainbows, Hearts, Floodgates, and Briar-shielded Elephants. 6) Nakamura Hirobumi, 5CB (with a Pox/recycler engine backed up by burn and sideboard stuff like Sleight/CoS/...). A couple of months ago, I lost a tight match to Nakamura-san, and he went on to win that tournament. Unfortunately for him, we didn't have a proper re-match here: he was badly mana-screwed twice, and was over-run by rampaging Elephants :-( I ended up tied with Kuroda-san, and a few tiebreakers later it turned out that I played one less game than him in accumulating my 11 wins (13 to his 14), and so the mathematically-dressed-up coin fell my way. Given the time it took them to run through OM%, OG%, and what-not, we could have had a playoff in the meanwhile, though!! Anyway, I managed to make another foothold for MtG-gaijin in Japan, and picked up a nice souvenier trophy/plaque, "Winner's Cup", and oversized Shivan Dragon (are these as common as the other oversized cards?), plus the mandatory photo session and what-not. Since I'm in front of an official "Pro Tour Qualifier" banner with a winner's trophy, if I work hard I can get really good mileage out of the photo :-) While I was polishing the trophy, Goro Matsuo-san has come up to offer his congratulations, and noted that, "At the rate they're giving those things out, soon everyone will be using them for Outpost tokens", which got a good laugh from the audience :-) Comments: while the deck started off fun to play, I lost interest in it after about the seventh win on the trot. It needs more underplayed cards with no real threat value to make it worth playing again :-) Personally, I don't get a lot of satisfaction or enjoyment out of playing something I didn't make from scratch, or at least contribute an original idea to, and while I might have made up a "generic G-weenie with 4 WOrbs" when WL came out (like every other man and his dog :-)), not pursuing it myself makes it "someone else's" to me. Effective or not, this tournament was enough to remind me of that - but again, it's a personal observation, not a preaching platform :-) For me, the great benefit of resources like the lists or the Dojo is from scanning the myriad of ideas, in search of something to prompt an original idea - sort of like science research, which cannot be conducted well in a vaccuum :-) Spectral Red started off like that, after reading someone's T2 report about Abeyance-Burn as a concept for the finishing blow. I had far more fun going 10-15 or whatever it was with Spectral Red (not to mention having people use it far more successfully than me!) than I did going 5-0-1 and winning with Stompy. I'll archive Spectral Red into my deck box - I don't think I'll be doing that with Stompy, which was "boringly efficient". Soapbox mode off :-) As for more important things: the recent spate of tournaments has totally exhausted my supply of Didgeridoos, Rabid Wombats, and Boomerangs, which I write on and give away as "Aussie theme cards" omiyage to my opponents after matches. At the PTQ, I actually gave one to a bloke who exclaimed in amazement that his brother had received one over a year ago, and how happy he was to have one of his own now, so the circle is spreading :-) Anyway, if anyone has any spare, preferably in BB although I'll take anything, drop me a line and see if I can trade you something for them! Regards, David. -- { David J. Low | dlow@kurasc.kyoto-u.ac.jp } { JSPS Postdoctoral Fellow | http://www.kurasc.kyoto-u.ac.jp/~dlow } { Radio Atmospheric Science Center | "The words of the Prophets are } { Kyoto University, Uji, Kyoto 611 | written on the subway walls...." }