Subject: I'm goin back to Cali-Dickhead PTNY report From: "Brian Hacker" Date: 1997/06/03 Hello everyone. Welcome to the extended version of a tourny report. Team Dickhead, comprised of Jason Zila, Truc Bui, John Yoo, and myself, Brian Hacker arrived on Wednesday morn in NYC. We went immediately to Atlantic Cite', to drop some bombs on Trump and Ceaser alike. The dice didn't do so well for us, so we decided to go to Rye Brook, ready to play. We arrived in Rye on Thursday, in the back of a limo, true Dickhead style. Within a few hours, there were fifteen guys watching the Houston Utah basketball game in our room. We all took twenty dollar bets with Justice that Houston would win by four or more. After all Utah has way too many white boys on the team to be competent. Hell, even Karl Malone reminds me a hick sometimes. Unfortunately Brian Weisman, sorry, John Stockton made a janky three to win the game and Justice went beserk on us. We had to kick him out of the room after we payed him his money. So the night before the big tourny, Daddy U, Long Bui and I did a six player open face draft where Truc gave us a sermon on the 5EVi draft. I think he opened from the book of Bui and read us a couple of the holy passages. If anyone else was there, they too would have been convinced that Truc is one of the best drafters in the world. We slept for a few hours, waking up to find that Hovi somehow got let into our room and was sleeping on the floor. Always got to watch those Northern Europeans, ya know. I was a little worried after losing money on the craps tables AND losing money to a member of PCL (I mean how often does that happen?) but I felt confident entering the tourny. Draft 1: I draft a pretty solid white blue green deck, replete with 2 undos, flood, ray of command and a number of solid creatures. I felt that the deck was a lock for a 2-1 or 3-0 performance. Round 1: Cpt. Cali drops bombs and wins easily. I feel good as I enter the next round. Round 2: I don't know anyone I played, so sorry that my opponents have to be nameless. I drop four land and can't cast a spell in my hand. I have 4 consecutive bombs at 5 mana but can't get there. I feel like a member of PCL in dallas. I undo twice in the next two turns, giving him 10 cards during his discard phase, but I can't seem to get in the groove and lose the first game. The second game sees me mulligan, draw no islands and lose with an incredible hand (flood, ray of command, 2 tempest drakes) I feel very frustrated after this round, but I know my deck is good. Round 3: I play some Mexican guy. He doesn't speak a whole lot of English, and this makes communication difficult. I draw 12 land the first game but look close to holding him off. He consistantly forgets to use his infantry veteran until after the attack phase and when I won't let him take it back, he starts cussing me out in spanish. I know a little spanish (I do live in San Diego) and I smile to myself as he calls me a motherfucker and asshole in spanish several times throughout the course of the match. I lose the game after drawing 12 land 6 spells. The next game I get beat down by 3 pearled unicorns after drawing 11 land 5 spells. I don't even take him to three. I never see any of my power cards and I'm infuriated. Getting beat down by fifth turn pearled unicorn is the worst feeling in the world Draft 2: I draft a pretty decent blue green black deck. 2 undos, flood, breezekeeper, wake of vultures, fallen angel, cloud elemental, ray of command. I feel like this is a good enough deck to give me a chance to win 3 in a row. Round 4. I win in two with incredible hands. Round 5. Before the round begins, I look to see my first round opponent behind me, my second round opponent behind me, and my third round opponent cheering me on from behind the ropes. I know that there is no way my tiebreak will let me see tommorow, but I pray to Allah, Jehovah, and Quetzcoatal that something will go my way. Turn 1 digging team. Turn 2 Ironclaw orc. Turn 3. Goblin King. Turn 4 incenerate. Turn 5 Talruum Champion. I know he has a disintegrate at the bottom of his deck because after I cut he lifted his deck up before putting it down. I peeked a disintegrate and felt relieved. I undo his creatures, ray of command and lock him down. He has 2 turns to live when he fireballs me out. Yah!! The second game he hearth charms me getting a 3 for 1 with the janky thing. I feel horrible as I know that my streak of 5 straight top 64's is over. Shit. Oh well. I guess it just wasn't meant to be. A synapsis of my teamates. Jason Super Z made it a short weekend as well by going 2-3 like me. At least he won a couple hundred dollars in money games. Truc Long Bui was the number 3 seed after the first day and went 0-3 in third draft. He ended up having to play John Yoo in the sixth round, but ended up a respectable 23rd. John Daddy U took out both Ben Possemiers and Mike Long in one shot in the sixth round on the first day. He beat Possemiers taking him out of the tourny. Long had played Ben earlier that day and lost tiebreak points putting him at 66th. Daddy U crept in at 62nd. Daddy U turned it on and finished 9th. He is tied for first in PT players points and won't go to worlds unless special invites are given to those withing twenty points of the lead. I think that this would be really great (the system will be imposed next year) as it would bring Pikula, Yoo, and other players who deserve the bid into World Championships. A synapsis of the money games. We took 2 N.Y. local for fifty a pop. We played a team thing with 4 canadians including Paul McCabe. We lost 4-0 to superior decks, superior draws, superior matchups and superior shit talking. How miserable is that? We got our revenge however. Knowing that McCabe has this protection from Dickhead thing, we got our east coast connection Hammer Regnier to sub for Zila. We played a 5EVi draft against Henry Stern, Scott Johns, McCabe, and Terry Borer, not an hour after he won. The east coast connection did his job beating McCabe and I beat Borer. U and Bui lost so it was Hammer and I versus Stern and Johns. We both won and cleaned up 200 bones. A small joy for me is that McCabe owes me 10 bucks. What small joys in life. A new column here. Props and Slops. Props to: Terry Borer for winning. While I can't always figure out what he's about, he seemed pretty cool this time. Congrats to Terry for winning. Mark Chalice. He finally lived up to the hype. Bout damn time Mark. Jeroen Weyland. An awesome guy. He went gangsta in a big way in N.Y. He beat Chinook the second day with a seventh turn four spell kill. Ironclaw orc, sunclasp, shivan, blast. Damn, this guy drafted cool. He had a bog deck replete with 2 bog rats, and 4 bog imps. John Chinook. One of the nicest guys on tour finally broke out. Awesome job, although Weyland seemed to have his number. I can't blame Chinook for that though. Chris Pikula. He has a really pretty, cool girlfriend. Hard to imagine that a guy with that much stubble could do so well. Chris unfortunately couldn't nut it up in the second draft and went 0 for 3 after going 3-0. Always fun, Chris was great to see in N.Y. John Yoo. Semifinalist. Semifinalist. Ninth. Three pro limited tournys. Three awesome finishs. Nuff said. Besides, John got the coolest warning of the tourny. He lost his sideboard and got a warning for "General Incompetence". That one is for the record books. Jeff Donais, Scott Mcgough and Sparky. Three really cool guys that I had fun with on the cybercast. Slops to Me. I'm shooting like 1 for 3 since shaving my beard. George Baxter. Baxter joined PCL. After reading that stuff about his brothers and Team Dallas, abandoning them to go to PCL just made my stomach turn. Sorry George but fileing for Social (read: Justice) Security this early in your career is sickening. Cmon' brother, stay with your homies. You're too cool a guy to abandon Baca. Me. I ran Jankpotence in the regionals. I lost. Pro tour judges. I think the average level on the judging staff at the pro tour this time around was like 2.3. The big fellas know there know their stuff but there are a lot of inexperienced judges. I think this will change very soon, however. A definate slops to the guys who gave that German so much shit after tying Donnie in the sixth round. It wasn't his fault and Stern made the correct ruling (in my opinion) The amount of jank I heard after that match was stagering, and could have gotten people kicked out of the tourny. Jason Z and I at limited pros. We have made 400 buck in the last two. Slack. Atlantic City. Nothing but blue hairs, geritol, and bad dye jobs. Viva Las Vegas baby! Houston Rockets for not nutting it up against Utah. Me for having wasted everone's time with this shit. Have fun, Hacker Team Dickhead Correct e-mail: bhacker@ucsd.edu Try sending me something now. If I got tha choose a coast, I got tha choose the east, I live out there so don't go there. -B.I.G. -Good advice Biggie