Subject: PTQ Report, NJ 020198 Date: Mon, 02 Feb 1998 16:05:17 PST From: "Sean McKeown" To: fkusumot@ix.netcom.com East Brunswick PTQ Tourney Report Sean McKeown It's been a while since I posted to the Dojo, but it's also been a while since I had something worth sharing around. If you're looking for nonsensical arrogant ranting, try the next report down...you won't find it here. After seeing a tourney report from a I.X Sligh player that said "any deck using Soltari Priest is a Hate deck", I got the name for my originally- constructed I.X deck. I've been building this thing little by little since early December, tuning and tweaking to work better. Now, confident in its ability at last, I am ready to kick ass in the East Brunswick PTQ for a chance at a slot to LA. Here it is, the Pretty HATE Machine. PRETTY HATE MACHINE aka "I TAKE YOU WHERE YOU WANT TO GO!!!" ----- 3x Aura of Silence 3x Empyrial Armor 1x Disenchant 2x Swords to Plowshares 3x Armageddon 4x Lightning Bolt 2x Incinerate 2x Scroll Rack 4x Tithe 4x Soltari Priest (FEEL the HATE!!!) 3x Freewind Falcon (FEEL the HATE!!!) 4x White Knight 2x Suq'Ata Lancer 2x Wildfire Emmisary (...YOU'RE GOING TO GET WHAT YOU DESERVE...) 3x Man o' War 4x Plateau 3x Tundra 3x Undiscovered Paradise 3x Wastelands 5x Plains ::SB:: 4x Winter Orb (...I'D RATHER DIE, THAN GIVE YOU CONTROL...) 3x Honorable Passage (FEEL the HATE!!!) 1x Man o' War (I can even go Forgotten Orb after game one :þ) 1x Aura of Silence 2x Disenchant 2x Null Rod (We hate Prison and Pebbles, too!) 2x Suleiman's Legacy ----- Nine Inch Nails aside for a minute, it's made to be able to handle a wide variety of decks game one, and be able to do SOMEthing in the side for the rest of the match. Necro might give it problems, but with some trick plays and Winter Orbs I should expect to come out on top... I laugh at PT Jank as I Aura them, Passage their Bolts, Orb their asses when they get Scrolls, and Man-o-War their War Beasts, obviously I don't think I have much to worry about from them! I played a less-tweaked version of the Pretty HATE Machine at the 1/17 PTQ in NYC, still deluded into using Tradewind Riders in the maindeck (2). If I have *EVER* used their ability against an opponent, I would be surprised, so out they went, 'Geddon-lock or no! I fixed the sideboard with extra 'Chants after losing to a Prison deck because HE got the Auras first; I conceded eventually while sitting on 3 Auras and 2 Null Rods...plus I will have to get through Pebbles and/or Prison at LEAST once if I want to hit the top 8 and the slot at the end of the tunnel. "DO, OR DO NOT. THERE IS NO TRY!!" A week before the tournament, I feel READY. Everything is tweaked, I have fixed my deck's mistakes, and I finally know what to sideboard against Erik Kesselman's funky deck (Winter Orbs would have given me a first-round WIN at the NY PTQ, rather than a first-round LOSS)! But most importantly, my mind is hardened by everything around me to just play good Magic... Zen or not, I've put myself out of the picture, I will win or lose as my deck is supposed to. No "Waaah! Manascrew!", because it'll happen once in a while off of 18 Lands and 4 Tithes. Just win, or lose. That is how I will get to L.A., if I am indeed worthy. "and once again, i'll pretend to know the way thru the empty space thru the secret places of the heart" The tournament itself. I made plans to take a bus from NYC to East Brunswick for the PTQ, slightly cringing at the extra $10 it would cost me for the day... my "Minion" and friend Kevin, co-founder of our small unofficial team, Team Bad Mojo, is supposed to come as well to play Propa-Orb in the Junior Super Series. The fact that it is on a Sunday makes it better, as I don't get a whole lot of chance to play now that I am at NYU, and I can get a bit of a warm-up: Thursday at NYU's Final Ascension club, and Saturday at Chameleon in Flushing, winning some TI Victory Dollars even though I sold off almost all of my expensive TI cards. It's amazing what just a Walk and Sapphire will do for a guy, when he's just so much better at Magic than the rest of the people :o). Oh, and Necro kicks ass with Lobotomy. We finally get down to East Brunswick by bus, and eventually find the Ramada Inn after wandering around on Route 18 for a bit... note to all other men, always stop and ask directions. I'm worried that we might be late, as NGround said that deck-reg should be finishing by 10:30. What was I smoking, thinking that the PTQ wouldn't start late?? Oh well, it turned out OK after all. I get on the line behind Mike Flores and a couple of people who had played in Washington the day before, and heard Mike's tragic story :) First round pairings get set up, and I am paired vs. Kieran Chase (DCI#3702), playing R/w/u Scroll-Sligh, apparently with some Sleights of Mind maindeck as well as Frenetics. Tony, the head judge, announces "If you think that Wall of Roots, Stasis, and Magma Mine is a reaaaally strong combo... see me." Game one, I die because he Sleights my Chicken (WTF??) and burns away my early blockers; I die to a Jackal Pup and a pair of Goblin Suicide Squads. I do what would turn out to be a very heavily used sideboard switch; I took out Geddons, anti-Art/Ench, and a Suq'Ata Lancer for Man o' War #4, 3x Honorable Passage, 4x Winter Orb. I go Forgotten Orb on him, only with Passages instead of MemLapses...I'll take THAT, thank you! Game two is interesting, as I get some pro-Reds to stare him down and an Orb to tie up his mana supply, making BL's and Scrolls harder to make work (if he wants to eliminate my critters that is). I stare a Vandal down with my Freewind, as I don't want him smashing my Orb so he can use all the nice Burn he must have been piling up. I finally plow the Vandal, wipe some later threats, and swoop in for the kill. Game three is goofy. I have a Plateau on the board and no other Red mana source on the table or in my hand, so when he Miners on turn 2, I Orb to keep the pest from seeing use. He plays Anhk, and we say that this will be a VERY interesting game...luckily I didn't draw a Paradise. I'm holding him off and winning The Downward Spiral, hitting with Chickens and the occasional silly little Kinnigit when he fails to burn them on sight. I draw an Armor, and gambit it out onto my Chicken as it will go for exactly the kill. Silly me, he Disenchants and I suck up some BL and Fireblast loving to go to the loser's bracket. I died sitting on the 2 Passages that gave me SUCH board control, because I had mana to use them each turn, even at the expense of Anhk's drawback. MR. SELF-DESTUCT!! Games: 1-2-0 Matches 0-1-0 Round two, I get paired up with Heather Brooke (#794849) playing Red/x Sligh, I never did find out what the other colors were for. She's really cool, she even offers to teach me to riffle-shuffle after the match, but I just admit that I am hopeless :) Game one, I get an early mana shortage, but begin to correct and clear her side of the board, laying some pro-Reds along the way. I can't beat her up fast enough, as I took too much early damage. I die to a Incinerate and Fireblast. I switch exactly the same 8 cards as against Kieran. Games two and three, we're both mana-hosed, but I draw lands faster than she does. Game two was a kill by an Armored Priest, game three by general creature silliness, including a Man o' War that further depleted her Gemstone Mine. Now does everyone know why I hate that card?? Cheap beating commences as she sits on only two Wastelands. Games: 3-3-0 Matches 1-1-0 Round three, I get paired up against Richard Genzlinger (#652693) playing G/w Stompy. I don't remember much of these games, except that I sideboarded in a single Man o' War for a Aura of Silence. I MoW'd a Rogue Elephant twice in game two, then finally Bolt the thing. With Aura out, I have some Shadow-beating and Chicken-beating (well, not quite a beatdown there), and keep him under 6 mana with Wastelands to make sure he doesn't play an Arrows or something. Message of the day, kiddies? Man o' War + Rogue Elephant = Not A Combo. Games 5-3-0 Matches 2-1 Ah, 2-1, Jank-land. I was loving it, I eat Jank for breakfast remember?? Round four pitted me vs. Robert Sullivan (#613030) playing...anyone want to guess? I was surrounded by it, and I figured out how you can tell a Jank deck from other W/r/u decks... ONLY Jank decks have the UL Plateaus ;) (I guess you had to be there). Game one, we're both mana-shy, me with a 2 Wastelands, 1 Paradise draw. I draw one more before I see colored mana, but I Waste his Tundra... he Tithes. He's fucked, woo hoo! Silly him, he fetches a Plateau. I Waste that too. I draw a Plains or something, and send him Further Down The Spiral with an Armored Priest. I sideboard in...guess what! Yup, 1x MoW, 4x WOrb, 3x Passage, although this time I take out Geddons, 1 Armor, Disenchant, 1 Aura, Scroll Racks. My SB so hoses Jank. Tee hee. Game two, I get 5 whatever, 1 Tithe, 1 Wasteland in my opening hand. "So, you lost, right?" "No, I won, you see..." My first ever Holy Pikula. There's no Paris Mulligan, and I expect to take it hard until I get at least one colored mana (ALL colored lands in my deck generate White mana). I discard 3 cards, until I draw a Plateau on turn 5. He Wastes, I Tithe. He was VERY happy to use that Wasteland, he said "TAKE THAT!!!" very emphatically :) He draws into his first Cursed Scroll, and cheers as he feels he just assumed TOTAL board control. I have no answers in my hand, so I have to top an Orb or Aura soon before it eats my comeback and PT dreams. Topdeck Winter Orb. Play Winter Orb. Laugh at opponents' groans of anger and disgust at my brand-new French BB Winter Orb. He plays some more Scrolls, getting 3 on the board soon enough. He uses 4 Plows on 4 Silly Little Englishe Kinnigits (WTF???), laughing demonically at my misfortune. At one point he untaps a Plains, moves to draw a card, then goes back (tapping the Plains) and untaps the Mishra's. I had to call him on that, and he was being a bit of a jerk by saying "My hand never left it!", but it turned out not to matter in the least. He wasn't laughing when I drew 3 consecutive Priests. (Didn't quite think as to how he planned to kill THAT thing, did he?) He plays his own, attempts to and fails to Scroll... I was going to Passage when he blocked one Priest with his own, but seeing as I had 2 on the board and 1 in my hand, I decided to save it for last-ditch DD spells (or more Priests if he has 'em). Bang, you're dead. ***HOLY PIKULA!!!*** :) Games: 7-3-0 Matches: 3-1 Sweeeeeet... Round 5, I play Brian Fletchner (#638719), playing WW/r/g Gun/"Jank" with Ernies. (I saw the Ernie while he was shuffling first game, and decided 2nd+ games would see me SB in Legacy.) Game one, I shuffle them up and come up with nothing; Tithing to fill my land count a bit. I MoW his creature, then Armor Up! to knock for 6, since he had no Red untapped and had already run through 2 Plows...calculated risk, but it worked. Then, I topdeck a Geddon and decide that I will win the damage race if I can just Geddon and not play stuff, as he has a Knight and Lion out. Of course, I then continue to topdeck sweet cards that would have won me the game, and he topdecks Plow #3. I lose. Lesson of the day: Gambits never work, or at least you should assume they never work. It was this game right here, and my first-round loss, that finally sunk in what all the good players know. Trust me, it's not something you can be told, it's something you have to understand. Risk, and chance, upsets your ability to play the game towards a victory...even when it seems as if that chance will eliminate your opponents' ability to play the game. I've learned from my mistakes, finally crossing the threshold from my agressive play style to a more calculated, conservative playing style. Funny, too, as just that morning I was thinking as to why I have sucess at some play formats or against some people, summed up in the phrase "Leave conventional thought to the rational thinkers!" Game two my deck gives me the draw from ass, but it starts looking better when I draw a pair of Wildfies and play them. He double-Bolts the first, the second ends up staring down 2 Lions, 2 Knights, 1 Priest, and Ernie. Can you say "Dead"?? I used Passages to prevent the Ernie damage, all 3 consecutively, hoping to draw some more creatures or removal so I can turn game in my favor. I draw no-thing. MR. SELF-DESTUCT!! Games: 7-5-0 Matches: 3-2 Facing mathematical elimination, as I did the branching, I find that there is room for one 5-2 as long as there wasn't any draw-silliness, which there ALWAYS is. "All for one, and one for DRAW!!" as they say. I play anyway, hoping The Curse Of X/2 will kick in and get me safely to 5-2, but I just don't care enough to put up much of a fight. I'm out of it, because I lost to a Jank deck, and a Sligh deck. My deck eats those for breakfast. Myself, however, seems to be lacking something in the good-player department...dropping both those matches to a failed gambit when I would have most likely won otherwise. There are two things I can say to myself at this point: 1) Face it man, you're a scrub. OR 2) Learn from this, and DO NOT do it again. Sure, there's the third, "Waah! Manascrew!", but after my "Holy Pikula!" I will never say that again, not even when it happens, because face it, it DOES happen. So, hoping to reclaim a bit of self-respect (of which I am always lacking), I keep in it. Besides, maybe someone will go crazy and kill the top eight. And I decided I was gunning for a match with Mike Flores, or a rematch with Rob Hahn (this time, I am not playing some janky 5cG Static Orb deck :)...both in the 3-2 department. Guess what... Match Six: Vs. Mike Flores (#142305) playing U/r control with all basic lands ;) Game one, I get the early beating, and he plays a Disk, and Forces when I attempt to Disenchant. I don't draw enough to keep up, and lose to a pair of Wildfies. I Sb in 11 cards: 2 Legacies, 4 WOrbs, 2 Chants, 3 Passages. I take out various and sundry cards, I mean...you have to pretty radically change your deck to effectively SB in 11 cards! Game two, my draw was so bad that I was reduced to silliness like Passaging the ping from a Firewalker to keep my Priest in play for another turn to hit for 2 more. You don't believe my draw could be that bad? Let's just say that he Flashfired me three times, and I didn't care, because there was plenty more where that came from. I get out a turn 2 Legacy, and he's discarding Wildfires :) and throwing them to Pyrokinesis...if I had gotten a turn 2 Orb instead of the Legacy, I would have had a hope and a prayer, but nothing doing. No complaints. Mike was roaring to go for the one 5-2 slot, but that didn't make him an ass or anything, we both really enjoyed the games we were playing (him for obvious reasons, me because I knew it didn't matter). We both chuckle when he plays a Flashfires that has "Tithe THIS Baby!" written on the plastic, so I did :)... "Iron Mike" kept going, keeping his Top 8 hopes alive, and though my deck did crap out on me each game after that amazing game Round Four, I didn't have the heart to fight him anyway. Games: 7-7-0 (ick) Matches: 3-3-0 (ick) I'm out. Buh-bye, and all that. "You could have it all, my empire of dirt I will let you down I will make you hurt. If I could start again, a million miles from here I would keep myself I would find a way" Some thoughts: 1) Cursed Scroll is one of the most defining cards of the environment. IMHO Cursed Scroll and Land Tax should be banned from the Extended environment, although I am not so hot and bothered about the Scroll, because it's easy to build your deck to deal with the scroll. WOrb, Geddon, and artifact removal is easy enough, and you can even use Monkeys and stuff on them. 2) I *WILL* get in to PT: NY. This I vow. I'm better at Sealed Deck than Constructed anyway... 3) In retrospect, I would have removed the maindeck Incinerates for Wraths of God, and the sideboarded Null Rods for Swords to Plowshares. Yes, I feared Prison...but that was probably a bit excessive. Plows were an easy answer for one of the few banes of my deck, the unchallenged Suq'Ata Firewalker. I also would have switched the Suq'Ata Lancers for 2 more Wildfires, it would definitely be worth the extra colorless mana. Live and let learn... 4) New Jersey is a nice place to visit, but I wouldn't want to live there :) Ah, the ever-customary (I wish, I wish, I wish I had a spine!) Props And Slops: ----- Props: "Iron Mike" [Flores]... Keep the dream alive! I'll hope to play you again sometime, preferably at Pro Tour: New York... Mark Kesselman's friend, for playing a Red/Blue Wall/Tradewind/Dracoplasm deck and NOT going 0-7. Just keep hating the Pretty HATE Machine and its unblockable Soltari Priests. My Wastelands, for making the game interesting and for reaaaally pissing off Mr. Sullivan. Is it wrong to be amused by the suffering of others?? :) My original deck, for having a nice chance at top eight. Anyone who can tell me where all these musical quotes are from! Slops: Me. And never again. My round 5 opponent, for being so anal about how his deck wasn't a Jank deck. There's no need to get into an argument... and as to insisting that you played me against my own sideboard?? Ha, ha. My own experience played my sideboard, not you...who cares if you sided out the Scrolls? I sided the same 8 cards against you that I did against pretty much everyone else today..... ----- "take my hand, i've lost where i began in my heart i know all of my faults will you help me understand? and i believe in you you're the other half of me..." I learned a lot, and am confident in the changes I will bring about in myself. There's no going back, and there's only one direction... I enjoyed my day, I traded for a Mox Jet from mostly T2 stuff (which does NOT happen every day :). It was "free", compliments of the Type I community of Flushing, New York, and at the worst I buffed my Extended rating up by a little bit. At least I should be ranked now... and although I was tired, hungry from my tournament-day "ritual" of not eating (as if I have a choice, when the nearest fast-food joint is two miles away...) I had basically a good day, despite not rolling over all my opponents (just some of 'em) --Sean McKeown --Gandalf@BDominia.com "Too late to turn back now, I'm running out of sound And I am changing, changing... And if we died right now, this fool you love somehow Is here with you... I won't deny the pain, I won't deny the change... And should I fall from grace here with you Would you leave me too?"