Subject: GP Antwerpen Report
Date: Tue, 28 Apr 1998 03:39:09 -0500
From: Franz.Heidbuechel@ercgroup.com
To: fkusumot@ix.netcom.com

Hi Frank,

I just came back from GP Antwerp, which for me was only a 90 minutes
drive. I will try to give you a report not only discribing my fate...

We were 7 members and friends of Team Aachen Fantastics from Germany on
Saturday. The tournament took place in a nice, big building which
offered even a little food and drinks. Around 360 players started the
day trying to qualify for the next day by getting into the top 64. A lot
of "names" were there from europe "crowned" by the appearance of Randy
Buehler and Brian Hacker.
The decks were opened and preregistered by the staff, which was a good
thing. But we lost all the time saved by this when it took them one hour
to proceed from round 1 to round 2 and about 30-45 minutes between the
following rounds. Anyway, everybody would keep the deck, he got and I
was quite satisfied with my deck, which was B/r/w had among other the
following highlights: Shock, Kindle, L-Blast, Edict, Cannibalize, 4 good
B and W Shadows,  Master Decoy, Avenging Angel, Commander Greven (yes I
played him and no it did not turn out as bad, because I played with 8
Swamps), Brush w.D. and as MvP of day Shaman en Kor (broken!). Plus 3
noteable sideboard cards, which one me one duel each: Calmig Licid
(should have been main deck, but I wanted to focus on beatdown),
Ensnaring bridge (main?) and Mind Peel!

Unfortunately I don't remember too much of my matches (I am 38 years old
so you should forgive someone who waits for his first white hair every
hour and I never fared so well in a big tourney before - I am only
playing MTG for 4+ years ;-( -  so I was a little bit exited at times).
I will therefore just concentrate on some highlights:

Round 1 - someone very nice from Belgium:
First round I met the propably second strongest deck of all my
opponents! Mind Games, Capsize, lots of burn, Banishing, Combustion and
Puppet Strings would have caused me a lot of problems, but I topdecked
like hell! I lost one duell but in the other two I just was too fast in
the beginning and could then squezze in with help from the decoy and
Mind Peel for his buyback. Furthermore, Combustion is not too strong,
when I have the Shaman out and some mana available ;-).
1-0

Round 2 - Kai Lange (Germany)
I know Kai as he comes to our Tuesday evening draft event rarely. His
deck features Spikes and no removal. I win the first duell with Decoy I
think and in the second it is again this guy, that helps in the
beginning. Then it comes to a stalemate, where I get one damage per
round from his Leeching Licid until I am at 5. At this point I can play
the Commander Greven and Kai is at 16 life. He has no black or Artifact
creature out and plays Serpent Warrior as potential blocker to go to 13
life. Somehow he forgot my Decoy, that was situated under his Licid. And
I had Seething Anger in Hand, which I played twice on the Commander in
my next turn making this now unblockable guy 13/5...
2-0

Round 3 - Guido Pacifici (Italy)
First duell is beatdown as usual, then in the next one, I have a good
start but then I draw 7 lands in a row which costs me the duell.In the
next duell I start ok again but then draw 5 red spells with no mountain
and my opponent gets all the removal he can muster and kills me easily.
2-1

Round 4 - Christian Lang from Kaiserslautern in Germany
I face Manta Riders and Winged Slivers besides Mind Games and Capsize,
but my deck showed in round one already, that it can handle much better
blue decks and I win two duells without problems especially as Christian
seems unfamiliar with the Shaman.
3-1

Round 5 - A very nice guy (name=?) from Duesseldorf in Germany
This was the battle of the decoys. I only remember, that in all three
duells, he plays his Decoy first, I will then cannibalize it to his Wall
of Essence and play mine, which he can remove only once, where the other
two times it means game for me.
4-1

Round 6 - Julien Mozziconacci (France)
At this point, I did not know it, but Julien was in already and I had to
draw to get into day two, but I thought, that I had to win this match in
order to proceed. But I had played anyway as I wanted to have a shot at
top 8 on the next day. I won the first duell and lost the long second
one to Shard Phoenix and horrible playing on my side.This duell was very
tense and my concentration was at its peak now after making these
mistakes, but I was exhausted, too. Duell three I do some Shadow and
Foul Imp beatdown before his Phoenix arrives, but Julien only has 2
mountains. Anyway, he kills all my creatures but the Imp with the
Phoenix, he is at 10 life and I am around 18. Then I topdeck Brush with
Death, which I can play with buyback bringing him to 6 together with the
Imp. In his turn, Julien plays Rathi Dragon, sacrificing his two
mountains. I think, the Brush would have been enough to win, but to make
things worse for Julien I topdeck cannibalize making his wall eat the
Rathi Dragon. Wow - I am in with 5-1 which puts me in position 32 -
exactly were I want to be tomorrow.... Julien at 39 makes it also in
easily so I do not need to be ashamed of my top decking too much.
Teammate Stephan Valkyser and "team associate" Timo Meinberg also make
it in with 6-0 and 5-1. Arne Bister and David Liersch both loose their
last round, where a win would have squezzed them into top
64.Nevertheless we drive home for 90 minutes in a very good mood.

Day 2:
After another 90 minutes drive we three arive at Antwerp again,
supported by team member Christian Ermentrud (he went 1-2 with a
horrible deck) and Stephans brother Martin Valkyser who fared like
Christian yesterday.

When I open my pack I feel like crying! Exactly what I did not want to
get I get! Not much removal, shadows or flyers or game breaking buyback.
Just a at best mediocre deck (B/G/w) featuring highlights like:
Banishing, Pacifsm, Bounty Hunter (slow), Knight of Dusk, Trumpeting
Armodon, Soltari Champion (MvP by far!), Spirit en Kor, Elvish Fury plus
some more green fat (with 3 Spikes) and Dauthi Slayer. In my
dissapointment I made some deck building mistakes like not playing
Trained Armoddon and Foul Imp for Dark Ritual and Blood Pet, but I had
so much BB spells, that I was (too much) worried about color screw. At
least I had something to sideboard, but I have bad daydreams already
with Shadows and Flyers beating me down while Wall of whatever stop my
poor attacks...

Round 1 Timo Meinberg from Aachen in  Germany
Great!! Timo is inofficial team member and I meet him 2-4 times a week
in our local shop. Now there is only one more thing that can make things
worse and that would be him starting with Shadows and Flyers. Well he
starts with shadows and flyers and beats me down in a rush. But I do the
same with 4 green fatties in game 2. Game 3 he handles my assault with
Decoy (Boy, would I love to have this dude on day 2!) and beats me again
with unblockable creatures.
5-2

Round 2 Freddy Cleuren from Belgium
I don't remember too much from this match but Freddy played my colors
with even worse spells. And he had some real problems to handle my
spikes, which costs him some creatures. At one point, he plays Dungeon
shade, that would caused me big trouble, so I have to enchant it with
spinal graft and then my Trumpeting Armodon tries to discuss with the
shade, that it should block - a question that remains somehow unanswered
(I had to use the Graft, because he would have killed my Armodon with an
additional blocker). Although he gets it back with Burial, he never gets
enough swamps to play it as it would die to the Armoddon. I win two
straight games.
6-2

Round 3 Mats Clays from Belgium
I know, that he has a deck with 2 Rolling Thunder plus Flame Wave, so I
kind of resign. But I somehow beat him down with Spike Soldier first
duell. Now I have two chances to win this match. Game 2 is very long as
I stop his Lab Rats with Wall of Blossom plus green creatures. But then
he plays Bullwhip and Fevered Convulsion and my Green Fat gets suddenly
very small and disapears in a hurry. As I can pacify and banish all his
other creatures it takes him a long time to remove around 12 creatures
of mine, that I play with the hope of squeezing to a time out (without
stalling of course). But then his thunder helps to save some time doing
10 damage at once. So we have a little time left and Mats calls a judge
to prevent me from stalling, although now a draw would not help at
all.(I already had a warning in this duell because I forgot to draw a
card from Provoke). But then I play like Rootwalla, Soltari Champion and
Trumpeting Armoddon in turns 3 to 5 and that is simply way too much for
his deck to handle. But don't get me wrong on this - Mats is really a
nice guy, he just was admittetly very nervous at this point and I am at
big tourney a very calm player, which usually make nervous people even
more nervous...
7-2

Round 4 Stephan Valkyser, Team Aachen Fantastics Germany
Of course I will play both teammates on this day! But worse, my last win
vs. Stephan must have been sometime 1995 or so as he is a far better
player, drafter and (sealed) deck builder. In fact Stephan and I are
playing board games for ten years now and we started with magic together
when Arabians just had left the stores. The only reason, that my
all-around stats against him are not 0-xx is, that I had two Sea
Serpents in the very beginning and he had none ;-). This time, he even
had the by far better cards. Two Stronghold Assassins in a Sealed Deck
are rather ok, don't you think? Winds of Rath, Bullwhip, Searing Touch,
Shock should help, too.
Anyway, I beat him down in game one with Soltari Champion plus support.
When he sees my Blood Pet, he starts taunting me for playing this crap
after three years of training by his. Well I guess he is right, but
Stephan will in the end win this tourney with Soltari Foot Soldiers and
Nomads en Kor, with which I will taunt him for the rest of the year ;-).
Unfortunately for me, his lonely Dauthi Maurauder beats me down in the
next two duells and I completely had forgotten my reality anchor in my
sideboard. I think its these kind of errors - that only occur to me when
I play Stephan, that prevent me from ever winning against him.
7-3

Round 5 Justus Roenau from Bielefeld in Germany
This is now for the money and it is easy for me. Justus went 6-0
yesterday, so he is 1-3 today and he really has a bad deck. Me drawing
the Soltari Champion each game does not really boost his chances. Mind
Games again proof to be too slow, as I still get damage through and he
has to save he mana while I can play additional attackers.
8-3

I come in at number 20 and win my first money ($250) in a tournament.
Timo looses in the final eight to finalist Lukas Ladra (he lost his
chance to play Brian Hacker) but is happy anyway as he is now qualified
for Chicago. From then on it is nailbiting for Stephan, as he luckily
beat Randy Buehler 2-1, then proceeds to squezze by Micheal Sochon 2-0
and comes back from a 1-2 to beat Lukas Ladra 3-2 while this Soltari
Foot Soldier does around 30 points of damage. What a weekend for our
team and each of us individually!!!

One last remark: Although I had no opportunity to talk to Brian Hacker,
I watched him play and was very impressed by him and the way he behaves
at the table. Being so relaxed and friendly while maintaining full
concentration is something I really would like to achieve myself.

Best regards

Franz Heidbuechel
Team Aachen Fantastics
Franz.Heidbuechel@ercgroup.com