Subject: Tourney Report Date: Tue, 05 May 1998 10:00:17 -0400 From: Jordan Chavez To: fkusumot@ix.netcom.com Hey Well, I finally decided to play a sancioned t2 tournament, something I haven't done in a month or so. It was local at the Game Parlor in Chantilly, VA, and the I expected the competition to be pretty good, as it always is. I expected a lot of el nino, or something along those lines. I played 5cb, quite good, you know: 4 Black Knights 4 Acidic Sliver - Omigod, these guys are so house 3 Dauthi Horror - For some reason that whole 'you can't block me' thing seems to work well against tradewind/wall decks. 4 Shadow Guildmage - I wanted to get one out 1st turn every game, and almost every game I did that, I won. 2 Nekrataal - These guys are really great sometimes, but suck the rest of the time. I should have played 3 for this tourney. 2 Necratog - munch munch munch....burp....beatings 4 Uktabi Monkey - What a wrecking ball! They kill scrolls, disks AND golems! 4 Man o War - fish of doom is always good, cept when your opponent plays wall o blossoms 4 Edict 4 Incinerate 1 Shock - I should make room for more 3 Worb - Not so hot tonight, I sided them out 5/6 matches. --- 9 Swamp 3 Gemstone mine 3 Undiscovered 2 City 2 Mountain 1 Sulfurour Springs 1 Underground River --- S/B 4 Pyroblast 3 Passage 1 Worb 1 Firestorm 3 Disenchants 1 Nekrataal 2 Perish It was 4 rounds swiss or something, top 8 single elim, judged by Garryberry Fortenberry. Match 1 vs Matt Gustafson with Geddonless El Nino propas, legacys, tradewinds, blossoms, sylvans, didn't see orbs? Round 1 Fight! He lays many a wall early on, I get a few critters, but walls and manowars slow me down. He drops props, drops the big bald guy in the sky, and I concede. In go pyros, disenchants, nekrataal, firestorm, perish for worbs, manowars, necratogs, uktabis, edicts Round 2 Fight! I play mad acidic slivers and guildmages and blow up all his stuff. I pyro his props, he lays legacy's but I don't care, cuz acidic sliver is pro:legacy's allure! HAHAHA! , I continue beatings with acidic slivers, dauthi horror and shadow guildmage. FINISH HIM: Incinerate+Sliver would be a good fatality, agreed? Final Round Fight! The number of walls of blossoms he seems to have in his deck is beyond my comprehension. No actually, actually he only plays 3, but I have dauthi horror(that's what they're there for). I nekrataal a wall or two, he plays more and we have a stall. He plays legacy's, steals my horror, i put it back on top with guildmage in response. He's around 8 or so, plays a tradewind, I have guildmage out and incinerate it, he taps out and counters, I put nekrataal on my library, nekrataal his tradewind, drop the horror, beat for a few turns, that's all she wrote. I love it when I play the deck I prepare for first round. 1-0 matches 2-1 games Match 2 vs Chad Day with Turbo Kitty Let me tell you a bit about this deck. It has been through the Chad Day-John Shulerization process, which means it is now ridiculous beyond belief. It's basically a "squandered resources, static orb, propaganda, howling mine, next turn geddon+wrath you lose I win" kind of deck. Oh and I won't tell about the super-secret sideboard tech, so don't ask. Round 1 I play turn 1 and 2 critters, then pop his howling mine with the monkey. He wraths, then wisdoms, I play yet more critters, but he plays that annoying HUMILITY, and wisdoms like 8 or 9 more times, so I concede. In go pyros, disenchants, firestorm for worbs, nekrataals, manowars(left in edicts for the wall of blossoms) Round 2 What a match! He's all talk about his great hand and procedes to drop turn 1 ANCIENT TOMB howling mine, I'm like whatever dude, I break it next turn with monkey, he plays another one, I monkey, he counters, I pyro and break it, he plays some other artifact, I monkey that one too. He's annoyed by now:) Propaganda? No, pyroblast! Another one? Think I'll pyro it. I show him the fourth monkey in my hand, and wreck him with the intense beatdown of one black knight on the table! He must have done like 14 points to himself with that silly ancient tomb. Round 3 He's like turn 1 ANCIENT TOMB, howling mine, I draw 4 pyroblasts:). I play a few critters, he plays a mine, I break one of the mines, and beat him down to like 5 or so. He has a squandered out by now, and wisdoms, then plays static orb and propaganda. I pyro the propagands, he mana leaks, I pyro again!:) I continue the tremendous beatings. He plays another propaganda, I pyro, he counters, I pyro back:) Oh, the Good Player am I. That's four pyros, kids. I win pretty easily, after making like 5 mistakes by untapping the wrong lands so I could incinerate him and shoot him with the sliver. 2-0 matches 4-2 games After this match I get to watch John Shuler play goldfish with this deck. Wow, is that scary. Match 3 vs Donnie Gallitz with mono-black beatdown necro(yes, sarcomacys also, but he went 4-0 so don't argue) Round 1 I was playing against him the other day, and he kept wrecking my 5cb with this goofy fish deck, so I was glad he laid a swamp as I had crushed his mono black deck. I am a just a wee bit mana screwed at one land, he capitalizes with sarcomancy x 3, dauithi slayer and bad moon. IN ONE TURN. I lose. Next round please. In goes firestorm, worb, 2 disenchants for nekrataals and 2 uktabis(I saw no disks) Round 2 We exchange critters, but he has sarcomancy enchantment with no dudes out, he plays necro and I drop worb next turn. He can't find another sarcomancy, and can't get a creature advantage. I finish him with a shock. Round 3 He gets the critter advantage with shadows, and I can't manowar anything as he had stripped my blue source earlier in the game. I die pretty quickly. 2-1 matches 5-4 games Match 4 vs Jason Winchester playing Stompy, nothing special Round 1 I have a pretty horrendous draw consisting of an edict, some monkeys, a worb and land. Edict is totally useless against stompy, as are worbs and monkeys. At about 12 life I finally achieve parity when he drops the goyf. I stall for a bit, but draw no nekrataal of 'tog so I concede. Side in nekrataal, perish, firestorm for worbs and an edict Round 2 Turn 1 guildmage, baby! He goes all the way as the number of elves I ping must be in the double digits. He's stuck at one land for the first 3 turns or so, so I have mad critter advantage and win. Round 3 Turn 1 guildmage again, I wreck his elves, and manowar his dervish when it gets big. Dervish is really annoying, but that's all, just really annoying. With 2 horrors and a guildmage on the table and both perishes in my hand I firestorm my way to victory. 3-1 matches 7-5 games All the games I've won have been after sideboarding. While we're waiting for the top 8 to start, me, Ryan Gill, Andrew Cuneo and Guy Chaney are having a profound discussion on the merits of desperate gambit, which I believed to have been able to target an opponent's source of damage. So we made a bet that if I was right, they would buy desperate gambits, but if I was wrong, I had to buy desperate gambits for them. Well, unfortunately I was wrong, and had to spend a whopping dollar on four desperate gambits, and we formed some kind of team, the desperate gambiteers. Later, Eric Turnquist must have stole all four desperate gambits, because he had them sitting right next to his deck when I played him. We agreed before the game that he could use them at will, without paying any mana, and if he wanted to, it could stay in play as an enchantment that could be activated at any time:). Unfortunately, even the power of desperate gambit could not stop the imminent acidic sliver beatings. Top 8(I forgot the order) -------------------------- Andrew Cuneo - El Nino with dissipates and spike feeders, not sure if he had geddons Joel Priest - W/R/U Control, wraths, frenetics, counters, whispers Guy Chaney - Garryberry Fortunberryish U/B tradewind w/whispers, firewalker, walls, capsize ???? - U/R beatdown waterspouts, frenetics, ophidians, manowars not counterburn ???? - Bloom, actually Andrew told me that it is now called "friends of Vhati Il-Dal not invited to the grim feast" or something like that:) ???? - ???? Eric Turnquist - El Nino w/firewalkers, no walls o roots Me - 5cb with beatings Pairings: ---------- Andrew vs Joel - ????Bloom vs ???? - Guy vs ????U/r - Eric vs Me - Quarterfinals vs Eric Turnquist Round 1 I drop the turn 1 shadow guildmage, that just about wrecks him. He drops a few walls of blossoms, which slows me down a bunch. He geddons, but I held back a buncha land. He draws like one land for the next 3 turns, and he can't play birds because of my guildmage. I play a shadow and win. In go perishes, nekrataal, pyros, firestorm, 2 disenchants for necratogs, uktabis, worbs, edicts. Round 2 Again, first turn guildmage wrecks him. I either disenchanted or pyro'd an early propa, and attack with shadows, slivers and knights He plays a tradewind, i pyro it. Shadow guildmage is really, really house. Almost as house as mana screw... Semifinal Pairings: ---------- Andrew \ Andrew Joel / ????Bloom\ ????Bloom ???? / Guy \ ????U/R ?with U/r / Eric \ Me Me / Semifinals vs damn it why don't I WRITE down people's names Round 1 I only have 1 or 2 critters, he shocks them both. I incinerate his ophids and edict his waterspout. Thank god he doesn't have whispers. I eventually start drawing some creatures, he quakes them away, the drops a disk which I monkey. I am able to reduce him to 5 with more critters, and incinerate and sac sliver for the win. In go pyros, nekrataal, passages for 1 monkey, shock, some edicts and some other stuff. Round 2 Same early creature exchange, but I am stupid and try to outrace a deck which has fireballs. It is my sliver vs his manowar, he's 1 life ahead, why I didn't attack and shoot the manowar, I'll never know. He plays a frenetic or something, hits me for 2, and fireballs me out for 6. Round 3 Mana screw is so house. Especially for your opponent. I have two swamps in play. My hand is as follows: 3 acidic sliver, 2 incinerate, 1 manowar and 1 nekrataal. He plays ophidian, waterspout, waterspout. Game. I think I would have won that game if I had drawn a mountain or red land early on. Anyways, I didn't get a chance to see the end of the tourney, but the score between andrew and the bloom deck was 1-0 bloom when I left. I think Andrew should have won, and went on to beat the blue red deck, but if he lost, then I think the blue red deck would have beaten bloom. Analysis? Tradewinds were everywhere. Play lotso nekrataals and terrors, kiddies, come to think of it, terror would have been better than edict in every situation I used it in during this tourney. I think 5cb is a really good metagame(did I mention I hate that word?) deck right now, or any kind of black beatdown with nekrataal and shadow. El nino is very strong and is very versatile, so play to beat it. Also, watch out for rogue fish decks:) Later all Jordan Chavez