Subject: US Pre-Release NY
Date: Mon, 28 Sep 1998 20:54:19 EDT
From: Gollyzilla@aol.com
To: fkusumot@ix.netcom.com

     Going into the tourney, I wasn't very confident in my chances of winning.
First of all, I had stayed up all night with two friends and got 3 (count 'em,
3) hours of sleep.  Second, the last pre-release I had been to was Mirage, and
I hadn't played much sealed deck after that.  On the train, I bumped into my
friend Asaf, who went on to win first place.  We looked over the spoiler and I
pointed out a card I felt was rather broken and/or begging for some errata:
Lifeline.
     Anyway, when we get our cards, Tony tells us we get to keep our decks
instead of handing them back after we register them.  So I open my starter and
lo and behold, I've got a Lifeline.  Cool.  On the other hand, one of my other
rares is a Rune of Protection: Land.  What the hell?!
     I build a B/R deck with plenty of removal and two green cards.  Before I
put Lifeline in, I ask the judges to make a ruling on whether it works for my
opponents as well as me.  They rule that it only works for me, so I put it in.

Creatures
Elvish Lyrist (enchantment removal)
Albino Troll
Unworthy Dead
Ravenous Skirge (amazing in sealed)
Phyrexian Ghoul
Hollow Dogs
Spined Fluke (new, beefier Kjeldoran Dead)
Priest of Gix
2x Cackling Fiend
Goblin Matron
Goblin Raider
Goblin Patrol
Viashino Sandswimmer
Dromosaur (cute? yuck - I sided out this card literally every match...)
Hopping Automaton (so cute!)

Spells and Artifacts
Lifeline (broken!)
2x Befoul
Diabolic Servitude
Duress (a mini coercion, cute!  and it's the only way to get rid of those damn
perpetual enchantments)
Arc Lightning
Falter
Heat Ray

Land
8 Swamps
6 Mountain
3 Forests
41 cards...I actually didnt use my Shower of Sparks...no room!
Sideboard: Hush (tranquility with cycling), Jagged Lightning, Corrupt, Breach.
This is the first time I didnt play with all the direct damage I recieved; i
left out both Shower of Sparks and Jagged Lightning.  Well, whatever - it
worked.

Round 1 (sorry, I wasnt planning on writing this, so I didn't take down
names.)
I play a scru- I mean an experienced challenged player ;)  But seriously,
after winning in 2, I give him some advice about sealed deck (play only 40
cards!)

Round 2  me vs. Not a Scrub
This guy went on to get 2nd.  Both games he plays more creatures faster than
me and then plays Opal Archangel.  I die quickly.  After losing this round, I
almost drop out to play booster draft.  Losing early on always discourages me;
i mean, i have to win my next 5 rounds to get a prize.  Luckily, I stay in.

Round 3
Fast creatures + removal = win.  Nothing really notable happens this round
except for this: I get out Lifeline, Phyrexian Ghoul, and Cackling Fiend.  I
sacrifice the fiend to the ghoul every turn to give it +2/+2 until EOT, and
because of Lifeline, Cackling Fiend returns to play at the end of every turn.
Every time the fiend enters play, my opponent must discard a card.  Pretty
soon my opponent had no hand and no creatures.

Round 4
I play an extremely amiable fellow.  He goes first:
him: swamp
me: swamp
him: mountain, play unworthy dead
me: mountain, play unworthy dead
after this, we are in a bit of a standoff, but i get out a ravenous skirge to
deal 3 a turn.

Round 5
I play Jay, who is also very friendly.  He beats me down quickly with that
annoying 2/1 first strike, flying pegasus.  When I am at 2 I get out Lifeline
and a Hopping Automaton which means I can block the pegasus forever, but he
topdecks a disenchant before I draw something to kill his pegasus.
Next game he mulligans, then draws too much land.  I get out Lifeline and he's
stuck.  During this game I had out a transformed sleeper while Lifeline was
out.  We call over a judge who looks and says, "Oh, the broken card."  He
calls over Tony, who, after several minutes of thinking, rules that sleeper
creatures cannot be brought back by Lifeline.  Third game I manage to pull out
a close victory.

Round 6
I win the first game so fast that I dont get to see much of his deck.  I
sidboard out a Befoul for a Jagged LIghtning because he has some black
creatures.  On to game two.  My opponent gets a much better draw this game and
I find out he has incredible removal: befoul, expunge, path of peace, jagged
lightning...he even had the black growing enchantment which buries X non-black
creatures.  He played that enchantment early, and by the end of the game it
had about 25 counters on it...luckily, most of my deck is black creatures and
I never played more than one nonblack creature at a time.  Because of this, he
didnt use it for fear of wasting it.  This game takes forever because neither
one of us can damage the other.  Finally I get out a Spinal Fluke (5/1
regenerator) and bring him down to 5 before he pacifies it.  Then I draw
Lifeline (finally!) which makes all my creatures invincible.

Round 7
It's a good thing i stayed in: I only need one more victory to win 12 packs.
My opponent is at a big disadvantage because he has lost his sideboard.  I win
the first game because of fast creatures and removal.  The second game goes
the same way, I win after he plays two Winding Wurms (4G, echo, 6/6) in a row
and I play two Befouls in a row.

So I end up winning after all!  I come in 8th over all.

Props:
Asaf for winning.  Congratulations!
My fourth and fifth round opponents for being so much fun to play against.

Slops:
Neutral Ground for being so sweaty...yuck!  my deck was stuck together at the
end of the day.

Peter Vabulas
Gollyzilla@aol.com