Subject: PTQ Rome Report: Muncie, IN Date: Mon, 21 Sep 1998 16:14:45 PDT From: "Doug Weaver" To: fkusumot@ix.netcom.com Welcome to my report everyone. The four slot qualifier on Sept. 19 in Muncie, IN was the largest event in this area since the GP Indy event several months ago. So naturally, there was a load of talented players in attendance. There were also quite a few teams in attendance- including Team Portal, Team Ultra Pro, Team C&C, Team Goal Line, Team Turbo, Team Extreme (that would be us), and some I'm sure I'm forgetting. My teammates (Bob Smith, Terrence Young, Steve Jones, Chris Hamm, and Sammy Gilly) and I did alot of play testing for this format. And our massive amount of dedication ended with this brilliant deduction... Rock/Paper/Scissors formats freakin' suck. We worked our asses off to create a meta-game deck that would carry us to Rome, but failed over and over again. So after all of that I ended up playing Mono-Red, and prayed for good matchups. I live in Indianapolis so the tourney was only about an hour or so away. After an uneventful drive we reach our destination. When we arrive there are only about 80 or so people registered! For a four slot qualifier! There was only about 15 min. left until the tourney was to begin, so I decided to walk around and scout the decks people were practicing with. Next thing I know the crowd almost doubles in size. There ended up being close to 140 people, and the quality of players was pretty damn high. So here we go..... ROUND 1 - Ed Peterson - Mono-Red - Chicago, IL Already a mirror matchup. First game he beats me outright in a close one. Second game I give him the big Rathi beatdown. Third game was a long one. We both had bad draws, and he got out of the gates quicker than I did. Then I drew three of my boarded in Bottle Gnomes. They give me the extra time I needed to burn him to death. 1-0 2-1 ROUND 2 - Scott Miles - Mono-Red - Indianapolis, IN Another mirror matchup. I win game one. Game two I see some unexpected cards out of him: Pallimud, Wall of Razors, Wild Wurm, Pandemonium, etc... I don't know how many of those were off of his sideboard, but they didn't seem that strong to me. Not that I'm too upset mind you. Anyway, Game two goes to me without much trouble. 2-0 4-1 ROUND 3 - Yabo (Team Portal) - Mono-Red - Chicago, IL Wow! What a shock! A mirror matchup for me!?!? Who woulda' guessed. What the hell is going on anyway? Three in a row. Damn, bet that doesn't happen too often. Oh well, I won the first two. Game one goes to me. Game two he lays a Rathi Dragon pretty quickly. I'm at 11 life. I have a Mogg Flunkie and a Mogg Raider in play. Two shocks in my hand. So unless I topdeck like a damn pro, we're going to game three. I draw a land (my fourth), lay it, and I attack. No block for him (the Rathi was the only creature in play for him), and that puts him at 10 life. He draws and lays a Goblin Bombardment. He attacks and I'm at 6 life. Okay here it is..... all or nothing. And I draw........... a freakin' Rathi Dragon! I am such a pimp! With the Mogg Raider in play, I'm the big winner in our Rathi stand-off. 3-0 6-1 ROUND 4 - Brandon Rutter - Counter-Chicken - Chicago, IL Brandon is a hell of a player. He made the final eight at the last PTQ Rome qualifier two weeks ago in Chicago. So I know I'm in for a tough match. Game one goes to him because I stall for a little bit with mana problems. This allows him to get set up, and I get run over. Game two I get a Spellshock in under his counterspells. He's low on life, so that's game. Game three he gets a damn good draw. He lays a turn four Drifter, turn five Spicy Chicken, and a turn six Wyvern with an untapped island. I catch the BIG beatdown. 3-1 7-3 ROUND 5 - Mark Slapek - Mono-Blue - Chicago, IL Game one I give huge beatdown. Game two, I see no Chills, so see game one for the result. 4-1 9-3 ROUND 6 - Steve Matsuchek - White Weenie - Rockford, IL Game one he mulligans down to four cards, and he's playing first so he's at a HUGE disadvantage. He catches big beatdown. Game two he has to mulligan again. But this time only once. I don't see much out of the deck, and he gets thugged by a Rathi. 5-1 11-3 ROUND 7 - Leonard Richardson - White Weenie - ?????????? Game one he can't handle a Rathi. Game over. Game two he is kicking my ass with like 5 pro-red creatures and a warmth on the table. Then I topdeck the fifth land I need to cast Apocalypse. BOOM! I'm feeling good now. He's got two cards in hand, and I've got a second chance to get out of the gates quicker than he does. His next turn: plains, 1/1 en-Kor. His next turn: plains, Soltari Priest. His next turn: plains, done. His next turn: Paladin en-Vec. I'd tell you my turns but it really doesn't matter. His recovery is amazing. Game three he just beat me. There was one point where I needed to topdeck an Apocalypse to get back into it, and didn't. So I lost. 5-2 12-5 ROUND 8 - Bob Smith (Team Extreme) - White Weenie w/ Red - Indpls., IN What a shitty position to be in. I'm the top ranked 5-2 player. My tiebreakers are great. Win and I stand a pretty good chance of getting into the eight. So I'm going for beatdown with extreme prejudice! And my opponent is...... a teammate. :( To make matters worse, this is a terrible matchup for me. Bob is a damn good player. One of the best in Indianapolis. I feel like I'm walking into a slaughter house. I win the match 2-0. Bob ended up getting terrible draws both games. I don't know how I won this match. The god of pimps must have blessed me. The odds were WAY against me. 6-2 14-5 We finish pretty early, so I have to do alot of waiting. It turns out that no 6-2's made the cut, and I finished 9th. Another bridesmaid finish (this is becoming a habit for me). Oh well, here's the top eight and what they were playing: 1 - Leonard Richardson - White Weenie - 7-1 2 - Bob Maher - Recurring/Survival - 7-1 3 - Darrell Lochtefeld - Mono-Red - 6-0-2 4 - Ryan Nunn - ??????? - 6-0-2 5 - Brandon Rutter - Counter/Chicken - 6-1-1 6 - Kyle Gansert - ??????? - 6-1-1 7 - Adam Donnely - ??????? - 6-1-1 8 - Eric Taylor - Counter/Chicken - 6-1-1 PROPS - Barratt Moy and George Pratt for putting on another great tourney. - My teammate Terrence for paying my way in. I'm broke as hell you see. - Our sponsor in Indpls., IN - Extreme Games. - Anthony Cantu (OCG) for finding Yoda. Dude, you are the shit! I owe you big. SLOPS - One of my opponents for asking my to be gentle when I shuffled his deck. If you care about your cards so much (which is fine), put them into sleeves and you won't have that problem. - Another of my opponents for a list of crap just too long to put onto your screen. Playing dumb just doesn't work when everyone knows how good of a player you are. Well, those are my takes. This is the part where I say, "Thank you, and I'm out"! - Doug Weaver "The Magic Pimp" ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com