Subject: Tourney Report---Japan Date: Mon, 27 Jul 1998 07:35:11 +0900 From: "Douglas W. Moore" To: Japan. Japan, Japan. What a metagame. Here its rock, scissors, paper, bamboo fan, teapot, rice bowl, etc. Here you see about 1/3 of the people playing net decks( 5CB, Counterhammer, Sligh etc), 1/3 play scrub decks, and the other 1/3 play what ever weird janky deck caught their fancy this week. I decided to bring a Oath of Druids deck because I wanted to play the card. Quite a reason, huh? I playtested it out and ended up with a Blue White Green deck something like this Oath x4 Sylvan x3 Peace of Mind x1 Blessing x3 Wrath x3 Disenchant x3 Spike Feeder x4 Archangel x2 SB Aura of Silence x2 Impulse x4 Wrath x1 Mana Leak x4 Phrexian Furnace x2 Scragnoth x3 Scroll Rackx2 penance x2 Mox Diamond x2 Sacred Ground x2 Peace of Mind x1 Enlightened tutor x2 Verdant Touch x2 Repentance x2 21 lands In playtesting i realized that this deck was strongest against weenies particurally green, black and red. It was weakest against blue or 5C blue because of counters, removal, and lack of creatures. Any way I decided to bring it and see what happened. The deck has several interesting features. perhaps my favorite is the Sylvan library/Peace of Mind trick. You can use the Sylvan to draw an extra card for four life. With the Peace you can then discard that extra card for one white mana and get back three life. If the oath is working you can get a ton of cards in a short time. It worked well for me in several games. The Tournament was near Nagoya in Handa. There was a big crowd of 80 people. 78 of them were Japanese. My friend John and I were the only foreigners playing. Just for the curious he played a 5CG Flagpole varient. I dont want to go through the tourney game by game I will just give an overview of what I faced and the results. Round 1 Straight red deck with a five color sideboard. Lifegaining and some timely manaleaks and disenchants pulled me through. He tried to play creaturelsess burn the second two games but the Archangel is castable in my deck. I win. Round two. I played a counter Hammer/Shard deck. His only creatures were shard phoenixes and they were gone for the second two games. The first game he left the shard in play just long enough for me to get my archangel. Again I win through scragnoths and casting to archangel straight. I win Round three. I play a straight blue deck with 4 steel golems and 4 standing stones. My oaths are useless again!!!!!!! We trade the first two games. Game one he sounters me and then finishes me off with a golem. the second game a turn 5 scragnoth goes all the way. Thew third game i get my second mana turn 7 and don't do anything. Death by mana screw. I lose Round four I play a scrub with a red deck. He didn't know what i was doing with the oaths and didn't know how to fight it. Game one I reach 50 life. I was asking him to give up because it was taking so long but he didn't. Game two i stumbled and he ran me over. Game three he cast a rathi early and hten an orgg but i repentanced both of them. That left him with two tapped Manavaults and one mountain after a fireblast. I win Round five i finally play the fkind of deck my deck was designed to beat. Straight green. My deck clicks, I get to use my oath. I win in three games again due to a poor draw. 9 mana sources, a disenchant, and three mana leaks before he runs me over. The third game I get what i need and win. Round five. I play a ten year old with a 5C donais deck straight from the net. The first game I give after 30 minutes because he has control and i want to have a chance to win the next. I know there is no way we will finish three. Game two lasts the other 30 minutes and we don't finish. He was a good player and didn't make any mistakes I could see. He even knew enough to phase out his rainbows at the end of his turn to deny me the oathing ability. I lose. Four and two was not too bad for me. But so much blue. Blue was ruling the day. Being able to cast the Archangel really saved me. When your opponent plays creatureless and several decks can your only chance is to play the Archangels in the late game. A Spirit of the night would have lost me at lest two more games. If you ever come to Japan to play drop me a line and I'll intro you to the scene.