Subject: Tourney report, t2, monored, 12/20 Date: Sun, 21 Dec 1997 07:06:45 -0800 (PST) From: David To: fkusumot@ix.netcom.com Hello. This is the first tournament report you'll read from me, although not the first I've written. The first one is lost somewhere on my hard-drive (it's probably my fault, but I'll blame it on windows 95 anyway : Bill Gates, may you die and rot in Hell for eternity). I played yesterday in the weekly type 2 tourney organized by Eternal Elysium, Portland, OR. Non-sanctionned for now, about 20 people show up every week. Last time I played, I took a 5 colors red deck of mine to the semis, and got beat down because all I could draw in the 3rd game was 2 gemstone mines. That sucked, but I was still pretty happy about my performance, because the deck was 100% mine. So I tried to improve it during the last 2 weeks, and was ready to go when on Friday night, on the Dojo, I see this monstrosity called REDRUM. Monored, almost pure creature beatdown. And I think: "This would beat my deck so hard, it's not even funny." I'm almost sure I don't have nearly enough creature control, even with 3 cursed scrolls, to face redrum . So as a last minute decision on Saturday, I decide to play this deck. If you want a list, just check it, it's somewhere in the decks section. I only had 2 ball lightnings, so I replaced the other 2 with suqata lancers, and for the sideboard I also missed 2 hand to hand, replaced with flashfires (the deck that beat me in the semis last time was WW/r). Notes: I'm still wondering what the 2 mindstones are doing in this deck. Sided them out each time, replaced them with the hammer, because this deck needs dd badly in the main deck. Also, enchantments are bad... for you. I am thinking of adding a touch of green for emerald charm or tranquility. Shatters in the sb were pretty useless too, with the 4 vandals in the main deck... Great cards : jackal pup. Did much more damage to the opponent than it did to me. I don't know if I was lucky not to face too much red (saw only one other monored in the tourney, didn't play it). Song of blood: nasty in this deck, it'a amazing how 1/1 creatures suddenly become big and threatening :-). Hand to hand: if you're playing monored, you *need* this card. Shuts down cops, quicksands, pumping abilities, and whatnot. Hand to hand rules. (almost no names, to protect the innocent and... awww, ok, I'm just bad with names, all right?) 1st match: newbie playing W/U/B. During both games he gets an invulnerability with buyback rolling, but still can't deal with all the critters coming at him. He even lobotomized me twice, took out my sandstalkers. Note on the sandstalkers: they're a control card, not a creature. It doesn't look like it, but that's what they are. They can read differently, according to the moment : "destroy target quicksand", or "Target opponent discards couterspell card", or even "Destroy target creature with power 2 or more". Trust me, that's the way they work. Well, not much else, except he got out a 2nd turn chill in the 2nd game (d'oh!) that I pyroblasted with 3 mana on turn 3, while beating him down with my first turn pup. Note to myself: when the opponent is playing blue, and plays first, and I've got a pyroblast in my opening hand, I should not play anything on *my* first turn, so I can pyroblast this sort of things on *his* second turn. I mean, this is just a big mistake, because he was even playing with sea sprites in the main deck!! What can I say, I don't play mistake-free Magic, although I've gotten a lot better in the last few months. It just takes time, I guess. Matches: 1-0, Games: 2-0 2nd macth: a weird pox deck. Too bad I didn't get to see much of it. Cursed scrolls were very, very annoying. Nice guy. Matches: 2-0, Games: 4-0 3rd match: mono-blue. Great. I hate those decks with a passion, the same way I hated counterpost in the old t2. Plus, I don't like playing this guy. He's very young (13, 14?), and a bitch to play against. Not a smile, complains about everything, will *never* let you take anything back (which is fine, it's a tourney, but the funny thing is, he does try to take moves back), and a sore loser. I draw my opening hand, and realize I forgot to sideboard out my pyroblasts from last game. I tell him this, begin to side out, but he calls the judge. Oh my, I'm sooo scared. Seven (the judge) tells him to relax. Consider this : 1) this is non-sanctionned. 2) in a previous non-sanctionned tourney here, I conceded a game AFTER I HAD WON IT because I'd realized I had 59 cards in my deck; he saw this (was playing next to me), so he knows I'm not a cheater. But he has to be an ass about it. Anyway, we go on and begin to play. I have to wait each time I cast something : if I don't, he bitches and says he might counter. During the 2nd game, I had a few creatures out, and he was all tapped except for a quicksand. I play song of blood and begin to reveal my top cards. He tells me to wait. This time I get upset (most of the time I just try to stay calm and concentrate on the game), look at him, and says loudly: "What are you going to do about it? (point his quicksand) Counter with this, maybe??" Geez! He says nothing. My creatures get their bonus :-) If you read this, man: LIGHTEN UP!!!! Anyway, I made a lot of mistakes in these 3 games. He won the first. I won the 2nd. He won the 3rd after I got him down to 2, but then I kept on drawing land after that (in a 20 lands deck, that's wrong :-). Too many mistakes. I mean, trying a boil (which could have saved my butt) when he's not tapped out?? I'm a scrub, what can I say. Matches: 2-1, Games: 5-2 4th match: Nelson, playing a weird W/G creatureless, lock deck (humility, orim's prayer, and nature's revolt). Nelson is a good player, and a very nice guy. He's always playing original yet efficient decks. Last time we played each other, he was playing a scary slivers deck. We drew, because we were both ahead, but played for fun, and he kicked my butt really hard. Don't laugh, slivers are scary. Try it : B/R/G, tons of slivers, and a sick twist: living death. We ended up splitting 3rd and 4th place. Today, someone else is playing his slivers deck, and the funny thing is, he got his butt kicked by it :-) And today, I beat him. Real fast in the first game. In the 2nd game, he gets out a cop:red, I get out a hand to hand for which he could never find a disenchant, in spite of his frenetic scroll racking. But he also got out a humility and a warmth. Ouch!! I slowly damage him, as he can't use the cop, and eventually kills him, but man, that was hard. I need enchantment removal -so- bad. Matches: 3-1, Games: 7-2 5th match: newbie? WW, apparently relying a lot on creature enchantments. I get the 1st game, despite a red-warded white knight (flickering ward), and one of my critters spirit-linked. 2nd game is more difficult, as he gets out a prot.red chicken, and also a red-warded, spirit-linked, empiryal-armored white knight. Help!! Thankfully, his hand is pretty low, so it's 'only' a 5/5 first striker. I'm at 7, he's at 2. He attacks: mistake. Actually, I don't know if it was a mistake, because it did put me at 2, and him at 7. Look, ma, a mirror-universe white knight!! ;-) I need enchantment removal -so- bad. Funny thing: I can't exactly remember what happened the next turn, except I top-decked a very nice card which saved my butt, because I won the game. Probably a ball lightning. Even with the chicken untapped, I was able to deal 7. Game, set, and match :-) Matches: 4-1, Games: 9-2 Pretty good: I go to the top 8. Pretty bad: I have to play mono-blue boy again. Bad start in the 1st game, pretty slow for me. That's bad because the only way to win is to kill him before he gets mana to counter all my stuff. We both get a handful of critters on the table, but his are bigger than mine: 2 air elementals and 2 ophidians, and a manowar. Me: 3 mogg fanatics, and some other 2/1 stuff (either canyon wildcat or pup). I snick in a song of blood. +3/+0. COOL! He has to block with everything he has, or he dies. Most of our creatures die, including one of his air elementals (the other one was tapped). One of my moggs get through and deals 4. That's enough to kill him the turn after that. Song of blood rocks. He's mana-screwed the next game, so I finish him quickly, and win. I expect him to make some sour comments on how easy it is to win when the opponent is mana screwed, but he shakes my hand, and says "Good games". Man, but that was nice! Or maybe he was being ironic, and he's even more wicked than I thought ;-) ;-) Semis: a R/G vineyard/beatdown. Nice guy. This is actually the first good vineyard deck I've ever seen. Vineyard kills me (I mean, just look at the deck: you see a lot of mana sink?). Very good player, too, thoughtful (the way I *should* play :-). 1st game: believe it or not, he gets more creatures out than me. My draws sucked. The wildcat did a nice job before he got incinerated though. I die. 2nd game was much closer, he was at 2, and I was at 8. My turn. I top-deck a viashino, and already have a suqata in my hand. All he has is a killer bee. I play everything and attack with everything. For whatever reason, I didn't think he was holding an incinerate, but he was, so he incinerates the sandstalker and block the suqata with the pumped bee, who lives and kills me during the next turn. Oh well. Not too bad. The guy playing slivers lost in the semis too, so we split 3rd and 4th, for some measly store credits. I got another much needed ball lightning. One to go :-). And my 3rd undiscoverd paradise. Not *too* bad for the $5 fee :-) Thanks for reading! Hope you enjoyed it. Comments? Flames? gekiere@lclark.edu David.