Jake, this is the first tournament report I've read from you and I was struck by how well-written and well layouted it was. I really liked the "MVP" section, whitch is a thing I will keep in mind if I ever write a tournament report again.

Thanks for a well done report and congratulations on your finish.

Its a scary thought how much of an impact the current metagame has on the list of "Viable decks".

Say, like, Tog was an awesome deck and did very well on its own, unless it encountered something fishy (bleh) or something else mr. Atog was allergic to. So if Tog is viable (or even the deck to beat), its perfectly viable to play a "hate deck" (a deck that is not equally good on its own, but that has a handful of good matchups).

There will always be something solid, a core of decks that has decent matchups in whatever field you play in and thus never become more or
less viable IF NOT hate decks starting popping up in large numbers. I can truthfully say that there's lots of Workshop-based decks that I consider a part of this core os solid decks that will do just fine whatever the field look like (unless the field looks like it did for Hulk when it was top dog). So far, its too early to give a judgement if the Oath is a core-deck as it needs a bit more field-time in my opinion.

Defining the core-decks is something that has to be done :)

Why would I want to rip a dragon out of my opponents hand?

Interesting, you only play magic online when helping out with the beta-testing? <3

I know there's bound to be people playing Magic Online on here, what's your screen name and what do you play?

My nickname is the same as on here and I mostly play Online Extended.

- Morphling
If you shoot him down with a Incinerator, you're my hero forever

Didnt the 4cc playa have 5 mana = Hard casting FoW?

I dont get it, what did you do with the fire/ice? Or was it like this: Opponent on 3 life, if Triskelion would've punched he could be Fired to death?

One turn of setting up and disrupting oponent (duressing) + Time Walk = Good.

When playing combo, especially stuff like TPS and DeathLong, you dont have to desperatly combo out *this* turn if you know you get the next one as well.

As I read this topic I remembered that I have saved some of my notes from last years qualifier for Swedish nationals and I checked up on them, just to see how they looked like and how I solved some kinds of situations that may come up when you do quick notes(I havent played off-line magic since...like 6 months ago).

And I was completely stunned by my own notes. Besides the normal facts about how much life me and my opponent had and what the source was from damage (an opponent dropping from 18 to 0 and TOG written as a source is always fun) I saw these two notes that I cant remember I've written:

"Beer" and "Cookies". The "beer" note is from the match when I played against reanimator and cookies is from the match against RG Beats. Either I was really hungry and thirsty or I was making a shopping list during my games.

Agreed



I havent seen an unpowered Dragon so I cant tell for sure how much gas it got in form of Artifact-mana, but without moxen+lotus I wouldnt really play a 4-mana tutor and instead go for the more speedy Intuition. This is of course only based on the fact that I havent tested the Tutor2 yet in any form of dragon and only fiddling with ideas.

The spells should be viewed as two different type of threats:

Intuition isnt a "must counter" - Simply let your opponent decrease the chance for him/her topdeck reanimation spells later in the game (as you pull at least 2 out if you need them) and counter the reanimation spell tutored for instead.

GU (or draw2, whitch is a rather catchy name for it actually!) on the other hand is a must counter as you otherwise need at least 2 counters to stop the incoming threat of reanimation.

Scratch "cast" and replace it with "resolve". 2 > 1.

Please, dont call Morphling unkillable  

"One time, at band camp"

 



Buy if you want to, or at least give him more money if you feel like being at least a bit nicer.

In T1 it might be, but Im just so happy that its crazy good in Online Extended and will push islands a bit more

I actually thought a bit about this and came up with these situations to
have some sort of discussion-platform (Please, do note that I dont include the mana cost in these thoughts):

Dragon:

What do you want to fetch in Dragon? (In no particular order)

1. Bazaar (Or Compulsion, but mostly bazaars) - To get going
2. Squee's to abuse the stuff in no. 1 above.
3. Worldgorger Dragon + Finisher
4. Reanimations.
(5). Force of Will / Xantid Swarm.

Intuition is in my opininon one of the best cards in Dragon as it easily fetches you pieces you want "right now". Every one of the pieces above can be fetched with intuition as a 3-of and you get the card you want. This has its good and its bad sides (Taking 3 Bazaars with Intution just to get the Bazaar wastelanded the next turn is not tech), but it works out just the way you like it. In this sense Gifts Ungiven is a lot weaker than Intuition because if you want a card you have to bait it out with a lot better cards (whitch is a contradiction really - but this is a combo deck, the best card in a given situation isnt "the decks best card") making your later draws suck balls in the long run if your plan "right now" doesnt work out the way you want it. BUT, and this is a big but, Gift Ungiven is very good when you want to reanimate in Dragon.

Gift Ungiven for against 4cc:

Animate Dead, Dance of the Dead,  Necromancy, 4th Card (Demonic, Ancestral, What ever)

This, if the spell is resolved, gives you either 2 reanimation spells or one reanimation and a broken card. This is something Intuition CANT do. So Gifts Ungiven is good, but its only good in special situations in dragon. I'd say I still favour Intuition in Dragon though I see the good in Gift Ungiven.


4cc / Ze Germbus:

Granted that 4cc doesnt play with intuition and probably doesnt want Gifts Ungiven, Im going to give some props for the spell in 4cc as 4cc has so MANY powerfull spells that your opponent doesnt want you to resolve. Imagine its the mid-end game and you GU (Gift Ungiven) for:

Demonic Tutor, Mystical Tutor, Ancestral, Mind Twist.

The tutors threats your opponent in the sense that they can turn into Yawg Will, Win Condition or something less nasty. But on the other hand its no fun to be mind twisted and watch your opponent fill upp his/hers hand again, now is it? The "bombs" in 4cc makes the GU a viable card as a "super-tutor". If you got your Crucible setup ready you can GU for:

Flooded Strand, Polluted Delta, Wasteland, Stripmine.

And let the carnage of the manabase begin!

Against fish you can, postboard and in a gamestate where the table is full of critters, GU for:

StP, Fire/Ice, R/B Elemental Blast, FTK. (Balance?)

GU is somewhat strong in 4cc as you can force your opponent to make some very savage decisions.

Hulk Smash:

Hulk Smash is another deck that utilize Intuition to its fullest potential, so again GU has to compete with Intuition for a place in the deck. Intuition for 3 Cunning Wish to fetch the Berzerk? Thats something GU can't do for this deck. I can see a case for fetching 4 moxen or 4 draw spells - AK, Deep Anal, Brain Storm and something else. GU isnt that strong in Hulk, Intuition is much more favorable really :/

Anyway, thats my £.02

Okay, now THATS a good choice! Pristine Angel will look awesome.

If you guys would hand Ookubo any one card that he would tinker with, what would it be? My choice would probably end up be Psychatog, 'cause we love each other so much

L - O - L.

The thing with Annul in Fish is:

You got the edge - You can nuke a win con/ troublesome permanent before it enters play/ etc etc

You dont have to drop something that possibly prevents you from breaking your opponents plan on turn 1-2, because you can stop it. This gives you the advantage of playing the "wait and see game". If your opponent tags along with you and play the same game you can drop a Cloud of Farie - You have gained virtual tempo, because now you have both put a threat into play and still can answer their possible threat.

Plus - The Mirrodin annuls looks cute foiled

Cunning Wish = flexible to threats. I've tested C wish this afternoon and these where my targets:

- Intuition. To fetch combo pieces more reliably.
- Misdirection.
- Tel-Jilad Justice.

And a few other common wish-targets (FoF, etc). It may be too clunky for the deck though.

Excellent article as ever JP, I wish I had something constructive to say at this moment, but I'll get back to ya after my first 5 cups of coffey

How come I fail to see the fun?

First of all; Congrats Smmemen to your succes at GenCon. I took the liberty to answer few of the questions from my point of view here, hopefully Im answering correctly




When do you want to cast it? Imagine the situation. where it would be good. The only situations you can get real milage out of the FoF is rare and since its restricted...

The last mono-U's era looked a bit different than this mono-U's era, my friend.



This is why I advocate Cunning Wish: If something land on the table that's not supposed to be there, the wish could serve as something to bounce any kind of threat. Also the FoF serve very as a card drawer in the board.



You cant really tap out like that against most decks with Mono-U. Remember - You have to have control and if your opponent plays with beats that the keg cant blast fast enough (say, a Titan) you have to counter that threat or you'll exchange gg's.

Edit, this was what smmemen said about this subject in his article:

In such a field, Back to Basics has a similar functionality to Crucible, but trumps it. Back to Basics in addition to many basic Islands is a threat that the metagame is not prepared to handle.



This is something I've been thinking of myself, with a small amount of Seat of Synods in the deck to really get to use the Tinker. The thing is that it takes up precious space in an allready tight deck that wants lots of attention. But it certainly can be built that way, a friend tested out exactly this as soon as Colossus was legal and came in first with his mono-U in a small, local tourney (he also played 4 mis-d, in the finals he was up against Dragon).

Depends. Are the Blood Moon foiled or not?  

Oh  

Well, anyway we both agree that the text on lands should come back so that newer players better understand what you're supposed to do with them. I can't remember the logic behind the simplified lands, but I remembered it as a very logic thing, Im going to do some research over @ wizards.com and see if I can find the piece.

Now, Im all confused - As a newbie I fully understood what the cardtype "Land" and what the game effect of "mana" ment and can't ever imagine where the hickup could come from not distinguishing these two from each other. I blame bad magic-teachers

I take it that the first part (lack of non-basic knowledge) is not happening during sanctioned games, but when you teach someone the basics of games?

Its a possibility, but what can the "Dark Ritual"-missunderstandings come from?

I wonder how one do to missunderstand its quite simple text. Have you, as your role as a judge, encountered such a being?

Has it ever?