Yes, I'm trying to get back into vintage. I'm sure this will be very helpful!

Pyrostatic Pillar seems like a waste of sideboard slot if you use it to stop storm combo. But you can make a case for it if you have 1 or 2 storm decks in your meta and a bunch of Snapcaster Mage decks.

Storm combo is pretty much dead. Lodestone Golem, Mental Misstep and Flusterstorm have killed the Dark Ritual pillar. Oath of Druids, Gush, Steel City Vault and Dredge is what's left of the combo decks. Pillar doesn't do enough against those decks so you should play other cards in your sideboard.

Grafdigger's Cage stops Oath, Dredge, Tinker and Yawgmoth's Will. Now that's a card that actually hits those archetypes hard, and for only one colorless mana. There are more cards that fit the bill, but Pillar isn't really one of them.

ps. I'm just a Ritual player trying to catch a break. Lol, jk.

I sleeved up the deck and tried it out for a couple of games, as well as testing it in workstation a bit.

The results have been good although sometimes variance doesn't favor the deck. It has a lot of drawing power and powerful perpetual mana sources, but sometimes the threats or answers from the opponent negate my hand and there is not much I can do. Other blue decks tend to be able to adapt better while this deck has more raw power.

I'm currently looking at making minor changes to improve every first turn I play in a match, especially on the play. One of the deck's greatest strengths is just throwing a draw seven out there. I want to have powerful first turn plays that puts the opponent on their heels immediately. I want to play this deck as a Grim Long style deck (it has always been my favorite deck) but trying to get around Mental Misstep and Flusterstorm as much as possible. Steel City Vault does not have rituals, and while it does have a number of targets they can all be considered ''random'' while Ritual plays a key role in the Grim Long strategy. Also, Flusterstorm can be played around, while storm decks can't. Steel City Vault does not need to cast ten spells in a turn, it just needs to assemble Vault Key.

I'm aware that this deck can operate in bursts rather than one big turn winning the game, but after goldfishing this deck for a good number of times I've come to the conclusion that it's only about half a turn slower than Grim Long, which is (in today's standards) really fast.

Any merit to playing Lion's Eye Diamond? It's a risky but powerful card. It's also good with Mox Opals.

I think it's pretty funny that someone with Grand Moff Tarkin as an avatar says that strategy is the least of his concerns, since Tarkin is like the strategical mastermind behind the Empire.

I get your point though, just wanted to share my laugh.

Fixing the Broken



Enchantment

Players can't draw more than one card each turn.

Players can't activate abilities of artifacts with converted mana cost 2 or less.

Magic Mushroom (uncommon)
3 - Artifact
T, sacrifice Magic Mushroom: Put a counter on target creature. As long as it has this counter, it's power and toughness double. Whenever the creature is dealt damage, prevent the damage and remove all counters from that creature.

Fire Flower (uncommon)
3 - Artifact
T, sacrifice Fire Flower: Put a counter on target creature. As long as it has this counter, it's power and toughness double and it gains: ''1R: this creature deals 1 damage to target creature or player.'' Whenever the creature is dealt damage, prevent the damage and remove all counters from that creature.

Magic Leaf (uncommon)
3 - Artifact
T, sacrifice Magic Leaf: Put a counter on target creature. As long as it has this counter, it's power and toughness double and it gains flying. Whenever the creature is dealt damage, prevent the damage and remove all counters from that creature.

Hammer Brother Suit (rare)
T, sacrifice Hammer Brother Suit: Put a counter on target creature. As long as it has this counter, it's power and toughness double and it gains deathtouch. It also gains: ''2B: this creature deals 1 damage to target creature or player.'' Whenever the creature is dealt damage, prevent the damage and remove all counters from that creature.

Frog Suit (rare)
T, sacrifice Frog Suit: Put a counter on target creature. As long as it has this counter, it's power and toughness double and it gains islandwalk and islandhome. Whenever the creature is dealt damage, prevent the damage and remove all counters from that creature.

Tanooki Suit (mythic)
3 - Artifact
T, sacrifice Tanooki Suit: Put a counter on target creature. As long as it has this counter, it's power and toughness double and it gains flying. It also gains: ''2G: this creature becomes tapped and indestructible until end of turn. If the creature is already tapped when you activate this ability, flip a coin. If you lose the flip, sacrifice the creature.'' . Whenever the creature is dealt damage, prevent the damage and remove all counters from that creature. If the creature is in indestructible form when it is dealt damage, this particular counter stays.

Starman (rare)
2 - Artifact
T, sacrifice Starman: Put a counter on target creature. As long as it has this counter, it gains hexproof, deathtouch and indestructible. Remove the counter at end of turn.

Juglem's Cloud (mythic)
2UUU - Instant
End the turn.

Enchanted Musicbox (rare)
2 - Artifact
T, sacrifice: Tap all creatures. Those creatures don't untap during their controller's next untap step. Instead, they untap during their controller's second next untap step.

1-up Mushroom (rare)
0 - Artifact
T, sacrifice: You gain 1 life.
''What did you expect it would do?!''

Thanks for the replies! Bazaar in a vintage madness deck, that's awesome. I'm sure that could be viable and totally unexpected in some metagames.

Since more and more vintage decks tend to be creature or permanent-based, madness could be something worth looking into.

I'll also mess around with a new age version of the Bazaar Storm deck, because it's just awesome. Infernal Tutor, then activate Bazaar in response to get hellbent, I love it.

I'm currently busy trying to trade for Bazaars so naturally I'm currently in love with it. I've searched the internet for all the information about Bazaar I could find, simply because I'm so excited I'm finally getting them!

Most of the information about Bazaar is the general kind. It's the card that makes Dredge work, it's a card you can mull down to as the only card in your hand and still win. But besides being a graveyard engine, it's also a draw engine.

The first powerful combination with Bazaar was Squee, Goblin Nabob. Then it was Worldgorger Dragon, and now it's the dredge mechanic. Bazaar has been used in Workshop decks. There was even a time when Bazaar was used in a Tendrils deck. This really intrigued me.

The time of multiple archetypes utilizing Bazaar are long gone. Why is this? I get that Dredge is more powerful then the above decks, but it's much more linear. Is there any merit in trying to use Bazaar of Baghdad as a card to filter your draws and look for game-ending bombs? Has it been tried in recent years?

I think we can all agree that despite build or variation of the archetype, MUD decks are generally better on the play. So the real question regarding this topic is whether this disadvantage (from a blue player's point of view) outweighs the potential benefits of being on the draw against other blue decks.

Because when I know what I'm up against, I'll play unless I'm playing against blue.

I'm just curious whether in a meta where you expect an ''even'' distribution between played archetypes, and when you play a very reactive blue-based deck, it may be wise to choose to draw when winning the die roll.

We could try to put the advantages and disadvantages of playing and drawing against each archetype into some sort of comparable content. I do have to admit that the disadvantages of drawing against MUD probably outweigh the advantages of drawing vs. blue but this theory can still be applied to heavy blue metas not to mention that Vintage is the format to try and find new tech because it's very easy to get sucked in by the stale nature of vintage, and that will make the innovative part of your vintage brain lazy.

White Dragon,

You state yourself that being on the draw against blue could be considered an advantage, against shops it's a disadvantage and against dredge it's not going to matter much. If there is not much of a difference overall with being on the draw, then why not try and get that extra bit of information? The cost for it is much less than a lot of players make it out to be.

Also, I'm not talking about basing all of your mulligan decisions on tells. Just when you pick up something and you were already considering mulliganing based on the fact the hand is average in general, and just plain terrible vs one of the pillars.

I'm talking about playing a blue-based control deck in a big vintage tournament like Bazaar of Moxen. I'm playing a Keeper deck myself, and I actually play a pair of Wastelands and a Strip Mine. So for me there is actually a bit of benefit trying to sniff out a Dredge player because there is no advantage for playing. I only get to destroy a Bazaar when it's on the table, play or draw.

Also, I'm not claiming to be the master of reading players, but there's just a world of difference between glancing over a hand, scanning for specific cards and staring at a hand while envisioning different lines of play. But mostly, my point is that there is more benefit to drawing than picking up tells. In general you're still looking for overall playability but vintage is very much centered around the opening hand and the rock, paper, scissors nature of it. Yes, playing first has a ton of advantages over drawing, but I think body language, especially in the vintage format, is being overlooked, because more so than in any other format, the opening hands are incredibly important in vintage.

I've come back to vintage after a couple of years of not really playing the format. During that time span I have played a lot of legacy and modern. When coming back to vintage and playing a couple of games I got smashed. I seemed to totally forget how to play this format. It took me a good couple of games to get the feel for the format again. Sometimes when you look at a format, when you play other formats and look again, your view on things might have changed while the format is practically the same.

As a player, I am very much strategically oriented. This may sound like a redundant thing to say when playing Magic but let my try to explain. My decision trees are basically based on information that I have gathered throughout the game. This makes vintage so unique. It has been said before and I will say it again; vintage is the puzzle format. So imagine playing a big tournament and you have no clue what you're up against. You're on the play. How do you evaluate your hand? Don't you keep hands based on how you plan to play out your hand? You have 0 information and you have a big decision to make. Now this may be true for the player who draws too but let me try to explain why this could almost be regarded as an advantage. Since there is such a big difference how the pillars from vintage attack you, it is rough to estimate whether your hand is good. Lots of lands is useful against a prison deck, but it will get you killed against dredge. It could be a strong hand against another blue-based control deck but it's absolutely worthless when your opponent tries to land a protected Oath on turn two. When totally in the dark, you can only base your hand strength on overall power, and you'll base that on whether you have bombs (blue power, tinker, demonic), whether you have countermagic and how explosive your draw is. Sure, it can give you a pretty good idea whether a hand like that will get there in general, but other that that it's just waiting for pieces of information to base your game plan around.

So let's say you're first to declare keep or mulligan. A good opponent doesn't even pick up his hand but tries to detect something from your body language. Imagine how he can deduce things by looking at how you evaluate your hand. Dredge players don't base their keeps on how their hand plays out, they base their decision on whether they have a Bazaar. Not to mention builds with Serum Powder will literally give away all the needed information. So imagine sitting down from an opponent, he wins the die roll and draws 7 cards after shuffling. He quickly scans his hand and declares a mulligan. While one should never make big decisions based on perceived body language. To me that looks like an opponent who was looking for a Bazaar of Baghdad and didn't find it.

On the other end of the spectrum we have blue decks. From experience I can tell you that I never snap-keep, unless I have the absolute nuts. I always try to imagine how the game might play out before I decide whether the hand is good enough. So when you sit down from an opponent, and he thinks a good bit before he keeps, I'd put him on a blue or combo deck, because he's either thinking out his strategy or doing math. Either way, you'll have a feel for what kind of game you can expect. Finally, in the middle are the Workshop decks. You never snap-keep, but you also never seem to really have to think too much whether a hand is playable. It requires somewhat of a decent mix of mana, resistors and theats. Spotting a Bazaar in your hand goes a lot faster than detecting whether you have a bit of everything.

My question to you is, when playing a blue deck, isn't it maybe better to choose to draw in hopes to pick up some tells on opponents to evaluate your mulligan decisions better? It also has some other advantages. Since blue decks always run Library of Alexandria, you not only increase your chances of starting the game with it in hand (8 cards opposed to 7), but you also get to use it in the same turn you put it into play. Also, it's confusing for the opponent. Count on it he's going to be thinking of decks that would have an advantage on the draw. He would most likely overthink the situation and put you on something unorthodox like a dredge deck that uses the discard step as an outlet.

When the first game is played, you will naturally choose to play first when given the decision because there is no more benefit in drawing after game one. Once you know what deck your up against you can evaluate your hand and have a feel for how the first couple of turns might play out.

So, to summarize. Is it justified for a blue player to choose to draw based on this reasoning?

I fail to see why the Tezzeret match-up is supposed to be harder than the workshop aggro. I agree that Staxx is beatable because with 4 basics you should be able to make your land drops and find the bounce spell to eot bounce and go nuts. But against the shop aggro deck it's different. I have more trouble against the deck that plays LESS resistors because the other cards work towards the same goal, but differently: allowing you to draw less cards, putting you an a clock. It's this combination of disruption and pressure that gives me a hard time beating the deck. One sphere is enough to stop you from comboing out and when the WS aggro player follows up with a Karn or something I'm on a serious clock. Ofcourse it is easier to use your resources to find your bounce when there are less spheres on the table but then it becomes less easy to go off after bouncing because you have used a precious tutor to find a bounce spell, very weak.

Tezzeret on the other hand has reactive disruption, it's much easier to play around it because it allows you to do the single most important thing a TPS deck is supposed to be doing before trying to win: sculpt your hand. After boarding they will be bringing more disruption to the table, disruption that attacks your hand. This is very annoying and will make the Tezzeret deck much harder to beat. Dark Confidant doesn't scare me. You can compare it to a suspended Night's Whisper. Life is a resource but we're talking 4 points of damage before the game is going to be ''decided''. Either the TPS player manages to resolve a bomb and is in great shape to seal the game or the Tezz player gets too many turns and becomes the more powerful deck, it will be hard to steal the game for the TPS player.

I personally don't board in Sad Sac against Tezzeret decks because of the reasons outlined by others. But I most definately think it's awesome against Oath decks and other TPS decks. It's not very realistic to try and win the game with Confidant beats but there is a chance it works. When I resolve my Sacrament I want my opponent to scoop, if he doesn't, I'm worried because I've burned a lot of resources in casting it.

I have a good record vs. Drain Tendrils and Tezzeret decks. I have a bad record against the red shop aggro deck. I made top 4 by beating Drain Tendrils with Spell Pierces and beat a Tezz deck with Mystic Remora. My only loss in the Swiss was against the Red Shop Deck. The same guy beat me in the semi's. The raw power of TPS is best attacked if you go for mana denial over spell denial. This is based on my experience with the deck. I'm playing this for 6 months but put a lot of time and effort into testing and it did pay off.

On the 5 color Staxx deck, I agree 100% with Marske. This is by far the easiest configuration to beat with TPS.

Very nice report! Also, pretty sweet you added links to the other tournaments you've played GWSx in. I've had a great time reading them and it really raises my enthusiasm for the deck.

Impressive how you ripped through the field even though your Sacramants were pretty much dead weight during the Swiss games.

Finally, thanks for an awesome day!

No, but that's probably because Guus is lanky and Kevin isn't. :p

Anyway, glad you enjoyed reading the report!

Hope you have some spare time during the vacation to have a testing night with Guus?

Yes, making it a Cryptic Command kind of card is a good idea. Then we can forget about the whole Tome thing/flavourtext because Anusien raises a good point: Elspeth wouldn't create an artifact book to bash other colors with unfamiliair magic tricks.

seems pretty fair for what the card is capable of. When I'm looking at Cryptic Command an an example most of the available options the card provide cost (Counterspell and Boomerang). Drawing a card costs one (or rather 1/2 of when looking at cards like Ponder, Serum Visions and Sleight of Hand). Finally, tapping down all creatures should cost about I guess.

With that in mind I think it's fair to raise the powerlevel a little bit. I think shooting 3 damage to an attacking or blocking creature is fair as many white cards can even remove attacking or blocking creatures from the game for 1 mana (straight up destroying is an option too but I'd prefer the ''red'' in this ability). The Rampant Growth searching up Plains is a great idea. Unearth is fine. I think the last ability could be more ''blue'' so let's give it the Burst of Energy ability. Tap or untap target permanent. It's very Twiddly but white has proven it can do those tricks as well.

Finally I'd like to add that the initial idea of making it so expenise is that I wanted to make sure it's caster would pay extra mana as some kind of fine (in lack of better words) seeing that being able to shock a player with a white card is fun but completely unfair. Other than that, I didn't want to make the mistake of creating a card that is out of flavour as well as powerful. That would make it a little over the top, or just lame.

That being said, I completely agree with the new ideas. The card is not only much better, but also more fun.

I picture the art being the same as the Command cycle, where magic escapes a jar and flows into four different directions. The colors blue, black, green and red should be a little visible in the different streams so that the idea behind the card is visible in it's artwork.

EDIT: Burst of Energy doesn't tap, so maybe that's no a very good idea. I'm not sure if white is supposed to tap doen lands and stuff.

If you read more carefully it's not that much out of flavor. That's what I was trying to explain in my original post. I am trying to make a symbolic card and I outlined the reason for doing so. Feel free to dislike the idea, but your responses could be more constructive as I'm only trying this for the first time and it's reactions like this that discourage me from trying again. Your last comment is dripping with sarcasm. I'm not really sure why you can't give normal constructive advice.

It's not the answer to white sucking, calling it ''payback time'' was supposed to be a joke, or did you think I was trying to break formats with this? It's more of a symbolic card where a white planeswalker creates a book to lash out at the other colors in the same manner white has lost it's power throughout the years. It's supposed to be a cool card, not a good card... But if you ask me, I'd love playing this in a casual but competitive mono white deck. Shocking a creature or Unearthing one seems pretty funny to me with a mono white deck.

How about making it ? If someone wants to play this he can ONLY do so in a mono white deck, that's the idea of the entire card. White lashes out at the other colors and doesn't want to allign. And having a converted mana cost of 3 actually makes it pretty good.

This is very weird card but who doesn't like weird cards?

Examining the Tome of Secrets

4W

Sorcery

Choose one - Search your library for a basic land card and put it into play tapped, Tome of Secrets deals 2 damage to target creature or player, return target creature with converted mana cost 3 or less from your graveyard to play or look at the top three cards of your library and put them in any order, then draw a card.

''This book contains the techniques being used by mages with different histories. Judgment will be brought upon them when we fight fire with fire.''
- Elspeth Tirel, Knight Errant

--------------------------------------------

It's expensive but it's an Unearth, Shock, Ponder or Rampant Growth. Whatever you want to be doing at that particular moment. It's kind of awesome because white has been getting weaker and weaker over time. Especially when they printed Damnation, Wrath of God lost it's shine and value. There is little white has to offer what other colors can't do except gaining life (which green does as well, only better).

So this card means payback time, getting shocked by a white card is pretty funny and seeing that it costs 5 mana I'd say it's pretty fair. Also, this HAS to be a rare. Rares are either very strong cards or at least cards that do something special.

I'm not sure if this card is playable. I can only see this being played in a mono white control deck that wants to be able to do something special without having to resort to splashing colors.

Arjan,

Great report and congratulations on your fine performance (especially with 4 hours of sleep playing that monster of a deck). I especially love the way you are hard on yourself and your lines of plays. I believe that people who notice their misplays and remember them accurately will improve each game they play. This must be true especially for you because you made top 8 at Nationals and here you are taking 3rd place. You must be confident in performing well in Breda when the stakes are really high. See you there man!

@ Zieby,

Thanks for your response! But personally I'm kinda glad that I didn't face you in this tournament seeing as you would make my life miserable with your Crypts and Brain Freezes!

@ Marske,

First of all, thanks! And regarding you sitting on the edge of your seat... Me too! I was really excited to play you because the stakes were high and we played the same deck. I was excited as well, especially after you forcing the Duress and resolving the first turn Necropotence! I think you're a huge Vintage enthusiast because you were so excited when witnessing the top 8 matches going down. Although you missed out on playing top 8 yourself, that didn't stop you from being excited for the rest of us. That's just real class man and it must mean you love this game to death. I can also mention the website www.themanacrypt.nl and the work you put into promoting events but I made that comment because you were running around with a huge smile on your face during top 8 because R&D kicked ass this event.

@Sean,

It's comments like this that make it all the more worthwhile to put in the effort of writing a detailed report. I already was hoping players from all over the world are reading and enjoying this because I love to read detailed reports myself. Thank you very much for your kind words man, I really appreciate it.

@Mantis,

You're absolutely right. I mixed the two first games of our Swiss match and our semi's match. You didn't have the Welder that game. Thanks for the props, I'm glad you liked reading the report!

After I missed the last two events because of various reasons such as drinking, partying and public transport I was eager to play the Hengelo event. I've been testing TPS extensively past week because I wanted to perform the best I could. I got op at 7 in the morning and made sure I would have enough food for the day. Enough bread, fruit and enough to drink. Usually I tend to make the mistake of not eating/drinking enough during events and end up with a headache after 5 rounds, especially when you play The Perfect Headach.. err.. Storm.
I agreed to meet Duncan, his brother Kevin and Guus in Diemen where they would pick me up with the car. We discussed all sorts of crazy stuff in the car. The thing I remember best is when we were discussing what metagame we would be expecting and that the REAL tournament starts at top 8 for us. Duncan was playing GWSx with Sacraments, Guus was playing Red Workshop Aggro and Kevin was playing 9sphere MUD. We figured there would be a lot of combo showing up, seeing that combodecks (especially ANT) dominated the last two events, in fact ANT is our National champion!

The Perfect Storm

Black Lotus
Mox Jet
Mox Sapphire
Mox Pearl
Mox Emerald
Mox Ruby
Lotus Petal
Sol Ring
Mana Crypt
Mana Vault
Memory Jar
Ancestral Recall
Time Walk
Timetwister
Necropotence
Yawgmoth’s Bargain
Tinker
Gifts Ungiven
Fact or Fiction
Mind’s Desire
Yawgmoth’s Will
Tendrils of Agony
Demonic Tutor
Vampiric Tutor
Mystical Tutor
Grim Tutor
Imperial Seal
Brainstorm
Ponder
Merchant Scroll
Chain of Vapor
Hurkyl’s Recall
Rebuild
4 Dark Ritual
4 Force of Will
4 Duress
2 Cabal Ritual
Darksteel Colossus
4 Polluted Delta
 Bloodstained Mire
2 Underground Sea
2 Island
2 Swamp
Tolarian Academy

SB:

Swamp
Island
Hurkyl’s Recall
Rebuild
Pithing Needle
Infest
2 Sadistic Sacrament
3 Dark Confidant
4 Leyline of the Void

When we arrived at the location we started off by greeting everyone. I quickly bought 3 Confidants from Rudy, sleeved up the cards Marius offered me to lend and quickly wrote down my list. I had a quick chat with Martin as I was curious what he would be playing. He piloted practically the same deck I am playing today to a top 4 finish at Nationals but today he was playing Sadistic Suicide. I was hoping not to face him during the event as FOUR main board Sacraments absolutely devastate me.
Well, let’s cut the chitchat for now and move on to the action:

Round 1 vs. Jean-Paul Pover with U/R Dreadstill

I keep a decent hand but without FoW. He opens with 2 moxen, Dreadnought < Stifle, Strip Mine, go. I play out my Island and pass, he responds by Stripping it, I cast Mystical for Chain of Vapor. He untaps, beats down with Dreadnought, plays a Tormod’s Crypt and passes. I start the turn without a board, fetch out Sea (taking the risk of Wasteland as it’s my last land at the moment and have blue and black cards I want to cast), Chain his Dreadnought which resolves and pass the turn. He Wastes my Sea. I eventually get a Swamp, Island and Tolarian in play, but he has the Magus which is killing me rapidly. I topdeck Necro, useless. He beats me for two and passes. I topdeck Cabal Ritual and cast it, trying to follow up with Fact or Fiction. I make a huge error by tapping my lands in reverse order, wanting to use blue from Academy as I declare FoF, so my nerves are already starting to catch up with me and it’s only round 1. I scoop and it’s time for game 2. I was on a one turn clock so FoF couldn’t save me but I still felt bad for making such a misplay.

Game 2 is explosive on my part although he has the Crypt again which annoys me. I manage to resolve a Jar and pass. He does nothing of importance and passes. I untap, upkeep crack my Jar and take some time to figure out the right play. I have enough Mana to cast Bargain but if I walk into a FoW I’m toast. I end up playing out my Moxen and Petal, Duress him, refuse to play land and cast Timetwister, hoping to draw into Tolarian Academy or Ritual>Tendrils. I’m already at storm 7 or 8 after Twistering. I can’t go off this turn unless I take a huge risk in Tinkering for Jar and cracking it with the lone Petal, this is not an option as my facedown cards include a FoW and a blue card. I Tinker up DSC and pass the turn.
Jean-Paul tries to Stifle a Dreadnought into play which I FoW. I smash face for 11, pass. He Time Walks and Ponders but can’t find his out.

Game 3 Jean-Paul opens with a crazy hand. He goes Lotus, Magus, Mox, Ancestral, Land, Top and pass. I have a good hand but I don’t have a Fow to stop his Ancestral. The judge declares we only have 5 turns left and he has Magus and Trinket Mage into play. My initial plan of Tinkering up DSC with FoW back-up and Time Walk needs one more turn to work and the game ends up in a draw. Jean-Paul shows me a Fow and a Misdirection with two blue cards so I’m lucky the game ended in a draw.

Round 2 vs. Martijn van der Vaart with DrainTendrils

I win the die roll and start off with Duress, he has a pretty strong hand with Confidant, Mana Drain, Lotus, Thirst for Knowledge, Land, FoF and Top. I take his Lotus and pass. He plays a land and I believe he plays his Top. We go back and forth for a while I make sure I can play a threat with FoW back-up. I have a Brainstorm, he Seizes me which I have to Fow. I draw into another Fow later. Eventually I try Necro. He gets a good read on me that I have the FoW so instead of Draining the Necro, he tries to TFK into better but Necro resolves.
I draw a lot of cards and pass the turn. When it’s my turn again I still have the FoW for back-up but he has a lot of cards in hand and mana open so I need to play cautious. I cast Grim Tutor first which resolves, then I play a bunch of accelerants, then I desire for 6. I flip bombs and mana. I manage to resolve Gifts for the win.

Game 2 I keep a powerful hand with Merchant Scroll, Mox, Sol Ring, Gifts, FoF, land and Bargain. After Martijn plays a land and passes the turn I lead with my Mox, Sol Ring and Merchant Scroll for FoW after topdecking the Ritual. He plays a land and passes. I think I draw land and pass the turn quickly, he does nothing of importance and plays the waiting game. I EOT Gifts which he Drains. I untap and try for Bargain, he forces, I force back and I win. I think it should be mentioned that after starting the day with a draw and a loss, Martijn managed to win 4 straight matches, earning himself a place in the top 8.

Round 3 vs. Linda Klepper with Elves

Linda is on a roll with her Elf deck and I’m looking forward to playing against her because I’ve never played against Elves. I win the die roll and fan open a sick hand with Lotus, Mox, Sol Ring, Chain of Vapor, Land, Vamp and Desire. I play out the hand and Desire for 7, I flip rituals and Ancestral among other things but with Vamp in hand I can easily tutor up Will, Recall into it and win.

Game 2 is more of the same. This time I manage to Desire for 5 on turn 1 after she resolved an Elf and passed the turn, I can’t go lethal the same turn but pass the turn with Necro in play. I take the match home in game 2. Linda and I joke a lot during the match. She says she’s enjoying the solitaire show, we talk some more after the match and I browse through her deck, curious what cards she’s playing. She has an odd build but it proved to be effective as she had a good record through the event.

I’m checking how the rest of the guys are doing I travelled to Hengelo with. Kevin is 3-0, so is Guus, and Duncan is 2-1. So by the looks of things we can all make top 8.

Round 4 vs. Guus de Waard with Red Shop Aggro

Guus and I have played this match-up to death at his home and although I have experience against him. In testing the results were in his favor so I’m going into this match as an underdog, especially since Guus is an experienced player who knows his deck by heart.
I win the die roll and game 1 I open with land Sol Ring, Guus proceeds with a Thorn and a Chalice for 1, this hurts my hand and my next topdeck: Ancestral Recall. Guus also manages to resolve a Welder to make sure he can tie me down with Tangle Wire. He resolves a Karn and the clock starts ticking fast. I can’t get wriggle out and die to Tangle Wire, Karn and Welder teaming up and killing me dead for 9.

Game 2 I have a strong start with Land, Ancestral, Mox, Brainstorm, Mox, pass. He answers with Thorn and Shaman, eating up my moxen. I manage to get Necro out, but Guus has pressure so my life is depleting fast. He wastes a Sea and later strips an Island to keep me off bouncing his board. Then when I’m set to bounce and go off next turn he rips another Thorn sealing the game.

I feel bad for being blown out and now having to win two straight matches but I’m happy for Guus as he can draw into top 8 now. Kevin sat next to us and he won against Dredge so he’s 4-0 as well. Duncan is making a nice comeback from 0-1 to 3-1.

Round 5 vs. Arjan Kuijper with Tezzeret

I win the die roll and start off with Lotus, Mox and Timetwister which resolves. Seeing as I also had FoF and Ritual I wouldn’t mind if he were to FoW my Twister but Twistering turn 1 is pretty good I hear. Arjen says something about resetting the game with a Sapphire in play and I remind him that I also have my land drop. Arjen declares he keeps his hand (classic joke) and I pretend I want to play a land (actually I don’t have any lands). I then pull my card back and tap my Sapphire for Ponder, it resolves. I then Play Jet (off Ponder) and Duress his hand removing Force of Will (he has lands, Time Vault, FoF and another FoW left in hand). I pass the turn, he plays a land and passes. I then bait Ancestral which he obviously counters. I then go nuts with Rit>Demonic into Lotus having Will in hand.

Game 2 is all Arjan as he starts off with turn 1 Thoughtseize removing my Lotus and A-Calling himself. I play land>Duress and see the following hand: Brainstorm, TFK, Gifts, Trinisphere, FoF and Tinker. I’m stunned and have to take his 3sphere, leaving him with a collection of broken restricted cards in hand. He plays a land and passes. I put out a Mana Vault and pass the turn, he plays Thirst for Knowledge end of turn. He untaps, Tinkers for Time Vault with 2 mana left to spend. I ask him if he has key, he smiles diabolically and reveals Key.

Game 3 I start off with Ancestral which I play in his upkeep, Arjan sighs. I think his hand isn’t so hot as he plays a land and passes with a long face. I proceed to Desire for 12 on turn two. Needless to say I won that game. He reveals a hand with a quick Tezzeret via Pearl and Mana Vault. Unfortunately for him he didn’t have enough time to Mystical up protection as planned.

Round 6 vs. Marius van Zundert with TPS

With the both of us having a 3-1-1 record it was all or nothing. We both kind of hoped we would both make top 8 rather than having to play each other but we both agreed on the fact that if we were to lose and miss out on top 8, it would be best to lose to each other.

I win the die roll and open with Duress which gets forced. I’m already sweating because this means his hand is probably bonkers. He plays a Duress of his own and takes my Will, leaving me with Tinker, FoF and Force. Marius smiles as my hand is strong as well. We wait a bit and I play a FoF at end of turn which resolves. It shows Timetwister, Grim Tutor, Chain of Vapor, Hurkyl’s Recall and Mystical Tutor. He piles Twister/Grim together and the bouncers and tutor. Still stuck on 1 land I take the big pile and pass the turn. Marius passes quickly and I Mystical up Ancestral. I try Ancestral which resolves. I then finally make a land drop and Duress him, he tries Ancestral Recall in response but I Force it. He reveals Tinker, Desire, Chain of Vapor and Dark Ritual (with Swamp and  Sapphire in play). I take his Ritual as this poses the most threats, Sapphire, Ritual, Chain and Desire spells trouble if he makes a land drop, Casting Tinker with B floating and a land drop to spare sounds scary too and seeing as I have the Chain myself I’m not too worried for Tinker>Jar/DSC and pass as I can easily bounce it. I pass and Marius rips Academy and immediately plays Tinker. I’m not sure if he remembered the Chain but he did. He looks at me and says ‘’No guts..’’ he lets me finish the sentence ‘’No glory’’ and there we go. He cracks the Jar and finds the Lotus, some Moxen and Twisters. I thanks the Magic Gods as I drew into Tendrils with Jar (Will and Twister in yard). Marius draws junk, we discard our hands and I win after some turns with Ritual, Cabal Ritual into Demonic Tutor. Marius takes a quick look at my yard and scoops ‘em up quickly.

Game 2 Marius has a great start with a turn 1 Necropotence, he draws 9 cards and passes the turn comfortably. I’m facing a tough decision after playing Sapphire>Ponder. I found a Duress but I also have the possibility of Ritual>Necro. I decide to go for the latter hoping to get lucky and draw 2 Forces or something. I draw 7 cards (should’ve been 8 because I fetched) drawing Force. I pass the turn and Marius starts building up storm with Moxen and Crypt. He taps his Sapphire for Ancestral. I think for a while but what the hell, sure. He draws his cards and tries for a Ritual. My gut is telling me this is the one I need to counter. I force, Marius forces back and Tendrils me for exactly the right amount, Ouch, selfownage.
Thankfully Marius reveals the Rebuild as he could’ve killed me no matter what.

Game 3 and the tension is building up. We both mull to 6 and I keep a questionable hand. Still I manage to resolve a turn 2 FoF at end of turn, I’m surprised it didn’t get Duressed on turn 1 or countered seeing as this was the only business spell I had. FoF reveals Time Walk, Merchant Scroll, 2 Rituals and a Sol Ring. Marius wisely splits mana and business. I take the business and untap, I draw… Sacrament (with Cabal Ritual on hand). I casually Merchant Scroll, Marius is fine with it as he expect the Recall. I tutor up the Force and he slowly starts to worry. I cast Cabal Ritual, Marius is a good player, he knows what’s coming.. Sacrament. He forces, I force, he scoops.

He extends his hand and is a great sport about the whole thing. It could’ve gone either way and playing the TPS mirror is difficult as all hell. I promise to take home the Workshop although I’m bluffing because two shops are in the top 8. Kevin and Guus! Guus, who beat me soundly in the Swiss, and Kevin who has 9 Sphere MUD. Duncan also made top 8 so the chances of us taking home the Workshop is pretty big.

Quarterfinals: Gerwin Ruiterkamp with Ghast Dredge

Gerwin wins the die roll and mulls to 6. He then opens with Bazaar and dumps a Gravetroll. He passes the turn and I open explosively with Emerald, Sol Ring, Lotus. I sac my Lotus for blue and Mystical up Ancestral I then Ponder into it and use my last blue remaining to cast the Recall. I draw into Vamp tutor which is just awesome against Dredge. I drop land and pass the turn with land, Ritual and Cabal in hand. I’m feeling great at this point because if Gerwin doesn’t kill me right now, I can Vamp into Will and win easily. He dredges a lot and attacks my hand with Cabal Therapies but he knows what’s coming as I’ve Vamped in response to the first Therapy. I untap, cast Will and win easily be replaying Lotus, all the rituals, Pondering, more acceleration, Vamping up Tendrils and Ancestral into it for the win.

Game 2 Gerwin mulls and I keep a sick hand with 2 Leylines, Ruby, Sapphire, Lands and a Merchant Scroll. He mulligans to three, then Serum Powders but finds the Bazaar. Once he declares he’s keeping I lay out the leylines. Gerwin is stunned and scoops.

Me and Duncan (def. his brother Kevin) won our matches pretty quickly so we could enjoy the spectacle of the other quarterfinal matches between Arjan (Almost Blue) and Frank (ANT) and Guus vs. Martijn (Drain Tendrils).

Semifinals: Guus de Waard with Red Shop Aggro

I win the die roll and keep but take a long time thinking through lines of play. I can storm for 9 on turn 1. I’m one B short for Duressing after Will so I have to take a different route. I decide to tutor up Necro. I can resolve it next turn through one sphere so I think I can handle what Guus is going to play. Guus starts off with Thorn and Trinisphere. From that moment on I can’t keep up and the WS aggro deck turns into a deck with hardlocks all over as he has Trinisphere, 2 Thorns, Chalice @ 2, Chalice @ 3, two Welders, a Tangle Wire and a Shaman. Needless to say he defeats me. In hindsight I should’ve cast Ritual, Demonic into Recall, Duress and then cast Recall via Sapphire but I’ve won a lot of games vs. Shop off  the back of Necropotence and I thought that would be a good bet.

Game 2 I mulligan but I open with Island into Ancestral, it looks like I will be making my land drops. He plays pieces while I make land drops. On turn 4 I cast Necro. Juggernaut is staring me down but I have 4 lands with Guus having Trinisphere and Thorn out. He wastes my Sea, I draw some cards. I have another turn so I set up the turn for bounce. He crashes into the red zone with Juggernaut and I go down to 2. He then plays Workshop and casts Triskelion. I’m dead with the win in hands.
Here I could’ve drawn a little less cards but I wanted to make sure I would make the land drops and took the gamble of Triskelion killing me (Guus didn’t have access to 6 mana on board before ripping the Shop) and he did.

I made mistakes throughout the day but I’m happy with my performance. There is still a lot to be learned, TPS is such a difficult and unforgiving deck. I will have to practice the Workshop match-up some more but I’ve been happy with my performance against Tezzeret, Drain Tendrils, Oath, Fish and Dredge in this tournament and/or in my testing.

Arjan, Duncan, Guus, Kevin and I congratulated each other with our performance and prizes. The four of us took home about $700 in cards. Guus and Duncan split the 4 Tropicals and the Workshop while I took home the 2 Badlands, the Mana Crypt and a Windswept Heath.
Kevin won a Delta and a Volcanic Island.

We went to a nearby snack bar and ate a lot! I ate the most which is kind of funny because the other guys are much bigger than me, Guus is like 6’5, Kevin is about 6’4 and Duncan is pretty big too with 6’2. So my 6’0 is not really that impressive next to these guys. And the first thing I did when I got home was.. eat.. I’ve read the tournament report from Smmenen earlier about the huge hamburger with the egg and I dare you guys I can eat two easily. Anyone wants to make a bet for a Lotus?

The ride back was fun, we talked about what a great day it has been and talked about the event and some random stuff like women, warcraft, chessboxing, punching someone in the Adam’s apple and more. Can’t really remember.. What we did remember is saying something about: the real tournament starts in the top 8. How often does it happen that everyone you make the trip with makes top 8? Well, every time if you’re us.

Props:

Marius: for being a great sport, rooting for us in the top 8 and being the biggest Vintage enthusiast you’ll ever meet. And oh yeah, thanks for lending me the cards.
Guus and Duncan: For plowing through the field and taking first and second place.
Rudy: Because he has all the cards, this time I bought Confidants from him.
Gerwin: For the great prize support and excellent organization.
Kevin: For winning four straight matches and drawing into top 8 like it’s nothing while he’s not a vintage regular by far. The Keijzer family is blessed with talent that’s for sure…
Arjan: For taking 3rd place with a Drain Tendrils deck without Drains or Tendrils

Slops:

Me:  For tapping Tolarian Academy for Blue with Magus out.
Snack bar:  For the hamburger sauce, it was meh at best.
Guus: for beating me twice (but this doesn’t really count =P)

I only took track of life totals and Duress hands so if any information is off feel free to correct me.

I’m looking forward to Breda and hope to have an equally good result, especially cause there will be a Lotus on the line!

See all of you there hopefully!

@Guus,

I have to think of the precise gamestate. I remember having the Petal game 2 so in that case I could've won through Tangle Wire. But it could easily have happened I fed my Petal to the Necro because my options were really limited having to keep making landdrops, having to keep bounce in hand but also Tendrils next to Ritual, Ritual, Demonic Tutor. I have not written down enough to make out what happened during the games but you are right in that Tangles are a bigger Risk than being blown out by Triskelion. But I think you are right, I had to wait until end of turn...

@Daedalus,

Thanks for clearing that up! It really sounded strange to me that Trinisphere would even out a Thorn if the spell's casting cost is 4 mana.

Then I think I played the match (almost) as best as I could. I'm not a worldbeater but I have a good grasp on how TPS works. Thanks guys, for clearing up the doubts because I almost started to feel as if I could've won, which I'm pretty sure was VERY hard to pull off.

Yeah, I think you're referring to the moment where I could've cast Gifts right? Never knew that Spheres worked that way. I assumed that regardless of Trinisphere, a Thorn would still make Gifts more to cast. Trial and error, as I will remember this the next time.
I also made a mistake the second game where I could've bounced his board when he attacked with Juggernaut, he wouldn't have enough mana to recast all the spheres and the Juggernaut. I had the second Hurkyl's Recall in hand but waited for the classic EOT bounce. I just totally forgot about the possibility of Trisk, I kind of deserved that he topdecked the 2nd Shop and being able to shoot my last two lifepoints away by casting Trisk in his second mainphase.

And yeah, I'll be looking forward to discussing strategies that could trump the WS aggro deck, the combination of pressure and lockpieces is hard to deal with. Guus managed to kill me in two games where I was set to bounce, but he used some tempo lockpiece/strip to ''timewalk'' and seal the games.

Awesome report man! Thanks for the props, it truly was an epic match. The TPS mirror was awesome to play, especially since you taught me how to slow down (after being a Grim Long player for a couple of months) and showed me why some mainboard inclusions (FoF for example) were really needed. It could've gone either way. Although you took the risk of going for Jar and cracking it, and Twistering in your Jar hand, it was a fine play as you had Tolarian out and could easily get enough artifacts out on board (pretty decent when you only have Academy and Swamp left after Tinkering your Sapphire away).

I'm sorry TPS couldn't win today as Guus was my nemesis today. He beat me twice! In the swiss and in the semis, damn workshop aggro. AND he knows how to pilot it perfectly, can't beat the odds then... And indeed, early Trinisphere both games killed me =( Oh well.. I'll get him next time.

And yeah, next time it's you in the top 8 I'm sure. You barely missed it for the second (or third?) time. Who knows? Maybe you can have your revenge against me there.. I'm ahead in head to head matches now, but top 8 wins count double right?

TPS is viable, and as long as people won't recognise it.. it's up to us to keep making top 8 appearances!

I'll be posting my report tomorrow!

BLACK LOTUS! I'm there, prize support is sick this edition!

I can't wait.. Lotus, Twister and a Mana Drain to be won in the top 3. Awesome!

I love the way you put this. As an avid chessplayer I like the use of the word gambit and it works very well in this context.

It's posts like these that makes me open MWS and play a couple of games, I love this game so much!

At the moment I have nothing specific to add to the discussion but just wanted to share my enthusiasm.

Pithing Needle is narrow but you can name Polluted Delta against TPS as they'll most likely run four of them. It is more effective than Fish's Wastelands and Stifles because a good player can play around it. Also, one card that shuts down four cards is a pretty good deal. Suddenly the TPS player only has 8 lands, 4 of them are basic lands so you'll have a pretty good chance of mana/colorscrewing him so bad that you buy lots of turns or even better; win the game. Combined with Null Rod that is.

Chalice is strong against TPS as well because Chalice at 0 and 1 are both annoying for a TPS pilot.

Personalbackfire,

I usually don't like boarding out FoW when playing against Stax but when playing with Confidants the curve seems to be to high to keep in all the expensive counters and bombs. It's very easy to die to Bobflips.

I figured you could go for the Duress plan on the play because it prevents lockpieces from resolving in a different way, and then you can keep some powerful bombs in the maindeck.

But looking at the sideboard I posted earlier, what would you recommend in place of the three Confidants? A Chain of Vapor and two Thoughtseizes then?

Personally I'd try and keep in as many bombs as possible. Gifts is slower than Jar and Desire so I'd try keeping them in the deck.

Maybe when I board out FoW I'm keeping more bombs and when FoW stays in I'll board out more bombs, you're right that it's important to lower the curve.

I just don't like playing with Cabal Rituals against Stax, after the first sphere hits the table it's completely useless. Stax is good at preventing decks from achieving threshold. Off color Moxen are less powerful when Spheres are being played but they still help to build up mana to race Spheres and to get more permanents into play.

So against Stax something in the lines of:

-1 Misdirection
-1 Gifts Ungiven
-2 Cabal Ritual
-4 Duress/-4 FoW (depending on who begins the game..?)

+2 Basics
+2 Bounce
+3 Confidant
+1 ETW

I'm not really sure how to board with the U/B shell. Something similar but probably boarding in Needles as well.

I believe UBr wants to keep in the off-color Moxen for a possible quick ETW so no Needles then. This could be wrong though, I'd have to test this some more first.