Type 1. Fairfax Virginia. Alpha Ancestral Recall.

[Triple_S]

Amen.

[Phantom Tape Worm]

With all the talk of metagame shifts and distortions, this tournament couldn't have been scheduled for a better time.  So much of metagame theorizing is just that, theory.  Or perhaps worse, based on apprentice playtesting. It will be good to get some real tourney results.

In the "alleged metagame" (to quote sliverking) GAT is currently king with mishra's workshop based decks ruling at the mighty tog's side as queen.  Keeper is struggling, combo is impotent, sligh, sui, stompy, zoo and all other weenie based strategies are dead.  

Is this actually the case?  Is GAT really that good in person?  I doubt it.  

I can say for certain that gro-a-tog is going to be present; in what numbers I don't know.  But realistically, regardless of the hype it has received, this isn't pre-restriction academy we're talking about.  This deck doesn't just win on the first turn and there is tech out there to stop this beast.  I remember combo winter.  I played through combo winter.  This is not combo winter.  Most people will admit DCI intervention was needed back then, but is it needed now?  It will be good to get more empirical evidence on the matter.  Well that, AND to find out where NoVa sits in the "alleged metagame".


@The Paragons in general: NoVa is prepared for anything the paragons can dish out.  In case you've forgotten, there is a price on all of your heads and I assure you none of you will make it past top 8  
 

[Triple_S]

So you'l be paying us a dollar also after we 2-0 each person?

[SliverKing]

Richmond Comix represent!!!

[Triple_S]

Quite the good day, 3 in the top 8 with the other 2 being one game away from t8 (win and get in)....

[Jacob Orlove]

So how did tog do? And who claimed the bounty on any paragons?

[Triple_S]

I lost 2-0 to someone with GAT in round 6 and I think one of the other guys may have lost to GAT 2-0 in the top 8 but I can't remember to clearly (long long day of cards).  The top 8 was something like this I believe:
1 Hulk Smash (Azhrei)
2 GAT
1 Keeper
1 Stax
1 Mask
1 U/G Threshold (also had Dryads and main deck Rods and B2B)

I can't remember the eighth deck but I'm sure a more complete posting will be provided regarding the results.

[SliverKing]

The 8th slot was PhantomTapeWorm and his GayFish deck.

I think his "NoVa is ready for anything Richmond can dish out" might need a little editing              but I hope they do one of these again soon...   high quality magic.  Just start it earlier (or on saturday) next time!!!

[Azhrei]

Hulk went into the top eight with a 77% game win record.  I got GATted by Jesse Driggers though, and he went on to the finals to lose to Thorme.

[Saucemaster]

So was Thorme playing Mask?  If so, this looks remarkably like what's been happening in our metagame out here--GAT doing solidly, Mask edging out GAT with SB'd Blood Moons/Chains, and Hulk making an appearance every so often.

Did TnT not do well, or was it simply absent from the tournament?

Incidentally, this also mirrors Azhrei's metagame predictions in the EVF thread.  

[Triple_S]

I was the only TnT deck in attendance...I went 3-0 (6-0) in the first 3 rounds, then got matched up with people I drove up with...lost to Thorme with Stax (went 2-1 was determined by who got the broken opening hand), then lost to Sliverking (he resolved Future Sight game 1, I resolved Blood Moon game 2)...lost to GAT in round 6 to be eliminated from t8 contention (I had the best tie breaks of the 3-2's and would have gotten in with a win).  TnT does need to adapt to the changes in the metagame...I am really thinking black over blue might be the right call.

[Azhrei]

Yeah, with the exception of the Stax deck (which I was perhaps remiss in not including) the t8 was basically what I had said were the best decks, and TnT and a second Mask deck each missed edging out a Mask deck and a GAT deck by just one loss.

I do, however, think that Hulk is the best deck in the format-- I had a full 10% better win record than any other deck, and I had fewer games in all since I had the first round bye. GAT is the only deck I even worry about with Hulk besides the mirror-matchup. Both GAT decks snuck into the t8 by having to play in the last round and 3 others were eliminated from contention, but the only Hulk deck was seeded first the whole day with the exception of one round where I think I may have been seeded second or third after a time-limit draw versus GAT.

I had not played Magic since November prior to this so I am probably rusty and had not tested much either.

[thorme]

Az did have a very impressive game-win percentage.  Although I never lost a match all day with Smokestack (unless for some reason you want to count my concession to Az to ensure we both made Top 8), I had a lot of close matches that I pulled out 2-1.  All 3 of my Top 8 matches were amazing matches with me barely pulling it out 2-1.

Amazing day for Richmond!  Up until the last round, the Top 4 was all Richmond!  

I was fairly impressed with the decks that were present.  Every top-tier deck in the format was well represented.  I didn't take notes, so I probably won't create a report, but here were my results:

Round 1: 2-1 over Sligh
Round 2: 2-0 over Cherry Parfait
Round 3: 2-0 over Rector Trix
Round 4: 2-1 over TnT (paired against Triple-S...boo)
Round 5: concede to Hulk Smash (Az)
Round 6: ID with GroAtog
Quarter Finals: 2-1 over Mask
Semi Finals: 2-1 over GroAtog
Finals: 2-1 over GroAtog

Looks like I got to test my deck against an interesting little gauntlet.

Thanks to Triple-S for the ride up, and the entire Richmond crew for making the long tourney a good time.

Time to go stare at my Alpha Ancestral some more.  

[Phantom Tape Worm]

WOW!  What a tournament!

The prize structure got changed up at the last minute due to some problems aquiring the foil psychatogs and gushes

1st prize:alpha ancestral recall
2nd - 4th prize: English Moat, Italian The Abyss, Morphling


There were 31 players in attendance and all of it was fierce competition!  Here were the decks:

Aggro:            5
3 Sligh
1 Taiga
1 TnT

Aggro combo:   4
3 Mask
1 Robot

Combo:            1
1 Trix

Control:           10
1 Enchantress
1 Hulk Smash
3 Keeper
3 Smoke Stack
2 Parfait (both splashed red)

Aggro control:  11
5 GAT
1 U/G threshold
1 Gay fish
3 Nether Void
1 Rec Sur


After an intense weeding out process of 6 (it was a marathon) rounds the top eight was made up of:
1 Gay Fish
2 GAT
1 Hulk Smash
1 U/G threshold
1 Mask
1 Keeper
1 Smoke Stack


if you annalyze the top eight you do find something interesting...

Fully half of the decks that made top 8 were gush based; the 2 GATs, rogue U/G threshold, and Hulk


Top eight pairings were:
keeper vs U/G threshold -----> Keeper 2-1
Hulk vs GAT ----------------> GAT 2-1
Gay Fish vs GAT------------->GAT 2-1
Smoke Stack vs Mask-------->Smoke Stack 2-1

Every single top eight deck definately deserved its spot, 6 rounds of swiss put each deck through a HUGE gauntlet.

Top 4:
Keeper vs GAT------------->GAT
Smoke Stack vs GAT------->Smoke Stack

Top 2
Smoke Stack vs GAT------->Smoke Stack


During the top 2 match, keeper and GAT played for 3rd and 4th place
keeper vs GAT------------>GAT

1st place: Smoke Stack, piloted by David Allen aka Thorme who always manages to bring out the insane skills for these big events
2nd place: GAT, piloted by Jesse Driggers aka Jesse Driggers
3rd place: GAT, piloted by Michael Scheffenaeker (zherbus please see about getting this man an account)
4th place: Keeper, piloted by Josh Reynolds aka Sliver King


The tourney was a huge success and you can definatly expect NoVa do be doing this again sometime soon.

I, of course, ran with Gay Fish.  My record was as follows:
0-1-0 vs parfait
2-1-0 vs smoke stack
2-1-0 vs nether void
2-0-0 vs nether void
2-1-0 vs mask
0-0-2 vs U/G threshold into top eight
1-2-0 vs GAT in top eight

I played zero scrubs, there simply weren't any at the tournament.

I changed the decklist slightly from what you've seen on the primer to include a merchant scroll and an additional wasteland.  The mighty coastal piracy and a misdirection were both cut to accomadate the changes.  After having played through the gauntlet at BC yesterday, I can honestly say that i'm in love with the scroll.  Games 2 and 3 it is effectively a more reasonably costed cunning wish even after you've cast ancestral, since much of fish's board is fetchable with the scroll.

The decision to relegate a misd to the board was due in part because of tog.  Players are getting wise to misd (they have to since the most popular deck in the format is now running it in multiples) and are chosing to play more and more unmisd'able spells.


Gay Fish's board 4/13/03
2 maze of ith (should have added an extra, TOO AMAZING)
1 disrupt (amazing)
1 misdirection (i'm going to drop this from the board)
2 psi blast
2 Blue Elemental Blast
2 Nevy's disk (i know it has no synergy with null rod, but against smoke stack and parfat...and it has not done me wrong yet)
2 boomerang
1 hurkyll's recall (might drop this, have yet to cast it vs smoke stack)
1 black vise
1 annul (amazing)



THANKS many times over to everyone that came out for the event, it absolutely kicked ass!



Oh, and bounties were collected yesterday on both Sliver king and Triple S, twice on sliverking  

[Azhrei]

The last bounty on Josh so doesn't count; he had just played two 90 minute matches in a row and doesn't even remember anything after about 10:30 today.  

And, in all fairness, I only Gushed three times during the whole tournament, and not once did I cast Berserk. It was weird.

[SliverKing]

Mask got a bounty on me... but I defy anybody to beat Unmask, ritual, illusionary mask, dreadnaught.

Like Azhrei said, I have no recollection of anything after that match with the ParagonHate.dec   yes that includes the 2 hour drive home...
By the way Phantom, thanks for hooking your buddy up with maindeck B2B/NullRod deck even though I was the only keeper player there.  DId you guys get a 100 nullrods for a dollar once so now you have to put them in every deck or what?

[thorme]

Quote (SliverKing @ April 14 2003,18:10)Like Azhrei said, I have no recollection of anything after that match with the ParagonHate.dec   yes that includes the 2 hour drive home...

When I looked over and saw his side with 3 Null Rods and 2 Back to Basics out, I couldn't believe it!

Props on a great tourney though SliverKing!  You took a fairly early loss to Nought, but fought back to Top 8.  After 6 rounds of swiss and 2 Top 8 matches with Keeper (which requires insane amounts of concentration, now more than ever)...you had to be fried.

Keeper is not an easy deck to win with these days.  As SliverKing and Az pointed out, it has winnable matchups against TnT, GroAtog, Stack, Mask, etc....but none of them are easy, and all require the Keeper player to be in top form.  It is awfully tough to maintain that form through so many rounds.

[Phantom Tape Worm]

@Sliverking: I have to give you props myself josh, not only did you beat the raw mindless hate that was Paragonhate.dec.  But you also managed to pilot one of the most complicated decks in the format to a top 4 finish.  Something no other keeper player there could do (you weren't the only one).  


And actually if you look at that pile that we threw at you in top 8, you'll see that it was in fact appropriate to run both b2b and null rods main deck given the metagame.

Out of 31 decks B2B is a back breaker against just a little over half the field.  And i'm sorry but null rod is just plain good in type 1.  Every deck runs some kind of artifact, and almost all decks run more artifacts than you'd run null rods.  So even if it's not brutal, it is generally at least somewhat useful.



Next time though U/G threshold (aka Paragonhate.dec) will actually have some playtesting behind it.  We finalized the maindeck at 3 in the morning the night before with a total of 10 games worth of playtesting in its various forms and no playtesting in its final incarnation.  I believe charles was still learning the deck as he played you in top 8    


In a way, i feel cheated though.  I didn't get the opportunity to play you josh.  And i'm not even saying that because I would have won, but because for some reason you and I always seem to have the most amazing games.  There really is no one i'd rather have as an opponent, and you always put up such a good fight before you finally go down for the count  

[Lexor]

I would first like to say that that was probably the best time I have ever had at a tournment. I would also like to thank both Phantom Tape Worm and Azhrei for helping me get an account but also being great guys and fun opponents.

Sliver King: You had a great run with a tough deck. We all had long grueling matches, I know mine with Thorme took quite sometime, however I still think I adequetly earned my bounty. I look foreward to a rematch when we are both at the top of our game.

[Triple_S]

Now if we could only get some better prize support (i.e. p9) in Richmond we would be all set.  Any chance someone can get on the horn with Pete @ starcity for a t1 event for Scourge Pre-release?

[Phantom Tape Worm]

@Lexor: Hey great to see that you got an account dude!  By the way, those pernicious deeds in the board for your GAT were amazing.  I'm still reeling from that 5 for 1 card trade you pulled on me.  ouch.

@Triple S: As a matter of fact...Pete owes me big time for not having the foil togs and gushes ready...i'll be in contact with him trying to set something up.

[Jebus]

You guys could always come down to Charleston for our T1 Tournaments.   99% of the time we have a P9 card for first.  2nd and third normally isn't too shabby either.

I felt the 7 hour trip to go play up there was worth it and I'm glad at least one of us made the top 8 (go Jesse!).

Thanks for the great tournament.  Maybe we'll come up again sometime.

[Lexor]

Yeah, I would skip out on the dream wizards prerelease if Star City had a t1 at theirs, better yet perhaps we should call dream wizards and hold a T1 at their prerelease. That would be good if any of you Northern Players wanted to come down, since its being held near BWI airport. Though I am not totaly sure they would do that since, well I cant recall them ever holding one before.

I would be totally willing to come down to Charleston, that is if anyone from VA would let me hitch a ride.  

[SliverKing]

Quote (Lexor @ April 15 2003,00:01)Sliver King: You had a great run with a tough deck. We all had long grueling matches, I know mine with Thorme took quite sometime, however I still think I adequetly earned my bounty. I look foreward to a rematch when we are both at the top of our game.

Just to clear something up, I didnt mean any disrespect to the guys I played so late.  All of them played well, and I didnt see any mistakes, so their wins were definetly earned.  I was mostly commenting on my zombie like state for humor's sake.  
In fact I'd like to take a second and give props to all my opponents on the day. With the exception of one guy who had just started playing his smokestack deck and wasnt up on all the timing rules, everyone played very well (maindeck pyroblasts, defense grids, null rods, and back to basics aside). Specifically Thorme's neverending string of comebacks... hungover from his own bachelor party! The man isnt human people! He just shows up on earth for gameday.
Lexor: congrats on the account, I'm up for that rematch anytime. Let me rephrase... anytime that I havent played 8 hours of Keeper already...  
@PhantomTapeWorm:  We do have the best games... The way the standings were playing out I thought you might get your shot in the Top8.  oh no... instead you send in the hate... thats alright... I'm too stubborn to stop playing Keeper, so you'll have plenty more chances.
I disagree with your analysis of the field though, not that it wasnt great, and really above expectations, but with regard to B2B.   IT really doesnt hurt the GAT decks, as they have gush and usually some basic islands. Sligh, Mask, Void, and Parfait dont care much either. Nor do enchantress, hulk, or TNT.  It only really cripples Keeper, and annoys the heck out of GayFish. I didnt see the Trix or Rec-Sur builds, so I dont know how theyd' be affected, but even giving you the benefit of the doubt, I dont think the B2B were that great against hte field.  Obviously something in the deck worked though or it wouldnt have made it to the Top8!
I'm looking forward to more of these big turnout, big prize tournaments, whether its in NoVa or through StarCity... screw getting them sanctioned, if this is what proxy-tournaments create!!

[Jesse Driggers]

the following is in reference to GAT.

I'm going to write a report sometime soon, because I have pretty decent notes, especially the t4 and final matches.

I also noticed that the Berserk was not used as often as I used too.(3 games total.)  this is in stark contrast to the last two tournaments that I played in, where I Berserked every other game or so.   Also, I did much more killing with my Dryads on sunday than usual.  

Also, My Steely Resolves were EXTREMELY nice today.  I have not lost a keeper match since I added them(I have also had pretty good hands/topdecks).  This is Nice because the Steely Resolve is decent card advantage vs Keeper.(it takes out all Swords, The Abyss, Red Elemental Blast(on tog anyways))   It also helps because they take out the wishes and generally do not add any enchantment removal.  this leaves Balance to clear up all creature theats.

The torny has come and gone, I will be expecting reports though, Closed.

Mo\n\n