At the last minute I decided to drive with Jason Stinnet (the Capn) to Connecticut for this tourney. We leave later than I'd like and get to sleep much later than I'd like.
I wake up grumpy and grow more so as we discover that the tournament site is located in the same Town that the Shining was shot in. My querulousness grows as we further discover that the tournament site is none other than the Knights of Columbus masonic hall, which has neither food nor even a drinking fountain.
I soon find Carl Winter and am flanked by people on approaching me whom I do not know. One person tried to start conversation with me in particular, a nice guy, while I was trying to figure out how to get something to drink, sign up for the tournament, deck reg., buy sleeves and sleeve my deck. It wasn't until an hour later that I find out that this person is none other than Zherbus.
From that point on, I turned that frown, upside down becuase that totally made my day. Zherbus was incredibly cool and it was the highlight of the day to finally get to meet Da Boss. Steve is amiable and cordial - better than what I even expected.
One of the best things about Type One folks is that they have, on average, at the top levels a very pleasant disposition. Many so-called pro players would mistake such a demeanor for scrubbishness or worse, but that is simply a mistake. Steve, Carl and I play to win - we are Spikes.
I felt bad becuause for like 30 minutes no one introduced me and as of yet, I can't read minds. I was mostly surprised becuase my impression was that Steve simply does not show up to these events.
Jason and I had talked at length in the car ride up about changes to the deck in light of the anticipated Tog, Slavery, and Oshawa metagame. If I had known I was coming, I wouldn't have even mentioned Slavery last week.
Here is what I played:
I played the deck posted here:
http://www.morphling.de/coverages/top8decks.php?id=114with the following changes:
- 1 MD Trike for 1 MD Duplicant
- 1 Ancient Tomb for 1 MD Library of Alexandria (thanks to Kevin Cron)
I moved the Tomb in the SB for games when I board in Rack and Ruins, Blood Moons, and the "Seven Man Plan."
My SB was:
3 Blood Moon
3 Rack and Ruin
2 Trinisphere
2 Gorilla Shaman
2 Duplicant
2 Platinum Angel
1 Ancient Tomb
I went down to 2 Trinisphere because I simply did not expect Combo in this environment.
I was shocked in the end to see as many Workshop as I did in consideration of the fact that I saw maybe one or two at the Waterbury in Jan. What I think was more surprising is that most of the Workshop decks I saw were not Slavery. People had the balls to play TnT, Stacker with Thirst, Stax, and Welder Mud in a field of Goblin Welder.
The Seven Man Plan is the key to beating Null Rod - something I demonstrated all day.
I never take notes during tournaments, so I apologize to the people whom I cannot remember names for.
ROUND ONE:
I sit down accross from a young guy in the very last table - something like table 140 or so.
We roll and he wins the roll.
My hand is:
Force of Will, Tinker, Thirst for Knowledge, Mindslaver, Volcanic Island, Chalice of the Void, and Black Lotus.
It was a poor hand to keep, but I do so anyway.
Game One:
He goes Swamp, Duress. I force of Will pitching Tinker. At this point he goes "Isn't that banned?" - I politely explain that this is Type One, not extended. I figure, even if I lose this game, it seems very unlikely I'll lose the match.
I use my Lotus and my Volc to drop Chalice for 2 thinking his deck will have lots of Sinkhole, Hymn, and Shades - the likely turn two play.
Unfortunately he Wastes my Volc. I draw Goblin Welder.
He then plays Dark Ritual Hypnotic Specter.
I sit helpless.
I topdeck Force of Will. Ouch.
He attacks into me, I go to 17 and he plays Ritual Juzam Djinn.
I topdeck Volcanic Island and draw Memory Jar
He attacks me to 10 and I was about to write off this game.
But I topdeck Goblin Welder and play it.
He attacks me down to 3 but he discards Memory Jar (one of 2 cards in my hand at this point).
At this point I have a very slim chance. I weld in Jar and Jar. I get a billion mana and either Academy or Workshop becuase I play Memnarch. I decide not to do anything else crazy this turn and try to bank on some real insanity next turn realizing that he'll have me at one life.
I block his Juzam with my Memnarch and his Hippie takes me to 1 life. I know that my only chance is to find Pentavus. Since Tinker is gone, I have to be a lucksack and draw into it.
I Jar and See Penatvus. I have enough mana to make two men and save one. At this point, I begin to Slave him infinite and win using Hatred.
Game Two:
I board in Angels and Duplicants.
He SBs in Chains of Mephistopholes. But I have turn two Memnarch and Turn three Pentavus and I steal his perms and beat him down very quickly.
Alternate Universe Round Two:
I sit down against Oshawa Stompy and am very pleased. This is the matchup I tested the most using the most deadly build with 4 Oxidize maindeck. The answer to Oshawa is the 7 man plan.
I win game one fairly quickly after FoWing the Null Rods and Get perm Slave lock. Game Two is all about my man plan and while I try to stop Null Rod, I dont really care that much if he resolves.
My plan is to play large beats and stall the ground with Duplicants if necessary and win the air with Angels. Ground Seal is not something I'm concerned about. Null Rod is much worse.
2-0
Since we have to Redo Round 2, I have to play again.
Real Round Two:
I play against a kid with a deck that scares the bejeezus out of me for some reason: Stacker/ Tubbies with Thirsts. I play extremely conservatively and lose a game that I should have won. I didn't Jar or Wheel on the appropriate turns and made huge play errors that cost me the game.
Game one was basically: Turn one large d00d: FoW. Turn Two Welder Large D00d. I could havce Thirsted and then welded in discarded Duplicant to slow down the damage but becuase I'm a moron I didn't. I took too much damage before I began to control the game and he had Trike in his yard and Welders to keep brining it back.
Game Two: I play more intelligently and seal the deal quickly.
Game Three was very interesting. I kept a very slow hand with Double Welder which plays out in the strangest way.
He played Trinisphere against me!!! Against ME. The deck with most accelleration in Type One. I make another play error and forget to weld it out, but it doesn't matter becuase I rack and ruin the Sphere and his beater and soon Memnarch joins the fun and starts to steal his perms. By the time I finally get to swinging and have complete control of the game and his permanents, time is called. I only get him to 10 life and he has one or two permanents remaining when I run out of turns. I did get to steal his last three turns though.
2-0-1
Round Three:
I am miffed to find out that I have to play the guy who I drove down here with.
Around this point in the tournament someone commented that I stole Smmenen's Slavery list off the mana drain. Someone said: "that is Smmenen" - Jason thought this was funny.
Jason is thinking about Conceding to me, but I explain to him that we should play it out. If he wins than that means he is more in this tournament than I am psychologically. We are both in the 2-0-1 bracket and we play it out. I go totally broken and have perm Slaver lock on turn two using his Welder. Game two is not much different except that I have Smemnarch.
We both are using the same sleeves and it is discovered midway through the next match, that Jason had had my Mox Jet, Mana Crypt, and Volc in his deck. This totally screwed me in the next round:
Round Four:
Despite missing Jet and the uber important Mana Crypt I keep the hand of:
Workshop, Mox Jet, Mox Emerald, Sol Ring, Gilded Lotus, and Chalice of hte Void with Goblin Welder only to have my opponent playing Control Slaver go first and drop:
Mox Ruby, Shaman, Sea, Ancestral.
I was Soooooo Angry. That completely negated by turn one Chalice for 2 off Gilded Lotus. he then Walked and did the most broken stuff before I got another turn.
Game Two I have to mulligan to 6. And I keep a hand with just Volc and Ancient Tomb for mana and he drains my turn two Blood Moon. Stok tells me to see him after the game because he gave me the cards that Jason had in his deck. No Wonder I coudln't win a game that round.
2-1-1
Round Five:
My opponent is a no show.
3-1-1
Round Six:
I play against GroAtog - a well designe deck with Thirsts.
I think it is Tog becuase his opening play is Mana Crypt (i only have myself to blame) and Sea. I play turn two Chalice for 3 thinking it will wint he game, but he drops Dryad.
Nonetheless, his Mana Crypt kills him by doing 5 consecutive turns of damage to him. I am so lucky.
Game Two: I dominate this game. Very Quickly I have Slaver lock despite his very early Ancestral. I was hoping to win in a most unique way: by killing him with his own Fastbond. I set myself up for a huge Yawg Will turn using his deck. The next turn I yawgmoth's Will him. But first I play Gush (he has 4 lands on the table and a Mox). I then play Yawg Will. I bring back Lotus and sac it for Black to DT for Fastbond.
I calculated the damage he had 3 Fetch and a sea in his yard, and two lands from Gush and another land in hand plus if i replay Gush that is 12 damage. He has a full grip of Draw, I figure that two deep anals and a few more land is enough to go lethal. I DT him and discover he SBed out Fastbond! How unlaucky. Oh well, I ruin his hand and Cast Ancestral on myself. SHortly thereafter I win using Memnarch.
Round Seven:
Here is my opponents report of this round:
Round 7 vs Steve Smemenen w/ Meandeck Slaver
Game one: I can't out race the infinite turn loop. I find out that Steve is more talkative and energetic than I imagined from reading his articles. It was a great pleasure to play against him.
Game two: I side in artifact and graveyard hate. He tells me that he has done more testing against Big O than any other deck. I play first and second turn hate. He plays second turn Pentivus. I see no creatures as he continues to bash my face with a 5/5
. Shit happens.
The only thing I'd add to that is that I save my FoWs exclusively for his Null Rod. Game One he has turn one Forest Gibbons, which Resolves and then Forest, ESG from game Null Rod which I force of Will. His Gibbons goes active but he forgets, however I have turn two pentavus so it doesn't matter. I string Pentavite tokens into Infinite slaver as I draw more resources and seal the game.
Game Two I play the 7 Man Plan and ignore his hate. He apparently overSBs becuase he doesn't play a single creature as I overrun him with large men.
I was more than a little irritated that they cut out the last round as that effectively shut me out of top 8 contention. Esp. since I drove 9 hours. I think that was a totally unjustified move.
Frankly, in a tournament of this size, luck becomes extremely important becuase the margin for error is so small that cutting out a round is a huge mistake.
Nonetheless, I had a blast and the highlight was getting to meet Mr. O'Connell. Carl was fun too!
Jason is a good sport and I think it was a big learning experience for him too.
As for changes to the deck, it is obvious that Pentavus number 2 is the appropriate third man: not Duplicant and no Trike.
The SB will also undergo some slight changes. That's all I have, but remember:
I Pwn J00: I'll take your turns, and your perms.
Stephen Menendian
