[Report] 25th (of 173) at SCG Rochestor

[Xenoben187]

Hey guys, I'm new to posting on TMD, though I've lurked for over a year.  I figured what a better way to start off posting on TMD than with my first SCG experience.  It was the most fun I've had at a magic event and i will definitely be at Chicago.

Prelude:
We left from Louisville, KY at midnight on friday because one of the people going absolutely HAD to stay so he could win his 30 dollar gift certificate playing block.  The trip was long and boring up until our driver gets pulled over somewhere in philadelphia.  Then she tells us that she has a warrant out for her arrest.  Everyone in the car is shittin bricks cuz if we drive from this far and end up being 20 minutes late...   But anyways, the cop only gives her a ticket and doesn't mention anything about warrants so we continue on our way.  As we arrive we notice a car wreck right out front of the parking lot with a bunch of magic players standing out front (atleast I assume chubby geeky lookin dudes with backpacks constituted magic players.)

Here's the decklist I played.

Gifts Slaver

Spells
4 Drain
4 Force
4 Brainstorm
4 TFK
3 Goblin Welder
1 Fact or Fiction
2 Gifts Ungiven
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Time Walk
1 Tinker
1 Mystical Tutor
2 Mindslaver
1 Sundering Titan
1 Pentavus
2 Duress
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Rack and Ruin
1 Demonic Tutor

Mana Sources
9 Solomoxcryptvaulten
1 Library of Alexandria
2 Island
2 Snow-Covered Island
2 Flooded Strand
3 Polluted Delta
2 Underground Sea
3 Volcanic Island
1 Tolarian Academy

Sideboard
1 Boseiju
2 Blood Moon
2 REB
1 Pyroblast
3 Chalice of the Void
3 Old Man of the Sea
1 Rack and Ruin
1 Recoup
1 Darksteel Collossus


Choices
Gifts Ungiven w/o Recoup:  I've played Gifts in this deck without Recoup for a long time and honestly, Recoup just isn't needed in slaver.  I play Gifts as draw spell # 7 and 8 that almost always wins the game. 
My general stack is Acall, time walk, tinker, tutor  What do you give me?  if you give me tutor, I've already won, and more efficiently than with recoup (fetch will).  If you give me tinker, I've already won.  so the only choice is giving me acall and time walk.  If you can't win off getting an Acall and a time walk.  There's something really wrong w/ your deck.  Note:  I never lost a game that I resolved gifts all day.

Goblin welder:  I only ran 3 because I really just don't like drawing 2, and there really wasn't that much hate there for welders

Duress:  I expected alot of control, and there was quite a bit.  If I had it to go back I'd have dropped these for maindeck blood-moon and 1 collossus

Rack and ruin:  There was ass ton loads of fish there today, chalice fish mostly.  Rack and ruin really never did anything good though all day.  It would probably become an echoing truth.

Recoup-Collossus in Sideboard: This was golden all day.  2nd game i generally always boarded into recoup-collossus kill, and after every game, the opponent would show me all the hate he boarded in for my welders.

Anyways, now onto my matchups

Round 1: goblins, I win the roll
I open up a 2nd turn tinker hand and play land mox.
He plays land Skirk Prospector
I tinker up pentavus and get a couple swings in and he goblin grenades my pentavus.
Next turn I gifts ungiven and he gives me demonic Tutor, demonic for will and he scoops.

game 2: rack and ruin + fact or fiction out, recoup collossus in
I open land,land,land, lotus, tinker,X, X so I keep.
He plays land, lotus petal, null rod...
ouch
I play land lotus, go
he plays land skirk, goblin vandal
holy crap that's bad.
I play land, go
Much to my relief he taps out for goblin warchief and attacks, not blowing up my lotus.
I tinker up collossus and proceed to victory.

1-0, 2-0

Between rounds I find out that my friend playing workshop.dec just activated a myr incubator against u/w fish for 37 tokens.  Then i go over to watch my buddy playing doomsday against Rich Shay.  It's 1-1 and my friend's hand is busted 2nd turn win w/ force backup, he does it and Rich can't believe it and looks for any out he can to win the game (counts cards, looks for marked cards)  Pretty much just sits there for 5 minutes trying to find any out while tendrils for 20 is on the stack eventually he shakes my friend's hand and says good game.  But anyways, on to round 2

round 2:  SSB piloted by Whatever Works

I win die roll and we play the draw game for a while, I drain a thirst of his, then he drains a thirst of mine end of his turn.  I resolve tinker for Titan and he never gets back into it.

Out (mystical, Gifts, duress, duress, Titan)  In ( REB x2, Pyroblast, blood moon x2)
I open like volcanic, welder, jet, demonic, force, thirst, blood moon
he plays some non-basics and moxen and passes turn.
I play jet, volcanic, demonic, he tries to force, I force back.  search out lotus and resolve bloodmoon.  I play welder next turn, he lavadarts it.  He draws every piece of moxen over the next couple turns + academy while I draw nonbasic land.  He drops academy then next turn I drop my academy, call a judge and he says they stay in play.  Then a couple turns later comes back and says they both die, gamestate hadn't changed so it didn't matter.  anyways, 1 turn before he tinkers, I'm 1 mana short of playing mindslaver and activating, w/ that academy I win.  doh.

Out (entire slaver package and blood moons for recoup, DSC, mystical, Fact, duress, duress)
We both play the control game for a while, I out control him and resolve tinker for fatty and win

2-0, 4-1

Round 3- Type 2 guy playing WTF
He beats me down game one w/ mongrel and ninja

I board out control slaver package for recoup, dsc, rebx2, pyro, OMOTSx3
I get a first turn OMOTS and sit there for a while with counters until I can find tinker for the win

I get second turn OMOTS, but he pumps vial to 3 counters and I crap myself if kira comes down.  Instead, Troll Ascetic comes down?  Oh well, didn't matter anyways, I brainstorm into gifts, gifts-tinker out collossus w/ REB backup and he scoops.

3-0, 6-2

Only me and my buddy playin workshops are still in contention from my crew at 3-0. 

round 4: FCG
Game one I tinker up pentavus while he has some dudes.  He drops sharpshooter and overruns me.

Out- titan- fact or fiction- duress x2 - rack and ruin  in recoup, dsc, omots x3

I get a quick oldman and slave him once.  DSC gets tinkered out and swings for the win

no changes in sb

I open up mystical, force, mox, land, land, thirst, X
turn 1 mystical for tinker, turn 2 tinker, forcing his REB.
DSC Swings for the win

4-0, 8-3

round 5:  Josh Ryder (shooting star) running Gro
I get a quick slave that turns into a lock in a couple turns

in: blood moonx2, challice x3, out:titan, duressx2, rack and ruinx1, fact or fiction

he resolves mage on thirst,  I don't draw much of a lot.  a screw up in my notes has me at 3 while he has dryad + mage on the table and I have 2 welders, so I tap out for mindslaver leaving 1 welder open.  Well, he has me at 2 and swings for the win.

there are 5 minutes in the round, so I just shuffle up and go (in hindsight I should have boarded in collossus).

Josh mulligans 3 times, and we basically start up when time is called.  I tinker really fast, he forces, I tutor up will and pass the turn.  I will, timewalk and tinker for titan.  ends up I'm lethal with only 1 more swing til lethal (dsc would have won)

4-0-1, 9-4-1

Round 6 vs. shockwave playing crucible control (finished 3rd place)

He draws an obscenely good hand and starts off w/ challice for 0 and 1 and just outdraws me hard,  I have no fuckin clue what he is playing and lose bad.

board in blood moons and recoup dsc and reb's for control slaver package.

we both draw a ton of cards, him through library, and me through thirst, eventually he tries to resolve an thirst of his own and I drain it.  On my turn I go to resolve blood moon, he drains, I drain, he forces, I drain....he forces back, going to 0 cards in hand, while I'm holding land, land, fact or fiction, so I'm feeling good.  Until he topdecks Yawgmoth's will and proceeds to win the next turn.

4-1-1 , 9-6-1

Round 7  5color oath Piloted by Eli Kassis
Game 1 he out draws me bad via intuition AK and wins

I don't remember how I boarded, I think just REB's and pyro in

I have to mulligan down to 5, and I'm not feeling so great about it, Eli says something like, here, I'll cut you perfectly into acall + stuff.  And he does, I draw some cards and time walk and my hand looks pretty good.  Then I pass.
He drops orchard, mox, oath and I'm not feeling so good again.

The next turn is the most busted set of things I've done in magic ever.  I Proceed to dtutor, will, walk, acall, tinker and all this in the face of losing and end up having to tinker up a pants down slaver and pass the turn.  He oaths, his entire deck minus 2 cards and witness comes into play, hitting will.  he taps down for will and I force.  on to game 3

I control the game via reb and pyro and drain, and get a quick slave off nuetering all of his kill conditions and beat him down w/ his own tokens for the win.

5-1-1, 11-7-1
I'm absolutely pumped after this game I'm 10th in standing going in to the final round of swiss and if I win my next match, I'm very much in contention for top 8.

round 8 gifted.fr piloted by dicemanx (2nd Place)
game one I have a very solid hand that ends up duressing him, in response he mysticals for acall, he is holding thirst, gifts, and tinker, I knock out the tinker.  He Acalls on his turn into lotus, tutor, will, takes about 10 minutes doing a bunch of stuff but can't find a red source to recoup for the win, finally, fact or fictions hits double delta and business x3, and split em like that and he takes delta and wins

game two, I bring in blood moons, challices, reb's and dsc-recoup for slaver package
I resolve a quick bloodmoon with 3 basics in play, but forget to tap jet instead of library while holding pyroblast in hand.  He topdecks island and resolves tinker

Overall I was very happy with my first SCG tournament.  I was only 1 game off top 8 and my only 2 losses were to complete and utter broken things happening from the 2nd and 3rd place finishers.

Props:
Hi-Val for the cool art he did on my friend's fact or fiction and gifts ungiven
Shockwave, dicemanx, whatever works, and josh ryder for being totally cool
Eli Kassis for taking the loss so well
The over all crowd for being much more cool than any PTQ I've ever been to
Jeff Warra for killing multiple people with Myr Incubator

Slops:
Me for making such a bad mistake against diceman in the last game, Also, not realizing I was at 2 vs. josh ryder.
Zvi for talking so much trash before the event then getting busted


Changes to the deck:
I probably won't be running this deck again after saviors is legal, Oath just gets too good with pithing needle legal.  But if I were to play the deck again I would change this.
Titan would become DSC because there were so many times where DSC was just better today.  Duress x2 and Rack and Ruin would become Crucible-Strip-Echoing Truth, or Blood moon, Welder, Echoing Truth

Other things I learned, OMOTS beats fish bad, even u/g fish can't deal with it without Kira.

Thanks for Reading,
Ben Russell

[Machinus]

Thanks for the report, and good job.