Alternate Title: Anusien stops sucking, takes home a Mox
I was definitely taking Rector Flash to the tournament. You have Chain of Vapor main to answer Leylines, and Tinker->Sundering Titan and hardcast Yawgmoth's Bargain to answer any sort of Leyline shenanigans. It has the power of Hulk Flash without any of the vulnerability to just having a single game plan. I think I even made some sort of bragging comment about how I do not need to buy any cards or scramble to get anything together. Pride goeth, right?
Then I start testing. Anyone who has tested Flash decks probably knows how that went. I tested against Team Arsenal's SS + Tendrils deck (hi Cody!) and got curbstomped. But whatever, anyone knows that you test against the decks that are going to show up, not the metagamed versions two people are going to bring. The problem arose once I tested against Rich Shay playing Bomberman. Brassman and I had the Rector Flash build down to 11 lands, 4 Ritual, 5 Mox, Black Lotus, Chrome Mox, Sol Ring and Mana Crypt with 4 Street Wraith. Even today I'm relatively sure that's correct since the deck needs to be fast or else it loses, but that configuration is simply not stable enough to win a 7 round tournament. The SCG event ended up being four players shy from 7 rounds, too. So then I switched to a list Andy gave me with Hulk into Heart Sliver + 4 Virulent Slivers. Nice anything, Rich. I was losing to Aether Spellbomb. I was losing to Engineered Explosives. I was losing to counters. I think at one point I just scooped to an open board because his deck was hundreds of times better than mine. This is something I am still trying to wrap my head around. Bomberman runs 2/2s for 3 and 2/4s for 4, and somehow it is better than half the decks in any given tournament. So I go to sleep after testing unsure of what I'm going to play.
I had actually loaded Bomberman into MWSPlay and tried to make it work. The deck I shuffled up was
Dan Cunningham's Top 2 list from Myriad Games. I just could not make the deck work; it had lots of hands where you would put a Trinket Mage on the board and just be unable to stop your opponent before they won. Part of this was user error, but I ended up removing a few cards to increase the draw spell count. After a few days of not finding any other answers, I switch to Bomberman. I talk on AIM to Roxas, BrassMan, T00L and Rich Shay before sleeving up this monster for the Power 9:
// Lands
4 Tundra
4 Flooded Strand
1 Snow-Covered Island
1 Strip Mine
1 Library of Alexandria
3 Island
1 Plains
1 Underground Sea
// Creatures
4 Trinket Mage
3 Auriok Salvagers
3 Aven Mindcensor
// Spells
1 Mox Jet
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Engineered Explosives
1 AEther Spellbomb
1 Sol Ring
1 Pithing Needle
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Time Walk
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Ruby
1 Black Lotus
4 Force of Will
4 Mana Drain
2 Misdirection
1 Echoing Truth
3 Thirst for Knowledge
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Merchant Scroll
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Yawgmoth's Will
4 Brainstorm
// Sideboard
SB: 1 Aven Mindcensor
SB: 1 Tormod's Crypt
SB: 1 Rebuild
SB: 2 Hurkyl's Recall
SB: 4 Honor the Fallen
SB: 2 Exalted Angel
SB: 1 Skullclamp
SB: 3 Duress
I'm pretty sure the maindeck is right, but the sideboard is a piece of crap.
A few points to consider:
The black splash: Lots of high profile players hate this, while a lot of people at the tournament ran it. Of course, I T8ed with it and JR got 9th without it. I do not know whether the other Bomberman player in the T8 ran it or not. Either way I do not think there is conclusive evidence based on tournament results. This originally started because in the middle of the mirror, Yawgmoth's Will is going to give you a huge advantage by replaying Ancestral, Time Walk, a creature and whatever cogs you pitched to Thirst for Knowledge. Ironically you actually board it out against Long. After I put a single Underground Sea in, I swapped a Merchant Scroll for Demonic Tutor. The Duresses seemed good against Long/Gifts/Flash, and that prompted the second Underground Sea in the main.
The mirror: There are not any good cards in the mirror right now. Elias and Stefan like Wrath of Good which seems pretty poor to me, since it only helps you when you're behind. I had Exalted Angel which is a good trump to Cunningham's Serra Avengers or the obvious Vedalken Shackles, but they don't help if your opponent brings in more Spellbombs and similar effects.
Stax: Time to do some serious testing. Cunningham ran 1 Rebuild, 3 Energy Flux. I cut an anti-Stax card because I didn't expect it to show up in large numbers, and decided that Hurkyl's was better in small numbers than Energy Flux and ran that. JR ran 1 Rushing River 2 Energy Flux, and said he should have ran Rebuild rather than Rushing River. I saw none of my anti-Stax cards in my matchup against SpookyKid, so it's rather inconclusive right now.
So anyway, tournament.
Round 1: JR Goldberg, Bomberman
Oh great. I have a tendency at these things to get paired against experts with my deck. At my first P9 right after Jacob broke WtF v3.0 I played that deck and faced Jacob round 2 at table 1. Needless to say he crushed me.
Game 1: On the play, I open with Library of Alexandria, Black Lotus and 5 irrelevant cards. He almost wins but I pull it out. Understandably, he waits until I recur Spellbomb after making infinite mana to scoop.
Game 2: I Trinket Mage into my tech: Skullclamp. He Trinket Mages into his: Sensei's Divining Top. I beat for 3 with Trinket Mage and he beats for 4 with Mindcensor + Mage and Drains Exalted Angel when I finally find it.
Game 3: I get Exalted Angel going in turn 1 of extra turns and cannot kill him in time.
1-1-1 in games, 0-0-1 in matches
Round 2: Paired down against Joshua Reynolds, CS
While shuffling he flashes me a red card that looks like Goblin Welder, but it could also be Squee, Goblin Nabob. Either way I feel confident.
Game 1: While shuffling (and I need it, since I saw some clumps last match), Katzby comes by and pulls my opponent aside. I figure this means he is getting a game loss for deck registration errors, and am glad I wrote my list out the night before and double and triple checked everything. Sure enough, he gets the game loss. Joshua accidentally wrote "1 Sundering Titan" twice for 16 cards in the sideboard.
Game 2: Joshua is on the play. My hand is rather good, with two Trinket Mages, Aven Mindcensor, Mana Drain, Pithing Needle by turn 3 or so. I Trinket Mage, he Forces, I Drain, he Forces, and then I untap and lead out with the other Trinket Mage, which gets my Lotus. On that endstep he runs out his last card, a Mystical Tutor, and I respond with Aven Mindcensor to counter it. He loses shortly after.
3-1-1 in games, 1-0-1 in matches.
Round 3: Jeremy Seroogy, 5C Stax
I recognize the name as SpookyKid, an ICBMer, but no one knows what he's playing.
Game 1: I open with Trinket Mage into Tormod's Crypt and use an Aven Mindcensor to counter something minor. He misses several attacks with Goblin Welder, but he does land Smokestack. I Crypt him in response to his Crucible, which is silly because I have to counter it anyway in the presence of Smokestack. Still his defenses came too late, and he dies a few turns later.
Game 2: I open with Jet, Mox, Mox, Will, Force of Will, Aven Mindcensor. He kept a rather solid five and my awful mulligan decision loses me the game.
Game 3: I open with Land, Lotus, Sol Ring, Trinket Mage, Aether Spellbomb, go. He opens on Mishra's Workshop, Black Lotus, Mox and plays Platinum Angel saying, "Might as well make you waste." I'm cheering inside because I have a turn 3 kill as long as he doesn't interact with me. Turn 2 I play my other land and cast Auriok Salvagers. On his turn 2 he merely plays Crucible of Worlds, so I combo him out easily on my turn 3.
5-2-1 in games, 2-0-1 in matches.
I'm happy to get out of there with a win because I think Stax is a bad matchup for me, even if I never saw any sideboard cards. At this point, T8 seems within reach for me although I'm afraid of jinxing myself by thinking about it too hard.
Round 4: Duncan Hall, poorly built Belcher.
Game 1: I'm on the play, and lead with Land, Lotus, Salvagers, go. I have Mana Drain and Thirst for Knowledge in my hand, and don't know what he is playing. He leads with Land Grant->Bayou, Elvish Spirit Guide, Cabal Ritual, Necropotence, leaving 2x Goblin Charbelcher and Tendrils of Agony in hand. The Necropotence is only for 4, but it's irrelevant as when I make mana off Salvagers, I draw Trinket Mage and combo him out on turn 2.
Game 2: I keep a rather poor hand: 5 mana sources, Demonic Tutor and Mana Drain. He plays Mana Crypt, Land Grant, Elvish Spirit Guide, Dark Ritual, Yawgmoth's Bargain and wins. I hear that Bargain card is good. When Belcher finally hits, it reveals some Defense Grids and Ground Seals.
Game 3: I'm back on the play and keep a decent hand; something like Force, Brainstorm, Thirst for Knowledge, Echoing Truth, land, mox, Trinket Mage. Against Klep I think I can't possibly win, but this player and build are not as good. He goes land, Mana Crypt, LED, Ritual, Necro (Force, pitching TfK), remove SSG for Tinder Wall, crack it and make 12 Goblin tokens. I respond with Land, Mox, Echoing Truth. The game takes a while to finish, but I win pretty handily. After the match, Duncan seems happy to have cast a Ground Seal which is actually pretty worthless.
7-3-1 in games, 3-0-1 in matches
Round 5: Bennett Toms, UWb Fish
I know Bennett; he doesn't play T1. He's a decent player but tends to lucksack pretty frequently and he knows how to play creature decks pretty well. He was playing against Paul Mastriano in round 4 next to Andy and Klep but of course neither one of them has the scout. Stefan comes through telling me he's UW Null Rod Fish, and can't say whether the Rods came out post-board. I'm glad I have Exalted Angels in the board instead of Vedalken Shackles.
Game 1: He gets a faster start with me, and puts me on the back foot by countering some draw spells. He only has Kataki or Dark Confidant beating down each turn so I have a lot of time. I finally combo him out from 13, using Yawgmoth's Will to make sure the creatures I have left are lethal.
Game 2: I open on Library but since I have no countermagic or Sol Ring or Lotus, I tap it on turn 3 to morph Exalted Angel. He can't figure out what it is but suspects Willbender. At this point I have Library, Sea, Plains in play. In testing getting WW was hard enough to get against Bomberman, so I start talking loudly to my friends and nearby players about how good Library is in the hopes that he'll Strip Mine that guy instead. When I'm tapped out, he does, and I make another land drop, my Tundra. He makes some guys, and doesn't Wasteland my Tundra for fear of getting the 3 for 1, and I unmorph Angel the following turn and win at 4.
9-3-1 in games, 4-0-1 in matches.
At this point I'm almost certain I'm in the Top 8, but I don't want to brag, talk about it too loud or even think that I'm a lock for fear of getting knocked out. However the two other 4-0-1 players drew last round at 4-0, so I definitely get the draw. Sure enough, there are three 4-0-1 players and 8 4-1 players, so I'm a lock.
Round 6: Andy Probasco, Gifts
ID. I have a poor T4 stack made up of Ravnica block and forward cards; we play Mental Magic with that and a little Type 4 but then standings come up. I'm in at 6th place, paired against Paul Mastriano. An hour or so later, the T8 begins.
Round 7: Paul Mastriano, Creator of Type 4, Discoverer of Stephen Menendian, Scroll Long
I get the scout as Merchant Scroll Tendrils combo and win the die roll.
I have a lot of countermagic and no gas. He puts me on Bomberman based on my turn 1 Land, Mox, Sol Ring and holds back Merchant Scrolls. He breaks the Draw, go with Vampiric Tutor. After Draining a Force of Will, Aven Mindcensor lands and stops that noise. I have to burn with the mana. There was no way I was winning this game, but I do make a horrible misplay. At 4 cards in hand, he goes Ritual, some other accelerant, Mind's Desire. For some dumb reason I drain a Desire copy. He flips over Merchant Scroll and Demonic Tutor. Merchant Scroll fizzles, Demonic Tutor gets him Yawgmoth's Bargain, and he draws Dark Ritual to win the game. As it turned out though, the last card in his hand was Yawgmoth's Will, and as he gives me no targets for the Misdirection left in my hand, I lose.
Game 2: I am on the play with Underground Sea, Tundra, Flooded Strand, Duress, Merchant Scroll, Mana Drain, Aven Mindcensor. I lead with Duress and see: Black Lotus, Flooded Strand, Dark Ritual, Cabal Ritual, Pyroblast, Tendrils of Agony, Brainstorm. I hesitate, but I take the Brainstorm because I figure he has to find Will, Bargain or a draw spell to make this hand lethal. I could take the Tendrils, but Brainstorm sets him up to find cards that find Tendrils anyway. He plays Strand, go, and I play Tundra and find Ancestral Recall with the Scroll. On his turn 2 he plays Island, and my turn 3 sees the Strand, pass. He makes no land drop, and on his end step I Ancestral. He breaks Strand for Volcanic Island and Pyroblasts, and I answer with Drain. On my turn I drop another land (Ancestral plus my draw step gives me Force + Drain) and make Mindcensor, leaving Drain mana open. We play draw go while I beat down, and when he has 8 cards and has not made his third land drop, he test spells with Black Lotus. Used to playing control where you just counter what they play with Lotus, I let it in. Then I look at his board, my notes, and instantly regret it. At this point I have Force, Force, Drain and Lotus in play; I can cast Force and Drain in the same turn. So I have Aven Mindcensor out and he has no other black sources, and probably doesn't have one in hand. The correct play is to Mana Drain Black Lotus and count on Mindcensor shutting him off from black mana long enough to let me win. I don't and he puts together a hand with mana sources and three Duress, which is enough to kill me.
9-5-1 in games, 4-1-2 in matches
Had I played properly, we would have gone to three games, and I think the matchup favors me enough that I would have won in game 3 as well. It came down to me not testing against combo well enough to know how to play the matchup and Paul Mastriano knowing how to play around Aven Mindcensor. Still I would have met Bennett again in the Top 8 and I'm not sure the matchup favors me if he knows to keep me off WW for my Exalted Angels. Then again, I have Aether Spellbomb, Engineered Explosives and Salvagers. I definitely can beat the Ritual Gifts player in the finals, since Mindcensor is sort of good against Gifts Ungiven. Overall though, I won a piece of power and earned myself some street cred, as the kids say. Just making Top 8 was a milestone for me (my first), and it gave me enough power to 10 proxy any Drain + Library of Alexandria deck.
Props:
Jesus and Rich Shay for helping me work on the deck
JR for being an awesome guy and talking to me about Bomberman after the tournament
Cody and the Arsenal guys for letting me come up with you
Klep for bringing Belcher and making 10th
SCG for holding these tournaments
Slops:
Elias and Stefan: You call that tech?
Klep's round 6 opponent for winning
Me, for not being Paul Mastriano in the Top 8
Smmenen, for not making it to the tournament
Mark Perez, for not making it to the tournament
