Myriad Games Vintage - Saturday, September 12th, 2009

Another awesome event. I don't think 6th out of 19 warrants a thread for my report, but I did take some notes.

Here is what I played:
4x Force of Will
4x Mana Drain
2x Misdirection
2x Duress
1x Rebuild

1x Voltaic Key
1x Time Vault
2x Tezzeret
1x Tinker
1x Inkwell Leviathan

3x Polluted Delta
3x Flooded Strand
4x Underground Sea
5x Moxen***
1x Black Lotus*
1x Sol Ring
1x Mana Crypt
2x Island
1x Snow-Covered Island
1x Tolarian Academy

1x Sensei's Divining Top
1x Brainstorm
1x Ponder
1x Ancestral Recall
4x Strategic Planning****
1x Mystical Tutor
1x Merchant Scroll
1x Time Walk
1x Thirst for Knowledge
1x Timetwister
1x Gifts Ungiven
1x Mind's Desire

1x Vampiric Tutor
1x Demonic Tutor
1x Skeletal Scrying
1x Yawgmoth's Will

Sideboard
4x Leyline of the Void
3x Energy Flux
2x Infest
1x Rebuild
1x Pithing Needle
1x Trinisphere
1x Chalice of the Void
1x Echoing Truth
1x Darkblast

Rd1 vs John Joyce (with 5C Vault Combo? He explained afterwards but I missed it. Confidant + Ancient Grudge main, White cards in the sideboard.)
Me: 20 19 18 13 12 10
John: 20 19 17 16 15 14 13 12
I'm playing. I ponder. He Duresses, takes Misdirection. I lay lands to 4 and 2nd main Planning. Meanwhile he has EOT Mystical for Force, then EOT Vamp for ACall (I presume, and am shown). He fires off Ancestral, which I force (pitching Desire), he forces back pitching Tezz so I Drain his Force. I untap into Vault and Key, Key gets drained so I respond with Scrying for five and don't find a counter (I find Drain but didn't leave UU open, thankfully a mistake I recover from). I do find Merchant Scroll, so after nothing on his turn I have Scroll->Mystical->Yawg->Win all with Drain backup.

Me: 20 19 18 17
John: 20 19 18
He's playing, and mulls twice. He still has Jet and Duress, which takes my Acall (Misdirection active but impotent). I topdeck Tezz and Duress him. Soon I have Drain and Mis-D active and win the counterwar over his Ancestral, also getting 5 Drain mana from his Force. I untap into the win. I should note that he was stuck on Jet for a while, and really had no choice but to fire off Ancestral.

1-0 Matches, 2-0 Games.

Rd2 vs Oli with UBG Tezz (Regrowth + Night's Whisper).
Me: 20 19 18 14
Oli: 20 19
I'm playing and fan out Ruby, Lotus, Planning x2, Ponder, Misdirection, Demonic. I planning floating U (intending to planning twice to find land if necessary, and then Ponder) and instead find Ancestral which I play. It resolves and I draw Land, Duress, Force so I duress him too. I think he duresses back taking Demonic, so I untap into planning again. Eventually (it seems) I Scrying for four to lock up the game.

Me: 20 19 18 17
Oli: 20 19 18 16
I have Crypt, three fetches, planning, Force and an Island, but he duresses T1 and takes Planning. I don't draw that well thereafter.

Me: 20 18 17 16
Oli: 20 19 18 16
I'm playing here, and my notes are unhelpful (focusing on game three...). I think I have the nuts from the beginning.

2-0 Matches, 4-1 Games.

Rd 3 vs ELD
Eric: 20 18 15 14
Me: 20 18 17
I resolve early Ancestral. He plays out his hand and when I Duress he shows Vamp, Scrying, Scrying. I mention that Scrying helped me against him at the last Tewksbury. We're playing essentially the 74 card mirror. I have a Drain for his big scrying and win from there.

Eric: 20 19 18 15 14 13 10 7
Me: 20 19 18 17 16 14
We have another quick counterwar over my Ancestral (my two Mis-Ds, his Mis-D and Force) and I draw three, but they're all mana. In the topdeck war he finds Mystic Remora. He sculpts while I continue to draw lands. At the end I have Vamp, BS, and Force, with Vault on the table but pass to him. He finishes with Tendrils (aided by my vamping for a drain). I had no chance anyway.

Eric: 20
Me: 20 18 17 16 15
I think he sits on another Remora, in any case my deck completely falls apart and ships me nothing. He tears me apart.

2-1 Matches, 5-3 Games.

Rd 4 vs Jeremiah
I initially put him on 5C Stax, but it's just a Shop-Tezzeret list with several tops.
G1
J: 20 19 17 16 15
Me: 20 19 18 17 13 10
I have a great hand, so when I duress him (he has Academy, Tezz, Wheel, Fact, Yawg) I take Wheel. I shortly duress again and take Yawg. Then we draw for a while until I drop a bomb to get him to force pitching Tezz. He has Top+Key but can't find Vault before I assemble the combo. I think I Scrying for 4 to stay ahead. This game goes for 40 minutes of the round.

J: 20 19
Me: 20 19 18 17 15
We try to play quickly, and he again has Top+Key to get more fuel than me. I think he has to tap out for the combo, or uses Key to draw into it, so I have one turn where my only option is to Twister + Hope, but I get the seven worst cards in my deck. He shows me gasoline in his twister 7 anyway.

G3
We're playing super quick, and I assemble Vault+Key on turn 3 of extras, but he rightly doesn't scoop and we draw. I even resolve Yawg, but have no business. He says afterwards that he could have scooped game one more quickly, but I don't fault him. We hope to meet in the top 8 for some untimed games.

2-1-1 Matches, 6-4 Games.

Rd 5 vs Harlequin's brother Eric
Eric: 20
Me: 20 19 18 17 14 11
I get infi turns and rebuild the mana crypt I used to do it. Eric doesn't scoop right away so I invite him to read Tezzeret.

E: 20
Me: 20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 9 8 6
I have a flux in my opener, plus an island and fetchland. But I hold it for value after walking, and he has strip for my island. Now I have to drop Sol ring to get the Flux out and eventually strand myself while he beats with Viashino heretic. I have no (well, draw no) outs to my own Flux.

E: 20
Me: 20 19
I have force, rebuild, demonic, mox, fetch, tezz. I first turn demonic for Lotus. He drops Shop- Lotus makes white- Jester's Cap, but floats two shop mana. "Two Shop mana?" I confirm? "Yes." Cap resolves and I force his thorn of amethyst. I drop tezz and find vault. He plays a goblin welder and I go infi. He doesn't scoop so I get key, mox, mox, etc. He says he's waiting for me to put an artifact in my graveyard and I remind him that welder has summoning sickness. He scoops them up.

3-1-1 Matches, 8-5 Games

Top 8 round vs Oli again
O: 20 18 16 14 13 12 10 8 7
Me: 20 19
I have a fast play to drop TV+Key but Key had to untap mana crypt so he has one turn. I have U open and brainstorm. He turns the one turn clock into 3 with Walk and Yawg (he duresses my force and BS whiffs, putting Mis-D in my hand). He goes slightly nuts, but ends up one mana short. In fact I was able to steal his ancestral on "turn 3" where he still Thirsted into the combo but was one mana short. Thankfully he a. choose not to duress me on his Yawg turn, and b. choose to ancestral before thirsting (or, at all). He actually is rightly convinced that I have the Misdirection as he discusses briefly with ELD whether Mis-D can change Regrowth's target (it can).

O: 20 18
Me: 20 19
I have a marginal hand, and he opens on library. I get crushed. I line up to have Twister and if he counters Ancestral, but he Duresses away Twister, and I have to fire blind ACall which he lets resolve to stay on Library. It doesn't matter.

O: 20 19 18 16
Me: 20 19
I have another marginal hand, with Ponder and two drains. USea and Tolarian. I ponder into a second Usea and my third drain. I drain his first Night's Whisper which gets force-backed. Then I drain his second night's whisper, but am forced to D'tutor for Top to turn on my Academy and third drain. Top isn't effective enough at digging and he puts me away.

Finished 3-2-1 in matches, 9-7 in games.

My three three-game matches against Oli and Jer were incredibly interactive and engaging. I only don't mention ELD because his Remora housed me, and he won ~90% of his mana crypt flips.

It was a ton of fun, and I picked up a bunch of EDH cards to nearly finish Numot (including Elspeth and Cryptic). Looking forward to the next Myriad Games event.