[Results] 2004-02-21 Ontario (66 players)

[Dr. Sylvan]

Another email has reached me about data, this time from an Ontario Vintage Championships in a store called Dueling Grounds (www.dueling-grounds.com).

1. Bryan Finch
4 Squee, Goblin Nabob
4 Force of Will
4 Intuition
4 Bazaar of Baghdad
4 Worldgorger Dragon
3 Compulsion
3 Duress
3 Animate Dead
3 Dance of the Dead
2 Necromancy
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Time Walk
4 Underground Sea
4 Polluted Delta
3 Swamp
2 Island
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Emerald
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Crypt
1 Ambassador Laquatus

4 Powder Keg
4 Stifle
3 Tormond^Òs Crypt
3 Chain of Vapor
1 Sliver Queen

2. Wayne Oickle
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Time Walk
1 Tinker
2 Intuition
2 Brainstorm
4 Goblin Welder
3 Duress
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Yawgmoth^Òs Will
4 Juggernaut
4 Phyrexian Dreadnought
4 Illusionary Mask
1 Triskellion
1 Duplicant
1 Platinum Angel
1 Solemn Simalcrum
1 Memory Jar
1 Sol Ring
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Emerald
4 Mishra^Òs Workshop
2 Island
1 Swamp
1 Mountain
2 Polluted Delta
1 Bloodstain Mire
3 Volcanic Island
2 Underground Sea
2 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine

3 Overload
2 Rack and Ruin
2 Diabolic Edict
1 Darksteel Forge
2 Stifle
2 Misdirection
1 Gilded Drake
1 Fire/Ice
1 Viashino Heretic

3. Frankson Lee
4 Goblin Welder
1 Mox Jet
1 Black Lotus
3 Pyrostatic Pillar
4 Wooded Foothills
1 Karn, Silver Golem
1 Mountain
4 Survival of the Fittest
4 Juggernaut
1 Mox Ruby
1 Sol Ring
1 Anger
1 Wheel of Fortune
1 Strip Mine
4 Taiga
1 Memory Jar
1 Duplicant
1 Elf Replica
1 Mox Sapphire
3 Blood Moon
1 Quirion Ranger
4 Mishra^Òs Workshop
1 Mox Emerald
1 Gorilla Shaman
1 Triskellion
1 Masticore
1 Mox Pearl
1 Squee, Goblin Nabob
1 Sundering Titan
2 Su-Chi
4 Forest
3 Wasteland

SB:
3 Pyroblast
3 Rack and Ruin
3 Naturalize
3 Chalice of the Void
3 Tormond^Òs Crypt

4. Ian Smith
1 Library of Alexandria
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Ruby
1 Sol Ring
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Black Lotus
3 Volcanic Island
3 Tundra
3 Underground Sea
1 Island
2 Polluted Delta
2 Flooded  Strand
1 Stripmine
4 Wasteland
3 Decree of Justice
2 Gorilla Shaman
1 Mind Twist
1 Time Walk
1 Yawgmoth^Òs Will
4 Mana Drain
4 Force of Will
1 Demonic Tutor
3 Cunning Wish
1 Mystical Tutor
4 Brainstorm
1 Balance
3 Swords to Plowshares
2 Skeletal Scrying
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Fact or Fiction
1 Isochron Scepter

4 Red Elemental Blast
1 Ebony Charm
2 Disenchant
2 Humility
1 Blue Elemental Blast
1 Circle of Protection: Red
2 Rack and Ruin
1 Diabolic Edict
1 Swords to Plowshares

5. Matthew Kershaw
2 Taiga
3 Mountain
4 Wasteland
1 Mox Ruby
1 Black Lotus
4 Wooded Foothills
3 Rishadan Port
1 Strip Mine
1 Fork
4 Slith Firewalker
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Price of Progress
4 Pillage
3 Chain Lightning
1 Black Vice
3 Blistering Firecat
4 Tanglewire
3 Gorilla Shaman
4 Jackal Pup
2 Fireblast

3 Tormond^Òs Crypt
3 Naturalize
3 Blood Moon
3 Null Rod
3 Cursed Scroll

6. Andrew Oyen
4 Goblin Piledriver
3 Goblin Warchief
2 Gempalm Incinerator
2 Siege-Gang Commander
4 Goblin Lackey
4 Skirk Prospector
4 Goblin Ringleader
4 Goblin Recruiter
4 Food Chain
1 Chrome Mox
1 Black Lotus
1 Goblin Matron
1 Goblin Sharpshooter
1 Wheel of Fortune
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Ruby
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Crypt
1 Strip Mine
4 Wasteland
4 Wooded Foothills
4 Taiga
6 Mountain

4 Red Elemental Blast
3 Blood Moon
3 Tormond^Òs Crypt
2 Naturalize
2 Artifact Mutation
1 Gempalm Incinerator

7. ANDREW PETKOVICS
1 Ancestrall Recall
4 Cloud of Faeries
4 Curiosity
4 Force of Will
4 Spiketail Hatchling
4 Standstill
4 Stifle
3 Voidmage Prodigy
4 Grim Lavamancer
4 Null Rod
1 Library of Alexandria
3 Faerie Conclave
4 Mishra^Òs Factory
4 Volcanic Island
3 Island
4 Polluted Delta
4 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine

2 Sigil of Sleep
3 Red Elemental Blast
3 Rack and Ruin
3 Maze of Ith
2 Fire/Ice
2 Tormond^Òs Crypt

8. Wilson Kan
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Reckless Charge
4 Goblin Lackey
4 Goblin Grenade
4 Mogg Fanatic
4 Mogg Flunkies
4 Jackal Pup
4 Goblin Cadets
4 Chain Lightning
4 Goblin Piledriver
4 Barbarian Ring
4 Wooded Foothill
4 Bloodstain Mire
8 Mountain

4 Goblin Vandal
4 Pyrokinesis
4 Pyrostatic Pillar
3 Gorilla Shaman

[LoA]

Damn, that's one of the most well-rounded T8's I've ever seen--I'm impressed.

The blue/black deck looks a little strange without drains, but I guess it's tough to argue with results.

Do you have a breakdown of the field?  Some of the decks (the type 1 version of RDW, for example) seem like they might be metagame-specific.

[Dr. Sylvan]

I've got nuthin' else, unfortunately. What I'm really "Cool!"ed by, though, is the Workshop Vengeur deck. That thing is just crazy-off-the-wall.

For people who don't want to force their brains to decide on archetypes from those poorly-ordered decklists, this is what I'm calling it:

1. Dragon
2. Workshop Vengeur
3. TnT
4. Keeper
5. Food Chain Goblins
6. Sligh
7. UR Fish
8. Goblin Sligh

[dicemanx]

Do you have a breakdown of the field? Some of the decks (the type 1 version of RDW, for example) seem like they might be metagame-specific

I can tell you that there is little to no metagaming in Toronto - people play everything and anything, so its difficult to prepare and do well. The remaining decks included just about every archetype. This is what I saw:

1x U/R Landstill (Shock_Wave)
1x U/W Landstill (wuaffiliate)
1x Belcher (bebe)
1x Rector (TorbinWren)
1x U/R/W Control (specialk)
1x Gay/r (petko)
1x Workshop/Mask (Moridar)
2x TnT (Balzary, Raye)
1x Parfait (Razor)
2x FCG (ReAnimator)
2x GAT
1x Hulk
1x IsoKeeper
1x Keeper
1x Suicide
1x B/G Nether Void
1x White Weenie (yeah, thats right)
1x Affinity
1x Madness
1x RDW (Ric_Flair's build I believe)
2x Dragon
1x SpoilsMask
1x Old School Academy
1x R/G Beats
1x Goblin Sligh

Some of those numbers may be underestimates as I did not get a chance to see every player in action, but it gives you a general idea what was played - which was pretty much everything under the sun.

[bebe]

Slaver was there as well I think and I saw more Fish than you. This was a nightmare of a tournament for me and I dropped early as I felt a little sick after a drink with Wu and Petko ( it wasn't the beer) and was going nowhere anyway. That list is less than half the field. Vintage Ontario is a crap shoot. You never know what deck to bring.

[Dr. Sylvan]

A PM from ReAnimator (Andrew Oyen) has informed me that the 5th and 6th places were reversed, which I'm now editing into the first post.

Further info gleaned from Andrew:

the classic tnt was played by Raye (his manadrain name) and he has a turney report on the open forum.

Special K (on the manadrain) came in 9th on tiebreaks, i think he was running straight UW landstill and Dicemanx has him and Wuaffiliate mixed up (K and Wu are good friends from the same city and usually carpool so its easy to mix them up)

i know for sure there was a tog deck semi powered as well as an Ostompy and GBvoid deck there as well

a car load of guys from the states came 5-10 minutes late and missed the turney, and a few other cars couldnt make it due to the weather, so there should have been at least 15 more people there who just got screwed over

[Eastman]

Damn, that's one of the most well-rounded T8's I've ever seen--I'm impressed.

Well rounded? Hardly. It isn't 'well rounded' at all. The decks in the top 8 all look pretty good, and I'm sure it was a difficult tournament, but you cannot call the top 8 'well rounded'  There are 5 straight aggro decks and 1 aggro control with only one each of combo and control.

[dicemanx]

@Eastman

Control had issues with certain types of aggro in the tournament, and there was little combo as people probably feared hate (especially Null Rod and Trinisphere from the Workshop decks, which turned out to be absent for the most part). Therefore, having so many aggro decks in the T8 is not surprising at all, but you're right in that control was underrepresented.


@Dr. Sylvan

Wuaffiliate (Al) did run U/W Landstill, not Specialk. Specialk (Arend) was running some weird control build with Standstills for card drawing.

[CHA1N5]

Well rounded? Hardly. It isn't 'well rounded' at all. The decks in the top 8 all look pretty good, and I'm sure it was a difficult tournament, but you cannot call the top 8 'well rounded'  There are 5 straight aggro decks and 1 aggro control with only one each of combo and control.

As for the different cards used, sure it had a lot of variety... but I generally agree with Eastman.

I'm having a hard time finding the Togs, Smokestacks and Mindslavers in dicemanx's list.  Not pointing fingers or anything, but when you have about 8-12 copies of these three cards at a tournament, you're going to see "unexpected" stuff in the T8.  

[dicemanx]

I think people here shy away from Prison and Hulk because:

1. The environment is filled with hate. Prison decks have enough trouble with Landstill and Oshawa Stompy, and most decks pack strong hate like Null Rod and RnR/AMutation. Plus, Prison is weak against the deck that was its killer way back when Stax was conceived: TnT. Slaver would have probably have leven less of a chance, but Stax might have been viable though. I personally would have run wMUD if I played.

2. Hulk does not perform well here in Toronto. In fact, you might be hard-pressed to find any local that would feel that Hulk is a defining deck of the format. Last time I saw Hulk in action it was losing to Fish, Landstill, and Dragon, three decks that are prevalent locally. To me, Hulk is just another good deck in a sea of good decks, nothing more.

[LoA]

By "well-rounded" I meant diverse.  Yes, there's an aggro-slant but I've seen a lot of redundant T8s.  Slavery seems to be around in the Cape a lot, Hulk dominates certain metagames, Duelman (no umlauts--sigh) generally has it's own look to it.  Living in the Northeast it's easy for me to start thinking that all metagames are control-based in one way or another.  It's refreshing to see new decks do well since I think it reminds us there's a lot of work yet to be done in this format.

Nothing will beat that mono-green LD deck from Amsterdam a few months back though.

[Eastman]

By "well-rounded" I meant diverse.  Yes, there's an aggro-slant but I've seen a lot of redundant T8s.  

I don't see that it is diverse either.

[LoA]

Just because 3 decks run Goblins don't make them the same deck.  One is pure aggro, one is aggro-combo (although I'll concede that FCG is a pretty lousy aggro deck) and one is aggro-control.  The rest of the T8 is control, combo, tempo, aggro, and control-combo.

[Grand Inquisitor]

Dave's just being difficult because he had a bad week.

[Dr. Sylvan]

Dave's just being difficult because it's that time of the month.

[Jacob Orlove]

Dave's just being difficult because it's that time of the month.

<|Eastman|> so I was bleeding all over the place
<|Eastman|> it was quite a bad scene
<|Eastman|> looks like the carpet is ruined

[Dr. Sylvan]

I demand a post from Dave saying, "Well played, clerks." and a sig change to something like "thirty-seven?!"