[Tournament Report] Columbus-5th Place (EBA)

[Jawman16]

*If the mods want to move this to the appropriate place, then by all means please do*

I have been playing EBA for about the last month and have bounced around between lists.  I saw soupboys list from the GP in Columbus earlier in the month and thought it looked solid so I gave it a shot with minor modifications.  It was definatly a great improvement over what I had been running.

Teh List

4 Exalted Angel
4 Meddling Mage

4 Force of Will
4 Mana Drain (Proxy)
4 Duress
2 Damping Matrix

4 Brainstorm
2 Swords to Plowshares
1 Vindicate
1 Mind Twist
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Time Walk
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Fact or Fiction
1 Demonic Tutor

3 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine
4 Polluted Delta
4 Tundra
4 Underground Sea
2 Island
1 Library of Alexandria (Proxy)
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Jet
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Crypt

Sideboard

2 Dust to Dust
3 Blue Elemental Blast
2 Coffin Purge
2 Stifle
1 Moat
2 Swords to Plowshares
1 Aura Fracture
2 Damping Matrix

So my friend Joe Nehrenz, his cousin and I make the trip down to Columbus from Akron to throw the Magikal cards around for a few hours.  It is always nice to actually play against solid players and solid decks which is something you don't always get in the local area.  So after the two hour drive and some Wendys we make it to the store.  We find out that a group of players are going to be late, like and hour and a half late, so we play some casual games until they show up.  Low and behold, who do I have to play in the first round but my friend and driver, Joe... Sux.

Round 1 Joe Nehrenz --Landstill

I know this is a bad matchup for me but I am hoping that the fourth angel in the deck will help me out and it did.

Game 1

Joe is very land and color light in the early going and I have the strips to keep him that way.  I duress seeing that he has a land in hand with one on the board.  So I play an angel and Brainstorm into Wasteland, Strip Mine, Black Lotus.  I already have a strip on the board.  I think I actually Forced his lotus to keep him off blue mana.  He scoops.

Game 2

He is color light again but has 3 Wastelands and a Stifle of a Delta.  I am left with an Island in play and get beat down to one by a factory until I TD a Wasteland of my own.  He pulls a bolt off the top and we move to game 3

Game 3

I resolve an turn one Meddling Mage naming Pyroblast.  I following it up with a turn 2 morph.  I flip the angel and begin to attack.  He never finds the answers and I have some counters if he does.

(1-0)

It sucks to have to put Joe at 0-1 but thats the way the cards fall sometimes.

Round 2 Roland --3 color Tog

Game 1

Meddling Mage is a house as they shut down Pernicious Deed and Cunning Wish.  He scoops to a Damping Matrix.

Game 2

I was land light the whole game but managed to get out the dueling mage combo of Deed and Wish but he already had the tog out and I was forced to block.  I was dead the turn after.

Game 3

I think I had a turn one Library of Alexandria.  I followed it up with Mage, naming Deed.  Exalted Angel does her thing for the win.

(2-0)

Round 3 Joe -- 4 color tog

Game 1

He draws about 2 lands the entire game.  I draw three strips.  Game.

Game 2

This game was aggrivating because I never drew a white source the entire time.  I had two morphs out with double mage and double swords in hand.  I still almost won off the morph beats because I resolved a Damping Matrix with me having the two morphs and him having a tog out so I attack with him being a 6.  He Wishes for Artifact Mutation and wrecks my matrix and blocks my dudes.  I scoop.

Game 3

Both of us blow out of the gates with fast mana but nothing to really play off it.  I topdeck an Ancestral and it resolves.  I proceed to Demonic Tutor for Angel and go for the win but he fires it while it is still morphed.  No matter, I topdeck another one and she flies in for the win.  Its a game of skill I tell you.

(3-0)

So sitting at 3-0 and in first place (tie)  I draw the next two rounds as I would have to play a local friend, Jason (2nd place Drain Slaver).  So we go off to Arby's and then come back for the T8.

Top 8 Rian--U/G Madness

Now one woud think this would be a good matchup.  Play angel and win right? well things are not always so easy.

Game 1

I have the nuts.  Mox Pearl, Mana Crypt, 2xAngel, Island, Fetch, Mana Drain.  I play the mox, crypt, island and morph.  He goes forest, emerald null rod!!  PWNED!!  Well there goes that game.  I never get the mana to morph up the angel until it is too late.  I die to an arrogant wurm, aquameoba, and mana crypt.  That sucked.

Game 2

More of the same Pwnage but this time it was my fault in not SBing correctly.  I brought in the moat instead of more Damping Matrices.  I resolve a Mage naming Mongrel early as I had duressed and seen two.  He plays aquameoba and I play moat.  We do nothing for a while as he plays two Sword of Fire and Ice and equips but cannot attack.  I realize I am going to lose badly at this point becasue all he needs is wonder and I am toast.  He topdecks the blue creature and pitches it.  I take 7 plus 2 to the dome plus 2 to the mage.  He draws two cards and plops out the dogs i had been medlding with for a few turns.  I scoop.  Stupidity=match loss.  I never saw one STP in either game though.  I had 4 in the deck after SB but I guess it was not to be.  I bowed out in fifth place at 3-1-2.


Some thoughts...

EBA is a strong deck as it has no real bad matchups.  It has solid chances against Tog and Slavery.  It is solid against aggro even though it wasn't for me, in T8.  Damping Matrix is a very powerful card in todays metagame.  As soon as I got home, I dropped the Mind Twist for a Skeletal Scying because I felt the deck needed more draw and I dropped an island for a plain and changed the fecthes to Flooded Strands.  The deck is white hungry and I lost at least 3 games beacuase of color screw.  The plains should solve that problem and stand up in the face of wasteland.  Overall I was quite happy with the deck.  It was fun to play and all my opponents were nice players.  Even thought I got a swift kick in the crotch in T8 I cannot argue with my finish.

Props

-Joe for driving us down there.
-Exalted Angel for being a great card
-Damping Matrix "                         "
-Jason for playing with Flametongue Kavu
-U/G Madness for being a cool ass deck

Slops

-Having to play Joe in round one
-The cops...
-Null Rod for pwning my nutty hand
-the tournament starting late
-White mana for hiding from me in certain games
-MInd Twist for sucking
-Mana Drain for only being successfully cast once and then having to burn because of it.
-Double Sworded Flying Aquameoba's.  Mise.

-Jeff Wilson

[Luiggi]

Hi Jawman16,
I've been looking into EBA recently, since I think it's an aggro-control deck that has some potential. The list I was using as a starting point was the one from the StarCity P9 in Richmond, that was running Negators and Impulse. What I noticed about your deck is that you don't have that many draw spells, and I wanted to know how much of a problem that had been for you. The build I'm toying around with runs Ophidians instead of Impulse, leaving the creature base at: 4 Meddling Mage, 3 Ophis, 3 Negators, 2 Angels. What's your take on this?

Best,
Luiggi

[CrazyCarl]

I've been tinkering with EBA for a few weeks now on and off.  Phyrexian Negator is soooooooooo good it's not even funny.  I became a bit disenchanted with Exalted Angel because the deck's mana base is so freaking terrible that it can be hard to flip her.  Instead of Ophidians I'm running Skeletal Scryings, but that may change.  Other than that I had a really crappy sideboard, so yours looks decent to me

[Luiggi]

I guess the Scryings make sense with the Drains, but I probably wouldn't run more than 2 in the deck, if that. It just seems that early game they're not really good, since we don't have enough cards to remove, and they only become good in the mid/late-game. I feel like the deck just lacks an early-game draw-engine. Would Intuition + AK/DA be any good in this deck, or would that waste too many spots? I just think it needs a little more oomph, .

The list I'd been running:

4 Meddling Mage
3 Ophidian
3 Phyrexian Negator
2 Exalted Angel

4 Brainstorm
4 Mana Drain
4 Force of Will
3 Duress
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Time Walk
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Fact of Fiction
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Mind Twist
1 Demonic Tutor
3 Swords to Plowshares

1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Pearl
1 Sol Ring

2 Flooded Strand
4 Polluted Delta
4 Tundra
3 Underground Sea
3 Island
2 City of Brass

The SB Cody Vinci ran at SCGP9 Richmond was:

3 Null Rod
4 Chains of Mephistopheles
4 Sacred Ground
3 Energy Flux
1 Swords to Plowshares

But with the restriction of 3Sphere and the subsequent changes in the environment I'm sure we can come up with something better.

Any thoughts on the maindeck and SB?

[the boogie man]

If you're going to run a bunch of chains, then you might want to add the playset of impulses. I don't know about the ophies, though, they seem really slow.

    About the angels; have you thought of replaceing them with decree of justice? I know that you can morph an angel early, but you have a bunch of early threats with the negators and the mages. it also replaces itself, and creates a crapload of chump blockers.

[Rex_Kwan_Do]

The sideboard I ran at the last SCG - VA needs to be completely redone. I still think null rods and chains may have a place but the sacred grounds need to go. As far as the draw engine goes, I am still convinced that having 4x impulse is the way to go. When I play this deck, I am always working towards setting up a broken Yawgmoth's Will turn. The impulses allow me to do this and my opponent had no idea what I'm doing. I've tested this deck in various match-ups probably about 200 times and over 50% of the time I am able to set up a mid to late game Will with ancestral or lotus in the yard. Without impulses, this is significantly harder to set up. Also, with a brainstorm and impulse in hand the ability to look through seven cards at one time and find that force of will / mana drain / STP you are looking for is very powerful. I have also dropped the mind twist I ran at SCG for a 4th duress.  Some new sideboard cards I am considering is 1x Boseiju, Who Shelters All, 3-4x phyrexian furnace, 3-4x energy flux, 3-4x null rod, and 3-4x chains of mepho. Any thoughts on that?

Cody Vinci

[Luiggi]

Since you have so much disruption don't you think the Mind Twist is worth having in the maindeck, just because it can do so much damage right after a Drain? Also, what's your take on Skeletal Scrying, that Carl suggested a few posts back?

I'll take your word for it on the Impulses and I'll try them out in place of the Ophies.

How did the Balance work for you? I noticed it on your VA decklist, but cut it in favor of the 4th Brainstorm, since the deck has 6 fetchlands to abuse them with. I can definitely see running the Balance in an Ophi-less build. In retrospect would you still use it in today's metagame?

Willow_Wisperer: I think the Angels just win the game vs. many decks, and with the boatload of disruption the deck has I think they can finish the game up very fast. The one problem I've had with them is that sometimes it's hard to find that double-white to flip them over, especially if we've already cracked a fetchland for an Underground Sea to Duress the opponent. So in that sense the Decrees would be better, to avoid the double-white problem by Cycling them...

Luiggi

[Rex_Kwan_Do]

I took the balance out of the deck as soon as SCG-VA was over. It pretty much sucks in the deck since there are so many creatures. I think something like a 4th brainstorm is a much better choice. Personally, I don't like skeletal scrying. I think the main reason for this is because I am always trying to work towards a well orchestrated yawgmoth's will and skeletal scrying has no synergy with it. I think it may have a place in the deck (no more than 2), but it's just personal preference, and by no means a necessity for the deck to function and win.


Cody

[Luiggi]

I totally concur with your assessment of the Balance and the Scryings. Thanks for the input!

What have you found your best/worst matchups to be? As with all Vintage decks I know one of the hardest things is knowing what to pull out in certain matchups. Do you have any SBing advice, assuming we're running a SB like the one you proposed (1 Boseiju, 3-4 Null Rod, 3-4 Energy Flux, 3-4 Chains of Mephistopheles, 3-4 Phyrexian Furnace)?

Luiggi

[Zeylon]

congrats. EBA is a great deck with a lot of solid disruption. I'm surprised it doesn't make more of an appreance in this meta. It packs great tools against all the popular decks.

[Luiggi]

I totally agree with you there, Zeylon, which is partially why I posted in this topic, to try and revive conversation about this deck,  . I think the sheer amount of disruption alone makes it a contender, not to mention how fast you can kill with a Negator or quick Angel.

Something I've been wondering is how the matchup is vs. Oath. Unless we get down a Mage naming Oath pretty fast I'd imagine that Goth Oath builds (like the one from this weekend's Chicago StarCity P9 tourney) should have a very good game against us, using stuff like Phyrexian Furnace to deny us the big YWill that Cody was talking about and using Ancient Hydra to kill off our Mages and make out Negators pretty bad. Not need to mention how much of a beatstick Akroma is, . Any thoughts on the Oath matchup?

Luiggi

[SonataOfTheCathedral]

I think Exalted Angel should be cut all together. When I play tested the deck Exalted Angel seemed useless, it really doesn't improve any match up except aggro but that appears in limited numbers. Plus the double white makes me want to almost run City Of Brass which already is a poor idea.

A better kill I think might look like:

4x Ophidian
4x Meddling Mage
3x Phyrexian Negator
1x Decree Of Justice

It may look like the deck is going towards the path of a control deck or Zherbus's 3cc deck but it is all you probably need. I don't think 2x Skeletal Scrying is enough as a draw engine. Ophidian is a really solid creature which is an amazing early game Mana Drain investment. If you want to gear even more towards control even the Negators can be taken out. This is the full list I have been tinkering with. It certainly was tuned to have a lot more game vs. Control Slaver unlike the version that took SCG Virginia.

Mana:
4x Tundra
3x Underground Sea
4x Polluted Delta
1x Flooded Strand
1x Island
1x Swamp
1x Strip Mine
2x Wasteland
5x Moxen
1x Lotus
1x Sol Ring

The Win:
2x Negator
1x Decree Of Justice

Disruption:
4x Meddling Mage
3x Duress
2x Phyrexian Furnace

Draw:
4x Ophidian
3x Brainstorm
2x Skeletal Scrying

Counters:
4x Force Of Will
4x Mana Drain

Broken:
1x Ancestral Recall
1x Time Walk
1x Yawgmoth's Will

Tutor:
2x Cunning Wish
1x Demonic Tutor

Removal:
1x Swords To Plowshares

Sideboard:
1x Disenchant
2x Swords To Plowshares
1x Skeletal Scrying
1x Fact Or Fiction
1x Balance
1x Stifle
3x Seal Of Cleansing
3x Arcane Lab
2x Hydroblast

The sideboard is awful right now but it does the job. I managed to squeeze in 3 strip effects into the deck because I don't think 5 is completely necessary. I definitely have great game vs. Slaver and my Oath match up is still moderately decent. Questions? Comments?

[Luiggi]

I definitely like the addition of Strip effects to the deck, . I'm not, however, completely sold on the 2 Cunning Wishes. To me they're too much of a control card, and we're not exactly a control deck, which is what distinguishes us from Zherbus' 3cc deck that you mentioned. I would like to cut both Cunning Wishes and add the 3rd Phyrexian Negator and the 4th Brainstorm, something we'd want to have to go with our 5 fetchlands.

Cutting the Wishes means that the Fact or Fiction should definitely come back in to the maindeck, and it might be a good idea to bring another StP back, as well. Cutting both Phyrexian Furnaces could free up the 2 necessary slots. Though this would make out Game 1 vs. ControlSlaver worse, I think with our disruption we've still got some good game. The Furnaces should be in the SB, probably.

What do you think of these suggestions?

Luiggi