[Results] Sports Cards Unlimited: Durham, NC for a Mana Drain

[RaleighNCTourneys]

Location: Durham, NC at Sports Cards Unlimited: Sunday, August 13th, 2006
Prizes:
1st- English Mana Drain
2nd- $75 store credit
3rd- $50 store credit
4th- $25 store credit

23 people showed up for this tournament. I don't have decklists unforunately (I definitely will for the Ancestral Recall tourney coming up in 2 weeks at Sports Zone in Cary). After 5 rounds of swiss the top 8 was:

1. Chris Coppola (Machinus) - Gifts (3-0-2)
2. EJ Walsh - Grim Long (3-0-2)
3. Marsh - Gro (3-0-2)
4. Cody Vinci - Drain Tendrils (3-1-1) Report: http://www.starcitygames.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=291903
5-8. (I don't know order)
Tim (Supa_Tim) - r/g hate
Daniel - MonoBlackAggro
Ben - Goblins
Richard - Rector Tendrils

Top 4:

Chris (Gifts) beats Richard (rector tendrils)
Cody (Drain Tendrils) beats Daniel (MonoBlackAggro)
Tim (r/g hate) beats EJ (Grim Long)
Marsh (Gro) beats Ben (Goblins)

There is a 4 way split for the Drain/store credit with Cody taking the Drain and giving cash to the others. Thanks to Scott for coming all the way from VA, hope you can make it to some more tourneys. If anyone sees any mistakes PM me or post here, I forgot the decklists at the store...

Hope to see everyone at the Ancestral Recall tournament at Sports Zone in 2 weeks!

[[supa_t(im)]]

I had a great time, even without DCI Reporter or whatever the software is.  It was awesome to finally meet some of you guys in person.

I don't think I'll be able to make the next one, but if these are still happening in October or later I will definitely make a effort to get there.

[Tobi]

Maybe the people that are registered on TMD could post their decklists. It's always interesting... 

[meadbert]

I played in the tournament and went 3-1 drop.  My only loss was to Chris Coppola.
I could have drawn into the top 8 but I had to get home and I knew I did not have time to hang around so rather than forcing an opponent to play me I figured I would just drop.

I ran Dragon with a transitional Oath board.

4 Bazaar of Baghdad
3 Polluted Delta
3 Flooded Strand
4 Underground Sea
1 Tropical Island
1 Island
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Pearl
3 Animate Dead
2 Necromancy
1 Dance of the Dead
4 Worldgorger Dragon
1 Sliver Queen
1 Eternal Witness
4 Duress
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Merchant Scroll
4 Quiet Speculation
3 Deep Analysis
1 Vampiric Tutor
4 Force of Will
4 Brainstorm
2 Misdirection
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Ancestral Recall

SB:
4 Forbidden Orchard
4 Oath of Druids
1 Razia, Boros Archangel
1 Akroma, Angel of Wrath
1 Gaea's Blessing
1 Chain of Vapor
2 Merchant Scroll
1 Misdirection


In general I don't recommend this, but for our meta game it was absoletly the right call.  There is just way too much random aggro to play a deck as dependant on the graveyard as Dragon is.

Mini Report:

Match One Cody Vinci playing Drain Tendrils.

Game one he never finds out what I am playing and he combo's off early.  I had been playing Oath around the shop so I figure he expects Oath and it is safe to play dragon in game 2.

Game two Cody had the nuts and after Intuition AK was ready to AK for 4 and play ancestral on turn 3.  Unfortunately for him I had Duress with Misdirection backup and Animate dead for the win on my turn 3 so I just barely raced him.

Game three I decide to run Oath expecting graveyard hate.  Cody Tinkered out an early Colossus while I used Quiet Speculation/Deep Analysis to get way ahead on card advantage.  I Merchant Scrolled for Chain of Vapor and bounced it with Force Backup.  I then played Oath and won two turns later.

Match Two: Ken Playing WTG/GAT hybrid

Game one I animate an early Sliver Queen and just run over his creatures.

Game 2 I switch to Oath.  He gets three beaters out but they are all 1/1.  Eventually I resovle Oath and Oath out Razia.  He is at 13.  Finally after I am at 5 life he plays a fetch land and a brainstorm leaving him with 3 3/3s out.  I am about ready to concede but he passes the turn.  I asked again and he said he doesn't want to attack.  Okay.  So I Oath out my other Angel, swing for 12 and win.  Apparently Ken thought I could redirect Razia Damage before I was damaged with Kudzus.  I couldn't.

Match 3: Chris with Gifts
Game 1: I keep a hand with Tropical Island as my only mana source.  I also have Ancestral Recall, Brainstorm and 3 Duress (A notoriously good card against Gifts)
Chris goes first and opens with Library of Alexandria.  I ancestral and draw no mana sources.  Next turn I brainstorm and see no mana sources.  I go about 6 turns till I finally get Strip Mine which I use to get my draw engine on line with Quiet Speculation.  Next turn I draw a mox and strip his Library.  I then cast Mox Emerald hoping to draw a force because I figure my only chance to to catch him with a his pants down and randomly animate Dragon for the win.  Chris lets Emerald Resolve and beats me a turn or two later.

Game 2:  This game lasts 45 minutes.  Again I draw no land but keep a hand with Black Lotus, Ancestral, Mystical and Brainstorm.  I start by laying Black Lotus.  Chris announces "With your luck that is your only mana source" and counters it.  I am shafted.  Luckily I top deck land the next turn and soon Ancestral and then get Quiet Speculation/Deep Analysis going.  I know one Deep Analysis was countered with a Remand which was like a three card swing for Chris.  That allows him to resolve Gifts.  That even's us up for card advantage.  I open my next turn by casting Duress, Chris casts ancestral while I have a Jet and a Sapphire untapped.  I vamp for MisD and Brainstorm into it to misdirect to myself.  I draw 3 off ancestral and I take Chris's other card he Gifts for.  The following turn I top deck Eternal Witness and notice I can actually hardcast it with Ancestral in the yard so I do.
Witness beats and Mana Crypt look ready to take Chris out but we go to turns.  Chris wisely casts mox Tendrils to gain 4 life and barely stay alive.  I had pitched Chris's Will into the graveyard after a Gifts.  He burned his recoup from hand on a duress.  I thought that was questionable but he is a better player than me.  When he flashed back recoup targeting Will I forced the Will leaving his Will and recoup RFGed.    I don't know if he had a colossus in the main deck but I was sitting on a Chain of Vapor in case.  Anyway game 2 ends in a tie and he wins.

EDIT:  This is the rest of my report.

Match 4 versus Dick who was playing Rector Tendrils.

Game 1 I first turn Duress him and see he has one land, one mox, one Zuron Orb  and a whole bunch of high CC cards including Bargain.  I take the mox and then proceed to combo out turn 2.

Game 2 I decide to play Dragon again figuring since he plays combo he won't run much graveyard hate in the board.  Basically I was wrong.  He had something like 11 Dragon hating cards in the board but gets unlucky and does not draw any of them.  (The fact that I duressed away his Brainstorm helped too)  This time I combo out turn 3.

I decided to drop after 4 matches.  I could have played another round, but I figured whoever I would get paired against would want to draw into the top 8 and it would have been a dick move on my part to force him to play and potentially miss top 8.  I did not have time to play the top 8 so I just dropped.

I am sure Dick thought it was a poor move on my part not to concede to him because I was dropping anyway but I wanted to be fair to all of the players there and giving one player a bye did not seem right. 

I found the Quiet Speculation/Deep Analysis draw engine to be very strong in Dragon.  A turn one Quiet Speculation draws 6 cards by turn 3 which is obscene.  Seriously, if my opponent drops turn 1 Confidant then he gets 2 cards by turn 3, so that draw engine is much weaker in terms of cards drawn.  I run 4 because players that are familiar with my deck counter the first and even if they don't I have 6 pitch spells and Bazaar to get rid of extras.  I would have run Timewalk in the sideboard if I had the proxy space.

The main problem with Quiet Speculation/DA is the loss of life.  It makes cards like Chain of Vapor and Rebuild very very dangerous and my game 1 loss to Cody was partially because of DA.  He stormed for 9 so I might have lost anyway but life loss can definitely hurt.

The draw engine is a bit worse in Oath because Orchard tokens are much scarier!

[[supa_t(im)]]

Here is my decklist:

“RG Tempo” 61
2 Taiga
3 Forest
3 Mountain
4 Wooded Foothills
4 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Ruby
1 Black Lotus
4 Elvish Spirit Guide

4 Wild Mongrel
4 Gorilla Shaman
4 Grim Lavamancer
3 Kird Ape
3 Basking Rootwalla

4 Root Maze
4 Rancor
4 Artifact Mutation
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Null Rod

Sideboard
2 Red Elemental Blast
2 Pyroblast
4 Naturalize
4 Pyrostatic Pillar
3 Blood Moon

I got beat by Marsh with Kudzu.dec round one basically due to mana screw.

I then proceded to sweep the losers bracket against Michael with monoblack Aggro, Brian with RG mirror, then Adam with BG Loam Control.  The only time I boarded was against Adam, as blood moon shuts off his deck which ran no basic lands.

Then I drew into top8 with Daniel who was playing Suicide Black, I think it was a pretty traditional list with hyppies and sinkholes.

Top8 I played EJ with my worst matchup ever Grim Long.  He duresses my root maze, but I rip another one off the top and have both Shaman and Root Maze on the board.  He plays necropotence, bounces maze and tinkers for Jar (not all in the same turn).  Knowing I have artifact mutation in my hand he pops jar right away but it gives him all mana and no gas.   I think that is almost statistically impossible.  With necro out and mongrel beating every turn he scoops.

Game 2 I keep a mana disruption hand, waste his turn 1 city, and follow up with turn 2 null rod with strip mine and ESG mana.  He doesn't win right away which means I get blood moon down and he loses.

Although I had never met most of the guys at the tournament (at least IRL) everybody made me feel like part of the group.  Vintage players really are the nicest magic players.

[Requiem]

This was a good event and it was great for me to meet some good Vintage players that are "relatively" close to me.

A year and a half ago I moved from the Northeast (one of the Vintage hot spots) to Alexandria, VA only to find that the area is one of those Vintage black holes where every format is well played and represented EXCEPT for Vintage.  (Go "Team Maine" by the way!)

Anyway, I had been fiddling with a deck (Bomberman w/ Black) for the last week or two and wanted to test it out in a tournament setting.  I am apparently allergic to MWS and as of yet haven't found anyone in the area to playtest with in person (please PM if you live in the area!) so this was a good place to do it.

So, just wanted to thank everyone for a good day.  Congrats to Cody, Chris, Tim, & Marsh on the Top 4.
I am going to definately try to make it down for more events in the future.

Later, Scott