[Report] Illinois States

[Roxas]

First off, the list I played. It worked extremely well.

4 Urza's Power Plant
4 Urza's Tower
4 Urza's Mine
4 Steam Vents
4 Shivan Reef
3 Island
4 Izzet Signet
2 Simic Signet

3 Bogardan Hellkite
2 Draining Whelk
2 Demonfire

3 Spell Snare
4 Rune Snag
4 Remand
4 Repeal
3 Wildfire
4 Compulsive Research
2 Tidings

SB:
4 Annex
4 Volcanic Hammer
2 Govern the Guildless
2 Plagiarize
3 Pyroclasm

So, in general, things went as I hoped and predicted - I didn't get paired against any aggro (Tron's worst matchup)in the first two rounds, and the vast majority of the aggro decks were in the losers' bracket by round three. However, due to unfortunate circumstances, I was unable to do well at this tournament.

Round one - U/R/g Tron - This guy was playing a list centered on maximizing Mirari, so it ran all sorts of bad conditional cards like Call of the Herd and Browbeat. I basically just won all of the counter wars over my threats and smashed him 2-0. (1-0 / 2-0)

Round two - G/W Loam. I managed to lose game one by having no counters or board control  save for two Remands and a Repeal in the top twenty or so cards of my library, but the following two games I won rather easily by the usual anti-G/W/x strategy - counter some shit, draw some cards, Wildfire. (2-0 / 4-1)

Round three G/W/B control - This is quite simply the lamest match of tournament Magic I have ever played. Game one, we both mulligan to six; he kept a one-lander and managed to draw more land while on the play, while I kept a one-lander with two Signets and failed to draw one. Game two was more or less the same thing, except this time I drew land and he didn't. Then, in game three, in the top twenty-three cards of my library, the only cards that weren't mana sources were two Rune Snags and two Compulsive Researches. (2-1 / 5-3)

Round four - G/W/B control - I counter shit and Wildfire. (3-1 / 7-3)

As I  mentioned above, at this point, I was quite confident of my chances - I was squarely in the higher brackets, and since I won round four rather quickly, I walked around scouting and saw that I could reasonably not expect to play against a single aggro deck for the remainder of the tournament, which was significantly to my advantage.

When round five started, I went up to find my pairings and was quite surprised when I saw that I had somehow moved from table fourteen to forty-one. Confused, I checked how many points I had and saw that I only had six when I should've had nine. I was sure the match slip was not in error, as I always quadruple-check match slips before turning them in. I told the judges about the error; they fixed my record, but told me to play against the table 41 opponent anyway. I was quite irritated at this, because, at best, my tiebreakers would now be utterly terrible (a 3-1 getting paired down to a 2-2 in a ~175-person tournament?), on top of the fact that this player would very likely be playing an aggro deck. I lose the match 2-1.

Props:
-Everyone who helped me test for this event and put together this great list
-Pastimes for managing to hold the event together despite having a way higher attendance than expected, having such a cramped store, and having been robbed earlier in the week

Slops:
-WHOEVER MESSED UP ENTERING RESULTS, GO DIE IN A FIRE
-Panera Bread for having even less sitting space than Pastimes

[Komatteru]

When round five started, I went up to find my pairings and am quite surprised when I see that I have somehow moved from table fourteen to forty-one. Confused, I checked how many points I had and saw that I only had six when I should've had nine. I was sure the match slip was not in error, as I always quadruple-check match slips before turning them in. I tell the judges about the error; they fixed my record, but told me to play against the table 41 opponent anyway. I was quite irritated at this, because, at best, my tiebreakers would now be utterly terrible (a 3-1 getting paired down to a 2-2 in a ~175-person tournament?), on top of the fact that this player would be playing an aggro deck. I lose the match 2-1.

Report it to the DCI.  I don't think that anything will become of your rating or whatever, but there might be some sort of reaction of out that.  I can't recall current DCI policy when this happens.  I have seen a re-pairing done, and I've seen it just roll as it is.

[Godder]

In chess, the draw (pairings) is final once published - corrections can be made for future rounds, but once a draw is up, that's it.

[The Atog Lord]

From the people who brought you the "Don't play any more land this game" ruling comes the auto-pairdown. They should have repaired -- you should not have been forced to suffer for their error. I would be very angry if I were you, and I strongly urge that you report this to the DCI.

[SpencerForHire]

During the prerelease I was doing strong going into the final round.  When the final round came up I had been dropped.  Having turned in my own sheet I immediately went over and inquired.  They looked up my previous rounds record and found they indeed made the error.  They stopped the round and repaired.. The only thing is you have to be quick because big problems can come of a delay between noticing and reporting it.

[UR]

You should have gotten the re-pair because this sort of thing destroys the integrity of the tournament (something the DCI is always out to avoid). Bad judge I guess...

Game one, we both mulligan to six; he kept a one-lander and managed to draw more land while on the play, while I kept a one-lander with two Signets and failed to draw one. Game two was more or less the same thing, except this time I drew land and he didn't.

I'm not familiar enough with your deck, but it seems to me that you should have gone to five. You basically had no strategy here...

[Komatteru]

I'm not familiar enough with your deck, but it seems to me that you should have gone to five. You basically had no strategy here...

With some decks, sometimes going to 5 is as close to an auto-loss as you can get, and you generally only would want to go to 5 if there was no way you could keep 6 (i.e., 0 mana sources).  Sometimes its better to take your chances with 6 cards and hope to draw something than it is to try 5.  If you need 2 land to operate, and your 6 card hand has one land in it, you have a much higher chance of drawing that land on your second or third turn if you keep 6 than you do of finding 2 land in the same time period with a hand of 5.

[Lou]

We had a similar problem at Colorado states with the DCI shit. In round three there were five 3-0s paired against 2-1s, and one 3-0 paired against a 1-0-2.

WTF?

[UR]

With some decks, sometimes going to 5 is as close to an auto-loss as you can get, and you generally only would want to go to 5 if there was no way you could keep 6 (i.e., 0 mana sources).  Sometimes its better to take your chances with 6 cards and hope to draw something than it is to try 5.  If you need 2 land to operate, and your 6 card hand has one land in it, you have a much higher chance of drawing that land on your second or third turn if you keep 6 than you do of finding 2 land in the same time period with a hand of 5.

This is where the other cards in your hand come in. Let's say you draw that land you so desperately need on your first draw (something like a 40% chance?) and you can play a Signet. Next turn you don't draw a land and you can play another Signet... yay! You are still losing unless you've got a Remand here. So it still doesn't sound like a strategy from what he posted. Maybe we could get some background on your decision?

[Roxas]

The hand was Shivan Reef, Izzet Signet, Simic Signet, Remand, Spell Snare, Compulsive Research. I kept it figuring that, if I drew a land, I would be quite well off (and I was on the draw), and from experience I knew that I could not reasonably expect a five-card hand to have enough tools with which to beat any non-control deck (I did not know yet at this point what my opponent was playing).

[UR]

Okay, that changes a whole lot. You've got the Spell Snare to counter an opposing Signet (or better, Castigate) and should you draw that land you are completely in the game.