Hi all,
This is my first TMD tourney report, so hope it all good. This was the Vintage part of the event known as the “Mox-a-licious” tournament here is Australia. The first part was the Highlander (singleton) tourney where plenty of players rocked up for the Mox Jet. Today, only 18 showed up for an extremely minty Illusionary Mask.
We only had 4 rounds to cut into top 8 (low turnout due to the massive highlander day before). I think my dismal performance was attributed to my brain melting. I foolishly built and played something you could call “Meandeck Tendrils” in Singleton and kept waking up from dreams where I kept fizzing!
Anyways, here is what I played:1 Island
2 Polluted Delta
3 Flooded Strand
4 Forbidden Orchard
2 Tropical Island
4 Underground Sea
2 Tidespout Tyrant
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Jet
1 Black Lotus
4 Oath of Druids
1 Fastbond
1 Krosan Reclaimation
1 Ancestral Recall
4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
1 Brain Freeze
1 Chain of Vapor
4 Gush
1 Vampiric Tutor
2 Thoughtseize
3 Merchant Scroll
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Time Walk
4 Ponder
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Duress
2 Tormod's Crypt
SB:1 Volcanic Island
1 Brain Freeze
2 Duress
2 Empty the Warrens
4 Leyline of the Void
2 Extirpate
1 Island
2 Oxidize
The expected field was Flash and lots of it. Stax was also making a big showing and little storm and random aggro.
Just wanna give a shout out to Mr. Shay for his awesome advice on the deck! Sorry I didn’t give it justice. (I made some very bad plays and my luck was of the same level).
On to the rounds!
Round 1: My brother Weng with “The human bullet!” (Mana Ichorid with TD tech)First round I play against my brother, joy.
Game 1:I’m on the play and drop turn 1 crypt. I do some card draw and I have DT in hand. I calculate that I get one turn so I crypt him (at the wrong time) to let him dump stuff in the yard, so my DT for my second crypt followed by a mini brain freeze will finish him off. He Bazzars, dumps 3 trolls, lotus, collusiem, breakthrough and I loose.
Game 2:Turn 0, I drop 2 Leylines with no land, but I have ancestral. He hardcasts 3 narcs (So lucky he didn’t have serenity!). I’m getting pounded, but I hit oath, and win after dumping my library, rec. for yawg for the win.
Game 3:Turn 0, drop 1 Leyline. I follow up with a quick oath, oath tyrant, ponder (bounce my sapphire) into ruby, lotus, scroll, replay sapphire, brainstorm into infi storm, scroll into freeze and win.
Feeling a bit melancholy and hope Weng makes it into the top 8.
1-0
Round 2: Jeff with Grim LongGame 1:I duress and duress and calculate that he needed to draw a really good card to go off next turn (has 2 dead cards in hand), so against my better judgement, I drop oath instead of scrolling for a force. He rips like a champ and tries to go off. I know he should be mana starved, but he drops academy. Post will, he should be 1 black short of tendrils, so he cycles rebuild into cabal ritual obviously and wins with tendrils. Why!!!!
Game 2:I turn 1 empty for 8 dudes. GG. My only broken play of the day.
Game 3: Tight game, where my Leyline is screwing him and my duress strips his hand. However, his hex cutting skills makes me draw all my duals and no fetches. I had an empty in hand and no red. After again thoughtsiezing his hand to shreads, he rips memory jar and draws 7, drops bling, rebuilds, and drops bargain. In response I float and gush hoping to find brain freeze. I don’t and just force. He reveals tendrils and wins. If I hit freeze, I was going to freeze in response to his draw from bargain, but alas no go. Perhaps I should have gushed in response to the jar… hummm…..
1-1
Round 3: Neil with FlashGame 1:I know he is playing flash, so turn 1 I drop crypt which stalls him (only plays MD 1 Chain of Vapour). I duress him something fierce and his hand is full of combo pieces, (the dudes, not flash/hulk). So I force his brainstorms, freeze his imp seal (making him loose some dudes in the process), drop oath and tyrant for the win.
Game 2:Neil combos turn 2 but drew haste sliver so I get 1 turn. I try to combo into Empty the warrens. I had red floating, but drew Fastbond instead. If I floated green (randomly), I could gush/scroll into better cards but missed out and died to poison. Ack!
Game 3:I duress to see hulk, scroll and lots of artefact mana, so I take lotus. Why? I dunno, but it didn’t occur to me that I could just take scroll and hope he doesn’t draw well. So obviously he scrolls into flash, and combos me with pact backup (yes, he drew it).
What a misplay. Unbelievable. I’m horrified and get some food, and mentally build myself for the next game.
1-2
Round 4: Cam with StaxGame 1:I’m on the draw and Cam starts by dropping spheres. I lead with land, emerald. Cam drops lotus, gorilla shaman, welder and eats my mox. I drop fetches in case of wastes. Cam has no really follow up plays, and pings me. Next turn I drop oath, oath a tyrant, timewalk (bouncing sphere), oath another tyrant and combo him out.
Game 2:Cam has a much better draw and wastes my every land. Crucible and welder join the party, undoing my force of willing, then spheres sure up the match. If I drew lotus, I could get out of it but alas, nope, I’m gorilla food.
Game 3:I drop oath turn 2 and cam scoops midway while I’m preparing for the will (with 2 tyrants out). Why! I took time figuring out the bouncing permanent thing
2-2
Top 8:We do the math and I have the nut high tie breakers (Jeff and Neil are top of the swiss) so I should get in but may edge Weng (my brother) out. Turns out, my breakers pull me up, and also pulled weng into 8th place! So we are pumped now and tell myself not to stuff up this second chance.
Top 8 are:2 Flash (lark with sliver in the SB)
1 Grim long
1 Pitch Long
2 Tyrant Oath
1 Mana Ichorid
1 Manaless Ichorid
Quarters: Neil with flash, the rematchI’m so going to win this no matter what I tell myself. Must redeem myself!
Game 1:I disrupt him with seizes and slow roll into and early oath. I eventually get 2 tyrants in play and have 2 brainstorms and a krosan rec in the yard. He attacks me with spirits and goes off with summoners pack. He goes through the motions, pings me with fanatic, and with the lark trigger on the stack, I flashback rec. targeting his is 2 creatures back into the deck. He pact of negation’s it but the damage is done, I bounce his carrion feeder and land and he loses to double pack next turn.
Game 2: Neil drops Flooded Strand and pass. I turn 1 duress to see flash and VT. I take the VT, thinking that taking flash means VT into recall which may be worse (I have no force). He wrecks me by top decking hulk and spawns many slivers. I ask I want priority before his attack and was going to mise by tapping my mox, fake stupidity and ask for burn (thus going to main 2), but it’s cheap and loose to some savage top decking skills.
Game 3:Neil mulls to six so I duress to see “U.Sea, recall, DT, Lotus, Plats, heart sliver”….wow. Neil tries to screw with my head about the previous duress, but I keep cool and take the lotus, then force the recall. I play my own recall, drop a land and pass. He rips brainstorm, but does not net him land so I comfortably drop oath and get tyrant on the table. I sided my rec, and I drew my 2nd tyrant, so I VT into lotus to hardcast leyline and Neil eventually looses to beats.
At this point, Weng also made the semi’s, beating storm and is now playing ICBM Tyrant oath. Weng has so much experience against oath so I know he will make the finals, so I got to win this match to see him there!
Semi’s: Jeremy with Pitch LongGame 1:I mull to 6 on the play, and get duressed. I brainstorm to hide my DT and brainfreeze and he takes my mox jet (yes, you can gather my hand was not very strong). I draw DT and pass only to lose it to a second duress. I draw brainfreeze and he EOT mystical’s for Acall with 2 cards in hand. For some reason, I think it’s his main phase, and I freeze it away. It was a terrible misplay. I had a feeling he was going to go off soon and that was my trump card (freeze him midway through his combo with a draw on the stack). So, he draws, rituals into bargain, draws a bit, yawgs, mysticals for tendrils, acalls into tendrils. Noooo!!! Why!!?!??!?!
Game 2:I turn 0 leyline. We trade infi duress and when the smoke settled, he is left with a cabal rit and me a land. We play draw go until I bust out a 21 point freeze on him hoping to his tendrils. It’s not there, but plenty of gas is gone. Next turn, I duress to find his tendrils. JOY! He was stockpiling a massive ritual hand. Soon, he drops necro (crud) and starts getting card advantage. After more draw go, he announces DT. With 10 cards left in the library, and no tinker in the RFG pile, I announce my second freeze for 6. The 6th card in DSC and he scoops.
Game 3: I drop turn 0 leyline. He’s on the play and goes busted with jet, rit, duress (takes my VT), lotus, land, necro going to 11 life. I try to match him and go land fastbond, land, mox, scroll but it gets forced. He plays some artifact mana and necros for more (playing sorta conservatively) going to 5. I draw island and pass. He is about to draw but his mate makes a bit of a “shriek” and Jeremy checks himself (nooo!!! my mise win!). He plays crypt, and tinkers it into DSC, following up with necro to 3 life. I draw scroll, and play it. It resolves. I’m thinking, do I get gush and try? or Chain of vapour. I wasn’t sure, but he could only necro 2 more times, but the DSC was going to definitely kill me if I didn’t bounce it. I went for bounce and it got countered anyway. He attacks, ponders into tendrils so rit, rit, tendrils finishes me. I noticed that bounce was incorrect after because he could have chained his neco, then my leyline, so I should have tried for it with gush (or even ancestral).
I end up 4th from standings and my brother splits for the mask *joy!* I get a BB AQ Mishra Factory.
I personally was not happy about the standard of my play, but still made it to the semis and played some very fun games. Still waiting for the day Weng and I face off in the finals.
The top eight go like this:Tyrant Oath (win) vs Flash
Tyrant Oath (win) vs Flash
Pitch Long (win) vs Manaless Ichy
Mana Ichy (win) vs Grim Long
Pitch Long (win) vs Tyrant oath (me)
Mana Ichorid (win) vs Tyranty oath
Best deck of the day was this quirky blue stax deck which ran:
Gilded lotus + welder (enchanted with morphling aura) + Candelabra of Tawnss for infinite mana, use it to play Mycosynth Lattice, then eat your board with gorilla shaman. WTF!? I’m not kidding, round 2, he was eating leylines and stuff! Its alternate kill was with braingeyser…not a typo…old school braingeyser!
Best deck of the day was the flash deck I didn’t play against. He mistyped his deck and didn’t have Body Double in the main! He top 8 with a 2-0 record every game. Miser indeed.
Thanks for reading!
Kenny
