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jeffthefob
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« on: January 20, 2009, 02:09:14 am » |
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There was a type 1 side event at GP: LA. Playing it in was Plan B since I obviously want to Day 2 the GP and perhaps win some money. But that didn’t work out, so I have to borrow a Time Vault from LSV to not have any proxies since it was a sanctioned tourney.
I didn’t get the top 8 list nor wrote down every archtype, the main reason I am writing this is because it was a sanctioned tourney. And after Ben’s article in SCG and the D.I. pages of replies here on SCG (-_-|||) and TMD, maybe this report can put a little more insight on it. The second reason, well, hehe, is probably because I did fairly well ^_^
Here is the list I ran, it was pretty similar to what I had been running for the last 2-3 month?
3 Thoughtseize
4 Force of Will
4 Mana Drain
1 Echoing Truth
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Tormod’s Crypt
4 Thirst for Knowledge
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Brainstorm
1 Fact or Fiction
1 Time Walk
1 Tinker
1 Yawgmoth’s Will
2 Trinket Mage
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Merchant Scroll
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Sensei's Divining Top
1 Vampiric Tutor
2 Tezzeret the Seeker
1 Darksteel Colossus
1 Time Vault
1 Voltaic Key
1 Black Lotus
1 Mana Crypt
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Sol Ring
1 Library of Alexandria
1 Tolarian Academy
3 Flooded Strand
3 Polluted Delta
2 Island
1 Tundra
2 Tropical Island
3 Underground Sea
Sideboard:
4 Oath of Druids
2 Empyrial Archangel
3 Yixlid Jailer
1 Pithing Needle
3 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Oxidize
1 Gaea’s Blessing
Yes, 3 Tez was a lot from my original list, I cut it for another source of mana, seems like a move I should had done a while long. Since this was a sanctioned event I was expecting more Ichorid, so I mained 1 Crypt and upped the count of Jailer.
The tourney was originally Swiss +1, which was a horrible idea, thus Dave Williams didn’t play in it. However, when the tourney started, the judge said it was 5 round of swiss cut to top 8. I was surprised, but this is much better, Swiss + 1 can be rough sometime.
The meta was surprisingly pretty diverse. There were couple budget decks running around, but mostly were powered. A guy from RIW games actually wrote down the whole breakdown, it would be cool if anyone who plays at RIW or knows that person can get him to post that ^_^ But from what I saw, there were at least 3 Oath, 3 Ichorid, 2 Grim Long, 1 Painter, 1 TMWA, 1 Elves, and of course couple Tez.
The top 8 were:
Tez (w) vs. Painter, Oath (w) vs. TPS, TMWA (w) vs. TPS, and B/g Suicide (w) vs. Unknown.
The top 4 were:
Tez. vs. Oath (w) and B/g Suicide (w) vs. TMWA.
And yes, the final was pretty anticlimactic as the B/g Suicide player scooped to me. Mox for 1st and Box for 2nd is rough. Even though I had a good match up IMO, my opponent was looking for his FIRST piece of power and really wanted it; kind of remind me when I started playing Vintage. And of course, the SCG article -_-, awk.
Round 1 I played against a face from NorCal. Awkward, we traveled to GP and had to play each other. John always play Oath, and he was in fact, playing it again. Game 1 was pretty bad for me he resolved an Ancetral and my hand was unexciting. But I kept on FoW’ing his TfK and eventually resolve mine and put me ahead in the game. I ended up hard casting DSC, and RAWR!. Game 2 was blurry, but my draws were better and I was able to outmaneuver him.
Round 2 was also another face I was familiar. John from LA, always see him playing Vintage in Norcal once per year when Eudo holds the back to back Twister/Lotus Tourney. Both of us were Fish type of player, and as I recalled he was playing Fish then. And unfortunately this tourney both of us weren’t playing Fish. He was playing his friend’s pet deck, a deck that has like infinite combos in it… He had Oath, Grim Tutors, Time Vault/Keys, rainbow lands, a truly unique creation that I really enjoying playing everytime.
Game 1 was luck at my part, insane luck. He played Mox Jet, Academy, and Duressed me seeing no FoW. Then upkeep Mystical for Twister, cast Ritual X3 and cast Twister. I FoW’ed back. Yeah, is nice. Then I cast EE for 0 and blows up the Mox. Yes, also nice. This remind me of a round in the actual GP where my opponent went: Turn 2 Mountain suspend Rift Bolt. Turn 3 Bolt me, Rite of Flame, Desperate Ritual, Seething Song, Lava Spike x3, and Grapeshot me to death.
Game 2 he went the Oath plan while I boarded in Canonists since I didn’t know he was playing his friend’s list. But ends up this game he tried the Oath plan after Twistering and I was able to prevent his Oath from hitting the table. His hand were probably “stuffs” from other parts of the combo.
Round 3 was also awkward. I played against Galen, another friend from Norcal. Unreal pairings, I want to play against other players I haven’t played before. I got Galen g1 and he got me g2. Both games were close and once side just drew bit better than each other. Though winning g1 and losing g2 should be like the opposite result since he was playing TPS. G3 was a bitch as time was called, I had Canonists and multiple counters in my hand, but Canonists aren’t 11/11 tramplers, I ended up not killing him. I asked if he would concede and he did after showing him my hand and explained how my line of play changed after the time was called.
Having both of us taking a draw there is stupid. No one gains since both have to win next round. This way one can make it, and Galen was cool enough to scoop because I was clearly winning in g3.
I ID with Ichorid rd. 4.
Round 5 was interesting. My opponent playing TMWA didn’t want to draw because 1. It was his first type 1 and he wanted to play. 2. He wanted to know how my deck works and etc. He told me both reasons after I explained to him drawing would 100% make us in top 8. He still wanted to play, so sure. My g1 hand was pretty good, while he spend 2nd and 3rd turn Wasteland’ing me, I was able to resolve Tfk and Ancestral and just found Tin-Man to do the job.
Game 2 was even more interesting. I didn’t board in Oath. Hehe. Not going to show him that I have Oath plan, so yeah, I added in an Oxidize. Game 2 was pretty much in his favor, he got a Null Rod turn 2 and turn 3 Bob. Bob got 4 activations…. But I was able to Oxidize Rod to get some mana for Trinket into EE. Then he didn’t use his Wasteland aggressively and I was able to FoF into Yawg. Will. Then, I simply had the most insane Yawg. Will turn I ever had playing Tez.
Top 8 I played against Geo (sorry if I misspelled it) Playing Painter. Geo is a part of the type 1 crew that goes to Eudo every year to compete for Twister/Lotus, a face that I recognized. Darn, out of 5 rounds, I played against 4 faces that I knew… sucks.
He won the die roll and mulled to 6. My hand wasn’t exciting, but he mull’ed to 6 and I had Thoughtseize turn 1 and had draws to get a U source to have Drains up. Well, he went, Ruby, Lotus, Underground Sea, cast Tez, fetching Painter…. Awk. Even more AWK when I Thoughtseize him and saw FoW + TfK. I guess it is revenge for his friend from round 2.
Game 2 was a uphill battle, I was drawing blanks and actions while he was able get TfK and 2x Painters. But his painters this game were 1/3 dorks from 10th Edition that just bashed. And he ultimately lost to my Yawg. Will which he knew I had in my hand from and earlier Duress which he forgot to wrote down.
The reason why I know this was because he asked me to reveal my hand again after Duress’ing me turn 1 on game 3. But g3 was more in my favor as he knew more lands than I did and I was able to resolve TfK which found my Yawg. I Yawg. Will’ed and played Time Vault from his turn 1 Duress and Vamped Tinker, casting Ancestral and pass, ending the turn with 5 life. He topdecked Grindstone and used it in response to my Tinker and he MILLED my key. But my Ancestral found my Tez, and I was able to combo him out regardless. Epic close games.
Semi. was against Oath. By this time I wanted to check out how Luis was doing at the main event and I heard he too was able to pass through his quarterfinal match. My opponent won the die roll, and went Orchird and Thoughtseize me. I thought about it long and hard and decide to FoW it. He passes, I went Sea, Pearl, and Sapphire. Casting Mystical for Tinker and cast Time Walk. My opponent’s disgusted face gave a tell that he can’t really stop it. After hitting him with Token and DSC, he scooped.
During SB’ing he was saying how bad he punted that; he had 2 Chalice in his hand. Must be nice to be me. Game 2 we jockey around for position but he played an Orchard turn 1 and ultimately gave me too much tokens. He may had it planned out because he cast E. Truth on the tokens, but I ended up FoW’ing it because I figure he has no action in hand. And 4 tokens went to town and earned me a spot in the finals.
At this time Dave Williams came up to me and greeted me. So, having read the M;TG Website reading he said he will show up to type 1 and ended up showing… I asked him what happened. And it turns out Swiss + 1 is what turned him away. So yeah, hope WotC never would do that… a random loss = no chance of winning is just rough. I also told him he would crush the field with TPS, due to combination of reasons ^^
I didn’t play out the final. My opponent scooped to me. I dislike high roller events, but I really like playing Vintage. Basically both of us walked out happy. And I know my opponent will play Vintage for a longer period of time, or at least, will start playing more.
That was pretty much it from the sanctioned type 1 tourney with some reports of the game. There were surprisingly amount of fully powered players at the tourney, a lot of them have BB, FB, and pimped out cards. I feel my set of UN was like a frog out of the pond. But, 26 people was pretty nice turn out, although I wished I played against more people that I didn’t know before.
Lastly, pops to LSV + Web, doing well at the GP. Thus I get to eat the whole pie. Though, money finish at GP would be lot desirable. Also to Dave and that other old duder judge for judging, and them to change to swiss + cut to top 8. And of course, you for reading xD.
Edit: I confused TPS with Grim... and corrected some typo; pretty sure there were more. sorry.
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