GI goes home early

[Grand Inquisitor]

I wish I was posting to tell you all about the shiny new black lotus I won, but I'm not.

TnT Collectibles held a T1 tourney today; first place took home a black lotus.  This is what I played, who I played, and how I did.

I got there pretty early and bought the 4th hypnotic specter and hymn I needed (yes, its sad, but i still haven't found all my old cards yet).

While everyone is shuffling in I got into a 4 player game; I was playing mono blue (boo!, but my only deck).

my sui deck:

mana:
18 swamps
4 Dark Ritual
4 Wasteland
1 strip mine
1 sol ring

critters:
4 hypnotic specters
2 Phyrexian Negators
2 Masticore
3 Nantuko Shades
1 Black Knight (i know, its all i had)

disruption:
4 duress
4 hymn to tourach
4 powder keg
3 diabolic edict

1 of's:
demonic tutor
necropotence
yawgmoth's will
demonic consultation
mind twist

sb:
2 phyrexian negators
2 the rack
2 royal assassin
3 dystopia
3 spinning darkness
3 filth

the md masticores, edicts and kegs were because i anticipated a heavy aggro field.  i was disappointed.  the metagame was surprisingly even; i saw lots of sui, sligh, parfait (sort of) mono-u, keeper, gro, enchantress, void, and assorted combo.  now to the games:

round 1, Greg with Uwb (fully powered)
i saw greg slapping people around pre-tourney with lots of power, and i was a little nervous when i found out i drew him.  this is afterall, my first real game of magic in 7 or 8 years.  it turns out his deck is blue with white for removal, black for more brokeness, and squee for forbid and other toys...

we roll and i go first (strangely i won every roll or coin flip in my five rounds.  i open up with shade and disruption.  he bounces him, and then counters him, but i keg away his mox and lotus, and drop a second shade.  more disruption, and i ride the shade to victory (legend and rasko can continue their argument, whenever i drew shade i won).

gm 2:  i have some early disruption, but i hit 2 squee with my hymn to tourach, ugh.  next turn he drops solitary confinement.  moving on to game 3...

i open with my usual disruption, this time my hymn gets mana drain and FoW, and this was the difference.  turn 2 i drop a necro and it resolves.  i apply heavy beats, and feel confident.  he hard casts squee; i scratch my head.  he stp's his squee; i look around the room.  he balances down to 1 card, 2 land, 0 creatures; i give a knowing smile and hold on to my hypno specter, hoping my last few life can find me something to finish him off.  i necro for 6 and then 3, wasteland, hypno and shade manage to win the match. (1-0, 2-1)

greg was a great person to play my first match.  he was friendly, helpful, and a tough win.

round 2: mike b playing sui black
i had talked briefly with mike before the tourney started, and he was trading for hymns and hypno's.  this led me to believe he was a beginner like me, and i think the slight overconfidence cost me the match...

game 1 i open with duress and a keg.  3 of mike's cards were skittering skirges, and i unknowingly thought this was a good sign for me.  2nd turn i dark rit out a necro (big mistake, even though my hand was empty).  he comes out with chimeric idols, and keeps laying skirges as i remove them.  i necro too aggresively and it costs me the game (he sinsiter strenths his skirge for the win!)

i side in negators, assassins and filths; i see none of these cards game 2.  my early disruption slows him down, but i draw no answer for his skirge, and i necro too much again (yes, i am new to this deck). i was looking forward to filthing my way through, but never saw a card from my sb.(1-1, 2-3)

round 3: kyle playing u/r couter, artifact, ld (some power)

i first turn into rit-hypnospecter.  more disruption and a shade finish him before he could get started.

2nd game he FoW's a first turn negator, but he can't find an answer for my 2nd turn shade.  kegs, edicts clear the way.  his deck was better than it sounded, just not against sui (too fast). (2-1, 4-3)

round 4, shawn o playing super gro

we both get slow openings, and stabalize after i remove his meddling mage.  i can't find a threat, and he finds mystic enforcer and rides him home (shrugs).

game 2 i board in dystopia, edicts, and assassins.  he applies mini beats early small bears and dryads.  i lay down a powder keg and go 3 for 1 (winter orb).  i draw another keg, and do the same thing to his next round of troops.  dystopia freezes him in his tracks.  i yawgmoth back a keg, some disruption, and an assassin (the only creature i had in the early game).  i eventually add a hypno, and a masticore, and overwhelm him.

game 3, the most frustrating game all day.  he drops an early meddling mage and names powder keg.  i drop an early masticore.  i feed an edict to my masticore and he gets stp'd.  he finds a mystic enforcer, while i draw 2 kegs before i draw a dystopia (i drew 6 swamps in a row, mid-game).  he keeps finding weenies to feed to dystopia and i can't race his enforcer.  what i think is a good matchup went terribly wrong. (2-2, 5-5)

round 5, mike l playing r/w, psuedo parfait

mike's deck was the control components of parfait with a splash of red for various tricks.  i really wish i had seen more of his deck, but they were pretty quick games...

i dark rit out a negator.  i get really lucky.  2nd turn i hymn away his stp, next turn he draws a plain; thats how magic is sometimes.  he eventually gets out a soltari visionary, but a add my lone black knight, and finish him off.

game 2, i bring in kegs (for ensnaring bridge), racks, and dystopias.  i get an early negator, but he gets  out a bridge.  i also duress a story circle which would have been bad news.  i drop a rack (he looks quizically at his bridge).  i add beats, he wraths.  eventually, i disrupt him enough to push him under the rack, and then drop a negator, keg his bridge and win.  mike was very nice guy, who i got very fortunate plays against (discarding stp gm1 and story circle gm 2).  (3-2, 7-6)

I have no illusions about making top 8, so i trade for some tropical islands (next time, emerald alice...) and split.

overall, it was a good first day back.  i played horribly in the mirror, and can't believe i lost to grow (this is a good matchup for sui, right?), but i did beat the guy with lots of power, and turn lots of cards sideways.

props:
attendees, everyone i played and met there were very friendly
TnT Collectibles, classy tourney, i good 1st experience coming out of retirement
slops:
me, for falling in love with necro in the mirror
meddling mage, i shall keg you yet my friend...

let me know what you guys think of the report and the deck.  masticore tested well, but he hurt me in a few games.  shade was a beast (hopefully i'll be adding a 4th soon), but i know i need more threats md.  having only 12 threats was a poor choice on my part.  can't wait til the next big tourney...

-GI

[Zherbus]

I really think the whole problem was that you worried too much about the mirror and aggro and not enough about control.

When I was there last time, 3/6 matches were combo, 1 TnT, and 2 control matches. Next time youll do better knowing the field, and work permitting, I will be there.

If you want my Suicide list for a mixed environment (I mainly use for testing as my tournament decks are limited to Keeper, TnT, and of course Nether Void.) let me know.

[CrazyCarl]

HE FOUGHT THE MULLET AND CAME OUT VICTORIOUS!

ph34r.  Anyways,  I really don't know a ton about suicide black, but welcome back to magic

[Anonymous]

Looks like the mullet found a new friend. (Sorry Squee))

[mezzir]

Quote (Zherbus @ Oct. 19 2002,20:58)I really think the whole problem was that you worried too much about the mirror and aggro and not enough about control.

lol
actually, there were a TON of suicide decks
it was scary
i played 2 in five rounds, playing suicide myself
i was gonna play Clubber Lang, but the PSAT's didn't give me enough time to stop at nicks house to pick up cards  
i ended up 3-2, it was pretty fun

kinda went to bed in a bad mood last night and had the PSAT's the next morning so i didn't sleep well and i was definately making a few bad plays near the end (tho that match didn't matter, i swept anyways)

and to GI, i was in that casual game, the guy playing the random deck made out of a type 2 Battle of Wits deck and some random rares with only painlands for mana  

hope to see you next time and hopefully i'll have my own fully built and tested deck
nice report!

[Grand Inquisitor]

thanks, carl, its good to be back.  zherbus, i think mezzir is right, i was only slightly over prepared for aggro.  sui does well against control and decent against combo pre board anyway.  i am trying to decide which guys to add to the negator, masticore, hypno and shade gang.  right now its going to be either pump knights or flesh reavers.  btw, does anyone know who took home the lotus, and what they were playing?

[BigChuck]

I don't know who it was, but they were playing Sui.

[BillTheDuck]

This was by far the wierdest tournament I've ever seen played.

There were only 31 people there (when we had 44 for a mox pearl). There were at least 9 suicide/void decks playing and 4 of them top 8ed. Neither Chuck or Phelon (the two that played in the finals the last two tournaments) made top 8, in fact, the only repeat was Penicious Dude's son Sam.

The finals were two very un-orthidox suicide builds, one piloted by a newcomer to the store (though local, and he says he'll be back) and the dumbest player ever (if he ever reads this, I don't care. I say it to him in real life all the time).

The new guy won and took the lotus, and that was that.

You guys better come next time, we need a big crowd.

[hulk3rules]

well, it was nice to see phelon finally lose.  that guy won the last two tournaments and it was getting annoying.

wait a minute.  i'm phelon.  seeing phelon lose sucked!!  but billtheduck is right. that was the weirdest tournament i've ever seen too.  it was a control players worst nightmare.  my matchup's were the following: stompy, sui, stompy, sui, stompy.  I ended up 2-3, losing more  matches then I had in the past two tournaments combined.  but, o well, not much i can do right now.

by looking at the report by GI, i'm pretty sure that the winner of the tournament was Mike B.  His sui deck was very unique, and included sinister strength, chimeric idols, and unearth (which proved to be very useful for him.)  Mike was a nice guy, and it was great to see him win, but it woulda been cool if sam won it all.  

for those of you who don't know, sam is pernicious dude's son.  i'm pretty sure he's under 10yrs old, prob 8 or 9 (sorry if i'm wrong dan) and he mad t8 last time, and the semi's this time.  i think it's just a matter of time before he walks away the winner at one of these tournaments.

[BigChuck]

Sam's 10..And if any of you remember the BD quotes, you should remember CooberP's quote upon losing to him "Sligh!? How the hell did I lose to sligh!?"

[BillTheDuck]

And GI, where you Stephen H? Thats who I remember beating greg round 1, but I don't remember for sure.

I was the guy you reported all you games too, in case you didn't know.

[pernicious dude]

Yeah, that was Mike D who took it home.
Really nutty deck.

He was running Unearth, Unholy and Sinister Strength, Hyppies,
Skittering Skirges, Chimeric Idols and Dauthi Horror.
Hymn and Duress, 1 Strip, no Wastes or Sinks.
Maindeck Terror.
I think the only recent cards he had were Shades.

Funny stuff.

I took my black out of retirement because no one there has been playing black.
I was one of the 9 black players.
Control was pretty much absent.

Sam and I got paired first round, so we both went into round two 0-0-1.
Second round I got BillTheDuck's brother Chris playing Dragon.
He went off first game, I think second or third turn.
Side I had 2 Furnace, 2 Planar Void and a Coffin Purge.
Umm, I won.
He went on to hit someone else with maindeck Crypts.
Bad day for Dragon.
Third round I got Vlad playing something red and blue.
I saw every Waste and Sink in my deck both games,
so I never got to figure out what he was playing.
Fourth round was Lou playing a black deck with Factories.
The games were another Waste and Sink party.
I'm running 3 Wastes main and a fourth on the side.
Fifth round I had Mike D, and we ID'd into top 8.

Jimmy, the guy he beat for the Lotus,
took me out first round.
Couple of the shortest games I've ever played.
He was running an oddball Suicide,
with 1 or 2 Scuta standing in for Negators,
Shades, Hyppies, Skittering Skirges and Flesh Reavers.
Again, no Sinkholes.
I drew ass both games, while he drew Negator,
Scuta and Reaver in multiples.
I don't think either game took five minutes.

Sam was playing our Parfait,
with the addition of hulk3rules' second Library and his Pearl,
(thanks again, Phelon)
but he lost it to Mike D second round of top 8
with a major play error each game.
He'd played fast and flawless all day,
losing only one match in the Swiss, but stress took him out.

Mike B was totally cool.

The final match, and especially the last game, was great.
Mike's Skirge traded with one of Jimmy's Skirges two turns in a row and came back a third time for the win.
Unearth owned.

Side note, BigChuck had a rough start.
Match one, game one, the first card his opponent plays is Onslaught.
Turns out the whole deck was November Type 2.
BillTheDuck offered him the match win.
Chuck flipped a coin and let the guy borrow a deck.
Terry handed him a fully powered Suicide, and Chuck lost the match.

I don't know how he did the rest of the day.

[BillTheDuck]

wait... FULLY POWERED?

I thought it just had a jet and lotus in it, so I gave him swamps (just two) to switch in for them.

I don't know why terry would use all those cards in his deck (even though now I remember he does), 1) because they make the deck worse, 2) because he doesn't even have them.

He sold all his power and now he just proxies it.

If Mike was actually using those cards, he was proxying without the actual card which is, um... not allowed.

[pernicious dude]

No, I meant as fully powered as Suicide gets.
Jet and Lotus.
And now that I think about it, you're right.
The Mox proxy came out for a Swamp.
My bad.
Terry did come out and hand him a Lotus, though.
I wonder if that was the one we were playing for?

Chris K said he ran into some off proxy issues, as well.
Opponent had Birds of Paradise proxied.
Turns out his  buddy had the real ones in his deck,
playing at the next table.
Someone else then loaned them a set,
and everyone went on with their business.

[BillTheDuck]

Oh, ok, because Terry does run a mono b with all 7, so I'm glad that wasn't it.

[BigChuck]

Honestly, I think we should all just label this a Fucked up tourny. I mean really. There were like 3 good players in the top 8, and one of them got there playing mono-green big creatures which he played as basically a joke. Almost every sui ran shadow creatures, and the people that normally do good(My, Phelon, Jarad, hell, even Greg) didn't even top 8. Oh well. I plan on meeting Phelon in the finals next month, but there best be a second prize. This whole only have a first prize business is horrible. Also, it was advertised as lotus for 1, twister for 2, so thats what it should be. He makes good money between the actual tourny cost, and people buying stuff. He can afford to do it. If there is only going to be a prize for first place, then we will be far more hesitant to come up in the future.

[BillTheDuck]

It wasnt advertised as twister for 2nd.

It was advertised twister for second if we get enough people. We didnt have enough people at all. He did give a second place because 2-3 people showed up late, but it wasn't big.

He basically broke even.

If he goes into dept on prizes then tries to make it up on sales, even if he does make it all back, hes doing good buisness.

I hope I explained this well to eveyone. We would plan on having a second and third and maybe more, but he can't lose money on prizes. I don't know anyone who can run a tournament like that.

Its not a permenant thing, its just that we got a very unexpected number of people. Maybe the date, maybe not, I dunno, but we should have got more.

[mezzir]

lol, a little side note/bitching about my match with sam
while i was really happy he made top 8, his deck loved him like i've rarely seen ever before
i was playing suicide and i got good draws, but he just got better
one of the games (dont remember which) he kept a hand with 6 white cards and a wasteland, topdecked a plains to play tax, then topdecked a rack the next turn
and discard can't really kill good topdecks
and every one of my negators was met with a timely pariah, which i'm sure he didn't run 4 of
all i gotta say is he should keep playing that deck cause it sure treats him right

and if i can trade for the cards for it, expect to see a rogue combo next time from me, none of this keeper or sui crap

[hulk3rules]

Quote (mezzir @ Oct. 20 2002,22:54)lol, a little side note/bitching about my match with sam

haha.  anyways, sam is the man at playing parfait.  he plays it faster then some people play sui.  however, if he makes t8 next time, someone has to remind him that it's not timed, so he can step it down a notch.  it was unfortunate to see him make those errors in the semis.

anyways prenicious dude, it was no prob lending the cards to sam.  they would have just sat in my binder through the tournament, so it was fine.  unfortunately, if all goes as planned and i get the cards i need, i'll be usin the pearl at the next tournament, and Library #2 will become an ancestral. however, i don't think my deck would use library, so i could most likely still lend it.