Really fast stats

[Azhrei]

Nov 23, 2002. Richmond, VA

16 people, cut to top 4 (which sucks).

1-2 loss to Gay Fish. Game three I got a fast lockdown of the board and then noticed that cards from game two's YawgWill were still removed after being shoved aside at some point. Sucks, but only loss for the day. At least it wasn't a clean loss.

2-1 win against Suicide. Bad game one, NUTS game three with lots of LD and me topdecking Force of Will every turn before I would have been killed by CURSED SCROLLS, can you believe it?

2-0 TnT, stabilized at 2 life game one, game two isn't even fair. I test so much against this deck it's sick; probably 10 games a week at least. TnT is my bitch.

Time limit against Biscuitville (BG Deed/Keg). Had no motivation to win because the four 3-0-1s all made t4 and one loss was out-- their games ended during ours (2 had gone in 2-0-1 and both won) and it all became pointless.

t4: 2 Gay Fish, 1 Keeper (TIC), 1 Suicide (TIC)

Suicide reams Fish, Fish edges out Keeper with a Psionic Blast for a stolen win game two, and then has a better game three.

Finals: Gay Fish, Suicide.

Suicide tears the roof off the sucka 2-1 with a monstrous Consult for Wasteland down to ten cards left... but he got the second one when he really needed it, so all is well.

Team Iron Chef takes the box.

Decks:

2 Biscuitville
3 Keeper
1 RG Zoo a la Milton (which looks sadly like Azhrei Sligh)
1 Sligh
2 Suicide
1 Miracle Gro
2 Gay Fish
1 TnT
X Some new guys playing who can say what?

Gay Fish had some good matchups (not TnT, for example) and some good luck (like me killing myself), but once again was a solid showing. It's way better than Gro.

[Matt The Great]

I'm afraid to ask, but...Biscuitville? Where did that name come from?

[Crawley]

You wouldn't happen to have a current decklist for Gay Fish, would you? I'd like to test against it.

[Azhrei]

1.X season almost a year ago... there was some BG deck that won somewhere, so people were copying it. Basically, I stripped all the crap out of it, retooled it, and made it GlobalReset.dec with Mongers, Boas, etc.. We had breakfast at a fast food place called Biscuitville so those Deed/Keg/Disk decks are evermore named that to us. My friend got 10th with it and won in the mirror match over whatever the other BG deck was last year, because ours was better.

The Phantom Tape Worm just posted a list for Gay Fish very recently.\n\n

[Crawley]

I see, thanks.

[Phantom Tape Worm]

Quote Gay Fish had some good match ups (not TnT, for example) and some good luck (like me killing myself), but once again was a solid showing. It's way better than Gro.

Good matchups?!  Ha!  Out of the 3 keepers there the faggoty little fishes played all of them.  Now typically yes, this is good news for fish, but ALL of them came prepared.  Tsabo's web AND peacekeeper in addition to all the regular REB's and extra plows, WTF?!

But it was great, all of the games were extremely good. Great back and forths!

Quick tourney report for myself....

As usual, I am with Gay Fish.
// creatures
        4 Rootwater Thief
        4 Manta Riders
        4 Lord of Atlantis
        4 Cloud of Faeries
// spells
        4 Force of Will
        3 Misdirection
        4 Standstill
        4 Curiosity
        2 Coastal Piracy
        1 Time Walk
        1 Ancestral Recall
        3 Null Rod
// mana
        1 Mox Sapphire
        1 Strip Mine
        1 Library of Alexandria
        2 Wasteland
        4 Faerie Conclave
        4 Mishra's Factory
        9 Island
// side board
SB:  1 Black Vise
SB:  2 Psionic Blast
SB:  1 Legacy's Allure
SB:  2 Sea Sprite
SB:  2 Wasteland
SB:  2 Blue Elemental Blast
SB:  1 Upheaval
SB:  2 Magus of the Unseen
SB:  2 Maze of Ith

Round 1: Azhrei w/Paragon Keeper
I'd normally expect to face off against Darren later on in the tourney, but I am always happy to do battle against keeper.  After all, I am playing the BEST keeper killing machine currently in the format.  Hmmm....I think I'll qualify that last statement before the flames begin.  I say "best keeper killing machine" because it very consistently defeats opposing keepers, AND does well against most other commonly played decks.  That said, I've been playing gay fish in this metagame for quite a while now.  ALL of the keeper players are gunning for me, which is really only fair I suppose, since I'm gunning for them.  Either way, they pack a lot of hate, and it makes my match ups against them even more difficult. Keeper is always a scary match up; I don't care what you're playing.  It is an excruciatingly powerful deck in the hands of a competent player and even decks like Gay Fish, Sui, and stompy which are designed to beat it can lose to Keeper.

Anyway back to the match.

2-1-0 Game one belongs to me.  Game two he drops tsabo's web and shuts me out.  Game three he drops tsabo's which is a big frown for me and then mystic tutors realizing that he is missing a whole bunch of cards he had yawgwilled during the previous game.  I hate to see rules technicalities like that ruin an otherwise good match...ah well, you can get your revenge next time Darren when both you and Sliver King are main decking webs




Round 2 Katzby w/ "Corson" Keeper
Ah yes, another keeper deck.  Abe is an excellent opponent; he is extremely knowledgeable about various card rulings and the complexities of the game and is very good with keeper.

2-0-0 We play an intense first game that takes all but 7 minutes of the round.  Again, great back and forth.  The game ends with me at 5 life, morphling and abyss in play as well as a whole bunch of jewelry w/ zorb. I have a null rod some man lands that can't get through due to wastelands/morphling, a lord of Atlantis and a doubly curious rootwater thief.  Had to race morphling with curious island walk and chump block him with the faeries and manlands I'd draw into.  Game two we speed through.  I very quickly establish favorable board position and am poised to go all the way, but time is running out in the round so Abe concedes.  Great game one!



Round 3 Radjammin w/PT Funk
2-1-0 I'm used to seeing Jammin play parfait, so that's what I was expecting, but a first turn negator signals otherwise.  He quickly flays me.  Game two and three my deck draws lots of cards.  Game three I get an active rootwater thief going on him...he sided out his negators and so is rather creature light against me.  I start munching away eating up his hippies; his lone river boa can't stop the fishy beats.


Round 4 my teammate Rich w/ U/r Gay Fish
We are both undefeated so Rich I and draw into top 4.  Incidentally, his deck kicks ass.  It's very much like mine, but with voidmage prodigy over lord of Atlantis and grim lavamancer over manta riders.  We've been referring to it as "needs more tempo.dec"


Round 5 Sliver King w/Paragon Keeper
Yet another keeper deck.  Josh is one of my favorite opponents, he and I always have excellent games, and these were certainly no exceptions.

2-1-0 Ok, generally the way it works is, I claim the first game, and his sideboard of tsabo's web and pyroclasm and REB's and plows makes him much more evenly matched with me on games two and three.  So I go into the first game expecting to win. No dice.  He balances and mind twists me early on and yawgwills for the nail in the coffin.  I lose game one...that's bad, cause I know he's got a LOT of hate in that board for me.

Game two is the most amazing come from behind victory I've ever had.  He goes for a turn two tsabo's web, but I force it.  WOO HOO!!  Then I do some land beat down early in the game, slapping him for a couple turns with multiple mishras.  Josh begins to joke about top decking tsabo's web, and I'm like "haha! no no my friend, you already cast that spell"  (that'll learn ya to cut regrowth  ) But then he says, "How do you know I don't have two in my board?"   And I'm thinking, eep.  Another turn goes on of manland beats and then he top decks demonic tutor...I have no force...what is he getting??!  Was he joking about that other tsabo's??  SHIT!  He casts tsabo's web.  Oh that's bad.  My board position is such that of my 4 lands, only one will untap.  I end up doing a lot of nothing for a very long time.  My feeble attempts at getting faeries to untap my man lands are thwarted by fire/ice.  Soon an abyss drops, I'm locked down.  Josh is at 11 and he begins doing all the things that keeper does once their opponent is hamstrung.  We have a counter war over a FoF which I loose gaining him much mana drained mana, but he can't use it then and there so it is taken as burn placing him down to 6.  Soon yawgwill hits...it resolves and my chances for victory are very slim.  During this time he utilizes his fetchlands and his life total drops down to 5.  Now, I've been keeping his red producing lands in check and so all he has is one fetcher, and I know about all the REB's he uses post board.  He taps 5 for a morph, I force, he cracks the fetcher for a volcanic and casts mana drain (I figured it'd be an REB, but that's just as good) I'm holding psi blast and he just went down to 4, I put my finger up to my temple and blast him, he forces, I misdirect.  He says, it resolves!  And his head explodes scanners style, an unbelievable win!

Game 3 he drops a tsabo's on turn two with me having no way to counter it.  poopy.  Oh well, I don't draw many man lands that game anyway.  Rootwater thief comes down and munches out peacekeeper, balance, abyss, in that order before getting blasted.  But the damage is too great, and without its bombs keeper can't recover.  Morphling meets the force of will and lord of Atlantis gives me the nod; he swings for victory.



Final Round Jesse w/ Sui Black

Sui black isn't a horrible match up for me, I usually go about 50/50 with it, and post boarded it gets much better...I was really hoping my teammate rich would knock him out though as he is stronger vs. sui than I am (since he has lavamancer), but to no avail.

First game he gets out a fast negator and slaps me around for a bit until I get some fishy blockers.  It provides enough of a deterrent so that negator backs down for a bit.  But a shade comes out to press the attack.  I get a curious faerie but keep drawing into islands and standstills...WTF?!  I get flayed by negator and friends.

Game 2 I standstill while he has 2 zombies on the board and it's a race between my faerie conclave and his undead, but one of them gets lost in the maze of ith.  He breaks standstill, I draw lots of cards and the game ends shortly thereafter when I use my psionic powers.

Game 3 he puts down an early keg, which I ignore.  I drop a rootwater thief who attacks for a round or two until some zombies come down to fend him off.  But lord arrives on the scene, and brings a syringe full of D-bol with him for the thief.  Rootwater powers up altered beast style, but he and lord both get sick with contagion and have to sit out.  Zombies continue swinging and a faerie comes down to help, but she gets kegged away, and the sick fish join her.  Mishra is ready to block though, but jesse consults demons for a wasteland.  They tell him the secret to getting wasteland is to remove all but 10 cards from your library, he says "OH, now i get it" and does so, wasting mishra.  The zombies keep swinging, and a masticore falls out of the sky to join them.  His head explodes as he touches ground, but the zombies are upon me, and I've lost too much blood....vision getting cloudy....my last sight is a tapped conclave that came too late.


It was a great tourney though; both versions of gay fish did very well.  I got to play some incredible games against some great players....oh yeah, I'd like to take a moment to look at all the boarded hate that was played against gay fish by keeper.

2 tsabo's web  <--only useful in our meta vs. gay fish
3 REB
1 Peace Keeper  <--ditto...possibly sui as well
1 Pyroclasm
2 Swords to plowshares

AND STILL somehow fish wades through.  So I'll just say it; Gay Fish is the HHH of magic, it is THAT DAMN GOOD!


All comments welcome

[Azhrei]

Like I said, favorable matchups. By favorable I mean "squeaking it out in massively close games that were great."

Actually, I think this tournament had more nail-biters than any other I've been in around here. I don't think it was just me having that experience. I saw a LOT of games being won in the 11th hour by random crazy stuff or just lucky as heck topdecking.

I will say that Gay Fish is more annoying to play against than Miracle Gro-- Gro is much, much easier to deal with. In fact, Gro is just another B2B.dec and Gay Fish requires real play style adaption to beat.

But dude, HHH? C'mon... that analogy would be more appropriate if Standstill were restricted. "Good a couple years ago, but now not so much."

[bebe]

Marc we still can't get any respect. how is our primer going? I notice that you tweaked the sideboard a bit. Maze of Iths ? Better than extra  Psi Blasts or Allures?
Keeper is running amok in toronto now that there are no active fish players left. I would take it up again but i'm working on my new deck.

[Razor]

Great reports guys.  Marc, glad to see the Mazes working out for you.  Too bad Tasabo's Web is cropping up.  Time to play SuiBlack or Cherry Parfait to surprise 'em!

[Azhrei]

Here's the problem: you really CAN'T surprise anyone around here. We have a couple people who play random decks every time, so people pretty much have to run bad sideboard cards to compensate. The Tsabo's Web (I ran one) is one slot that would have been a 5th control card, but since SliverKing is the only other control deck, we don't mind losing mirror match board cards to have a better shot against the field. If the Fish people brought something else, they'd get lost in the shuffle to no advantage.

However, I will say this: Fish is performing on par with Keeper, give or take, in our metagame, but all of the other players have by and large decided to continue to focus on Keeper hate decks, which in turn lose to Fish (aggro-control is good against aggro/untuned decks) so the Fish guys have a good match against Keeper and aren't being hated against like Keeper is by the other decks. I'm not taking anything away from Tape Worm because I'll be the first to say he's a very solid player and has a great deck especially for our metagame-- the reason I bring this up is that THE AGGRO PEOPLE ARE NOT DOING THEIR JOB. They're gunning for Keeper and not knocking out Keeper anyway, and they're losing to Gay Fish because they're not prepared for it. You tell me how that's good business. The Keeper decks are making it to the t4 anyway, and Gay Fish isn't seeing things that should beat it like TnT, Sligh (PoP is good  ), Mask, and so forth. At least one of our consistent Suicide players is boarding wisely and he took out BOTH Gay Fish decks this time, albeit in close games.

I think the only way this could be more frustrating would be to be a Keeper player in a field of combo, and then to have a B2B.dec roll into town... and all the combo people KEEP PLAYING COMBO in the face of 20 counterspells.

The semi-predictability of our metagame is starting to sour it, as there are a few people who always play the same decks and do well with them, and then there are people who play flavor of the month decks to try and beat the consistent players and never succeed. It's at the stage where people can say "X, Y, and Z will play their signature deck so we have to prepare for it, and A, B, and C will play God only knows what but will have no tuning or testing so just play a smart board and don't worry." It's making our top four look strikingly similar every time (1-3 of 3 Iron Chefs, 1-2 of 2 Gay Fish Brigade, possibly 1 other guy) assuming the attendence is the same for each event. What this means is that the metagame decks to beat tend not to change... and yet the remainder of the metagame shifts wildly from tournament to tournament, but doesn't crack into the realms of consistent performance.

So why is that? I know Thorme, the Mask guy who made second at States, gets bored with decks. That's a reasonable excuse if being entertained through novelty is better than fun through winning. A lot of other times I just get the impression that people are throwing shit to a wall and seeing what sticks... until they do well one month and change up again the next, only to get knocked out immediately. I really don't know what the story is, but I do know that until people start showing some consistency in what they play, our field isn't going to be terribly healthy-- right now it's dominated by PLAY EXPERIENCE as the primary factor. Not matchups, not tech, not even necessarily *skill* as a player, but the simple virtue of who has the most games under their belt with the deck they're using.

I've always been of the mentality of finding a deck that fits the player and then mastering it-- I don't think you can do well any other way. You can have the best deck in a format and suck with it if it's not your style. MORE IMPORTANTLY, you can have a great deck and suck with it IF IT'S BRAND NEW TO YOU. With a month to conceive, build, and test, there is NO WAY you can be fully competent with a deck enough to be on a levelplaying field with someone who has had the same deck for months and months.

Ugh, sorry for the rant, but I'd like to see a maybe less "diverse" and more "stagnant" metagame so that our top four can start to be what gets shaken up regularly and not the metagame.

[Phantom Tape Worm]

@Bebe: Yeah, sometimes I feel like Rodney Dangerfield, especially when I have to explain to someone who's not familiar with the deck what it is.  "You're playing a merfolk deck?  Uh...cloud of faeries?  You know, I used to have a merfolk deck, you should play sunken city in it ."   Most people tend to rank fish decks somewhere in between thallids and thrulls.  And so I guess that's probably for the best because as Azhrei noted, people don't bother preparing for it.

Normally the sideboard is a work in progress, but for right now I'm pretty satisfied with it:

SB:  1 Black Vise   ----------> Used vs control in its various incarnations
SB:  2 Psionic Blast ---------> Used vs sui, and "peaceful"  keeper (I hate ghandi)
SB:  1 Legacy's Allure-------> Used vs sui, stompy, TnT, and assorted aggro
SB:  2 Sea Sprite-----------> Used vs sligh, zoo, OSE, anything packing burn
SB:  2 Wasteland-----------> Used vs keeper, TnT, Zoo, anything packing all NB lands
SB:  2 Blue Elemental Blast-> Used vs sligh
SB:  1 Upheaval-------------> Used vs Parfait only. One day this card is going to save my ass, that's why it stays in.  I've never actually cast it.
SB:  2 Magus of the Unseen-> Used vs TnT, mask, stacker
SB:  2 Maze of Ith----------> Used vs TnT, mask, sui, almost all aggro  

Maze of ith is totally sweet!!  I am so excited about boarding it that I kicked my mom in the face!  (sorry, www.realultimatepower.net  it's too funny)  Are they better than extra psi blasts?  I think so, but that has to do with my side boarding strategy.  I generally don't pack more than 2 of any one card for the sake of diversity.  Psi blast is good vs most aggro, but not say mask; and definitely not sligh or stompy (won't necessarily stop river boa vs stompy, and I don't want to take 2 more damage against those decks AND waste a critical early game turn).  Legacy's allure is great against some decks, but often it just isn't fast enough to save you.  By boarding no more than two of any given card I ensure that I have something to board in vs anything in the metagame.

The primer is....well, it's in the works.  Actually, if either you or Razor have any of my early e-mails that explain how the deck works, I'd love to get my hands on them to see what I wrote.

Keeper unchecked?  That can't be pleasant.  Get one of your buddies to play fish, that's what I did.  I'm actually hoping to convert more players here in Richmond to fish.  My goal is to see a time when entire schools of fish decks devour everything in their path.  It will be reminiscent of combo winter or black summer; everyone will be playing fish, or a deck to beat it.  New fish builds would evolve out of such a time.  As it stands now a U/r build has emerged, it made top 4 in Richmond and was mostly unpowerd (no ancestral or moxen).  This new build shows much promise.


@Razor: Tsabo's is the bane of fish, but as I stated earlier, a new build has emerged; this new U/r version can take out the web and not think twice about it.  Red has many middle fingers for Tsabo.  So bring on the hate keeper, it won't save you


@Azhrei: I think a lot of the reason that people focus so much more on keeper and largely ignore fish is because no one can fathom losing to such a harmless looking deck.  I mean, look at the creature roster.  Good aggro doesn't care about manta riders or rootwater thief or cloud of faeries, they're pussy creatures!  Lord of atlantis may be a little more dangerous at 2/2, but honestly, the last time you probably saw him played was in your little brother's deck.  You know, the one that you'd lose to intentionally just to make him feel better.  People just don't respect the deck and I probably wouldn't either if I weren't playing it; it just looks so weak.

Keeper also leaves the opposing player with a sour taste in their mouth.  In a typical game keeper will mana bully you, card bully you, and take control in such a grandiose way that the opponent becomes traumatized.  "I just don't know what I can do against that keeper deck, it's too broken."  And suddenly the pet deck they were working on loses all of its appeal, even if they won a game vs keeper.  The losses are what stick because they are such huge ostentatious victories.  This may sound kind of weird, (decks have personality?) but Keeper is an arrogant deck.  It's not happy just being a simple control deck, but instead wants a combo-like "I go off in your face" style win that utterly humbles and devastates its opponent.

Also, keeper is a "money deck," it requires power.  Many people who don't have power feel like they can't compete unless they can regularly beat keeper, the same goes for any new pet deck they might try out.  Keeper has been billed as the best deck in type 1 and as such it is the measuring stick that all players test their decks against.



As far as the predictability of the metagame goes, hmmm...  Isn't a shifting metagame with a diverse field a healthy one?  Experience with a deck certainly helps, but it isn't the only factor in making top four.  Case in point, untested U/r gay fish made top four with a player piloting it who has a) never played the deck in a tournament setting, and b) played the deck only a handful of times to begin with.  Granted, he made some HUGE playing errors vs sui black in the semi's that were, in my opinion, a direct result of his lack of experience with the deck.  I'd agree many people are currently throwing shit at the wall, but that's a perfectly viable way to find out what works for them.  Who knows, maybe one of these days I'll take razor's advice and shake up the metagame with something even weirder than gay fish

All comments welcome

[Dante]

Quote (Phantom Tape Worm @ Nov. 25 2002,13:29)Who knows, maybe one of these days I'll take razor's advice and shake up the metagame with something even weirder than gay fish

All comments welcome

How about curious bi-sexual Noble Panther?

 

[chocolovebox]

I want to open by saying two things:
1. Dante, glad to see you getting into the spirit of things! I have often referred to one of the weenie creatures enchanted with everyone's favorite card drawer as "bi-curious."  Perhaps it's a name we'll use for the two-color version (though the R/U wizard version we're currently running goes by "Harry Potter is a Faggot, and if we ever go three-color, I cannot fathom what being tri-curious would entail).
2. Phantom Tape Worm (god help me if I start calling you that in real life) makes such a good point about Keeper's personality and the humiliation that comes with the losses to it.  It's as traumatic as a hot girl ask you out to a party, only to find out it was all some ploy and she and her friends were trying to bring the ugliest date possible, leading you to swear off women forever (and explaining why all our deck names are thick with homosexual content).

Now, to inject my post with a little substance: I would like to hear from Azhrei what decks he would enjoy to see in the metagame (I know his comments weren't really asking for certain decks so much as constant decks, but I'm quite curious as to the answer and would like to see it posted).  Oh, and of the two standard sui builds (zombie build and reaver build), which do you fear more with the new paragon deck and which do you think is more powerful overal?  And what scares you out of a sui/sligh board against your new monstrosity?  (Sorry, don't mean to sound like a fourth grade teacher asking their kids to write an essay on the topic of how their summer went.)

As for Phantom, would you want to place more Mazes in the SB?  You gave such rave reviews, yet they'd possibly come at the expense of cards that can deal with Peacekeeper.

[Azhrei]

1) It took Matt a long time to not call me Azhrei in person. God, was that ever annoying.

2) Everyone has a theme... I name my decks after pro-wrestling, you guys have your homosexual theme... hey, everyone needs a hobby.  

3) I fear the same things as always against Suicide: early hand and land destruction. Reaver bothers me slightly less because I can race with Mox Monkey if I have to.

4) I'd like to see some ACTUAL aggro decks. I think we had 2 Suicide decks and 1 TnT this time, one Sligh if memory serves. That's four out of 18 decks. There were three control decks, and three aggro-control blue weenie decks. Nearly half of the remaining field was mid-range controlly/fatty/aggro/unfocused/whatever.dec. I think it's pretty well established that mid-range decks DO NOT work in Type One-- for an example of why this is true, try playing TnT without Mishra's Workshops and see how devastating it becomes.  

I guess as far as a metagame goes I'd like to see Mask stick around, and maybe more than ONE Sligh deck-- fast aggro decks are needed because they keep people honest. Looking at a field and KNOWING that I won't see a PoP all day is demented.

[Matt The Great]

Quote (Azhrei @ Nov. 26 2002,08:19)2) Everyone has a theme... I name my decks after pro-wrestling, you guys have your homosexual theme... hey, everyone needs a hobby.

You say that like there's a difference.

::powerbombs Matt the Great through a flaming table::\n\n

[Radagast]

@Azhrei: Have you considered Slingshot Goblin as anti-Fish tech? The only thing it doesn't stop is Factory -- and turning a deck into nothing but 7 pitch counters, 3 Null Rods, and 4 Mishra's Factories seems "pretty good". I'd use it over a second Web, at any rate.

@Fishy People: Have you tried Gush? While it *might* conflict with the manlands, I know that it's the single scariest card in Gro (not counting the obvious like pitch counters).

[DigDug]

I play with Gush, but my fish deck is only Extended.

[Fishhead]

Quote This may sound kind of weird, (decks have personality?) but Keeper is an arrogant deck.

When Keeper gets going it just does broken thing after broken thing; "I take your mana, I Tutor for Mind Twist, I Twist your hand.  I draw 3 cards.  I cast Y-Will and do it all again."  Its flashy and spectacular and, of course, it attracts attention.  And with the attention comes the hate.  

Quote Ugh, sorry for the rant, but I'd like to see a maybe less "diverse" and more "stagnant" metagame so that our top four can start to be what gets shaken up regularly and not the metagame.

You could always change decks yourself, lol.  I consider it part of my responsibility as far as keeping T1 alive; if I win with a deck one week I try to bring something different next week so people wont get bored/pissed off.  There are plenty of interesting decks out there; if aggro isnt doing its job then you could always bring TnT or Zoo.

[thorme]

Quote (Azhrei @ Nov. 24 2002,21:45)I know Thorme, the Mask guy who made second at States, gets bored with decks. That's a reasonable excuse if being entertained through novelty is better than fun through winning.

To each his own.  Inventing new decks and trying to be competitive with them is what keeps me interested in the game.  (This is why Limited is my favorite format incidentally, but I still love Type 1 due to the immense card-pool from which to build)

Never fear, you will see Mask again at Comix, just not for 2 months straight again.  Personally, I enjoy our metagame, and I would think that you would also enjoy it if you have "fun through winning" and Keeper almost always makes top 4.

[Azhrei]

Well, actually, and I know this might sound really, really dumb... but I don't like to PLAY all that much. Seriously. I MUCH prefer the deckbuilding and theory aspect of Magic; in fact, I've said numerous times that if I ever got my rating up around 1850 (which will take some traveling unfortunately) I'd quit sanctioned play and feel none the worse for it.

I guess I feel like what a "rogue player" might feel in an environment of "netdeck" people, except the other way around.  I like tuning, and testing, and tweaking, and agonizing over one card choice, and it just kills me when I see something that looks slapped together or I can tell hasn't been played ever before. It's a sickness, I know.

I enjoy creating new things too-- take OSE as an example. However, we played that deck straight for about a year to make sure we had it right, and the Gay Fish crew is doing the same sort of thing with their own created deck of choice. Maybe it's my inner perfectionist not understanding why everyone isn't the same way?  If I get an idea for something new or different, I stick with it until I am 100% sure I have it right and have made it the best deck I possibly can.

I think a big part of my frustration is that I'm always trying to get people together for playtesting, which is the part I enjoy MUCH more than the actual tournaments since it's when the deck construction aspect (e.g. why I play Magic at all) happens, and that always falls through. I would LOVE to test and tune Mask, TnT, Gro, or anything else people come up with, but we don't get the chance to sit down and really improve upon the ideas people have. I only like to do well in tournaments to validate my testing and theory; if someone else took my deck and won I'd be just as happy as winning with it myself.

To me, Magic is mostly about the deckbuilding process and we've more or less done Keeper to death in this, even with all the new changes. I'd like to start tricking out some new stuff, but I don't get the opportunity often.