Eon Blue Apocalypse wins the mox @ concord

[mezzir]

where to start...

just a warning, i didn't take notes and i'm really tired, so excuse any mistakes and gaps in the report

the night before the big mox tourney i spent the night at nick (billtheduck)'s house to make our departure easier in the morning, and just caues chilling with him is better than anything i'd be doing at home.  We played some magic and some mortal kombat, and i spent some time trying to convince nick's little bro (who came with us playing dragon.dec) that yes, there was a combo with smoke in MKTrilogy that if you got the timing exactly right was unstoppable.  We headed to bed around midnight-ish, about an hour after we had planned.

so we woke up at about 8, planning to leave the house at 8:45 and meet our ride at TnT in hadley around 9.  we were running a little late thanks to nick's incredibly long shower, but still arrived before phelon (hulk3rules).  Once all of us were there, we piles into Dan (pernicious dude)'s big red van and we were off.  Dont ask me how the two smallest people got the middle seat and me phelon and nick squished into the back.
After almost getting lost and stopping for pizza (i was the odd one out and got a salad, nothing beats chicken ceasar!) we made it to the store in Concord New Hampshire.  We got there at i think 11-ish, right at the beginning of registration, so we had plenty of time.  During that time, i got my act together and borrowed some of the cards i was hoping to use and missing (demonic tutor, FoW, mana drain instead of nothing, mana leak, and counterspell   )
So after a few casual games with my g/r survival randomness, the pairings were up

first round: Matt playing 5 (maybe 4) color survival with living death.

game 1: opening hand was i think 2 lands and 5 utility cards (these games were really rough in my memory). for about 6 turns i failed to draw into another land and even tho i managed to counter a survival and a avalance riders, he got a 2nd survival and killed my other land.  i scooped soon after when he played living death and ended up with 6 or so creature on the board to my no creatures and 1 land and balance only in the SB
0-1
SB: dont remember, i didn't get any of it

game 2: my deck farts on my big time, opposite of game one
i keep a hand with 3 lands, 3 utility and 1 creature (a phid)
and then for the entire freaking game i drew 1 non-land card
0-2 loss

0-2 games
0-1 matches
i just got swept by a 5 color extended deck, i was pissed to say the least.
i shoved my deck back in my bag, told someone from team hadley to guard it, and left for the bathroom and dunkin donuts.  at dunkin donuts i got a muffin and a suprisingly good french vanilla coffee, which greatly helped my mood.
so, i was feeling good, and i looked up to hear the round 2 pairings

round 2: dan (pernicious dude) playing sui - the guy who gave me a ride, hadley on hadley matchup, arg

game 1: my deck did what it does best, laugh at me and give me all the mana i need, except just in the wrong color.  quick-ish game if i remember right due to dan also having a good hand; i lost.
0-1

SB: +(1 stp, 1 balance, 1 ensaring bridge, 1 propaganda, 1 teferi's response, 1 control magic, 3 dodecapod), -(d. blow, some creatures, maybe a duress or a counter or two, not really sure)

game 2: got an early propaganda which stalled me time to fend off all his attackers with counters edicts and a full complement of STP's until he stalled a bit and i finished him off.

game 3: same-ish as game 2(?) -  i'm really fuzzy on this one, feel free to help out dan, i think you took notes.  either way, i won
2-1 win

2-3 games
1-1 matches

round 3: someone playing U/w trick

game 1: early duress/negator coupled with meddling mages to stop his deck from working made quick work of the game.

sb: + 1 jester's cap, -1 stp

game 2: i had some trouble finding creatures, but managed to duress away his only counter, see an illusions in his hand and no donate, then cap away all his donates.  he played it out for a while but then realized he only had 1 wish MD and he scooped.
2-0 win

games: 4-3
matches: 2-1

round 4: someone playing TnT - dammit...i seem to rememer this being a tmd member, but i can't remember who

game 1: he does what TnT's supposed to do for a while when the opponent is keeping welder and survival off the table, play fatties.  he got me really low, then played a memory jar, which ended up being the key to my win.  he had me at like 6 or something and the cap put everythign i needed into the graveyard for one hell of a yawgmoth's will leaving him with no creatures, no hand (maybe 1 card actually), and me with a decent sized hand and creatures on the board. the game was over quickly after.
1-0

SB: +(stp, ensnaring bridge, balance, control magic, propaganda, teferi's response, planar void, forgot about the BeB or just didn't want to) -(phids, lions, maybe a counter or a duress or two)

game 2 - his deck farts on him. simple as that, i counter a few cards and ride some creatures to victory.
2-0 win

games: 6-3
matches: 3-1

round 5: chris k playing mono-g squirrelcraft.  we're both 3-1 so we ID and get into the top 8.  during this time i got a fun game in with my g/r survival against his mono-u chronotog/stasis/smokestack deck. it was pretty close but i just kept drawing burn, burning his tog and getting another turn to build up a creature army. i was one more burn short of a victory, and what do i draw? Unyaro Bee Sting!!!  and yes, i have red burn in the deck and plenty of it, but it's just too cool. and hell, it won me the game

games: 6-3
matches: 3-1-1

finally after some more wandering around and watching games, the top 8 was announced.
4 of the top 8 were from the hadley crew, we were feelin pretty good about this (me, phelon, chris k, and steve)

Top 8: Phelon playing Masknought

game 1:  i go 2nd and phelon goes nutz unmasking me, playing a mask, a few moxen, and tainted pacting for a recall with no mana to play it left.  gogo topdeck duress!!  that right there was pretty much the game. he had no hand and some moxen and a mask in play, and it was over quick per some negators and lions

SB: +( propaganda, control magic, ensnaring bridge, stp, balance), -(phids, lions maybe?)

game 2: phelon keeps a hand that he later realizes he shouldn't have and even after a good 1st turn i striped his underground river which led to severe mana screw.  quick game again.  really sucked the games were so short, phelon's deck seemed to kinda putter out after doing so damn well during the swiss rounds.  but hell, we were all tired by this point.
2-0 win

side note, out the top 4 was me vs bryce and steve h (also from team hadley) playing andystok.  i almost said to him something about trying to make it a team hadley finals, and then i recalled reading a report from less than a week back where team goat said that and then neither of the team goat members made into the finals, so i just shouted a 'good luck' over to steve h at the other table.

games: 8-3
matches: 4-1-1
top 4:bryce (klown) playing triniti (as far as i could tell)

game 1: i honetly remember next to nothing about this game...my best guess would be early negator and ride it with counter/duress backup, but i'm not sure.  any help would be appreciated. regardless, i won

SB: +(jester's cap, planar void (i saw a grim monolith game 1)), -(2 stp)

game 2: he gets a sylvan out and is doing well with it and i eventually force through a jester's cap. he makes a mistake with his sylvan the next turn grabbing an underground sea instead of a demonic tutor by accident, allowing me to cap away the rest of his win conditions the next turn. i felt really bad and probably would've let him take it back, but he just beat himself up for it and kept playing as best as he could.  tons of props for hanging into the end and coming pretty close to stroking me out.
2-0 win

games: 10-3
matches: 5-1-1

The Finals! steve h playing emerald alice (gro SBing oath engine) at this point we realized that team hadley was taking everything, but both of us were powerless and wanted the mox bad.

game 1: early duress if i remember right and i either stp'd or edicted a dryad when he was already at low life and finished him off the next turn.  not a real eventful game (steve, feel free to add in cause i didn't take notes)

SB: i was expecting the oath engine to be sideboarded in since i had seen him play earlier: +(planar void, control magic, oath of ghouls), -probably stp or something, not sure.

game 2: he gets a morphling out.  end of story, i kept a hand i probably should've, but i knew i had another game to recover

game 3: this is it, winner take all.  and unfortunately, i dont remember much.  early duress helps a great deal and my mana base performed well.  counters and negators seemed to be too much for gro. he did get a powder keg out and keg'ed away a mage, but to no avail.  
2-1 win

games:12-4
matches: 6-1-1

and the mox came back to hadley.
 

so, without further ado...the monstrosity i call my deck:
//EBA (Eon Blue Apocalypse)
//The Mana (cover your eyes, its bad)
4 Island
1 Plains
1 Swamp
1 Tundra
1 Underground Sea
1 Flooded Strand
1 Adakar Wastes
1 Underground River
1 Gemstone Mine (it gets a little better after this)
4 City of Brass
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Jet
1 Black Lotus
1 Sol Ring
3 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine

//I'm Playing WW/u!
2 Savannah Lions
3 Swords to Plowshares
3 Meddling Mage
1 Dismantling Blow

//I'm playing mono-u!
3 Ophidian
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Time Walk
1 Fact or Fiction
3 Mana Drain
4 Force of Will

//I'm playing sui!
4 Duress
4 Phyrexian Negator
2 Chainer's Edict
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Yawgmoth's Will

2 Vindicate (didn't fit anywhere else)

//SB:
SB:  1 Planar Void
SB:  1 Balance
SB:  1 Swords to Plowshares
SB:  1 Control Magic
SB:  1 Teferi's Response
SB:  1 Propaganda
SB:  1 Oath of Ghouls
SB:  3 Dodecapod
SB:  1 Ensnaring Bridge
SB:  2 Blue Elemental Blast
SB:  1 Karmic Justice
SB:  1 Jester's Cap


finally, props and slops

props: almost everyone and everything, notably:
dan - for taking us and being such a damn cool guy
phelon - for lending me the counters and the tutor (drain+FoW > mana leak and counterspell)
dunkin donuts: for having the best damn french vanilla coffee i've ever had (and the only one, but it was still damn good)
everyone i played against: not a single unsportmanlike move, word or gesture in any of my games.
that pizza place we stopped at on the way there - for having an incredibly good chicken caesar salad.  screw pizza
and last but certainly not least: steve aka zherbus. for setting this thing up, finding a prize, and just being the coolest guy ever.  sorry bout the bad day with your deck, you'll bounce back next time

[Hyperion]

Good job winning the tournament.

After looking at your decklist, I must admit though that I'm surprised it did that well. I imagine some of the more questionable cards are placeholders until you get what you need for it, like the 1 maindeck Dismantling Blow, and running Mana Drain and Negator in the same deck. Ophidian seems sort of out of place here as well.

Really, what IS your strategy with this deck? How would it look if you had all the cards you needed for it?

[Zherbus]

First off, I dont want to be belittle Mezzirs win. He played perfectly and his decks basic premise is a good idea.

However he did have a mixture of good fortune in that:

1) He topdecked a Duress at the right time against Mask in the T8! The mask player had already unmasked so he though he was in the clear to tutor for ancestral.

2) PLAY MISTAKES!!! Kl0wn was tired and did the whole 'I dont think I'll tutor for a win condition when he has a Cap out, Ill just let him take all my ways to win'.

Also, in his round 4 match, Andrew had him on the ropes with some fatties. He should have just left what wasnt broken without trying to fix it. He Memory Jar'd instead and lost because of it.

It was some tragic mistakes, but thats what it came down to.

3) Look at the T8 matchups - Keeper took out another Keeper, Gro took out another Gro, Combo took out another Combo, and Mezzir beat mask. That, I feel, increased his chances later on in the T8.

[kl0wn]

Quote (mezzir @ Dec. 09 2002,12:53)top 4:bryce (klown) playing triniti (as far as i could tell)

game 1: i honetly remember next to nothing about this game...my best guess would be early negator and ride it with counter/duress backup, but i'm not sure.  any help would be appreciated. regardless, i won

I'll try to fill in the gap here:

I kept a hand that was quite spicy, but was missing enough land. I figured I could get by with it anyway.

I Vamped for Abyss and sat on it for a few turns (hoping to draw into help) until you Vindicated it and ran me down with guys.

Quote Kl0wn was tired and did the whole 'I dont think I'll tutor for a win condition when he has a Cap out, Ill just let him take all my ways to win'.

No way...

That was my plan all along. I let him take my win conditions so that he would play all sloppily and eventually let me Stroke him out. It was working pretty well until he Duressed me and would have taken my Stroke. Who wins with Morphling anyway? *tries to save face*\n\n

[LoA]

The Jar, in retrospect, was a mistake.  I made the play in an effort to dig out a Trisk for the win.  His first land was an Adakar Wastes, and I assumed he was playing some heavy W/U control deck (I had heard there were 2 Millstone-esque decks around and thought this might be one).  I was fearing a tutor to Balance or some other sweeper.

Sideboarding in game 2 was tough, since playing this deck you often wonder what the hell you're facing--which, I gather, is the point and one of the reasons Chris B did well with it.

[MolotDET]

Quote round 3: someone playing U/w trick

game 1: early duress/negator coupled with meddling mages to stop his deck from working made quick work of the game.

sb: + 1 jester's cap, -1 stp

game 2: i had some trouble finding creatures, but managed to duress away his only counter, see an illusions in his hand and no donate, then cap away all his donates.  he played it out for a while but then realized he only had 1 wish MD and he scooped.

This was me and I was playing MonoU Trix.  There was no White in my deck.

just a few corrections.

Game one was won by the second Negator you droped, because I topdecked all my land and no counters even though I drew assloads of cards.

Game two you were casting creatures but I was countering them.  Than you cast the Cap to which I responded with ancestral and AK for 3 and 4 and drew no Force of Will.
The game ended when I got my wish and looked into my SB and realized I had not sided in Stroke, so I could not get Hurkyl's Recall and gain enough mana to stroke out your deck.

anyway, congrats on the win, it is always cool to have something so rogue show up and take home the prize.

as I have said numorous times over all the report threads the whole weekend was a lot of fun.  And I am hoping it will happen again.  Most of my opponents were very sportman like, with you very near the top of that list.