Hello and welcome to my double tournament report. My name is David Feinstein and I play in Rhode Island. The t1 Northeast championship was my second type 1 tourney and I was really looking forward to it. Before I go any further let me say that this report is long, as I touch on alot of different things that happened this past weekend and go in depth on O stompy. If you don't like long reports, go away :-p
Now, where was I. So I play in Rhode Island, and own absolutely no type 1 cards. I was looking forward to this tourney for a while. When it was originally announced to be 10 proxies, I was estatic. When it got changed back to five, it just wasn't worth it for a strictly limited/t2 player like me to go... that is until my good friend Greg Kelley randomly decides to offer me all of his power for the weekend. W00T
I inform a certain atog lord that I will be going with him to Connecticut, so he offers to come to RI to pickup myself and fellow Jew Jaimie Lamkin. Now, you'd think that someone with temporary access to all of the power and practically every playable other card would want to utilize it and play something really powerful, like say, control slaver. I must admit, it was tempting to go that route since Jaimie was playing it and (super shock) so was Mr. Atog Lord himself, Rich Shay. The two of them had tested the deck EXTENSIVELY, inside and out, knew every little nook and crannie to that thing. Much of this information was passed onto me. But you see, I am a man of the forest. As much as I try to deny it, I just am. Doesn't matter the format, I'll go green. Yes, even in limited, with 300+ mirrodin drafts under my belt, I've unwittingly and uncounciously played green in about 299 of them. :-p
T1 would be no exception to this.
My first T1 tourney was a few weeks earlier with madness. I had fun, made top 8, got my ass handed to me by Eastman. All was good. Andrew Lambe, a.k.a. Hyperion, had helped me TONS with the archtype. So I was tempted to run it again naturally... but it just feel quite right. No, it wasn't that madness barely went 50/50 with tog or slaver, it was something else...
It just wasn't green enough.
So of course I went with with Big O. I had looked into a red/green madness version, and then red green beats, but they both lacked being mono green. Yes, Big O. fit that criteria perfectly... that and it completely whomps control slaver. Don't let anyone fool you, control slaver does have an awful matchup, and it is this deck. Oshawa also does great against standard tog. Versions with quirion dryad in it are not as good for the little green men as I had originally thought, but I'll get to that later. Yes, oshawa was the deck for me. Fast and green, just how I like it.
The problem with Oshawa is it can lose to random things. Rich called it "the green version of fish." I didn't agree with him at the time, but he ended up being right. More on that later too. Here's the list I went with for Saturday's t1 Northeast Championship:
4 Basking Rootwalla
4 Arrogant Wurm
4 hidden Gibbons
4 Survival of the Fittest
4 Squee, goblin nab00b
4 Wild Mongrel
4 Elvish Spirit Guides
3 Null Rod
3 Troll Ascetic
2 Naturalize
1 Mox Emerald
1 Sol Ring
1 Black Lotus
4 Bazzar of Baghdad
3 Wasteland
1 Stripmine
13 Forest
SB: 2 Naturalize
4 River Boa
2 Viridian Shaman
3 Ground Seal
1 Null Rod
3 Viridian Zealot
The maindeck is standard fare, but the sideboard all came from results of testing. The board makes control slavery go from being a great matchup to damn near impossible to lose. Control decks in general just crumpled up and died after the board. MVP's in general were the boas, which should have been maindecked. The card you should be scratching your head at here is the viridian shaman. Two questions probably are going through your head right now: 1) Are these really necessary when virtually everything else in the board already covers the artifact problem, and
2) Am I really that cheap a jew that I couldn't at least make these uktabi orangutans?
To answer question 1: the shamans were last minute additions to try and help against meandeck slavery. Meandeck is a much more formidable slavery variant for me because of chalices, so I added these two because I could survival for them whenever I wanted. I didn't test a whole lot against mean deck slavery because I didn't expect that much of it and I honestly think that Rich's version is just plain better. More on this later.
To answer question 2: Yes, yes I am.
So Rich comes to pick up Jewmie and myself and we're off like a 10 year old mini-van out of hell. We left at 8:40, Rich is at the helm of his parents mini-van. At 9:00, I am at the helm. You see, Rich is a great guy, a damn fine magic player... and quite possibly the worst goddamn driver I know. This is a man who has managed to get lost THREE times in the past when following me to my house to draft. THREE TIMES. That takes talent. So anyway, 20 minutes into driving with Mr. Atog, Jaimie and I are ready to hurl. This is mostly, but not entirely, Rich's fault. Besides the fact that when he drives he becomes posessed by a rabid soccer mom, we also had terrible directions. Absolutely horrdenous directions. I can thank mapquest for that one. Once Jaimie and I forcefully subdue Rich and wrest his keys away from him, we have a mostly smooth journey to Newington. Actually, I can't really take credit for getting there. A random gas station attendee gave us crystal clear corrections once we got lost. We knew we had to act fast when we passed Gay City park (Kerz, who I did not drive with, has an actual picture of this wonderous place up in these forums). Random Gus the gas station attendant really saved our behinds, and we got to site right on time.
Once inside, I quickly go to anyone I recognize and ask if they have hidden gibbons on them. They all reply with "You're playing O Stompy, bleh!" Yeah, bleh to you too.
Andy Stok does a heartfelt thank you for coming speech and then we're off to the races.
Round 1- Alden with Draw 7.dec
Alden is a nice guy who turns out also plays in Rhode Island, which I didn't know at the time. Game 1 I blitz him but only knock him to 1 before he can get the turn 4 kill on me, and I wonder if taking out Beserk was the best idea. SB out 3 survival, 3 ascetic: SB in 1 null rod, 2 naturalize and 3 v. zealot. Game 2 I go forest, lotus, mongrel + null rod. I won that. Game 3 I get out fast pressure but he's setting up fast. I'm trying to disrupt him through wastelands but I know I need to rip something quick or I'm dead. I topdeck nullrod and he sighs. He takes his turn and drops an academy to go along with his now useless artifacts. He then plays some draw 3 spells and I wonder what he's up to since he can't do squat with the rod staring him down. He's low on mana off the academy from the draw spells but with his remaining two he casts hurky'ls recall on my null rod. NO NEED. He casts helm of awakening. He drops a future sight. I fear the worst here, but it flips over a land and since he can't play one he's out of ways to keep going. Time is called and he says go. I start off my extra turn by replaying null rod, and I swing with small guys. I think it was 3 basking rootwallas and a zealot. I knock him to ten and after combat zealot away the future sight. On his turn he draws and taps for some mana with his academy. I'm wondering what he's trying to pull here and then he casts Barrin's Unmaking, targeting my null rod. He states that brown is the most common color, snd I tell him that brown isn't a color. So he targets my wild mongrel. He has some extra mana to play with from helm of awakening, which neither of us realized. Just as he was ending his main phase a spectator informed him of this, and I then had to ask that spectator not to say anything else. He then whispers to his friend something about me trying to get away with shady play by not mentioning the mana to my opponent, which definitely angered me because I didn't notice the helm's ability either. Alot of things happened in that main phase but Alden and I agreed that he should have extra mana added to his pool to make up for us not noticing the helm. With that extra mana he tendrils me for 6, taking him to 16. He then passes the turn. I attack with 3 rootwallas and pump one of them taking him to 11. I then drop wild mongrel and a hidden gibbons. I could have not dropped the gibbons here and tried to bazzar into a better play, but I was low on cards in hand and squee-less to I just had to hope he would activate it. On his last turn he tries to go off yet again with a yawg's will. I know he won't be able to and just cross my fingers that he activates the gibbons. He casts brainstorm and then says go. With gibbons active I know have lethal damage and alpha strike for the match.
This was a really close match and the last one to finish in the round. Alden was a really awesome guy and I hope to see him around in the future. M: 1-0
Round 2A - Steve O'Connell with Keeper
When I saw the pairing I knew that name sounded familiar, but I couldn't put my finger on it. Once he sat down a bevy of players around him started complementing him on this very site, and I realized he was Zherbus. Steve didn't talk much, but appeared to be a cool guy. I must say that after reading his report I was a little hurt that he basically ignored our games, essentially regarding them as a joke. He didn't even name me
Nevertheless, we did have some games, and they didn't go as horrible for him as he mentioned...
Game 1: I drop some little green men, he drops a little innocent morph. I then waste his white sources and lay some more men. He lotuses out of the land problem and shockingly flips over exalted angel. He can't swing with it since I have arrogent wurm and gibbons out to go along with my weenies. He doesn't draw into much else and I eventually just alpha strike him with lethal damage stacked. SB out: 3 null rod, 3 ascetic SB in: 3 river boa, 3 v. zealot. Game 2: He starts with mox, mox, lotus, mind twist for 4. I start laying out cards to discard and he informs me that twist is random discard... I felt like a total noob, but then again this was only my second t1 tourney. I had parised (he might have also, I don't remember) and my only possible mana was 2 forests, so if he hit them both I was prepared to scoop on to game 3. He hits one of them and takes most of my weenies. I have 2 cards left in my hand, one is a forest. Luckily, he doesn't lay a land and says go. I draw a strip, lay the forest and pass the turn. He lays a land and says go. I lay and use strip and he responds by trying to draw spell into another land. Unfortunately, he doesn't lay another land for a while and by the time he does I zealoted away both of his moxen. I continue getting lucky by drawing a strip and destroying that too. His next land doesn't come for a while and his deck decides to be cute and have it be a library. He's understandably upset and I win a game that I probably didn't deserve to.
M: 2-0 ... wait a second, let's change that back to 1-0.
To beat a dead horse, this is where the tourney turned to utter shit. Basically, all players were informed by Andy Stok that this round did not count and all matches would be replayed. The results that just happened would not count for anything. Needless to say, no one was happy. We had waited an extra half an hour after this round because we thought they were fixing results, but it turns out they just decided to toss them ALL out the window. Some bad if you ask me. Some bad if you ask anyone. Another hour + was tacked on to the tourney, and many records were about to change for the worse.
Round 2B- Richard with keeper
Games 1 and 2 were very similar. I had nice draws and he didn't have exalted angels, so I won in short order. Richard was a really cool guy who I talked with throughout the day. Rich and Jaimie also won their matches, so no one from my camp was ripshit... but dozens of others were. 9-10 refunds were given and I'm sure there were some people who just stormed out in disgust after losing this round. If the three of us had all just lost we probably would have walked out as well. I mean come on, who wants to stay in a tourney when you've just lost a round that shouldn't have even been played? To Stok's credit, he handled the situation well and offered everyone who stayed free beverages as well as pizza discounts. M: Still 2-0.
Round 3 - Micah with EBA.
When I sat down the first thing Micah said was "why can't I play any o. stompy?" His friend asked him what O. Stompy was and he pointed to someone near us playing the deck who just started their match. I stayed completely silent and just shook his hand.
I go first and he debates on keeping the hand. He decides to so I lay a forest and rootwalla. He is very surprised and said he had no idea I was stompy, because if he had known his hand would have been shipped back. Good thing I kept my mouth shut before :-p Actually it didn't matter, since I was land light so he was actually able to Negator my face in. I do a similar board plan to that against the keepers and game 2 he drops damping matrix on me. This was very interesting, but overall had little effect on the game since I just ran him over with boas and such. Before game three he sideboarded in 1 card. He remarked to me that he only had one of this card but he thought it was pretty good against me. I pondered as to what it could be... Game 3 started out about the same for me, as I had good opening drops of small men. He then plays his 1 card and informs me that this was what he just sided in. After it resolves my entire board goes away and no it wasn't a balance. I'll drop some hints: it's a sorcery that costs 2B and rhymes with cherish. Yeah, I lost this game. I was completely baffled as to why he didn't bring this in earlier, but it didn't matter because it wrecked me this game. After that my fate was a sealed by a pair of angels... one was exalted and the other was pristine. Despite perish, I'm not surprised I lost to EBA. It's a tough matchup for me to begin with. Micah was a cool guy anyway so it didn't bother me. M: 2-1
It is here where we decide to go make a quick trip to burger king. Jaimie, Rich, myself and fellow Rhode Islander Jason (apollyon on TMD, who will be mentioned later in this report) Rich is given directions which basically consist of 3 lefts. Since this is Rich, he somehow construes that into 2 lefts in a right. To make matters worse, he is driving. Not two minutes into our five minute trip, I hit my head on the dashboard not once but twice as Rich runs a red light and stop sign consecutively. He takes the incorrect right turn a minute later, to which Jaimie and I wonder why. We drive for another 5 minutes, and in those 5 minutes my head crashes down on the dashboard more than a freshman goes down the night of a senior dance. At this point, I tell Rich to turn around or the Shay van gets a new coat of puke in the front seat. He accomplishes the turning around part well, but a minute into our unsucessful trip back from finding burger king, the car in front of us decides to come to a complete stop, which of course results in Rich having to break ASAP, which of course results in my head hitting the dashboard one last time. The car that randomly stopped in front of us had some hottie running out of it, so I got over it. We get back to the site just in time for round 4, but not before I run over to buy some water from the dealers.
This point on I'm going to kind of breeze over the rounds, since this IS a double report and I still have another tournament to discuss
Round 4 - Keith with landstill
Games one and two involved me playing guys and having the artifact destruction for his disk exactly when I needed it. Keith was a nice guy and I wish I remembered what his TMD name was. M: 3-1
Round 5- Greg with TNT
These games were fast paced. Game 1 I run him over with men + naturalize. Game 2 he runs me over with men + double chalice. Game 3 in go the Shamans and I survival for them to stop his chalice for two. Once that got out of the way I survivaled into anything I wanted and won in short order. Greg was another really cool guy and my favorite opponent of the day. We were both dead tired and just wanted to have fun.
Round 6 - Roscoe with g/r beats
Roscoe was a very nice guy. The winner here had an excellent shot at top 8, since they just announced that that they cut round 8. Roscoe had that casual player aura around him, if that makes any sense. I was expecting a burn deck, possibly food chain goblins. I wasn't too far off the mark. Game 1 he starts with kird ape and then follows up with rancor. He gets in some beats but I stabalize and am getting ready to swing for the kill. Unfortunately, he lightning bolts me 4 times over the next 2 turns and I just happen to be at 12.
Game 2 I come out with turn 1 arrogant wurm and we're onto game 3. He comes out with turn 1 boa, turn 2 rancor and I just get my ass handed to me. He doesn't know how trample works, but I tell him how damage can be assigned under trample when I block so he then makes the correct decisions. This is where Rich was right, Oshawa can just lose to random things that most other decks wouldn't lose to. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't disappointed to lose, but Roscoe was a genuinely nice kid and I was rooting for him to make top 8. I told him about the concept of intentional drawing, and when to consider offering the draw and when not to. Unfortauntely he played out his next round and lost, thus not making top 8. M: 4-2
Round 7 - Joe with 'I lose chalice for 1.dec.'
Yes I made that deck name up. Joe was dressed up as a swashbuckler and was a really intense dude. Based on his attire, I expected fish with coastal piracy. Game 1 he drops black vise and the vise does 6 to me. He burns me out in to time. Game two was really close but I manage to edge him out. Game 3 was even closer but I totally threw it away. Jaimie watched me as I naturalized a cursed scroll when he had 2 of them out. I was holding an arrogant wurm and thought I had enough mana to do both things, but I didn't. I only had 1 elvish spirit guide in my hand when I thought I had 2. Basically, I should have just madnessed out the wurm and not worried about the scroll. If I had done that, he would have been dead instead of at 2. Since I horribly misplayed (it was past 11), he had an extra turn to kill me. With 3 mana and 4 mountains out, he has one card in hand. I'm at 8 life. After he draws I ask him if I'm dead, he thinks about and says I might be. He cursed scrolls naming fireblast. He remarks about hoping I can hit it. I do hit it, falling to 6, then he sacs all 4 mountains and double fireblasts me. He had me and was slow rolling... no need, at all. He played such all stars as Varchild's war rider's, which made this loss even more depressing. I have no one to blame but myself for this loss. After the last 2 rounds I decide that spike feeder will be making a home in my sideboard. Although I was definitely pissed that I lost this match, Joe had a non-net deck, and I have alot of respect for people who do well with homemade decks.
Final match results: 4-3
Not very stellar for me. Jaimie ended up with a similar record, but he beat Smemenen earlier and effectively knocked him out of t8 contention. At this point, it was approaching midnight and boy were Jaimie and I tired. We were all ready to go but this certain atog just had to go and top 8 :-p To make an already too long story short, Rich top 8'ed and then won the whole shebang. He mised the lotus + trophy then smartly sold the lotus back for $475.
So Rich won, and I'm very glad he did. He put alot of work and effort into that deck and it was great to see him win it all... even if it did mean not leaving until around 4:00 in the morning. He wants to drive, and my dirty look to him says it all. An hour later I pull us into some random quickie mart and we hang out there buying and heating up frozen foods with their terrible microwave. We get to Rhode Island around 5:00 and I offer Rich and Jaimie the chance to stay at my house, hoping they'd come with me to Disposable Heroes tomorrow. They choose not to and go home to Mass while I arrive at my house and sleep around 5:30 A.M.
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If you made it this far, I give you an honorary gold star. Welcome to part 2 of my report. This part is going to be a hell of alot quicker. 18 people showed up for Disposable Heroes T1 tourney on Sunday. They didn't get 30 people so the 1st prize ancestral had to be cut, but top 8 prize support was still fantastic. First prize was a box and a half and second prize was a box. You can't ask for much more for only $15 entry fee. Working on 4 hours of sleep, I revamped oshawa stompy and helped two of my friends, chris and greg van dijk, build their decks also. This was my revamped list:
4 Basking Rootwalla
4 Arrogant Wurm
4 hidden Gibbons
4 Survival of the Fittest
4 Squee, goblin nab00b
4 Wild Mongrel
4 Elvish Spirit Guides
3 Null Rod
3 Troll Ascetic
2 Viridian Zealot
1 Mox Emerald
1 Sol Ring
1 Black Lotus
4 Bazzar of Baghdad
4 Wasteland
1 Stripmine
12 Forest
SB:2 Naturalize
4 River Boa
2 Oxidize
3 Root maze
1 Null Rod
3 spike feeder
The changes were minor, but I was very happy with them. If i were to play the deck again, I would break down and cut the ascetics for 3 boas main. Possibly cut a squee for the 4th boa. Boas main are just a beating. I brought them in alot today...
since of the 18 people, six were control slavery. Yes, not meandeck. This is where I go back to my much earlier comments on Semenen's deck... none were here, and none made top 8 in Newington. I'm being a bit unfair in that Control slavery is much easier to build since it doesn't use workshops, but I still think that control slavery is just much more consistent.
Anyway- Round 1- Angelo with sui black. I've known angelo for a while, and he's a good player. He top 8'ed regionals a few years ago, something I only wish I could have done. Game 1 he sees my forest and cringes, saying this is a bad matchup for him. I tell him i don't know how the matchup test out, but apprently he was right. Both games he gets some discard on me but I just crush him despite it. An unchecked Bazzar just flat out wins this matchup. I told Angelo that I thought he'd be fine. It was only four rounds today, so I expected him to top 8 despite the first round loss. M: 1-0
Round 2 - Chris Van Dijk with control Slavery
I helped him build this, which is basically Rich's build down to the last card. These games were just blowouts, which is honestly how this matchup should be. Ostompy just obliterates control slavery. I was none too happy that I had to play both of my good friends who were in attendance so early in the tourney. M: 2-0
Round 3- Greg Van Dijk - Sligh
Sigh. He's a friend and I just hate playing friends. This matchup is 50/50, but in my favor after board. Especially since i added feeders. Both games he doesn't draw much land, which doesn't help when I strip and waste it away. M: 3-0
Round 4 - Chris just lost his last round, so he's 1-2. I tell him to stay in because he has a decent shot of coming in at 8th. He played me, I'm the only undefeated, so if he 2-2's and I 4-0, he's all set. This round I get Aaron Kerzner (Kerz), who I recently started chatting with alot. This is one funny kid. Nice guy too. Basically, I tell him I have to play it out because I want to help Chris get in. Since Kerz is in win, lose or draw, he offers to just concede. I accept. He was control slavery anyway, so I'm pretty sure I was going to win this round anyway. M: 4-0
Top 8 is announced and I'm in at first seed. Chris is 8th... so he is in fact but... he's playing 1st seed... :-/
Top 8 quarters- Chris Van Dijk /w control slavery
These games are basically identical to the earlier ones. He didn't draw as wel this match, so the games didn't last long. M: 5-0
Greg also made top 8, and just lost. At this point, angelo advanced to top 4 (he won all his matches after losing to me), as did 1 slavery and 1 tog.
I was feeling pretty good at this point, despite not having any sleep whatsoever. I had not dropped a game yet, and I figured that all three decks were good matchups for me... I figured wrong.
Top 8 Semis- Scott with Grow-a-tog.
I had not tested against the quirion dryad version, but I didn't think it would differ from the normal tog matchup. Basically, he destroyed me both games in fairly short order because he had quirion dryads AND togs. 1 giant threat I can get past, 2 I can't. That's why normal tog is much better for o stompy than this version... they only run 3 togs.
So I got half a box and promptly went to bed for the first time in close to 3 days. Angelo ended up beating Scott in the finals. Congrats to him.
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Thus ends my double report. I hope you enjoyed it. Time to sleep. Bye.
- David Feinstein
