StarCityGames - VA

[Zherbus]

Orlove won with Meandeck Oath.
Saucy made T8 with Meandeck Oath.
Smmenen made T8 with Meandeck Oath.
thecapn made T8 with Meandeck Oath.
Someone else got second with Titan/Juggernaut/Smokestack.dec

[Eastman]

How many in attendance?


How many played meandeck oath?

looks like said oath deck os pretty good eh?

[Zherbus]

There were 88 people, I think half the people playing Meandeck's Oath made T8.

[Razvan]

Congrats to everyone that played and did well.

So, is Meandeck Oath the precise same thing as everyone else's post-CHK Oath deck?

[jpmeyer]

Congrats to everyone that played and did well.

So, is Meandeck Oath the precise same thing as everyone else's post-CHK Oath deck?

There is only one thing to say here:

jpmeyer: oh man you are so reverting to the bd days
jpmeyer: HOLY SHIT
jpmeyer: 1 NEW CARD IN A DECK
jpmeyer: OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG
Smmenen: w/e
Smmenen: the deck is functionally different
Smmenen: with brainstorm
Smmenen: it is terrible without it
Smmenen: absolute garbage
Smmenen: so it is a huge advancement
Smmenen: and its all ME

[Sagath]

The Nostalgic value of playing Oath shocks me to my very core, and Ive had the deck built since orchard came out. In a 90 person field, the fact that 4 Oath decks made T8 definatly warrents discussion. Mind you this is only a one tournament exposure, but the fact remains, if these statistics keep up (ie: hate is lacking, which is probably why it did so well) then the deck is outpowering even Workship.dec. for t8 spots.

Should we be keeping an eye on this? Or as popularity increases, is it going to turn into dragon2 and fade away with the hate?

[Zherbus]

So, is Meandeck Oath the precise same thing as everyone else's post-CHK Oath deck?

No. For starters, it wasn't nonsense like 2 Colossus for the creature-base.

[Razvan]

So, is Meandeck Oath the precise same thing as everyone else's post-CHK Oath deck?

No. For starters, it wasn't nonsense like 2 Colossus for the creature-base.

So it's like everyone else's deck, just with inferior creatures?

ps: It's jokingly. Although I honestly don't see why Spirit or Akroma is better.

ps2: Welder. I didn't see that. Interesting.

ps3: Okay, I have fun talking to myself. Even welder isn't that fantastic, as it will only work once or twice...

[Toad]

ps: It's jokingly. Although I honestly don't see why Spirit or Akroma is better.

Goblin Welder?

Both die to STP anyways. And they can all be bounced back to your hand. Or Control Magic'ed. Or whatever. They die to the exact same removal.

Considering every deck uses fetchlands and/or Mana Crypt, Mana Vault, City of Brass, Akroma and Darksteel Colossus have the same clock. And Colossus is slower if you have been forced to use the Orchards several times before Oathing up something.

[Razvan]

Toad, I know, I was talking to myself a couple of times (it's sunday morning, still a bit hung over... I realized Welder's a problem, but it will only work once or twice on average)...

[Bulls on Parade]

Smmenen: the deck is functionally different
Smmenen: with brainstorm
Smmenen: it is terrible without it
Smmenen: absolute garbage
Smmenen: so it is a huge advancement
Smmenen: and its all ME

Wait, people were considering playing the deck without Brainstorm?
I've seen the list, and it's 3 cards off the very first list I threw together for the deck (Misdirection/ SotN for  Tinker, Colossus, Mystical). I really wasn't very impressed with it; that is, I am extremely confident in the archetype but I did not and do not think that list was near optimal. Do you honestly think this is the real deal and you've made a huge difference? Because I think there's almost definitely plenty of room for improvement as far as this surely viable archetype is concerned.

Edit: Well then, that's a different story. My mistake.

[Toad]

That comment was made about Workshop Slaver some while ago.

And I do run Oath without Brainstorms.

[Razvan]

That comment was made about Workshop Slaver some while ago.

And I do run Oath without Brainstorms.

So that your TMD Custom Name of "Crazy Frenchman" hold true?

I found it useful, for when you draw one of your kill conditions, and the second one just isn't able to punch through...

[Toad]

Brainstorm is not the only way to get rid of your drawn win conditions you know

I'm running Chalice of the Void and always aim at a Chalice for 1 as soon as possible anyways.

[Thug]

I cant imagine running Oath without Brainstorm, I would run 6 if I could. (But I would run 6 brainstorms in almost any type1 deck, so that doesn't really say much )

Are there any lists posted somewhere of such an Oath deck?

Koen

[Eastman]

Smmenen: the deck is functionally different
Smmenen: with brainstorm
Smmenen: it is terrible without it
Smmenen: absolute garbage
Smmenen: so it is a huge advancement
Smmenen: and its all ME

Wait, people were considering playing the deck without Brainstorm?
I've seen the list, and it's 3 cards off the very first list I threw together for the deck (Misdirection/ SotN for  Tinker, Colossus, Mystical).

Yah, he's talking about control slaver, and yes, he added brainstorm over a month after lists posted here from NE tournaments showed that we had.

[Kowal]

The full t8 looks like this:

Corey Canfield (Diaonic, 5/3) beats Andrew Probasco (BrassMan, three color Titan)
Jacob Orlove (derf, Oath) gets beaten by Stephen Menendian (Smmenen, Oath) but Smmenen scoops.
Justin Walters (Saucemaster, Oath) doesn't have to play Jason (TheCapn, Oath) because Jason scoops.
Jay Koffman (Stax with Seal of Cleansing) beats Eric Miller (The Man Show)

Jacob Orlove beats Corey Canfield with a first turn Pristine Angel hardcast game three.
Jay Koffman applies the hurt on Saucemaster because Seal of Cleansing > this tournament.

Jacob beats Jay in the finals.  Coverage to go up on SCG sometime soon.

The field was, I believe, 80 players, not 88.

[Machinus]

Damn you meandeck! I was planning a dominating breakout performance at the next  local tourney with orchards, and now all the scrubs are going to be packing the hate. Damn you I say!

Also, congratulations on the awesome finishes! I can't wait to talk about Oath.

[Saucemaster]

Considering every deck uses fetchlands and/or Mana Crypt, Mana Vault, City of Brass, Akroma and Darksteel Colossus have the same clock. And Colossus is slower if you have been forced to use the Orchards several times before Oathing up something.

And considering that when you're swinging you normally have an active Orchard/Oath and that, as Toad pointed out above, people usually find a way to do 3-4 damage to themselves in the first two or three turns anyway, Akroma + Spirit is frequently a turn faster than Colossus.  Akroma + Spirit = 18 damage dealt on the second turn after you land Oath.  Colossus = 12 damage at the same point in time.  Plus, blocking is actually useful sometimes, even in Type 1.  Sometimes.  Okay, so that's a minor point.

[Grand Inquisitor]

Congrats to meandeck for absolutely murdering this tournament.

Can anyone comment on why people were scooping to each other in the T8?

[Saucemaster]

Well as far as Jason scooping to me:

1) The mirror is STUPID.  It's painful.  

2) Jason was tired, and in his words: "I just won a Mox.  I want to go get drunk now.  I'm conceding."

3) We decided well beforehand that this tournament should be about the team, and not any one individual, so if paired against each other in the T8, we were to scoop to whoever had a better chance of taking the whole thing.  I'm not sure I had a better chance than Jason, but I think he felt like his heart wasn't in it, and I wanted it more, so I'd be more likely to win the next round.

[Smmenen]

The most important thing for me is that our team do well.

Here is why I scooped to Jacob despite 2-1ing him.  In game three of our match, my hand was:
Orchard, Wasteland, Strip, Wasteland, Brainstorm, Mana Drain, Oath and I drew Lotus off the top.  I went Lotus, Orchard, Oath, Brainstorm and won quite handily.  His double Orcard got murdered.  I am the biggest mizor in the Oath mirror.

In the swiss, Kevin Cron (my main man) and Jacob were in the X-0-2 bracket and they played.  Jacob had slightly better tiebreakers so Kevin scooped to him.  

Then in Round 7 Aaron LeKarz scooped to him despite them going to time.  

Kevin and Aaron had already invested in Jacob and if Jacob got more prizes he could pay them back more easily.  Additionally, we had talked about this earlier that we would split prizes ahead of time in certain limited circumstances.  

The only thing I asked from Jacob was that he knew how to beat 5/3.  He seemed to think that I would do better than him, which I admitted I had more experience against it since we specifically tested against it - but the important question for me was: will you win?  The only thing that was important to me was a victory for meandeck.  He said yes and I beleived him so I scooped because two long hard rounds of 5/3 were ahead that I could enjoy with much less stress and he could win more products to pay off the scoopage that Kevin and Aaron gave him to get him there.

[Mykeatog]

So-- East and Myself were gonna show up, but the thing was..

we were under the assumption that people were going to be playing magic.

Sad that this tournament doesn't really have a winner.

[Smmenen]

That's a ridiculous thing to say.  Especially from you Mykatog.   I'm dissapointed.

[rozetta]

This thread is currently quite confusing. We have a discussion and mini play reports about "MeanDeath Oak" with no list to even refer to. Also, people are alluding to the fact that it's pretty similar to the Orchard/Oath decks that have been popping up in various threads on here for a good while. So is it something completely new or is it one of those decks with a couple of card changes and the "MeanDeath stamp of approval"?

For us who don't have the list, there are a lot of questions. Does it have a "Keeper" style answer base or is it more mono-U control style? I guess it runs Akroma or SotN and Pristine Angel (probably in sideboard).

Detective work is fun and all, but the feeling that the whole world is talking about something that you don't know about can also be a little frustrating. I know that a lot of stuff is discussed on irc, but I was out of computer access over the weekend and missed out on it.

I hope I didn't come over too whiney. I realize that you might just be waiting for SCG to post the coverage article and hence the decklists, in which case that's okay, but I just thought that a decklist might put some needed context to the discussion. I'm sure I'm not the only one thinking this.

Admittedly, I think most teams saw some potential in Orchard/Oath which is why the public discussion threads on here died down a while ago. Nice to see that it actually turned out to be as strong as it looked. Good work at the tournament! I think this has the possibility of causing a significant metagame shift.

[BlkXplsn]

What disappoints me so much here was the amount of scooping done.

[Dante]

steve posted his list in irc last night after being harrassed for it immediately.

it was 4x brainstorm, fow, manadrain, mana leak, oath. AK, intuition.  2 x impulse, mis-d.  1x ancestral, timewalk, blessing, Sotn, akroma.  37 spells

4 orchard 1 trop, 4 fetch, 5 islands, 3 strips, 5 mox, 1 lotus.

or something like that, within 1 card.

[jpmeyer]

And the list was posted on the Star City boards.

[The M.E.T.H.O.D]

I don't see what the big problem is with the scooping.

They proved they deserved to win, they got pass swiss

They proved that there deck works, 4x of them in t8

They proved that there team is good, 4x of them in t8

TEAMMATES can choose to do whatever they want.  According to what steve said they did what was best for the team.

I don't know what the big deal is, they didn't pressure anyone in t8 who wasn't on the team to concede or anything.

Where's the beef? I just don't see it.

[matt_v]

This thread is currently quite confusing. We have a discussion and mini play reports about "MeanDeath Oak" with no list to even refer to. Also, people are alluding to the fact that it's pretty similar to the Orchard/Oath decks that have been popping up in various threads on here for a good while. So is it something completely new or is it one of those decks with a couple of card changes and the "MeanDeath stamp of approval"?

For us who don't have the list, there are a lot of questions. Does it have a "Keeper" style answer base or is it more mono-U control style? I guess it runs Akroma or SotN and Pristine Angel (probably in sideboard).

Detective work is fun and all, but the feeling that the whole world is talking about something that you don't know about can also be a little frustrating. I know that a lot of stuff is discussed on irc, but I was out of computer access over the weekend and missed out on it.

I hope I didn't come over too whiney. I realize that you might just be waiting for SCG to post the coverage article and hence the decklists, in which case that's okay, but I just thought that a decklist might put some needed context to the discussion. I'm sure I'm not the only one thinking this.

Admittedly, I think most teams saw some potential in Orchard/Oath which is why the public discussion threads on here died down a while ago. Nice to see that it actually turned out to be as strong as it looked. Good work at the tournament! I think this has the possibility of causing a significant metagame shift.

We will have the top 8 decklists on the Star City Games website tomorrow.

-Matt