Swiss Army Knife and My Little Pony: Oathing up Good Creatures in Type One.
A StarCityGames Power Nine Tournament Report
In the weeks leading up to the StarCityGames Power Nine Tournament (SCG VA), I was struggling to find a decklist that I felt confident about. Worse Than Fish won me a box of Kamigawa boosters in early September, but with three match losses to Control Slaver that day, I started to have doubts about the power of Null Rod in Type One. My unspectacular performance at the TMD Champs in Endicott convinced me that it was time to find a new deck. I tried a Control Slaver variant at the $10 Hadley tournament, but the deck just didn't gel for me. A 4-2 record with Stax the next day at Somers reminded me why I stopped playing workshop prison in the first place: it depends too heavily on the die roll and on getting good draws. I did not want to put my luck to the test in seven or more rounds.
The small obstacle of not having a deck wasn't going to stop me from attending SCG VA, though. I finished up my work thursday morning, and waited around for Corey (Diaonic) to arrive with Ben (Kowal) and Ben (Not Kowal). They show up two hours late (one instead of eleven), because they stopped to get lunch. I hop in the car with my sleeping bag, some clothes, and all the playable cards I own. The ride down to Virginia takes forever, and we arrive at "Super Josh's" (Sliverking's) house after midnight. Josh goes to sleep, but Marc Perez (PhantomTapeWorm himself) shows up. We poke around Josh's amazing house, which has an amazing home theater with a gigantic TV, sound system, and couches. He also has a pool room (with foosball too), a fully stocked bar, and like 10,000 extra rooms. If you ever get the chance to attend pre- or post-event parties there, you shouldn't pass it up. I go to sleep around 3, but apparently Marc and Kowal stay up until like 6 or 7 talking about videogames and other randomness.
On friday, we all wake up around 11, and basically sit around the house playing Type 4 and talking about the metagame while waiting for more people to show up for dinner. I start to think that I should probably play metagamed 5/3 the next day, tweaked for the mirror. Everyone is anticipating a lot of combo, because of Smmenen's latest article series on MeanDeath, but I figure if enough other people are playing shops, I can probably cut some combo hate for some workshop hate. Justin (Saucemaster) shows up, having taken the train down from Philly. With a meandecker now in attendance, the conversation shifts, but at that point, I just start playing T4 continuously. It's so much fun. Shane (Triple_S) arrives at some point and we switch from Kowal's deck to his.
Eventually, Meandeck shows up in force. Steve Menendian (Smmenen), Doug (hi_val), Jason (thecapn), Kevin Cron (CH41N5), Rian (Kirdape), and Joe Bushman pile out of the "BushManVan" and into the house. Some other people show up, but I lose track of who is who. Josh grills up some burgers and then we watch some alien movie with Christopher Walken that apparently scarred PTW for life. Then, Shortbus unveils "the cake". Pictures can be found
here. Then, Meandeck takes over the pool room to build their decks and such, so I decide to go to sleep. Marc is apparently getting up at 8, so I ask him to wake me up when he gets up. I get to sleep at about 2, and wake up to Marc's alarm at 8 (he and Kowal also crashed on the couches in the TV room). Marc and Kowal are both out, since they apparently decided to stay up really late again. I take a shower and get dressed, but everyone from my car is still sleeping. Doug asks me if I want to ride with Meandeck to go get breakfast, so I accept.
On the way, they talk about SB tech for the deck they're playing at the event, just as Shortbus did the afternoon before. They're playing some kind of oath build, and agree to share the list with me on one condition: I have to be their teammate for the event. If it's in the team's interest for me to draw or scoop, I'll do that, and they'll do the same for me. Since this is a win-win situation for everyone involved, I agree.
As an aside, they discussed this over the phone with Zherbus and Carl later in the day, and on their boards today, and agreed to invite me onto the team permanently--an invitation I accepted.
As an additional aside, I'd like to take a moment to apologize to Team Short Bus. It was neither my nor Meandeck's intention to cause such an appearance of impropriety, and I am sorry that the situation ended up looking as bad as it did.
So anyway, Meandeck hands me this list:
MeanDeck Oath:
4 Intuition
4 Accumulated Knowledge
4 Brainstorm
2 Impulse
4 Force of Will
4 Mana Drain
4 Mana Leak
2 Misdirection
4 Oath of Druids
1 Akroma, Angel of Wrath
1 Spirit of the Night
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Time Walk
1 Gaea's Blessing
4 Forbidden Orchard
1 Tropical Island
4 Flooded Strand
5 Island
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Pearl
1 Black Lotus
1 Strip Mine
2 Wasteland
Sideboard:
3 Ground Seal
3 Energy Flux
2 Back to Basics
2 Control Magic
2 Arcane Laboratory
1 Platinum Angel
1 Iridescent Angel
1 Pristine Angel
Once they explained the brilliant creature base to me, I was sold. Going over sideboarding strategies in the car just reinforced how good this deck was going to be for the SCG VA metagame.
We got breakfast at a grocery store and then headed over to the event, where I had to throw Oath together. Luckily, I had all my cards with me, so it was just a matter of finding the creatures. I borrowed a Platinum and an Iridescent, but I had to buy a Pristine. I had Doug make me proxies of Spirit and Akroma, which gave this report its title:
Then we registered and waited for the event to start.
Round 1: Richard with GAT
Game 1, I have Orchard as my only colored source, so by the time I force Oath onto the table, he has 4 spirit tokens and a 1/1 dryad on the board. He attacks, putting me at 11, and plays another dryad. I oath up Spirit and attack, putting him at 13. He plays no spells and swings in for 6: I go to 5. I oath up Akroma, and attack with just her. He draws, and plays something to pump the dryads, but I block them both and drop to 1, then swing in for the win.
Game 2, I give him an early spirit token, and drop Oath, but he has double Naturalize, and I don't have enough free counters. He strips my Orchard and starts the 1/1 beatdown. I eventually find another Oath and force it onto the table. His life total goes 20-14-8-2-lose, but he did get me down to 8 by the end.
Round 2: Chris with mono-b Land Destruction
Game 1, I oath up an early Akroma, Misdirect his edict, and win.
Game 2, I mulligan into Duress and he gets Necro on the table. He goes to one life, but can't find any threats and scoops.
Round 3: Shane (triple_s) with 5/3
Game 1, I win the match roll, and mulligan into Orchard, Mox, Oath.
Game 2, he mulligans into turn 1 Trinisphere.
Game 3, I mulligan into an early Oath, but I have no Orchard. He has Trinisphere and Crucible/Waste, but no threats. He has 8 mana on the table, but taps 3 for some card, leaving 5 open. I finally draw an Orchard, drop it, and play the Time Walk that I'm holding. He casts Thirst for Knowledge, and discards the Lava Dart he drew, but doesn't have the mana to flash it back under Trinisphere. He just wastes Orchard. I take my next turn and Oath up Spirit. He goes to 14. He untaps, attacks for 1 (putting me at 18), and Darts the token. I swing, putting him at 8. He takes his turn and Oaths. He flips over the top card of his library: a Duplicant. Dupe eats Spirit, and he hardcasts a Titan to destroy my ability to play spells. I Oath up Akroma and put him at 2. He untaps, and looks at his board for several minutes. He swings, putting me at 6, but it's not enough. He scoops.
Round 4: Justin (Saucemaster) with the mirror
Justin had just beat Rian in the mirror, so he knew just how bad it was. Rather than play a match that basically amounts to a coinflip, we decide it's safe to ID.
Round 5: Scott with 4cC
Game 1: I Oath up an early Akroma, but he forces through Swords a couple turns later. I have Spirit and Blessing in hand, and it takes me forever to get a brainstorm, because I used one and pitched one to force. Eventually, I find one, and get Spirit of the Night out, but thanks to 3 spirits beating down and an Exalted Angel, I can't attack effectively. I draw a ridiculous amount of cards, but he gets a decree and kills me. I should have just scooped much earlier just for time. I win the next game easily with a Pristine Angel. Game 3, I have to go find an Oath, and by the time I get an Angel on the table, we're in extra turns. I needed to find Time Walk two more times, but AKs give me nothing. The match ends in a draw.
Round 6: Kevin Cron (CH41N5) with the mirror
Kevin is 4-0-2 after going to time in the first two rounds, but we don't want to play this mirror out. He decides to scoop.
Round 7: Aaron LeKarz with TPS
Game 1: I have Orchard as my only colored mana for several turns, and he quickly amasses an army of 1/1s. Neither of us can get our gameplan going quickly enough, so he just runs me over with tokens. We talk a bit during the game about how terrible a draw would be, and observe that one player might as well scoop, because that's really no worse than a draw.
Game 2: I get out an early Arcane Lab, and counter a bunch of his attempts to set anything up. He finally gets Echoing Truth and plays a Jar, but it doesn't get him any gas. Akroma shows up, and he scoops to my handful of counters. This game took forever.
Game 3: We're running low on time. He takes a lot of damage from Vault and Crypt, since I countered his draw, but we hit extra turns. I get out Orchard/Oath on turn 3, but he's at 9. He then wins the flip, and I can't kill him. He asks me if I want to scoop, and I tell him that Kevin just scooped to me, so I really can't. We're surrounded by no less than five judges, so there's no risk of anything illegal happening. He asks a couple more times, but I tell him that I can't let Meandeck down like that. Then he takes the match result slip and writes 2-1 on it. It was a classy move on his part, and three or four people say as much. He gets invited (again) to the party that night at Josh's, and some Meandeckers later offer to put him up at Chicago, since he didn't yet have anywhere there to stay.
So, the top 8 is me, two people with regular 5/3: Corey and Eric Miller (I think), one person with a techy 5/3 build (Jay), Andy (BrassMan) with Meandeck Titan, and three Meandeckers with Oath: Justin, Jason (thecapn), and Smmenen. The top 8 pairings go up, and it's two oath mirrors. I'm playing Smmenen.
Game 1, his life total goes 20, 14, 2, lose. Game 2, he gets orchard advantage and wins. Game 3, he gets a ridiculous Orchard advantage, but I hardcast Platinum Angel. My plan is to eventually get artifact mana and hardcast an unblockable angel, while fending off his control magics on my Plats. We hit extra turns, though, and find out that it's sudden death--highest life total wins. I extend my hand, but Steve wanted me to win. Fortunately, the winner won't have to meet the other oath winner in the next round. At this point, we know that 5/3 beat MeanTitan in our bracket, and Steve asks me if I can beat it: he just wants two Meandeckers in the finals. I tell him "I think I can beat it", but he says that's not good enough. I tell him that I think he'd do better than I would, but he says that's not the point. I realize that I have to tell him that I can beat 5/3. I can't just say it, though--it has to be
true. I start to say "I think...", but stop. I collect myself and say "Yes. I can beat 5/3." That was
hard to say, but it was an amazing boost to my game. I owe him, not just for scooping, but for forcing me to believe in myself completely. That was crucial for my next two matches.
Here's Steve's summary
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.
Top 4: Corey (diaonic) with 5/3.
As we're sitting down, he tells me that I'm going to lose, but it's impossible to mess with me at this point. I tell him there are too many people counting on me for me to lose.
Game 1, I counter some early stuff, and he's left with a bunch of mana. he goes for a Titan, but I drain with 3 islands and a jet on the table. I untap, Brainstorm to get rid of Misdirection and Spirit, Intuition for AKs (6 floating), AK for three (5 floating), play Mox Emerald, Oath (4 floating), play Orchard, AK, and burn for 3. Then he loses.
Game 2, I keep a no land hand with like double force, brainstorm, mox, time walk and lotus. I brainstorm into no land, and proceed to eventually see 17 cards before I get a single land. He gets Trinisphere, Chalice for 2, Crucible, and all the rest, and while I finally get the mana for Energy Flux, I then topdeck Back to Basics after losing my mox. Three turns later, he draws Juggernaut, which I can't stop because Chalice is still on the board, since I never saw land #3.
Game 3, I look at my opening hand of Island, Mox Sapphire, Mox Emerald, Black Lotus, Mana Leak, Accumulated Knowledge, and Pristine Angel, and my mind just boggles for a second. I call Steve over, but he's busy with Type 4. I drop the turn 1 Pristine, and Corey does a double take. His hand apparently had Ancestral, Walk, Trinisphere and more, but his deck just can't beat Pristine with a few instants to back her up. Because I'm an unnecessary miser, I drop Orchard, Oath on turn 3, but he wastes the Orchard. It's okay, because turn 4 I topdeck Time Walk for the win. This game was definitely my most ridiculous of the entire event, beating even the game where my opponent Necro'd to 1 and scooped.
So now I'm in the finals with Jay. Kowal has us move to the end of the table so he can do coverage, which is apparently going up tomorrow. For now, I'll just provide a brief overview of the match.
Game 1: I win the match roll to start us off, and drop Orchard, Oath early. On his turn, he plays a Seal of Cleansing. I turn to the judges watching the match and ask "Is that main deck?" It is, and I have no counter. I draw some cards and get a second Oath down. The first card I flip over is Akroma, who goes all the way (as usual, a wasteland kept Orchard from tapping twice).
Game 2: I have to keep a hand that's like island, fetch, mox, mana leak, mana drain, intuition, ak. He thought about his opening hand for a while, so I felt kind of safe, but he drops a turn 1 trinisphere and I just can't find any more land. I think 24 mana would have been optimal. He locks me down with Smokestack, Trinisphere, and Chalice for 2, and drops a Juggernaut that will kill me before I could ever play spells. I scoop.
Game 3, my opening hand is double force, ancestral, three other blue cards, and mox pearl. I mulligan, and comment that I've already mulliganed into orchard, mox, oath twice, and that it'd be nice to get that again. I count my six cards twice, and pick them up to see Flooded Strand, Forbidden Orchard, Mox Jet, Mox Ruby, Intuition, and Force of Will. How good! I play fetch, mox, mox. He plays a city of brass and passes. End of turn, I crack the fetch and intution for Oaths. I topdeck Back to Basics, and drop Orchard and Oath. Jay plays another City, and tries for a Seal, but I Force. On my turn, some cards go to the graveyard, and Akroma comes into play. I draw an Island, but it doesn't matter. Jay goes to 12. On his turn, he plays a second Seal (he was holding two), but he just can't stop the angel, and I win the StarCityGames Power Nine Tournament II.
They put down all the power cards while I'm writing up some quick notes from the finals, so I reach over and snag the lotus. Seven cards get picked in some order, and then I get the Twister. Some pictures are taken, I shake hands with a bunch of people, and everyone starts to trickle out of the room. I go up to Aaron LeKarz, and give him a Mana Drain. This is becoming a habit. Later, he tells me that I shouldn't feel guilty about him conceeding, but I reply that he shouldn't feel guilty about the drain, because I gave it to him for the same reasons that he decided to scoop: it was just the honorable thing to do. Finally, it's just me, Bleiweiss and Pete, Forsythe (who played some combo oath build to a mediocre record), Smmenen, Kevin, and a few other people. We talk to Forsythe a bit about T1, and walk out. Smmenen and Kevin go back to talk to him some more, so we wait a bit, and then leave the building. All the doors to the parking garage are locked, so we have to walk around to the car entrance and walk there.
So we drive back, with Aaron LeKarz following us. At one point we hit a giant bump in the road, and everyone in the van gets lifted like an inch off our seats. Bushman quickly asks "did we just hit a kid?!?" and everyone busts out laughing.
So we arrive back at Josh's house and there is much drinking and burder eating. I get into a Type 4 game with Knutson and some others, but Andy and Doug decide to team up and kill me. A ton of great stuff happens, like me inventing "super chaos awesome ball", which is like pool, except completely different. Kevin reads to a group from the Real Ultimate Power ninja handbook, which made it like five times funnier than normal. I installed IRC on the computer in Josh's guest room, and various people go on at different times.
To get an idea of just how drunk Marc got that night, check out this irc convo. that I had to copy and email to myself for posterity (I had set the irc nick to joshparty after installing mIRC so that anyone could sit down and start talking):
From: Jacob Orlove <
j_orlove@hotmail.com>
To:
j_orlove@hotmail.comDate: Sat, 23 Oct 2004 23:39:12 -0700
Subject: perez drunk
<joshparty> hihhiihhihihi
<joshparty> i am assholamane
<Ephraim> Well now, and here I thought this place as dull.
<joshparty> i like bosy
<joshparty> boys
<joshparty> anus
<joshparty> eat it
<Ephraim> But since it's been graced with the presence of assholamane...
<joshparty> wnt t make dse
<joshparty> xerx
<joshparty> sex
<joshparty> how bout we are the anssnsus sexxo?
<Ephraim> Nah, never mind. It's still dull.
<joshparty> i love you
<joshparty> ephran
<joshparty> hiihihhiihhi'
<joshparty> ?
<Ephraim> I feel nothing for you whatsoever. You bore me.
<joshparty> whant to make me pleafure
<joshparty> ?
<joshparty> asl?
<Ephraim> bored/bored/bored
<joshparty> m/22/va
<joshparty> nopes
<joshparty> awant to the gay?
<joshparty> anyone
<joshparty> ?
<Ephraim> and your asl may as well be boring/boring/boring
<joshparty> maybe xservux:?
<joshparty> xzerubru
<joshparty> zerbus
<joshparty> gay?
<joshparty> saix
<joshparty> ?
<joshparty> mabye
<joshparty> nopes
<joshparty> gg
<joshparty> my name is clergy en vec
<joshparty> i am the blow job
<Nitelite2> shutup
<joshparty> on the guy from anssu
<Ephraim> Your name is Boris McBoring
<Ephraim> The only thing entertaining about you is telling you how boring you are.
<Ephraim> And that's starting to bore me.
<joshparty> i love you
<Ephraim> Whatever
There's a lot more to be said about the party, but most of it can be found in
the picture thread. So anyway, I go to sleep at like 3 am, but Kowal wakes me up at 5:30 so we can be back in time for him to do all the work he needs to hand in monday. How lame. It takes us forever to get out of Richmond, because we keep using the GPS to find roads that go over or under 95. Eventually, we're out, and I have to keep two drivers awake for many, many hours. Corey and I actually have a great conversation for a whole bunch of hours, while both Bens are dead asleep in the back of the car. Kowal stays asleep, but the other Ben takes over the driving, and I have to help him navigate through New York City. I get an hour of sleep around 1:30, and we finally arrive at Brandeis around 5. I get some of my cards back from Kowal, and go back to my room to take a shower and unpack. I try to start my report, but I'm distracted by coverage. I go to sleep at like 8:50 and get up a little after 9. I make it to my 10:00 midterm with some time to spare, and do fine. Then I spend this afternoon and evening surfing the internet and writing this report.
