Block Party

[Byron]

This past Saturday, I played at a Magic card tournament. It was a "Block Party" tournament, meaning you could play any deck composed of cards from a single expansion set... excluding banned cards (more on this later.)

Before I get into the event, let me share my preparation with you guys. Odyssey block U/G Madness was my top choice with Urza's block Accelerated Blue being my second, courtesy of Hi-Val http://www.themanadrain.com/index.php?topic=30700.0 thanks Hi-Val. Anyways here were my 2 choices:

Odyssey U/G Madness 1.3
Mana
12 Island
10 Forsest
2 Tarnished Citadel

Creatures
4 Basing Rootwalla
4 Wild Mongrel
4 Aquamoeba
4 Arrogant Wurm
4 Roar of the Wurm
3 Wonder

Card Manipulation
3 Quiet Speculation
2 Deep Analysis
4 Careful Study

Counters
4 Circular Logic

Sideboard
4 StupifyingTouch
3 Turbulent Dreams
3 Ray of Revelation
2 Deep Analysis
1 Krosan Reclamation
1 Quiet Speculation
1 Wonder

The SB Wonder was there for Skies/Waters.

Urza's Accelerated Blue 1.2

Spells
3 Masticore
3 Morphling
4 Power Sink
4 Grim Monolith
4 Miscalculation
4 Powder Keg
4 Stroke of Genius
4 Rewind
4 Treachery

Land
18 Island
4 Remote Isle
4 Blasted Landscape

Sideboard
4 Hibernation
3 Palinchron
3 Douse
2 Annul
2 Scrying Glass
1 Masticore

Hibernation was there for my U/G Madness' Wurms and Mongrels. Palinchron was there for Odyssey block Mono Black Control (Innocent Blood, Chainers Edit, etc.) I decided on U/G Madness as it was more consistent and heck, it's good enough to win a legacy tournament. Accelerated Blue can't say that!

There was a modest turnout (6 players) and I eventually discovered what all of them were playing except for one random dude. On with the tourney:

In Round 1, I play my toughest match of the day: Some Urza's U/B 187 Bounce deck. He stole my creatures with Gilded Drake and Snapped them back to his his hand. It looked pretty janky but it worked to an extent (except for his Cloud of Faries, they were straight up awful, lol.) I won game 1 due to attrition b/c of the brokeness Quiet Speculation, Roar of the Wurm, and Deep Analysis while his combo only showed up some of the time. I boarded out 1 Wonder, 1 Quiet Speculation and 1 Deep Analysis for 3 Turbulent Dreams to deal with Gilded Drake. I notice that he sideboards a lot so i'm kind of worried... In game 2 he plays a Bone Shredder! And bounces that to his hand several times. But he stops drawing Snaps or Bone Shredders and all of his 4 lands are too tied up cycling with some Urza block blue enchantment for him to keep up with my tempo. He did Eradicate my Basking Rootwalla and Quash my Circular Logic but it wasn't enough. Also I never drew my Turbulent Dreams and I never saw a Gilded Drake.

After the match he told me he considered playing U/G Madness but he didn't have a sideboard for it, unlike his U/B 187 deck. He then showed his his "U/G Madness" but it was actually more of a U/G Threshold that didn't run Nimble Mongoose for some reason.

games: 2-0
matches: 1-0

In round 2, I play an underpowered Mirage Sligh deck. Suq Ata Lancer and Lava Hounds were the only decent creatures in his deck. I even Circular Logiced his 4th turn Lava Hounds to prevent him from taking 4 damage. See how nice I am After winning game 1, I didn't sideboard. In the second game I kept attacking with with early drops until he played a Bloodrock Cyclops. That's the only turn I didn't attack since it wasn't worth trading when I was winning the damage race and all he had was a 3/3 that had to attack. Next turn he played a hasty Talruum Minotaur as a blocker so I decided to run him over with all my guys and finish him off, no problem.

games: 2-0
matches: 2-0

So now i'm in the finals and I know from the ending of the previous round that my opponent was playing Cursed Scroll, a card that is banned from Tempest block. I inform him that according to the official DCI rules, his deck is illegal and give him the option of taking them out and either playing a 56 card deck or presideboarding against me. Well this fool refuses my offer and insists on playing with the illegal cards or not playing at all. So I call the judge over. They look up the Block Format Deck Construction rules online and rule in my favor. So basically i'm right and he's wrong and his comeback is "You must really want to win." Yeah, I wanted to win so much, I added banned cards to my deck! Stupid hypocrite. So he forefeits and I win the tournament. Personally I feel that if he were any kind of man, he'd play against me anyway, admit he was wrong and apologize to everyone he beat that day because he cheated against them all.

games: 2-0 (obviously b/c he wouldn't play me)
matches: 3-0

The cheater ran a Tempest Mono-White Weenie deck. Another guy ran Urza's Stompy. I didn't get to see what the last person ran but I guess it didn't matter as he didn't place high enough to play me anyways.

[Dante]

I moved this to the Casual Forum because the Tournament Report forum is for competitive Vintage reports, not other formats.  Thanks!

Dante

[49 Cents]

Didn't anybody play Glare? Glare, Hierarch, etc look really good.

[Hi-Val]

Accelerated blue would have OWNED! Congrats on your win in any case!

And AB houses Glare so hard. Confiscate much? : D

[Jacob Orlove]

Is 4 Necro 4 Ritual 4 Consult somehow illegal in this format? Because that seems like a pretty good foundation for a deck. You even have painlands to splash Incinerate and Brainstorm.

[Byron]

Forgive me but I haven't played Magic in 3 years so I don't know what Glare is.

Accel Blue was decent after sideboarding and would have been better in my first match against the Gilded Drake/Bone Shredder bounce deck but when I solo tested them against each other, U/G Madness won more games. Plus I figured in an unknown enviornment, it's better to play an aggressive deck anyways.

Someone suggested a Necro deck in the link I posted in my report but 1) I didn't have the cards and 2) The lists (support cards) looked awful to me. Someone at the tournament even suggested Bargain but I don't think pure Urza block has the support cards for it...

I guess the bottom line was I wanted to play a block deck that I know was battle tested and proven, plus the fact that I have much more experience with U/G Madness than with any other block deck practically made the decision for me (although I admit I considered switching to Accel Blue.)

[andrewpate]

I don't see any reason why Sabre Bargain couldn't be made to do some nasty things in Block Wars.  Voltaic Key is banned, which is going to slow you down, but you can still sacrifice Academy Rector on turn 3.  Think about this:

Turn 1:  Swamp, Duress, go.
Turn 2:  Plains, Dark Ritual, Academy Rector, go.  (Rector is on Moat duty.)
Turn 3:  Phyrexian Tower, sac Rector (BB), Bargain, draw 19, Ritual (BBBB), Grim Monolith and tap (3BB), Swamp, tap out (3BBBBW), Skirge Familiar (BBW), pitch 5 cards (BBBBBBBW), Soul Feast (BBW), draw 4 more, pitch 5 and Soul Feast again, draw 4 more (still BBW), cast Yawgmoth's Will, pitch a card, Ritual, Ritual (BBBBB), Soul Feast from the yard, pitch 5 and Soul Feast from the yard.  Draw 8 more, pitch 5, Soul Feast for the win.

I don't know if that's the best deck, but I'm fairly certain that it's a good deck.  The accelerated blue deck probably beats it because it doesn't have the Standard version's lifegain and additional fast mana.  Still, I think it has some good game overall.

Congrats on the win, btw.  Too bad that last guy was such a tool about it.

P.S.  Glare is a deck from Ravnica Block based on the card Glare of Subdual and token generators like Selesnya Guildmage and Vitu-Ghazi, the City Tree.  It runs efficient drops like Watchwolf and Loxodon Hierarch and basically acts as a beatdown deck extremely good at beating other beatdown decks.

[Chill79]

if i would play block party it would be some kind of urza block tinker...

4*Tinker
4*Mishra's Helix
4*Grim Monolith
4*Metalworker
4*Phyrexian Processor
4*Masticore
4*Dark Ritual
....