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moxpearl
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« on: April 16, 2007, 10:09:24 pm » |
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And now for something completely different…
The Twin Cities, Minnesota. Currently, home of the jankiest metagame, where you can expect the unexpected. Why not try to revive a little known outdated deck and have some fun with Sundering Titan, one of my favorite vintage creatures (2nd to Auriok Salvagers, of course!) 18 people showed up at the Monster Den for the monthly vintage tournament. 25 were needed for the ancestral, so we were playing for $225 cash instead.
A year ago, I could always count on the usual suspects -- gifts, slaver, tps, 5c stax, uba stax, and oath, with tier 1 decks showing up at the top tables. However, this year, the metagame at the Monster Den has been chock full of random and hate decks. The past few months have had SS with leaks and no erayo, enchantress, a 5c stax deck with bobs, karn, and smokeys, counterbalance control, a myriad of TMWA types, illusionary mask, and tons of fish of all varieties. Even the standard decks are odd, such as an oath deck packing colossi and dragon’s breath.
With my newly acquired bazaars, I wanted to try Dragon. WGDX seemed like a great choice, but with all the swords, stifles, crypts, and extripates, I didn’t think it was viable. However, if not Dragon, why not Sundering Titan? He is so much fun to get into play. Swords? Sure, lose three lands. Stifle? Sure, take on a 7/10 beater and lose lands when you get rid of him. Crypt the grave? I’ve got more toys to animate. What’s the fastest deck that gets 7/10 into play? Cerebral Assassin.
Competitive? Maybe not, but it looked extremely fun. So, I sleeved it up, tested it, made some changes, and decided to give it a try.
Monster Den Cerebral Assassin:
4 city of brass
4 gemstone mine
1 underground river
1 shivan reef
4 bazaar
1 academy
1 vault of whisper
5 moxen
1 black lotus
1 lotus petal
1 mana crypt
1 sol ring
1 worldgorger dragon
2 7/10
1 eternal witness
1 triskelion
4 goblin welder
2 squee, goblin nabob
3 animate dead
2 reanimate
1 vampiric tutor
1 demonic tutor
1 yawgmoth’s will
4 duress
1 entomb
1 ancestral recall
1 time walk
1 tinker
3 intuition
2 careful study
2 deep analysis
1 echoing truth
SB:
1 sulfurous springs
1 duplicant
1 razormane masticore
1 darkblast
2 tormod’s crypt
1 foil possessed portal (I don't normally play foil, but this one is so cool looking)
1 red elemental blast
1 pyroblast
1 balance
2 Shattering Spree
3 Ray of Revelation
Main changes from the lists I’ve seen :
Squees – just 2 instead of 3 or 4. Squee is a slow draw engine with today’s fast paced decks. However, this legend still helps offset all the card disadvantage discarding. Squee is also helpful with SB Possessed Portal and Razormane.
2 Deep Analysis –DA is a faster draw than squee, though against fish decks, the -3 life hurts. Intuition for 2 DA and 7/10 is a popular pile. Why not 4 DA and no squee? The flashback life loss along with cities and painlands eat away at your life very fast. I settled on a mix of 2 squee and 2 DA.
4 Duress – I’ve seen some lists with Force of Will or Xantid Swarms. There’s not enough blue to pitch for force and the deck already has too much card disadvantage. The Xantids can be slow and cannot stop combo (which is the deck’s worst match-up.)
Artifact Toys – I’ve seen Platinum Angel, Duplicant, and Possessed Portal in the main deck, but I chose to leave them in the SB. There is so little room in this deck, so 7/10 had to shoulder most of the burden of winning.
Careful Study – I tested Read the Runes, but the mana cost was too much. Since there are less instant tricks, Study for U usually equals RTR for U2, so RTR is only better when you have 3 extra mana sitting around. I’ve also seen Thirst for Knowledge, but three mana is tough to get in a wasteland heavy environment.
This tournament was full of fish. Bob fish. Disk Fish. Counterbalance Fish. RWB Fish (tmwa.) And there were a few variations of gifts, combo, and oath decks. The dust settled after four rounds, and the Top 8 contained UWB fish, UB fish with mesmeric fiend, UW fish deck, ETW gifts, Slaver gifts, 5C-Bob Stax, and another decks I wasn’t sure of, and of course my MDCA deck.
On to the matches:
Match 1 – UW Landstill
Game 1, the early turns consisted of leaks and swords battling summoned, animated, and reanimated welders. Finally one stuck, and I was able to discard and weld a 7/10, smashing his two tundras. At 4 life, he played Balance and my gas was gone. However, he soon fetched to drop to 3, and I top decked Triskelion to win.
Game 2, He mulled and kept a Black Lotus and brainstorm hand with six cards. When I dropped a welder, he brainstormed and mana leaked. I had reanimate and intuitioned for 7/10 who stomped for the win.
Matches 1-0, Games 2-0
Match 2 – 5C-Bob Stax
I’ve seen this deck lock the board down only to lose to his own Bob. This player is a gambler with Bob.
Game 1, he opens with Eye of Chaos...nice, for me. However, later, he locks me out with crucible, wasteland, and Karn beating for the win.
Game 2, I open with ancestral, discarding Dragon. Next turn, I RE-animate dragon for a 7/7 flying attacker (the only time WGD saw play this tournament.) He echoing truth’s my dragon and the game returns to normal. But, I eventually get out two welders with reoccurring triskelion and 7/10 to win.
Game 3, He opens with Leyline of the Void, which I didn’t see coming at all. I had one echoing truth for it, but it was practically over for me. Without tinker in hand, I switch to plan C with the turn one play of emerald, pearl, city of brass and Eternal Witness! My opponent plays welder and balances me to zero cards. EW beats for like 8 as my opponent plays chalice at zero and 1. His welder finally blocks to stop my aggro attack. I play Razormane Masticore and he has little to stop it. Time is called and he plays Demonic to play Karn. I ping Karn and attack and he doesn’t block, dropping him to 1 life. He topdecks Smokestack to add a blocker. In my remaining two turns, I’m not able to get through his two blockers.
Matches 1-0-1, Games 3-1-1
Match 3 – Blue control with Trinket Mages and Tops.
Game 1, I have to mull to five and I keep a bad hand with no lands, but with welder and ancestral hoping to draw a land. A few turns later I get a 2-squee/bazaar engine going but it’s too late. He’s able to tinker out colossus with trinket mage to assist. After taking 13, I weld out the colossus, but his trinket mage beats for the win.
Game 2, early on, he gets out Trinket Mage, lotus, and top. I duress and he brainstorms protecting a counter. Next turn, he uses lotus to counter a threat, but I’m now free to tinker out 7/10, only destroying 1 island. He’s get out a Morphling, but I animate another 7/10 to join the bunch and even Superman can’t save him.
Game 3, I can’t remember the details, but he gets stuck on low mana, and I get out double welders early with 7/10.
Matches 2-0-1, Games 5-2-1
Match 4 – ID into top 8.
Top 8:
Quarterfinals – UWB Fish
Unfortunately, this is my friend Brad, and we obviously didn’t want to meet in the quarterfinals.
Game 1, I open with land, lotus, duress (see swords, standstill, mage, and lands), take swords, and he drops a mage naming animate dead. I vampiric for ruby, play welder, and then tinker for titan. With his manabase crippled, he’s not able to recover.
Game 2, he gets out an early confidant, and I intuition (getting forced and REB’ing back) for darkblast, 7/10, and DA. He gives me 7/10 and plays mage naming darkblast. I’m able to drop 2 welders, but he topdecks mystical with confidant, gets echoing truth, and beats for the win.
Game 3, I get out an early welder, but he vamps for darkblast killing my welder. I duress seeing lots of lands, and I demonic for tinker. He drops grunt and I tinker 7/10 into play. He’s able to get up to three lands with echoing truth and stifle to stop the 7/10, but I have a welder on the board and intuition in hand and he scoops after the intuition gets another 7/10, trisk, and random card with bazaar in play.
Matches 3-0-2, Games 7-3-1
Semifinals – Slaver with Gifts
Game 1, I get a decent hand with welder, lotus, reanimate, gemstone, DA, and bazaar. Little do I know, but he has the nutz with black Lotus, lots of artifact mana, yawgs, recoup, gifts, drain after a brainstorm. He drops a land, mox, sol ring, and I drop the welder turn one. Next turn, I decide to use the lotus to DA, he Thirsts in response. It resolves and I get ancestral in the next two, but still no titan. He gets drain mana up. I draw petal and decide to flashback DA, which he drains, and I play ancestral resolving, but I get no titan or mox. I can bazaar, but at that point I would need to draw mox and titan, so I decide to wait. He combos out next turn with my DA mana. Probably should have gone for the small chance.
Game 2, I mulligan into double welder, two lands, animate, and dragon, and I play a welder. He opens with land, welder, mox, vault. Not good for me. I drop another welder, but still no discard outlet. Next turn, he plays a land. Turn three, I still don’t get a discard outlet, and on his turn, he thirsts slaver to the grave and that’s all she wrote.
Matches 3-1-2, Games 7-5-1
The SlaverGifts and UB Fish split the top 2 prize.
Post-tourney thoughts:
- The careful study’s worked well. I might need one more or maybe one TFK because I found myself a few times needing another discard outlet.
- Getting DA with intuition against fish is bad, because the loss of life adds up
- I didn’t use Yawgs, WGD/animate, or Possessed Portal once. They’re what makes this deck strangely fun, so I’m disappointed the opportunity never presented itself.
- Don’t dilute your deck too much when sideboarding. Even with hate on the board, you always have a few more options to win. With this deck, it doesn’t seem to works to SB answers for answers against you. They can just become dead cards and this deck wants to get toys into play fast.
Props:
To Jason, the owner of Dreamers and Monster Den, who continues to support this awesome format on a monthly basis.
To the newer players coming out for vintage. The old vintage rank and file in the Twin Cities is no where to be found, so it’s great to see new faces at the tournament.
To the players trying out new inventions and decks, even if they aren’t top tier. Seeing weird combinations of old cards is one of the reasons this format is a lot of fun.
Slops:
To Wizards, for continuing to make Ichorid better, and graveyard hate more popular. It's so hard to play a Bazaar deck these days.
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