[Premium Article] So Many Insane Plays - Vintage Champs 2008 Top 16

[Smmenen]

http://www.starcitygames.com/php/news/article/16218.html

uesday, August 5th - At last weekend’s U.S. Nationals, 2007 Vintage World Champion Stephen Menendian attempted to repeat his victory of last year. Unfortunately for Stephen, he fell at the final hurdle… but he answered a variety of questions on the metagame along the way. Today’s So Many Insane Plays is part 1 of an epic-length tournament report… enjoy!

To answer question people have asked me, here is the deck I played:

The Perfect Storm
Stephen Menendian

2 Underground Sea
1 Bayou
4 Polluted Delta
1 Bloodstained Mire
2 Island
2 Swamp
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Jet
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Crypt
1 Mana Vault
1 Black Lotus
1 Lotus Petal
4 Dark Ritual
2 Cabal Ritual

1 Chain of Vapor
1 Rebuild
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Time Walk
1 Brainstorm
1 Ponder
1 Merchant Scroll
4 Force of Will
1 Misdirection
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Gifts Ungiven
1 Tinker
1 Timetwister
1 Mind’s Desire
1 Memory Jar
4 Duress
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Imperial Seal
2 Grim Tutor
1 Yawgmoth’s Will
1 Yawgmoth’s Bargain
1 Necropotence
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Darksteel Colossus

Sideboard:
4 Tarmogoyf
1 Bayou
3 Yixlid Jailer
2 Tormod’s Crypt
2 Extirpate
1 Leyline of the Void
1 Massacre
1 Hurkyl’s Recall

[Moxlotus]

Why the Goyfs over Negators and Bobs?  If you went with the black guys, you could play the Academy that we all know you love.  And how did you come to play a 3 Jailer, 2 Extirpate, 2 Crypt, 1 leyline package for Ichorid?  Any reason you decided with DSC instead of Tendrils #2?

edit:

I'll get to that in the next article.  I'm working my way there 

Cool.

[Smmenen]

I'll get to that in the next article.  I'm working my way there

[MaxxMatt]

@Smmemen
Hurry oh! Hurry oh!   The Mountain wisely went to Maometto



Nice to see you change your radicated idea TPS is an unplayable pile cannot be played in a highly competitive field.



Your changes to commonly played TPS lists:

-2 Lands
+2 CabalRitual

-3 Brainstorm ( only due to restrictions )
+2 GrimTutor
+1 Ponder

TPS is still a good deck to play, flexible and skill intensive.

Nice to see LotV as a singleton: you sure program to tutor for it and instead of hoping it comes in your initial hand. You'll better protect it with an hand full of distruption and bombs instead of mulliganing into it only to see it crushed by the commonly played Reverent Silence

Nice to see you opted for Jailers. They are killed by Ichorids weapons with far more difficulties rather than TCrypts or LotVs.

Nice to see you opted for winners' high differentiation: Extirpates & co. are common sideboard tools; DSC, Goyfs and ToA will be enough not to suffer them and not be able to win game 2&3.

Nice to see you choose to leave TPS staple skeleton almost untouched: you did changes, forced by recent restrictions, following the common sense. Add Ponder as BS#2 and additional black tutors to fill the remaining empty slots.

Congrats for the finish. You are a good player with a good deck!
An overall good deck, now you decided to play it, don't you?



Maxx

[wiley]

This actually led Mr. Garfield onto an interesting tangent about modern game design (and systems theory principles!) that I'd be happy to share in the forums if readers are interested.

At least one is.

What if this metagame actually most resembles this one, outlined here and here?

The links were broken for me, which ones were you talking about?

Why the Goyfs over Negators and Bobs?  If you went with the black guys, you could play the Academy that we all know you love.  And how did you come to play a 3 Jailer, 2 Extirpate, 2 Crypt, 1 leyline package for Ichorid?

In his prelim tourney list he plays the negators, his reasoning was he needed the basics and he still didn't use academy.  As for the Ichorid package, well that is probably the best one that I have seen.  A stagnant set of hate cards can be easily met, by switching up his options (as well as upping them) he not only cuts off Ichorid's cabal therapies but also slows their clock.  Good plan.

How prevalent were Wasteland and Strip Mine during the prelims/tournament?

[Smmenen]

What if this metagame actually most resembles this one, outlined here and here?

The links were broken for me, which ones were you talking about?

http://www.starcitygames.com/php/news/article/8912.html
http://www.starcitygames.com/php/news/article/9163.html

[DarkfnTemplar]

@Steve
   Did you have 3 or 4 mana sources the turn you duressed and d-tutored in your last game versus Paul? Basically, would you have 5 the turn after?

[Smmenen]

That's next week's article, when I report my match with Paul. but i understand what you are getting at.   it's all covered in next weeks article.

[AngryPheldagrif]

@Steve
   Did you have 3 or 4 mana sources the turn you duressed and d-tutored in your last game versus Paul? Basically, would you have 5 the turn after?

I'm guessing you're referring to the possibility of tutoring for Tendrils. In fact, I was watching the whole match and joined the discussion afterwards. Basically, after he Duressed the Misdirection, he had two options: he could either tutor for Tendrils and hope to draw any land or 0 cost artifact to resolve Tendrils for 3 with the Tormod's Crypt already in hand, or, had he made the correct call the turn earlier and taken one of the Forces with his first Duress, he could have tutored for Rebuild and Duressed the second Force and Rebuilt to survive regardless of his draw. His tutoring for Chain was a mistake as he readily admitted. He had miscalculated things due to the huge stress of the situation.

He had 4 mana at the time, for reference, and no sources remaining in hand.

[Clint_NZ]

Ohh man, A 2 part mini-series....(Spread over a week no less!)

I might go mad in the mean time!!!

Sorry had to get that out of the system.

First, thanks for the links. Second, love the Ichorid board hate.

Being at the bottom of the world, means we do not generally have large vintage events.
So reading your tournament articles is a blast.

Cheers for the read.
Clint