Short Tournament Report -
I'm only writing this because I said I would, and not because anything terribly interesting happened. 23 people showed up to play Vintage at Knight Ware in Studio City, CA.
My friend, Phil, was the judge and was also playing. In order to finish his rounds quickly so he could get back to judging, Phil was willing to switch decks with me. (He was running The Deck.) I declined since I knew there'd be a lot of random decks in the room, and I'd rather be pro-active than reactive. This was my first of many misplays on the day. See my previous post for my complete decklist.
Round 1 - Kevin with FishThis was Kevin's first Vintage tournament, and it showed. He was a nice guy, but he just didn't really know what was going on. To start with, his deck ran Stifle, which is terrible, but would've actually been good game 1 since I wasn't playing around it AT ALL.
Game 1 - all he'd seen was Swamp, Ritual, Bob (eating a FoW), and Wasteland. Not being able to extrapolate Dark Times from that, he tapped his only source of blue (I think to play a Qasali Pridemage). This allowed me to rip Lotus off the top and go from a board position of just a Swamp to a Swamp and a 20/20. Of course I made the 20/20 on my turn to play around him ripping a Wasteland... I didn't realize I accidently played around him having blue-mana up for Stifle. I'm still pretty sure I win this game anyway. His hand was all answers and no threats. Even if he'd managed to Stifle the Hexmage, that would've been a 1-for-1 trade and in no way a blow-out.
Game 2 - He goes turn 1 Trop. I go turn 1 Swamp, Thoughtseize, seeing a hand of almost all hate (FoW, Stifle, Echoing Truth, Wasteland, Strip Mine, Meddling Mage). I think I took the Echoing Truth, knowing there's no way I can lose. When he's staring down a nearly lethal Bob and 'Goyf, I make a 20/20 because I'm kind of a dick. (I'd already traded a Wasteland for his Stifle, and he had no idea how to use his Wastes to keep me off the combo.)
Afterward, Kevin asks me for advice about his build, then proceeds to argue against everything I tried to tell him. Whatever. He's perfectly welcome to keep wasting slots on Stifles and running a card like Meddling Mage that's marginal at best and ONLY if you really understand the format. (See round 4 for some great examples of bad Mage-ing.)
1-0 (2-0 in games)
Round 2 - ANTI hated everything about this match.
Game 1 - He has pretty much the nuts, plus a brainstorm to hide the nuts from my Duress. C'est la vie. He does almost die to his Ad Nauseam, but then he storms out and puts me at 3 with a Bob in play while he goes to 18. What was frustrating about this game was how he tried to storm again after a Bob flip and a fetch-land put me at 1. You're at 16 against a 2/1! Just pass the turn and let me die to Bob! He finally did, and I did.
Game 2 - He's been Duressed 3 or 4 times, he's at 8 life against my 4/5 Goyf + Bob. He rips an Ad Nauseam and proceeds to flip perfectly, go to two life, and win (his flips were something like Lotus, Ritual, Recall, Tendrils, and his Recall hit all gas). This game sucked because he had nothing in his hand, and the Ad Nauseam allowed him to just win. Had the topdeck come one turn later, he wouldn't have had enough life to use the Ad Nauseam. Magic sucks sometimes.
1-1 (2-2 in games)
Round 3 - StaxGame 1 - He won the die roll.
Game 2 - Bitterblossom was a champ, allowing me to stay ahead of Smokestack. Then, when the time was right, I sac'ed the Tribal Enchantment to make my two 'Goyfs friggin' ridiculous.
Game 3 - I kept a bad seven. I knew I was on the draw and he'd probably have resistance. I had a hand that allowed me to go Land, Jet, Lotus even through his turn 1 Sphere. What it didn't have was a second land. Turn 1 Goyf isn't enough to get there. It was a bad keep and I deserved to lose because of it.
1-2 (3-4 in games)
Round 4 - Another Fish player with main deck Meddling Mage and Stifle (EDIT: In my original post, I got this out of order with round 5. Serves me right for trying to do a tourney report entirely from memory)
As in round 1... nice guy, bad deck.
Game 1 - Turn 1 I Duress FoW. Turn 2 I try to make a Crucible of Worlds off a Ritual, and he casts his freshly drawn Force of Will. He then proceeds to play a Meddling Mage, naming Crucible of Worlds. Yeah... that happened. Please, people, stop running this card if you don't really understand what's going on in every matchup. I make a 20/20, but am caught totally off-guard by Curfew of all cards. Now, I've run a deck with Curfew before, but I also ran a bunch of guys who were good to reset, like Spellstutter Sprite. When you have to pick up your two drop for no value, Curfew gets worse. When Tinker decks are also running Bobs, Curfew gets even worse still. So he takes out my 20/20 with a Curfew, but I win anyway because he's got a deck full of the wrong answers and - like round 1 - no threats.
Game 2 - I hit him with an early Thoughseize and let him keep the Curfew, since it's ridiculously easy to play around as long as I know about it. I play a Hexmage and just start beating with it. Then I tutor up a Bitterblossom and play it, then I think I played a 'Goyf and made a 20/20 the next turn. The only creature he played all game was a Meddling Mage naming (you guessed it) Crucible of Worlds.
2-2 (5-4 in games)
Round 5 - Jonah with BG Kinda Rockish Stuff (EDIT: I got this out of order with round 4)
Jonah's a friend, but this was his first Vintage tournament, so his deck was a little untuned. (EDIT: Turns out I forgot about Jonah's one other Vintage Tournament in which he won a FRIGGIN' MOX JET... so yeah, good player, just doesn't play much Vintage. And I think he was handed a deck for that event, whereas he tried to brew this one himself.)
Game 1 - He's on the play and Duresses me, but doesn't take my Duress. I'm able to Duress the Dark Ritual out of his hand, making a turn 3 Hypnotic Specter his next play. I know the coast is clear, so I make a 20/20.
Game 2 - I don't remember much of this game. I know I had a dominant enough start that Jonah scooped to go playtest Standard.
3-2 (7-4 in games)
So I made some bad plays and beat the people who don't play Vintage. With the number of people in the room, 3-2 was actually good enough for one person to make top 8, but I was 9th on breakers. 9th out of 23... ugh.
I feel weird giving thoughts on the deck, since it was only five rounds and I just barely broke even on the day. I maintain, though, that the green splash is really good, and 'Goyf beatdown is a much better Plan B than Leyline/Helm.
What about instead of 5 Leyline/Helm, we go 3 Painter's servant/2 Grindstone, or something like that? You have a 2nd wincon and unless you get turn 0 leyline it is much cheaper, as it cost 6 mana total with the highest costing mana being 3, as opposed to two 4cc. You could also maybe do 4 Painter's/1 Grindstone, or maybe even 3 Painters/1 Grindstone, and a beats equipment to make the Painter's servants or Bobs a little more threatening. What do you think?
Doing this hurts your G1 plan against Dredge which is one of the benefits of playing this deck.
We are discussing alternatives to Helmline, how is this idea any worse than splashing green for Tarmogoyfs or blue for power? With Tarmo and with blue you still have the same problem as being vulnerable to dredge, so I don't understand why you would post this.
My reasoning for not going with Painter's/Grindstone is that, like Leyline/Helm, neither half of the combo does anything on its own. Neither one hurts as much when you flip them to Bob, but a Goyf off the top is relevant way more often than a Grindstone off the top if you don't have a Painter, or vice versa.
I can't speak for Sporkcore (since the game 1 plan against Dredge is NOT the reason I play this deck), but I can say that Painter's/Grindstone brings with it one of the worst parts or Helm/Leyline (dead draws) without bringing a little splash value (being stupid good against 1 deck in the meta).
