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Media314r8
12-31-2009, 01:25 PM
Just returned from the Meandeck open (cash) legacy tournament, where I made (and split) top8 with UGW CB-Survival. We had 45 people in the main event, and played six rounds of swiss. I went 4-0 (undefeated in games) and then ID’d 4-0-2 into the top 8 with this list:

// Lands
4 [ZEN] Misty Rainforest
4 [ON] Flooded Strand
1 [7E] Island (2)
3 [R] Tundra
1 [ALA] Forest (3)
1 [MR] Plains (1)
4 [R] Tropical Island
2 [R] Savannah

// Creatures
1 [ARB] Qasali Pridemage
4 [CFX] Noble Hierarch
4 [ALA] Rhox War Monk
1 [ALA] Rafiq of the Many
4 [FUT] Tarmogoyf
1 [10E] Squee, Goblin Nabob
1 [JU] Wonder

// Spells
4 [CS] Counterbalance
4 [MM] Brainstorm
4 [EX] Survival of the Fittest
4 [CHK] Sensei's Divining Top
4 [AL] Force of Will
4 [R] Swords to Plowshares

// Sideboard
SB: 1 [FD] Eternal Witness
SB: 1 [JU] Genesis
SB: 3 [SHM] Faerie Macabre
SB: 3 [CHK] Ghostly Prison
SB: 1 [DIS] Trygon Predator
SB: 1 [TO] Llawan, Cephalid Empress
SB: 1 [LRW] Gaddock Teeg
SB: 1 [LRW] Sower of Temptation
SB: 1 [PS] Meddling Mage
SB: 1 [M10] Baneslayer Angel
SB: 1 [TSP] Tivadar of Thorn

Round 1 vs Steven with Zoo

(Knights of the Reliquary and 3 Horizon Canopies main – he was borrowing my deck, and we had extensively tested the night before, which was most of the reason for my baneslayer in the board. There was at least 4 zoo decks at the last meandeck open, and I wanted a finisher post-board that would finish the game in a hurry while being mainly red-removal proof.)

I keep a Cb-Top hand with a brainstorm and a second top, he mulls to six on the draw, and. (to shuffle away) He leads with Nacatl, I establish a turn two CB, but brainstorm into a survival, no guys, no swords. Ugh. I take blows from nacatl and fetch myself down to a precarious six life, all the while finding things life survivals and counterbalances to counter his other spells before I find a creature to start my survival engine, and make a war monk, hierarch, rafiq, (who I believe was fireblasted) warmonk. The game is over in short order.

SB: -1 Rafiq, -1 quasali pride mage, -1wonder, +1 e witness, +1 genesis, +1 baneslayer

Game two he makes a nacatl on the play (with canopy into taiga) and I take three before making a 2/3 goyf, (brainstorm+fetch) which he bolts and cracks in for 2. I make a survival and hold priority to survival the Squee I drew away for an E Witness. He has a pridemage, but is still on two lands, so he swings in for three. I’ve been drawing lands like a pro, but am still at 10, so on my turn I get back Squee, and run Squee->genesis->goyf. With the game all but locked down, I survival Squee for baneslayer, and end the game shortly thereafter.

Matches 1-0, games 2-0

Round 2 vs Ryan with Enchantress (running exploration)

Ryan wins the die roll, but mulls. I keep CB, brainstorm, 2x goyf, 3 lands. He mulls to five and is quite distraught, but keeps his five. He leads with plains, go. I land, pass, he misses a land drop and passes again. I make a goyf with only a fetch in the bin. (whee!)
He missed another land drop, and I make a CB with brainstorm mana open, and attack for 1. He misses yet another land, and passes back. I endstep brainstorm into force, monk, swords. I put force in my hand to go with the otherwise useless second CB I’d drawn, and keep the swords on top. I Make a second goofey, and swing two. He draws, and discards a moat endstep. When my attack step comes, he realized my goyfs are now 3/4s, and we go to game two.

*At this point, I suspect either dutch stacks or possibly Eskimo Quinn, and sideboard accordingly.
SB: -4 StP, -1 CB, +1 E Witness, +1 Genesis, +1 Gaddock Teeg, +1 Meddling Mage, +1 Trygon Predator.

We both keep our seven, and he leads with forest, an exploration, savannah. (oh shit- eternal garden… I’m glad I won game 1 at this point, luckily I kept a CB-top hand) I make a top and pass, and he only plays one land, and a ghostly prison. I make a Counterbalance, and pass, and he must have drawn a land, as he plays one, followed by another ghostly prison, which I whiff against with CB, revealing a survival. I make a survival and pass, with goyf in hand. He attempts an enchantress presence, and I don’t find a RWM/predator with top to counter it. (I suppose enchantress isn’t quite as bas as eternal garden) I play a fetch, hierarch and pass with potentially three mana up and goyf in hand to shuffle my library with. He attempts a sterling grove, I spin top, fail to find a two, and survival goofey for Squee, spin top, and see a force and a RWM, who I put second from the top. I draw force, and pass, and he fetches a second enchantress, which meets my RWM. He then drops a serra’s sanctum, and attempts a replenish. I find no rafiq or wonder, and I am forced to draw RWM to pitch to the force. I draw with top and go into race mode, no longer having a three to float. I play top, pitch Squee, find predator, and play predator. He baits CB with a utopia sprawl, which I allow to resolve (we both have copious amounts of mana by now, including a sanctum on his side, but I only have one untapped to attempt to counter anything relevant), then attempts a words of war, which I find a war monk for with, and he passes. Knowing winconditions is a good thing, and I draw the monk, and survival Squee for Gaddok Teeg, RWM for Meddling Mage on Sacred Mesa, knowing his only outs are his two O-Rings, which are by far easier to CB than replenish or Sigil of the Empty Throne, now cut off by teeg. My next turn I survival for my predator to ensure his O rings are only temporary, and he extends the hand.

Matches 2-0, games 4-0

Round 3 vs Eric with White Stacks

I win the die roll, and play land, he plays factory, I play goyf. He plays Chalice at one with an ancient tomb to avoid daze, and I make a Counterbalance. He makes a 3 sphere, and I reveal a brainstorm. I attack, pass, he attempts a crucible and I flip a RWM. There was a brief point where two factories were staring down goyf, but a quasali pridemage helped end that stalemate quickly. Ancient tomb did nearly enough damage to him as goyf this game.

SB: SB: -4 StP, -1 CB, +1 E Witness, +1 Genesis, +1 Gaddock Teeg, +1 Meddling Mage, +1 Trygon Predator.

He makes a land and passes, and I make a hierarch with CB in hand. He makes a second land and a chalice at one. I draw top (obviously) and make a goyf. He plays a three sphere, and I draw a second hierarch, which I cast into the chalice to grow goyf. I finally find a survival, and one of his EoTs the turn he made a smokestacks, fetch genesis, and play him. He sacks his smokestacks after I bin the CA engine. I end up just beating with goyf while Meddling mage chants ‘geddon, which was set before I found a Rafiq and RWM to float on top to counter literally every relevant spell in stacks. I also had force, brainstorm, CB in hand, but resisted the urge to shout “…and I still had all of THEESE!”

I believe this match was a perfect example of why I don’t play stacks… sometimes your opener is fine, but you just never… draw… gas…ever.

Matches 3-0, games 6-0

Round 4 vs Bobby with Trainwreck

He keeps a hand with 3 damnations, 4 lands. I keep a hand with CB, Survival. I have Squee in my deck. At one point he damnations goyf, Rafiq, hierarch after falling to seven life. Yeah, I still won. Squee is in my deck.

SB: -4 swords, +1 genesis, +1 teeg, +1 witness, +1 sower of temptation (as he does run fat like Oona and Helldozer, so tutorable removal is nice when I’ve boarded out swords. Having another cmc4 in the deck is something good too. Wonder stayed in over meddling mage as with edict, innocent blood, deed, pulse, and damnation, mage will never be chanting protection from a win when it matters, and the CMC of four is much better for CB, wonder also having the occasional benefit of exalted attackers flying over garruck’s beasts or Helldozer.

I have genesis. He makes a critical mistake at one point, and uses coffers to play dozer and attempt a pulse in one turn. He had damnation, but wanted to maximize his mana. I didn’t find a four for CB the turn before, but I sure found a three. He haunting echoes me, but doesn’t remove survival, Squee, genesis, or RWM. I think a gaddock teeg ends up beating him to death for the final three points. TRAINWRECKET’UM!

Unfortunately, I trainwrecked Bobby so hard he was derailed out of the top8. Sorry bro-seph.

Matches 4-0, games 8-0

Round 5 vs Lee with Mono Black (AKA nighthawk + jitte ‘combo’)

We ID as the only two X-0s, but play it out so I can write a six round report instead of a four round report.

I keep a CB, Survival, top, hierarch, lands hand on the draw, and he runs shade and bob into CB, but makes two nighthawks, which set the life totals at 26-11 before my hierarch->RWM->Rafiq ruins his fun. I first attacked with the double-exalted, double-striking RWM when I was at 15, but he had a smother and I couldn’t find a 2 for CB, so I just did it again next turn. I win at 33. Nighthawks do not deal with double-strike well.

SB: -1 wonder, -2 goyf (does not race nighthawk well, as I only put creatures, instants and lands in the bin), +1 Baneslayer, +1 E witness, +1 Genesis.

Game two plays out similarly to game one, but with me having a swords on one of his nighthawks, and his life never being above 20, as I had an early RWM without the aid of survival. Survival shows up, and with it, Rafiq to bring it home.

Matches 4-0-1, games 8-0 (‘kind of’ 5-0 matches, 10-0 games)

Round 6 vs Vince with White Weenie (with ‘geddons)

We ID, but again play it out for the sake of my report.

Game one Counterbalance is shit against a deck with a curve of two. Go. Fucking. Figure. We both have slow starts, and many swords. He swords two of my goyfs while I have a CB, and cannot for the life of me find top, leaving me with only hierarch, and I swords three Serra Avengers. He geddons, but I have a land in hand and a hierarch on board. I win from 3 when his life total was at 31 at one point. (there was likely a jitte involved pre-hierarch)

SB: -1 wonder, -4 tarmogoyf (3/4 at most w/o forcing jitte/vial/geddon), +1 genesis, +1 E Witness, +1 Meddling Mage, +1 Trygon Predator, +1 Gaddock Teeg

Game two he turn one aether vials, I have turn two CB/top, and he drops in an avenger, which I swords. I make a hierarch, and start swinging one while he plays lands out of his hand and leaves his vial at two without dumping his deck in on my endsteps. He finally casts a jitte, and I spin top, failing to find a two. (go figure) I have two swords in hand aloingside a brainstorm, force, and one swords in the top 3. He has one card left in hand and has not been vialing in guys. I allow the jitte to resolve, and swords a jotun grunt that jumps in front of my hierarch on my next attack. I keep swinging for one, and swords’ing the dudes he topdecks for the next two turns…. Until I run out of swords, and he KEEPS TOPDECKING DUDES! I stare at the force in my hand and rue logic. (and CB… and not seeing a threat other than my hierarch…) FML, so much for going undefeated in six rounds of swiss.

Game three the beast is back. I have turn one top, turn two survival, and he had turn one vial, turn two jitte. Fuck. Life. I start my engine while he starts raping me. I can’t find a force or a pridemage before he ‘geddons, and jitte noms my hierarchs who normally laugh in the face of geddon. Cruel, cruel irony.

End Results: Matches 4-0-2, games 8-0 (‘kind of’ 5-1 matches, 11-2 games)

Refelction on the deck: I didn’t see any Ichorid, graveyard decks, or goblins, so the ghostly prisons, faerie macabres, and tividar sat idle in the board, as did Llawyn, but I feel the cards are strong enough to justify them as one-ofs. Tividar, especially in conjunction with ghostly prison, is hard for goblins to win through, (assuming you get to that point in the game) and Llawyn has been gravy in testing against fish, as well as randomly bouncing Progenitus. I think Genesis E witness is mandatory in any survival deck’s 75, as it wins wars of attrition and heavily influences control MUs for the 2 slots they take. Though I never needed wonder to race with rafiq or RWM, I think having it was comforting against all the decks with moat I saw, as well as necessary to race goblins, especially in lists still packing 4 ‘drivers. Wonder may be better left in the board, or as a predator in the main, but wonder does pitch to force, and in situation where it needs to, can be cast, making it less of a dead slot than some cards in survival MBs.

CB was incredible, and the ability to shuffle additional times for G while gaining CA with squee was unreal. Finding RWMs to pitch to force when CB fails is also icing. Both survival and CB were destroyed fairly often, and against everything but aggro, if survival stuck, I was sure to win in the long run. I would never play fewer than 4.

RWM was stronger than goyf, but obviously worse in metas with wastes. Serving as force-fodder and counting CMC 3s along with his large ass makes him one of my favorite beaters ever. All hail pancake master!

Noble hierarch provides accel, wins goyf wars, and blanks dazes often. Once exalted triggers begin to stack up, especially on RWMs, it’s difficult to lose races. Being fodder for edicts, fixing mana against wastes, and providing green in a mana-hungry survival deck are only side-tasks he does when not serving as a better birds or paradise, as he ~does~ attack!

Baneslayer was a fine card in the sideboard, as I really liked having her in the deck against zoo. She may be tested over wonder in the main, as she can still attack over moat, races aggro well, and is one pain in the ass against decks without white mana that plan to win by attacking.

Kira, Great glass Spinner may come back into my 75 at some point, as making RWMs, Rafiq, Sower, and Baneslayer shroud-y is pretty swell methinks.

Props:
*CA$H tournaments! Prize split is soooo much easier when everyone gets exactly the same thing… and something everyone wants!
*~FREE~ side-events to people who dropped- having something to do when you scrub is infinitely better than just watching your buddies do well and feeling shitty about yourself. Wining money in said events is even better!
*My house and Wadsworth for making up six of the top eight slots! We rock!
*Smenendian for having a winning record at his tournament this time and ~almost~ making top8… God wanted us to split and for everyone to drive home safely – that’s why you couldn’t be in the top8 and insist we play it out!
*Domo-kun!
*RRRAAATZZZZLLLL for not being in the top 8 – that’s for PEOPLE!
*45 people for coming – this was a blast to play in and had a great meta and prize support
*My hero who had 3 points in round 5 and was still playing! Kent should have given you an FNM card or a ribbon for being so tenacious! Go you!

Slops:
*Mark (Morbid) for having four points after round four to my 12 points… his were obviously from four draws. Way to play Eskimo Quinn – the only deck slower than lamestill. (love you buddy)
*Fucking Umezawa’s Jitte! Killing my hierarchs and being all game-dominatin’ n’ stuff!
*People within 3 hours not showing up – Do it next time!
*Plateaus for not winning any matches - I suppose the person getting them would have to make top8 first!

Mark Sun
12-31-2009, 02:16 PM
Deck was insane when I tested next to you guys the night before.


Slops:
*Mark (Morbid) for having four points after round four to my 12 points… his were obviously from four draws. Way to play Eskimo Quinn – the only deck slower than lamestill. (love you buddy)


Haha, fuck you :tongue:

Actually, I went 1-2-1 on the day, drawing the first round with Nate, then beating Aggro Loam, lost to Doran homebrew (3x Krosan Grip off the top to kill Moat, Runed Halo, Runed Halo), and finally losing to Menedian (0-1-1 games, missed a Sacred Mesa trigger in the first game -- savage cuts). I found it hilarious that three of my rounds went to time though, seems to be a serious problem.

arcboundravager2
12-31-2009, 03:21 PM
Props:
*My house and Wadsworth for making up six of the top eight slots! We rock!


YIOWS :tongue:

GtF
12-31-2009, 04:36 PM
Nice report. The deck looks good and incredibly fun (it plays like all my favorite cards). It does look a little bit creature-light for a survival deck though. Are there any non-creature slots that could be shaved for a couple extra guys?

Illissius
12-31-2009, 04:55 PM
The deck indeed looks nice: no-frills, cram all the best cards in. I'd like a Sower maindeck though; maybe over Rafiq.

DireLemming
12-31-2009, 05:32 PM
You sided in Witness and Genesis in each of your matches. Do you still think it was the right call to start without them?

Xero
12-31-2009, 09:06 PM
Round 3 vs Eric with White Stacks

I He plays Chalice at one with an ancient tomb to avoid daze, and I make a Counterbalance. He makes a 3 sphere, and I reveal a brainstorm. I attack, pass, he attempts a crucible and I play an expensive brainstorm into a RWM.


Did you get rid of Chalice? Otherwise, you shouldn't have been able to Brainstorm.

Media314r8
01-01-2010, 01:07 AM
Did you get rid of Chalice? Otherwise, you shouldn't have been able to Brainstorm.

Correct, I just remeber countering the crucible with CB, must have blind CB'd it - fixed report. I su'posin it's better to write reports the night of/day after.

@ Genesis and Witness main: Not so hot against most aggro, combo, and burn, but I've considered -1CB -1 top for the dynamic duo MD. More testing is needed. I think I would main some number of finks and oran-riefs first to further hoze aggro.