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View Full Version : [Report] Burn at Untouchables - 2nd place



pocari79
06-28-2010, 12:31 PM
Went to a 17 man tournament at Untouchables on Sunday. Here's the decklist:

18 Mountain
1 Barbarian Ring
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
4 Rift Bolt
4 Lava Spike
3 Shard Volley
4 Magma Jet
2 Incinerate
1 Smash to Smithereens
3 Price of Progress
3 Volcanic Fallout
3 Fireblast
3 Sulfuric Vortex
3 Hellspark Elemental

Sideboard

3 Powder Keg
3 Pithing Needle
3 Faerie Macabre
3 Nevinyrral's Disk
3 Red Elemental Blast

I didn't change the list up as I didn't really have an idea of what the field would look like right before the mystical tutor banning.

Round 1 - CounterTop w/ Cunning wish. (0-2)

Game 1 - He got a fast counterbalance + top by turn 3 and I basically didn't resolve a spell past that. The game took forever since his kill condition was Elspeth. He was hitting all of my spells with counterbalance and the game ended with him discarding counterspells. He was also running pretty much all basics so my PoPs would usually only hit for 2. *sigh*

Sideboard: +3 REB, +3 Pithing Needle, -3 Shard Volley, -3 Price of Progress

Game 2 - This game wasn't close either as he got down a fast Jace while I was tapped out and he was going to ultimate me before I could kill him.
0-1

Round 2 - CounterTop w/ Thopter Foundry (1-2)

I don't remember which game I won but the game I did win, he wasn't able to assemble his combo on time and had no counters either so I burned him out. I sideboarded +3 REB, +3 Needle, +3 Faerie macabre, -3 Shard Volley, -3 Hellspark Elemental, -3 Fireblast. yeah, I sided wrong pretty badly. I thought I could stop the foundry/sword combo with faerie macabre but he had academy ruins and 2 land so he was always going to be able to put the sword back to the top of his library. Also, I had pithing needles out for foundry and jace and didn't expect the engineered explosives. *sigh*.
0-2

Round 3 - Bye

hoorah, i finally *won*. Usually I would have left the tournament by now but I was here to game so I decided to kept on playing and maybe try to get the rating a bit higher.
1-2

Round 4 - U/R Landstill (2-1)

Game 1 - I lost this game was over pretty fast since he was countering all my burns spells while burning me and attacking with 2 mishra's factories. I didn't see the standstill so I thought he was counterburn. not that it mattered much since I would have sideboarded the same way.

Sideboard: +3 REB, +3 Pithing Needle, -2 shard Volley, -1 Smash to Smithereens, -3 Hellspark Elemental

Game 2 - He drew all spell snares this game and for some reason, i only had 1 and 3CC spells to cast all game.

Game 3 - This was actually a close game as he was countering my burn but I kept drawing more burn and REBs and I ended up killing him before I died the next turn.
2-2

Round 5 - Eva Green (2-0)

Game 1 - He did turn 1 hypno and I burned it. then turn 2, thoughtseize and dark confidant. He got out a sylvan 3rd turn and I decided that there's no point in burning his creatures since he was going to get card selection if the game dragged out longer and I killed him around turn 5. I love playing decks that don't have blue. don't have to worry about my burn getting countered.

Sideboard: +3 Powder Keg, -3 Hellspark Elemental

Game 2 - He was able to turn 1 bob, turn 2 goyf. Then i played then 2 powder keg and the game was pretty much over since he took around 5 damage from Bob alone and I was bolting him left and right. this matchup would have gone much worse if he had an early sinkhole but he didn't get any. wohoo!
3-2

I didn't think that I was able to make top 8 as there were 6 spots locked already after round 4 and there were around 5 guys battling for the last 2 spots. I wanted to at least watch top 8 so I went back to the store and found out that I made top 8!! No idea how that happened but I guess cause the 2 guys i lost to made top 8, my tiebreakers must have been good.

Top 8 - 4C Landstill (2-1)

Game 1 - I didn't know what he was playing until he played standstill and I punted this game since I cracked standstill almost immediately when I only had 3 cards in hand and I made him get a 7 card hand. then he cast a Jace v2.0 with protection and was able to use the ultimate.

Sideboard: +3 REB, +3 Pithing Needle, -3 Shard Volley, -3 Hellspark Elemental

Game 2 - Managed to get a turn 1 needle on Jace. He also managed to extirpate my chain lightnings and magma jets away after 2 turns. After I burned him for a couple of turns, he played standstill with no threat on the table. this time, I drew until i had 7 cards full of burn or REB and cast a lightning bolt at the end of his turn to make him discard. there was a point where I had him at 4 and I had a fireblast in hand but he had 2 cards that I wasn't sure of and my only other cards in hand were 2 sulfuric vortexs and only 3 land in play. I decided to be a bit more safe and draw out the counterspells with the vortex as they're a must counter or else he dies in 2 turns and ended up winning with the 2nd vortex. Other people said that I should have risked the fireblast and if he does counter, we'd both be in topdeck mode but that just doesn't seem good for me since if he would have draw spells and I don't. Any opinions on this??

Game 3 - More of the same as game 2 except he literally countered every burn spell he possible could and he was at double digit life until he dropped a landstill again with no threats and then I drew into 5 burn spells and 2 REBs and was able to use up all of his counters and I still had enough burn leftover to kill him.

Top 4 - CounterTop w/thopter (round 2 opponent) (2-0)

Game 1 - He mulled to 6, I mulled to 5. I had 3 mountains, sulfuric vortex and price of progress. I was on the play and cast a turn 3 vortex and he was tapped out to play counterbalance. No FoW and blind flip didn't get him a 3CC. It was pretty much GG from here on as he just kept on losing 2 life while I tried to burn him to make it end faster.

Sideboard: +3 REB, +3 Nevinyrral's Disk, -2 Shard Volley, -1 Smash to Smithereens, -3 Hellspark Elemental

Game 2 - He got the turn 1 top, turn 2 counterbalance, turn 3 thopter foundry. I got turn 3 vortex (countered), turn 4 vortex (resolved) and again, just started to try to burn him through the countertop to make the game end faster. He did end up getting rid of my sulfuric vortex at 1 life and then I played a disk that was countered and another disk that resolved since he had no cards in hand and i don't think he had a searchable 4CC spell. Blew up the world next turn and he was only able to make 4 tokens to go up to 5 life. I then drew into a bolt and bolted and price of progressed him for the win.

he was wondering why he never saw the disk when I played him round 2 and I told him that I thought pithing needles could handle his deck then but realize it couldn't stop enough things at once and that disks also solve counterbalance.

Finals - Zoo (1-2)

Game 1 - I managed to kill his creatures before they attacked me. However, he still had burn and I played a sulfuric vortex while i was a bit ahead on life and in response he played a lightning helix and that turned the tables. We were both in topdeck mode and he got the bolts and fireblasts before I was able to get them.

Sideboard: +3 Powder Kegs, +3 Pithing Needle, -3 Hellspark Elemental, -3 Volcanic Fallout. Not sure if I sided this right but then my board doesn't really have anything for zoo. Took out the fallout since all of his creatures are 3 toughness.

Game 2 - Simiar to game 1 except he had 1 land for 5 turns. Apparently he could have won that game but he conceded and didn't see the winning play. I was at 7 and he was at 4. He has a fetch and taiga and I had 2 mana open ready to price of progress. apparently he had a chain lightning and fireblast and thought he couldn't win before I chained his lightning back to him.

Game 3 - Same as game 1. I had a bit of a life lead and decided to cast the vortex and then he helixed me in response. I went down to around 9 life and he went bolt, bolt, fireblast. Since when did zoo become the burn deck??

Afterthoughts

Zoo seems to become super crazy fast now that it's painful to "waste" a bolt on a creature. I'm thinking I have to play searing blazes in the sideboard now and I'm going to have to retool the manabase so I can get enough fetchlands to be able to searing blaze on his turn with landfall. Also, if countertop is going to be so prevalent, I'll probably have to replace the pithing needles with Null Rod and if reanimator is "dead", might have to replace the faerie macabre with krosan grips just to hate more on counterbalance. The decklist will probably look similar to what bigbear102 posted on the burn thread a couple of weeks ago except I still hate the goblin guides.