[Report] Spinning into Top Eight like a true Sensei

[Stifle]

After months of messing around with Countertop Thopters + bad tempo decks, a certain friend of mine told me to embrace my inner masochistic side and so I went back to playing 4c Countertop.

Here's my seventy-five.

Mainboard: 60

Spells: 32
4x Brainstorm
4x Counterbalance
4x Force of Will
4x Sensei's Divining Top
4x Swords to Plowshare
3x Firespout
3x Jace, the Mind Sculptor
3x Counterspell
3x Spell Snare

Creatures: 6
4x Tarmogoyf
2x Vendilion Clique
Lands: 22
4x Flooded Strand
4x Misty Rainforest
3x Tropical Island
3x Volcanic Island
2x Tundra
2x Island
1x Forest
1x Plain
1x Karakas
1x Scalding Tarn

Sideboard: 15
4x Pyroblast
3x Krosan Grip
3x Tormod's Crypt
2x Hydroblast
1x Llawan, Cephalid Empress
1x Firespout
1x Relic of Progenitus

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Round 1: vs. Adi (UW Countertop Walkers)

Game 1 - He wins the roll and attempts a turn 3 balance when I crack brainstorm and spell snare in response. I dropped a land, casted my own balance and passed. My opponent went for a second balance which resolved and he passed. I felt like such a virgin in bed here because when I brainstormed, I should have made sure a two drop was on top since the only reason my opponent would blitz a Balance is unless he had the second copy. With my next turn, I had a mind sculpting Jace in hand and began to weigh out my options... he had one mana open and I had force backup while we both had balances up. I attempted the Jace play when his Counterbalance trigger kicked me in the nuts and revealed a random Elspeth. Don't remember much after that except I tried for a Clique which saw something like Elspeth, Elspeth, Engineered Explosives, Runed Halo, and StP. After a grueling twenty minutes later, he finally got top to stick and I conceded shortly thereafter.

Sideboard:
-4 Swords to Plowshare
-3 Firespout

+4 Pyroblast
+3 Krosan Grip

Game 2 - It was a race against time at this point and I knew I had to play fast. REAL FAST HAHA. WITH A CONTROL DECK PLAYING A CONTROL MIRROR. Game was pretty one-sided as I achieved the CB/Top lock out by turn 4 and eventually beat him down with the blue, flashing 3/1.

Game 3 - Time was called while we dicked around with our fetchlands.

0-0-1
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Round 2: vs. Navid (GW Vial Knights)

Game 1 - Navid is a pretty cool dude playing a pretty cool deck doing pretty cool things with stuff like Vial, Student of Warfare, and Knight of the Reliquary. Unfortunately for him, he mulled twice while he was on the play and I kept my seven. He opened up with some creatures which I took care of with Jace bounce/Firespout then proceeded to win with double goyf.

Sideboard:
-1 Counterspell
-1 Firespout

+2 Krosan Grip

Game 2 - Guy went turn 1 Vial while I proceeded to metaphorically shit myself. He dropped a bunch of creatures with his cheater 1 drop artifact which I had the answers for until he dropped a second Vial. A turn later, my opponent moved his first Vial up to four to cheat in a Kinsbaile Cavalier into play. Opponent was stuck on two lands because he kept cracking his Horizon Canopy to draw. I had the Jace play with two Goyfs out already. During his turn, he attempted a Retribution of the Meek on his main phase which prompted the Force of Will in my hand and I plowshared his 4 drop while his Student of Warfare was staring back at my beefy Tarmogoyfs. I bounced with Jace, swung in for ten points of damage with no creatures on his side, he conceded the same turn.

1-0-1
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Round 3: vs. Ryan (Mono Black Control)

Game 1 - It was Ryan's first Legacy Tournmaent and with a 2-0 record so it looked like he knew what he was doing. He mulled once, while I kept my seven and I think I won the dice roll. Don't want to remember this game because it was a grueling thirty - forty minute game when I managed to grind out the win with one life and the CBTop lock out. The things to note here was that, I could have masturbated while playing and played better then how I did in this game. Oh and lol he went through FOUR ABYSSAL PERSECUTORS.

Sideboard:

Nothing (but I shuffled and took out the same cards to make it look like I was sideboarding in something relevant)

Game 2 - With the way this game was going, it pretty much paralleled the last Game. I incrementally began to gain the advantage and when I was in a position of winning, time was called.

2-0-1
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Round 4: vs. Tri (Show & Tell with Natural Order)

Game 1 - Tri is a good friend who attends the same FNM that I go to and when we met on that friday, he played a homebrew which I was skeptical about. But considering that he was three wins and zero loss, the guy definitely knew what he was doing. He mulled once, brainstormed and pondered a couple of times, and his Show and Tell resolved which prompted an Emrakul on his end and a land on mine. I took an Emrakul swing and when I couldn't dig up the Karakas... we went to game two.

Sideboard:
-3 Spell Snare
-1 Tarmogoyf
-1 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

+4 Pyroblast
+1 Llawan, Cephalid Empress

Game 2 - I kept a somewhat shaky hand while he proceeded to accelerate in mana with Noble Hierarch. The next turn or so, he dropped another one, and proceeded to beat me down for two. A few turns later he dropped a Dryad Arbor and the following turn after, a third Noble Hierarch while I had a Goyf in play. He swung for four, and passed. During my turn, I firespouted leaving him with two lands and I swung back with my 4/5 Goyf. I kept counters back in my hand and proceeded to beat him down with the best two drop creature ever printed not named Dark Confidant.

Game 3 - I kept a hand with 4 lands (one being a Karakas) and three Pyroblasts lolol. We began to flirt with some countermagic and I drew into a Top which resolved and helped in finding the Faerie trio in my deck and casted it. He showed me a hand with two Emrakuls, a Natural Order, and Show and Tell. Don't remember what I took but it didn't matter because I drew into Llawan thanks to Top and at this point I was loltastically salivating because I had responses to both his Progenitus and Emrakul. The thing I do remember was plowsharing away a noble to keep him off colored mana, and beating down with the flying posse to clench the win.

3-0-1
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Round 5: vs. Weston (New Horizons)

Game 1 - Weston is a friend of mine and was the only 4-0 in the building at that time so I felt a little bad when I kept asking him to scoop to me but we eventually decided to just play it out. My New Horizons friend had aggro on board pretty early into the game with a turn 2 goyf. Two turns later, he missed a land drop and attempted a Knight of the Reliquary. I counterspelled with two mana up and he dazed me THREE times (wut wut) to make sure the Knight resolved. I took a few beats from his Knight and Goyf until I decided to take advantage of his tempo loss. He had one land out when I casted the four mana blue planeswalker so I decided to Swords away his two drop which followed up with Jace bouncing his three drop and just as I predicted, his next turn was land - go. I countered his Knight, and sealed his fate with Jace.

Sideboard:
-1 Firespout (maybe)
-1 Counterspell (maybe)

+2 Pyroblast

Game 2 - This was a dumb game. My opponent mulled once and after a grueling war of attrition, I was stuck at two lands for the longest time but had all the answers and he was on topdeck mode with no threats on board. I eventually drew out of my mana screw, and he promptly conceded.

4-0-1
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Round 6: vs. Caleb (Belcher)

ID

4-0-2

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Quarterfinals (Top 8): vs. Shai (Dark Horizons)

Game 1 - He won the dice roll, thoughtseized me a couple of times, Hymn'd me, and beat me down with his dudes. It wasn't even close.

Game 2 - We actually had a game going on this round which comprised of him dropping bob, pernicious deed and a lot of discarding on while I did nothing relevant throughout most of the game. My opponent gradually took me down to four life and I was at a board position where I could have lived a few turns more because I had the mind sculpting Jace out with Goyf in play while he had Knight of the Reliquary and Bob. I plowshared his Bob when I forgot that he had Pernicious deed out. He smelled blood because I was tapped out so he cracked deed for two, and swung in for game.

SON I AM DISSAPOINT
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Afterthoughts: Made a couple of mistakes throughout the tournament but my deck was surprisingly forgiving and it gave me the chance to recover from my errors. It sounds a little crazy but against Show and Tell variants, make sure you board in Llawan if you have it in the sideboard because that's your only out to a resolved Progenitus. Goyf is pretty much the best blue creature ever printed and yesterday''s tournament reassured that fact for yours truly. Didn't come across a single Goblins or Merfolk today which was pretty copacetic.

Record: 5th out of 40

* Congrats to neji and PanderAlexander for top eight-ing.
* Shoutout to amigos Tri & Alex for making it out to Knightware and playing. Good show, gents.
* Thanks as always to Lori & the judges for hosting such a smooth event!
* Knightware was recording feature matches on the top Table which we will have links up for so be sure to check out my games in Round five and top eight quarterfinals so you can comment on how much of a bad player I am. :)

[COBBLER]

HOW DID YOU FORGET DEED iam just kidding lol, good report though, those videos of the matches should be funny that trip daze I did got 0 value lol i also used it to couter a counterbalence not a counterspell which is actualy worse lol

[2Rach]

His name's Adi, and I still have his Vindicate. (just incase he does stumble upon this thread)

[Stifle]

HOW DID YOU FORGET DEED iam just kidding lol, good report though, those videos of the matches should be funny that trip daze I did got 0 value lol i also used it to couter a counterbalence not a counterspell which is actualy worse lol

LOL. Wait, are you sure? I thought we were contesting over whether if Knight was resolving or not... my memories are a little fuzzy but if we did fight over the balance that is definitely worse haha.

His name's Adi, and I still have his Vindicate. (just incase he does stumble upon this thread)

Thanks man.

[jazzykat]

Nice report. You might want to add when and where you played the tournament but otherwise it was good.

[HokusSchmokus]

nice report und congrats to your finish!

can you post a link to the videos?

[Stifle]

Nice report. You might want to add when and where you played the tournament but otherwise it was good.

Thanks for the head's up and critique. I linked the event on one of my asterisk-notes but I'll be sure to place it so that people will know right away next time.

nice report und congrats to your finish!

can you post a link to the videos?

Thanks for reading! The videos will be up in a week or so to my knowledge, but I'll be sure to bump/update this thread when it does.

[everythingitouchdies]

Congrats man. This was a great tournament.

[klaus]

I'd strongly suggest to keep Jaces in against Emrakul.dec

[Michael Keller]

I'd strongly suggest to keep Jaces in against Emrakul.dec

Jace does nothing against Sneak Attack, which Emrakul sees a lot of play with.

And Show and Tell cast on their play, their turn three cannot be salvaged by a Jace because you have yet to drop your third land. I'd rather run one more Karakas in the board; you can still manipulate draws with Top and fetches.

[Koby]

I'd strongly suggest to keep Jaces in against Emrakul.dec

I disagree as well. During this tournament (I also played against the deck) Progenitus is the prefered SnT target; Emrakul is Snuck into play with hasty abilities leaving Jace to sit there like a lame duck.