The inmates were running the asylum….

It was a quiet day at the Temple this Sunday. Grant, Xi, and many of the regulars were out at the GP Trial, leaving Charlie in charge of the register and me running the Legacy event. 11 players showed up nevertheless, to test their wits and cunning in an epic battle of magic and mayhem. I set up four rounds with a top 4 cut, and we were off.

My 3rd Degree got a new name this week, since it’s evolved from its original form. Napalm I’m calling her now – burn that sticks. High Tide made an appearance for the first week this time, doing unsurprisingly well. This was a budget build of mine, replacing the Candelabras with the Snap/Fairy combo and the four copies of Force of Will with the still-solid Spell Pierce. Will it do well enough to place or even win? Other decks included Black Control, Cephalid Breakfast, Other Burn, Reanimater and The Gate.

I pulled a bye the first round, and hoped for an easy slide into the top four cut. Hightide threw down with Black Control for round one, taking the match and showing its resiliency to hand disruption. The Nighthawks are tough, but not fast enough to stay ahead of the flood. Cephalid Breakfast was matched up against Other Burn, and a player unfamiliar with the build. Game one was taken easily, firing off a Dread Return to fetch a Sutured Ghoul and Dragon Breath. Exiling a Krosan Cloudscraper and Death’s Shadow to the Ghoul made for 26 points of hasty beatstick. Game two saw the flexible deck ramp up around 3000 points of life, placing it well out of flame range.

Round two saw Napalm burning at the bars of the Gate. Game one dropped to a misplay on my part. Was it a game changer? I ignored a lonely Gatekeeper of Malakir, choosing instead to use my dying Lavamancer to pop my opponent for 2 to the face. Next turn an Umezawa’s Jitte drops and equips and I have no quick answer, and no answer for the Jitte in my board, since I alternately side out the artifact removal. Game two forced me to mulligan, never a good start for a pure burn deck. I struggled and held on for a bit, taking my lumps from an Abyssal Persecutor, until the hated Vampire Nighthawk hit the board. Almost out of burn, and with no Dark Confidant to help me out, I scooped to the airborne lifegainer when my opponent dropped a second. Right play? Perhaps not, I had a Rift Bolt, and was drawing into another one to handle the second Nighthawk. I may have been able to burn him out before he drew into the removal he needed to kill his own Persecutor, but my headache said differently. The Gate has proven to be a tough matchup for me, mostly because of the life gain, or the Jitte.

In another match, Black Control was pitted against Cephalid Breakfast. Game one went easily to the blue illusionist, but Black came back with Leyline of the Void in games two and three. Something that the Cephailds have a hard time playing around. Always a solid grave-hate card.

Round three brought me face to face with the Reanimated dead. Game one was a quick win, as my opponent kept a less-than-optimal hand of one land and no other mana sources (Lotus Petal). Four turns or so later, he was just getting his mana base together when the final flames took him down. I dropped game two to the bitch Iona. I led game three with my standard grave-hate tool, the Relic of Progenitus. Raise Dead targeted the Entombed Iona, but the Relic scooped her out before she had a chance at rebirth. A second Iona was pitched desperately after the Relic scoop and ahead of the Raise Dead, but being a different Iona, the spell still fizzled and Napalm swooped in for a quick finish.

Round four had The Gate and Hightide draw into the 1 and 2 spots, respectively (*note*, Standings determined by opponents’ match win percentage. Your mileage may vary). So it came down to four determined competitors squaring off for the number 3 and 4 spots. With all at 6 match points, the winners of these would be in the top 4. Reanimater faced Black Control and Napalm faced Cephalid Breakfast.

It was a deck I felt fairly confident I could disrupt now that I was familiar with it, both before and after boarding. Game one was an easy win for me. I never saw my Relic for game two, but it was close. Game three gave me my turn 1 relic, but the Breakfast had a different trick to show this time, with its infinite life gain. I toyed with the idea of making my opponent pass me priority for all 3000 triggers he put on the stack forcing a draw on time and probably giving me the #4 playoff spot on tiebreakers, but figured what the hell, it’s Sunday Legacy and not a big deal. I scooped to the unburnable life total, though questioned the move later. As was pointed out to me, just because I couldn’t win, doesn’t mean my opponent has won. I could have potentially played that game to a draw, or even a loss on his part if he drew off an empty library (having Pondered a few times, his deck was short). I still had the relic out to hold off any real threats, and the little 1/1 and 1/3 he had out weren’t about to beat past my 2/2 Goblin Guides. C'est la vie. I am out, and Cephalid Breakfast walks into the top 4 with Reanimater.

The semi-finals saw a very interesting match of Hightide and Cephalid Breakfast, probably the only real threat to the vaulted build which was there Sunday. They went all the way, but Cephalid Breakfast finally pulled a win in Game three off a Silence. Pact of Negation from the sideboard countered the white control, but left Hightide with no answer for the drop that same turn of the critter/mill combo and the Dread Return beating that was to follow. Would the Candelabra and Force of Will made the difference? Hard to say, but Hightide put in a respectable performance anyway, especially considering it was piloted by a first timer that day.

The Gate took down Reanimater, and Dan Livant II split the top prize of the day with Albert Wooten. Congratulations also to our #’s 3 and 4, Vinnie and Sidney.