Hello again! It's been a while since my last tournament report here, but I'm back with another Top 4 at an SCG event under my belt. This time I played Storm (or ANT, although I don't think the name is that accurate any more).
First a little flavor of the trip. The guys I drove down from Seattle with met up at my place, delicious Caribbean sandwiches from Paseo in hand. Chowing down to a sandwich so stuffed with pork and dripping with juices that you can't eat it without a fork and knife ain't a bad way to start a trip. Once we made it to Portland, I certainly didn't waste time testing Standard despite only having a dozen or so games under my belt. No way. Rob and I went out to a club in old Portland where I learned that gin & tonic glows blue in a blacklight (quinine, an ingredient in tonic, is highly florescent). Some dance floor action later, we headed back to rest up for Standard.
Woo. Standard.
Yeah that didn't go well. I lost on camera, and the field seemed prepared for Esper Dragons. But enough of boring formats; I wasn't that sad to lose. We obviously went out for drinks again, this time at a tasty cocktail place. Who needs sleep to play storm? Whiskey will do just fine.
8 AM rolled around, and I groggily rolled out of bed. Time to battle with this beauty:
4 Infernal Tutor
1 Grim Tutor
1 Tendrils of Agony
2 Past in Flames
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
2 Preordain
1 Sensei's Divining Top
3 Cabal Therapy
3 Duress
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Lotus Petal
4 Dark Ritual
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Polluted Delta
4 Misty Rainforest
2 Underground Sea
1 Volcanic Island
1 Tropical Island
1 Bayou
1 Island
1 Swamp
// Sideboard
1 Sensei's Divining Top
2 Xantid Swarm
2 Dread of Night
3 Abrupt Decay
1 Ad Nauseam
2 Chain of Vapor
2 Flusterstorm
1 Krosan Grip
1 Surgical Extraction
R1 - Infect 2-0
This guy seemed pretty soft. Game 1, he tanked and then Dazed my turn 1 Preordain with a Glistener Elf in play, and snap-Stifled every fetch. That last one cost him when I used it as bait to get the last blue card despite Force out of his hand and went off. Game 2 I just went off faster. Nice combo deck.
R2 - Burn 2-0
Holy hell she loved pink. Bright, violent pink on her playmat, deckbox, sleeves, dice, sweater, even fingernails. She was friendly and pleasant to play against though. Game 1 I got lulled into overconfidence by misogynistic biases, and didn't respect the turn 1 Grim Lavamancer on the play. I Preordained setting up for next turn instead of aggressively looking for a Therapy, and she punished me by cheerfully dropping that hateful enchantment bear into play. Not to worry! I had exactly enough life and mana to Tendrils for lethal, with me at 2. Past in Flames and Tendrils costing 4 has never been better! Game 2 I #yolod turn 1 into an unknown hand despite her posturing as if she had a Mindbreak Trap. Definitely calling that bluff every time. She had an Eidolon next turn, but instead she got to play 3 turns and 1 minute of magic.
R3 - UWR Delver (ESG) 2-0
This was a brutal match for ESG, which is too bad because he had an interesting list. I saw Delver, Pyromancer, Myth Realized, and maindeck Mogg Salvage. He mulliganned both games. In the first I Therapied Delver instead of his two Dazes, but those Dazes delayed me a fair bit. I should have just taken them. Won at a healthy life total though a Force. Next game he had Bolts and Canonist. I had the Decay and won from there.
R4 - Reanimator 2-1
Game 1 was a nail-biter. I thought he was on D&T because I thought I saw a white card while he was shuffling, and he looked like that kind of player. My Preordain set up for a kill next turn instead of looking for disruption. He played Hapless Research. Oops. I Brainstormed and Pondered to find disruption, but instead all I found was a lot of mana and the tutor. Eh. #yolo. Petal, Ritual, Ritual, LED, LED, Tutor? Ok. Past in Flames? Crack Researcher, Ok. Got there! Game 2 my Ponder whiffed and left me with a Therapy for disruption with no hand information and some mana, hoping to find a tutor or discard. He Pondered and kept, so I figured time was right to fire off the Therapy on Entomb. It was the top cardGame 3 he t0'd Gemstone Cavern and Entombed in my upkeep. I Pondered into Duress and played it off Petal, taking his Reanimate in a hand with Ponder and Swamp. He played Swamp and passed, interesting. I drew and Brainstormed, bricking on land. Oh well. Lotus Petal, Xantid Swarm? Resolves. Hmm. Lotus Petal, Duress? Take Ponder, seeing Force of Will. That left him ripping off the top while I had Swarm in play, and I got there first off of Tutor for Ad Naus. This was the only game in the entire tournament where I resolved Ad Nauseam.
R5 - Elves 2-0
He mulliganed into an unexciting 6 and I killed him quickly. Game 2 he whiffed on a blind Therapy for Dark Ritual, and I set up for a kill on my turn 2. He played Visionary and flashbacked Therapy taking my Infernal Tutor, but I had another on top. Take that Danyul! Your Llanowar brother couldn't stand up to the mighty power of the swamp!
R6 - BURG Delver 2-0
Table 1 could double-draw in, but I got paired against a 13-pointer (he got an unintentional draw round 1). We knew each other and my lifetime against him is like 4-0, so I offered the draw regardless. He declined since he knew the matchup, not a wise choiceGame 1 he mulliganned to a mediocre 6 and I killed him through a Deathrite Shaman with a sweet line. I had 5 cards in graveyard, Lotus Petal x2 and LED in play, Cabal Ritual, Grim Tutor in hand, 3 black floating and 2 lands untapped. Obviously I could play Cabal Ritual and sac the Petals, but Deathrite would take me off threshold. I got to use the cool trick of play Grim Tutor, hold priority, play Cabal Ritual, hold priority, crack LED and Petals. I tutor chained from there. Game 2 I got down a Xantid Swarm against a Delver. His Delver flipped, and he swung in. "You're attacking?!" I asked. He played Deathrite and tried to block with it when I swung in on my turn. Nope. "Might want to leave that Delver on D," I commented. He did. So while I was doing nothing waiting to draw a tutor or a cantrip at least, he was holding back with Delver and draining me with Deathrite. Deal. It bought me enough time to get the kill.
R7 - ID
Going into the top 8, my game win percentage was 92%, not bad.
Quarters - ANT 2-1
I had the play, pretty crucial. I had the maindeck Top in play, but bricked on lands and tutors while he was merrily cantripping away. He won, not good. My board is good for the matchup though: +2 Flusterstorm, +1 Surgical Extraction, +1 Ad Naus, -1 Swamp, -1 Past in Flames, -2 Preordain. Grindfest. I had a quick kill game 2 while he cantripped, and then game 3 I was pretty far behind, but topdecked 2 Flusterstorms and a Surgical. He stripped one Fluster, didn't know about the second (or Surgical) when he tried to go off, and I wrecked him. Took a couple of turns to finish the job, but the game was over.
Semis - Miracles (Joe) 1-2
This is a frustrating match for me, especially as I think more about the plays I made. I think I could have 2-0'd, but made mistakes. I'd like to go into detail about the games, so any people who get bored by storm players wanking themselves with lines, mana, and storm count should skip this section.
Game 1 - I'm on the play and keep a good hand: Probe, Delta, Dark Rit, LED, Lotus Petal, Infernal Tutor, Cabal Therapy. Probe saw Snare, Pyroblast, StP, a couple lands, but no Counterbalance or Force. LED was the draw. I immediately realized it's a turn 1 kill, but I needed to figure out the line. I tanked for a minute counting if I could do a tutor chain, and Joe made impatient gestures and asked me to do something. I recounted my line (I've miscounted tutor chains twice before in high-pressure situations - something about it doesn't click for me), and the judge prompted me to make a play. It's a reasonable request, I had tanked for 2 or 3 minutes at this point, but I was a little rattled. Fine. Land, Petal, Dark Rit, Therapy you, LED, LED, Infernal Tutor, crack for 6 black. Oh crap, I'm 1 storm or 2 mana short of the tutor chain for lethal. Alright, Past in Flames? I played it and realized I would only have 5 mana after flashing back Dark Rit, shouldn't have played that Cabal Therapy. Alright, Tutor for Tendrils, hope a flashbacked Gitaxian Probe finds a +1. I flipped Cabal Ritual off the top and killed him! He was understandably a little upset. Poor play gets rewarded!
-1 LP, -1 CR, -1 CT, -1 Duress, -1 Swamp, -1 Grim, -2 Preordain, +1 Top, +2 Xantid Swarm, +3 Decay, +1 Krosan Grip, +1 Ad Naus
Games 2 and 3 are getting muddled in my memory and I threw away my notes (stupid me!). I need to take some time to recreate the game states in my mind. In summary, game 2 I shuffled away an Abrupt Decay and he ended up waiting to deploy Counterbalance until after he Cliqued away my Decay. I lost to Counterbalance and Clique beatdowns, although I had a shot to win when the top was a 3cmc except he had drawn a second Flusterstorm and Spell Snare in the 4 turns. Game 3 seemed like I had a good shot to win, but he topdecked a timely Counterspell for Ad Naus, and RiP sealed the deal.
Losing to Joe was a bittersweet end to the tournament. Let's just say he's a player that I would have felt especially happy about beating. Even more frustrating, Shawn (lordofthepit) conceded to Joe instead of avenging me. Joe said that he wanted the points, Shawn said all he cared about was the plaque. So Shawn offered a split and conceded instead of fighting. I had to walk away in disgust - what's the point of playing in a tournament if not to win it? Hopefully it's not for the money. For me, it's to see a #1 next to my name and a picture of me holding a trophy. Maybe he can explain his reasoning here. But in the meantime, the internet will see that the Legends build "beat" the Ponder build, and Joe notches another victory. Intriguingly, in the split discussions, Joe wanted to make very certain that was allowed because he had received an email from Jared Sylva that the points and the first place must go together - implying that Joe had similarly bought victory before.
My mood started improving once we got away from the venue, and by the time I got back to Seattle I was ready to celebrate with CML (congrats on the win!). He had played the entire 2-day tournament on mushrooms so he was a little out of it, but we still had ourselves a little party. Nothing is sweeter than hanging out with friends, winning, and celebrating success. It was a fine weekend.
Grim Tutor kill count: 4 or 5
Ad Nauseam kill count: 1
Past in Flames: infinite
Props:
* Kai for convincing me to try 2 Past in Flames with his success in Kyoto.
* CML for being the hero Magic deserves.
* Portland being cool
* Grim Tutor for being awful and ugly and exactly what the deck needs.
Slops:
* Miracles
* Sensei's Top making every round go 10 minutes past time.
* Shawn conceding the finals.
* Ad Nauseam. Because that card sucks (even if it won me a game).
Last edited by phazonmutant; 05-06-2015 at 11:39 PM.
Languages and dates for every set. For all you true pimps.
Congrats on the finish, man. Waiting for sweet pictures of your deck!
sheeeeit. Paseo is open again?!
Originally Posted by TsumiBand
@warfordium on twitter.
Congrats on another excellent tournament run and an entertaining report.
I'll offer my reasoning, although I'm not sure you'll find it satisfactory.
1) My mentality regarding Magic accomplishments is different than yours: you've written previously (I believe in an SCG Seattle report) that you would consider playing out matches after being locked into the Top 8 in order to get a higher seed, because you value the trophy and want to position yourself in the best position to do so. I respect that attitude a lot, but I unfortunately can't claim that I have the same, despite comments about "warriors can't block cowards" or whatever other banter I throw around with our friends to get us hyped (a slogan which was infinitely more appropriate when I was slinging Wild Nacatls than spinning Tops). I mentally feel like my job is done after the cut to Top 8 and prefer to lower the stakes. Even though I have been quite successful in elimination matches, I haven't refused a top 8 split in almost five years, when I actually made my first Top 8 with Zoo at a local dual land event and denied my first two opponents splits because my matchup was favorable. It ended working out well for me, as I won the entire event, but my opponents were disappointed and I felt bad. I know this is certainly the wrong approach to take in competitive tournaments, but it's my attitude nonetheless. Ever since then, I have agreed to a Top 8 split at every point in the elimination rounds, regardless of whether my opponent is Jacob Wilson, Joe Lossett, or a mediocre player who lucked into his first Top 8 (not referring to anyone in particular).
2) I had no use for the Open Series points. I anticipate taking a Magic hiatus soon to focus on school and I am qualified for every Invitational for the next year, of which I will probably attend none. On the other hand, I am actively rooting for Joe to do well in his quest to qualify for another Players' Championship. I feel SCG has marginalized the West Coast and the Legacy community with their recent schedule and tournament structure decisions, and Joe is a very skilled West Coast player who regards Legacy as his favorite format. I was very happy when I heard that he commented about the lack of Legacy tournaments with the new event structure at his Players' Championship interview, even if SCG cut that out of their segment: it's the exact message that I've dedicated so much time trying to convey, and Joe is a high-profile SCG grinder with the voice to reach more people. Furthermore, even though I have since switched to a very different build of Miracles, I used to watch his stream quite a bit and I credit it with dramatically improving my technical play during my first few months of learning Miracles. I hadn't thought about it from the perspective of "avenging a friend", and if I had done so, maybe I would have played it out. Sorry to disappoint you.
3) If I could draw up the perfect scenario for me in the Finals, it would have involved agreeing to an even split of the cash prizes before we played it out, with me beating him in the Finals, as I don't get many opportunities to play against a player of his caliber in a big tournament. I would be able to claim to be the championship but concede the Open Points for 1st Place to him. The initial proposal I offered when he asked if I was interested in the Open Points was as even cash split with me getting the plaque and him getting the Open Points. Unfortunately, this was not allowed by SCG, even though I am aware many previous Finals have done it in the past. He countered with an uneven cash split slightly in my favor in exchange for the Premier IQ championship perks, and I gladly accepted, as the recognition wasn't worth that much to me: even though being recognized as the champion in a Premier IQ would have meant a lot to me within the context of my Magic "career", ultimately, being regarded for my Magic accomplishments isn't that important. If we were still under the old Legacy Open structure with broadcasted matches, I would have insisted on playing the match out for the camera, win or lose. But the point seemed moot at that point once SCG established that we could not separate the Open Points from any recognition for the win, especially given that there would be no video or written coverage.
Hopefully that makes a little more sense. Sorry it was disappointing to you, and I'm sure you'll disagree with a lot of my motivations, but it is what it is. It's a shame it put a damper on a great weekend for the two of us and our friends.
I know this is off-topic but I hadn't heard about this. What did he say?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpOO...utu.be&t=0m22s
Greg may have lost to Joe. But Greg's hair went undefeated.
Last edited by danyul; 05-05-2015 at 11:54 AM.
Elves Discord Channel: https://discord.gg/2EVsdw2
From his Twitch stream, it sounded like SCG asked people something about their thoughts on the new Open structure (it may not have been that specific, I can't recall). And Joe said something like "he's disappointed they cut back on Legacy", as pretty much everyone is.
Hell yeah! This time with 100% more livable wages!
Thanks for explaining. I see where you're coming from, and I respect the big picture view. I'm still disappointed you didn't play it out though. It didn't really put a damper on things, just gives us one more thing to rib you about
...what did I just watch.
Languages and dates for every set. For all you true pimps.
Nice job, Greg.
Yeah, these two games were the ones where I drew the worst out of all the games in the tournament. Both six-card hands were keepable, but I wasn't thrilled about either of them, knowing your list and general sideboarding plans. Being on the play would have made a big difference in G1. I'm hoping we'll get a rematch sometime soon. I had what I felt was a pretty decent sideboard to fight Storm, but unfortunately I was soon cast into the darkness of three Death & Taxes matchups over the next four rounds, and that deck proved to be a big bald spot in my sideboard that got exploited.
I know what you meant, but this was amusing.
We talked briefly about G3. Back on the first couple turns of the game, did you intend to win through Rest in Peace, or were you intending to find more discard for it? I'm curious about the lines you were considering on those early turns.
Unreal. I can't believe you don't play this deck all the time.
Congrats on the finish!!!!
About splitting its just a week manner.
You have to play for the win and for the tropy.
Speaking with wagner after the event. He was sad because he splited the modern and legacy top 8 of the mkm series and he won both. Gettinng 1300€ total and me not splitting eining only one event was 2000€.
I have played rounds where I was going to enter top if I Id just because knocking out my opponent because its a bad pairing and for having a higher set.
Now going all in is like Id last round of a 4-5 rounds of a local event.
Congratz! And nice report :)
Grim Tutor ftw!
One remark: Don't you Probe before tutoring for Tendrils in SF g1? It adds LED as an extra out, giving you ~25% instead of ~21% (12/47 instead of 10/46 - not counting the probes left, and ignoring extra SDT outs), drawing a brick means you can't tutor but if probe bricks you're quite dead anyways.
Regarding splits: I always split top-8's whenever I can, but still play for the win. I'd rather have less variance in the prizes, but still play for the glory/trophy/whatever.
37th GP Ams'11 | 80th GP Stras '13 | 5th BoM Paris '13 | 12th GP Lille '15
I'm a little disappointed by the lack of folic acid and magnesium in that decklist, but congrats on the finish nonetheless!
I think the biggest thing is the deep seeded emotional understanding that the right play is the right play regardless of outcomes. The ability to make a decision 5 straight times, lose 5 times because of it, and still make it the 6th time if it's the right play. - Jon Finkel
"Notions of chance and fate are the preoccupation of men engaged in rash undertakings."
Thanks! I was thinking that as I wrote the report - you're right that I messed up the Probe as well.
I can understand top 8 splits. Personally, I feel more incentivized to win if there is no split even though I don't really care about the actual money value. But I understand that others would prefer to have a consistent payout and winning is gravy.
What? Thanks though.
Languages and dates for every set. For all you true pimps.
That decklist made me pregnant, but since there wasn't enough folic acid, now I have a spinal tube defect. Thanks Greg. Ya jerk.
Nature. Everybody's talking 'bout it. Know what comes from nature? Onions. Chock full of folic acid and magnesium. Good for your colon.
Find me on Twitter: @beanaman
But I like 'em because they taste good, like America used to.
I think the biggest thing is the deep seeded emotional understanding that the right play is the right play regardless of outcomes. The ability to make a decision 5 straight times, lose 5 times because of it, and still make it the 6th time if it's the right play. - Jon Finkel
"Notions of chance and fate are the preoccupation of men engaged in rash undertakings."
Oh, and grats on the finish btw. Even if it wasn't as bursting with onions as Richard Cheese would prefer
Find me on Twitter: @beanaman
Good job buddy. Happy to hear you're storming these days. Keep up the good work!
In regards to Legacy:
Congrats Greg.
If you want to practice more against Miracles, I'm happy to jam games in Vegas :)
Richard Cheese & .dk: wow. Somebody went deep for that joke.
Haha Magic players never think anyone else is any good. Glad I could prove you wrong!
I totally agree with you about splitting.
I'll take you up on that!
Languages and dates for every set. For all you true pimps.
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