Top 8 at Battle for Black lotus

[Mapson]

This weekend I went to Squabbles Trading Cards in Maryland to battle some legacy. I decided to register something different for this event after having a pretty rough patch with Imperial Painter as of late. Don’t worry, I still love that deck, I just needed to play with real cards like Brainstorm and Force of Will…but not too many real cards. Without further ado, here’s what I registed.

UR Painted Stone
Creature (8)
4x Goblin Welder
4x Painter's Servant
Artifact (14)
4x Grindstone
2x Lion's Eye Diamond
3x Mox Opal
4x Sensei's Divining Top
1x Tormod's Crypt
Instant (17)
4x Brainstorm
4x Force of Will
4x Intuition
1x Misdirection
3x Pyroblast
1x Red Elemental Blast
Land (21)
4x Ancient Tomb
3x Great Furnace
1x Island
1x Misty Rainforest
1x Mountain
4x Scalding Tarn
4x Seat of the Synod
1x Tropical Island
2x Volcanic Island

Sideboard
2x Ancient Grudge
3x Blood Moon
3x Ensnaring Bridge
2x Flusterstorm
2x Tormod's Crypt
1x Transmute Artifact
2x Wurmcoil Engine

Rd 1 – Loam – Ian Bosley
I won the die roll and kept a risky hand for game one. Double Force of Will, double Brainstorm, Sensei’s Divining Top, Great Furnace and I can’t remember the last card. This keep was very loose. I was a bit too high on the power of Top and Brainstorm to fix things. The deckc mulligans pretty well and I didn’t use that to my advantage. I led with Top, spun it on turn two, found no lands, got Wastelanded and promptly lost. Game Two my opponent floods (a risk of his deck) and doesn’t do anything. I also don’t really do much as I drew the reactive cards but I eventually resolve Wurmcoil and beat him down. Game three my opponent leads with turn one Dark Confidant into turn two Liliana of the Veil. I thought I might be able to crawl out at one point but my opponent top decked abrupt decay for the turn to make sure I couldn’t. Rough start for me, my opponent went undefeated for the entire event and walked away with a Lotus. Good for him. 0-1

Rd 2 – Shardless – Jeff Bourne
A friend of mine who I haven’t seen in quite some time. We chat for a bit. I mulliganed to 4, partially due to no landers, and partially due to a Mulligan Procedure Error. I get to pull a sweet misdirection on a Hymn to Tourach before dying. Game two I have very fast start, winning on I believe turn three with goblin Welder to protect against Force. Game three I have another speedy start. Opponent has a surgical to beat my Welder but no Force of will and dies. I believe he mulliganed in one of the sideboard games as well as game one. 1-1

Rd 3 – Shardless
Hey, this is familiar. I actually got paired down to a two pointer this round which I was not thrilled about. I figured it couldn’t be good for my breakers and I’m always anxious when I lose round one. I win this match very quickly without anything noteworthy happening other than my opponent needing to mulligan a lot. 2-1

Rd 4 – Death and Taxes – Rudy Briksza
Got to love playing against people you know, right? I was not pleased with this pairing as my record against Rudy in sanctioned play was 0-2. Plus, I knew he was on Death and Taxes and I realized I didn’t really have a great way to interact with Sanctum Prelate. Rudy continued the trend of my matches and mulliganed to 4(?) game one, and scryed to the bottom. I vomited my hand onto the board on turn one, playing land, Mox Opal, Grindstone, Welder, LED. Rudy tapped out for a Thalia and I was able to Intuition for the win. Game two had an interesting moment. There was a point where Rudy and I disagreed on if I had played a land already or not. The question could be solved by knowing if I had missed a land drop on any turn, and while there was no reason why I would have outside of human error we couldn’t prove one way or the other. I think it’s interesting that there’s not a good way to settle that issue. Ancient Grudge proved an all-star and won me the second game. 3-1

Rd 5 - U/B Eldrazi
Eldrazi are fast and scary but he was a turn to slow in game one, I killed him on turn three with Force of Will backup for dismember. Game two was one of my most grindy of the event. My opponent led with Chalice on zero into Thorn of Amethyst off of a City of Traitors but then he didn’t have a follow up for a few turns meanwhile I struggled to break free without being able to resolve mox opal. I also didn’t want to tap out at any point and expose myself by not being able to pay one for Force of Will. Eventually I blew up the Chalice with Ancient Grudge but let myself get Though Knot Seer’d. Thankfully my hand was very good. I was able to resolve a Ensnaring Bridge followed by a Blood Moon. My opponent started getting crafty and targeting his own Seer with the trigger from his Wasteland Stranglers to get under Bridge but I discarded my hand to LED and was eventually able to assemble the win while not letting him attack me for the last two life points. 4-1

Rd 6 – Colorless Eldrazi
Thankfully I win the die roll. I’m able to resolve Welder before he can resolve Chalice. I’m able to win with an Intuition over a few turns thanks to Welder. Game two my opponent has a pregame Leyline. I sadly think about my Welders. I resolve an early Ensnaring Bridge and hope my opponent doesn’t play Ratchet Bomb. Then my opponent taps out for a Helm of Obedience. I’m pretty scared. I spin top and see Grindstone and Painter but no Force. This would be good but I only will have 5 mana available on my turn. Thankfully I spot the line. I draw the Servant for turn, draw Grindstone with Top, fetch, and tap two to Transmute Artifact my Ensnaring Bridge away for an LED and activate. 5-1

Rd 7 – 4 color delver – Ben Friedman
ID into top 8. 6th place 5-1-1

Quarters– Burn - Mike Tomitz
Game 1 I kept a slower hand because last time I played against him he was on something else and the hand would have been ok. It was not good enough for this matchup though. Game 2 I get fairly quick. In Game three things are very close. He ends up top decking a Barbarian Ring for lethal when I had the combo as well as a misdirection on top of my deck. It was pretty annoying as most lists have dropped barbarian ring and had it been a typical mountain instead I win. Also annoying because in testing I changed my City of Traitors into Ancient Tombs but had I been playing City of Traitors I could have won. I couldn’t pay two life because I knew he had a price of progress in hand.

Overall I was very happy with my deck. I drew well for the most part and usually felt solid. Adding Ancient Grudges was a last minute change but they were the best cards in my board. They were so good. The whole sideboard felt good though. Despite not winning this was probably the happiest I’ve felt with the list I registered for an event. Thanks for reading. Feel free to ask any questions.

[brenden2000]

[QUOTE=Mapson;971356]
Rough start for me, my opponent went undefeated for the entire event and walked away with a Lotus. Good for him.


I was under the impression that Top8 for that eventt would be splitting, seems like a lot of value to split. Glad you got Top8, I dropped after Round 5.

[amppyou]

Congrats again, man. I'm going to test some Ancient Grudges in my board at the next tournament. I want to give Izzet Charm another chance, but if it doesn't work out, I'll try your configuration and go +1 LED & +1 Misdirection.

I didn't know that you were an Imperial Painter player. How did you like U/R by comparison?

[Mapson]

@Brendan, I was hoping for the top 8 split. $500 a person but alas no such luck.

@amppyou
Thanks again. Do it! They're so good, and the fact that you can even just randomly bring one in as a hedge against pithing needle/null rod, and not struggle to find it is just so good. I don't really love the thought of comparing the two decks because despite winning with the same combo it feels like they play out pretty differently. Imperial Painter fits more into the style of magic I like to play but this deck feels much smoother. The last time a list felt so correct to me was when I got to play dig through time in modern.

[GreatWhale]

Nice report, what was the UB Eldrazi? Stranglers and Drowners?

Was this tournament streamed somewhere?

[Mapson]

Nice report, what was the UB Eldrazi? Stranglers and Drowners?

Was this tournament streamed somewhere?

stranglers and skyspawners. He said that skyspawner is insane and you're doing it wrong if you're playing matter reshaper instead of him. It was not streamed unfortunately.