hungryLIKEALION
01-11-2010, 02:47 AM
3rd Place - Harry Matten Gillen
The David Byrne Special
Designed and played by me. >:3
4 Wild Nacatl
2 Kird Ape
3 Figure of Destiny
3 Grim Lavamancer
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Qasali Pridemage
2 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Lightning Helix
2 Chain Lightning
4 Path to Exile
2 Sylvan Library
1 Umezawa's Jitte
3 Plateau
3 Taiga
1 Savannah
3 Arid Mesa
3 Windswept Heath
3 Wooded Foothills
2 Horizon Canopy
1 Plains
1 Forest
1 Mountain
sb
3 Engineered Explosives
1 Umezawa's Jitte
3 Gaddock Teeg
3 Tormod's Crypt
3 Price of Progress
2 Krosan Grip
That seems like a good way to begin my tournament report. 3rd out of 82. Damn, does it feel good to say that. For a while I've been wanting to establish myself as a serious player in the northeast legacy scene, and I feel like yesterday I took a huge step toward accomplishing that.
So, the story of this tournament begins around December 9th when I tried to get a car together for the Dec. 19th event at Jupiter Games. However, the snow here in PA was terrible that day so my brother decided to drop out and I had no one to car pool with so I didn't go. However, when I saw the DFD announcement, I immediately resolved to make it to that one and began figuring out what to play. My brother and I share a collection and currently only have 4 goyfs, so I brainstormed for some non-goyf decks I could play and considered lending my brother my zoo deck for the day. My dad gave me a good chunk of christmas money, so I looked around for some decks I could invest in. The original plan I had was to order LEDs and Burning Wishes for a Storm deck I was working on, but it was gonna cost me a little too much money and I wasn't fully confident in my ability to play it properly for 6+ rounds in one day, so I abandoned that idea. Then I decided to look at buying dredge, which I have some experience playing, but nobody in the world has any of those cards in stock so I gave up on that too. I then investigated merfolk, as I entertain some small affection for the archetype since I played it in standard for a long time, and ended up buying all the pieces I didn't have (Just the standstills, mutas, and a few random folk to round out playsets, since I already had the rest.)
We got to about a week out from the tournament before my brother decided he would rather I play Zoo after all and he would play merfolk, to which I agreed. Then he decided to abandon merfolk and play the white deck he's been working on again. I settled on a list, got up at 6:30, and was off to the tournament by 7:30. My car roster was as follows;
Kennifer "The Ken" Koepplinger (Merfolk)
Kurt "The Cute One" Madouse (Pox)
JT "..." Gillen (Mono White Workshop)
And of course
Harry Matten Gillen. ;) (Zoo)
We had a pretty good drive up, aided by some awesome breakfast sandwhich melts from wawa, and arrived around 10:15 at the tournament site, Jupiter Games. Ken and Kurt made it out for the Dec 19th even so their guidance in finding it was invaluable, since our GPS is pretty damn retarded.
I got in and registered my deck, bought a play mat since I forgot mine at home, and got ready to play some magic! My brother laid out his deck and backdr0p apparently saw it and since I had played him recently on MWS with the deck he started talking to us and it was pretty cool to meet him and the rest of the montreal guys, as they were all very nice and fun people to play against. Just as they announced that they were ready to collect the deck lists, Kurt knocked over my tea mug, spilling it, inducing massive frowns from me. :(
Round 1: Pierre-Marc with Supreme Blue/Progenitus (Enigma)
I sat down for round one and was greeted by one of the Montreal dudes I just met. We had a little bit of friendly banter as we shuffled up and began the game.
Game One:
I win the die roll. I open on Figure of destiny and beat in for 2 on turn two, not wanting to get spell snare as I don't know what sort of blue deck he's playing yet. Turn 3 I play pridemage and beat in for 3, putting him to 15 since I know he's a CB deck. He firespouts here so I know he's supreme blue and say "I would play against supreme blue round one." He smiles. He forces my next creature and I end up getting a goyf down, followed by a qasali pride mage. I swing in with exalted to put him at 8 and get a mancer down. He gets double goyf and war monk and I mancer him to put him to six, untap, and throw a bolt and chain at him since he's out of cards in hand and just cashed in his top to get the second goyf, putting the game away.
I sideboard as follows:
-4 Bolt
-2 Chain
-1 Ape
-1 Mancer
+3 Price
+2 Grip
+3 EE
Game Two:
I open on Fig again and he plays turn 2 wall of roots. I pass the turn back despite having a path in hand with which to remove it and he untaps and casts natural order. Didn't expect that out of supreme blue. My attempt to race is pretty laughable.
Game Three:
For the third game in a row, I open on figure. I swing him down to 15 with figure before it gets swordsed an dI have a goyf. He has a goyf which gets pathed and we trade several turns worth of Engineered Explosives where I lose some one drops, he loses a war monk, and I think a couple goyfs blow up as well. I get lavamancer and nacatl down and bash him to 6. I swing to put him on 3 the next turn and price for lethal.
1-0, 2-1
In between rounds one and two there were some technical difficulties I guess, so we had a loooooong break. I hung out with one of the players from my area for a while and met some more friendly people.
Round 2: John with Dead Guy Ale
John is one of those people I just met. I was watching him play before the round so I saw he was running what looked like an old school DGA deck.
Game One:
He wins the die roll. I mulligan. I open on Grim Lavamancer and then Kird Ape, bashing him for a little while. He vindicates some dudes, swords some dudes, I burn some of his dudes, and my lavamancer advantage grants me victory.
I sideboard as follows:
-2 Ape
-2 Pridemage
+3 EE
+1 Jitte
Game Two:
I have no one drop :( But I play turn two goyf. He hymns me and Goyf gets in to put him to 19, 15, 11, 7. He vindicates Goyf, plays some swords on my smaller guys, We're both topdecking and I go Figure go, he vindicates it, I topdeck another figure, he topdecks another vindicate. Eventually he gets jitte active and I can't quite draw enough relevant cards to win.
Game Three:
I keep a hand with no one drop but turn two sylvan library. Sylvan Library is incredibly important in these suicide matchups so I keep. I make no turn one play, but on turn two resolve the library . I pay 8 life to draw two cards and beat him down with KoTR (5/5) and Pridemage. I cast a lightning helix and pay another 4 for another card, and he scoops when I remove his blockers.
2-0, 4-2
After round 2 there is a lunch break. I'm kinda frustrated since it's already like 1:45ish and we've only finished round 2, and there's infinite rounds to go, and now there's another half hour of down time. I realize John left behind his spin downs so I take them to him at the pizza place around the corner before going to Wendy's with my car buddies since the line at the pizza place is like ujhdfhuighjks long. I get Honey BBQ Bonless Wings that I eat half of before giving the rest to my team mates and an Oreo Twisted Frosty, which kicks ass.
Round 3: Mike with Mono Green Chalice Aggro (memnarch25)
Game One:
He wins the die roll and mulligans to 6. He makes turn one Treetop and passes, and I think he's playing a bad rock deck. I kept a hand with two wild nacatls, Figure of Destiny, Jitte, Helix, Plains, and a Plateau but no green source. I draw my card and it's not a green source, so I play figure and pass. He plays wall of roots. Merp. I play jitte and pass, once again missing a green source. He sacs the wall to natural order and makes progenitus. I die a little inside. I topdeck the green source and play the cat. He swings and makes a new wall. I put jitte on figure and swing with both guys, putting him on 13 with the unblocked cat. He swings again to put me on two and passes. I swing again to put him on 10. He swings again and I remove my jitte counters and cast my lightning helix to go to 3. He either plays a Kitchen finks or Natural orders for one, I don't remember, but either way it's enough to stop me from being able to race.
I sideboard as follows:
-2 Chain Lightning
-2 Lightning Bolt
+3 Gaddock Teeg
+1 Jitte
Game Two:
I keep a hand with 5 creatures and 2 lands, and draw a fuckton of creatures and not a single removal spell. He plays a lot of creatures and we get into some very complex board states with multiple goyfs staring down multiple goyfs, amongst other things, but my tempo allows me to force him into some bad blocks and I take it down.
Game Three:
Back on the draw, I look at a hand of Nacatl, Teeg, KoTR, 2x Plateau and 2x Horizon Canopy. I like it well enough, so I keep. He plays Ancient Tomb, chalice at 1. Lame, but okay since I have teeg for next turn. Plateau, pass the turn. Ancient Tomb, chalice at 2.
...
Bummer. I didn't side in grips or EE, so I literally have only two spells in my deck I can now cast, the two KoTRs. I play Plateau and pass the turn. He plays a treetop village. I play the KoTR in my hand off a canopy and pass the turn. He doesn't make a creature, so I pop the canopies for cards and beat in, drawing the second Knight. (!!!) He plays a Kitchen Finks and I play a fetchland and the second Knight, and am able to battle my way through the Kitchen Finks, Treetop Village, and Dryad Arbor he offers as chump blockers. Effectively playing a deck of 21 land, two 3 cost beaters, and 37 blanks, I win the round. :D
3-0, 6-3
Round 4: Alex playing UG Merfolk
He's a pretty well known magic player from the area. Honestly, I hardly feel like talking about this round because I just fuck up all over the place and thinking about it makes me angry. Both games he wins he wins because of Jitte and me not knowing how to draw good cards. Meh.
3-1, 7-5
Round 5: Seneca playing BGW Rock
I hate playing against rock decks. They are a negative matchup for Zoo, though not too negative; Maybe 45-55 their favor. This one was pretty cool though, as he was playing Vampire Nighthawk and Gatekeeper of Malakir, both of which are pretty boss cards. I was quite impressed by their power.
Game One:
I win the roll and open on nacatl. He thoughtseizes me, but I forget what he took and I didn't write it down. I think it might have been a path though. My cat gets him to twelve before being killed but I get in with Grim Lavamancer, once by swinging and then by mancing to put him on 9. For there I burn him out.
I sideboard as follows:
-2 Ape
-2 Pridemage
+3 Engineered Explosives
+1 Jitte
Game Two:
I get in some early creature damage but have to keep burning paths on Vampire Nighthawks that I'd much rather be burning. Eventually he outgoyfs me since I'm left with burn for removal and he still has 4 goyfs in his deck. Also? Gatekeeper of Malakir is a beating, and carries a jitte just fine.
Game Three:
I have a very aggressive hand where I bash with goyf, burn with lavamancer, kill his blockers, and burn him out. After a very long game two, I was relieved to be done with the round.
4-1, 9-6
Round 6: James playing Ichorid (jimirynk)
James informs me that he knows what I'm playing, but I don't know what he's playing. I make a joke about being able to find out via the pictures cdr's been posting on the source, only to discover there are no pictures of him actually playing, only sitting around! Breaking my balls here, cdr!
Anyway...
Game One:
Since I do not know what he's playing, I keep a well balanced hand with Figure, Goyf, Pridemage, and Chain Lightning. I open on figure and am greeted by Dredge being Dredge. I chain my own figure on turn three to remove bridges, and make some blockers with goyf and such, but it's not even close to enough and he takes it home after dread returning his maindeck ancestor's chosen (Really? C'mon, man. :( )
I sideboard as follows:
-2 Library
-2 KoTR
-2 Ape
-1 Jitte
-2 Helix
+3 Teeg
+3 Tormod's Crypt
+3 Engineered Explosives
Game Two:
He mulligans. A lot. I think he ended up on 4 cards, but it might have been 5. I open on Grim Lavamancer and then Gaddock Teeg, with an EE on 0 before playing Teeg. I have a second EE in my hand. I use the EE to blow up some tokens and his hand is lacking in gas because he didn't hit a dredger on his careful study and I take it home.
He says "Now that I know your hate is Tormod's Crypt..." despite not seeing it game two, so I assume he's just trying to get into my head. (Though he's right. ._.; )
Game Three:
He casts Putrid Imp, discards two bridges and a therapy, and then therapies me naming goyf and misses. I play a cat and he plays two tireless tribes. I start swinging into him with the cat and a figure, but it's pretty tough to get past tireless tribe, as it turns out. I get his tokens with an EE and force him to dread return for a Grave Troll which comes in as a 4/4. Time gets called while I'm trying to force the last few points through, and I finish him on turn 5 of extra turns thanks to chain, bolt, mancer, untap helix mancer.
5-1, 11-7
Round 7: Eric playing Tempo Thresh
He's undefeated and the only player I lost to all day was the other undefeated, so I have the highest tie breakers of all the 5-1s, so we determine it's safe for us to draw in.
5-1-1, 11-7
We try to do a prize split, but Jeremy Tibbets wants to play it out so... yeah. We play it out.
Quarter Finals: Mike playing Mono Green Chalice Aggro (memnarch25)
Playing against Mike again. Not sure how I feel about that. At least if I lose this one, I thought I'm losing to a nice guy.
Game One:
I win the die roll and open on Grim Lavamancer and apply the beats. He plays Kitchen Finks and a Jitte but it's not enough to stop me from KoTRing his face in.
I sideboard as follows:
-2 Ape
-2 Chain
+3 EE
+1 Jitte
Game Two: He's on the play. He plays turn 1 wall of roots, turn two wall+3sphere. I of course did not make a one drop because I kept a hand with three qasali pridemages instead, and after he acidic slimes my plains I am unable to find a third land to cast spells.
Game Three:
I open on Nacatl and Lavamancer and burn every blocker he presents. Kind of an uninteresting final game, but such is life.
6-1-1, 13-8
While waiting for the other quarter finals matches to end I have a pretty long discussion with backdr0p about a wide variety of legacy subjects, mostly focusing around bant decks and zoo. He gives me some cool deckbuilding ideas.
Semi Finals: Shawn playing Dream Halls
It's only fitting I should run into a combo deck eventually. As far as combo decks go though, this one isn't one of the worst for me since I do have a good number of cards that interact with it, and pitching red cards to get free burn is nice.
Game One:
I play t1 nacatl off forest, t2 Jitte (Forced) t3 no third land drop ape, t4 lavamancer. At this point he's on 8. he casts dream halls with two ancient tombs to go to 4 and I have helix+path+mancer+figure. If my forest had been a taiga or fetchland, I could have had mancer down a turn earlier and won this race, but twas not meant to be. :(
I sideboard as follows:
-1 KoTR
-1 Jitte
-4 Path
-2 Library
+3 Teeg
+3 PoP
+2 Grip
Game Two:
I play t1 Fig, t2 Gaddock Teeg. Woo hoo!
He plays t2 Show and Tell. :(
Hi, Progenitus. Bye, my life total.
6-2-1, 13-10
In the end, I was quite happy with my performances. I landed a set of Trops and a set of Polluted Deltas as my prize, and have been much enjoying showing them off to all my friends back at the local shop so far. I've even begun brewing a UGB deck to utilize all these nice blue duals I've been winning lately ;)
Anyway, props n slops!
Props:
Lions.
Wild Nacatl, for making my favorite deck playable.
Qasali Pridemage, for making my favorite deck stupidly good.
Jupiter Games, for being a very impressive store.
Eli, for throwing a great tournament.
cdr, for doing all the updates and picture taking.
Knight of the Reliquary, for showing up when I needed him.
Wendy's, for both the Twisted Frosty and the Victory Baconator I had on the way home. The Bacon was actually Crisp for once.
All the awesome people I met, especially the sourcers.
Engineered Explosives. Please, Zoo players, use it. It's good, I promise.
Richard the Lion for being my mascot.
Slops:
Kurt, for spilling my fucking tea >:O
New York for being COLD AS FUCK.
My Teammates for none of them even coming close to top 8 contention. C'mon guys, I can't do all the work.
Price of Progress, for never doing anything but still being a neccesary sideboard slot. :(
My headphones, for not magically getting into my backpack when I forgot to grab them in the morning.
That's probably good for now. Thanks for reading. :)
--hungryLIKEALION
The David Byrne Special
Designed and played by me. >:3
4 Wild Nacatl
2 Kird Ape
3 Figure of Destiny
3 Grim Lavamancer
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Qasali Pridemage
2 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Lightning Helix
2 Chain Lightning
4 Path to Exile
2 Sylvan Library
1 Umezawa's Jitte
3 Plateau
3 Taiga
1 Savannah
3 Arid Mesa
3 Windswept Heath
3 Wooded Foothills
2 Horizon Canopy
1 Plains
1 Forest
1 Mountain
sb
3 Engineered Explosives
1 Umezawa's Jitte
3 Gaddock Teeg
3 Tormod's Crypt
3 Price of Progress
2 Krosan Grip
That seems like a good way to begin my tournament report. 3rd out of 82. Damn, does it feel good to say that. For a while I've been wanting to establish myself as a serious player in the northeast legacy scene, and I feel like yesterday I took a huge step toward accomplishing that.
So, the story of this tournament begins around December 9th when I tried to get a car together for the Dec. 19th event at Jupiter Games. However, the snow here in PA was terrible that day so my brother decided to drop out and I had no one to car pool with so I didn't go. However, when I saw the DFD announcement, I immediately resolved to make it to that one and began figuring out what to play. My brother and I share a collection and currently only have 4 goyfs, so I brainstormed for some non-goyf decks I could play and considered lending my brother my zoo deck for the day. My dad gave me a good chunk of christmas money, so I looked around for some decks I could invest in. The original plan I had was to order LEDs and Burning Wishes for a Storm deck I was working on, but it was gonna cost me a little too much money and I wasn't fully confident in my ability to play it properly for 6+ rounds in one day, so I abandoned that idea. Then I decided to look at buying dredge, which I have some experience playing, but nobody in the world has any of those cards in stock so I gave up on that too. I then investigated merfolk, as I entertain some small affection for the archetype since I played it in standard for a long time, and ended up buying all the pieces I didn't have (Just the standstills, mutas, and a few random folk to round out playsets, since I already had the rest.)
We got to about a week out from the tournament before my brother decided he would rather I play Zoo after all and he would play merfolk, to which I agreed. Then he decided to abandon merfolk and play the white deck he's been working on again. I settled on a list, got up at 6:30, and was off to the tournament by 7:30. My car roster was as follows;
Kennifer "The Ken" Koepplinger (Merfolk)
Kurt "The Cute One" Madouse (Pox)
JT "..." Gillen (Mono White Workshop)
And of course
Harry Matten Gillen. ;) (Zoo)
We had a pretty good drive up, aided by some awesome breakfast sandwhich melts from wawa, and arrived around 10:15 at the tournament site, Jupiter Games. Ken and Kurt made it out for the Dec 19th even so their guidance in finding it was invaluable, since our GPS is pretty damn retarded.
I got in and registered my deck, bought a play mat since I forgot mine at home, and got ready to play some magic! My brother laid out his deck and backdr0p apparently saw it and since I had played him recently on MWS with the deck he started talking to us and it was pretty cool to meet him and the rest of the montreal guys, as they were all very nice and fun people to play against. Just as they announced that they were ready to collect the deck lists, Kurt knocked over my tea mug, spilling it, inducing massive frowns from me. :(
Round 1: Pierre-Marc with Supreme Blue/Progenitus (Enigma)
I sat down for round one and was greeted by one of the Montreal dudes I just met. We had a little bit of friendly banter as we shuffled up and began the game.
Game One:
I win the die roll. I open on Figure of destiny and beat in for 2 on turn two, not wanting to get spell snare as I don't know what sort of blue deck he's playing yet. Turn 3 I play pridemage and beat in for 3, putting him to 15 since I know he's a CB deck. He firespouts here so I know he's supreme blue and say "I would play against supreme blue round one." He smiles. He forces my next creature and I end up getting a goyf down, followed by a qasali pride mage. I swing in with exalted to put him at 8 and get a mancer down. He gets double goyf and war monk and I mancer him to put him to six, untap, and throw a bolt and chain at him since he's out of cards in hand and just cashed in his top to get the second goyf, putting the game away.
I sideboard as follows:
-4 Bolt
-2 Chain
-1 Ape
-1 Mancer
+3 Price
+2 Grip
+3 EE
Game Two:
I open on Fig again and he plays turn 2 wall of roots. I pass the turn back despite having a path in hand with which to remove it and he untaps and casts natural order. Didn't expect that out of supreme blue. My attempt to race is pretty laughable.
Game Three:
For the third game in a row, I open on figure. I swing him down to 15 with figure before it gets swordsed an dI have a goyf. He has a goyf which gets pathed and we trade several turns worth of Engineered Explosives where I lose some one drops, he loses a war monk, and I think a couple goyfs blow up as well. I get lavamancer and nacatl down and bash him to 6. I swing to put him on 3 the next turn and price for lethal.
1-0, 2-1
In between rounds one and two there were some technical difficulties I guess, so we had a loooooong break. I hung out with one of the players from my area for a while and met some more friendly people.
Round 2: John with Dead Guy Ale
John is one of those people I just met. I was watching him play before the round so I saw he was running what looked like an old school DGA deck.
Game One:
He wins the die roll. I mulligan. I open on Grim Lavamancer and then Kird Ape, bashing him for a little while. He vindicates some dudes, swords some dudes, I burn some of his dudes, and my lavamancer advantage grants me victory.
I sideboard as follows:
-2 Ape
-2 Pridemage
+3 EE
+1 Jitte
Game Two:
I have no one drop :( But I play turn two goyf. He hymns me and Goyf gets in to put him to 19, 15, 11, 7. He vindicates Goyf, plays some swords on my smaller guys, We're both topdecking and I go Figure go, he vindicates it, I topdeck another figure, he topdecks another vindicate. Eventually he gets jitte active and I can't quite draw enough relevant cards to win.
Game Three:
I keep a hand with no one drop but turn two sylvan library. Sylvan Library is incredibly important in these suicide matchups so I keep. I make no turn one play, but on turn two resolve the library . I pay 8 life to draw two cards and beat him down with KoTR (5/5) and Pridemage. I cast a lightning helix and pay another 4 for another card, and he scoops when I remove his blockers.
2-0, 4-2
After round 2 there is a lunch break. I'm kinda frustrated since it's already like 1:45ish and we've only finished round 2, and there's infinite rounds to go, and now there's another half hour of down time. I realize John left behind his spin downs so I take them to him at the pizza place around the corner before going to Wendy's with my car buddies since the line at the pizza place is like ujhdfhuighjks long. I get Honey BBQ Bonless Wings that I eat half of before giving the rest to my team mates and an Oreo Twisted Frosty, which kicks ass.
Round 3: Mike with Mono Green Chalice Aggro (memnarch25)
Game One:
He wins the die roll and mulligans to 6. He makes turn one Treetop and passes, and I think he's playing a bad rock deck. I kept a hand with two wild nacatls, Figure of Destiny, Jitte, Helix, Plains, and a Plateau but no green source. I draw my card and it's not a green source, so I play figure and pass. He plays wall of roots. Merp. I play jitte and pass, once again missing a green source. He sacs the wall to natural order and makes progenitus. I die a little inside. I topdeck the green source and play the cat. He swings and makes a new wall. I put jitte on figure and swing with both guys, putting him on 13 with the unblocked cat. He swings again to put me on two and passes. I swing again to put him on 10. He swings again and I remove my jitte counters and cast my lightning helix to go to 3. He either plays a Kitchen finks or Natural orders for one, I don't remember, but either way it's enough to stop me from being able to race.
I sideboard as follows:
-2 Chain Lightning
-2 Lightning Bolt
+3 Gaddock Teeg
+1 Jitte
Game Two:
I keep a hand with 5 creatures and 2 lands, and draw a fuckton of creatures and not a single removal spell. He plays a lot of creatures and we get into some very complex board states with multiple goyfs staring down multiple goyfs, amongst other things, but my tempo allows me to force him into some bad blocks and I take it down.
Game Three:
Back on the draw, I look at a hand of Nacatl, Teeg, KoTR, 2x Plateau and 2x Horizon Canopy. I like it well enough, so I keep. He plays Ancient Tomb, chalice at 1. Lame, but okay since I have teeg for next turn. Plateau, pass the turn. Ancient Tomb, chalice at 2.
...
Bummer. I didn't side in grips or EE, so I literally have only two spells in my deck I can now cast, the two KoTRs. I play Plateau and pass the turn. He plays a treetop village. I play the KoTR in my hand off a canopy and pass the turn. He doesn't make a creature, so I pop the canopies for cards and beat in, drawing the second Knight. (!!!) He plays a Kitchen Finks and I play a fetchland and the second Knight, and am able to battle my way through the Kitchen Finks, Treetop Village, and Dryad Arbor he offers as chump blockers. Effectively playing a deck of 21 land, two 3 cost beaters, and 37 blanks, I win the round. :D
3-0, 6-3
Round 4: Alex playing UG Merfolk
He's a pretty well known magic player from the area. Honestly, I hardly feel like talking about this round because I just fuck up all over the place and thinking about it makes me angry. Both games he wins he wins because of Jitte and me not knowing how to draw good cards. Meh.
3-1, 7-5
Round 5: Seneca playing BGW Rock
I hate playing against rock decks. They are a negative matchup for Zoo, though not too negative; Maybe 45-55 their favor. This one was pretty cool though, as he was playing Vampire Nighthawk and Gatekeeper of Malakir, both of which are pretty boss cards. I was quite impressed by their power.
Game One:
I win the roll and open on nacatl. He thoughtseizes me, but I forget what he took and I didn't write it down. I think it might have been a path though. My cat gets him to twelve before being killed but I get in with Grim Lavamancer, once by swinging and then by mancing to put him on 9. For there I burn him out.
I sideboard as follows:
-2 Ape
-2 Pridemage
+3 Engineered Explosives
+1 Jitte
Game Two:
I get in some early creature damage but have to keep burning paths on Vampire Nighthawks that I'd much rather be burning. Eventually he outgoyfs me since I'm left with burn for removal and he still has 4 goyfs in his deck. Also? Gatekeeper of Malakir is a beating, and carries a jitte just fine.
Game Three:
I have a very aggressive hand where I bash with goyf, burn with lavamancer, kill his blockers, and burn him out. After a very long game two, I was relieved to be done with the round.
4-1, 9-6
Round 6: James playing Ichorid (jimirynk)
James informs me that he knows what I'm playing, but I don't know what he's playing. I make a joke about being able to find out via the pictures cdr's been posting on the source, only to discover there are no pictures of him actually playing, only sitting around! Breaking my balls here, cdr!
Anyway...
Game One:
Since I do not know what he's playing, I keep a well balanced hand with Figure, Goyf, Pridemage, and Chain Lightning. I open on figure and am greeted by Dredge being Dredge. I chain my own figure on turn three to remove bridges, and make some blockers with goyf and such, but it's not even close to enough and he takes it home after dread returning his maindeck ancestor's chosen (Really? C'mon, man. :( )
I sideboard as follows:
-2 Library
-2 KoTR
-2 Ape
-1 Jitte
-2 Helix
+3 Teeg
+3 Tormod's Crypt
+3 Engineered Explosives
Game Two:
He mulligans. A lot. I think he ended up on 4 cards, but it might have been 5. I open on Grim Lavamancer and then Gaddock Teeg, with an EE on 0 before playing Teeg. I have a second EE in my hand. I use the EE to blow up some tokens and his hand is lacking in gas because he didn't hit a dredger on his careful study and I take it home.
He says "Now that I know your hate is Tormod's Crypt..." despite not seeing it game two, so I assume he's just trying to get into my head. (Though he's right. ._.; )
Game Three:
He casts Putrid Imp, discards two bridges and a therapy, and then therapies me naming goyf and misses. I play a cat and he plays two tireless tribes. I start swinging into him with the cat and a figure, but it's pretty tough to get past tireless tribe, as it turns out. I get his tokens with an EE and force him to dread return for a Grave Troll which comes in as a 4/4. Time gets called while I'm trying to force the last few points through, and I finish him on turn 5 of extra turns thanks to chain, bolt, mancer, untap helix mancer.
5-1, 11-7
Round 7: Eric playing Tempo Thresh
He's undefeated and the only player I lost to all day was the other undefeated, so I have the highest tie breakers of all the 5-1s, so we determine it's safe for us to draw in.
5-1-1, 11-7
We try to do a prize split, but Jeremy Tibbets wants to play it out so... yeah. We play it out.
Quarter Finals: Mike playing Mono Green Chalice Aggro (memnarch25)
Playing against Mike again. Not sure how I feel about that. At least if I lose this one, I thought I'm losing to a nice guy.
Game One:
I win the die roll and open on Grim Lavamancer and apply the beats. He plays Kitchen Finks and a Jitte but it's not enough to stop me from KoTRing his face in.
I sideboard as follows:
-2 Ape
-2 Chain
+3 EE
+1 Jitte
Game Two: He's on the play. He plays turn 1 wall of roots, turn two wall+3sphere. I of course did not make a one drop because I kept a hand with three qasali pridemages instead, and after he acidic slimes my plains I am unable to find a third land to cast spells.
Game Three:
I open on Nacatl and Lavamancer and burn every blocker he presents. Kind of an uninteresting final game, but such is life.
6-1-1, 13-8
While waiting for the other quarter finals matches to end I have a pretty long discussion with backdr0p about a wide variety of legacy subjects, mostly focusing around bant decks and zoo. He gives me some cool deckbuilding ideas.
Semi Finals: Shawn playing Dream Halls
It's only fitting I should run into a combo deck eventually. As far as combo decks go though, this one isn't one of the worst for me since I do have a good number of cards that interact with it, and pitching red cards to get free burn is nice.
Game One:
I play t1 nacatl off forest, t2 Jitte (Forced) t3 no third land drop ape, t4 lavamancer. At this point he's on 8. he casts dream halls with two ancient tombs to go to 4 and I have helix+path+mancer+figure. If my forest had been a taiga or fetchland, I could have had mancer down a turn earlier and won this race, but twas not meant to be. :(
I sideboard as follows:
-1 KoTR
-1 Jitte
-4 Path
-2 Library
+3 Teeg
+3 PoP
+2 Grip
Game Two:
I play t1 Fig, t2 Gaddock Teeg. Woo hoo!
He plays t2 Show and Tell. :(
Hi, Progenitus. Bye, my life total.
6-2-1, 13-10
In the end, I was quite happy with my performances. I landed a set of Trops and a set of Polluted Deltas as my prize, and have been much enjoying showing them off to all my friends back at the local shop so far. I've even begun brewing a UGB deck to utilize all these nice blue duals I've been winning lately ;)
Anyway, props n slops!
Props:
Lions.
Wild Nacatl, for making my favorite deck playable.
Qasali Pridemage, for making my favorite deck stupidly good.
Jupiter Games, for being a very impressive store.
Eli, for throwing a great tournament.
cdr, for doing all the updates and picture taking.
Knight of the Reliquary, for showing up when I needed him.
Wendy's, for both the Twisted Frosty and the Victory Baconator I had on the way home. The Bacon was actually Crisp for once.
All the awesome people I met, especially the sourcers.
Engineered Explosives. Please, Zoo players, use it. It's good, I promise.
Richard the Lion for being my mascot.
Slops:
Kurt, for spilling my fucking tea >:O
New York for being COLD AS FUCK.
My Teammates for none of them even coming close to top 8 contention. C'mon guys, I can't do all the work.
Price of Progress, for never doing anything but still being a neccesary sideboard slot. :(
My headphones, for not magically getting into my backpack when I forgot to grab them in the morning.
That's probably good for now. Thanks for reading. :)
--hungryLIKEALION