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ThePrevailer
01-16-2012, 04:56 PM
This report was written for the Magic club at my school, which has a lot of players new-ish to Legacy, so there's a lot of information here:

First of all, my decklist:

3 Savannah
1 Tropical Island
2 Forest
1 Plains
4 Windswept Heath
2 Misty Rainforest
2 Marsh Flats
2 Horizon Canopy
1 Ghost Quarter
1 Bokuka Bog
1 Tower of the Magistrate
1 Dryad Arbor
1 Maze of Ith

3 Aven Mindcensor
1 Birds of Paradise
1 Eternal Witness
2 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Gaddock Teeg
4 Knight of the Reliquary
3 Noble Hierarch
4 Qasali Pridemage
1 Rafiq of the Many
2 Scavenging Ooze
2 Scryb Ranger
2 Stoneforge Mystic

1 Batterskull
1 Sword of Body and Mind
1 Sword of Light and Shadow
1 Sylvan Library

3 Green Sun's Zenith
1 Path to Exile
4 Swords to Plowshares

SB:
3 Choke
3 Spell Pierce
1 Terravore
2 Enlightened Tutor
1 Absolute Law
1 Pithing Needle
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
1 Ratchet Bomb
1 Stony Silence
1 Wheel of Sun and Moon


Round 1: WBG Junk

Game 1:
I played some dudes, he played none. He had a dark Confidant that I StoP'd the turn he played it, and then I saw equipment and nothing else. He never got white mana. I beat him to death wondering what he was playing....
No Side.

Game 2:
He get out an early Aether Vial into Dark Confidant and starts drawing cards and losing life while I beat him for 1 with an exalted BOP. We both get creatures, but he eventually has three 4/5 Tarmogoyf and a Stoneforge Mystic. I was able to blow up the Batterskull, but my Ooze couldn't shrink the goyfs fast enough. I lose but I noticed his life total was around 8, margely because of Confidant.

SB: +2 Enlightened Tutor, Pithing Needle; -2 Canonist, Teeg
The logic behind this SB was that even though Needle doesn't do much, the three cards I took were not only dead, but hindered me more than him in this match, since he was running Vial and not Zenith.

Game 3:
I had a Pithing Needle and Maze in my opener, dudes were played, Dark Confidant lost him 3 life when he draw Vindicate, my Maze was gone soon after. I played a resonably large Knight, and later Enlightened Tutor'd for my Sword of Light and Shadow (man life without Stoneforge was SO SLOW), equipped it, and death was quick. Ooze was effecting at keeping Goyfs smaller than my Knight, so that was satisfactory.

2-1 games, 1-0-0 matches


Round 2 vs Ellis with BR Painted Stone

Game 1:
I keep a have with some ramp and removal, thinking for some reason that I was playing his Monowhite deck, because I'm an idiot. His t1 Bloodstained Mire into Grindstone snapped me back to my senses really quickly. The next turn he has Painter's Servant , but no Dark Rit (or Lion's Eye Diamond) and I had a Swords to Plowshares. Blows were traded, artifacts were blown up by Qasali Pridemage, I got a SoLaS, and lots of artifacts were blown up by Qasali Pridemage.

SB: +3 Spell Pierce, 2 E. Tutor, Sony Silence; - 2 Stoneforge Mystic and 3 equipment.

Game 2:
Again with the t1 Grindstone, I think I blew it up, because when he played the Painter's Servant, it stuck for an uncomfortably long time. After a few turns, I drew a Scryb Ranger, which had protection on par with Progenitus thanks to the Servant (naming blue), so that was really nifty. He cast some Leylines, but didn't see a Helm of Obedience. Soon enough I drew Enlightened Tutor and found Stony Silence, shutting down all his combos. Once I removed the Painter's Servant, he could Pyroblast it, and the game was over soom after.

4-1 games, 2-0-0 matches


Round 3 vs Dan Case and Team America.
We talk about drawing, but since there were 3 undefeated players, an ID would have taken up both out of the running for first. So we play it out.

Game 1:
Don't remember all the details here, but I know I fetched for a bunch of basics, he played some Goofs, he Smothered my Knight, and I responded with like 4 abilities including procuring a Maze of Ith. I think he had a Tombstalker and 2 Goyfs to my KotR, Maze and some dorks. 6/6 Knight > 5/6 Goyfs, and Maze stopped the 'Stalker. I get there.

SB: +3 Choke, Terravore, - 4 Knight of the Reliquary
KotR came out because I was expecting Grave Hate, and TA doesn't like dead cards, it's card disadvantage is bad enough with Force and Daze; and if it was the wong decision, I had g3. Choke came in because blue gets sided out alot of the time when facing aggro, and even if it was countered, that's -2 cards if FOW, and -1 card, one land if Dazed. I completely forget about Virtue's ruin cuz I'm an idiot.

Game 2:
The game started with a Tormod's Crypt in play on Dan's side, which was cool. ;-) The details of the actually game are fuzzy, I think I have this thing where I block TA's matches out of my memory like I would other traumatic experiences. I never saw any of my SB cards, eventually he was topdecking and I wasn't, which is my favourite place to be. I'm pretty sure I won because he was drawing lands and dead 'Stalkers all through the late game.

6-1, 3-0-0


Round 4: BJ with UG Infect
This is a really hard match for me: I played him last week, and lost because I wasn't sure what the best way to attack his deck was. This week I had thought about it and realized really all I could do is try to remove EVERYTHING as soon as possible.

Game 1:
He has an Inkmoth Nexus, I have a T2 Canonist which stops him from ever 1-shotting me. He gets for 5 infect once, and I'm sitting there thankful that I'm still alive. I beat him for a few turns, then he attacks into my Pridemage with the Nexus. I told him I wasn't blocking, and he passed priority. Since it was his only creature, I decided to pridemage it anyway, and he used Vines of Vastwood in response to kill me. I hate being outplayed....

SB: +3 Spell Pierce, Pithing Neede (for Inkmoth); -Teeg, Witness, 2 Ooze
Don't need late game cards against combo....

Game 2:
He has some guys, I have some guys, I keep StoP open from turn one, but he never attacks. I use Stoneforge to get out Batterskull, then draw Sylvan Library when I'm at 27 life. During his next turn he plays 2 more dude for a total of four and passes. I look at the top 3 and see 3 Swords to Plowshares! I pay 8 life to keep all of them. When he eventually attacked, I StoP'd three of his guys, and swung back for lethal. Sylvan Library is AWESOME when you can just draw 3 cards per turn. I think I ended that game at 3 life from just the Library.
No side.

Game 3: I have a Path and StoP in my opener, and keep W open the entire game again. He cast Land Grant, showing me Berserk, Brainstorm, Misdirection. He eventually used the BS and used Berserk to kill my Scryb Ranger. The game went long and BJ was topdecking for a lot of it. I eventually draw Sylvan Library and overwhelmed him with card advantage, as they say.

8-2, 4-0-0 for 1st place for the first time ever ^_^

Props:
+ Sylvan Library for getting there against BJ
+ Scryb Ranger for making Dan read it again during our matches
+ 4 maindeck Pridepage, while really there cuz I keep forgetting I still have 4, turned out to be really useful. I really only need two, but there it is.
+ Exalted Games for having a foreign box for me to dig through
+ Dan Case fro loaning me a Trop and a Spell Pierce that I never saw

Slops:
- forgetting I had 4 Pridemages and cutting Terravore instead.
- never drawing a Spell Pierce ever
- walking into a Vines of Vastwood trap.

KobeBryan
01-16-2012, 05:13 PM
Curious as to why you would include 3 combo hate cards in your main board?

MiniLuv
01-16-2012, 06:55 PM
I'm guessing you are playing a budget version since you are using Ghost Quarter over Wasteland.

A couple of questions I have:
1) Was the singleton Rafiq worth the Blue splash?
2) Was there a reason you did not include Jitte?
3) Why only 2 Stoneforge Mystics?
4) Why the MD Canonists?

I disagree with your SB plan versus the Team America deck since Knights can always actively refill your grave with lands whereas Terravore just sits there looking good if hardly any fetches have been used.

Water_Wizard
01-17-2012, 03:01 AM
Where's the Maze in your list?

Whippoorwill
01-18-2012, 04:13 AM
Congrats on the finish, you were long overdue to take 1st! Hopefully I'll be there next week, depends on the snow.


Round 4: BJ with UB Infect
This is a really hard match for me: I played him last week, and lost because I wasn't sure what the best way to attack his deck was. This week I had thought about it and realized really all I could do is try to remove EVERYTHING as soon as possible.

His deck is actually UG. Just a typo though since you mentioned green cards in the report. As for how to beat him, you just have to hope he doesn't get his fast start + protection or just run him out of resources like you did. Its really a hit or miss matchup. Adding a Melira in the side to GSZ for may be worth considering due to the amount of Infect we see there.


Curious as to why you would include 3 combo hate cards in your main board?

He didn't like it when I turn 1 EtW him for 5 both games about a month ago when I was playing TES (http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?15028-Deck-T.E.S-The-EPIC-Storm) (He keeps saying I was playing Belcher though. :eyebrow: Combo Elves is also fairly common at the store.

ThePrevailer
01-20-2012, 07:12 PM
@MiniLuv:
1) No splash is necessary for Rafiq in my experience, as mana dorks and GSZ are enough to get him into play. The splash was mainly for the SP Spell Pierces, which I've been testing, and and starting to decide I don't really like.
2) Yes. I don't have a Jitte and don't think it would change the deck very much anyway.
3) I'm not convinced you need more than 2. With them, you have 5 effective equipment you could draw, plus Library to find them. In a lot of match-ups, any one will help you win the game, and most of the time none are required.
4) Because I really hate storm and it's a hard match-up for this deck. Canonist is also randomly good against Snapcaster, again another test slot.

As far as the SB plan for TA, the pilot is a good friend of mine who I test with regularly. I know that I have a fairly positive matchup against this individual player, so I boarded to screw with him.


@Water Wizard, the Maze is maindecked, I left it out as a typo I guess.