MOCS Season 9 winner report with Elves!

This report is based on an interview I did with Julian Knab for the “Everyday Eternal” podcast after my win in the season 9 of the MOCS on Magic Online.

For reference this is the list in used the MOCS.

4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Quirion Ranger
4 Wirewood Symbiote
4 Elvish Visionary
3 Heritage Druid
3 Nettle Sentinel
1 Birchlore Ranger
1 Elvish Mystic
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Wren's Run Packmaster
2 Craterhoof Behemoth

4 Glimpse of Nature
4 Green Sun's Zentith
3 Natural Order

2 Dryad Arbor
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Verdant Catacombs
1 Windswept Heath
2 Forest
2 Bayou
1 Pendelhaven
4 Gaea's Cradle

Sideboard

2 Null Rod
2 Pithing Needle
2 Choke
2 Thoughtseize
2 Cabal Therapy
3 Abrupt Decay
1 Sylvan Library
1 Progenitus


1.) What's your competitive history? What have been your biggest successes thus far in Magic?

I've been playing Magic on and off for over 15 years and have always done it in a very competitive way. I've been to one pro tour in the early 00s, but mostly managed to consistently top 8 PTQs and cash a GP once in a while. I then took a long break and got back to Magic a few years ago focusing on MTGO. I've been averaging about 40 QPs / season for a while now, playing mostly limited.

It's only this year I really got back both to live magic and constructed magic though. I played my first GP in seven years in Vienna and managed to stay in contention for top 8 all the way to the 14th round where I lost a win and in on camera. That really pushed me to focus even harder and I followed it up with a cash finish in Warsaw as well. Together with the GPs I also went back into constructed to give me more shots at qualifying for the pro tour again.


2.) What were your matchups in the swiss and how did they play out? Any interesting situations/interactions?

This is what I played against in the swiss and the top 8.

Round 1 vs 12-post 2-1
Round 2 vs Burn 2-1
Round 3 vs Miracles 1-2
Round 4 vs Miracles 2-1
Round 5 vs Burn 2-0
Round 6 vs Miracles 2-0
Round 7 vs UWR delver 2-0
Quarterfinals vs 4 color cascade 2-0
Semifinals vs BUG delver 2-0
Finals vs Elves 2-1

The first interesting game was third one in the first round against 12-post. The board state was fairly complicated where he had a Pithing Needle set to Deathrite Shaman and a Titan in play and a Crop Rotation in his hand. I had a Craterhoof in play from a Show and Tell as well as multiple small elves including two Symbiotes and two Deathrites. I had the option here to go off, but instead chose to make a non lethal attack hoping he would hold on to his Crop Rotation and not get the Chasm right away. He took the bait and went down to five. The turn after I just proceeded to Zenith for Reclamation Sage and activate my Deathrites first three times and then a fourth in response to his Crop Rotation. It was a nice way to start the tournament as I felt I outplayed him and it really gave me a confidence boost!

Against miracles I'd say every game was interesting and involved a lot of play. I won't get into every game, but instead give my general view of the matchup.

The short story is that the matchup is all about Top. If they get it and you don't have an answer you're most likely going to lose. However there's still a lot to think about when playing the games out since they generally go about 15 turns rather then the normal five-ish in other matchups.

My advise is to let the games take time. I don't consider elves in any way a combo deck against miracles, but rather a deck that tries to go for inevitability. If you play right I'd say Terminus isn't your biggest worry, Entreat the Angels is. For me the sweet spot is to have about three power worth of creatures on the board where you can save two. For example a Quirion Ranger, a Wirewood Symbiote and a Dryad Arbor or a Deathrite, a Symbiote, an Arbor and an uncracked fetchland. You might add one more elf to the board if you got plenty in hand but never more. Three to four power is enough to put a clock on the opponent and force him to find answers and can kill a Jace instantly if he zeroes it but will only let him go one for one or at best two for one with Terminus. I'd say that Arbor is actually among the more important cards in the matchup as you can fetch it right back eot after a Terminus. Because of this I try never to crack fetchlands unless absolutely necessary.

Playing like this I won every game I played against miracles where they didn't get an active Top and since I sideboard two Needles and two Null Rods that's more then half the games post sideboard. I beat multiple early Terminus, I think three in the first seven turns i one game, as well as early an early Counterbalance I couldn't remove in another.

In my matches in the top 8 I don't really have a lot of stories about interesting plays, but rather about the lucky breaks you need to win a tournament like this.

Against the BUG delver in the semis I kept a somewhat bad hand with Craterhoof in the seven. I Thoughtseized him the first turn and took a Ponder leaving him with Show and Tell and True Name Nemesis. I had no idea what the SnT was for and it seemed a little odd to me. I proceeded to draw Natural Order and then Progenitus, for a moment forgetting about his Show and Tell and cursed my bad luck drawing both the targets I had in my deck.... until he played it the very next turn dropping Iona to my Progenitus. The ”bad” card was actually the only draw in my deck that saved me from that!

And the best game of all was of course the now famous (?) four card, no land keep on the play. More on that later!


3.) I assume you got into Legacy only some time before the MOCS? If so, what's your opinion of the format? Are there some things that you really enjoy or don't like? Anything you would like to change about the format? Also, from your experience, what are the strongest decks to play in it right now?

I got into it a bit earlier then just for the MOCS, but still quite recently. I've always enjoyed watching coverage and streams of the older formats as they are much more complex then standard and limited, but the first legacy match I actually played was this Easter when I borrowed a deck from a friend (thx Svante!) to play just for fun. I enjoyed it and actually won more then I lost and since I wanted to focus more on magic I had decided to get good at playing at least one deck in every competitive format.

The deck I borrowed was ANT, but I felt elves suited my play style better. I have played kind of similar decks in the past being successful with decks like elf & nail and a mono green Skull Clamp deck with Beacon of Creation during the first affinity era. I also picked up Birthing Pod as my deck of choice in modern and out of the competitive decks they seemed to have the most similar style. First and foremost though I wanted to learn a competitive deck since the goal was to have more dailies and MOCS events to play in and do well in.

Before the MOCS I had put in about 150 matches with the deck which is enough to have played against all matchups and have about ten matches against the big decks, but it certainly isn't enough to master it. One thing I do though, that is my best tip for anyone picking up a deck, is to keep stats. I write down the score of every single match I play which is important for several reasons. First of all most people have a very selective memory thinking they do better then they actually are, secondly it gives you a way to see where improvements are needed. For example I think I started out zero to five or something like that against miracles and now I'm almost up to even. That shows me that I've found a strategy that works. The sample size is still small, but it's a lot better then nothing as long as you are aware of how that works.

The other thing I do is to make sure to read and watch a lot about the format and decks I try to master. Without reading the elves thread at The Source and watching Julian stream as well as following his updates on the list I would never have picked it up as fast. There are a lot of good players out there and you should really take advantage of it. I don't think that you're a lazy person if you net deck or make changes based on other peoples lists. It's rather just another skill to sip through all the information out there and find which players you trust and which are at what level of play and deck building skill.

As for legacy in general I think it's a great format with a lot of diversity. In the 150 odd matches I've played I've faced 25 different decks! And that is still with placing decks like four color delver and RUG delver in the same category and BUG deck both with and without Shardless Agent together. I've also not counted the bad home brews and budget decks Ive faced to that list.
I feel that mircales, elves, BUG and possibly some variation of delver are the strongest decks in general, where the other decks are more metagame dependent where you can do great in one tournament and fail miserably in another. I prefer to play decks that give you a good shot against a variety of decks rather then the ones that are great against a few and bad against the rest.


4.) Tell us about how you felt when you kept 4 cards without a land when down 0-1 in the Final match.

So heres the story from the start. I got paired against elves in the finals and won the die roll which is the most important part of the whole matchup!

My six card keep was however on the slow side with two fetch lands, Symbiote, Elvish Visionary, GSZ and Reclamation Sage. It's fine six against most decks, but not really where you wanna be against elves. The game played out as you might expect with me playing towards a possible turn four glimpse into a win, but unable to disrupt my opponent he easily won on his turn three. That's pretty much how the matchup works. Since there is no disruption in the main deck the game is usually over by turn three. The odds that both players are keeping slow hands are pretty low so going first is really important!

So down one game I look at the first seven cards which are: two Dryad Arbor, two fetch lands, Nettle Sentinel, Deathrite and Heritage Druid. Not wanting a repeat of game one I felt it was too slow and mulliganed.

The six card hand was: five cards, one cradle. Mulligan.

Five cards: No lands... oh shit :(

Four cards: Quirion Ranger, Wirewood Symbiote, Nettle Sentinel and Elvish Visionary.

Here I more or less gave up telling my friends who were following me via Facebook that it was over. But then I remembered Olle Råde telling me off for conceding too early in a game in the swiss rounds and I obviously had to play it out considering the stakes. Going done to three was never an option for me even without a land in the hand. My reasoning was that with this hand I could top deck two lands in a row and maybe be in business, but with a three card hand I'd probably need two similar top decks even if I got a land in it.

So turn one I pass and tell my opponent in the chat that I wished the finals would have been more interesting then this assuming I'd lose.

I draw a Bayou right away and drop the Nettle.

Second draw is a Cradle and I can drop my entire hand drawing a fetch land on the Visionary. I actually have a shot this game after all! My heart starts pounding pretty hard from now on.

Third draw is a Glimpse of Nature which gets me into Natural Order and with the slow hand my opponent kept the fourth turn kill I get is enough!

Third game is actually similar in the opposite direction, but my opponent doesn't have my luck. It's his turn to mulligan to four, but he gets a good hand and actually have two turns to top deck Natural Order for the win, but luckily for me he fails to do so and I walk away as the winner!


5.) Before the finals, did you know that your opponent also played Elves?

I used mtgGoldfish throughout the top 8 to see what my opponents where playing. I really don't consider it cheating as you would almost certainly have information about your opponents in a live magic tournament.

My opponent in the finals just had one record with a legacy deck which was with elves, but it was a few months back so I couldn't be certain.


6.) You're going to the Pro Tour now, congratulations on that! Do you intend to still keep playing Legacy every now and then or was this just a one-time gig (to show all the other players how it's done right! ;))) )

Thank you!

I went into legacy to have access to more dailies and since I've enjoyed the format a lot I plan to continue to play then when it fits.

My main goal now though is to do well in Washington and or win the MOCS finals so I can stay on the tour. It's obviously a long way to go for that, but I'm miles farther ahead then I was two weeks ago.

If I get to stay that will obviously change the formats I play slightly since it's the competition at the highest level that's my draw to magic and what I love about it.