Top 4 at GENEVA legacy VI with Grixis-controll

Hi, like I wrote down in my last report, I love to take the opportunity to write down a report after each bigger event I attend. This gives me the chance to reflect on the plays I did and the cards that performed well and the ones that might be to bad to play in my list.

Like allways, the day befor the tournament has to be included as well, cause sometimes gamechanging things are happening even befor you start the tournament.

So on saturday I was allready set on my mainboard up to the point where a message from one of my colleauges shook up everything. If interested in the list I wanted to play up to this point you can read my last tournament report, the sideboard would have been a little different though.

Okay, back to the point. He sent me a link to a Grixis-controll-decklist that has won a 109 person tournament in finland. I took a look at it and was imidiatly doubting if my list was better at any point than this one. So I took some time thinking about it and in the end assembled the main 60 of the finish list.

I was expecting alot of Lands, Jund and Miracles in the metagame of Geneva so I had to made some adjustements to the sideboard. So the final 75 looked like this.


//Lands
1 Badlands
2 Bloodstained Mire
1 Island
4 Polluted Delta
4 Scalding Tarn
1 Swamp
2 Tropical Island
2 Underground Sea
2 Volcanic Island

//Creatures
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Young Pyromancer
2 Snapcaster Mage
1 Tasigur, the Golden Fang
1 True-Name Nemesis

//Spells
2 Abrupt Decay
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
3 Gitaxian Probe
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Force of Will
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Painful Truths

//Other
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

//Sideboard
2 Blood Moon
1 Pithing Needle
1 Grafdigger's Cage
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Flusterstorm
1 Pyroblast
1 Envelop
2 Submerge
1 Izzet Staticaster
1 Toxic Deluge
1 Diabolic Edict


After I assembled the deck I had to rewrite my sideboardstrategies and went to bed close to 12 pm.
I wasn't able to catch nearly as much sleep as I hoped for.

It is a 2 hour ride to Geneva from my place and the tournament was set to start at 10 am. So I had to wake up at around 6 am to take a shower get something to eat and go to the trainstation. I like to take the train one train earlier then the one that arrives on time, this way if something with my connections is messed up I still arrive on time at the venue. Like allways everything went fine and I arrived at the venue 1 hour before the tournament was set to begin, My decklist was prepared and so I had some time to talk with some people I knew and the TO.

Sadly some friends of mine, that planned to be there as well, decided that the trainride would be to expensive and they might have to leave early to catch their last train home, so they didn't show up. But anyway at least one person from my region was there as well.

The tournament ran a little late because some players just showed up at 10 am and still had to be registered, but that was no mayor problem. Overall there were 101 players so we had to play 7 rounds. 15 minutes later the players where seated and the anouncement was made and decklists collected. And so the tournament started.

1st Round VS Death'n Taxes

Game 1: I won the dieroll and had to mulligan to 6. My Deathrite Shaman instantly was plains to Swords to Plowshared. I played a blind Cabal Therapy and guessed he was playing miracles, naming Counterbalance proved me wrong. He then Wastelanded my land leaving me with no mana at all. The tiredness even caused me to drop some cards from my hand so h got a good look at what I was playing. Fortunately not many people know the deck at all and most think I'm on Grixis-Delver. Anyway, without any mana this game ended rather quickly.

Game 2: In this game he made a terrible mistake (yeah lack of sleep and stuff like this...) he attacked with his Thalia, Guardian of Thraben into my untapped True-Name Nemesis. And later in the game didn't use his Spellskite to redirect the bolt I pointed at his Vryn Wingmare.

Game 3: He opened up with Plains into Mother of Runes. My first Turn was a blind Cabal Therapy naming Thalia... I hit 2 of them. I stripped his hand and Izzet Staticaster wrecked havoc on his board. At that point it was a little onesided.

2-1

Sideboarding:
//In
1 Izzet Staticaster
1 Toxic Deluge
1 Pithing Needle

//Out
1 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Force of Will
1 Tasigur, the Golden Fang


2nd Round VS Aggro Loam

Game 1: He starts with a Verdant catacombs and nothing. I play Gitaxian probe and see 2 Chalice of the Void, Karakas, Maze of Ith, Sylvan Library, Verdant Catacombs. Okay Aggroloam, therapy the chalices away and pass the turn. He redraws his 3rd Chalice. Fortunately I play Abrupt Decay in the Mainboard now and I got one waiting in my hand, so I fetch up my Tropical Island and use it to destroy his chalice EoT after forcing his library, he floods out and never gets into the game at all.

Game 2: This game was a real grindy one. Jace did a good job at improving my cardquality up to the point were I played a Blood Moon closing out the game.

2-0

Sideboarding:
//In
2 Bloodmoon
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Submerge

//Out
2 Force of Will
1 Gitaxian Probe
1 Tasigur, the Golden Fang
2 Cabal Therapy



3rd Round Vs Tin-Fins

Game 1: He mulled down to 5 on the draw end his only play in the whole game was Marsh Flats into Undrground sea, casting Thoughtseize. Because I had no card to take a look at his hand I assumed that he was playing some sort of Deathblade deck. Oh I was soooooo wrong.

Game 2: Like I said, I thought he was playing Deathblade, causing me to board out all my Force of Will and not boarding in Surgical Extraction. The game still wasn't that easily won by him. Because Shaman and a Therapy forced him to try his luck on my Turn without the chance to regain life with Children of Korlis. Anyway, he won on his following turn.

Game 3: This time I boarded in the right cards and he had to mull down to 5 again. First turn Grafdigger's Cage locked out his Combo and he didn't draw enough mana to establish the Monastery Mentor he boarded in to blank my combohate.

2-1

Sideboarding:
//In
2 Flusterstorm
2 Surgical Extraction
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Pyroblast
1 Envelop
1 Diabolic Edict

//Out
2 Abrupt Decay
1 Gitaxian Probe
1 Tasigur, the Golden Fang
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Painful Truths
1 Lightning Bolt



4th Round Vs MentorMiracles

Game 1: the game started with a pretty funny judgecall. At the end of my 2nd Turn my opponent used his Sensei's Divining Top to rearange his top 3, after that he drew a card and than he drew another card. I stopped him and asked him why he just drew 2 cards. „Oh, for the turn and Ponder.“ „Uhm... which Ponder?“ and then he realised his mistake... I guess he had a Ponder in his hand, that he wanted to play, but brainfarted and thats why he drew the second card.

The Mainboard Abrupt Decays realy overperformed in this match, I destroyed 2 Counterbalances in game 1 and 2 in Game 2 once flashing it back with Snapcaster Mage. The second card that realy overperformed in this matchup was Painful Truths. Drawing 3 cards for 3 mana even at sorceryspeed was just insane.

The first game I won on the back of Deathrite Shaman and True-Name-Nemesis, the second game the +2 of Jace, the Mind Sculptor on an emptyhanded opponent sealed the deal.

2-0

Sideboarding:
//In
2 Flusterstorm
1 Izzet Staticaaster
1 Toxic Deluge
1 Envelope
1 Pyroblast
1 Pithing Needle

//Out
1 Lightning Bolt
2 Cabal Therapy
2 Force of Will
1 Gitaxian Probe
1 Tasigur, the Golden Fang



After the 4th Round I realy felt the pressure, I was 4-0 and by winning the next round I would be in Top8 nearly for sure. I ate some pineapple and drank some Cola, to get a sugarboost. The other player from my region just lost his first match against a stormplayer. So I knew there was a stormplayer at the top-tables. And so I went to my seat at table 1 and played against...

5th Round Vs Storm(ANT)

Game 1: I knew what he was playing when he put down his [cards]Underground Sea[cards], Gitaxian probed me and snap-Cabal Therapyed my double Force of Will. A Probe of my own then revealed me his hand. Lion's eye Diamond, Cabal Ritual, Brainstorm, Infernal Tutor, Polluted Delta, Preordain. I started the game with a Deathrite Shaman, So I had to sacrifice my Shaman for Therapy + Flashback to reduce his chances of winning in the next turns. At some point I was stranded with a single Abrupt Decay in my hand because of a Duress. I then drew a Painful Truths, which I imediatly casted... Force of Will, Force of Will, Snapcaster Mage... My luck was just outragous. My opponent Probed on the following Turn and just went pale. „Yeah, I'm sorry.“ I drew all my forces in the top like 15 cards. Another Deathrite Shamen then started at pecking away on his lifepoints. He didn't drew anything to combo of with my 2 Forces.

Game 2: We both mulligand down to 6. He kept a hand with 3 Lands, Jace, Vryn's Prodigy, Infernal Tutor and Tendrills of Agony. Jace was promptly killed by a Lightning Bolt, and 2 Young Pyromancers reduced his lifetotal pretty fast.

2-0
Sideboarding:
//In
1 Envelop
1 Pyroblast
2 Flusterstorm
2 Surgical Extraction
1 Izzet Staticaster
1 Grafdigger's Cage

//Out
2 Abrupt Decay
2 Jace, The Mind Sculptor
2 Ponder
1 True-Name Nemesis
1 Tropical Island

I was shaking. A 101 player tournament was the biggest event I attented yet and I was in the Top8 with close to 95% certainty. (There's allways some stuff that can happen to ruin your chances. Like not beeing able to I.D. Because you get paired down)

The following 2 Rounds were pretty plain and simple.

6th Round and 7th Round Vs XXX

Double I.D.

I had enough time to catch a lot of breath in this nearly 2 hours of time and I was realy thankfull for it. For all the people, that don't know anything about Geneva, it is located at a big lake and looks like this:

http://s23.postimg.org/y6gp556yj/20151206_164804.jpg

I grew up in the north of germany I have some kind of special connection to water. I like the sound the waves make when crashing at the shore. And so I went to the lake and tried to relax a little from the stress of the last 5 rounds. Waiting for the other results to com in and see who made top8 besides me.

Top8 Breakdown

The Top 8 of the tournament contained

2 Miracles
1 Lands (The player from my region, he made it in by taking a risk and drawing in his 7th round, but his tiebrakers were good enough)
1 ANT (my opponent from round 5 made it in as well)
1 bUrg-Delver
1 GBw (Some kind of The-rock style of deck. Let's call it very-very Dark Maverick ^^)
1 EsperMentor with Countertop
and me.



Top 8 Vs the Rock

Game 1: Due to me beeing the second seat after the swiss portion I decided to start the match. And promptly had to take a mulligan. My creatures died like flies Liliana of the Veil and Abrupt Decay on his side did a pretty good job there. On the offensive side Knight of the Reliquary and Tarmogoyf finished of my lifepoints.

Game 2: All 3 games of this match were pretty cardadvantageorientated and in the 2nd game Painful Truths did its best to get me this extra cards and grind out my opponent with one for one trades. The game ended with Blood Moon locking my opponent out of playing anything.

Game 3: He started the game with Bayou into Deathrite Shaman. Lightning Bolt. 2nd Land into Dark Confidant. Lightning Bolt. Tarmogoyf. I Submerged the Goyf and play [cards]Blood moon[cards]. Hoping he has no basic land in his upper cards. Sadly he has a Forest and casts a Green Sun's Zenith for Qasali Pridemage. Now my memory gets a little shacky. I know that I casted 2 Painful Truths during the game and A LOT of stuff happend. At some point in the game I end up with 3 Elemental Tokens, two Deathrite Shaman, a Young Pyromancer and a Jace, the Mind Sculptor on 2 loyalty. My opponent has two 6/6 Knight of the Reliquarys one of them tapped and casts a Toxic Deluge for 2 life. I know that he wants to kill my Jace so I exil one of the lands in my graveyard making his knight 3/3 after the resolution of the spell, actually I should have exild a 2nd Land with the 2nd Shaman. He attacked Jace. I flash in Snapcaster Mage and recast a Lightning Bolt from my Graveyard killing his Knight. If he would have waited a turn I would have not been able to kill it, because he could have activated the ability in response making it bigger. After this play I grinded out a lot of cardadvantage from the jacestorm and got ahead significantly on the board. Somhow I won than...

2-1

Sideboarding:
//In
2 Blood Moon
1 Pithing Needle
2 Submerge
1 Diabolic Edict
1 Toxic Deluge

//Out
4 Force of Will
1 Cabal Therapy
1 Gitaxian Probe
1 Tasigur, the Golden Fang


Top 4 and beyond

I was sitting down at the table next to my opponent for the Top 4 but the last mtch of the Top 8 hasn't finished yet and because the matches were timed we couldn't start, so we went to the other table and watched the last match.
At som point the winner of the 3rd Top 8 match approached me and asked me if I was okay with splitting the Top 4 prices. I was wondering how we would do that because the cards were not in batches that could be easily divided by 4 but I was not relucant. We were in the tournament for roughly 9 hours now and I noticed the fatigue. So I asked himhow we would do that. And he told me we would sell the prics to the organizer and splitt the money. I was okay with that and after some negotiations with the tournament organizer we had roughly 210 € per person. When we proposed the offer to the winner of the last match he was in favor of it as well and so the top 4 split without playing. At that point it was around 9 pm and I knew that i still had a long trip back. I drove part of the way with the other player from my region chatting and later eating something at a gas station. Overall I had a longer trip this way, maybe by 30 minutes, but it was fun to relive part of the tournament and chat about stuff.
I arrived home around 12 pm. The only thing I was able to think about at this point was „4th in a 101 person tournament“... That and... „Oh my god I just want to sleep now“

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Lightless

Hi, like I wrote down in my last report, I love to take the opportunity to write down a report after each bigger event I attend. This gives me the chance to reflect on the plays I did and the cards that performed well and the ones that might be to bad to play in my list.

---

First of all, that's a really nice report you wrote here. Just for information, I'm the bUrg player in the top 8 and the winner of the last matches in the top 8.
Just a question about the name of your deck. You call it Grixis Control, but it looks more like a BURG Control because of Decay. Am I wrong?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Lightless

After I assembled the deck I had to rewrite my sideboardstrategies and went to bed close to 12 pm.
I wasn't able to catch nearly as much sleep as I hoped for.

---

I went to bed at five, then I have to wake up at six. => Insomniac players win! xD

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Lightless

4th Round Vs MentorMiracles

---

If I remembered well, your opponent was Maxime Gilles, I let you see what he did in GP Paris 2014. ;-)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Lightless

Top 4 and beyond
I arrived home around 12 pm. The only thing I was able to think about at this point was „4th in a 101 person tournament“... That and... „Oh my god I just want to sleep now“

---

You were lucky I were at home at 1 am. -.-'

Congrats again for the results and your deck looks pretty interesting. What are the bad matchup of your decklist?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by AfroSmile

First of all, that's a really nice report you wrote here. Just for information, I'm the bUrg player in the top 8 and the winner of the last matches in the top 8.
Just a question about the name of your deck. You call it Grixis Control, but it looks more like a BURG Control because of Decay. Am I wrong?

---

You could call it 4color-control, but it actually evolved from the Grixis-controll Deck. In the Version before I played 1 Tropical Island in the main and the 2 Abrupt Decays in the sideboard. Now they are shifted into the mainboard. I will continue to call it Grixis-controll, the 2 green cards don't demand a namechange for me. ;)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by AfroSmile

Congrats again for the results and your deck looks pretty interesting. What are the bad matchup of your decklist?

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Thanks, and to be honest I think that Lands is after all the worst matchup this deck has. If your opponent is aware of what you are playing. The big plus is most opponents are not, they think you play the delver-plan and play around Stifle and daze and other stuff that you don't have in your 75. This way you gain some time to set up the board in a favorable fashion.
I don't think burn is a good matchup either. But to be honest, I can just extrapolate from the old decklis,t because I played this version of the deck only at this tournament yet.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by 'Nilla Pac

A four color deck with blood moon in the sideboard? I love it!

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I was the aggro loam player of the round 2 and i dislike :P

I finish 10th at 5-1-1. Guy, you kick me out of the top :) Good job.

Guys don't complain about coming home late.

I went 1-2 drop , that's your solution :tongue: I had time to lunch properly, came back to do the meta breakdown and was home around 6 PM !

Against long tournament, just scrub!

Congratz,

Yeah, this deck is more like midrange (shardless like) than control. The control era of grixis pyromancer decks has vanished with the Dig through time ban.

Congratulations,

How did the one of Tasigur perform?

I really like your list, but question the inclusion of Tasigur - is it there against Goyf decks or more like a general CA engine?

Personaly I like to diversify my threats. The biggest problem you have with Pyromancer + Tokens and True-Name is, they die to any gobal -X/-1 effect. Tasigur gives you another angle of pressure. The activated ability is pretty neat in any cardadvantage matchup and he demands an answer or can, even in a stalemate, spiral out of controll.