Last Saturday I played my mono black hybrid suicide/smallpox deck, named The Dark Side (as a suggestion by one of my friends on the GP Amsterdam), in a 34 player sanctioned Legacy event in Rotterdam. I played the same list as I did a few other events before and I’m really satisfied with the results of the list so far (out of 4 tournaments I won 1 and 2x top 4 split). I will update the primer this weekend, but the old topic can be found herehttp://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...de.&highlight=

Now on to the tournament, I registered the following 75:

The Dark Side

// Lands
4 Wasteland
3 Mishra's Factory
2 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
4 Verdant Catacombs
1 Marsh Flats
6 Swamp
1 Bayou
1 Forest

// Creatures
4 Dark Confidant
3 Bloodghast
3 Death's Shadow
2 Tombstalker

// Spells
4 Smallpox
2 Liliana of the Veil
2 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Thoughtseize
2 Innocent Blood
3 Sensei's Divining Top
2 Snuff Out
2 Vendetta
3 Chrome Mox
2 Bitterblossom
3 Hymn to Tourach

// Sideboard
SB: 4 Chalice of the Void
SB: 4 Surgical Extraction
SB: 4 Pithing Needle
SB: 3 Krosan Grip

There were 34 people, which was quite a large number (the previous edition only had 16 players) and I was pretty excited to see how my deck would play in a somewhat larger tournament. The first pairings showed I was to play one of my friends who came along, with whom I play regularly in our small playgroup. The matchup was pretty favorable though (Affinity has never been a problem), but playing a friend round 1 is still kinda lame. On to the rounds!

Round 1 – Affinity
Game 1 he mulliganed to 5, but still had a pretty strong opening. I was able to resolve a fast Bitterblossom, but his combination of Master of Etherium + Vault Skirge kept me from doing any damage, while slowly bleeding to death. He didn’t have much of a board presence and could not force an attack through my tokens, but his 2 cranial platings prevented me from attacking at all, since he would just gain massive amounts of life. I failed to find anything relevant to remove either his master, skirge or provide some pressure for quite a long time. Finally I had a Death’s Shadow out, which was slowly outgrowing his master and when my Tombstalker hit the field I thought it was game, unfortunately he had 1 of his 2 dispatches to remove my shadow and killed my Tombstalker with his 14/2 Vault Skirge. My life total was so low that I could not finish him off before I died to my own Bitterblossom. He was at 2 and I had 5 tokens, but it was game for him. We needed to pace up, as 35 minutes already passed and we certainly didn’t want to draw.
Game 2 he mulligans again to 6, but this time I shut off his platings with cranial. I find a large Tombstalker to quickly finish him off, while he is stuck at land and dead draws.
Game 3 was very very close. The board was again kind of a stalemate, when we went into extra turns. He landed a Tezzeret in the third turn. His -4 would kill me, but he needed a blocker to be sure to survive my final attack. He chose to be safe and make a 5/5 from a springleaf drum. I just needed a land from my dark confidant or draw to cast Lily and remove one of his blockers to swing for lethal. Confidant didn’t find the land, but my draw did. I slammed the land on the table, put down and casted Lily, said -2, swing for lethal! Then he pointed out the pithing needle on his side was on Liliana… DOH! We went into a draw because he was unable to finish me. However, after the match I reminded that the needle was in fact on wasteland (in game 2 it was on Lily though). We argued about it some more, but there was nothing either of us could do about it. Pretty lame though, to end a match with a friend in such way. Note to myself: ALWAYS write down needle targets, even in friendly matches.
We were the last match to finish and I could immediately start for round 2.

Round 2 – Down paired VS Goblins
This is a pretty difficult matchup for this deck. They often play too many creatures and deal much damage, which makes the suicide plan rather unattractive. I wasn’t too happy seeing this as my down pair.
Game 1 he is stuck on 3 land and can’t cast most of his hand, while deal some damage using bloodghasts and mishra’s. At some point he gets vial active, but I can finish him off before he does anything.
Game 2 he is again stuck on just 1 land, but opens with a turn 1 vial. The vial curves perfectly in lackey (which I destroy), marshal, matron, Liege, ringleader etc. Too many creatures…
Game 3 I put pithing needle on Vial and go for mana denial, which works pretty well again. This time he gets back in the game at some point, but a flying Tombstalker got me the game.
Vault skirge + master + platings, ik had bitterblossom, kon er niet door aanvallen, kreeg em op 2, stierf aan BB,

Round 3 – Up pair VS Sneak and Show

Game 1 he plays turn 2 SnT into Emrakul… I didn’t know what he was playing and didn’t find any answers.
Game 2 he goes again for a fast Emrakul. This time I’m prepared and able to resolve smallpox. He went draw go for a few turns, after which I exiled his SnT and he scoops.
Game 3 he AGAIN has turn 2 SnT, this time showing Griselbrand. Ulgh. I knew this card would be played as the draw 7 is insane, which he demonstrated just fine. None of my sacrifice spells resolved and I wasn’t able to race him due to the life link. SnT was always a difficult matchup, though very well winnable. With the addition of Griselbrand it has become twice as difficult .

Round 4 – Up pair VS TES

I know my opponent pretty well, he is a nice guy and nice to play against. I knew he was playing TES again, so that made the matchup slightly easier.
Game 1 I open with turn 1 inquisition, turn 2 hymn. He does nothing anymore except drawing more infernals and wishes and I kill him with some guys.
Game 2 he had the turn 2 win, but I had turn 1 Chalice on 1. He doesn’t find any answer while drawing again more wishes and infernal tutors. My guys were able to finish him off before he could cast any answers.
Although I had been rather lucky with my opening 7’s, it was confirmed that Storm combo isn’t my worst matchup (all hail Chalice of the Void), the honours go probably to Griselbrand and friends.

Round 5 – Bant
Game 1 I open again with turn 1 inquisition, turn 2 hymn, which totally wrecks his hand. He was still able to cast a Gheist but smallpox cleared the way for my little guys.
Game 2 he sided wrong, as he didn’t have any answers to my quick Bitterblossom (after the game he showed his wraths in his SB) since he didn’t see that one game 1. He opened with tropical, GSZ intor dryad arbor. My turn I wasted his tropical, chrome mox into vendetta on his arbor. Board cleared! The Bitterblossom came in a few turns later and finished him off very easily as he drew only lands. Not very exciting, but I think I would have won it anyway.

Round 6 – UW control

This would be very exciting, as the winner would go top 8 and the looser go home. My friend playing affinity warned me that he played a lot of counters and that was very usefull info.
Game 1 I resolved only 1 vendetta and 2 bloodghasts, everything else got countered. I got him to 1 when he drew his 5th land and landed batterskull. I found no answers and died…
Game 2 I win when I landed a Tombstalker and he had no counters anymore (after countering pretty much EVERYTHING). His deck had played only 12 creatures (Delver, SFM, Snap) so there was no pressure at all. This allowed me to sculpt my hand with must-counter-spells such as smallpox, which cleared the way for my Tombstalker. When the big guy landed he said “oh Tombstalker, that sucks” and we were off to game 3.
Game 3 he kept a hand with ONLY counters. I was on short of land, but a bloodghast and Mishra were attacking for some amount. He even needed to discard, because I didn’t play anything and he couldn’t use his counters. He eventually landed batterskull again, but this time I was prepared with pithing needle and found a smallpox , destroying his germ. Jitte was also answered with a Pithing needle (not that he had any creatures, but whatever, better to be safe) and I was almost sure of victory. He only had a Jitte and Batterskull, while I had Liliana, top and a Mishra. A stupid mistake let him use his Sword to Plowshares on my Mishra when I wanted to attack and didn’t use Liliana’s +1 in advance, as I didn’t want to discard my Snuff Out. When I finally found a Bitterblossom he was able to land Jace, bouncing my token. Although Jace would eventually die because of the blossom I’d was hoping for more pressure to prevent him from stabilizing. And there my top revealed the third saving angel, pithing needle 3! I won quickly after. This was a very exciting and fortunately my deck did everything it was supposed to do. Game won! With a record of 4-1-1 I was ensured of Top 8. My friend playing Nic Fit finished his game for Top 8 just before and also made it (his 3rd tournament with the deck , nice!).

The Top 8 consisted of:
The Dark Side (suicide black)
Pox
Sneak and Show (round 3 opp)
UW blade control
Aggro Loam (GBR)
Nic Fit (GBW)
Maverick (GWU)
UWb blade control

I was paired against another friend, playing the pox deck. I never played this match, so was curious to see who would win this. And it was better than some of the other possible matchups. (Ahum, Sneak and show...)

It was not very exciting though. At some point his boardstate was 3 land, incl Mishra. Mine was Bitterblossom with 3 tokens, Dark confidant, Top and 5 lands incl. Mishra and both empty handed. It ended quickly.
Game 2 was pretty similar. My opening was 2 Bloodghast (Hymn that!), Pithing Needle (to name cursed scroll, Lily and Karn), Bitterblossom, 2 wasteland, swamp. He opened with swamp, dark ritual, duress (Bitterblossom), Thoughtseize (needle), Extirpate on Bitterblossom. He should have discarded bloodghast and exiled it, but he didn’t know I was only running 2 blossoms. After a few turns the board state was again pretty miserable for him, sitting on 3 lands and an Engineered Plague on spirits, while I had Dark confidant, Top, Lily and a Mishra. It was good game very soon afterwards which meant I reached Top 4, yeah! Then my Nic Fit playing friend took his time, playing a ONE HOUR game in game 2 against maverick, having a 1-0 lead. He eventually lost that game (partly due to some play errors) but luckily grave Titan and deed took him the game. The Top 4 (the other decks were Sneak and Show and Aggro Loam) decided to split and we both went home with €67,50 store credit. Nice! Once more it was a very successful and fun edition of the monthly Legacy Tournaments at Magic United. And to go with the flow:

Props
- Winning 2-0 from TES.
- My friend reaching Top 4 with Nic Fit (his tournament report can be found here http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...ontrol)/page58 by jobdevries)
- Price support and organization
- Trading 2 bayou’s with one of the store owners for my Dark Lands deck (soon to be updated in New and Development)

Slops
- Drawing to Affinity and having to argue about a Needle target. NEVER again.
- Not knowing what to spend the store on after finishing my latest legacy deck!