[Report] Oh My God, Their Deeds...!

[Eldariel]

I've been running this Faerie Stompy-family for a few years now. Always from behind the scene, just gently nudging things in the right direction, interacting directly only when absolutely necessary. However, when times get desperate, eventually even the Godfather himself has to pick up the gun to get the job done. This is a story of one of those times.

Finland has precious little when it comes to Legacy. Few random tournaments of maybe 15 players maybe once or twice a year and that's about all. We do have one relevant Legacy Event yearly though, the Legacy Champs. As it happens, Sunday the 18th had the honour of hosting the flamboyant event this year. Of course, I had no choice but to enter; I've been complaining about the lack of proper Legacy events here for a few years now and I have a deck I happen to have a rather strong connection to, which I'd love to get to play. Add to that the fact that I happen to love this game and the stage was set for the Godfather to make his grand entry.


As should already be obvious, there was little in question about my deck choice. Not only would it just be wrong not to play my own deck in one of the few tournaments that actually grace me with their presence, Faerie Stompy is also basically the only deck I own in its entirety. I own duals, Forces, etc., but beyond that, I'm basically lacking the cards for just about anything else. It's still totally moot since it'd take something with calibres exceeding my decksize to make me even consider playing anything else in a tournament. The only question was the exact list I'd run and card availability played a strong role in making those decisions easy (since I can't exactly put together anything too wonderful on the 11th hour). Here's what I ended up running:

Finnaerie Stompy
Lands
4 [EX] City of Traitors
1 [MR] Seat of the Synod
4 [TE] Ancient Tomb
5 [UNH] Island
1 [U] Tundra
1 [ON] Flooded Strand
1 [ON] Polluted Delta

Creatures
1 [SC] Shoreline Ranger
4 [AN] Serendib Efreet
3 [FD] Trinket Mage
4 [P2] Sea Drake
4 [UL] Cloud of Faeries
2 [LRW] Pestermite
3 [LRW] Mulldrifter

Spells
4 [AL] Force of Will
3 [BOK] Umezawa's Jitte
4 [DS] Sword of Fire and Ice
4 [MR] Chrome Mox
4 [MR] Chalice of the Void
1 [FD] Engineered Explosives
2 [U] Psionic Blast


Sideboard
3 [4E] Control Magic
2 [SOK] Pithing Needle
3 [DK] Tormod's Crypt
3 [A] Winter Orb
3 [MM] Misdirection
1 [BOK] Umezawa's Jitte


Initially I was a bit worried since I haven't played any Lorwyn limited and thus don't own a single copy of Mulldrifter or Pestermite. Luckily the shop was open during the tournament so I picked those up along with the Seat of the Synod and the Shoreline Ranger. I felt obliged to fit few Psionic Blasts in especially since I don't own a Cursed Scroll presently, and because "Thinking People Dead"™ generates general hilarity - not to mention the fact that removal+hit-your-face is actually a good package for a card. I didn't own any more EEs or Powder Kegs so none were present between the main and the side, making that extra removal all the bit more crucial.

Now, a word about Finnish Legacy. We don't really have many Legacy tournaments around, but turns out Finns tend to follow the internet forums even though most of them just lurk there. The metagame was actually very up-to-date. It included a ton of Dirty Deeds! Seriously, half the decks around seemed to play Pernicious Deed, whether control, midrange or aggro. The card was just anywhere. I thought they'd be a few months back and there'd be a lot of Goblins, Threshold et al, but turns out the metagame was very heavily anti-Thresh which sucked. Why? I had my EE in the main and Needles on the sideboard. EE is great against Goblins, Threshold and Empty the Warrens. It's Not Great against Deed. Had I had that Needle MD, I could've brought honour to the family with an easy victory. Alas, poor Cyrus.

Anyway, after royal 3 hours of sleep and horrible, horrible feel in the morning (why is it that we Magic-players don't ever seem to sleep enough before tournaments? Recurring theme in all reports), I managed to drag my body into a train and get to the location in time. Better yet, they actually were selling cards so I didn't have to resort to my backup list without any Lorwyn-cards and manafixers! On that note, I ended up paying 8 euros for fucking Seat of the Synod, Shoreline Ranger, 2 Pestermites and 3 Mulldrifters. 8 euros for 7 sad commons? WTF! That's why I shop online. I also ended up borrowing a bunch of duals to randoms who were putting their decks together and failed to collect them after the tournament. Turns out sleeping 3 hours does have some downsides after all.

Since I had my lists and deck ready (sans the said commons) and dice packed and all that prepared, all that was left was shuffling, scouting and playing. To my surprise, one guy asked me if I'm Eldariel on SCG forums. Turns out he's been lurking around for a long time and just never bothers to post, and he isn't the only one either. I found out that like 3 other guys had Faerie Stompy together. Somehow all those Sea Drakes have found their way to Finland, which is especially funny since I never talked much with any of my Finnish pals about the deck - they'd just read about it online and put it together. Oh well, at least everyone knew who I was...which was totally not what I was expecting. Also, my deck advantage felt kinda compromised since I apparently was totally on the radar. Mysterious are the ways of the Internet.


Finally, once all was said and done, we got underway with the tournament. Without further ado:

Round 1 - Tuomas playing Ubg Landstill

We exchange the pleasantries and the die lands his way. He elects to play and keeps while I mulligan...and see Mox, City, Drake, Drake, Efreet and something trivial. Not a bad start for the day! So, he plays Land-go, I play my first Drake. He does something irrelevant, I play a second Drake. He does some more irrelevant thing and I beat him down to 2 combined with his fetches. He Control Magics one Drake and I beat over FTW. My hand contained two more Efreets. What can I say? Fat Blue FTW!

Sideboarding I don't have any memories of, I think I took out some Chalices, EE and equipment for Needles and Winter Orbs. He probably brings in some creature control. Anyway, game 2 I get going with a Tomb, shocking myself down to 12. However, that involves a Trinket Mage, a Pestermite and a Mulldrifter. He countered some things that would've wrecked him (a Needle and a SoFI, I recall), but he never really got a chance to counter my creatures and on the critical turn after he played his Deed (turn 5 I think; he's been busy countering stuff thus far) without the mana to pop it, I Psionic Blast him out after swinging him to 2.


He laments how he hasn't played for aeons and how his deck is horrible. I had lamented how I can't win from the draw after the die roll, so meh. We play a third game for fun and I get stuck on a land and a mox for aeons and lose. Wasn't really much of a game. Since it didn't count, I kept a bad hand that I probably should've mulled and since we played preboard, I didn't have the Needles to deal with his Deeds so he had the long game.


Round 2 - Jari playing Gwb Survival

He seems to be a resident of the shop since I seem to find him whenever I attend some Magic tournament. He's also an Eternal advocate so I expect a tough match. However, I have a rather fast hand, opening with some Efreet beats and coupling him with Mulldrifter. Jari Deeds and gets a Survival in play and I kick myself for not having a Needle in the main again. Anyway, I follow up the Deed with a pair of EoT Pestermites and a Shoreline Ranger and even with Survival, he can't regroup in time (he had a Squee, and 5 mana to work with). It wouldn't have mattered anyways as I had a Psionic Blast on the top with him at 3.

I side out stuff to get Needles in. I also bring in some Control Magics, but never really saw or needed any. G2 is very anti-climatic. He plays a Sakura, while I fetch a Needle with my Trinket Mage. I play Needle, he fails to sac his Sakura, I name Deed anyways. I swing for the fences, he drops Survival and I'm feeling bad as my board only contains two creatures and one equipment. However, after next turn beats, he reveals a handful of lands. Apparently he kept a 5-lander with Survival. Didn't pay off.


Round 3 I get paired up again Mikko playing Loam-A-Tog. Mental sigh, third Deed-deck. Still no Needles.

I thought he was playing Threshold by his first Tropical. I had kept a hand with Chalice, double Force, Island and Mox along with Cloud of Faeries and some other guy on the draw, hoping that my draw-steps and Cloud would yield a land. Obviously, they don't and while I play Chalice at 1 and Force his Force, he pitched Accumulated Knowledge. I first thought he was playing one of those old Threshold-builds. Then he Intuitioned for 3 cycling lands. Fuck. Loam. I'm stuck on two mana with a Chalice at 1 doing absolutely nothing. I proceed to get back into the game and that glacial deck doesn't seem to manage to kill me, but I scoop it up to save time since it's clear I'll eventually get grinded out no matter what I topdeck.

G2 I bring in Winter Orbs, Needles and Misdirections for some equipment, EE and a Chalice. I just need one Chalice at two, so 3 is plenty. Of course, I get creature fucked and land a Winter Orb only to have him build his manabase while I'm stuck drawing lots of lands. Then I draw some more lands and die.


Well, that was just as anticlimatic as the second match of the second round. I never really did anything and he Deeds stuff away and I don't still find any Needles. Again he was a fellow who hadn't played for 4 years or something. Meh. Seems like Legacy Champs awaken all the dinosaurs.


Round 4 - Anssi with GWb Rockish midrange thing

Anssi is a good friend of mine so we have idle chatter while getting the game started. G1 start well when I play Drake and equip it with SoFI. It might've been a mistake though since when the Drake gets StPd, I miss a turn of beats. I should've probably been laying another Drake instead. Anyways, my second Drake meets a Vindicate, then he gets Hierarch triplets into play and forces me to Force a Witness. My Trinket Mage trades with a Hierarch with the SoFI's help, but I don't have any creatures to tutor for (god, I was hurting for that Phyrexian Marauder at this point) and I succumb to his constantly growing beats.

G2 I play some early dudes and beat him for a while, but for some god-stupid reason I got Chalice with my Trinket Mage instead of a Needle (I feared StP, I suppose. Whatever), he drops a Deed and I die. Needle would've been better, although he had Seal of Primordium and Disenchant in hand. At the very least it woulda been an extra draw and an extra turn of beats. Soon after, a herd of Elephants shows up again (seriously, there're always 2 or 3) and stomp me while I am thinking WTF I was thinking.


Amusingly, midway through the round, the person next to me yells for the judge. His opponent had played a Drake off one land and the judge was asked to clear up the confusion. The judge managed to rule it wrong, and I got a chance to correct it and she read it up on the SCG and lamented how unfair a card it is. Funny.


He apologizes for his draws in the both games and I apologize for my retarded stupidity and we pick up few guys and go to eat, since the round was over so quickly. We do the Mac Mac Mac Mac-thingy, but something that's composed 99% of fat and eat that something while observing the tournament. An interesting point of note is that the other Faerie Stompy-decks seem to have went to about the same record as me. They played right by my side all day. At this point, almost all of us lost two in a row. Oh, I also managed to lose my die while eating. It sucked. Luckily we were in a store so I bought a new one for 80 cents. Still, losing dice sucks.

I figure that I might as well stay in and go for the prizes of Top 16, and heck, since I came that far there's no reason not to play. Soo, I decided that it's about time I stop losing. Also, it helped that 2/2 bracket had more red decks. I like red decks. They're crunchy.


Round 5 - Valtteri with Goblins - probably mono-red, didn't see any splashes.
I feel sorry for this. I won the die roll. I fan a stupid opening hand. Further, I know he's playing a red deck from my scouting earlier. Turn 1 Chalice. He goes Mountain-pass. Turn 2 Island, Cloud of Faeries, Cloud of Faeries, SoFI, equip. I shock myself down to 12 with the Tomb but whatever, I already have the game. He doesn't have a second land, I drop another SoFI and beat in. He gets the second land off the top, but just scoops in the face of two SoFId Clouds.

Again, I bring in Needles. Yea, I should've had them MD. Yea, I know I made a mistake. Yea, I know the Godfather should know better. Whatcha gonna do? I didn't know I'd be playing against Deed 4 rounds out of 6 and Vial-decks the rest.

He starts with a turn 1 Vial, I put together a Jitte. Then I drop a Mulldrifter, while he drops a Piledriver. The pile gets in a time or two. Then he taps out for two more Vials. Ouch. Of course, my Mulldrifter finds a Trinket which finds a Needle which makes him roll over. He does get to Pyrokinesis my Mull and Trinket with my SoFI and Jitte on the table, but that costs him the last cards in his hand (Warchief) and the Piledriver isn't very scary alone, while his all really scary Goblins are sealed by the Needle; I woulda went for an EE, but it would've taken an extra turn worth of mana to play it and blow it up, and I didn't feel I could allow his biggest Vial get above 3. He gets a Lackey, I find a Shoreline Ranger, he finds a Matron, but it's too late, I toss double SoFI and a Jitte on Shoreline and that's all she wrote. Equipment is good against Goblins. Who knew?

So yea, we come to the conclusion that Goblins are a pretty big underdog in that MU, especially without Tin Street Hooligans. Nothing we didn't know already, but still an interesting rehash.


So then, Final Round - Fight!
Round 6 - Tatu with Ugbw Counterslivers

Spectators note that we're both very talkative and we give them a show for their money (the whole none of it), making Extremely Hilarious Comments™ on every card played. Unfortunately, I don't have a transscript available since it wasn't written, but our neighbours seemed to enjoy it and we were having quite a blast too.

Anyway, G1 seems to go well when I Force an early Sinew, find a Drake with SoFI and try to swing for the fences. Then I lose. How? Hibernation Sliver+Winged Sliver+Vial at 2+Muscle/Sinew, can't remember. Anyways, the problem is, I can't get through. All he does is take 2 whenever I swing while he swings back for a whole lot more and thanks to Vial, he isn't even losing anything in the process. I couldn't find my EE and I didn't have Needles so again, I was fucked.

G2 I brought in Needles and some Misdirections, taking out something random. I make a few dudes who eat Swords, but Psionic Blast controls the sliver population and Crystalline doesn't appear, so my third guy sticks, picks up a stick and starts poking those Slivers to the grave. Tatu soon follows.

G3 was more of the G2. He kills some of my guys, I slow him down a bit, get an equip down and mow down the Slivers. It involved a tricky hand with two Sea Drakes as the only threats, but I made up for that by playing Psionic Blast as my first spell, drawing a counter (I tried to hit his Muscle, which just joined a Sinew Sliver on the board). Then the road was open, first for Engineered Explosives at 2 to sweep his Muscle and Sinew, then for Sea Drake to resolve, which ate Swords, followed by Mulldrifter and second Sea Drake, one of which picked up equipment and ended the show. Apparently, Counterslivers aren't very scary unless they get Winged Hibernation going on.


After that, I borrow my Sea Drakes to the store owner for the time being and wait for the results. I turn in at 12th, I think, with no 4-2s (but all 4-1-1s) making the Top 8. Ironically, all the Faerie Stompy-players seemed to be sitting at 4-2 at the end of the day - with any luck, some would've Top 8d, but shit happens. Anssi managed to Top 8 with his Rock-deck along with Cephalid Breakfast, some Tendrils-combo (I think Iggy Pop, it looked very black, but coulda been SI too - TES didn't manage I think), some High Tide-combo (only lost coming from Faerie Stompy, naturally) and a bunch of those Deed-decks that seemed to flood the tournament. I'll be betting the Top 8 will be available online later on, but until then, I'll work with what I've got.

So, at the end of the day, I walked away with 12th out of 50something and 20 Euros, not horrible, but not very good either. The winner got a nice bunch of foils in Cunning Wish, Exalted Angel, Pernicious Deed and some other. I didn't stay to find out who won it in the end. I managed to retain my pride, I found out that I was actually sorta famous around here, and I managed a 2-2 record against Deed-decks without MD Needles. All in all, not bad, but god, this is the last time I'm playing Faerie Stompy without at LEAST one MD Needle. Seriously, there's just no excuse for not running one. So many MUs get so much better with just a single card, and it hurts basically none...


So yea, after that I took my leave and ended up watching not one, but two different fireworks shows over the journey. I dunno what they're shooting for but I don't really care either, it was worth watching.


Props:
-Safe Haven for actually arranging a Legacy tournament
-50+ people for showing up
-Everyone who had netdecked Faerie Stompy
-Everyone who hadn't seen Faerie Stompy in action yet
-Anssi for Top 8ing
-Me for actually waking up for the tournament
-Psionic Blast for killing people...and Slivers
-Sea Drake for killing people and confusing judges
-Sword of Fire and Ice for keeping Goblin Population in check
-Needle for owning every card in the format

Slops:
-Deed
-The judge for screwing up Sea Drake-ruling and Tarmogoyf-ruling - she's very qualified, but apparently not familiar with Legacy-cards.
-Dirty Deeds
-Anssi for knocking me out of contention for Top 8
-Deed
-Mac Donald's food
-Dirty Deeds
-Me for being a retard and having the Needles in the SB
-Deed
-Finns for playing Deed
-Finns for not being backwards
-Deed


Sooo, that's it for me and Finland! Nobody better come telling me it's too boring to read or complaining about gorging out your eyes, I'm still in a daze for not sleeping and I don't have memos. Anyways I'm hoping it's readable and reasonably accurate. Until next year!