1.5 tournament report - Third place of 5

Beyond Dominia: The Type 1.5/1.X Magic Mill: 1.5 tournament report - Third place of 5

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By Brian Epstein (Briane) on Thursday, January 31, 2002 - 01:49 pm:

Yup. Only 5 people showed. A rather pathetic showing, really. We found a lot of people who were excited to play, though, so maybe the next one (in two weeks) will be better attended.

Prizes were $7, $5, $3. 3 rounds of Swiss, cut to Top 4. Afterwards, we realized we should have just played Round Robin. Whatever.

This week was remarkable for the intense amount of apathy exhibited by all the participants. I couldn't decide on a deck *at all* and almost put together 9 Land Stompy (and another version adding red and going to 10 lands) just for kicks; I also threw together a slightly rogue Land Grant Stompy. John (Taiga.dec) put together UG Miracle Grow and brought the RWU deck he had been working on. Evan (BGr Void) completely forgot we were having a tournament and didn't change his deck much.

Anyway, as it turned out, we had:
me, playing Stacker 1.5
John, playing Taiga.dec
Evan, playing BGr Void
Andy, playing WW
Josh, playing Bw Pox

My notes are poor, so I'll give what little information I remember (or have written down).

Round 1:
vs. John, w/ Taiga
John switched his decklist a little, adding in (at least) one maindeck Winter Orb. I don't know what it came in over, but I would guess he lost (at least) one Albino Troll for it.
Game 1:
He Land Grants for Taiga. I see 2 River Boa, Kird Ape, Lightning Bolt, Incinerate. I play a Waste and waste the Taiga. I win.
Game 2:
I Waste a Taiga. He returns it to his hand with Ranger. Oops. He wins.
Game 3:
He Land Grants for Taiga. I see 3 Lightning Bolts (seems a bit strange, but that's what I have written down), Artifact Mutation, Fireblast, River Boa. He says out loud "I know you have it." I'm happy to deprive him of his red mana, and I win by Earthquaking for 4.

Games: 2-1
Rounds: 1-0

Round 2:
vs. Evan w/ BGr Void
Game 1:
He gets a strong draw, while I keep a medicore one. He wins.
Game 2:
I have him at 1 for a while. I haven't drawn and Blood Moons or Nev's Disks. He plays Spiritmonger, who soon goes on the offensive. Karn blocks. Spiritmonger eventually grows large enough to kill the Golem Legend, but I play another Karn immediately afterwards. I'm waiting to topdeck Masticore (who can regenerate) or any burn.
I lose.
Weak!

Games: 2-3
Rounds: 1-1

Round 3:
I'm ranked last, so I get a bye. :)

Games: 4-3
Rounds: 2-1

Cut to Top 4:
Andy, who went 1-2 (thanks to his bye), is out.

Round 1:
vs. John
I hate this match-up. Truly, I do.
Game 1:
He Land Grants, showing me 3 Giant Growth, Rancor, and 2 Kird Apes. I draw nothing but 4 mana creatures, sitting at 2 lands the whole time.
Game 2:
John takes some pain form a Karplusan. I think I Waste a Taiga, which he all but places in the graveyard. He says "Return it to my hand." I say, "Then I don't play Wasteland" and play Mountain instead so I can burn his Ranger. My bad. :( He then takes plenty more pain from a Juggernaut.
Game 3:
He Land Grants, showing me Rancor, Wild Mongrel, Fireblast, 2 Incinerate, Chain Lightning. He Artifact Mutates my Mind Stone, leaving me at 2 mana. I get a third Mind Stone, but never make the leap to 4 mana. :/ His Saproling tokens go most of the way.

Games: 5-5
Rounds: 2-2

Round 2:
vs. Josh w/ Pox
Game 1:
I beat him down, while I gain 5 life from a Swords'ed Juggernaut. Life gain hurts when you're a slow-ish control deck.
Game 2:
I draw the 1 Blood Moon I side in. By the end of the game, he has like, 6 Mountains and 1 Plains. I have a ton of Mountains, including all 4 Factories. While I was in complete control of the game because of it, *not* having the Blood Moon would have been nice so I could have won faster. :)

Games: 7-5
Rounds: 3-2

So, I win back my entry fee. :)

Decklist changes:
-1 Cursed Scroll, +1 Barbarian Ring

Future changes might include adding another Nev's Disk (seemed unnecessary last night, though) and adding back in the fourth Aeolipile. Someone mentioned Extruder, and I think that has some (but not much) merit. I may play Extruder in a different Workshop deck, though.

SB:
3 Earthquake
3 Blood Moon
4 Red Elemental Blast
4 Anarchy
1 Nev's Disk

Future changes:
I though I had 4 Earthquakes, but I could only find 3 before I left. I would lose an Anarchy for it.


Taiga.dec changes:
Only heard of the maindeck Winter Orb(s).

BGr Void changes:
Evan ran 4 Call of the Herd, but I don't know what he cut out (Scragnoths?). I think I saw at least 1 Scragnoth, and I saw at least 1 Kavu Chameleon (which is also new). I think the Calls were disappointing, and the Kavus seemed only marginally better. I think the double green casting cost was a little problematic, though.


By Brian Epstein (Briane) on Thursday, January 31, 2002 - 05:56 pm:

Changes to the BGr Nether Void deck:
-2 Rhystic Tutor
-2 Spiritmonger
-2 Scragnoth
+2 Kavu Chameleon
+4 Call of the Herd

And its new sideboard:
3 Massacre
2 Stench of Evil
2 Tsunami
2 Spiritmonger
2 Diabolic Edict
4 Emerald Charm


By John J. on Thursday, January 31, 2002 - 10:21 pm:

No one cares, but I might as well add in:

Changes to Taiga.dec:

Maindeck
+2 Winter Orb
+2 Karplusan
-2 Albino Troll
-2 Treetop Villages

Sideboard
+2 Winter Orb
-2 Hull Breach

Even though I won, the Winter Orb was pretty much a waste: it wasn't even helpful versus Nether Void, and that has 8 manlands! Against Brian's Artifact monstrosity it usually seemed like it would help, but then he would start playing Mind Stones. It would have been a lot stronger if a serious control deck had showed, but Nether Void seems to often play like a "Here are large creatures, now I will destroy yours" kind of deck (failing to pull the Nether Void has that effect), and no one was running heavy Island.

While it was fun watching people draw no mana all night (or the impossible draw where Pox ended up drawing all black cards and all four of its basic Plains), the interesting point for me was the last game of the night. Taiga was 1-1 with Nether Void, and my opening hand was something like:

Quirion Ranger
Land Grant
Lightning Bolt
Chain Lightning
Kird Ape
Giant Growth
Rancor

Unwilling to mulligan and holding a hand of pain, I play Taiga, Ranger. Soon she's Rancored and a Kird Ape is in play, and I draw into an Incinerate. Now the draws start to get silly. Within five turns I draw three of my rangers. Which turned out to be good, because I was still running off a single Taiga, and needed the Ranger to do anything at all- and she was a priority removal target. At last I drew a Forest. The majority of the game past about turn three or so he was always one or two life ahead of all the burn in my hand (tapping out to play a spiritmonger pulled a bolt and a chain). He kept killing Ranger after Ranger- I ended up playing all four of them. The game ended one turn before his manlands were to smash my skull in with me dramatically topdecking a mountain and Incinerating and Fireblasting for the win.

Brian is serious about apathy going into this tournament. Everybody misplayed a good deal (note that Brian attempted to waste a Taiga with the Ranger out, not once but twice), and people just seemed content to hold bad hands, hoping the mana would work itself out. I almost think I won because my deck is hard to play badly, and only ever needs two lands.

I will say that Karplusan forest really didn't impress me much. Winter Orb might have under different circumstances.


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