Total players 33
I was only able to play in the Saturday event at Origins, but I had a great time and managed to take 4th with Keeper.
(Decklist @ bottom)
Round 1: Paul: Trix
Game 1: First turn Duress from him reveals FoF, Drain, FoW… he takes FoF. Early Waste/Strip from me. I counter a few card drawers. He Timetwists, I draw into Mindtwist for 7. (2 Mox + Academy, plus Mox in play) wow.
Game 2: I cast Ivory Mask in the midgame, he forces leaving 1 card in had. He draws up to 2. I Cast cap, but can’t pop it. He’s holding Illusions, (but I don’t know it). He Vamp tutors and draws Donate… Casts Illusions. I cap and don’t see Donate #2. He wins because I sided out ZOrb. Doh. I am upset by all of this, but the general mood of the match keeps me from making negative emotional mistakes
Plus, I can’t really complain after the Mindtwist in game 1! Game 3: This game was nominal for both of us. I waste a few early lands and simply counter big threats (Bargain, if memory serves). He expends too much of his hand and is top-decking when I have 3+ cards.
Notables: Paul is fun, as is his entourage of friends. Perhaps I’m just saying that because his buddy declared that the winner of our match would get the last of their supply of Smirnoff Ice! Guys, I don’t know your names… but that Ice was excellent!
Paul caught some slack from his friends for not playing optimally. Case in point: he had Academy and Will in his hand with a bunch of artifacts in play. He chose to play the Academy and wait a turn before Will, but I wasted it and he didn’t have enough gas to make his Will a winner. His decision was not without consideration, but I think he might choose differently in the future!
W 2-1
Record: 1-0
Round 2: Paul: BBS
Game 1: We trade Strips and he stalls @ 2 island. I D-Blow a Sol Ring and Mox. In retrospect, this is careless use of my D-Blows (ie. B2B), but I hesitated a little to see if he would pull out of his mana screw… when he did not, I went to work.
Game 2: He draws too much land. I manage to counter his first Morphling & follow up with mine.
Notables: I am pumped after 2-0-ing my worst matchup. That, and I am realizing the value of 2 x D-Blow in my main deck. I feel bad for Paul, because BBS was the best deck for this tournament and he got terrible draws against a great matchup for him.
W 2-0
Record: 2-0
Round 3: Jason: Keeper
Game 1: He has Sylvan. Draws too much. I cast Morph and he Edicts. I Regrow Morph and he Regrows Edict. I emergency Balance away Morphling, but he has 4 Mox & ZOrb so he sacs all of his land and proceeds to draw more and FoF into too much of an advantage. I get him to 4 cards in his Library with Ancestral in my hand, but he has Blessings and I’m short on decking him by 1 (stinking) card. Manage to Plow Karn that eats my Moxes, though
But that was just for fun. Game 2: He gets Ancestral/Walk/Bless/Ancestral/Walk in the first 4 turns. I don’t.
Notables: Jason’s Keeper has a few interesting elements: Karn & Planar Portal. The Portal didn’t amount to anything in our match, but Karn was something I had to deal with (luckily, I had Pearl and Plow when he hit, but it didn’t really matter.)
I have seen the power of Sylvan, but I think that it’s still very metagame dependent. In this tourney filled with Control and Combo, it was probably amazing for Jason.
Oh, and Jason (et al): don’t forget to use your Zuran Orb in the future. I wasted at least three of your lands in the early game and you didn’t sac them for life. Didn’t amount to anything, but keep it in mind.
L: 0-2
Record: 2-1
Round 4: Jason: B/u Goodstuff
Game 1: He mulligans. Goodstuff in his new draw: Will, Mirror, Mind Twist, Drain Life… but it’s all too slow. At one point, I discard 1 of the 4 Mana Drains in my hand.
Game 2: He has Ritual/Duress/Hymn, but I still have second turn FoF.
He never damages me.
Notables: I had been sitting near Jason for previous rounds, so I knew his deck a bit. It was good Black disruption (Hippy, Duress, Hymn) with Blue Power and random Goodstuff (Mirror, ZOrb). However, he also had pump knights, which seemed to not have much synergy with the rest of the deck. I may be reacting more to this particular tourney, though, because they happened to be suboptimal against this field.
To Jason’s credit, he got horribly lopsided draws in our match (all late-game in game 1, all early-game in game 2).
W: 2-0
Record: 3-1
Round 5: Smith: BBS
Game 1: He has only two cards in the mid-game, and I’ve seen them both (via FoF). He peels B2B after a counterwar on my turn.
Game 2: Me: 3 land, Annul, Ancestral, Force, CoP:Blue (first turn) Land, Go.
Him: (first turn) Library, Emerald, Lotus, Force my annul, B2B (turn 2) Misdirect my Ancestral. That is the House that Smith built.
Notables: none, really… this is how I thought Round 2 would go!
I was unprepared for the BBS matchup. Need to give it a lot more thought in the future.
Smith ended up in second. Again, BBS was the right call in this environment and the only reason he didn’t win was because he got housed by a first-turn City of Solitude (w/Force backup) out of one of the combo decks. Wow.
L: 0-2
Record: 2-3
Round 6: ?? (Sorry, man): Academy
Game 1: Random Power-Monolith-Stroke
Game 2: Null Rod
Game 3: Null Rod
Notables: After the match I asked him what he had for Null Rod, and he said that he had two Disenchants. He just didn’t have the means to get them when they hit.
W: 2-1
Record: 4-2
Round 7: Charles: Worship/Beetle Keeper
Game 1: His card quality is simply lower than mine (by design, unfortunately).
Game 2: He stalls on land early and floods late. He misjudges by saccing his Factory to my Balance, because he is afraid of losing his Blue. He probably figured I had a way to remove it, but I didn’t.
Jedi Mind Trick. Notables: We ended up talking at length about his deck and its history. Charles is a fun, old-school guy who missed many expansions in the Mirage/Tempest/Saga era. He adapted his old control deck when Worship came out and he used Deadly Insects at that time. Then, when he learned that Morphling could kill the Insects and survive, he went with the cheaper Pincher Beetles. [He had tried Morphling and found that he had trouble casting and protecting it. At the time I didn’t ask about his mana base, but I realize that that might be the reason.] Other than the title cards, his deck was basically Keeper with heavy counters (FoW, Drain, Counter, Dismiss) and some inefficient card choices (Disenchant over D-Blow, only 1 FoF). I made no bones about his deck being a bit sub par, but I congratulated him on his success with an otherwise rogue-ish take on control. That, and I suggested Blurred Mongoose in place of the Beetles
W: 2-0
Finish: 5-2 -- 4th Place
So, success was had by me (and many others). The metagame for this tourney was exceedingly strange. My matches were long, so I was only able to see the decks within a few tables of myself (fortunately, the top tables)… what I saw:
Lots of combo: Trix, Turboland, Several Academy
Lots of control: several Keeper and BBS
At least one deck comprised mostly of 7th Edition… looked like a couple of Starters.
Some really interesting rogue-ish decks: UW Aggro with Shadow dudes, Land Tax and B2B. Multicolor Legends deck with Sisay, Rubinia Soulsinger and cheap removal/utility (saw Berserk used as removal
) 2 Mono Black decks that didn’t fit into any stereotype (POX, VOID, etc.)
Only saw 1 Sligh, but I know that I probably missed all of the aggro matches that weren’t next to me! Still, aggro did not have much of a presence in the top tables.
The Deck I played:
2 Morphling
1 Zuran Orb
1 The Abyss
1 Moat
1 Balance
1 Swords to Plowshares
2 Dismantling Blow
1 Time Walk
1 Timetwister
2 Gaea's Blessing
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Regrowth
1 Mind Twist
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Stroke of Genius
3 Fact or Fiction
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
4 Mana Drain
4 Force of Will
1 Black Lotus
1 Sol Ring
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Emerald
1 Library of Alexandria
1 Strip Mine
4 Wasteland
1 Tolarian Academy
3 Tropical Island
4 Underground Sea
4 Tundra
4 City of Brass
SB: 1 Diabolic Edict
SB: 1 Misdirection
SB: 1 Oath of Druids
SB: 1 Powder Keg
SB: 1 Jester's Cap
SB: 1 Sacred Ground
SB: 2 Annul
SB: 1 Ivory Mask
SB: 1 Circle of Protection: Red
SB: 1 Hydroblast
SB: 1 Blue Elemental Blast
SB: 1 Null Rod
SB: 1 Circle of Protection: Blue
SB: 1 Tormod's Crypt
Things that I am considering changing based on this tourney:
Main deck-- I found that Time Walk was not very useful. It allowed me to finish a game faster with Morphling, but it’s hard for me to quantify if it earned it’s keep. Of course, I did not have a *really* broken Will all day, either.
StP was downright bad in this environment, basically because I played against only Morphling and Hippy/Pump Knight. I think I’m sold on Edict. (I was worried about predictions of Aggro from the Friday night T1.)
Sideboard-- There is too much unfocused hate in my sideboard. I have 8 cards that I’d like to bring in against Keeper and BBS (nearly the same 8)… and 7 for most combo decks. That’s too many cards to make room for. I found myself leaving the Annuls in the board too often (that may not have been the right choice in each case, but my lack of preparation was causing indecision). I’m not playing Red (and I don’t wish to) so the Miner/Shaman take on the control mirror is lost. I love CoP:Blue… if I could ever draw it and cast it in the same game, it might be good!
Otherwise, I need more efficient weapons against other control decks. I went 2-2 against control in this tourney, and my two wins were due to (first) luck and (second) poor deckbuilding by my opponent. That’s not something I wish to rely on. I think I can handle the Keeper mirror, but can anyone suggest a better sideboarding philosophy against BBS? CHA1N5