Hi all
I decided to play Parfait because it a deck I have all the cards for and it (still) not heavily metagamed against.
My deck list is:
14 Plains
3 Wasteland
1 Lotus Petal
1 Library of Alexandria
1 Sol Ring
1 Strip Mine
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Diamond
1 Mox Pearl
4 Land Tax
2 Scroll Rack
2 Zuran Orb
4 Argivian Find
1 Soldevi Digger
2 Replenish
4 Orim's Chant
1 Enlightened Tutor
1 Planar Birth
2 Ivory Mask
1 Jester's Cap
3 Aura of Silence
1 Tormods Crypt
1 Story Circle
2 Swords to Plowshares
1 Balance
1 Moat
1 Wrath of God
2 Sacred Mesa
Sideboard:
1 Ivory Tower
1 Wrath of God
1 Masticore
4 Abolish
1 Ankh of Mishra
1 Grindstone
1 Swords to plowshares
1 Cursed Totem
1 Humility
1 Story Circle
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Powder Keg
I've slowly been tuning this deck to my style (still haven't gotten that stupid masticore out of the side), and had tried to metagame it to what I expected to see (all combo and control).
We had our usual turn out of 8 (enough to sanction it), and nearly everyone played the decks I expected (which meant only one deck with a significant amount of creatures).
Round 1: Glen playing a half powered Academy.
I tested a fair bit against this deck during the last week and a half. It wrecked my maindeck. I think once I side I should do alright.
Game 1: I drop a fast (2nd turn) aura of silence, which slows him up. He goes to capsize it (no buyback), and I kill his mox. He drops more artifacts, then I get another Aura into play. He struggles to get more artfiacts out, and I chant him when he plays his next draw 7. I drop another Aura and a tormod's crypt. Then next turn an Ivory Mask. He Conceeds.
Game 2: I get out another early Aura. He plays some stuff, and then tinkers for a cap. He pulls out both my mesa and my Cap. I was holding my Soldevi Digger, and had Scroll Rack in play, so I figured I'd keep playing. I recovered well with an Aura, then next turn I chanted, killed two of his artifacts, and replenished both Auras back. At that point time was running out, and glen figured he couldn't kill me in time, so he just gave up.
Round 2: Jason playing turbonevyn.
Now Jason absolutely whipped me last time, so I knew I was in for a hard time.
Game 1: I drop another 2nd turn Aura (I love the fact that my deck knows when to give me anti-combo hands), and follow it up with another a few turns later. Then I throw down a Cap, which cause Jason to go into a flurry of card drawing, trying get his kill mechanisims out of the deck. He failed.
Game 2: For some strange reason I keep the stupidest hand. Land Tax, 2 Abolish, 4 Plains. At the end of his first turn 1 kill his mox. I drop plains, Land tax, Mox Pearl(off the top). Next turn I thin my deck, and pull a mesa off the top. I put it into play and get a strange look from jason (I tell him I'm playing a beatdown deck). His deck is struggling to find pieces of his combo, so I just keep pulling out land, and bashing his with tokens. By the time he starts doing stuff, I have 2 Ivory masks in play, and 5 tokens, he is on 11. He can't find his fastbond, so he drops his siesmic assult and starts flicking land and my tokens. I keep making more and get him down to 4 when I tutor out my Ankh of Mishra. He looks at it in disgust, as for the past week, he had been saying he didn't think it was that good against him. He eventually dies to My mesa.
Round 3(Finals): Andrew playing Keeper
Andrew had been trying to get stacker together all week, and at the last moment realised he had no chance, and pulled out his broken keeper deck. If he played stacker I would of smashed him (I proven this before), instead he playing the incredible, look at how many broken cards I can fit into one deck, Keeper. I pray the my luck will hold up.
Game 1: He starts with Mishra's, Mox, Sol Ring. I have a slow hand, but it has a tax, so I drop that. He draws, sighs and states he should have mulligained that hand. He hits me with mishra's. I draw a strip Mine off the top, and make my land tax even more useless. I get up to four land, he has one, and bait with a Cap. He force of wills. I look at my hand of argivian find, Ivory mask, wasteland and something, and think things are looking good, all I have to do is argivian find the cap and get his morphlings out of his library. He top decks another land, and mind twists me for 4. I hate broken keeper. It always does this to me. Next turn he taps out for a morphling. I really regret cutting my third swords, as I draw some crap and the morph bashes me to death.
Game 2: I get a cool opening hand, which go's plains, black lotus, sac lotus for white, drop a scroll rack, bait with a Zuran orb(I didn't expect him to counter this, but when he did, I looked at the balance in my hand and thanked the gods). The balance resolved leaving me with a scroll rack, and 2 plains in hand. We both playout land for a few turns, with him casting ancestral to help him recover. Eventually he drops morph with one blue untapped. I top deck humility, and make it a 1/1 dork. A few turns later he finds a seal of cleansing, and I start getting hit again, I draw counters with stuff, and finally get a story circle into play when I'm on three, we draw for a few turns, then he DT's for a seal and I fail to find another answer to the morph. Too many broken cards in keeper. And that stupid fact or fiction. The number of times he casts that and pulls up 3+ broken cards. I hate keeper.
Anyway, I'm happy I went 2-1 in what I though were 3 bad matchups for my deck. Congrats to Andrew for having a big fat pile of broken crap.
Not a bad report.
Hooray for my broken pile of crap!
I'll post an exact decklist later, as we all know that small changes in this kind of decklist make a big difference.
Initially I had been planning to play stacker, because it's hell fun. Sucks against parfait (10 or 12 disenchant effects ain't good) but would have been good vs the rest of the field. I'll make a quick list of the field (which was as we'd expected)
Glenn (semi-powered academy)
Andrew (Me, Keeper - well sort of franchisy)
Miki (parfait)
Jason (Turbonevyn)
Hugh (We expected some combodeck, he played turboland with lots o' counters)
Eddie (We expected something tubbies-ish. He played a weird turbo-cap deck with workshops and stuff)
Tom (sligh)
Shane (Old school control. No, not that deck of nameless's - I just mean an old school control deck.)
Anyway, onto the matches
Round one: Me VS shane
Game 1:
The first few turns we drop a few land and moxes each. Third turn I FoF - we have a bit of a counterwar over it, I win, and get a 3 card pile with sylvan in it. I drop sylvan. At some point around here I get a mishra, and start beating down with it. Turn 5 or so I drop a morph, he tutors up a balance and kills it. I draw my second factor, and then screw up - I should have dropped the trade routes I was holding to protect my dudes, but didn't. So one died. I continued beating down until he was on three, and then he won a counterwar over a morphling. In my turn, I regrow my other factory, balance away the morph and swing for three with winter.
Side: +2 gainsay and 1 mana short, -1 abyss -1 seal of cleansing -1 impulse
game 2: Less interesting. He keeps a 1 land 1 mox hand. About turn three I strip away what is still his only land, drop a morph the next turn and win.
Round two: Hugh playing turboland.
game 1: I get some fast mana. We drop land and moxes for a few turns - I think he dropped an exploration. Turn ~4 I mindtwist him down to 2 cards. I drop a morph and wander across for the win.
+1 ankh of mishra +2 gainsay +1 Seal of cleansing: -1 abyss -2 impulse -1 stripmine.
game 2:
Hugh goes first. in my first turn I ancestral and get the ankh. Good times. Then he timetwists in his turn, and drops a rootwater thief - eep!
Luckily I'd drawn the ancestral again off the twister, and still have the ankh. I drop the ankh (no comboing me out!) and say go. He strips a morph out of my deck, so I VT for the other one. I hold it for a long while, worried about his counters. Luckily, I have a slyvan to keep me counter-heavy. Eventually (me on 8) I get a FoF to start a counterwar over. He doesn't counter it, and I get a FoF and timewalk out of it (yea broken junk). In my turn, still worried about counters I cast the timewalk and then FoF again - he doesn't counter, and now I can double force and manadrain backup my morph, so I feel good. I drop it and smack his pair of theives, and he scoops. *phew*.
Round 3: Miki. See above.
Woo hoo! Broken junk!