Tournament Report: PTQ: Return to Ravnica – Standard Constructed

For PTQ: Return to Ravnica I managed to convince myself to play a “real deck”: Kibler’s Naya Pod List from TCGPlayer 5k, San Diego with a few tweaks.

Paul Johnson – Naya Pod

4 Birds of Paradise
4 Avacyn’s Pilgrim
4 Strangleroot Geist
1 Nearheath Pilgrim
4 Blade Splicer
1 Fiend Hunter
2 Borderland Ranger
2 Birthing Pod
1 Phreyxian Metamorph
3 Huntmaster of the Fells
4 Restoration Angel
1 Zealous Conscripts
2 Wolfir Silverheart
3 Bonfire of the Damned
1 Dismember
3 Gavony Township
1 Cavern of Souls

4 Razorverge Thicket
4 Copperline Gorge
2 Rootbound Crag
2 Sunpetal Grove
5 Forest
1 Plains
1 Mountain

Sideboard:
1 Hellrider
2 Crushing Vines
1 Zealous Conscripts
2 Hero of Bladehold
2 Celestial Purge
1 Oblivion Ring
1 Manic Vandal
1 Combust
1 Stingerfling Spider
1 Ambient Grudge
1 Acidic Slime
1 Pyreheart Wolf

Specific changes from Kiblers list were removing Thalias as I wasn’t too fond of them; shaving a Forest and a Dismember; which let me include 3 Bonfire of the Damned maindeck (as the card allows for some insane blowouts) and the 4^th Strangleroot Geist. My sideboard was all over the show and I never even considered bringing in the Vandal or the Wolf.

We had 114 Players which meant it would be 7 rounds of Swiss and cut to top 8. Highly unlikely that any x-2s would make it as we were so close to the next bracket. As per usual, I’ll do my best to recall the specifics of each match, but names and/or plays may be at the mercy of my memory.

Round 1: Kelly Laird - U/W Delver

Game one sees Kelly drop and flip an early Delver of Secrets while I start getting in there with a couple of 2-power guys (Strangleroot Geists I assume). A Bonfire of the Damned to wipe Kelly’s board of Insectile Aberration and Geist of St Traft seals the deal for me. I’d like to think this wasn’t miracled, as there were multiple occasions over the weekend where I had a Bonfire in my opener and waited for the opportune moment to get the most value out of it.

I decide to board out my Birthing Pods and Silverhearts to bring in some hate for the Blue menace. I think every match this tournament saw me boarding out all of my Pods to make room for cards I wanted to bring in, and to hopefully give the opponent more dead cards. I’m not sure if this is correct, as any artifact hate will still kill Golem tokens.

Game two Kelly responds to my Geist with a Phantasmal Image, which stays back on D for him. Due to the way Undying and how AP/NAP trigger stacking works it meant that his Image returned to the field with nothing to copy, so was a 0/0 with no abilities and a +1/+1 counter on it; far less imposing than my now 3/2 Geist. Kelly wasn’t sure of this, but the Judge we called over confirmed I was right; to top things off I then dropped a Blade Splicer post-combat. At some point it looks like I cast a Stingerfling Spider to take out his Restoration Angel, cast a Resto of my own to give me another Golem token; and even chuck a Huntmaster of the Fells in for good measure too. Finally a Crushing Vines takes out his final Angel that was trying to hold up a defence and I cruise in for the win.

After we’re done Kelly tells me that he boarded out his fliers (ie Delver of Secrets) - barring the Angels - in an attempt to blank any hate that I brought in. Considering I drew two flier specific cards it seemed quite unlucky for him. I also don’t know if that’s a particularly good strategy as a t1 Delver that flips on t2 can sometimes steal games that they have no right of winning.

1-0

Round 2: Bronson - B/W tokens

Game One shows me beating down with a Strangleroot Geist, then a Huntmaster of the Fells and some other dorks until Bronson (at 5 life) lands enough anthems to make attacking highly unprofitable. I proceed to let my Huntmaster flip into a Ravager and back again 3 times (made all the more difficult by Midnight Haunting) to finally finish him off.

The board stall was interesting, because as Bronson pointed out, if he’d drawn a Vault of the Archangel I was going to be in a very bad position. Much the same could have been said for him if I’d drawn either a Gavony township or a Bonfire of the Damned.

Game Two Bronson gets land-flooded while I chuck dudes on the board and swing for lots.

2-0

Round 3: Ben Upton – Jon Finkel’s PT Spirits

Game One a flipped Delver from Ben gets in for early beats while I respond with Geist beats of my own. A Huntmaster helps me stabilize my life total, and my guess is that the flip takes out the flying Nacatl and lets me put the game away. I think Ben played some Lingering Souls in an attempt to stem the bleeding; they may or may not have died (again?) in a horrible fire.

Game Two I’m not sure what happened exactly but my life total goes 20, 22, 20, 19 as opposed to his 20, 18, 16, 15, 13, 8, 5, 3. I do recall baiting out a Mana Leak with a Stingerfling Spider when the only flier on-board was my own Restoration Angel. After the Spider this the bin, Ben asks for the wording on its ETB trigger, worried he may have just cost himself the opportunity of having me off my own Angel. I assure him that it is most definitely a “may” trigger.

3-0

Round 4: Tony Matthews – R/B Zombie Pod

Game One sees both our life totals jump all over the place- mine due to Huntmaster triggers mostly and Tony’s due to all the Blood Artist triggers. I think this is the game that my “mull to 5, bonfire” notes apply to. The life totals make me think I may have Bonfired his board with 4 creatures, incl a Blood Artist, dropping me to 3 (then possibly 1 due to an undying Messenger) and putting him at a rather healthy 18. I pod away a 1-drop to get my lonely Nearheath Pilgrim in an attempt to get myself out of harm’s way – I gain 4 life from something here – maybe pairing with a Ravager and swinging? This game ends with an interesting interaction (and an incredible mind blank for me); Tony has two Birthing Pods on the battlefield. He pods a Geralf’s Messenger and I assume he’s off to get a Falkenrath Aristocrat – I think I had a flying blocker, so that was acceptable. He proceeds to get a Zealous Conscripts (with the obvious intention that he was grabbing a 4-drop on the way) and uses it to steal something of mine and kill me. I nearly scoop my cards up, then realize that this isn’t quite right and call a Judge over. The Judge rules that Tony has incorrectly resolved an ability, so backs up to the initial search for a 4-drop. Once Tony shows me that he does still have one in his deck and can definitely get the Conscripts, I scoop em up.

Games 2 and 3 see Tony losing from 11 and 10 life respectively, at least one game due to Hellrider, followed by Zealous Conscripts stealing a Phyrexian Obliterator that he’d been counting on to hold me off.

4-0

Round 5: Zen Takahashi – Esper Midrange/Solar Flare

Game One sees the rather gross board state of (on Zen’s side) Sun Titan, Sun Titan (Phantasmal Image), Sun Titan (Phantasmal Image), Blade Splice, Golem Token compared to my Huntmaster, Angel, Blade Splicer x2, Golem Token x2. Zen (with a Vault of the Archangel) makes things incredibly difficult for me, but I chuck enough things in the way to first-strike his real Titan and stay alive (at 2) while his life sky-rockets to 41. Highly impressed with how I’ve managed to claw back my board position he blows up the world with a Day of Judgment. I find the first threat (a Blade Splicer) but Zen copies it with an Image, then kills my team, followed by me.

Game Two starts off with the same Strangleroot Geist/Phantasmal Image shenanigans that occurred in my match with Kelly (although Zen gets in for some beats of his own for a couple of turns). He decides to blow the world up again. Following the trend from Game One I find the first threat: a Hero of Bladehold. “There’s a win-con” Zen exclaims as he copies it with an Image then kills mine. He takes the game very handily from there.

This was the first match where I felt like I really didn’t have a shot; it seems main-deck wraths are really bad for creature-based decks; who would’ve guessed?

4-1

Round 6: Walker McMurdo – Delver

Game One sees the very unusual situation of Walker tapping out; and me responding by casting a Wolfir Silverheart (a card generally terrible in the Delver match-up), bonding it with my Strangleroot Geist and getting in the red zone for 7 points to drop him to 8. Faced with well over 15 power on the board, he scoops. I think he may have cast a Sword of War and Peace, but it certainly didn’t seem to do him any good.

Game Two looks like a steady grind where I drop him by 2 points for 5 consecutive turns while my own life total dances between 18 and 16 for a while. I’m not 100% sure if this was Huntmaster or Nearheath Pilgrim at work. The game ends with me on 5 life and Walker on 3. Walker brought in Hero of Bladehold against me; I don’t recall exactly how I punched through for the final points (my guess is either Fiend Hunter or removal for a Flier) but my team got there just in time.

5-1

Being 5-1 puts me at my win-and-in. I discuss with a few other guys about whether there’s a chance I could ID into top 8, but the general consensus was no; I’ll have to play it out.

Round 7: Phil Xing – Delver

Game One was an incredibly close race, I clog the board with dudes whilst taking lots in the air. Finally we’re both on 2 life and I pass the turn with a Huntmaster of the Fells on-board and without having cast a spell. Phil doesn’t have an instant so dies iun his upkeep to the Ravager that it transforms into.

Game Two has me at an early advantage, which quickly flips the other way when phil casts a Timely Reinforcements followed by enchanting his Geist of St Traft with Spectral Flight and dropping me from 20 to 12. I cast a Stingerfling Spider and use it to prevent the Geist and his Angel buddy from both getting through each time he swings. I feel I even stooped so low as to Combust an Angel token at one point. The game ends with me on 2 and Phil thoroughly dead.

This was the first Delver match all day that felt like I had a chance of losing.

Because the higher ranked players had ID’d their way into the top 8, winning the final round meant that I (and two of my fellow players from Christchurch; Dan Mckay and Andrew Brewer) actually finished higher than them in the swiss standings (I came in at 2^nd). With the changes to the play/draw rule in the Top 8 (higher ranking player chooses) this actually put us in a great position. Due to the novelty/pressure of playing in the top 8, my notes are more or less non-existent here so this is all from memory.

Top 8 Semi-Finals: Jacques van Eeden – Bant Pod

I was initially pleased to dodge Zen (who had also made T8 and would face Dandan in the semis) until I read the deck tech that had been written on Jacques’ Bant Pod list. In short, he’d designed it to beat Naya Pod – the exact deck I was playing.

Game One I know Jacques can “go bigger” than me as he has Elesh Norn in his list. Unfortunately his Images do a great job of copying my guys (or his Sun Titans) and clogging the board up, letting him get her out and putting me out of the game. Strangest moment was attacking with an 8/8 Ravager of the Fells (bonded with a Wolfir Silverheart) into Jacques 10/10 Sun Titan (also bonded with a Silverheart (Image)). The Titan smashed the Werewolf down allowing me to play my second Silverheart letting me have to 12/12s. Unfortunately next turn was when Elesh Norn showed up and put a halt to any ambitions I might’ve had.

Game Two has a beautifully slow-rolled Bonfire of the Damned taking out two Birds of Paradise and stunting his board development. Strangleroot Geists and other dudes backed up with Gavony Township take Jacques out before he can stabilize.

Game Three Jacques mulls to 6 and I get in some early beats. He gets an active pod, and sacrifices a fresh Huntmaster to pod up an Acidic Slime to destroy my Gavony Township. At this point I had 3 Forest in play, Township and a Cavern of Souls naming Human, and no white mana sources. I let my Huntmaster flip to keep his board clear of creatures as letting him pod into a Sun Titan would have probably been game-winning. Jacques draws a Razorverge Thicket and despondently plays it tapped; if it had been an untapped land he would’ve had 6 mana available to him. In a last-ditch effort Jacques copies my Ravager with a Phantasmal Image. I joke about whether he wants to pod it into a Birds after he ships me the turn, then cast a Zealous Conscripts popping his Image and taking me the win.

I was simply ecstatic that I had beaten the deck that was designed to beat mine, especially with my Bonfire play in Game Two.

Top Eight Quarter Finals: Zheng Jingwei (Joe Zheng) – R/G Aggro

I met Joe when I travelled for a PTQ for the first time (Wellington, way back in 2010) and have found him to be an absolutely great guy (and also an incredibly tight player) so was pleased to be playing against him in the quarters. I mention that I have no idea who our match-up favours and Joe says with a grin that he knows and will tell me after.

Game One says Joe fighting a losing battle against my Huntmaster/Ravager team who beat him down handily.

Game Two I have Joe on the back-foot but decide I’d like to punt the game amazingly. He attacks with a Strangleroot Geist which I decline to block (dropping me to 7), I hit back dropping him to 1 after blocks. Joe then rips a Zealous Conscripts, steals a dude and swings back for lethal.

I could have easily played around this in several different ways; either blocking and trading with his Geist, or holding some number of dudes back just in case would have worked. It hadn’t even occurred to me that he could draw the Threaten-on-a-stick, and Joe played to his outs, so he definitely deserved the win.

Game Three has me coming out the gates with multiple Geists which Joe responds with in kind. He taps out to Phyrexian Metamorph another, and I respond by playing my first Zealous Conscripts, stealing a dude and dropping him from 14 to 5. When I play my second Conscripts to steal his Metamorph (I put him on having Ancient Grudge, as he has the mana up for it) I swing with my team, expecting the Metamorph to die and be returned under my control (due to the Undying trigger). I’m partially correct – after declaring attacks, Joe proceeds to Ancient Grudge his Metamorph. Unfortunately, as I hadn’t /actually/ read the wording on Undying (it returns under the owner’s control) Joe has it copy and then steal one of the attacking Zealous Conscripts. After blocks my misplay has almost wiped my side of the board, but dropped Joe to 1. Shortly after I believe that I unnecessarily miracle a Bonfire for the win.

Top Eight Finals: Andrew Brewer – House of the Undying (R/B Zombie Pod)

Meeting Brewer in the finals of a PTQ in Auckland was a bit of a surreal experience. He’s a good friend (I’d just been on his 21^st bus trip the weekend before) and we’d travelled over to GP Melbourne together earlier in the year as well.

Coverage is available here: http://www.facebook.com/groups/153949381340499/permalink/365651166836985/

Some salient points from our match: Andrew was surprised when I snap-blocked his Gravecrawler with my Pilgrim on t2; it’s my experience in this match-up that trading creatures when there /isn’t/ a Blood Artist or 2 on the board is always preferable, as is protecting a high life total. Game One felt like I never had a chance to lose; the Coverage gets it wrong as I’d had the Bonfire in my hand from the start and slow-rolled it to clear out some number of Artists.

Game 2 I misplay terribly; my keep of Birds, Purge, Fiend Hunter and lands is a bit loose, but I would still probably do it. Purging the Crawler to stem the bleeding was just stupid though, and show’s how little testing I’d done with this deck. Fiend Hunter-ing the Messenger was never going to end well and I knew the game was pretty much over as soon as he cast it.

Game 3 the only real point of difference I think would have been when I blinked my Splicer; the other option was to pass the turn; flip my Huntmaster, shooting an Aristocrat and causing Andrew to tie up a couple of mana (sac’ing a Gravecrawler to keep the Aristocrat alive, then re-playing it next turn) and then flickering my Ravager giving me a couple of extra life. As it happens, it probably didn’t matter at all; Andrew had another Aristocrat in hand.

Final record: 2^nd place and a box of AVR.

Musings from the tournament:

• While the Delver matches were usually tight, I feel that unless they get the nut double-Delver flip draw, the match-up is very much in your favour.
• Zombies are hell. Blood Artist is public enemy number one; you have a few different ways of killing them maindeck, so its not terrible, but the sheer amount of life you can lose from Artist triggers + sac outlets is just absurd.
• Podding a Blade Splicer into a Huntmaster without casting a spell, flipping into a Ravager and then flickering the Ravager back to a Huntmaster with an Angel in their turn is as absurdly good as it sounds.
• Wraths are /really/ bad for this deck. Don't over-extend if at all possible.

Stay tuned for my follow-up report: WMCQ Auckland.

Peace, and please feel free to provide feedback/spread the word.

- PJ

Dooming Travelers since 2011

PTQ Honolulu Tournament Report

Saturday 26th November 2011

4.55am - Alarm goes off. Time to win a PTQ.

5.08am - Showered, shaved, check. Pants?

5.10am - Pants, check.

5.30am - Out the door, into a taxi and off to the airport.

7.00am-ish - Onto the plane

8.00am-ish - Off the plane, onto a bus.

8.50am - Arrive at venue. See nothing is really happening. Go get food.

9.20am - Return to venue. See nothing is still really happening. Wait.

Wait.

Register for tournament.

Wait.

Wait.

…

Wait.

The Players meeting occurred at 11am. For a tournament that was advertised to start at 10am, this was rather annoying to say the least. I understand James (the TO) waited because there weren't as many tables as they’d been promised and they were trying to source more, but it still wasn’t a good look. This meant that our 83-person, 7-round PTQ was as cosy on the tables as our largest PTQs in Christchurch had been. Sigh.

Prior to opening our packs for registration there is a bit of discussion and joking about whether you want to open good cards (as you’ll be passing them very shortly) and be passed equally good cards or whether you’d rather open bad cards and get passed good ones. I figured I didn’t really mind what I opened, as long as I ended up with a playable deck. So, of course, after ripping into my 6 packs I find both Garruk and Tiago looking up at me. Not that Snapcaster is generally a particularly strong card in limited, but between the two of them that would have covered my tournament entry fee. Anyway, we wrote everything down, shuffled the pools around (Jason Hoe who was sitting opposite me ended up with the pool he’d registered, which is always amusing), and got down to the business of building a deck for the day.

Here’s my pool:

White:

1 Chapel Geist

1 Cloistered Youth

1 Elder Cathar

2 Feeling of Dread

1 Ghostly Possession

1 Midnight Haunting

1 Purify the Grave

1 Rally the Peasants

1 Selfless Cathar

1 Silverchase Fox

1 Slayer of the Wicked

2 Spare From Evil

1 Thraben Purebloods

3 Unruly Mob

1 Urgent Exorcism

2 Voiceless Spirit

2 Village Bell-ringer

Blue:

1 Armored Skaab

1 Back from the Brink

1 Delver of Secrets

1 Forbidden Alchemy

1 Invisible Stalker

3 Makeshift Mauler

1 Memory’s Journey

1 Murder of Crows

1 Rooftop Storm

1 Stitcher’s Apprentice

Black:

1 Corpse Lunge

1 Curse of Oblivion

1 Dead Weight

2 Ghoulcaller’s Chant

1 Manor Skeleton

2 Markov Patrician

2 Tribute to Hunger

1 Victim of Night

Red:

1 Ancient Grudge

1 Ashmouth Hound

1 Bloodcrazed Neonate

2 Furor of the Bitten

1 Hanweir Watchkeep

1 Rolling Temblor

1 Traitorous Blood

Green:

1 Bramblecrush

1 Full Moon’s Rise

1 Grizzled Outcasts

1 Kessig Cage-breakers

1 Make a Wish

1 Mayor of Avabruck

1 Moonmist

1 Somberwald Spider

2 Spider Spawning

1 Spidery Grasp

3 Travel Preparations

1 Villagers of Estwald

Artifact/Gold/Land:

1 Blazing Torch

1 Cobbled Wings

1 Creepy Doll

1 Galvanic Juggernaut

2 Ghoulcaller’s Bell

1 Mask of Avacyn

2 One-eyed Scarecrow

1 Trepanation Blade

1 Geist of Saint Traft

1 Kessig Wolf-run

1 Foil Plains

Immediately Green and White scream out as the two strongest colours, triple Travel Preparations, the Mayor and the Cagebreakers are all solid cards. Apparently mine wasn’t the only pool where this happened - every game I played against a deck which was base White, and five of my matches were G/W. Unfortunately the grand total of removal in these two colours is sweet-fuck-all. Blazing Torch is solid, but everything else is conditional: Slayer for monsters; Urgent Exorcism for Spirits; Bramblecrush for… nothing really. In hindsight, I possibly should have considered Ghostly Possession, at least as an answer to big threats. I nearly went with G/W splashing Blue for Geist and two Feeling of Dread, then came to my senses as I realized I had absolutely no fixing, the Geist was never going to be cast on turn 3, and I probably didn’t need the Feeling of Dreads. Next was toying with a Black splash for the Tributes and Dead Weight, and if I’d had some fixing I probably would have gone this route (I even considered boarding into it if I absolutely had to, but never did). I figured my best bet was to make my deck as consistent and aggressive as possible, and just try to turn guys sideways faster than my opponent. Here’s what I registered:

1 Chapel Geist

1 Cloistered Youth

1 Elder Cathar

1 Midnight Haunting

1 Rally the Peasants

1 Selfless Cathar

1 Silverchase Fox

1 Slayer of the Wicked

3 Unruly Mob

2 Voiceless Spirit

2 Village Bell-ringer

1 Kessig Cage-breakers

1 Mayor of Avabruck

1 Spidery Grasp

3 Travel Preparations

1 Villagers of Estwald

1 Blazing Torch

1 Galvanic Juggernaut

1 Foil Plains

8 Plains

7 Forests

This almost always became -1 Plains, +1 Make a Wish - I really liked this card all day, but wouldn’t have wanted to play more than one. I often boarded out the Rally the Peasants, as it was just there to allow me to win the occasional race/kill out of nowhere and lost its value once my opponent had seen it. The 2 Scarecrows came in against fliers and that’s about it.

On to the games!

Round 1: Jordan Schroder

Jordan spends what must’ve amounted to nearly 10 minutes trying to figure out what’s going on with his deck before presenting it to me. He counts it several times and comes up with 41, or 42 cards. This allows me to nip over to my bag and grab my dice, which was good. Jordan’s deck issues happened throughout the pre-game of our match, which I thought was weird.

Game 1: we both play Cloistered Youths (which flip very quickly) and Blazing Torches. Mine gets rebuked but I’ve got an Unruly Mob in play along with a Silverchase Fox wearing a torch. I cast Travel Preparations and in response Jordan tries to shoot my Mob. I respond by throwing the torch at his face and sac’ing my Fox, putting the Mob at 3 toughness. It was pointed out to me when I attempted to do a similar move in Round 2 (we’ll get to that…) that I can’t actually sac the Fox without a target. So, in the unlikely event you ever read this Jordan, my apologies, I should definitely know better. In the end I cruise on through this game and smash him good.

Game 2: I over-extend a tad more than was necessary and get blown out by Blasphemous Act. Jordan promptly drops 2x Thraben Sentry and there’s not a lot my deck can do about them.

Game 3: isn’t a real game, Jordan draws a million land and by the look of my notes I beat him down with Mayor. I decide to play around the Act by sandbagging my Kessig Cagebreakers - I figure they do a pretty good job of recovering from a board wipe. One card I saw a lot of all day was Moment of Heroism. It works great as a combat trick, and can swing a race in your favour.

1-0

Round 2: Andrew Plinston

I recognized Andrew from Nationals, and knew that he was on our National Team this year, so wasn’t expecting a match as easy as last round.

Game 1: we try to race each other with our G/W decks. Unfortunately, Midnight Haunting, Ambush Viper, Travel Preparations and a Gallows Warden are a damn sight better than anything I can muster.

Game 2: goes to my Silverchase Fox and Voiceless Spirit who prepare for traveling against his Festerhide Boar, Elder Cathar and Fiend Hunter.

Game 3: I start off in a commanding position whilst APL uses Silent Departure to try to regain some tempo. At this point I decide I no longer want to win the game and instead of flashing-back my Travel Preparations and comfortably cruising to a win with a large Voiceless Spirit and 2x Unruly Mobs on defense, I swing with my team into APL’s guys. Here is where I attempt to sacrifice my Fox to pump my Mobs and force trades around the board, but a Judge confirms that no, I can’t do that without a valid target. The game goes rapidly downhill from there.

1-1

Round 3: Aaron Sewell

Aaron’s name is one I recognized, but I’m not sure from where.

Game 1: we play the G/W mirror by dropping Villagers of Estwald with Aaron having the dual advantage of being on the play and an Avacyn’s Pilgrim. I try to stabilize but a Midnight Haunting, Abbey Griffon and a Silver Dagger all conspire to get me low enough for a Brimstone Volley to finish me off.

After the beatdown in the air I bring in both Scarecrows which show up in both of my next matches and reduce his spirits to really terrible flying Spawn.

Game 2: Aaron has a Priest, a Torch, a Fox, a Volley and a Midnight Haunting but has been on the back foot the whole game. He decides to finish it off with a Travller’s Amulet and a Caravan Vigil. Neither of these things can save him.

Game 3: Probably the most intense and one of the most fun games I’ve played in this Sealed format. I’m on the draw, but still get an early Mayor out. Aaron makes a big call and drops a Splinterfright, followed by a Tree of Redemption. So, all I need to do is kill him twice, before his giant trampling elemental smashes my face in? Ok then. One of the first cards that Aaron mills from his deck is Divine Reckoning, which makes things a whole lot trickier. Now I need to build up enough guys to kill him twice, and he can wrath the board and still be left with a giant trampling elemental of doom. Aaron drops down to 5 life before pulling the trigger on the Reckoning (thankfully after he has already milled 2x Volleys and a Harvest Pyre), but can’t attack as I’ve left 2W open and might have Rebuke. He quickly finds out that no; it isn’t rebuke; it’s just a couple of Spirits. The following turn the Spirits fly over and I drop my Kessig Cagebreakers that I’ve been holding forever. Aaron kills my Mayor and hits me for 9 with Splinterfright, but can’t stop the Cagebreakers bringing 6 Wolves with them (I think I also Travel Prep’d just to be sure).

2-1

Round 4: Matthew Griffin

Game 1: I’m on the play but quickly get smashed by the Boros monstrosity Matthew was running. I see Geistflame, a Reckless Waif, Bonds of Faith, a Priest, a Cultist, a Doomed Traveller and a Rakish Heir.

Game 2: I’m on the play again and Matthew’s double Geistflame and Chapel Geist can’t stem the bleeding long enough.

Game 3: Sees me sandbagging a Mayor all game, in the hope that he might tap out and I can cast it and Travel prep in the same turn. The only card I’ve got noted down here is Tormented Pariah and I remember smashing him with Cagebreakers again.

3-1

Round 5: Dan Bretherton

Dan’s another name I recognize but am not sure why. I really enjoyed my games with him as he was a nice guy to play against and talk to.

Game 1: I mull a 5-land, Cagebreakers & Unruly Mob hand on the draw, into a 1-lander then into a second 1-lander and decide I’d better keep it. Dan drops an Ambush Viper and transforms Vilalgers of Estwald before I make a play so decide to scoop before showing him any of my deck.

Game 2: I snap keep a 6-land Mayor hand and ride to victory on the back of my army-making machine.

Game 3: I’m on the draw, mull to 6 and am never in the game at all.

3-2

At this point standings go up and I think I might still have a slim shot at top 8. Matt Rogers helpfully points out that no I don’t, so these games are just for prizes/PWPs. I also manage to misplace my notebook prior to this match but thankfully Dan is sitting next to me and hands me a piece of paper from his.

Round 6: Marcel van de Steeg

Game 1: I’m out of the gates too fast for Marcel’s Chapel Geist and Instigator Gang to do anything at all. Rally the peasants pushes things over the edge I believe.

Game 2: I’m not really ever in this one, which is impressive as all I wrote down for Marcel’s plays was “Spectral” and “Moment”.

Game 3: I drop a t2 Mayor and am intentionally reckless with it - either trading or forcing a combat trick from Marcel to make him kill it. This is because I know I have Kessig Cagebreakers in hand and Marcel’s life total dropping from 14 to 3 to dead is probably a result of them.

4-2

Round 7: William Poor

Game 1: I have double Preparations in hand after a mull to 6 on the play and by the end of the game have a fistful of Green cards and never draw a single forest.

Game 2: William’s turn to be colour-screwed as he drops Ulvenwald Mystics, a Hamlet Captain, a Gatstaff Shepherd and somebody prepares for travel without ever getting White mana. I think the Mystics were slayed for being wicked and I took this game handily.

We joke about how it would be nice to get a real game this match, where we can both cast all our spells.

Game 3: His life total stays at 20. Mine doesn’t.

4-3

Final placing: 22^nd and no plane-ticket to Honolulu.

In the end, Allan Barclay did the best out of all of the Christchurch players who traveled up (myself, Allan, John & Traci Seaton) with a record of 4-2-1. We all ended up going out for dinner together and I ate far too much but it was totally worth it after skipping out on lunch. They all tried to convince me to go to GP Melbourne and I think I probably will, just need to book some tickets!

It was a long and tiring day, and the top 8 didn’t finish till around 10.30pm at a coffee shop. I ended up heading out to Vagabonds Takapuna for a draft the next day (I 0-3’d triple MBS draft like a boss) but did manage to crush everyone in a game of EDH to make it all worthwhile. Also picked up some Verdant Catacombs (I now have a complete playset of Zen fetches) and a couple of cards for my Dragon Stompy legacy deck. All in all, it was a thoroughly enjoyable trip.

Peace, and please feel free to provide feedback/spread the word.

- PJ

Dooming Travelers since 2011

Tournament Report: WRGC Invitational - ISD Block Constructed

Sunday the 30^th of October. Wizard’s Retreat Invitational. Innistrad Block Constructed. Let’s do this.

I got up early to throw together the Innistrad cards I had lying around. I knew I wanted to go for some sort of G/W Tokens strategy, as Doomed Traveler is fast becoming my favourite card in the set and I’ve played a little bit of block with G/W tokens online. My dilemma occurred from having all these sweet Black cards I wanted to run as well, namely Sever the Bloodline, Bloodgift Demon and Bloodline Keeper//Lord of Lineage. A quick bash together and a few games goldfished and I had started to despair – I only had two Isolated Chapels and one Woodland Cemetery so it looked like my deck would just die to its own manabase more often than not. I stuck the workings of the deck into a fatpack, along with some spare basic land and some optional cards and headed down to my LGS.

Within about 5 minutes of walking in the door Jimmy Sharples has come to my rescue and handed me 2x Isolated Chapels and 3x Woodland Cemeteries. The deck I ended up running was:

Creatures (17)

4 Doomed Traveler

4 Mayor of Avabruck//Howlpack Alpha

3 Fiend Hunter

3 Geist-Honored Monk

2 Mausoleum Guard

1 Mikaeus, the Lunarch

Spells (19)

4 Sever the Bloodline

4 Intagible Virtue

3 Midnight Haunting

3 Parallel Lives

2 Rebuke

Lands (24)

4 Woodland Cemetery

4 Isolated Chapel

4 Gavony Township

6 Plains

5 Forest

1 Swamp

Sideboard (15)

3 Angelic Overseer

2 Bloodgift Demon

2 Curse of Death’s Hold

2 Elite Inquisitor

2 Paraselene

2 Urgent Exorcism

1 Divine Reckoning

1 Nevermore

The numbers were a little funky (should’ve definitely had a 4^th Midnight Haunting, but couldn’t find my copy) and the sideboard was very much a case of “what do I have that’s cool and with what I know of the field can I see myself bringing in?” Altar’s Reap was a last-minute-before-I-walk-out-the-door inclusion; I figured a little bit of card draw with the option of blanking someone’s removal and/or creating a flash blocker Spirit token or four might be good enough.

So, how did I go? (Usual disclaimer about this being done from memory and no notes, yadda yadda yadda…)

Round 1: Chris Entwistle – G/W Humans

I haven’t faced the Human deck before, but railbirded a practice game Chris had been running against another guy before the tournament. I knew he had Garruks, Champions, and some Token guys like me.

Game 1: We both drop some early guys, get in for a bit of damage, but I get there and Chris doesn’t. I feel like this was one of the ‘drop a Mayor of Avabruck, let him transform, play Parallel Lives, gg?” style of games.

Pretty sure I bring in the 2 Curse of Death’s Hold and maybe cut the Altar’s Reap. The Demons might have come in too, as apart from Spirits he’s lacking fliers (although can still tap them down if he keeps his Priests of Avacyn in).

Game 2: I’m not sure how this game played out, but I know I won. Pretty confident that Chris wasn’t really in the race for game 2.

1-0

Round 2: Chris Smith – B/W Tokens

Pre-game Chris comments on my small pile of tokens asking if I’m going to be making some Spirits, I say “yeah, and hopefully some of these too” flashing him a Wolf. Its midway through the match when I realize the giant pile of cards he has sitting next to him is his collection of tokens (including Saprolings, Cats and Soldiers!)

Game 1: We both drop Doomed Travelers and donk them into each other. I let his Spirit swing past mine then remove it with Fiend Hunter. Chris is missing land drops which lets me start whittling away at his life total. I know at one point Chris tries to stabilize with a Geist-Honored Monk and Midnight Haunting. Unfortunately for him Sever the Bloodline neuters that plan letting my team cruise over for the kill.

Curses come in, Rebukes I think are out. Maybe cut Alar’s Reap (not very good as surprise when Chris has used it in Game 1) for Demons too.

Game 2: I really felt for Chris on this one – it runs the opposite for him. He mulls to 6 then proceeds to draw nothing but land as my guys swing across the table and kill him

Chris had some interesting stuff – Skirsdag High Priest and Tribute to Hunger. About now was when I realized I should have been running Tributes over Rebukes, or maybe a 1-1 split. I also think that Mayor is a much stronger player than High Priest as left unmolested he’ll win the game for you on his own. The High Priest has a higher potential payoff, but requires much more set-up and guys. Chris and I play some friendly games afterwards and at one point he hold off playing Tribute till my turn to let my Mayor of Avabruck flip and gain a couple of extra life. He then realizes how bad a play this is, because I can now drop a Midnight Haunting in response and keep the Mayor alive, I let him take it back (I’d rather test against an optimal line of play) but think I win anyway.

2-0

Round 3: Daniel “Dandan” Mckay – RUG Snapcaster Vengeance

Game 1 I come out the gates with a couple of Doomed Travelers who Dan Geistflames for me. A couple of turns and a couple of Intagible Virtues later and he realizes his mistake and reaches for the sideboard.

I have so much in my maindeck which is terrible against his lack of creatures. Out comes Fiend Hunter, Rebuke, Sever the Bloodline and Altar’s Reap. In comes Paraselene, Nevermore, Urgent Exorcism. Think I brought in the Demons and a couple of Overseers as threats which didn’t just die to Geistflame.

Game 2 Dan plays much tighter, letting my Doomed Travelers do their (not very relevant) thing on the ground and countering/killing any real threat I try to land. At one point he drops Tree of Redemption and swaps his life total with it. It turns out that a 20-toughness Tree is pretty good at surviving Blasphemous Act. Not much I can do apart from get my face burned by a couple of active Burning Vengeances.

After seeing him bring in the Trees I probably should have considered bringing Sever the Bloodline back in, as I actually had no way to deal with them. Ah, hindsight!

Game 3 was awesome. I’m on the play and because Dan leads with a Hinterland Harbor I get to ‘safely’ drop my Mayor of Avabruck. He Geistflames it in his turn, so he doesn’t have counter mana open for my Nevermore naming Burning Vengeance. Turns out he has two in hand, draws straight into the third and has no way of removing it. Unfortunately, Dan proceeds to do the trick with the Tree again, counter/kill anything vaguely resembling a threat that I manage to draw (“I’ve only cast Dissipate 5 times this game…) and eventually kill me with Snapcaster beats and a Devil’s Play that he’s been holding since I cast Nevermore. Turns out I’d completely forgotten that card. At the end of the game I have 3 Anthems in play, my Nevermore, maybe a Parallel Lives and a whole heap of land doing nothing. Dan played really well and deserved the match win, we both really enjoyed the game.

2-1

Because there were very few of us playing (14?) there were some odd things going on with pairings. I find out that I’d been paired down against Dan, who last round was paired down against Jimmy and lost (apparently his deck rolls to Hexproof.dec). My next round my opponent gets paired down to me!

Round 4: Anthony Day – R/G Werewolves

Anthony’s the only 3-0 because of my loss to Dan and I have no idea what he’s playing.

Game 1: Anthony wins the die roll and chooses to play. I keep a bit of a slower hand and am really unhappy when he drops and taps a mountain for a Reckless Waif. A couple of turns later I’m chumping his Waif with my Mayor of Avabruck, Severing the bloodline of his 2 Howlpack Alphas, and picking up my cards for Game 2.

Absolutely no idea how I sideboarded here, except I know I managed to completely miss the Elite Inquisitors which would have been amazing.

Game 2: Anthony has red cards in hand and nothing but Forests in play. I beat him into the ground with tokens.

Game 3: I get a Mayor online with Parallel Lives support and take over the game – forcing him to block my wolves and use up his 2x Full Moon’s Rise to keep them alive in consecutive turns. Moonmist fogs for a turn but I win the attrition battle and grind out the match.

Anthony’s deck was hyper-aggressive due to the Reckless Waifs, and could steal a win out of nowhere with Brimstone Volley. I didn’t see any Prey Upons from him, which seems like an odd choice to me – Werewolves are almost always bigger than anything else on the field and being able to remove a blocker for 1 mana to get a hit in seems really powerful.

3-1

Round 5: Michael Day – B/R Vampires

Game 1 starts off with Michael Geistflaming my Mayor. He tries to connect with a Rakish Heir which gets ambushed by a pair of Spirits from Midnight Haunting. Parallel Lives and another Midnight Haunting give me a veritable army on my side of the board. Michael tries to stabilize with a Bloodline Keeper, so I tap the top of my deck and call the Intagible Virtue from the top for the win. I also had a Fiend Hunter in hand to remove his guy, but the called shot was too good to pass up.

I remember to bring in the Elite Inquisitors this time around and I think the Curses and maybe the Demons came in too. Altar’s Reap, a Monk and the Rebukes were out?

Game 2 we do some early trading and I start the beatdown with my army. A Falkenrath Noble from Michael threatens to make things difficult for my tokens, and a second one looks to take over the game until I Sever the Bloodline for the win.

4-1

The tournament was only 5 rounds of Swiss and I waited around for everyone else to finish their last round to find out how I went. I knew Dandan was at 4-1 as well, and depending on how Antony goes he could have got there too. Sam Weilly challenged me to some Standard, but it turned out I’d left my Puresteel deck at home. I decided to play my block deck against his Solar Flare build anyway. Weirdest situation was having his Phantasmal Image copy my Geist-Honored Monk - I swung in with the team and he Doom Blades a Spirit making my guy small enough to not trade with his Image, but trades all round otherwise. Post-damage the Image shrunk and died anyway but it was still fairly entertaining. I eventually manage to take one game off him with Bloodgift Demon beats; the turn before I can hit him for lethal with the Demon and an Angelic Overseer he drops Elesh Norn to shrink my team and bash in for a whole heap with a Snapcaster and something else. I return with a Sever the Bloodline on his Praetor for the win.

Results go up and because I only lost one game (to Dan) I win the tournament 75% to 72%! Excellent!

I think this deck is a solid choice in Block – Parallel Lives and Sever the Bloodline are great for edging out the mirror and there’s no better feeling than the play sequence of: T1 Doomed Traveler; T2 Mayor, bash for 2; T3 bash again, transform my Mayor, T4 Parallel Lives, gg? Mayor on Turn 2 more or less asks your opponent for the Geistflame/Dead Weight or they lose then and there.

Changes I would make are cutting one Altar’s Reap for a 4^th Midnight Haunting, and swapping one maindeck Geist-Honored Monk for a Bloodgift Demon. Paraselene was in the hope of hitting multiple Burning Vengeances, but 2x more Nevermore would probably just be better. The deck really wants a way to be able to gain some life to get out of burn range once you’ve stabilized so maybe a couple of Moment of Heroism or a Disciple of Griselbrand could be worth toying with. The Angelic Overseers never really did anything, and I never brought in Divine Reckoning – I’d really like to try Purify the Grave to help deal with graveyard shenanigans (although Dan was the only one of those I faced, there were at least 2 U/G dredge decks in the field). I could also easily see trying to fit a fourth Fiend Hunter in the main. The Rebukes should be just about anything else – I don’t know if I cast either of them all day. Tribute to Hunger would add a little bit of life-gain and do a pretty similar job. Those are my current thoughts anyway.

No idea when I’ll next be putting together a report – there’s nothing major coming up until the PTQ in Auckland at the end of the month, so that might be the one.

Peace, and please feel free to provide feedback/spread the word.

- PJ

Dooming Travelers since 2011

Tournament Report: Innistrad Game Day

A nice sunny day in Christchurch saw 27 players descend upon our LGS - the Wizard’s Retreat - for our first constructed tournament post-rotation. Having not played any Standard since Nationals in August (and absolutely nothing since Innistrad’s release) I decided to go with a deck I know quite well – Puresteel Paladin aka Voltron.

Full credit goes to Mike Lanigan (@mtgjedi on twitter) for the decklist, which I bastardized due to metagame calls (“3x Nihil Spellbomb in the board should fix all those graveyard decks!”), stupidity (“2x Day of Judgment? I’m sure I won’t need those…”) and forgetfulness (“I feel like I haven’t seen either of my Inkmoth Nexi all day… wait… they’re sitting in my Dragon Stompy Legacy deck as proxies?!?”).

The list I ended up running was as follows:

Creatures (16)

4 Vault Skirge

4 Doomed Traveler

4 Puresteel Paladin

2 Mentor of the Meek

2 Trinket Mage

Equipment (16)

3 Flayer Husk

4 Mortarpod

3 Sword of War and Peace

2 Sword of Feast and Famine

1 Sylvok Lifestaff

1 Blazing Torch

2 Batterskull

Spells (6)

4 Dispatch

1 Oblivion Ring

1 Mox Opal

Lands (22)

4 Seachrome Coast

4 Glacial Fortress

2 Moorland Haunt

11 Plains

1 Island

Sideboard (15)

2 Celestial Purge

2 Dissipate

2 Flashfreeze

2 Phyrexian Metamorph

2 Revoke Existence

3 Nihil Spellbomb

1 Indomitable Archangel

1 Etched Champion

2 of the Plains were supposed to be Inkmoth Nexuses, and the 2 Metamorphs were Phantasmal Images. I knew we had at least one Burning Vengeance combo deck in the room, hence the overload on graveyard hate. The Indomitable Archangel was a cute idea I wanted to try, and I figured at the least he was a flying 4/4 for four.

Report time! Due to my lack of note-taking this is all done from memory. I may have got some of the situations a bit fuzzy with regards to what game they happened in and the order of things, but these all definitely happened!

Round 1: David Harragan running G/W Tokens

Ah… tokens. Wrath seems like it’d be good right now. Oops.

Game 1: David drops a Blade Splicer - who promptly dies to a Mortarpod – and a completely surplus Shrine of Loyal Legions ensuring his win, even as his Golem token beats me down with augmented power from Intagible Virtue.

I think I board in Revoke Existence for Shrine and Golems. Not sure what went out. At this point I’m kicking myself for cutting the Days that were in the original list.

Game 2: is more of the same; crushed by a Golem token, while David proceeds to never tap out for the rest of the game. Afterwards he flashes me a hand containing 3x Naturalize. Yeah… that seems bad for my deck.

0-1

About now I decided to go and grab a coffee from the local mall.

Round 2: Bye

Excellent - a bye! And all I had to do to earn it was lose the first round...

1-1

Round 3: Keith Stokes with UB Control

I'd tested the deck very briefly against a UB deck the night before at FNM and despite getting manascrewed most of my testing games (which in hindisght was due to my missing Inkmoth Nexi... 20 lands really isn't enough!) I still managed to win a couple of games.

Game 1: I drop some guys who get in there for some early damage. Keith wipes the board a turn later than he should and I come back with a Paladin wearing a sword. His Grave Titan tries to help out, but pro-black and some spirits in the air combined with a mortarpod seal the deal.

Not sure if I brought in Revoke Existence and maybe Celestial Purge for his Wurmcoils/Grave Titans. Pretty sure I brought in at least one Spellbomb to try and reduce his Snapcaster usefulness. Definitely brought in the 2 Phyrexian Metamorphs to try and copy his fatties.

Game 2: is more of the same; little guys wearing pants bashing in early. I get an active Paladin and start shifting Mortarpod around to kill his Spellskite that’s preventing me getting through with a Sworded guy. Keith tries to redirect my equip to Spellskite and we get into a brief discussion about the legality of that. I tell him that Equipping can only target a creature you control, so he can’t re-direct the ability. I’m not entirely sure what Keith thought he would gain even if it did work like that, as I was equipping for free anyway. I kill the Skite and swing in for a bunch of damage. Keith taps out for a last-ditch effort: Consecrated Sphinx. It sticks, draws him a couple of cards then gets Dispatched while my team cruise in for the kill.

I saw absolutely no removal in the second game from Keith, who at one point activated his Nephalia Drownyard to mill me. I'm sure it would've been better to hit himself in the hope that he ends up with something that he can Snapcaster back, but I wasn't going to complain.

2-1

Round 4: Xavier Mclean with Mono-Black Infect

I have no idea what deck X-man is playing (he's been out of the loop even longer than I have and has borrowed a deck from a friend). We have some nice casual banter about how the tournament's going while shuffling up and he complains about how Vampires (or was it Werewolves?) just rolled him because his Victim of Night's were useless. Hilariously enough, I'm probably one of the few match-ups where they're actually better than Doom Blade because he can kill my Germ tokens with them!

Game 1: I keep a hand with a bit of early action and we trade one-for-one early on (Mortarpod’s pretty sweet at popping all his 1-toughness guys). I make a bad call of dropping 2 Doomed Travellers to up my clock, when I have a Mentor of the Meek in hand. Xavier catches some of my stupid and swings an Inkmoth Nexus at me when I have mana up, an untapped Moorland Haunt and a guy in the yard. The stupid continues when I try to block one of his Phyrexian Crusaders with a white creature wearing a Sword of Feast and Famine (“I don’t think that does what you think it does…”). I drop some germs to buy some time (“Hah! They’re not white!”) I Dispatch his hasted Skittles, but eventually succumb to his Contagion Clasp grinding me out a turn or two before I can finish him off.

Celestial Purge and Etched Champion definitely come in, Lifestaff, 3x Sword of War and Peace and 2x(?) Batterskull go out. Metamorphs are in to help against Skittles and to lessen the impact of his Phyrexian Crusaders. Revoke Existence is in for Lashwrithes and Clasps.

Game 2: Another close one; I drop a guy, he kills it with Clasp. I O-Ring his Clasp and he looks at me a little funny (I don’t have any poison yet). Fairly certain I win this game due to Xavier trying to equip Lashwrithe to a couple of 1-toughness flying dorks and having them popped with Mortarpod; half-retail for the first and the full 4-life for the second gave me a nice edge in the race.

Game 3 Xavier jokes about how he could keep his hand and just give me the win (think it was a 1-lander or something). I keep a hand with some guys and removal and feel in control for the whole game.

Lashwrithe is obscenely good in the Mono-black deck as it turns any of their guys into very fast clocks. It’s also really important to remember that they’ve always got the chance to rip a hasty Skittles off the top, so ideally you want to save a Dispatch/Purge to deal with it. Xavier was using Virulent Wound, which – considering the large number of 1-toughness guys running around at the moment – seems like a really solid call.

3-1

Round 5: Mo Nicholson with White Weenie (splashing blue for Geist of Saint Traft)

Mo and I take about 20 seconds before deciding to ID, then have to call a judge over to ask how we actually go about doing it! We decide to have a couple of friendly games to kill the time and I beat him 2-0. It turns out that Angelic Destiny isn’t so good when the guy enchanted with it gets exiled from the game, and copying your opponent’s Hero of Bladehold is really good when you have a token sub-theme.

3-1-1 and Cut to top 8!

About now I’m incredibly stoked. Considering how the day had started this is the best result I could hope for. Looking around the top 8 we have two White Weenie decks, David and his GW Tokens, a 4-colour Pod deck, 1 Mono-red, me with Puresteel and a couple of decks I can’t recall/didn’t see.

Quarterfinals: Daniel Liberona with Mono-red

Game 1: Daniel and I play cat and mouse with him attacking me with Chandra’s Phoenix, Stormblood Berserkers and Stromkirk Nobles and me trying to keep the damage down without killing any of his guys to give him Lavamancer fodder. Daniel nearly uses his Berserker to kill both my Doomed Traveller and the Germ that’s blocking him, then realizes how bad that would be for him (I’ve got a Moorland Haunt in play, but no creatures in the yard). I find a Lifestaff which helps stem the bleeding, but he finishes me off before I can take complete control.

In – Revoke Existence for Shrine, Celestial Purge, Etched Champion and Flashfreeze. Out 2x Sword of Feast and Famine, Blazing Torch and some other stuff.

Game 2: I keep a hand with a Lifestaff, Pod, Celestial Purge and some other stuff. We trade 1-for-1 early on, and I exile his Curse of Stalked Prey to stop the Lavamancer(!) beatdown. Daniel proceeds to rip nothing but land while I draw action and put the game away.

Game 3: Don’t really recall this apart from Daniel again ripping lots of land while I smash him down. He flicks through his library at the end of the game and there are 3 Manic Vandals hanging out vaguely near the top. Glad I never saw them!

Daniel’s deck was running a proliferation sub-theme – Stromkirk Noble, Stormblood Berserker and Shrine. Don’t recall if I saw any Koths, and I know I never saw any Heroes (which I’m pretty sure destroy my deck if they get to swing).

4-1-1

Semifinals: Matthew ‘Mo’ Nicholson with White Weenie

After our friendly games I wasn’t the matchup Mo wanted to see. He takes game 2 off me, but makes a couple of mistakes over the match like swinging a guy into a Batterskull Germ wearing a Sword of War and Peace (Me: “Uh… ok… kill your guy, gain 6 life?” Mo: “Wait, that thing has vigilance?” Bystander: “Yeah, it really does everything!” I end up bringing in Revoke Existence for the Destinies, Phyrexian Metamorph for Geists and Etched Champion because it blanks his deck. I cut a Batterskull, the 2 Swords of Feast and Famine and the Lifestaff. Game Three involves a turn where he double destinies and swings at me, I take it like a champ, Dispatch his guys on my turn and smash back with a Sworded guy.

Grand Abolisher is a major annoyance for the Puresteel deck as it means you can’t respond to Champion of the Parish triggers with Mortarpod or having them cast an anthem effect. The games seemed to revolve around me taking a control role and chumping their guys while hopefully smashing them with a Sworded guy.

5-1-1

Finals: John Seaton with 4-Colour Pod

John and I are good friends and did a fair bit of testing for Nats together. I’d railbirded one of his games earlier and had seen what made his Not-Quite-Bant-Pod deck so cool – splashing black for Skinrender and Unburial Rites. He also had a Sheoldred at the top of his chain because he didn’t have an Elesh Norn handy and couldn’t be bothered trying to track one down. This was probably the best possible news for me as Elesh Norn pretty much just wrecks my deck. The last time John and I faced each other in a Top 8 match was M11 Game Day where he crushed my homebrewed UR Frost Titan/Destructive Force deck with Turboland. I was ready for revenge!

Game 1: We both drop some early guys and then I crash in for a heap with a guy wearing a Sword of War and Peace. He searches up a Wurmcoil Engine in an attempt to stabilize while on 2 life, saying: “If you show me the direct damage I’ll scoop.” I don’t have a Mortarpod in play or in hand, so start digging with Mentor of the Meek and Paladin. Four mana available and my two options are drop another Sword of War and Peace, suit something up and I should still be able to crash through for enough to kill him (I hadn’t done all the math) or go for the style-kill. I cast my Trinket Mage and ask John: “What 1-mana equipment can I search for to kill you?” He can’t think of anything, so I drop the Blazing Torch on the table. We both have a good laugh and shuffle up for game two.

Out: 2x Sword of War and Peace (in hindsight, this is totally and utterly wrong, as the Pod deck usually has a lot of cards in hand and not a lot of early action), Sylvok Lifestaff and Blazing Torch (even though it was such an awesome play!). In Revoke Existence for his Pods/Wurmcoils, Phyrexian Metamorph to copy his good-stuff and Flashfreeze.

Game 2: John drops an early Venser the Sojourner. I try to stop him from going ultimate but this just allows John time to run out a pod and start working on value. Skinrender slows my assault and eventually he gets the emblem. I continue playing for a bit, but quickly realize that I really haven’t got a chance of beating him.

Game 3: John goes to 6 cards and keeps. I drop some early guys followed by a Sword of War and Peace while he builds up his land-count. I swing in for 10, John draws his next card and extends his hand. Keeping a 5-lander with all his colours and Venser, while not drawing any action lead to an easy victory!

6-1-1 and Game Day Champion!

Barring FNM this was the first tournament I’ve won, and the first Constructed Tournament in Christchurch that I’ve felt really comfortable with (ignoring my first round!) It’s been nearly 2 years since I’ve come back to the game of Magic and over that time I feel like my play-skill has significantly improved and I feel less of a draw to playing “cute” decks. This deck seemed like a really solid choice, and if I was running it again I’d make the following changes:

• Cut the 2 Dissipates for 1 more Flashfreeze and 1 more Celestial Purge. I never boarded them in, and couldn’t conceive of a match-up where I’d want to. 3 mana is 1 mana to much to be keeping open, and UU isn’t that easy to hit. I never faced Wolf-run so I’m not entirely sure how good the Flashfreezes are, but they’re certainly the best answer this deck has to Dungrove Elder.
• Cut 2 of the Nihil Spellbombs for 2 Day of Judgment. I’d possibly consider Divine Reckoning in this slot instead, because you’d usually be happy to keep one of your guys alive (hint: it’s the deck’s namesake!) and you’d only really be bringing them in against Token decks anyway.
• Cut the Indomitable Archangel for 1 more Etched Champion. Etched Champion is just so good at blanking some strategies. I never really found myself wanting the Archangel, and apparent from my first round where David brought in Naturalizes against me, I don’t recall anyone bringing in targeted artifact-hate. If Creeping Corrosion starts seeing play again (unlikely with the decline of Tempered Steel) I’d consider something like Hero of Bladehold or Mirran Crusader in this slot instead.

I never found myself missing the Inkmoth Nexuses – there wasn’t any occasion that I can recall where I wanted Metalcraft and was lacking it, or where I think a poison win would have been easier. Maybe if we get another infinite-life combo seeing play they might be necessary, it also is probably worth trying a couple of Ghost Quarters in that slot instead. Doomed Traveller is awesome. Just trust me on this (and all the pros that are currently playing him, I guess!). Two Moorland Haunts seems to be the right number – I could see maybe going up to a 3^rd, but you never want more than one in play. I know I never mentioned Vault Skirge, but he really does everything this deck wants; helps against aggro with his Lifelink, is an evasive threat for Sword-wearing, turns on Metalcraft and when he finally dies provides a body in the yard for Haunt. Mentor was another card that – while it didn’t blow me away – was just a solid play for grinding out some card advantage. I think I used the Metamorphs to legend-rule one card in the entire tournament (Skittles maybe?) and I can’t see the Phantasmal Images with their drawback being better in this slot… you can’t equip them, and the Metamorphs help towards Metalcraft while also giving you the option of copying a Sword already in play. Batterskull looks like it should be too expensive for a deck running 22-land, but I was always happy with them.

Right, that’s enough for now; tune in to read about how I did the following day at the Wizard’s Retreat Invitational (ISD Block Constructed)!