#fnm report

[khans-of-tarkir]

FNM Report: Played in a Standard 2-Headed Giant tournament using Junk Constellation, and my partner with UR control. We beat face for the first 3 rounds, beating first UR artifacts and GR midrange, then mono-U devotion and UW control (thanks, Erebos!), followed by a crazy game against BW enchantment aggro and the JOU event deck (we stabilized from 1 life, Courser of Kruphix ftw), but lost in the finals to GR hydras and that BW Bogbrew Witch deck that was going around when Theros came out. Ended that 3-1 which was good for 2nd, a promo Bile Blight, and entry into the 9:30 draft. 

In the draft I pack 1 pick 1 took Chord of Calling, followed by Hornet Queen the very next pick... these games weren't pretty. I drafted up a really nice GW aggro list, choosing a lot of fliers and huge beaters. I won round 1 vs GR 2-0 (dude got a foil Nissa tho so he actually won tbh), then round 2 vs UW aggro(?), again 2-0, and finally round 3 vs. BG aggro 2-1. That was good for first place on the opponent's win-percentage tie-breaker, which got me another Bile Blight promo to finish my playset and 4 packs of M15. Opened a Yavimaya Coast and foil Spectra Ward, which I traded for a foil Life's Legacy and a FTV: 20 spindown. Very good night, ended up with a few EDH cards and had a whole ton of fun. Looking forward to M15 Game Day tomorrow too, though I'm not sure on what I'm going to run between Junk Constellation and GW aggro. Just going to have to wait and see!

[immortalpoet]

Drafted theros tonight

Best draft in a while. A lot of the power players played in the standard tournament so I had a good chance of getting good picks early on. I started to draft bant good things until I noticed I was going black white really heavily. I ended up randomly snagging a scholar of atheros halfway through pack two, due to time. Little did I know how powerful that little bastard was in limited. My p1p1 was Heliod and I got passed a colossus of akros and then a hundred-handed one, do my first three picks were all relatively solid rares. Round one I basically steam rolled him both games with the colossus. Stalled till turn 8, played the giant metal dildo, waited for ninth and tenth lands. Death was swift and angry. Score 1-0 Round two was kinda back and forth with him swinging in and me swinging back. The first game he got slapped by the dildo, the second game I saw just how useful Heliod can be in limited. Eot make 2-3 dudes and wait. It ended with me above 30 life and him with an empty board and 0 life. Score 2-0 Round three was tough. I got game one with the colossus swinging for lethal and the scholar putting the hurt on. Games two and three were dumb. He got two of the chimera that when you cast an instant or sorcery scry 1, and the guy that when you scry he gets +2/+0 and first strike and just durdled all over the place. Friggin stupid. Score 2-1 The last round I played down and got about 2 turns into the game when I asked the judge how many rounds there were. He said this was the last one so I asked my opponent if he'd just be willing to give me the game. He said he'd do it for a pack as we both thought I was going to go to the top. We both agreed and called the match. Score 3-1 Turns out, the guy that beat me ended up taking first simply because he beat me. He was technically undefeated due to a round 1 bye and a opponent drop in the last round. I'm not too mad because I got 8 packs for $15. Out of my winnings I got a xenagos, elspeth, two colossus of akros, foil boon satyr, daxos of meletis, swan song, temple of silence, firedrinker satyr, prophet of kruphix, Heliod, and a hundred handed one. Over all I'm proud of myself for building something that could actually stand on its own and win and super happy I have some things I can peddle off now. Now it's time for sleep so I can sell my cars tomorrow and make money.

[immortalpoet]

So I won another edh pod tournament tonight. It looked like it was going to go in another players direction when the sharuum player tried dropping a memnarch on the board. By this time I had had enough time to drop fourteen mana and an omniscience down and had all my mana open. The riku player couldn't do anything and the mimeoplasm player was tapped out so no counters from that side either. I ended up playing a blue sun for 11 and made the sharuum player mill that many off of my jaces erasure. After I drew my answers, the riku player started saying "I don't really like this. I think we dun goofed." I started drawing a lot of cards. A whole lot. By this time I had my general, azami, on board plus tefiri, venser, and several other wizards. I ended up drawing into my last combo piece on my draw and playing it for free with plenty of counters in hand. I look at the rest of the players and ask if that's game. They tell me to play it out. So I ended up milling myself until I found my lab maniac and cast him for the win. Six packs for five bucks seems ok yeah?

[justindz]

Miracle Whip

That's the punch line to a joke involving Gideon Jura and the rest of my FNM deck. What follows is more serious: shorthand tournament report and thoughts on the UW Miracles deck. I do not currently own any UW duals, so I played it with 4 Evolving Wilds and basic lands. Surprisingly, this worked out perfectly. I had no relevant mana color issues all day. I had lots of other issues. Just not those.

Round 1 - Ian w/ UG Infect

Ian hears the pairing and gets depressed, assuming he's going to lose. I tell him that I'm playing a bad deck. Game 1 I mulligan to five, never get anything for Miracle and lose. Game 2, he and I both mulligan. He keeps a not-so-good hand. I keep a Gideon, which I play on turn 4 via Pristine Talisman and he loses to Gideon, effectively. Game 3, he curves out Elf, Lash, Artful Dodge. I Ponder looking for a two-outer Divine Offering, since I can play a blocker the next turn and then have Gideon and so on. I hit lands, shuffle, draw, hit a land, die. I mulliganed three times this round.

0-1

Round 2 - Dan w/ Delver

This is the worst match for Miracle Whip. Everything in your deck is a 700 cmc Sorcery. If they can flip a Delver and Leak/Snap, they can generally get there unless you run insanely lucky on Miracles. He is playing the variant with Champion of the Parish, which also gives him another "nut draw."

Game 1 is surprisingly hard-fought. But, I end up flooding and getting 7 land in a row, seeing no Miracles and slowly die to a Delver. I think I mulliganed this game as well.

Game 2, I board in 11 cards. He flips a Delver pretty early. I win the game in turn 4 of extra time after casting a total of four full-value Timely Reinforcements, getting a nice Pike blowout with Divine Offering and eventually playing enough Angels that he runs out of Vapor Snags and Snapcasters. Fettergeist was an MVP, getting me through flooding yet again by making several attacks unprofitable.

0-1-1

Round 3 - Joe w/ RB Vampires

This is a new guy. He's playing an un-sleeved, 70ish card pile of RB vampire cards and apparently no removal other than Act of Treason. Mana Leak, O-Ring and Gideon get there two games in a row.

1-1-1

Round 4 - Ben w/ RB Undying

This is a Blood Artist/Killing Wave deck, but runs a ton of Undying creatures, most with some kind of evasion. It also runs Bone Splinters and Barter in Blood. Luckily for me, Terminus is really good against Undying. Also, this round taught me how critical Ponder is to the deck. In the prior rounds, I had seen maybe two Ponder total and they all blind-shuffled away garbage. In this match, I was able to set up Miracles a few times and they went the distance. I had one mulligan this round.

2-1-1

Thoughts on the Deck

I don't think I like Miracle Whip. It's possible I played it poorly, so I'll probably give it another shot. But, mostly I think the deck is extremely high variance. It floods easily, but it also needs large amounts of mana. It's very slow and sometimes you just don't hit Miracles and the deck largely does nothing. However, when it works it's very rewarding. Nothing quite like spitting out ten Angel tokens.

Also, I got to ultimate Tamiyo for the first time on paper (did it once on MTGO beta with an Orim's Chant in hand). My opponent did not conceded, so I got my first taste of true power. Machine gun Ponder is pretty sweet, as is semi-infinite Mana Leak, etc. Regardless of what deck choices I make in the future, they will include Tamiyo.

What I want to try next is UR control. However, I cannot find any Bonfires locally to trade for or borrow. I'm not sure the deck will work without them. So, I may run Miracle Whip again, see if I play it better or shuffle better and go from there.

As far as sideboarding goes, the big decision I made was to fit in a full four copies of Fettergeist. That guy plus Timely Reinforcements really tips the fast aggro matches pretty well. I will continue with this strategy. Fettergeist is one of my favorite cards right now.

[justindz]

FNM Draft Report

I just went 3-0 (6-0 in games) at FNM drafting Innistrad/Dark Ascension. I drew the last round, but we played it out for fun.

I started out in white, but it was clearly getting cut. After two picks, I decide to switch and see a foil Immerwolf. So I grab that. But then I get passed Havengul Runebinder, so I decide to try for UW. Then I get a Fiend of Shadows, so clearly black's open. Long story short, I end up sort of behind on a plan, but deciding to go UB and end up getting a mid-pack Zombie Apocalypse (why not?!).

I open a Bloodgift Demon in my first Innistrad pack and pick a Murder of Crows over an Endless Ranks of the Dead. Which is a trap card. Hilariously, I end up wheeling Endless Ranks of the Dead and playing it anyway. I end up aggressively grabbing every Zombie I can get, including a Ghoulraiser and a Ghoulcaller's Chant since I have some nice bombs. I also get a Geistcatcher's Rig, 2x Dead Weight, a Griptide and Silent Departure and some pretty solid two-drops.

I was incorrectly nervous about the deck, since I think UB is tier 2 and I'm pretty sure some Lingering Souls and Drogskol Captains were opened at the table. My plan is very, very grindy. But if the game goes long, I liked my chances. I probably underrated Havengul Runebinder when looking over my list, although I correctly passed on Makeshift Mauler twice for cheaper zombies that didn't eat dudes in the yard.

At any rate, I start out playing against UW Skies. But it looks like a few people sitting close to each other were all fighting over that so it wasn't the strongest build. I 2-0'd that. Next round, I played against another UW Skies with 2x Drogskol Captain but not many token makers. He also had a mill sub-theme going on. Apparently he did pretty well with that. Against me, he just fueled my Runebinders and found me value, so he ended up siding it out. 2-0'd that. I played the final round against the undefeated BW deck with Lingering Souls. He basically flooded out two games in a row and although he managed to kill my guys, I managed to keep bringing them back and I 2-0'd that.

I did not cast Zombie Apocalypse, although I did board it in once against Geist-Honored Monk. Endless Ranks of the Dead made a total of 4 Zombies in three rounds. That card is still awful, but the late plan in draft left me without anything to really play in that slot. I didn't want to run Spiteful Shadows, obviously.

Zombie tribal. Braiiiinnnnsssss.

[justindz]

"4-0" at FNM with BW Tokens

FNM tonight was Standard. AKA, "win packs to draft with" format. I played my BW tokens deck with random filler cards in the sideboard again. The main change I made this time was to run 2 Sorin, Lord of Innistrad instead of one and to run 2 Honor of the Pure instead of 2 Sword of War and Peace, which ended up in the sideboard.

Round 1 - Patrick w/ Mono-Blue Mill - on the draw

Next month, we have a rogue FNM where everyone has to play a brew. Patrick was getting a jump on R&D.

Game 1 - I'm on the play and bowl him over furiously with tokens and virtues, despite two Dungeon Geists.

Game 2 - Patrick has to mulligan. However, he hits land drops and I get on the bad end of a Jace and Wurmcoil with insufficient pressure. He Jaces me three times and then kills me with Increasing Confusion.

Game 3 - I come out swinging with tokens and Virtues and crush.

Round 2 - Tom w/ UW Delver - on the play

Game 1 - I keep a land with two land and plenty of action. Unfortunately, I miss 4 land drops in a row and scoop to Batterskull when I brick on the land to O-Ring it before he untaps. I wasn't dead and it was a bit premature, but I didn't want to go to time, considering this can be a drawn out match.

Game 2 - I do my tokens and Virtues thing. We each get down fairly low, but I Vault back up to 16 (see what I did there?) and win the game.

Game 3 - I start off with a mulligan but my hand is pretty strong. He gets down an early Geist and takes me down to 2 before I stabilize with tokens and Virtues. On a critical turn, I want him to tap out for Batterskull and pass, in case I draw a swingy card. I have a Revoke in hand. I tell him that a Batterskull will wreck me here. He plays it. I untap and Revoke. I feel bad, but we consult afterwards and he says that it was still the correct play either way. So I feel less bad. At any rate, he goes down to 1, but if he draws a Vapor Snag, I die. Luckily, I top deck a Mortarpod like a total sack and Germ him to death.

These games were all brutal and grindy, which is what I expected.

Round 3 - Ian w/ Freeeeeeets - on the draw

This is a dangerous match to play before the final round, since I am borrowing cards from Ian. However, he is a true champion and does not force-DQ me!

Game 1 - Ian has the nut draw into Elesh Norn and kills me before I find removal.

Game 2 - I have the nut draw with turn 1 Nihil Spellbomb, turn 2 Mortarpod to kill his Birds and win easily.

Game 3 - I don't have any graveyard hate, but I have a Mortarpod to kill his Bird and this slows him down long enough that we play a real game. I am able to get a Virtue down, which allows a single token to survive Elesh Norn. He plays Elesh Norn three times and I have Tragic Slip, Go for the Throat and finally an Oblivion Ring. He does not have any action after that and I take him out with tokens.

Round 4 - Mike w/ Wolf Run Naya - on the draw

We are the only 3-0s, so we ID and then play for fun. I hate being on the draw for this match. For the record.

Game 1 - He does the Wolf Run thing and obliterates me. I actually had action, but he had main deck O-Ring for my Hero of Bladehold. Duly noted. I actually could have O-Ringed his to get my Hero back, which may have made a difference. But we weren't sure after the fact. It was a punt either way.

Game 2 - He has a slow start with Nexus into Crag tapped and I pretty much get there with my tokens.

Game 3 - This is a pretty real match. I am mostly in the driver's seat, but take a hit when he O-Rings my Hero. Then I ring his ring. Then he rings it again and finally I ring his ring and get to start attacking. His two Huntmasters are no match for my Hero of Bladehold w/ Vault of the Archangel machine and I am able to kill him for exactsies post combat the next turn with 6 lands and a Mortarpod from 4 life.

3-0-1

I win some packs, which I am saving for the team backdraft in April.

Thoughts

Despite the lack of basic Islands, I continue to be impressed with the BW tokens deck. It has nut draws, is fairly consistent, can operate reasonably well on low mana and has a surprising amount of reach. The only changes I would make after this event would be to properly complete the sideboard. I just need to drop Timely Reinforcements in there, I think. Obviously.

I still refuse to play Champion of Parish. A non-flying, conditional 3/3 or 4/4 just doesn't seem exciting enough to me. I would probably try him out if I decide to give Boros Tokens a whirl. But I'm happy where I am so far.

[justindz]

Undefeated at FNM

Just got back from FNM where I went undefeated for "three" rounds and then drew in the finals. I played UB control and had about half the deck. My last round opponent was the gentlemen who was gracious enough to lend me the cards. We were both undefeated.

For the deck, I started from the list that David Shiels used in GP: Baltimore. I then sat down and made a few changes:

First off, take one Liliana out of the main and swap it to the sideboard for a second Nihil Spellbomb.

Actually, that was it. I agreed with everything else. I just really like an extra Spellbomb for the mirror, Solar Flare, Lingering Souls decks, Frites, blah blah. Good value against a ton of stuff.

So anyway, it went kind of like this:

Round 1, I get a bye. My second standard FNM since before New Phyrexia comes out and I don't even get to play one of the games! Horrible.

Round 2, I play against UG Self Mill. Both games I start with a Spellbomb in hand, and both games I draw into and play a Curse of Death's Hold on turn 5. In the first game, Curse was a four for one. This match felt like I was pre-boarded. Each time, I just killed with Consecrated Sphinx.

Round 3, I play against an Esper Unburial Rites "Solar Flare" deck. This match was epic. I managed to handle an early Wurmcoil Engine with two Go for the Throats staring at me from my hand and mocking me. The game was very tight and went for about 40 minutes before he conceded to save a few minutes. I had him to the "mill to death" stage. Post-board, he took a mulligan probably looking for a faster line of play. This game, he had to kill me. I sat back on answers and ended up sticking a Bloodline Keeper towards the end. We went to turns and with a Phantasmal Image I was almost able to kill him again with a flipped Bloodline Keeper but was a turn too slow.

Round 4, I mentioned above. ID against Frites, then win a long first game played for fun. Answered every Lingering Souls and Unburial Rites in the deck and then milled him out. Played a lot of Snapcasters into Elesh Norns just to Morbid up my Tragic Slips.

So I got a sweet Tectonic Edge promo and my packs had some decent (but not insane) stuff finally. I got all excited to trade up the rest of the deck, only to find out that all the cards I need are like $400 a piece. Darkslick Shores. Seriously?

Also, it is raining extremely hard here. I had to canoe across the parking lot.

[glimmerpost-blog]

Game day: 4-1 Hippo-Blade.

I was supposed to miss today's event as I was supposed to work, but due to some unforeseen events, I actually ended up getting to play, albeit I barely made it on time. The night started bad and progressively got good. Match 1 GWb Birthing Pod G1: I got straight wrecked by what was apparently the most aggro-y hand the dude had ever played.  Strangleroot Geist into Blade Splicer into Phantasmal Image Blade Splicer?  I pretty much got rolled up before I could even so much as play a Solemn, and a board wipe just wasn't in my opening hand. G2: This game actually played out a while.  I managed to board wipe him several times before he eventually managed to hard cast an Acidic Slime, killing off my only relevant threat (Glint Hawk Idol).  From this point it was kind of over, as he podded into a Sun Titan which recurred Phantasmal Image, which recurred another Phantasmal Image.  I topdecked a Slagstorm but obviously that was not the type of wipe that I needed. Sideboard strategy: -3 Origin Spellbomb, +3 Revoke Existence.  I was just not lucky enough to see those Revokes. Match 2 GWb Tokens G1: Ugh, this is a shop retard from another sister store across town.  This guy is one of those obnoxious morons who thinks he's really good at Magic because he's played at a few SCG events and never breached top 32.  He would also refer to almost every god damned spell as some type of image of himself.  "Gather the Staley," "Lingering Staley," "Doomed Staley," etc, and had proxied Human/Spirit tokens with pictures of himself on them.  Ughhhhhh.  Either way, I tuned him out and cleaned up G1 pretty easily.  He frontloaded his entire hand, got me to 5 life and started talking shit.  I resolved a Day, the following turn I resolved a Wurmcoil Engine, followed shortly by Sword of War and Peace followed by Sword of Feast and Famine.  Ended that game at 75 life.  After being mocked by quite a few people in the room for all of his shit talking, he shut up. G2: This game I opened a really grindy, board-wipey hand that had 1 Glint Hawk Idol, 1 Sword of Feast and Famine, 2 Slagstorms, 2 Mountains and 1 Clifftop Retreat.  This moron frontloaded his hand again, ate a Slagstorm and got his board wiped.  I topdecked a Wurmcoil which I stalled into.  I played Wurmcoil just in time for him to resolve Elspeth Tirel.  He protected her from Wurmcoil with Lingering Souls tokens long enough to use her -5 ability, destroying only my Wurmcoil and Sword.  (Lol?)  I drew Sword of Body and Mind and went to work on him with the Lifelink token.  He manages to stall me a little bit more with ANOTHER Lingering Souls, and eventually he has to O.Ring my sword.  At this point, I'd drawn Hippogryph and recurred Wurmcoil.  He started slow-playing to try and draw it out to time, but unfortunately for him I topdecked Devil's Play and domed him with it for 12. Next time, talk less and play better. Sideboard strategy: -3 Origin Spellbombs, +3 Nihil Spellbombs, -2 Obilivion Ring, +2 Elspeth Tirel.  My general idea behind Elspeth here was that I could use her as an additional way to gain some life, as well as probably stall him out for a turn or two while he tries to swing at her.  It wasn't like Oblivion Rings were useful here anyway.  I probably should have boarded Revoke Existence for Honor of the Pure, but I figured if it came down to it, I'd just have to ride out Slagstorms for those. Match 3 Mono White Humans G1: Yay it's our shop retard again!  Well, this match was unfortunately not interesting whatsoever.  I opened a hand with some land, a Day, Glint Hawk Idol and I believe an Origin Spellbomb.  He frontloads 2 Mirran Crusaders that eat a DoJ, he starts getting rage-y already.  Shortly thereafter he plays Fiend Hunter targetting a Solemn that I'd played.  (Yes, AGAIN.)  It eats a Slagstorm and gives me the last land I need to be set at 6.  I topdeck exactly what I would want to topdeck at 6 mana, and play big daddy Wurmcoil.  He ragescoops and hands me the 2-0, bitching about how he can't beat me and that the pairings are rigged.  Afterwards he drops and leaves, lulz. Match 4 Delver/Pike G1: Hey I'm playing Dave again!  We play out some pretty silly hands, mine is 3x Galv Blast, Origin Spellbomb, Glint Hawk Idol, Devil's Play, Mountain.  He plays Delver on the play, I fry Delver on the draw.  Landgo, I get Glint Hawk Idol Leak'd.  (I curse audibly.  :[ ) We both get stuck landgo'ing for a while.  Eventually I start drawing answers, so I try and bait out his countermagic with Timely, which surprisingly resolves and is followed by a Sword of War and Peace that pretty much neatly wraps the game up for me on a Soldier token. G2: I wish this game were more interesting, to be honest.  But it basically came down to him getting Kibler'd.  He kept a hand that must have only had the 1 Delver in it, because when I fried it on T1 he just goldfished for a while.  Eventually he resolves a Runechanter's Pike and Invisible Stalker, but I'd already drawn Nihil Spellbomb and was sitting on Metalcraft on board.  He played cautiously because I only had tokens on board and Nihil on the field.  I got him down to 12 via some Timely tokens and a stray Devil's Play, then 3x Galv Blasted him to death.  :[ Sideboard strategy: -3 Origin Spellbomb, +3 Nihil Spellbomb.  Anybody seeing a trend here?  This is why I am thinking about taking Origins out. Match 5 U/W Spirits/Control. G1&G2: Neither one of these games was particularly interesting.  I'd write more about them but I have to admit that I don't remember much beyond "Opening hand contains Slagstorm and Day each game, I board wipe enough to resolve Wurmcoil or Batterskull and win." Sideboard strategy: I didn't even sideboard, because during G1 I didn't even see enough of his deck to be sure that I was actually playing against Spirits.  I think he may have just been having bad luck, because his hands seemed to miss land drops more often than they ever should. So that's it.  Nothing too interesting tonight, sorry guys.  It was mostly uneventful, and the 4 packs bought me into a draft that we played later in the evening before going to Dave and Busters to help our friend Dalton break into his car after he managed to lock his keys in it.  Yep, he's a retard.