GP Charlotte 2016
The Weeks Before
Preparing for the End
I’d been trying to decide on what variant of Jeskai to play at the GP for a few weeks. I was pretty much set on having Kiki-Resto in the deck, until a certain newer card started to make waves online.
I was skeptical at first, but I’ll admit Nahiri seems like the real deal. As it turns out, tutoring for the best creature in the game and giving it haste isn’t half bad. Between speculation by Jeff Hoogland, Shaun McLaren’s streams, and testing with the Jeskai cabal (one member of which who was on Nahiri even before she started gaining popularity online), I was starting to get nervous. My combo can be easily interrupted by creature removal. Nahiri ticks up to 6 the first turn, can protect herself, and she can deal with a slew of cards that Jeskai usually struggles with. She’s a distraction when she needs to be, and can win the game quickly if left unanswered. I was at the very least intrigued.
The Open
I played in the SCG Open in Indianapolis the weekend before the GP. I wanted the practice and to see what the metagame looked like in this post-eldrazi world. I registered a familiar Kiki Resto build, and didn’t quite make day two due to a combination of bad matchups, some bad luck, and less than optimal play on my part.
Things I took away from this event:
A number of people seemed to be on Nahiri. At the very least, if they were playing Jeskai, they were playing Nahiri.
The players who weren’t on Nahiri decks were tuning their decks in preparation for the Harbinger.
My Tron matchup is still miserable. I lost to Tron round 8 with Stony Silence, Counterflux, and Crumble to Dust in my opening hand on the play because my opponent had natural Tron plus a tower, and Karn and Ulamog in hand. This led me to decide against playing Crumble in my board at the GP. Maybe this is wrong, but I just don’t think the card does enough in the matchup, and I’d even argue than Tron is better now than it was before Eye of Ugin was banned.
The next day, Peter Ingram won the Open with Nahiri. Any skepticism I had left was gone, as that finish proved that Nahiri was here to stay, whether I liked it or not. I’m always a skeptic though. I saw a lot of people playing her, and a lot of people not doing great. I don’t think you NEED to be playing her, but it’s undeniable that she’s a viable option. All of this reflection was well and good, but I still had to decide what I was playing at the GP, and fast.
GP Charlotte: Friday
My flight from Chicago landed early Friday morning in Charlotte. I met up with the guys I was staying with from back home in CT (Avery, Taylor, Pat, and Brendan), and we made our way to the hotel. Almost everyone I was with had byes, and because I hadn’t quite met the threshold this year, I was itching to get down to the tournament center and play in some GPTs while I had time. This went terribly, but I’m glad it did.
I had played at MTGCardMarket’s weekly modern the Wednesday prior, and decided to try out a Geist build. It went fine, and I enjoyed the more proactive nature of the deck. I started to think about how Geist must be great against Nahiri, and consequently started to get a little delusional. I had convinced myself that out of nowhere, this was what I should be playing the coming weekend. What I would come to accept later is: when it comes down to it, I’m not a Geist player. Every time I try to play that configuration I end up doing significantly worse than anything else. I don’t know what it is, but it’s just not in the cards for me. The problem was that I didn’t realize this until the day before the GP.
Trial #1: Bogles
As I was waiting for my trial to fire, I was joking with the guys about people always bring these super linear, glass cannon decks like Bogles to GPTs so they can spike them quick and dirty. Obviously that’s exactly what happened to me when I sat down my first match of the weekend.
Two games were over like that, my Geists just sat there and chumped the superiorly equipped hexproof dudes until I ran out of 2/2s to block with. There is close to 0% chance of me beating that deck if they don’t just lose to themselves.
Trial #2: Jund
I decided to chalk that one up to bad luck and give another trial a shot. Two byes are worth $15 right? Sure, if you win them. I sit down across from my opponent and assure myself that the Bogles player was a fluke. I’ll surely play a real game of magic here. I wasn’t totally wrong.
Joseph swiftly dismantled my hand and my Geists rotted away as Lilianas and Bobs took the game over. Game two was better, Ajani Vengeant and Thundermaw helped me take it, but game three left me feeling like a deck full of burn spells wasn’t where I wanted to be. I knew people were going to be playing Jund in the main event. I didn’t want to come in playing a deck that had a bad Jund matchup. I decided not to play in another event and continue hemorrhaging cash, and Avery offered to help me test as much as I wanted for the remainder of the night.
The Switch
What we did was a mistake. We didn’t realize this until later, but it’s helpful to acknowledge now. We went to check on our other friends who had just started playing a Modern Challenge. Avery and I decided it might be helpful to scout the challenge and see what people were playing, to get a cursory, if not wildly inaccurate, prediction of the metagame. Out of the maybe 100 players in the event, we found the following:
Jund - 10
Abzan Company - 8
Infect - 6
Kiki-Chord - 6
Tron - 6
Elves - 4
Affinity - 3
UW Control - 3
Zoo - 3
Jeksai Harbinger - 3
Eldrazi & Taxes - 3
Scapeshift - 3
Grixis - 2
And everything else had one player or didn’t seem relevant to record.
This data was obviously flawed for a number of reasons. We had a very small sample size, chances are most of these people didn’t have byes, etc. There was just no way this could accurately represent what the breakdown would be at the GP. Either way, I went down this list and asked myself “Do I want Geist in this matchup?” and the answer was a resounding no by the end. Now I had to decide to play a deck I’ve been playing for years, or the new deck that everyone would be expecting. In addition, playing Nahiri, while the shell seems similar, requires a different strategy, and without any practice I wasn’t so sure I would feel comfortable throwing it together last minute. I’m also fundamentally opposed to running Serum Visions in Jeskai decks in modern but that’s probably an argument for another time.
Maybe the decision didn’t matter as much as I thought at the time, but Avery and Taylor both suggested “playing what you know,” which is a common phrase you hear in reference to Modern. There’s some argument as to whether it’s as true as people say it is, but I’ve always thought that my knowledge of the deck and the format is the reason I enjoy piloting it. I sleeved it up, we talked about numbers, and tested a bunch of games against Abzan Company, a deck that I expected to see a fair amount of even though its showing wasn’t so stellar last weekend. The testing felt good and I started to feel better about tomorrow, as I decided to remain faithful to my favorite angel and goblin.
GP Charlotte: Saturday
The Deck
Creatures (14)
4 Snapcaster Mage
4 Wall of Omens
4 Restoration Angel
2 Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
Spells (21)
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Path to Exile
2 Lightning Helix
2 Electrolyze
1 Spell Snare
3 Mana Leak
2 Remand
1 Cryptic Command
1 Ajani Vengeant
1 Sphinx’s Revelation
Lands (25)
4 Celestial Colonnade
4 Scalding Tarn
3 Flooded Strand
1 Arid Mesa
3 Steam Vents
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Sacred Foundry
1 Sulfur Falls
1 Cascade Bluffs
2 Island
1 Mountain
1 Plains
1 Tectonic Edge
1 Desolate Lighthouse
Sideboard (15)
2 Stony Silence
1 Wear / Tear
1 Supreme Verdict
1 Wrath of God
1 Anger of the Gods
2 Counterflux
1 Dispel
1 Elspeth, Sun’s Champion
1 Vendilion Clique
1 Celestial Purge
2 Relic of Progenitus
1 Timely Reinforcements
Main Event: Day One
I got up early, showered, grabbed breakfast, and headed down to the tournament center.
Round One: Evan / Jund / 2-0
Game one was a grind. We both eventually got to top decking and eventually I ripped an Ajani and took the game over. Game two was equally grindy, and I ended up swinging with Colonnade for lethal while at one life.
Round Two: Vincent / Affinity / 2-1
The first in what I didn’t realize would be a slew of Affinity decks I would play this weekend. The takeaway from this is: don’t listen to what anyone says about Affinity, just play hate and prepare for it no matter what.
I managed the board game one and took him down with burn spells. Game two I lost to a misplay on my part around an Etched Champion. Game three I combo’d him out fairly early when he had tapped out.
Round Three: Ryan / BUG Tezzeret Control / 2-0
I had no clue what Ryan was playing. I saw blue and black lands as well as Inkmoth Nexus. Eventually he played a Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas which I dealt with quickly. He played Chalice of the Void on two which shut off a lot of the cards in my hand, but eventually I drew Resto and Kiki to end the game. Game two was a little easier because Ajani and burn spells helped me close the game out fast.
Round Four: Mason / Affinity / 2-0
Burn and Restos take game one and two.
Delay
I won’t go into any crazy detail about this as everyone knows what happened at this point. It was annoying, and to be honest I do think it affected my play. I was exhausted by the time we left and I noticed my sharpness going down after this two hour plus break. Also, I didn’t get paired down for any of the “random” rounds.
Round Five: Danh / Lantern / 2-0
Game one he had a slow start and I kind of just ran out my burn and creatures and made sure to keep up countermagic for his two Ensnaring Bridges in hand that I saw from Clique.
Game two was a little more ridiculous. I had worked through a Pithing Needle and Leyline of Sanctity early on, but eventually he developed his board to the point where I was under a lock, facing down two Ensnaring Bridges, Lantern, and one Codex Shredder. This wasn’t so bad though, because my board was Wall of Omens, Snapcaster Mage, Vendilion Clique, Restoration Angel, and Kiki-Jiki. I effectively had him in a soft lock on his draw step by going Kiki > Resto > blink Clique if he ever drew something I couldn’t deal with. Eventually he replayed Leyline so my plan became dig for my Cryptic Command so that I could bounce his Leyline and burn him out for the win, which eventually happened after a very long game.
Round Six: Aaron / Affinity / 2-1
Aaron said he’d been playing affinity for a long time and I could tell. He caught me off guard a bunch, by playing 3 basics, by playing Dispatch, but in games one and three the combo eventually got through.
Round Seven: Justin / Affinity / 0-2
Here’s where my exhaustion started catching up with me. Game one I have the combo in hand, but Justin has a Plating out and I need to win before it kills me. I play a Resto DURING combat and block an unequipped creature, so he switches the plating over to the creature I blocked. Totally unnecessary on my part and I recognize this, but I have another Resto in hand so I shake it off and just remind myself not to do that next time. Just play it on his end step and win the game. I pass turn, he goes to combat, and I literally make the exact same play and lose my second Restoration angel. Whoops. Game two he lands an early Champion and I have absolutely nothing.
Round Eight: Zach / Affinity / 2-0
Two games of me playing burn spells against x/1s and x/2s.
Round Nine: Stephen / RG Tron / 1-2
I dreaded this. Game one was grind but I lost to back to back big threats. Game two I actually took with Ajani. I kept it safe until I could ult. But game three I couldn’t bring anything together and just lost to Ulamog.
I felt really good about day one. My goal was to make day two, and without any byes I was pretty happy with myself for accomplishing that. We got some food late (we got out of the tournament center after midnight) and I went back to the hotel and crashed.
GP Charlotte: Sunday
Main Event: Day Two
We got crepes for breakfast, and I’d like to think those were what helped me through the rest of this event.
Round Ten: Ben / RG Tron / 2-0
Ben was playing a Tron build with Oath of Nissa and Nahiri, which actually might have been scarier than regular Tron for me. Thankfully I had a combo kill for him because he got to 48 life. Game two he landed a Crucible of Worlds but I had an Ajani to set him back to zero and a Resto and Colonnades to close the game out.
Round Eleven: Ross / Jeskai Nahiri / 2-0
I was worried about this matchup. I feel generally favored because Nahiri is sorcery speed and my deck mostly operates at instant speed. Boths games were grindy and came down to me burning and Colonnade’ing my way to victory.
Round Twelve: Jody / Jeskai Control / 1-1-1
This match really put me on tilt. I want to be unbiased in my retelling of what happened so I’m going to try. Game one he drew a ton of burn spells. I was stuck on lands and had three untapped lands and a fetch, and after his bolts and helices I was down to 4. I had to get the fourth land so I could start casting spells so I fetched on his end step and went down to three. He had two cards in hand, and in response to my fetch he played Snapcaster and targeted bolt in his yard, casting it on me. I cast Remand on the bolt. This is where things got messy.
I drew a card, and he brought the bolt back to his hand, so I immediately said “That doesn’t go back to your hand, it’s exiled” because that’s a common mistake I see people make and isn’t anything out of the ordinary, except he then slammed the bolt back down AND the Mana Leak in his hand and said “Mana Leak your Remand.” I said the Remand had already resolved and he can’t Leak it, but he said he never let Remand resolve. I said he did and when he brought it back to his hand and I told him he realized his mistake and wanted to take it back. He started to get super argumentative and claimed he NEVER brought the bolt back to his hand. I wasn’t going to argue so I called a Judge.
The Judge came over and after this guy kept talking over me I patiently waited and explained what happened from my perspective. The Judge ruled that the Remand had resolved and the bolt was exiled, and that my opponent wouldn’t have the opportunity to Mana Leak it now. My opponent appealed this ruling, so after about 10 minutes the Head Judge came over and asked us to explain what happened again. I again waited patiently to speak after my opponent furiously defended himself, claiming the Lightning Bolt never left the table. I told the Head Judge that this was, frankly, a blatant lie. The Head Judge then gave us his ruling, which was that based on the information he’s heard, he “has to assume my opponent knows the winning line of play” so he allowed him to Mana Leak my Remand. This was incredibly frustrating because I didn’t think that in Professional REL we’d be given any assumptions about our plays or mistakes. I tried to brush it off but honestly this was crushing at the time. I felt cheated.
I ended up winning game two and then game three we went to time after our 12 minute extension, which made that ruling feel even worse.
Round Thirteen: Phillip / Abzan Company / 2-0
I had removal and he had creatures. I think this is a good matchup generally. Especially considering we can beat their infinite life combo.
Round Fourteen: Anthony / Jeskai Nahiri / 1-1-1
We went to three games and I had the combo in hand if I had another turn in the last game. My opponent wanted me to concede and I requested the same of him, neither of us did. I really didn’t want to draw but I wasn’t going to take a loss that I felt wasn’t deserved. Of note from this game, he brought in Geist against me but I anticipated it and brought in an Anger because I had seen the Geist in game two with my Clique. These games are also way too grindy and I need to figure out a way to win faster.
Two draws pretty much locked me out of any top contention, but I thought my record was solid and kept playing to cash.
Round Fifteen: Andrew / Affinity / 2-1
Andrew was cool, and this last match was super refreshing compared to some of the others I had played in day two. He had a rough start game one and mulled fairly low, but he eventually landed an Etched Champion and I couldn’t close the game out. Game two I combo’d him out and game three I did the same after dodging a very close Blood Moon that would’ve locked me out had I not fetched for a Plains earlier on.
Final Record: 58th Place / 11-2-2 / 25-9-2
I guess the moral here IS "play what you know." That, or play what's good against seven rounds of Affinity.
Seriously though, overall I’m really satisfied with my performance at the GP. My goal was to make day two and I accomplished that plus some. I feel like I could’ve won one of the matches I lost had I played better, and I could’ve avoided the draws had I played differently. Either way, I’m happy with the deck, and I look forward to continue tweaking it and playing more and lerning from my mistakes. It’s funny because I was definitely feeling a little burnt out on it lately, but this finish completely restored my faith.
Thanks for reading if you got this far! Get in touch if you want to talk Jeskai!
@adinolfi on twitter or via email.
