The Topdeck

I play Magic: The Gathering. I'm going to try and take a run at playing it competitively. I'm not sure how that's going to go.

[thetopdeck]

I’m on MTGO.

I started playing online about a month ago.  I was jamming Bant Marvel until the ban.  After it, I tried R/G Pummeler and Temur Aggro, both of which I own in paper.  I’m using the rental service from Mana Traders online and it’s worked out pretty great.  I’ll go a little more into detail about it in a later post, but my account name is josephgutierrez if you’re interested in trying to play some magic.

[thetopdeck]

Metamorphosis 2.0

Changes are coming the Magic's block structure as the game continues to evolve over time.

Overall, I’m pretty happy with the changes.  I’m glad to see the return of the “core” sets.

[thetopdeck]

I ended up grabbing the last few pieces I needed to complete this deck last week.  After goldfishing some at home, I decided to just jam it at the weekly Legacy tournament at my LGS.  This is the list that I settled on.  There were a few things I was going back and forth on.  I’m still not really sure on the snow-covered basics and the Into the North package, but it worked out okay.  Expedition Map just might be better though.  I’m also still not sure on the split between Duress and Inquisition of Kozilek.  Sideboard looks okay.  Surgical Extraction might be better than the Faerie, but it does get around Chancellor of the Annex.  I think there was a PPTQ at another local shop, so there were only 8 people that showed up.  So we had three rounds, then cut to a playoff between the top 4.

Round 1 - Infect

A turn one Thoughtseize showed that my opponent was on Legacy Infect.  It was my first time playing against it, but I know how fast the deck can be, so I was a little nervous.  I took his only pump spell, leaving him with two creatures in hand.  He spends the next two turns playing his dudes, but I play Hexmage on my turn two and Dark Depths the next turn, for which he has no answer.  I brought in 3 Toxic Deluge and 3 Abrupt Decay, taking out 3 Not of This World and 3 Pithing Needle.  Game 2, he Wastelands my Bayou and has an Inkmoth Nexus so I started to regret taking out Pithing Needle, but oh well.  Game 3 I just decide to run the same 60 back.  It ends with a necessary Crop Rotation getting countered and he is able to get there pretty quickly with a Become Immense that I can’t do anything about.  Not a promising start with the deck, but I wasn’t too discouraged.

Round 2 - Mono-blue Delver (I think)

I had no idea what he was on for the longest time.  He didn’t land any creatures, but just countered all the land tutors I was trying to play.  I didn’t draw into any discard, but naturally hit Thespian’s Stage and Dark Depths by the time he puts down a True-Name Nemesis after we take a few turns doing nothing.  After getting down a Marit Lage, I had a Not of This World for an Echoing Truth.  He counters that but I have a Crop Rotation to fetch up a Sejiri Steppe to win.  I can’t remember much about game 2, but my life total looks like I Thoughtseized him twice and then went on to win without him touching my life total.

Round 3 - B/R/g Reanimator

I win this match in 2 games, because he has to aggressively mulligan both games.  In both games, I’m able to strip away the reanimate spells before he gets a chance to cast them.  That’s just how B/R Reanimator goes sometimes, I guess.

Top 4

Two guys wanted to play it out and I had the time, so we did.  I ended up being paired against the guy on Elves.  Game 1 he was on the play, but had a slow start.  He ends up drawing a few more cards, but isn’t able to put enough power on the board before I find a Hexmage for my Dark Depths.  I brought in 2 Abrupt Decay and 3 Toxic Deluge, taking out 3 Not of This World and a Duress.  I made a play mistake here, naming Heritage Druid on a Pithing Needle because I forgot that it’s a mana ability.  It’s bad since I should have just named Wirewood Symbiote or a Quirion Ranger which he goes on to play in the following turns.  He does his elf stuff and gets out a Craterhoof Behemoth for the win.  I don’t make the same mistake in game 3.  I don’t have the combo in my starting seven, but have just enough to slow him down.  I strip a Heritage Druid from his hand and then play a Pithing Needle on the Wirewood Symbiote.  I keep him off enough mana to cast the Craterhoof in hand and draw a timely discard spell to take the Abrupt Decay from his hand and go for Marit Lage on the following turn.  All these games were pretty intense and seemed like they took forever, but my opponent pointed out that each of the games were less than 4 turns, reminding me that Legacy is an interesting format.

For the final, I’m up against the Infect player I lost to in game 1, but he’s nice enough to split, so I get to go home with some new cards I got with the store credit and a slight feeling of satisfaction.  Overall, I like the deck.  I think that my sideboard was alright for the decks I saw, but I’ll have to re-evaluate where I’m at with the deck after more testing.

[thetopdeck]

This was my first ever legacy event.  I guess it was also my first team event too.  Here’s the link for my decklist.  I run a white splash for wear//tear in the sideboard.  I think more people run Tidespout Tyrant main, but I prefer Iona, Shield of Emeria.  I also run Stronghold Gambit in the side as a way to get a fatty on the battlefield without it touching the graveyard.  Anyway, here’s how it went.

Round 1 - BUG Delver

There wasn’t much to it this round.  I go to 5 cards while on the play in the first game, but never see a reanimate spell.  He plays DRS turn 1 and another on turn 2 and that’s all she wrote.  Game 2 didn’t go much better.  I keep a six I like, but have no protection or disruption.  I go for it anyway, but can’t fight through the counter magic.  I try to cast two reanimation spells a few turns later in a single turn, but he’s got the graveyard hate.  A rough way to start the tournament, but I wasn’t too worried.

Round 2 - Storm

Like me, he was new to Legacy.  I’m on the play game 1, again go to 5 and play a Thoughtseize on turn 1.  From his hand, I know what he’s on, but I just don’t have enough to deal with it.  His Ad Nauseum ends up not being enough to get there, but I don’t draw any action.  He manages to get there the next turn.  I brought in the 3 Stronghold Gambits, taking out a Reanimate Dead and 2 Unmask.  In game 2, I have a quick lock on the board state, bringing out Griselbrand on turn 1 and then going to 5 and getting a Sire of Insanity in play.  Game 3 ends in the middle of it since my teammates won theirs, but we play it out anyway.  Stronghold Gambit to put an Iona in play on turn 2 is all I needed though.

Round 3 - R/B/g Reanimator

In game 1, I’m on the play and start by showing him a Chancellor and he laughs and tells his teammates he’s playing the mirror.  I play a Faithless Looting binning the Chancellor and a Grisielbrand.  He plays a Lotus Petal into the Chancellor’s effect and then plays a Thoughtseize, seeing double Exhume in my hand.  I bring back the Griselbrand and bring myself down to 3, but am able to put an Iona into play naming black and lock him out of the game.  I brought in the 3 Faerie Macabre, shaving on Griselbrands and another Reanimation target, thinking I’ll be able to reanimate his creatures if I get the chance.  He leads with a Thoughtseize, taking my only renanimation spell, but I do the same thing on my turn.  It goes on for a few turns with each of us making land drops.  It eventually gets down to a turn where I flashback a Faithless Looting.  This apparently reminds him of his own Faithless Looting, which he flashbacks on his turn.  This turns out to be a misplay since he would have been able to Dark Ritual and cast the Griselbrand from hand.  On my turn, I Thoughtseize his Griselbrand into his yard, then reanimate it.  Since it’s his only creature in the yard, I cast Exhume bringing out a Chancellor and that quickly closes the game.

Round 4 - Death and Taxes

In game 1, I have a turn 2 Griselbrand and go down to 5, activating Griselbrand twice looking for a way to get something else on the battlefield.  I don’t find it and he casts Swords to Plowshares the next turn.  I manage to get a Sire of Insanity out the next turn, but by then, it’s too late because he has Mother of Runes out and too many creatures to stop.  In game 2, he puts a Karakas down on his turn 1, making the Griselbrand in my graveyard look terrible.  He then vials in a Containment Priest and that’s all she wrote.

Round 5 - Omni Sneak & Show

I’m on the play and show him a Chancellor.  He knows what’s up.  After a Faithless Looting, Chancellor is the only thing in my yard.  He ends up with a lot of counterspells in his hand and is able to keep me from getting the Chancellor back on the battlefield.  I finally land a Reanimate Dead on it.  A Thoughtseize shows me that my Chancellor is locking him out of casting the 2 Sneak Attacks in his hand.  He can’t find it and we go to game 2.  I bring in the Strong Hold Gambits here and a Wear // Tear.  My hand lets me put Sire of Insanity in on my second turn and that’s all I needed.

Round 6 - Burn

This match was pretty quick.  He’s on the play and starts with a turn 1 Goblin Guide.  This nets me a swamp.  I start with Dark Ritual into Entomb, grabbing Iona.  Cast Exhume and naming red slams the door shut.  In Game 2, I power out a Griselbrand turn 2, but don’t activate.  After he passes it back to me, I attack with Griselbrand, draw 7, and find the cards to bring Iona out.  I end up 4-2, but the team took the third loss in this round, so we call it a day and head back to the hotel room.

Overall, I was pretty pleased with my results.  The next morning, I ran the same list again for the Legacy Challenge and proceed to drop the first three rounds.  Not as great as the day before, but it happens I guess.  I think that the deck was a good start into the format and since the combo is so straightforward, I felt it was a good choice for the tournament since it was so linear.  Variance was pretty cruel on Sunday, but I don’t regret my decision.  It’s just part of playing the combo like that.  

I don’t know when the next chance is for me to play Legacy at a large event is, but one of the shops near me is getting Legacy to fire every weekend.  If I were to play this list tomorrow, I’d probably opt for a green splash over the white.  I think Abrupt Decay is where I want to be at right now, but I think I’ll also be trying to jam some other decks I was able to trade into.  

I’m going to try and keep doing these tournament reports in different formats.  I have some time over the next few weeks, so hopefully I get a chance to jam a few games.

[thetopdeck]

I’m playing MTG again.

I’m finally done with grad school, so now I can get back to the more important things in life, like Magic the Gathering.  I bought back into standard, but also into legacy.  I’m also considering streaming MTGO, but I’ll have to see what some other commitments look like.  It’s good to be slinging some cardboard again.

[thetopdeck]

I’ve gotten into competitive EDH.

I made time to join a competitive EDH league at my LGS.  It’s been fun.  I bought into Jarad a while back just to have an EDH deck to mess around with.  Jarad is fun and I’ll still probably end up playing that deck in a few weeks, but I made the investment into a Karador/Boonweaver Combo deck similar to this list.  I probably won’t be making the investment into the duals because I’m a dirt poor grad student, but maybe one day.  I’m also not sure if I like the deck well enough to go that hard into it.  I also have the skeleton of a Food Chain Tazri list.  I’d probably run that tonight but I’m too lazy to throw it together.

As a side note, I’ll be graduating in May.  I’m planning on really getting back into Magic.  I don’t have a competitive standard deck currently, but will be looking into getting one with the release of Amonkhet.

[thetopdeck]

Grixis Delver by ErGeco deck list with prices for Magic the Gathering (MTG) and Magic the Gathering Online (MTGO).

What I’m going to be running tonight for Modern.  I’m thinking about moving over to the new Grixis tech that runs Death’s Shadow, but it’s going to be this for now.

[mtggoldfish]

Six New Magic Products

New sets Kaladesh and Aether Revolt, new Planeswalker Deck product, Commander 2016, Planechase Anthology and a new Duel Deck!

[thetopdeck]

I'm stoked.

[thetopdeck]

I’m in a slump.

Losing makes me feel like I’ve wasted some of my life and I need to reevaluate my life choices.  I also can’t figure out what deck to play, so it is like I’m having some sort of identity crisis.  Terrible.

[thetopdeck]

The 0-2 feels

So my one of my Magic goals for the year was to attend at least one competitive REL event a month.  January went by pretty quickly, but I was able to squeeze in going to a standard PPTQ last weekend.  Unfortunately, I went 0-2 in my first competitive event in the year.  I ended up playing the Naya list I was on, but got beat out by Mono-green Stompy and a Temur Black list.  Oh well.  I’ll probably be moving away from Naya and back to Atarka Red for now.  February is going to be focused on Modern though, with the SCG Regionals this weekend and SCG Louisville in a few weeks.  I’m threw together a Naya Burn list which I’m going to take to FNM tomorrow night to get in a few reps and try out some of the changes I made before Saturday.

[thetopdeck]

Naya Prowess

G/R Landfall was a really fun deck to play.  I’ve had a 64% win rate with it, which doesn’t sound spectacular, but it was good enough to prize quite a few nights.  With OGW, I just feel that the new removal shuts the G/R Landfall deck down.  Some form of Atarka Red probably deserves a spot in the meta, but I wanted to see what else I could brew.

I was drawn to Naya but I felt that it was just lacking a card or two to get there.   This Naya Pumps list was something I considered during the BFZ standard, but I never got around to throwing it together.  I took the list and tried to see where it could go.  Expedite seemed like an auto-include, but I wasn’t sure what else.  Eventually, I settled on this list:

Lands - 24

4 Plains

2 Mountain

2 Forest

4 Battlefield Forge

4 Wooded Foothills

4 Windswept Heath

2 Cinder Glade

1 Canopy Vista

Creatures - 13

4 Monastery Swiftspear

4 Seeker of the Way

4 Abbot of Keral Keep

1 Den Protector

Instants/Sorceries - 20

4 Titan’s Strength

3 Expedite

4 Defiant Strike

3 Temur Batlerage

3 Dromoka’s Command

3 Become Immense

Planeswalkers - 3

3 Gideon, Ally of Zendikar

Sideboard

1 Den Protector

3 Roast

3 Valorous Stance

2 Fiery Impulse

3 Wild Slash

3 Hallowed Moonlight

I haven’t been extensively testing, but I’ll be using this shell if this sort of deck has a spot going forward.  I’m unsure on the 24th land.  I think that consistently hitting land drops ensures that I can reliably cast Gideon or that I’m able to cast two spells a turn.  Gideon is just such a great card in this shell.  He immediately adds to the board, triggers prowess, and dodges sorcery speed removal.  He also works well with Temur Battle Rage and with Dromoka’s Command.

There are a few things I’m unsure about.  The board probably needs a lot of work.  I’m not sure if I need to dedicate the 3 Hallowed Moonlight for the Rally match-up.  I probably need to test against it a bit, but the potential for it to be a blow-out means I’m going to keep it there for now.  I’m also not sure on the split 4/3 split on Defiant Strike and Expedite.  If I decided to cut another land, then the fourth expedite is probably what gets added, but I’m not sure.  I may also decide to cut down to 2 Become Immense.  It has been more difficult to cast without having 12 fetches, but I’ll have to see.

There are also other cards I need to consider.  Feat of Resistance seems like a decent card.  I originally had Atarka’s Command, which may deserve a spot, but I feel that I don’t go wide enough to fully utilize it.  Tom Ross posted a Naya list which might be the way to go.  His list ran Needle Spires and Monastery Mentor, which may be the right call.  I’m not entirely sold on it though.

I guess I’ll just have to see how the meta sort of pans out this weekend at #SCGATL.  There’s a PPTQ I’ll be attending next week, so I want to see how this pans out.  I also like the U/R Prowess lists that others have been posting.  If neither pan out, I’m not sure what I’ll be going to do.

[thetopdeck]

I had U/R Twin built but never got a chance to play it :(

[thetopdeck]

I didn't see that one coming.

[thetopdeck]

My Magic goals for 2016

Magic-wise, I didn’t accomplish much in 2015.  Starting grad school and changing jobs just didn’t leave much time for anything else, but I hope that changes in 2016.  Here are my goals for this year:

Play modern.  I did manage to buy into modern by the end of 2015.  I have all of Naya Burn, most of U/R Twin, and a UWr Kiki-Control deck I’m close to finishing.  I’ll probably be jamming Burn for the next couple of months just to get started.

Play in at least 12 competitive REL events.  Hopefully I’ll be able to attend a lot more, but if I can average one a month I’ll be satisfied.  For January, I’ll be attending my the PPTQ at my local game shop.  Unfortunately it’s the week that Oath of the Gatewatch releases.  In Feburary, I’ll be going to the SCG Southern Regional.  I just signed up for it yesterday, so I’m hoping I was able to sign up early enough to get the playmat.

Spend less money on Magic.  It’s not that I’m really opposed to spending money on Magic cards, but I do make a lot of dumb purchases and still have the habit of taking my prizes in packs rather than store credit.

Get into EDH.  I don’t know why it took me so long to get one, but I bought the 2015 Meren pre-con.  I like what it does so far and it’s been fun to play with.  I’m not sure how deep I want to go in on the deck, but I’ll see how it goes.

Blog more.  I haven’t been posting regularly, but I hope to change it this year.  I’ll probably be doing a weekly or bi-weekly wrap up of how my tournaments have gone.  I also want to start a “Cards I Bought This Week” column where I just post what I bought and my reasons for buying them.  I also probably should update the blog’s actual layout, but one step at a time.

I’m hoping for some good results this year.  There are a lot of different things I still need to learn about the game, but it’s been a good start so far and I’m hoping for some luck to come my way.

[thetopdeck]

Where I’m at with R/G Landfall

So it’s been about a month since I started grinding with this deck and I’m siting at a 65% win-rate.  I struggled a little early on just getting back into the game and trying to navigate the meta, but I think that I’ve just started to hit my stride. 

I’ve been playing with the same 60 since I picked up Magic again last month.  It’s Kirkwood’s list from GP Indy card for card.  The only real changes I’ve made have been to the sideboard.  I’m still not entirely sold on Yasova Dragonclaw and Sarkhan, Dragonspeaker.  I’ve removed both of them in favor of more Wild Slash and Rending Volley.  I’ve tried Act of Treason too, but I’m not too sure about that either.

Jacob Wilson’s list from the SCG Players’ Championship is pretty interesting.  I like the 23 lands mainboard.  24 lands always did seem like a bit much, even with landfall being so important.  I’m not entirely sold on either of the phoenixes, but Hooting Mandrills probably deserves a spot in the sideboard.  I’ll test a bit for now and see how it goes form here.

[thetopdeck]

I’m playing again and I’m on R/G Landfall.

It’s been a while, but I finally made time to start playing some Magic.  I bought into standard this past week and made the decision to go with R/G Landfall.  I saw it on stream and liked how it played.  I feel that it’s a little similar to how U/W Heroic played.  It also makes sense because I still have the option of going wider with a more regular Atarka Red strategy.  Anyway, here’s the list:

Lands

5 Mountain

4 Forest

2 Cinder Glade

4 Bloodstained Mire

4 Windswept Heath

4 Wooded Foothills

1 Evolving Wilds

Creatures

4 Monastery Swiftspear

4 Scythe Leopard

1 Zurgo Bellstriker

3 Snapping Gnarlid

4 Abbot of Keral Keep

4 Den Protector

Sorceries/Instants

4 Titan's Strength

4 Temur Battlerage

4 Atarka's Command

4 Become Immense

Sideboard

3 Wild Slash

3 Rending Volley

2 Roast

3 Arc Lightning

2 Outpost Siege

2 Sarkhan, Dragonspeaker

In FNM-level events so far, I’m 5-4.  A few of the games I’ve lost so far are just because I don’t know what I’m playing against and the other ones are just me trying to figure out the deck.  I’m still not entirely sure what hands I’m supposed to keep or ship, but that comes with practice.  I’m going to to play a few more times later this week, so I’ll let you all know how it’s going.

[thetopdeck]

I haven’t been playing :(

I haven’t had the time or money to invest in Magic the past few months.  Life’s been just hectic, but it’s been good.  I spent my time trying to get into grad school and doing stuff for work.  It’s paid off though, since I start grad school next month and a new job, so life’s good.  I might try to take Heartstone a little more seriously since it’s less of a commitment in both time and money.  I’ll see how it goes though.