The General Magic: The Gathering Thread

[WickedBoy6]

Well, there goes the Eldrazi EDH deck I wanted to build. All I have is Ulamog. I need everything else.

[phlip]

Well, this looks absolutely miserable/amazing... now to see if there's anyone around who I can con into giving it a go...

[Jenelmo]

i have played a variation on it with a 3 strikes and you are out rule to get the games longer a couple times before with just a stack of random cards but quickly found that it is way more fun if you create a "deck" and switched over to a quickly created "deck" and it seems like the article goes over alot of good things to have in your "deck"

[Utilitarian]

I'll file this under "ways to show people I know they don't understand the rules nearly as well as they think they do" right after "ways to learn that _I_ don't understand the rules nearly as well as I think I do"

[korvys]

philip: If you're going to PAXAus, I'll be happy to give it a go with you. I think I might have to make a stack myself.

[Duckay]

Oh, I know I don't understand nearly well enough to play properly. That said, if I see you guys at PAX Australia I'll give it a go with you.

In other news I don't think there's a more frustrating tournament result than 9th.

[chetoos]

I've been stuck with a thought of late, and I was wondering, what is the benefit of playing lands like Karoo? Like, the original ones, not the ravnica bounce duals. They just seem illogical to me.

[Kapol]

Chetoos, I think the idea is the fact that it's basically two mana for one card. Like, you could keep 1 plains and Karoo in a hand of 3-drops and be able to drop them. It's basically getting an extra land in the card. You're not (normally) getting ramp from it, but you're getting... card advantage in a way? That might not be the best way to put it though.

[korvys]

Yes, you're getting a card (a "free" land) at the cost of a mana on whatever turn you play it. You don't get an extra land in play, but you effectively get an extra land in hand.

If it said

Code: Select all

Comes into play tapped.
Can only be played if you have another tapped land.
When it comes into play, search you library for a land and put it in your hand.
T: Add U

it would basically be the same card.

[Phosphatide]

I only just now discovered this new line of Ultra Pro products. I know what I'm getting for my next big tournament.

http://www.ultrapro.com/advanced_search_result.php?keywords=doge&search_in_description=1&osCsid=aesqfhf5mr1jcprpcuv8spu8v5&x=0&y=0

[phlip]

philip: If you're going to PAXAus, I'll be happy to give it a go with you. I think I might have to make a stack myself.

I'm not going to PAX, but I will be going to the GP this weekend... hoping I bump into some number of you all there...

[korvys]

Not me, unfortunately. A fair number of regulars from my LGS will be.

That's near (by Australian standards) to Duckay and JackSlack, though. I wonder if they're going?

[Duckay]

Very little will keep me away from GP Sydney. JackSlack isn't going, though.

[phlip]

My GP Sydney tournament results, short version:

M15 Sealed GPT: 0-1 scrubouts
2HG M15 Sealed: 1-2
M15 Draft: 2-1, with a bye

Main Event M15 Sealed: 3-3 drop
M15 mini-masters: 2nd place out of 38 (4-1)

All in all, some good, some bad, but a lot of fun.

TLDR version - Click to Expand

Typing this from the hotel on my tablet... The note-taking app for some reason disables auto-correct, so I take no responsibility for any typos that slip through... [And then actually posted when I got home on Sunday, and had access to the Internet...]

So, Friday started with trying a GPT, partly for practise for the main event, partly because I wanted the playmat... ugly as sin though it is. I open what seems to be a really irritating pool... Ob Nixilis, Garruk and Spectra Ward with nearly zero white or black support. Its green was good and it had fixing, though, so I assume Garruk made the deck... I dunno, I didn't play whoever got it.

The deck I get passed is reasonable... no bombs, but the general power in the fillers is there. I scrub out in the first round, though, so I don't get to try it out much.

2HG Sealed is interesting, it's the first 2HG I've ever played. For the statistics, the Ajani came from the booster with Jace on the front, but the Jace came from the booster with Nissa on the front... I can't remember which ones had the Llanowar Wastes or the Shivan Reef.

As much as it would have been nice to have both walkers in the same deck, try to get that Ajani synergy going... it made more sense to have GW and UR, so I had Ajani (but never played it) and my partner had Jace (but only ever activated it once). We win the first round with nonstop aggression... my deck clogged up the ground, while my partner's took over the sky. Round 2, I keep a sketchy hand because it looks like my partner's hand can keep us going until I draw into gas... Instead I play turn-6 hardcast Triplicate Spirits into turn-7 hardcast Siege Wurm and at no point draw any other spells. Round 3 we seem to be getting there, but end up losing to nonstop bombs... Soul of New Phyrexia (plus bonus maindeck Negate for our Encrust) being the main offenders. Total haul for the event: my share of $45 in rares, and a booster each. Almost broke even on the entry fee.

The "Foiled Again" draft was interesting, the idea is that everyone gets a random lucky-dip from a box of old FNM promos and prerelease promos and such... and then another one per round win. Then a throw-in booster for 2-1 and a second booster for 3-0. I draft heavy black, figuring it's open after getting 3 relatively late Accursed Spirits... my secondary colour is either blue or red, and I'm not settled. Eventually settle on blue, without much to go on... but everything dries up in Pack 3 and I end up not making playables. I have to splash, and I go for some random green commons I had from late picks to make up the difference (two Shamen of Spring and an Invasive Species with no combos).

Round 1 I get justly crushed, round 2 my opponent gets mana screwed two games in a row, and round 3 my opponent doesn't show (since it's like 9PM at this point). My haul: a raredrafted foil Llanowar Wastes (picked before I realised I'd be splashing green, which was a nice happenstance), a promo Kitchen Finks and Tectonic Edge, plus an IOU on a third promo (the lucky dip ran out, and they had to start taking addresses instead). Plus a booster, which I haven't opened yet.

Main event... I open a pool that's pretty whatever, I don't think about it too much. Get passed a pool that looks awesome... Cone of Flame, Stoke the Flames, double Elvish Mystic, Hornet's Nest, Kird Chieftan, a bunch of other nice RG... And then the announcement: "Just verify the registration of this pool. These are NOT your cards" and I was sad.

Here is the pool I actually get... it looks like it has a sweet BR deck... Cone, Dust, triple Covenant, Nightfire... but I lay it out, and it turns out those colours have 10 creatures total, not all of them any good. Even with that much removal, that's pretty bad. So I try GW... Sunblade, quite a few weenies, Raise the Alarm... 20 playable cards. Ugh. End up taking the larger half of each deck and smushing them together, ending up with RG, solid but with no impressive points, splashing Nightfire.

First round, get crushed by Caustic Tar in both games... in particular, game 2, I've taken some early beats, and stabilised at 6 vs 25, with an active Nightfire that's wiped his board, and preventing him from playing most of his deck... when he rips the tar, and suddenly I have to deal 25 in a single turn. I could manage it in 2, but not in 1, so I lose... so hard that I end up in last place (out of over 800) and get a round 2 bye.

Round 3, I'm playing against someone where this is their first actual tournament... before this, they'd played kitchen-table with friends, but that's it. I try to be as nice as possible to the guy, but the game itself is not close. Lowlights include: we get randomly deckchecked before game 2, and while we wait he mentions that he couldn't find one of the cards on the registration form, and he thinks he might have only marked 39 cards... I guess not, though, because we got our decks back and played out as normal, but that was an awkward wait...

Round 4 I'm back to playing experienced players, and lose again... End up punting one game away: my 10 life to opponent's 6. I've got some large board that's all tapped from attacking, and an Inferno Fist. He attacks me with his team: a 2/2 and two 2/3s. I should let it happen, take 6, since the only thing he could have in his colours to make it lethal is Sanctified Charge, and I could Fist in response, and crack back for the win. Instead I Fist immediately, and my opponent Charges in response for the win.

It's at this point I'm realising at this point that despite being 2-2, my deck still hasn't won against an experienced opponent (not to say anything bad against my R3 opponent, he was a nice guy, just needs more time with the game)... which isn't promising.

Round 5 I manage to eke out a win, mostly due to some bad mana screw from my opponent... Game 3 is won by just putting Inferno Fist on Krenko's Enforcer and attacking with it 5 times. Opponent loses with 6 lands on the field and Garruk in hand, which I would have had no way of dealing with. He even cast Life's Legacy to draw 4 and didn't hit a land... He told me after that he considered cycling a Ranger's Guile to draw an extra card off the Legacy, but decided against it as he figured 4 should be enough... and drew no lands, and lost with a swamp on top of his deck.

Round 6 I punt again in game 3... I'm on 1, opp on 6, I have Enforcer, opp has Charging Rhino I've been chumping. I draw Inferno Fist, so try to go for the win... but opp has Aetherspouts. By habit, I automatically pop the Fist and burn his face... only to find, second main, that I'm one mana short to play a blocker for the Rhino... I have 4 mana left, and two 5-drop 4-power creatures in hand. If I'd realised in time, I could potentially have stabilised, replayed Enforcer, attacked with it enough... instead I was super DoB.

So I drop and sign up for the Mini-Masters Challenge... 38 players, 1 booster each, 3 lands of each colour, shuffle up and play. Single-elim, winners get an additional booster and build a 30-card deck from essentially an ever-growing sealed pool.

Game 1, my opponent gets turn 2 Sungrace Pegasus, turn 3 Ajani's Pridemate... an annoying enough combo in Draft, let alone pulling it from a single booster... but luckily I manage to Encrust the flier (itself no mean feat with only 3 islands in the deck), so that the kitty doesn't grow beyond 3/3, and manage to win with the blue Paragon, Nimbus and Military Intelligence. My first rare is Twingrove, which isn't amazing when there's only 3 forests in the deck, but he gets better as the matches go on.

Second round I get the bye again, much happier about it this time... and to my pool I add Urborg, for my collection, and Burning Anger, which would go nicely on a Venom Sliver which I also get.

Round 3 I win with said Venom Anger combo, and then win game 2 with Anger on Siege Wurm... Open Polymorphist's Jest.

Round 4, we're down to 5 players, which is awkward for single-elim, but the guy who gets the bye drops to leave with friends, so this becomes the semi-finals. I do some disgusting things... I draw a Lightning Strike, so I figure I'm good to attack... attack with Siege Wurm and a 5/5 Twingrove token into a board of 2/2s and 2/3s... trigger Military Intelligence, draw Polymorphist's Jest, think "OK then, that also works..." He makes some not-especially-profitable desparation-blocks, and the Jest is a 4-for-1 that wipes his board.

Into the finals... by this point the decks are looking pretty awesome... as 5-booster-sealed 30-card decks, they're better than most Sealed pools (also, being the ones that made it to the finals selects for a lot too...) and I get run over by a really fast deck after keeping some sketchy hands... I side out Military Intelligence for Titanic Growth, which is potentially a mistake, but I wasn't doing a lot of attacking that matchup... But he manages to assemble Rogue's Gloves on Scrapyard Mongrel, plus Pathmage and his own Military Intelligence... Drawing 3 cards a turn, anc hitting me for 8 in the meantime. Hilariously, I'm forced to crack Evolving Wilds for an Island, and immediately draw Burning Anger on the next turn... But it was always thus.

Here's what my final pool looked like... Aside from the rares and a couple of other key cards, I don't remember what came from which booster, so I can't recreate my earlier pools... I'm pretty sure this was my initial pack, though... maybe 1-2 cards different.

I don't think I'll go back tomorrow... A couple of the Sunday events look fun, the sort of thing I'd play if I were there anyway, but not enough that I'll actually go out there just for them. Instead I'll spend the day lazily making my way back home.

Other highlights... I ran in to a lot of LRR fans who recognised my Diagram playmat, and saw some other people repping the Phases shirt or I Think I'm Just Dead Here sleeves, or advising each other to just Jund 'em right in the face. I also ran into one opponent in the main event who was a subscriber in the stream chat... got to impress him by saying I was "the LRRbot guy". I also considered waiting for him to go into the tank for something, and tell him to "go left"... decided that would be a dick move and instead say it between games... he says that he probably would have flipped the table... Good times.

All in all, it was a lot of fun, and I'm looking forward to going again next year... luckily, looking by the dates, it should be with the 2015 fall set, not with the core set this time, so hopefully it'll be a more fun format... M15 sealed is really miserable. I know people always say that Sealed is "you open bombs or you lose", but I think that actually applies to this format... wrongwaygoback posted some stats on Twitter: of the 17 sealed GPT grinders on the Friday, 7 contained a Soul, 5 contained Triplicate Spirits... only 5 decks managed to win without one of those 2 things. And of the two decks that went undefeated Day 1, both contained Souls... one of them contained two Souls. I much prefer a format where if you open a pool that doesn't have any good bombs in it, you can still build a solid deck and win through good play... rather than just being all but dead already.

[korvys]

Well, as I said in the chat, I don't really agree about this being a bomb driven format (any more than sealed already is, that is), but wow, yeah, that pool is kinda garbage. I'd would have expected to see s

The only thing I can think of is pushing the black splash harder, to get covenant of blood but then you're losing the creatures to cast it, to get festergloom cause it wrecks triplicate spirits, and to get flesh to dust to kill souls. But you'd have terrible mana.

[Duckay]

I had a pretty poor GP experience. Ended up 6-3 in the main event and dropped from the Sunday Super Standard because I was just playing very poorly, making mistakes I shouldn't have made, because my head wasn't in the game.

The only game I felt frustrated over was round 4 of the main event, because I had mana problems both games. That said, I didn't have mana troubles the rest of the day so it wasn't too bad. I still complained about it to some friends, only to have one of them (who had been a few seats down from me) tell me to cheer up because I got beaten by a pro.

...yep. Didn't realise it at all. Kinda glad I found out after and not before.

[korvys]

Do you know who it was?

[Duckay]

Yes, although don't get too excited -- it was not a big name pro. It was an Australian, Matt Anderson. I'd never met him before, much less played him but apparently my friend's "good luck" before the game was intended with a "better you than me" attached.

If you want a bigger name pro story, Patrick Sullivan bummed a cigarette off my friend while we were commiserating after a round. So that was fun. (Actually he's a really nice guy.)

[korvys]

Most real pros (as opposed to be the wannabe pros) are pretty nice, or so I've heard. For some reason a lot of people seem to think being competitive means being a dick. Hence the people I'm sure we've all met at our LGSs.

[Duckay]

One of my three LGSes has a bunch of people like that, the other has none, and the third is a very different environment. That's why I like to play at the second store most of all, but perhaps I am that person there and everyone's too polite to tell me so.

I've certainly got no complaints about any pros I have met (all... both of them, if you're counting Anderson as a "real pro" -- what's your criteria to separate that from wannabe?), except insofar as that it gave me the opening to make jokes about my friend being so starstruck by Sullivan that he gave him a smoke even though he only had a couple left.

[korvys]

I just mean those local guys who might have won a GP or something, and now act like they're better than everyone. Everything I've heard about the Pro Tour level players, is that they are humble.

[Psithief]

Sooo…

they're changing Standard.

I don't even play Standard. Bye bye Core sets.

[Volafortis]

Well, I've played against Brad Nelson (he actually lives only an hour or so away from where I do, and he goes to most major events at Paradox in Fargo, which I often do, as well)

He's an alright guy, and he's nice online, but he's kind of condescending and certainly has an air of superiority about him at times. I've personally never had any issues: We played a great match during Scars/Innistrad standard, and my experience against him was overall great, but a few of my friends from the game store I was going to at the time have had less positive experiences with him.

Beyond that, I've also played against a major Pro Player from Spain (can't remember his name) during the free mini-masters event at GP Minneapolis, and he was super nice.

I think that the "Pros are dicks" stereotype comes from people who know them from before they went Pro.

[Duckay]

Well, I mean there's a couple of things that are potentially at play here. On the one hand, competitive players can give off a standoffish vibe if they'd rather concentrate than make pleasant small talk, which can be read as rudeness. On the other hand, even if you're a very skilled player it's wrong to deliberately treat others in a condescending way, and middle players easily have a more skewed view of their skills than pros. Then again, I've heard that a lot of pros can lose sight of what's "obvious" to them compared to typical FNM players and that can be read as condescending when maybe it's not intended that way.

The biggest "then again" though is kin of personal. There's a group of players at the other local store who were very quick to tell me that it was just luck that got me my tournament wins and places so you better damn well believe that if I won a GP I would feel as though I had earned the right to tell them that no, it isn't just luck, I am good at this game. But then, I'm an asshole.

[korvys]

Yeah, but there's a difference between people who think they are better at magic than you, and people who are better at magic than you, and think that makes them better than you.