My Regionals

Yesterday was Regionals, and this is the deck that I've been tuning:

4 Birds of Paradise
4 Noble Hierarch
4 Qasali Pridemage
4 Gaddock Teeg
4 Woolly Thoctar
4 Dauntless Escort
2 Kitchen Finks
4 Wilt-Leaf Liege

4 Path to Exile
4 Naya Charm

4 Forest
2 Plains
1 Mountain
2 Treetop Village
2 Ancient Ziggurat
2 Wooded Bastion
2 Karplusan Forest
4 Brushland
3 Fire-Lit Thicket

Sideboard:
3 Guttural Response
3 Windborn Muse
3 Cloudthresher
2 Behemoth Sledge
2 Kitchen Finks
2 Pollen Lullaby

This originally started as an idea of how to use Bloodbraid Elf, but he's not that good unless you can hit for 3 right away and not get chumped by a stupid Spectral Procession token, or worse, trade with a buffed Spectral Procession token.

I modeled it off of the Dark Bant deck, playing Woolly Thoctar instead of Rhox War Monk and Doran. A lot of decks can't deal with a Woolly Thoctar on Turn 2. I also chose to run some of the new GW cards like Qasali Pridemage and Dauntless Escort, and Gaddock Teeg (which shuts off Spectral Procession and Ajani Goldmane among others), and then obviously ran Wilt-Leaf Liege, which is insane.

Naya Charm ended winning so many games against BW Tokens that I ran the full set. Possibly this can go down to 3, as starting with two in hand isn't that great. I also ran 4 Gaddock Teeg in the main because it shuts off Spectral Procession and Ajani Goldmane, and gives you game against Five-Color Control.

I thought a lot about the mana base, trying to figure out how best to hit Woolly Thoctar mana on turn 2 and 3, and how to hit Naya Charm mana by turn 3. Because of Naya Charm, I'm not running the full set of Ancient Ziggurats. Plus, Ziggurat is pretty awkward with the Shadowmoor lands like Wooded Bastion.

The sideboard was a little bit thrown together, and there are changes I'd definitely make. Behemoth Sledge I actually didn't like in the maindeck because it's slow and it's really bad with Ancient Ziggurat when I need to play a threat. I bring it in against Red decks. The 3rd and 4th Kitchen Finks were also kind of just a throw-in, so I'm looking to put something actually good in.

I was hoping to play a lot of Tokens and Red decks, as I thought that's what the metagame was going to be largely comprised of. What ended up showing up was a more spread field, including various Jund flavors, Doran, Five-Color Control, and Faeries. Here was my day:

Round 1 (W) Five-Color Control - Game 1 I hit turn 1 Woolly Thoctar and have double Path. Game 2 he hits Hallowed Burial and takes control. Game 3 I stick Gaddock Teeg with Dauntless Escort backup and he can't do anything.
Round 2 (W) BW Tokens - Two absolute blowout games.

At this point we took a lunch break, and I was feeling pretty confident about the deck since things were going according to plan.

Round 3 (L) BG Rock - Game 1 I get eaten by two Cloudthreshers, I take Game 2 on the back of Naya Charm, and Game 3 I cannot deal with Garruk + double Chameleon Colossus.

After this round, they announce that there will be a delay, as the computer running the tournament ran out of batteries and corrupted the back-up file, and they had to manually reconstruct the tournament from entering the players in to manually pairing and entering three rounds of swiss. James Lee is a good man, and in that two hours we did a Cube draft (outside on the beautiful lawn on a beautiful Seattle day!). Someone needs to teach me how to Cube... I thought I would get out of the funk of losing my first two in a row in what seems like my past five premier-level tournaments.

Round 4 (L) Doran - I found out that Doran > Woolly Thoctar... also similar problems with Chameleon Colossus as the last round. So much for breaking the funk...

Round 5 (L) Five-Color Control - I messed up Game 1 not thinking about getting blown out by Volcanic Fallout (it ended up being a Pyroclasm, a miser's Pyroclasm at that), and throughout the match I kept attacking into Runed Halos for no reason... Joe let me off the hook a few times for being really freaking retarded, and I did hear about it at dinner.
Round 6 (W) - Jund Rock
Round 7 (W) - BW Kitkin - This plays similar to BW Tokens except they have one-drops and Wizened Cenn, so you can get blown out if you don't hit one of your three-drops very early on.
Round 8 (L) - Faeries - I mulled to 4 in Game 1 and still didn't play that well, walking into a Broken Ambitions on the threat that I drew. Game 2 I may have been tilting and kept 4 lands, a Treetop, and 2 Noble Hierarchs and don't draw much gas for the entire game. I'm not sure if this is a poor matchup or not, but I don't want to dedicate too many board slots for it.

So most of the matches I lost I can pin to not playing very well, which is good for my deck since I like it a lot, but bad for me since it means I suck. I would definitely rather play this deck for the Grand Prix than BW Tokens.

The mana's definitely a little weird and I had to pitch a lot of hands because of bad mana. If I add more painlands, however, I take a LOT of pain because of my color-intensive spells like Wilt-Leaf Liege, Naya Charm, and Woolly Thoctar.

While I'm very good against token creature decks that play a lot of dudes, I wasn't very successful against decks that play fat like Doran, Chameleon Colossus, and Cloudthresher. Unfortunately, my colors don't let me play a lot of great removal like Terror, but I do have Condemn, which is very efficient. I'd probably replace two Kitchen Finks in the board for 2 Condemns, just as Path to Exile #5 and #6.

Guttural Response could also become Vexing Shusher or Eyes of the Wizent, but with Guttural Response being just fine and Sanity Grinding lurking, that change probably won't happen. All the other cards in the sideboard are just fine. Pollen Lullaby had to be my favorite card of the day, almost more than Naya Charm.

I'll be running this deck next weekend at First Pick's cash tournament. I would recommend trying the deck against the field, there's nothing like a turn two Woolly Thoctar or blowing people out with a Cryptic Command-like tap-your-team effect from a green deck.

GPT Seattle at Games & Gizmos - Finals

Finals: Martin Goldman-Kirst (Five-Color Control) vs. Michael Dipetrillo (Five-Color Control)

Michael led off the finals of the Grand Prix Trial with a Vivid Creek, as did Martin, and they began the classical Control-on-Control mirror match by playing lands and passing.

Eventually, Martin played an Esper Charm on his end step, and then had to pitch a Wall of Reverence at end step, which Michael sarcastically dubbed “Wall of Relevance”. After Michael evoked a Mulldrifter on his own turn, Martin played an Ajani Vengeant and started powering him up and stunting Michael’s mana.

With Ajani Vengeant at 6, Michael evoked another Mulldrifter and played a land and pitched Plumeveil, another very dead card. With Ajani at 7, Michael played a main phase Volcanic Fallout to keep it off his ultimate. Martin kept playing land and keeping Michael’s land tapped down.

With Ajani Vengeant at 7, Michael end step tried to bounce Ajani with Cryptic Command, which Martin responded with his own Cryptic Command. Michael Broken Ambitioned for 4, which Martin paid for. Michael revealed his own Ajani Vengeant off the clash.

Martin: “Awkward!”
Michael: “I’m keeping, heh.”

Michael played the top card of his library and legend ruled Martin’s. Martin responded with Broodmate Dragon on his turn which resolved and made a Red Dragon friend. Michael played a Plumeveil at end step.

With 6 cards in Martin’s hand, Michael made his own Broodmate Dragon, which Martin tried to Crytpic, but met Broken Ambitions (This Broken Ambitions was not as hot for either player as the last one.)

Martin made his 11th land with Michael with only 2 up, but he opted not to do anything. Michael went into the red zone with his team and Martin opted to trade, and both players started playing Draw-Go again.

With 13 lands, Martin resolved another Broodmate Dragon. All Michael did was end step Esper Charm to draw cards. Michael matched him on lands and made Wall of Reverence which was main phase Terrored. Martin attacked, did 4, and traded a token for a Plumeveil and passed, and Michael played another Esper Charm to try and win the card advantage war.

With no creatures left in play on his own side, Michael traded Wrath of God for Broodmate Dragon and the board was back at equilibrium and Draw-Go ensued. After a couple of passes, Martin yelled “Screw it!” and made a Wall of Reverence and started gaining life. On his next turn he made a Mulldrifter and filled up his hand. Mulldrifter got in for damage, putting Michael at 12.

Michael asked to Evoke a Mulldrifter and was allowed, and he passed the turn. Michael went to 10, Martin got slaphappy when he commented that he had 17 lands to Michael’s 18. On Mulldrifter’s next attack, Michael Terrored it. On his main phase, he played a Mulldrifter, and Martin drew end step off of Esper Charm, played Volcanic Fallout, putting the score to 23-8, and Michael opted to Esper Charm at his own end step, forgetting that it was his own turn still and had to discard down.

Martin played his third Broodmate Dragon and passed, and Michael responded with Wrath of God. On his next main phase, Martin put his hands to his head in thought and said “I have to do some math right now”, investigated Michael’s graveyard, but passed the turn.

It was Michael’s turn to “do math” and he decided to run out Cruel Ultimatum. Martin Cryptic Commanded, to which Michael responded with his own Cryptic Command. Martin thought, and made nine mana. “This is so hard, I have a headache!”, he said as he Brokened for 8 mana. Michael Brokened it back for 5, and Martin tapped all the rest of his lands to pay for it. Michael revealed a second Ajani Vengeant off the clash, and Martin milled. With Martin’s Broken for 8 on top of the stack, Michael Cryptic Commanded and checked the libraries (both had 11) and chose to tap Martin’s nonexistent team, eliciting laughter from the room.

Cruel Ultimatum finally resolved, putting the score 22 to 13 in Martin’s favor and a Broodmate Dragon back to Michael’s hand. With two in the grip, Martin played his own Cruel Ultimatum, which resolved. Martin got back his Broodmate Dragon. Martin evoked Mulldrifter, to go down to 5 cards in the library, and ran out the Dragon, and passed.

Michael Esper Charmed Martin to make him pitch cards and made his Broodmate Dragon and passed. Martin played his second Cruel Ultimatum, putting Michael to 3 and pitching his hand of Broodmate, Ajani, and Cruel Ultimatum, and muttered “I messed up!” Martin drew to leave one card in his library and attacked with his Dragons into Michael’s one creature to win.

(For rules buffs, what happens when you Cruel Ultimatum your opponent to 0 life, but you only have 2 cards in your library? The answer is at the end of this report.)

Martin – 1, Michael – 0

In Game 2, Martin mulled to 5. He attempted a turn 2 Scepter of Fugue, which got Broken Ambitioned and milled Story Circle and Wydwen. Michael Evoked Mulldrifter and passed, then Martin missed his third land. Michael Mulldriftered again, but it was Ambitioned on Martin’s 2 lands. Martin got his 3rd land but could not answer Michael’s Ajani Vengeant next turn, which kept his Vivid land tapped. Martin got to 4 lands but couldn’t prevent Ajani from getting to 8 counters.

Maritn slammed a Pithing Needle, and Michael asked “Naming?” and Martin quickly named Ajani Vengeant. He tried to Broken, but of course that’s no good. It didn’t matter because Michael had Cryptic to bounce it. Ajani destroyed Martin’s mana and even stuck around since he started at 8 loyalty counters. Martin asked him to reveal a Broodmate Dragon and he’d scoop. After conferring with a judge, Michael flashed the Limited bomb and Martin scooped up his one land.

Martin –1, Michael – 1

For Game 3, both players kept 7. Martin nailed a turn 2 Scepter of Fugue on the play this time and used his mana to make Michael start pitching cards. Michael attempted to refuel with an Evoked Mulldrifter, which Martin dittoed.

With Martin tapped out, Michael stuck a Pithing Needle naming Scepter of Fugue. Martin Evoked Mulldrifter with no lands up, and Michael went into the tank, considering a counter. He Brokened for 1, and Martin put an Esper Charm on the bottom and shipped the turn, indicating that he was indeed tight on mana. He tried Mulldrifter again, and indicated that he kept 3 Mulldrifters, three lands, and Scepter. Michael had another Broken Ambitions and won the clash, milling 3 of Martin’s lands.

Martin ripped an Island and passed the turn. Michael gassed up with Esper Charm at Martin’s end step. At Martin’s next end step he tried a Wydwen, to which Martin played Cryptic Command, but met Negate, giving Michael a path to victory. Michael stuck his seventh land and played Ajani Vengeant and started powering it up.

Martin drew and missed land again in much frustration. He hit his next land, and Michael Esper Charmed at end step. His next attacks put Martin at 11, and then 8. At end step, Martin tried to legend rule Wydwen, which met Broken Ambitions. On Michael’s next turn, he played Broodmate Dragon and Martin scooped them up.

RESULT: Michael beats Martin in 3 and earns the three-round bye at Grand Prix: Seattle.

(The answer to the rules quiz: You resolve Cruel Ultimatum in the order of the card: you draw your remaining library and your opponent is at 0, and you check based effects. You both lose at the same time, so the game is a draw. God forbid that happens in this mirror.)

GPT Seattle at Games & Gizmos - Semifinals

Semifinals: Michael Dipetrillo (Five-Color Control) vs. Zaiem Beg (BW Tokens)

“You realize card advantage wins games,” Zaiem posited to Mike as he elected to play first. Mike sent back 7, then thought and also sent back 6. He quickly kept his 5. Zaiem made the first play with a Knight of Meadowgrain and got in for 2. His next turn, Zaiem attempted a Kitchen Finks, which was Broken Ambitioned by Mike.

On Mike’s turn, he summoned Ajani Vengeant and Lightning Helixed Zaiem’s only creature. Zaiem made three Spirit tokens on his turn with Spectral Procession. Digging for land, Michael evoked Mulldrifter, layed a tap land, and passed the turn.

With only one land up on the other side of the table, Zaiem played a Glorious Anthem and split his team up between attacking Ajani and Mike, putting Mike to 17. Michael played a Wall of Reverence and passed, ready to have Spirit tokens bounce off itself. Zaiem attacked for 4 to put Mike 13 and shipped the turn with 5 lands up. Michael drew and said go and started gaining 1 off of Wall of Reverence.

After another Spirit attack from Zaiem for 4, he hideaway a card on a Windbrisk Heights. Michael did nothing, went up to 11 then back down 4 to 7 on the next attack, and Zaiem followed up with a Bitterblossom from under his Heights. Michael continued to play land and ship the turn, then chastised himself for forgetting the Reverence trigger for the second time in the game. Zaiem attempted another Glorious Anthem, which was Broken Ambitioned. Zaiem then attacked for 4 again, putting Mike to 3.

Michael drew a Wrath of God off the top and played it, to which Zaiem sarcastically remarked “Okay, fine.” Zaiem played a land and said go. Mike made another Ajani Vengeant and Helixed a Faerie Rogue token, represented by a card from the game Bella Serra.

Zaiem made another token and attacked Ajani with a token, which met its end via Cryptic Command by going back to his hand. Zaiem then played a second Bitterblossom and shipped. After an end step Esper Charm to draw two, Mike used the last two counters on Ajani Vengeant to kill the remaining Bitterblossom token and passed.

Zaiem attempted an Ajani Goldmane which was Broken Ambitioned, revealing a Cloudgoat Ranger on the top of Zaiem’s deck and a land on Mike’s deck, which went to the bottom. Zaiem attacked with two Bitterblossom tokens, putting Mike to 4, and shipped the turn. Michael dug for answers with a Mulldrifter, which was Terrored at end of turn.

Zaiem went to his combat step to have his guys tapped down with Cryptic Command. On Mike’s own turn, he played a Volcanic Fallout, clearing the board, and then made a Mulldrifter. Mike was still at 3 while Zaiem now found himself at 8 thanks to Bitterblossoms and Volcanic Fallouts. A Glorious Anthem came on to the board for Zaiem’s next turn. Michael again filled his hand via Esper Charm, and on his own turn ran out Cruel Ultimatum and swapped life totals. Zaiem went to one, and when Mike Esper Charmed on Zaiem’s draw step to empty his hand, Zaiem scooped them up.

Michael 1, Zaiem 0

In the other Semifinal, Martin Goldman-Kirst beat Thomas Rolling in two games, so the winner of Zaiem and Mike’s match would have Five-Color Control waiting for them in the final.

In Game 2, Michael shipped his first 7 cards again.

Michael: “Yeah, let’s mulligan to 5 again…”
Zaiem: “Skipping 6, are we?”

After Michael kept 6, Zaiem made a Bitterblossom on his second turn, which was Celestial Purged on Michael’s own turn. Zaiem responded with another Bitterblossom and a Windbrisk Heights. On Zaiem’s next turn, another Windbrisk Heights came into play, followed by Burrenton Forge-Tender, which met Terror.

Michael missed his fourth land drop and shipped. Zaiem made a Marsh Flitter after attacking for 1. Michael missed land again, but had Volcanic Fallout to kill all of Zaiem’s tokens. Marsh Flitter survived, however, and got in for 3, putting Michael to 14. Zaiem made another Marsh Flitter and attacked with his team again, to which Michael made a Plumeveil in front of Marsh Flitter. Zaiem made a Glorious Anthem from under his Hideaway land and sacked a Goblin to the blocked Flitter to trade with Plumeveil and get in for 4, putting Michael at 10.

Michael hit his fourth land and used it to Cryptic Command Zaiem’s team on his combat step. The next attack step, Volcanic Fallout hit the board destroying Zaiem’s tokens again, and after the big Marsh Flitter’s attack, the score was 10 to 4 in Zaiem’s favor.

On Zaiem’s next turn, he attacked Michael down to 2 and ran Head Games out, which was Broken Amibitioned. Michael topdecked a dead Volcanic Fallout and facing Bitterblossom, Marsh Flitter, and a benched Mutavault, he scooped them up.

Michael – 1, Zaiem – 1

In Game 3, Michael opted not to complete the mulligan trifecta and started with seven cards, while it was Zaiem’s turn to invoke the Paris rule. Zaiem kept 6, and played a Burrenton Forge-Tender on his first turn and started to beat down with it. He attempted Tidehollow Sculler but met Broken Ambitions which milled among other things a Bitterblossom, Anthem, and Mutavault. After attacking on his next turn, he played a post combat Glorious Anthem, which was Brokened again, but this time he got to keep the Bitterblossom on top of his deck.

However, Zaiem opted not to run it out on his turn nor his next turn, as Michael kept playing land. After finding his fifth land, Zaiem “gave him something to Cryptic Command” and played the Tribal Enchantment, which resolved. Michael continued to play land until the score was 15 to 9, when he Terrored the BFT to set up Volcanic Fallout on his next combat step. Post-Fallout, Zaiem attempted a Cloudgoat Ranger, which met Cryptic Command.

At 11 to 7, another Cloudgoat Ranger entered the stack, and was Broken Amibitioned. Michael kept an Esper Charm while Zaiem had to think about keeping Ajani Goldmane. At end step, Michael filled up with an Esper Charm from hand and on his main phase put a Mulldrifter into play and looked fairly comfortable with all of the cards in his hand.

After his draw, Zaiem asked his opponent “Do you have Cryptic Command in your hand?” to which Michael quickly replied “Yep,” which he may have not expected, but regardless he played Head Games, which resolved, since he only left up 2 lands that could produce Blue. (Michael did indeed have Cryptic Command in hand.)

With a handful of Vivid lands, Michael drew and passed, as Zaiem went 9 life from Bitterblossom. “I punted this game, I thought he had a tri land” Michael lamented. He made Glorious Anthem, attacked for 2 and traded a token for Mulldrifter. “Wow, I’m dumb” Zaiem said as he made an Ajani Goldmane post-combat. “I guess I think he has Cryptic off the top every time.”

Michael played Wrath of God and followed up with Broodmate Dragon, his two post-Head Games draws. Zaiem went to 8, and made a Marsh Flitter. Ajani was activated and passed the turn.

Michael drew his card and sheepishly played a Cryptic Command off the top to tap his team. Zaiem sighed (in good spirits), tapped his board, and watched two 4/4’s go sideways and put him at 0.

RESULT: Michael beats Zaiem in 3

GPT Seattle at Games & Gizmos - Quarterfinals

Quarterfinals: Martin Goldman–Kirst (Five-Color Control) vs. Dwayne St. Arnould (Black-White Tokens)

Martin won the die roll and kept his 7, as did Dwayne. Dwayne’s first play of Tidehollow Sculler was Broken Ambitioned by Martin, with Dwayne keeping an Ajani Goldmane on the top of his deck. Martin layed a land and said go while Dwayne made a Knight of Meadowgrain.

Martin ran out a Pithing Needle on his fourth turn, naming Ajani Goldmane. Dwayne attacks to see a Plumeveil enter play from Martin, which he Terrored before it could block. Martin ships his fifth turn with no land, and Dwayne attacks again into a second Plumeveil, which this time does eat Knight of Meadowgrain. Dwayne followed up with a Cloudgoat Ranger, which on Martin’s turn had his Kithkin friends Volcanic Fallout’ed.

Dwayne responds to the sweeper with a Spectral Procession, to Martin’s chagrin. Martin hardcasted Mulldrifter on his turn. Dwayne followed up with the Ajani Goldmane in his hand, but thanks to Needle, he shipped the turn.

Martin: “If you played that, that means you don’t have anything better to do.”
Dwayne: “Stop thinking logically.”

Martin made a pair of dragons of the Broodmate variety, while Dwayne could only ship the turn and eat 8 from the Dragons. Dwayne makes another Spectral Procession, to which Martin asked “Does that even do anything?” and played a Broken Ambitions. Martin left a Esper Charm on top while Dwayne left a Cloudgoat Ranger.

Martin’s dragons go into the fray and this time get chumped. Dwayne played his Cloudgoat Ranger and ships, as Martin end step drew with Esper Charm, and flashed two Cryptic Commands, drawing the scoop from Dwayne.

Martin 1, Dwayne 0

They both kept their openers for the second game. Dwayne laid a Windbrisk Heights and made a Knight of Meadowgrain turn 2, safe from Broken Ambitions this time thanks to going first. On the third turn, Knight of Meadowgrain got in and Dwyane made a Bitterblossom.

On the fourth turn, Dwayne attacked again with Knight of Meadowgrain and made a post combat Glorious Anthem, while Martin laid his fourth land. Dwayne’s next attack with a token and Knight put Martin at 11. Dwayne attempted a second Glorious Anthem, which drew a Broken Ambitions from Martin.

On his next turn, Dwayne asked if he could attacked, which made Martin pause.

Dwayne: “Am I dead?”
Martin: “No, you’re not dead. Just thinking what to do.”

Martin fogged with Cryptic Command, and Dwayne shipped the turn. Martin continued to lay land and say go. Dwayne asked to attack again, which drew out Volcanic Fallout, leaving only Knight of Meadowgrain, which put Martin to 6. Martin predicted a Cloudgoat Ranger, but Dwayne instead emptied out his hand and made a second Bitterblossom and Knight of Meadowgrain.

Martin ran out Cruel Ultimatum to go back to 11. Dwayne got in again, making the score 8 to 20. Martin made a Broodmate Dragon and a Pithing Needle on Windbrisk Heights, with three guys ready to attack for Dwayne. With Martin tapped out, Dwayne ran out Tidehollow Sculler, revealing Cruel Ultimatum #2, Wrath of God, Broken Ambitions, and two lands. “I think it’s a pretty hand,” said Martin, and Dwayne elected to remove Wrath of God. Martin played his second Cruel Ultimatum, and on Dwayne’s next upkeep, the score was 11-13 in Martin’s favor. All Dwayne did was make a Burrenton-Forge Tender and pass the turn.

On Dwayne’s next upkeep, Martin tapped down Dwayne’s team and drew with Cryptic Command. Dwayne laid a land and said go. Martin got in for 8, putting Dwayne to 5, and followed up with Ajani Vengeant to Helix his face, putting him 2 and effectively dead to his two Bitterblossom activations, ending the match. Dwayne then flashed the Mutavault under his Windbrisk Heights.

RESULT: Martin beats Dwayne in two.

Quarterfinal: David Lowe (Red) vs. Thomas Rolling (Green-White), Game 3

For their third game, David mulliganed down to 6, thought about it and kept. Thomas kept his 7. David made a Figure of Desinty off a Mountain, while Thomas made a Birds off a Forest. Thomas got in for 2 by leveling up Figure, and made another Figure of Destiny. Thomas drew, went into the tank. “It would be a terrible, terrible idea,” Thomas thought aloud, and off a Wooded Bastion, ran out a Noble Hierarch and a second Birds, wary of getting blown out by Volcanic Fallout.

It was David’s turn to go into the tank, before laying a land and declaring attacks with his two Figures. Thomas declined to block and tried to level up his 2/2 Figure to a 4/4 before damage, earning a Path to Exile in response. The attack put Thomas to 17.

Thomas laid a Windbrisk Heights, tapped 4 and made Ranger of Eos, getting two Burrenton Forge-Tenders, which may or may not be relevant against David’s Red deck. He made one of them and shipped the turn.

David tapped 5 on his turn to make Demigod of Revenge and got in immediately for 5, putting Thomas at 12. Thomas made Ajani Goldmane and strengthened his team, then got in for free with his Birds, Ranger, and Forge-Tender. After declining to block, Thomas revealed the Wilt-Leaf Liege under his Windbrisk Heights, knocking David down 10.

David drew and thought for a long while, presumably about what his paths to victory were at this point. In the meantime, Zaiem Beg won his match against Nash Foster in 3 piloting Black-White Tokens successfully against BG Elves. After thinking, David played an Ancient Amphitheatre and passed the turn.

David made his second Burrenton Forge-Tender and pumped his team up again, which drew a Flame Javelin pointed at Wilt-Leaf Liege in response. The newly made Forge-Tender took that Flame Javelin instead, making Wilt-Leaf a 5/5 and out of range of future Flame Javelins. Thomas attacked with the team, and David scooped up his lands in concession.

RESULT: Thomas wins 2-1.

In the remaining match of the quarterfinals, Michael Dipetrillo’s Five-Color Control deck beat Corbett Gray running Boddy Red.

Thinking, thinking, thinking - the beginning of GP Seattle prep...

In my estimation, here are the relevant decks in Standard:

BW Tokens
Five-Color Control
Kithkin
RW Cruise
Faeries
Esperlark
Bant strategies
Blightning (I think this deck's pretty bad right now, it only beats Faeries and Five-Color, and mostly old Five-Color lists at that)

Reveillark seems to be an extremely important card in this metagame. It's so hard to deal with that you either run it yourself, or you don't care about it. Generating lots of creatures also seems good, with Spectral Procession and Bitterblossom being awesome cards, which in turn makes Glorious Anthem another really important card for decks that go this route.

I think the beginning of this month I'll be running Kithkin. I know it's a favorite against Cruise, Faeries, and Red decks. It's certainly fast enough that it doesn't really care about Reveillark by the time it comes online. I also get to play Glorious Anthem and Spectral Procession, as well as other hits like Cloudgoat Ranger. The only deck I'm really worried about from the major decks is Five-Color Control, and at least there are tools to beat it. I'm also not sure how good I'd be against a T2 Rhox War Monk or Troll Ascetic.

The field seems like it will be fairly spread out, so tuning for the mirror past some sideboard cards seems unnecessary at this point. Stillmoon Cavalier seems like it'd be really good, but why isn't it in every Kithkin board?

Anyway, some initial thoughts I need to get down.

Constructed for Christmas?

With limited almost over, it's time to get into Constructed! I want to try some new ideas in Standard and playtest it more just to be more familiar with the matchups, since I did a fair amount of testing, but nowhere close to the amount I did last Extended season. (This is of course for the Type 2 Power tournament before Christmas.) Having a full-time job sucks, especially the full-time part! But so does not knowing people well enough to call them up and saying "We are playtesting for 6 hours right now!" like I could back at school. For States I probably tested 15-20 hours at most, whereas for the first Extended PTQ I think I can say I playtested closer to 30, and then probably closer to 40 before the Grand Prix. Considering my current circumstances, I'll just have to deal with it I guess.

I also want to start goldfishing some Extended. Even if it doesn't get banned after Worlds, I really don't want to play Elves since I'd play the mirror for half the day at a PTQ. Tezzeret doesn't seem that fun either, but I could play that. I could play Faeries, but I really want to play something more proactive and fun. I've checked off All-In Red, Goblins, and Dredge as decks from the Top 16 of the Pro Tour I'd like to try, and also Zoo since I think you can tune it to beat Elves. Hopefully Elves really isn't actually so powerful that it's incorrect not to play it, since I haven't tested it, since what I really liked about the last Extended format was that you could just play one of many powerful decks, play it well and see results. But if there's an overwhelmingly powerful deck, I'd make myself play it.

Back in Seattle tomorrow!

A statistical look at the Standard metagame

So I've been tinkering a little bit with an application that takes all the Standard decks played in Magic-League tournaments and determines what are the common decks being played by finding the similarity between all pairs of decks and then clustering the resulting graph. The clustering is fairly naive; I just consider the clusters formed by the subset of edges with the greatest weight (similarity).

Similarity is the percentage of different non-land cards among two decks, in a nutshell. I only looked at the clusters that represented at least 1% of the decks (I had about 4200 decks downloaded), and these are the best results I got, considering pairs of decks that are at least 80% similar:

541 Faeries
465 Five Color Control
313 Kithkin
281 Red Deck Wins
203 BG Rock
160 Reveillark
141 Merfolk
52 Doran
49 Ten Commandments
2205 decks covered

Note that this doesn't cover all of the decks played, since there are a lot of homebrews, variants, and plain ol' bad decks played. But this is an interesting look, considering that on Magic League there is no issue of card availability.

In the future, I'll expose this via a web tool. Some other ideas are to break down variants of each large archetype, break down matchup statistics (since Magic-League publishes all match results to their tournaments), determine the most characteristic decklists for an archetype (using some kind of node centrality metric), and implement some kind of tagging system to name archetypes.

If you have any other ideas for this, I'd love to here it!

Who the heck came up with "Red Deck Wins" anyway?

So I'm going to commit to playing Red Deck Wins. I think it will be a solid call in a metagame where Five-Color Control and Faeries are the consensus best decks in the format, since I think I have an edge on Five-Color and am pretty solid against Faeries. Here's the 60 I'm going to run:

18 Mountain
4 Ghitu Encampment

4 Figure of Destiny
4 Mogg Fanatic
4 Ashenmoor Gouger
3 Boggart Ram-Gang
3 Hell's Thunder
4 Stigma Lasher
4 Demigod of Revenge

4 Magma Spray
4 Incinerate
4 Flame Javelin

The sideboard will look something like this:
4 Pyroclasm
2 Wild Richochet
2 Chaotic Backlash (???)
4 Vexing Shusher
3 undecided... Everlasting Torment? Pithing Needle? Manabarbs?

I don't think Manabarbs is a good solution because I think I would only bring it in against Five-Color, and they can trump me with Runed Halo naming Manabarbs. Everlasting Torment and Pithing Needle solve Story Circle and Burrenton-Forge Tender, while Torment will also answer Runed Halo when a creature like Demigod of Revenge is named, and Needle can stop Planeswalkers and Tokens. Not sure, will try both a couple times in the coming week.

Kithkin is my worst matchup because of Spectral Procession and Cloudgoat Ranger. Pyroclasm probably helps, and I threw in Chaotic Backlash too, but I need Everlasting Torment/Needle too for Burrenton Forge-Tender, so I'll test this too, maybe I don't need Chaotic Backlash.

I'm actually really excited for States. Hooray 60-card decks!

Frustration in Drafting with Shards of Alara

(That title is for Google, because apparently a lot of people end up here trying to figure out how to draft Shards of Alara. Lol.)

Anyway, drafting this set has been pretty frustrating for me. I think I generally know how to draft it decently, know what cards are powerful and how certain archetypes are supposed to go. I'm still making tons of play mistakes, which is my own damn fault. But man, am I getting manascrewed a bunch! And so are my opponents! It is the least fun way to win at Magic, because no one likes not casting their spells, and I certainly can't assert that I played better than an opponent that did not cast their spells either.

My drafting strategy has been to take any first pickable cards, but otherwise take tri-lands and panoramas as they come around (even regardless of color). One draft I took 5 lands in the first pack because I really really wanted to fix my mana. Yet I still get mana-screwed a whole bunch. What the hell is going on?

The thing with Panoramas is that they are actually pretty bad when your two-drops are multi-colored. If I have a whole bunch of RG haste guys and Steward of Valerons, I really don't want to be playing 4-5 Panoramas, which is why I don't value those creatures as highly as others.

Also, which has been said by numerous writers, when figuring out mana sources, you shouldn't count, say, Naya Panorama as a White, Red, and Green source because it's never both: it's a white, red, OR green source. But then how do you figure out splashing? If I'm splashing, say, White in my RGB deck for say.... Oblivion Ring, Naya Charm, and Bull Ceradon (Naya Charm maybe a stretch, but the other two I think are acceptable splashes, tell me if I'm horribly wrong.) and I've got say... two Naya Panoramas, and let's say I'm equal parts Black, Red, and Green for the most part. Do I play one Plains because I've now got three ways to get White, or do I need to play 2 or more because I will probably be needing those Panoramas to get my main colors? Similarly, if I've got 3 or 4 Panoramas and I want to play three colors plus a splash, what are my options? Could go 1-4-4-4? 1-5-4-3? 2-3-4-4?

Maybe I value the Panoramas too highly, and there is an upper bound on the number you can play if you want to cast your early drops and your gold cards in the early game. Maybe I just need to be stricter with my colors when I draft and never "need" the Panoramas.

As for Constructed, I think I'm now leaning toward Five-Color Control, because I actually need a lot of cards for the Red Deck. But Red has favorable matchups against Five-Color and Faeries, so I'll keep thinking about it and still be ready to throw down some cash to build that deck. At first I thought Manabarbs would be really sick to play against Five-Color, but I'm afraid Runed Halo (which is coming from the Board anyway to fight Demigod) will make it very very bad, especially if they can Wrath and stabilize and actually put you on a clock. I also think I want to try Jund Charm in the Red Deck, because of the obvious instant-speed Pyroclasm, but also pumping your guys and dealing with Mannequin, Reveillark, Persist and Unearth guys.

I've been wanting to make some changes to the Five-Color list I've been playing. Bant Charm has been okay for me, but it seems Condemn is almost strictly better than it. The only artifact I think I care about is Loxodon Warhammer, but I can just kill creatures (which Condemn does), and paying 3 to counter a Cryptic Command (or worse, Negate) isn't terribly exciting. Esper Charm is fine as card draw and pretty good as discard, and it gives me an edge against Faeries. Jund Charm is surprisingly versitile, because it gives me another go with a Kitchen Finks, and it can stop Demigod recursions. That card is definitely staying in. I want to throw in Nucklavee (I guess just 1) and some mix of Remove Soul and Negate. Probably more Remove Soul because I want things to fight early aggro (Stigma Lasher really hurts me!) and maybe 1 or 2 Negates. I kind of just want to run Chris Woltereck's winning 5-Color deck, but it doesn't run Mannequin and I really like Mannequin, especially on Empyrial Archangel. Oh, and Resounding Thunder is HOT, definitely throwing 4 in the sideboard!

Seattle PTQ

So I scrubbed out of another PTQ yesterday. I thought my pool was okay, I was RGW splash Blue for Stoic Angel. I left Vein Drinker in the board because there were too few playable Black creatures. I of course misregister my deck and leave out a Rakeclaw Gargantuan, which I realize in Game 2 of the 1st round. What happened was I layed out RGW in the beginning, really liked it, and then started laying out the other decks. With around 8 minutes to go I lay out RGW and start registering. I knew something was weird because I was short a playable, so I threw in something terrible like Incurable Ogre. (I need to join the "Incurable Ogre sucks" bandwagon really soon.) Ughhhh...

Round 1 I throw away Game 1 by Time Walking myself via an onboard Vithian Stinger against an aggressive start. Round 2 I lose to a pretty tight player and I don't think there was a lot I could do. 0-2, but I'm going to ride it out.

Round 3 I blow someone out. Round 4 I lose in three, both times to Flameblast Dragon, but in Game 3 he needed help from Spearbreaker Behemoth. I really love Sealed deck...

I still decide to stay in because I want to keep playing with the pool. My opponent doesn't show up Round 5, but it becomes a bye so I don't even get rating points. Round 6 I blow someone out who got flooded. Round 7 I beat a newer player. Round 8 I pretty much get blown out. 4-4, but I still got a draft set out of it for 60th out of 196.

I have no idea what to do to make myself stop playing awfully. I wish I could play Limited as much as I can playtest for a Constructed format, because I don't make nearly as many mistakes in Constructed as I do in Limited. This three weeks will be glorious, getting to test out a new Constructed format.

My thoughts right now on Standard are
- I hate the 5-Color mirror.
- I hate Kithkin because it cannot win against 5-Color.
- I (right now) hate my Bant deck because it cannot beat Kithkin.
I think I can tune up my Bant deck to have a little better game, because even if the matchup is terrible, it won't make up a huge part of the metagame. It played surprising well with "fair" decks like Doran. I've also ran the mono-Red deck a couple times on Magic-League and kind of like how that plays out.

Current thoughts on Standard

I've started playing a little more Magic Workstation this weekend, just trying to get a feel for the format and where my Bant deck stands. I played a couple of games against Five Color Control and I thought the deck was okay against it. If I get a T2 Finks or War Monk (preferably War Monk because he trumps their Finks), I can sit on my own counters as they try to deal with it. Treetops in the mid to late game are great too because they are Wrath resistant. I just have to avoid getting Cruel Ultimatum'd because I cannot recover from that huge card disadvantage because they're bound to find an answer to my Treetop Villages.

I played a couple games against Kithkin. The deck has huge problems against the swarm, and the worst card for me is Spectral Procession. The other day I ran a 10-game set of this matchup in solo mode plus a paper deck in front of my computer and it was 7-3 in favor of the White deck. Stillmoon Cavalier is a beating for my deck that I cannot deal with besides Colossus, and Stoic Angel was okay sometimes.. Stillmoon can still jump in front of her. The matches were dreadful enough that I almost want to dump the deck.

The more I look at the Five-Color list that I'm running, the more I want to run it. I also like the idea of a Doran update with Tidehollow Scullers and Thoughtseizes in the main, and with some other splash, probably Blue. I could just run Kithkin, since I'd prefer playing 8 rounds with a beatdown deck than a thinking deck, but I don't know how much tuning that deck can do to beat Five-Color. Maybe I'll try Marsh Usary's Chatoic Backlash list.

First Constructed ideas

So at work, instead of doing work, I was thinking about Standard decks. I wanted to play a deck withmain deck Gaddock Teeg because Cryptic Command is probably the best card in the format, Manneqin is played a lot too, and people are talking about playing things like Cruel Ultimatum.

I then wanted to dip into blue to play Rafiq of the Many and Bant Charm. While Rafiq is probably best as a 2 of since it dies to a lot of things and is best when your opponent taps out and you can play him down and swing for 10 with a Chameleon Colossus or 8 with a Treetop Village on an idle board, say post-Wrath. I initially made it really aggro with Llanowar Elves, Steward of Valeron, and Wren's Run Vanquisher.

I then decided that I'd rather play Cryptic Command than spear it because it's the best card in Standard, and already have an answer to it in Bant Charm. Then I wanted to play Birds of Paradise to shore up my mana. I didn't have a lot of Elves then, so I took out Wren's Run. I took out Cloudthresher because I had thrown in Mulldrifter and had Birds now too. Then I wanted to add more blue so I wasn't only playing 6 blue cards, so I added more blue and made it more of an Aggro-Control deck with Rhox War Monk at my 3, and a couple Broken Ambitions.

I goldfished for a little bit, decided that casting Cryptic Command was really hard, but I wanted to stay Aggro Control, so I made Broken Ambitions a 4-of and cut 2 Cryptic Commands. Here's the draft for this deck now:

4 Birds of Paradise
4 Kitchen Finks
4 Rhox War Monk
4 Chameleon Colossus
2 Rafiq of the Many
4 Mulldrifter

2 Cryptic Command
4 Oblivion Ring
4 Bant Charm
4 Broken Ambitions

3 Forest
3 Island
2 Plains
2 Seaside Citadel
4 Yavimaya Coast
1 Brushland
1 Adarkar Wastes
2 Flooded Grove
1 Wooded Bastion
1 Mystic Gate
4 Treetop Village

Now I think I'm best at Constructed because I can easily practice it, and even tune decks by myself by opening up two instances of Apprentice or playing the paper cards in front of my Apprentice screen. But I'm not that great at building my own decks for a new format... in fact I've never played in a tournament like States where the format is really wide open. My idea of the gauntlet will definitely look something like:

5-color Control (I think there are two variations, didn't play block so I'll have to do some homework on this)
Faeries and weird variations (aka Faeries with Doran)
Some Doran deck
Some Merfolk deck (probably with Chameleon Colossus)
Kithkin
Some Red/Green deck

I'll keep looking over the spoiler for ideas, but I'll mostly be looking at Block decks and adding and considering the 10th cards, like Wrath of God, Terror, Condemn, Treetop Village, and Loxodon Warhammer. I'll probably test this a little bit on MWS or throw the deck to my friends have them give it a spin, and if it's good I'll buy the cards at play it at some Standard events.