Subject: SW Regionals Tournament Report - 1st and 20th Places Date: Mon, 18 May 1998 00:11:14 -0700 From: Matt Stenger To: fkusumot@ix.netcom.com Here’s Christa and Matt’s SW Regional Tournament report. Enjoy. (Christa) I thought I would go for the speed kill with an old fashioned non-tech mono black deck for Regionals. The Costa Mesa players had laughed at Kurt at the weekly Type 2 tournament when he showed up with his mono black deck until he obliterated every deck he faced that day. I talked to Kurt about his deck and decided that mono black might just be fun. (Matt) When Kurt first sent me a copy of the deck, he was sporting Pit Imps in the spot where we’re now playing the Choking Sands. Outside of that change, this *is* his deck. Some other teams were playing Guildmages (and Undiscovered Paradises) or Sewer Rats in their version. He also mentioned that some people were playing Necros over the Scrolls. One of the three Phoenix-based suicide-black decks in the tournament went with Necros and dropped out at 2-2. What we played: “Suicide Black” 4 Black Knights 4 Dauthi Slayers 3 Dauthi Horrors 4 Sarcomancy 4 Erg Raiders 2 Nekrataal 1 Kaervek’s Spite 4 Unholy Strengths 4 Bad Moons 3 Choking Sands 4 Dark Rituals 3 Cursed Scrolls 16 Swamps 4 Wastelands Sideboard 3 Spinning Darkness 4 Gloom 2 Coercion 2 Diabolic Edicts 2 Perishes 2 Forsaken Wastes (Matt) As you read the round summaries, keep in mind that Christa wins the tournament, and I come in 20th. FIRST ROUND (Christa) First game, I see he’s playing u/w. I don’t see much except a counterspell or two before I deprive him of mana and my first turn knight and sarcomancy go the distance. I think that with added strength of the Bad Moon and the Unholy Strength the game lasted 4 turns and the only thing that got counterspelled was my second Choking Sands. Second game, I’m plugging away with Erg Raiders and I finally see what he was working up to: Howling Mine/Island Sanctuary. I die to Erg Raider damage. I never saw any of my sideboard: 4 Glooms. Third game it’s over again in 4 turns with a second turn Gloom. (Matt) I face perhaps the worst deck in the tournament, and the worst deck for me to face. My opponent is playing mono-blue with the following cards STANDARD in his deck: Dream Tides, Propaganda, Mana Web, Mana Chains, Psychic Venom, and Man-o-Wars. I manage to still take game one with a well-placed Spite, but games two and three I die to his overwhelming creature hate. I checked the standing after round 7. This guy still only had 3 points. Per his DCI number, he’s unranked as well. Oh well. I guess I need to win the next six. SECOND ROUND (Christa) He drops a forest. I am happy. I start out with my usual three 3rd turn creatures, drop Bad Moon, attack for 9. He has islands by then and I was still trying to figure out what he is playing. It was over too fast. Second game out comes the Choking Sands in favor of Perishes and an Edict. I never saw them, but his Wall of Blossoms were ineffective anyway against the onslaught of creatures. He tapped out and I finished him off with a Kaervek’s spite. (Matt) Ok, so I’m in the 0-1 bracket. How bad can this match be? My opponent is playing 5CU (Donais, but with standard Phoenix and a better basic land ratio). Like Christa, I get the good ritual + creature draws with wasteland-sands backup in game one. Game two is a little tighter with his reaching 6 free mana and getting whisper-licious on me. Eventually he establishes control and I start shuffling for game three. In game three he establishes board control (4th turn wrath, 5th turn wisdom sigh), but fails to draw whispers or wrath and eventually, no matter how much he wisdoms the double-bad-mooned raiders come to get him. Either I can’t write a DCI number correctly or this guy doesn’t exist. Not looking like a good day for my rating. THIRD ROUND (Christa) I think this round was Matt Perry with his mono red deck. He annihilates me first game. I side out Choking Sands, side in Spinning Darkness. I was in control in games #2 and #3 with excellent opening hands and he was rather surprised that mono black won the race. (Matt) I finished this round before some people had begun shuffling. My opponent is mono-green and playing (AFAICT) Vineyards and Armadons (various). Game one he gets out-raced (he had taken 12 when his first fattie hit). Game two while I attack with 2 shadows, he and I both burn on his double-Vineyards. So maybe the 1-1 decks aren’t that good. Yet another unrated, unlisted player. FOURTH ROUND (Christa) This round I played Jerry’s 4 color black. My deck was too speedy for him and my game 2 early gloom shut out his Wraths. His deck had some fun stuff in it though. (Matt) I played a guy whom I only wrote down as “Eric” on my notepad. Took the win to advance me to 3-1 though. There is a faint ray of hope for me reaching the finals. FIFTH ROUND (Christa) This is when I hit my first 5Cblue. I was ecstatic, this is the deck I had owned when I playtested it in 4 games. He took one game when my 7 pieces of land destruction didn’t come up, but I mauled him in the other two games. Sam is a very sharp player, it was a pleasure to play him. He kept saying, “Mono black should NOT beat me!” (Note from Matt: “YES Virginia, mono-black SHOULD beat 5CU if it’s playing 7 standard LD and can play 3 creatures before they get double-blue.”) (Matt) Now at 3-1 I start seeing some of the more interesting decks in the tournament. My opponent is playing RW En`kor + Maniac + Firestorm. It’s not exactly the ultimate in combos, but the individual pieces are pretty darn good against me anyway. I hadn’t seen the deck before, so game one I find out about the Firestorms the hard way I over-commit with creatures and eat a big one. Game two I go first and outrace him with two sufficiently-non-firestormable unholy’d Erg Raiders. Game three I get a small shadow beatdown going while he’s mana screwed. I Sands away his Red and drop double Glooms. Goodnight and drive home safely. 4-1 Light at the end of the tunnel. Sadly though, another 1630 player. SIXTH ROUND (Christa) Leonard and I, #2 and #3 seeded, intentionally draw. #1 seed Michael Cavey loses this round, making Leonard and I the only undefeated players. (Matt) I don’t have the luxury of drawing now or ever. My opponent is Jacob Stirler (1877) he’s from Tucson and we’ve met in do-or-die rounds a few too many times now. I finish game one in record time. He goes first, but before he plays his second island, I ritual out Slayer + Sarcomancy and with double-unholy in my hand I know ONE of them is getting played next turn on the Slayer. Game two I fall behind. I don’t get creatures out before the 16 counterspells in his deck kick in. Game three I’m excited about going first. I don’t get a ritual and it’s standard mulligan. Ah well. Turn one swamp, “your turn.” He drops an island and is done. I draw the ritual and drop two creatures before he gets a second land. Fate smiles on me. He drops his second island and is done. My turn I unholy the shadow creature and serve for 6. It’s looking good. *BIGGEST MISTAKE OF THE TOURNAMENT* I played an unholy strength on my Dauthi Horror. Even though he had ground creatures in his deck (Golems, Gnomes, Stones) I should have unholied the Knight. He drops a turn three Quicksand and the 4/2 Horror sinks into quicksand. Momentum turns and Jacob is playing for the finals and I’m playing for 20th. Ah well. SEVENTH ROUND (Christa) I get matched up with a guy in 11th place who knows he can’t afford to draw. Of all the people with one or fewer losses, I swear we are the only ones who played. First game I get a Black Knight out with Unholy Strength. I get in one attack and he drops a Mogg Maniac. I attack next turn, he blocks and I take 4. Next turn he casts another Maniac. I don’t attack. Next turn he attacks with the Maniac, I don’t block. I attack with my 2 creatures and get him down to 10. Of course he sends a Ball Lightning my way and the Maniac never attacks again. He finishes me off with some heat. Second game I sideboard in the Edicts and Spinning Darknesses so I can pull the old surprise when he sacs all his mountains to Fireblast me. He still just rolled over me. I was really surprised because I had dominated the mono red deck I played earlier. The damn Maniacs stopped me cold. Who coulda guessed? I never saw any Cursed Scrolls against him either. (Matt) I’m playing for a little pride and the hope of a prize here. Fortunately I get to play Christa’s 4th round opponent. Jerry is a good guy, but his deck is too slow. He’d already suffered a brutal defeat to Christa and I gave him a beating as well. Christa ends up making the final eight. I finish 20th. My prize is a pack of English Tempest. Whee. (Christa) FINAL 8 I don’t have all the names, but I remember Michael Cavey (currently ranked #3 in Type 2) with I think a blue/white control deck (I never saw it), Sam Gutierrez (not sure on last name, cool guy, and he wants a re-match) with 5CBlue, Leonard with White Weenie, Josh Eustace with blue and something (I never saw his deck either), Jeremy Brower with Necro, and Mike S. (don’t know last name) and Matt Peters with mono red decks. Sam and I are paired against each other again. He withdraws as he’s flying back to Colorado in the morning, and I sit back in amazement and impatiently wait for the other semi-final matches to finish. Leonard finished up his match and we start playing. He has the White Weenie/Empyrial Armor thing going on, but I have a first turn Ritual….Black Knight…Unholy Strength and he smiles appreciatively. He puts down his second plains and casts his first creature (Soltari Priest), and I Chokings Sands a Plains. He doesn’t have any mana on the next turn, and I Choking Sands the other Plains the turn after that. I think this game went to turn 5. Second game I am enthusiastically sideboarding my 4 Glooms and 2 Edicts when he says his deck is short 1 card. He looks around for it but never finds it, and Mad Hatter gives him a game loss/disqualification. This is the wierdest Final 8 I’ve ever been in. Jeremy and Mike take frigging forever to finish up their semi-final matches. It must have taken them at least an hour and a half to finish up. Jeremy then plays Matt and emerges victorious. I feel like I’m coming off the bench cold. We have a Phoenix/Tucson friendly rivalry thing going on, and I’m tired so I offer him a draw. He says he wants to play. So I sit down, knowing I have a good change of winning the race against him. First game goes pretty quickly, Jeremy has necro’d down to 1 life and hasn’t gotten another Drain or Bottle Gnome to make up for it. He disks or charms away all the creatures I drop, Lobotomies me with a land in hand, and after we both draw lands for about 5 turns, I top deck a Cursed Scroll with 5 lands in play and one other card in hand. Second game he was ahead of me the whole way. He had a first turn Ritual….Bottle Gnomes and I had a first turn Ritual….Forsaken Wastes. He took some damage from my creatures but killed a Sarcomancy early. I was taking 2 for each of his 1 damage until he disk’d away the enchantments. He dropped a Steel Golem and started going to town, Draining any of my creatures that hit the table. I died to a really fat clean up Drain Life. Third game I Coercioned on turn 3. He had a Steel Golem, Bottle Gnomes, Drain Life, Stalking Stones, and a Disk. I gambled and took the Stones as he had two Swamps in play and all 3+ casting cost spells in hand. The gamble paid off big time as he went two turns with no land and didn’t get enough mana to drain my creatures or disk. (Note from Matt: At this point, in a bizarre display, Christa actually begins talking smack to Jeremy. I had been saying “SERVICE!” when Christa had been attacking for some time now, but now she gets into the act. I think she even said [after Jeremy closed his eyes and gripped the top of his deck] “Jeremy’s thinking ‘What card can I POSSIBLY draw that will save me now.’” I think she actually looked at him and said “How many life do you have? One? Uh oh” when she played her closer in game one.) The 4 Wastelands and 3 Choking Sands were key to a lot of my wins. The only deck that could deal with my fast black weenies with Unholy Strengths and Bad Moons was mono red. I did not have a single person sideboard something effective against my deck. I Spited my way to victory in a few games and won quite a few with the Scrolls. In retrospect, the only thing that I thought could have been better was the sideboard. I never drew an Edict that was sideboarded, so I can’t say how effective they were. The Glooms were my buddies. Sam says he had a Disenchant, Wrath of God, and Humility in his hand when I dropped my second turn Gloom against him. I never had a Spinning Darkness in my hand. I used the Coercion once, but if I play the deck again, they won’t be in my sideboard because they are too slow. The Forsaken Wastes was only used once and had limited effectiveness. (Matt) After playing in the tournament, I’m going to replace the Coercions in my sideboard. I’m pretty sure I’m adding Null Rods. One of these should make the difference in games versus black. Matt and Christa Stenger matts@goodnet.com http://www.goodnet.com/~matts christa@goodnet.com http://www.goodnet.com/~christa