Date: Tue, 19 May 1998 07:27:46 -0400 From: Jay Schneider Subject: Here's the tournament report ----------------------------------------------------------------------- "Hey look up it's a Blood Moon." Andy Wolf says. "Yeah." says Paul Sligh. I just nod. This is as good of a starting point for my report on the Southeast Regionals. The above conversation took place at just after midnight the morning of the Regionals as Andy, Paul and myself went to a coffee shop to discuss sideboards. After a few hours of sleep, I'm giving Paul a ride to the tournament. As is my tradition I listen to Radio Disney and the first song they play is my portent. Paul decided to take the second tune they played. My song was "I feel good" about as promising of a portent as you can get from a radio station specializing in Cartoon Music and Soundtracks. Paul received "Men in Black." When we get to the hotel it's a zoo. 332 players are there, and it's going to be 9 rounds of Swiss to a final 8. I haven't decided what deck I'm going to play yet, although I have my current version of 5 color Geeba ready and Deck Listed just in case. Andy at the last minute decides to go with Gypsy Pox (also named Wolf Pox - the alternate names got edited from my deck listings) he always does this at big tournaments. He reverts to a Pox player when he can't decide. Not a bad idea as he's the strongest Pox player I've ever seen. Paul is playing "The Black Box." As it is not finished/thoroughly tested I'm not going to talk about it - please don't ask. I was going to but as we scrambled to put together a second copy they make last call for deck registrations. With a cry of "Horse Shxt" I say here take this one and hand in the 5 color Geeba listing. About the deck: 5 color Geeba is very close to the Sligh Invasion listed under my deck listings. The primary difference is the reduction in number of Fireblasts for a couple of creatures, 7 lands go gold and the sideboard goes rainbow tech. Round 1: Pedro Carrillo - Generic No Tech Sligh 350 of us are crammed into a space that allows 400 by fire marshall codes. He clearly didn't plan on tables. I'm in the middle of an aisle in between Andy and Chris Donahoe (Neutral Ground Atlanta finished final 8.) We each have enough space to fit our chairs as long as we don't have to move our arms or lay more than 5 permanents. I'm very glad I'm playing Geeba. I win the die roll, choose to go first. I've got a solid hand, a pup, a flunky, a lancer, a fanatic, an incinerate, 2 Cities of Brass. It's a solid but painful hand. He's a young player and I get the feeling he's probably playing red but I keep it. It's solid after all. So I start, City, pup go. He goes mountain fanatic. I decide I'm probably going to die. I draw a wasteland, lay it, attack with the pup. He blocks with the Fanatic then sacs it to deal me 1. I take my damage and he says "and you take one from the pup." I call a judge to explain to him about damage. It's odd he made no other playing mistakes the entire match and making one that out of the blue (red.) He dies that game by 2 points of damage. Board: Pups out, Honorable Passages in, Plans and 1 Scroll out, Mana Leaks in. Game 2, I'm dead on turn 5 with about an extra 10 points of overkill. Game 3, I honorable passage a Ball Lighting. Nuff Said. He's down in 5. Paul goes down to Black Shadow beatdown (see the Radio Disney portent and the lyrics to M.I.B. for details.) Andy's Pox always beats control. 1-0 Round 2: Yuh Kong Liao - Black Shadow Weenie I can't find my table. Then I hear David Doust calling my name. "Jay you're up here" as he gleefully points to a feature match table. Great, I think, can't I hide in the swarming mass of humanity in the pit for a few rounds. On the plus side Yuh Kong is a great guy. He's a protour vet. from Fl. Someone you have an enjoyable match against win or lose. Also, the stage only has two matches per 8 foot table (as opposed to 4) and there is space to the sides and behind you. It even has air circulating. He wins the die roll. He plays Swamp. I smile - he doesn't usually play Necro, no ritual Red beats black. His creatures have shadow. Mine are flunkies. Flunkies are bigger than all black weenies. Pups are faster than all black weenies. Black weenies with first strike eat fire. Red beats black in 2 games. No real boarding. Default is pre boarded for this fight. I think I tossed in a pair of Slights for Bad Moons or in case he has Blue. 2-0 Round 3 (and lunch): David Davenport - En-Kor Maniac Red decks that are winning don't eat lunch. You have lots of time to, but you have to be hungry to play red. So I don't eat. I go looking for my table back in the swarming mass and whose cheerful voice do I hear? "Jay you're a feature match again," David Doust says. I just groan. He also tells me that I'm going to be up there as long as I keep on winning. I groan a little more. On the plus side, I'm red, there's plenty of fresh oxygen up here (as opposed to the pit which is always quite ripe,) I haven't eaten and I have a good omen from the Radio Station that's all ears. David is one of the stronger South Carolina players. He used to play with us when he lived in Atlanta, his decks are often uncomfortable match-ups for me. En-Kor Maniac (earthquake, Firestorm, prot red) is not my favorite fight. I win the die roll. Get out a flunky with a friend on two. He land stalls for a turn. I draw an Invasion Plan. I demonstrate to the En-Kor Squad why Invasion plans are in the deck as they selflessly one per turn throw themselves in front of a flanker while watching a pup and a flunky go all the way. Board: Slights, Mana Leaks. I drop Ball Lightnings and something. We both show each other how cool we are to play with artifact hammers for 1 on the first turn. He drops a Knight. I top deck a Vandal, shock the Knight. He drops a Gold Land and tries to scroll the Vandal with 3 cards in hand. He misses. The Vandal doesn't. I waste the gold land. Vandal and scroll go all the way, especially after I Sleight the Crusade. He also fails to draw any other red lands. 3-0 Round 4: Brooks Rhodes - White Weenie with bolt Brooks is a nice but newer player. Game 1 I demonstrate how really cool Invasion plans are when you can cast a 3/3 for 1R. The good folks from the WW insisted on solitary blocking him (and they say Goblins are mindless.) Game 2 I have a fast start and it's over in about 4 turns. Somewhere during this time Andy gets into trouble with stupid pairings and loses one to some strange deck, then draws against another Pox deck (they killed each other in the upkeep with Cage vs. Tongs.) Paul makes a huge playing error and taps out all his blue during a long counter war. That's what he gets for spending too much time fixing up his new house (which is very nice) and too little time practicing magic. 4-0 Round 5: Sol Malka - 5 color Good Stuff At least I know where my chair is. About this time I'm considering hiring a decorator or at least investing in a nicer chair. Sol Malka is a superb player from Neutral Ground Atlanta (who sad to say is going home to Hollywood, FL for the summer.) I know his deck having lost to it the week before. As an aside in addition to his excellent magic play Sol is the BEST Magic the Game Show player. It isn't even close, he can quote the card text off any Magic Card ever printed. I've never seen him being wrong. Some people just have memory storage systems that way. He knows all the cards about a week after the set hits. It' just amazing. Due to the fact this is his current Type II and the suprises that it throws out make the deck much stronger I won't mention his deck type. Suffice it to say all our fights were glorious, I eek out the first, he crushes me in the second, I play for (and board for) speed in the third, and the deck lets out a roar and strip mines him into submission while flunkies and pups do him in 4. 5-0 Round 6: John Johnson Counter Sliver John was a nice guy playing a deck I hadn't practiced much against. Game 1 I had a "Plan" and his slivers insisted on blocking Ball Lightnings and Flankers and stuff. I thought this was going to be easy. I was wrong. My girlfriend (Demaris Rogers) brought me a Gatorade as she dropped by after attending the wedding I had skipped out on to play in this tournament. I boarded in Mana Leaks a couple of blasts and a couple of tranquil domains (he had legacies and everyone boards enchantments I hate.) Game 2: He teaches me that I can't handle Crystalline Slivers. Game 3: I Paris my initial hand, then draw 2 Mountains, 2 Tranquils (both), 2 Mana Leaks. I keep the hand as I'm going first and realize I'm going to die. I lay a mountain. He drops an U/W pain. I lay a mountain (have top decked a mountain). He drops a Gemstone. Then taps a plays a ....Muscle (I was all prepared to lost to the crystalline) sliver. I Top deck a shock. He plays a gemstone. I draw a wasteland and waste his U/W. He does nothing. I drop a colored. He does something. I leak it. I drop a scroll. He counters, I leak again. His Gemstones break when he casts the Cop Red (which I tranquil.) He never show other color. I go pup. He man o wars, I scroll it, drop the pup and a suq ata. He casts a Man O War. I scroll it, Flunky, next turn I kill with the Suq Ata and the scroll. 6-0 Round 7: Mike Wolek 5 color White This is a Junior from Orlando. He's playing En-Kor white with lots of Prot Red and Armor and Geddon. Tithe, Firestorm, Man O War, all the usual 5 color white tech. Game 1: I kill very fast. Board: 2 Sleights 2 Tranquils. Out 3 Lightnings, 1 Vandal. Game 2: I'm going slow he drops a turn 2 priest and a turn 3 Armor. He hits me for 6 . I think that I'm probably going to lose the race as I have a Vandal out at this point. I top deck a sleight - sleight the priest to Prot White, disenchanting the armor. Then I shock the bugger. He still fights on and later in the game has a Warrior En-Kor and a Booty Gnome. I'm attacking with a Flunky and a Suq Ata. He blocks the Flunky and redirects 2 to the Gnome. I drop a Fanatic and sack it to deal 1 to the Warrior. He redirects to the Gnome and then wants to sack the Gnome for 3 life. He finds out about the damage prevention phase and legal effect during it. 7-0 I'm in at this point. Round 8: Andrew Pacifico and I ID. Round 9: Paul Weber 5 color black Paul Weber is another Neutral Ground Atlanta player of no little merit. He plays 5 color black extremely well. I'm in, win, place, or draw but we (by we I mean the general attitude of the players of Team Neutral Ground Atlanta) don't throw games to anyone. Ever. I honestly hoped he would win but I wasn't going to give it less than 100%. Game 1: I kill him quick. Board: Sleights, Pyroblasts. Game 2: I mulligan, and still keep a bad hand. He kills me quick Game 3: A close fight where he looks dead after I sleight his Neckratall to Red, and fill his graveyard with scroll bait. He top decks a Necratog which wrecks me. My first loss but I'm glad Paul Weber made it. Single Elim Round of 8: I play Andrew Pacifico, they player I ID with in round 8. He's playing the predominant deck U/G Tradewind Bounce with a little white for Geddon. The first game is very close, I get a Invasion Plans out kill all of his creatures, he gets a Tradewind out and geddons to protect it. He didn't need to I top deck nothing but land. He eventually Geddons again, I still draw lots of land that same Tradewind is out there beating me down. I put out a pup for his Allure to take, but I can't find anything but land to punish him for it. The Tradewind scores from the 20 almost unassisted. Sideboard: I love to board against this deck and feel very strong. I go heavy control and wind up with a deck that has better creatures than he does and more counters. I board 3 Mana Leaks, 4 Pyroblasts, 2 Slights, 2 Tranquils. I take out 3 Balls, 2 Vandals, 2 Plans 4 Shocks. Game 2: I get a pup and a flunky, he gets no wall of blossoms. No fight. Game 3. He gets a wall, but seems to have a problem with the second blue. I strip one when I see it, win a small counter war, and kill him with a counterspell in the hand. Single Elim Round of 4: I play Mike Wolek from Round 7 again. Game one he kills me. I'm suprised. Game two, I hit him fast and hard. Game three: I draw 4 flunkies and 3 suq ata's. I go flunky then suq ata, suq ata, flunky, double flunky. He has prot red and the en-kor are redirecting, but it doesn't matter flunkies are too big to die so the Warriors are just walls I draw more and better creatures. Finals: Pat Calahan. Pat is the other Sligh player from Neutral Ground Atlanta. Blood Moon indeed, two Red's in the final. He's advantaged in the first but I gain the edge when the passages go in. He is almost exactly Sligh invasion from the deck list dropping the Invasion Plans and Suq' Ata's adding a fireslingers. Game One. To the crowds amusement we both drop out turn 1 pups. He won the die roll and had a bit of an advantage and took the first. Board: See round 1. Game 2. The hand looked good, but I top decked only land as I cast a fireblast on his Viashino on turn 6, with three more lands in the hand. He scrolls me with a fireblast. Nuff said. Well second isn't bad and how can I complain about losing to a Sligh deck, played by a strong player from Neutral Ground Atlanta with not a control deck to be found. 4 of the final 8 were from Neutral Ground Atlanta as were 3 of the final 4. Sorry about the length of this write-up. I'll have 5 color Geeba in the June deck listings, but you should be able to create it from the write up at the top. Jay Schneider j@photobooks.com