Subject: MA Regionals Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 08:51:00 -0400 From: "Deep, George (GROTON)" To: The Dojo Ok, I know what you are saying if you read Jim Stors review of the tourney....."Team Comic Connection? Who the hell are they?" Well we were the ones that got our @$$'s handed to us that day. You see about two months ago we started to prepare ourselves for this years chunck of Qualifiers and Regional tournaments. The one thing we try to pride ourselves on is building our own decks not direct copies from the Net or magazines. Sure the decks we were playing were variations of the top decks but they wern't card for card copied. The one thing I found with the deck I was playing U/R was the covering of colors. With 4 Gemstone mines and 2 Cities out of 20 land there were 6 sources of any color mana I needed for backup colors. Two weeks before the regionals I had adjusted the U/R from a Regins of Power deck to counter/burn I was unsure of the sideboard at this time so I looked at the mama in the deck and decided to throw in two cities and 4 gems in to test an idea....my idea was that through the first game with an opponant he/she will see islands and mountians and say hmmmm counter/burn? When infact I drop in (say against green) 2 Perishes. Not that new of a concept the 5C decks that is but it is usualy already in the main deck not all in the sideboard. Which I thought would be a supprise on my opponent which it worked very well and stuck with it. The side board at the time consisted of 2xPerish 1xHidden Retreat 1xEarthquake 1xCOP Red 1xNev. Disk 2x Sleight-o-mind 2xHydroblast 2xPyroblast 1xHavok 1xFlashfires 1xNeedlestorm *(for the rest of the deck see J. Stors Counter/Burn only main diff. was I used the Hammer of Bogarden in mine) Well the deck worked well and the sideboard was the key to the decks success. I took first and Jim Stors took second at the Type 2 held at The Norwich Comic Connection. The week before the Regionals we tested the decks again at a Type 2 at The Comic Connection of Colchester. Again the deck worked and worked well. Jim and myself tied for first. (Jim had beaten me in an earlier round so he took first and I took second) We were ready. Or so we thought. The MA Regionals: Round 1: Schneider Burn Game 1: I start out strong with a few counters in hand an island and a mountian. Turn four I drop an Emmisary and use the last counter on my gemstone mine. For the rest of the game I sit there with 2 mountians and an island...he Cursed Scrolled me to a pulp. Game 2: I sideboard my anti-red alla cop red, hydroblasts and hidden retreat. Well I won't drag this out all I have to say is 1 island and 1 mountian all the way to the end with 2 disenchants in my hand while he has a Scalding Tongs and a Steele Golem....ow! Round 2: ProsBloom Game 1 and 2: I might add that this deck took me quite by supprise. Well by turn 3 on game 1 and turn 4 on game 2 I got the largest Drain Life known to man. Round 3: W/R Mogg Maniac/Earthquake/en-cor Game 1: A turn 3 Firewalker shut him down quick with the weenies countered the rest. Game 2: Legacy'd his Mogg Maniac 8 pt. earthquake and an Air Elemental to finish him off. Round 4: 3CW This one went all 3 games but in the end I got mana screwed and he took me 2-1 I dropped along with the rest of Team Comic Connection with the exception of Jim who stayed till Round 6. All in all we had a good time and learned one thing over all...why build your own deck when you can have the pros do it for you. One thing I would like to add is that I would like to see how some of these guys play with decks they built themselves just to see if they are that good or just blind luck. Congrats to those who made the cut. Well see ya all at the Exodus Pre-release on the 6th. George Deep P.S. ED WHERE ARE OUR SHIRTS!!!!!!