Subject: [TOURNAMENT] London, Ontario regional qualifier for Canadian Nationals Date: Tue, 26 May 1998 20:17:17 GMT From: robin@execulink.com (robin) To: fkusumot@ix.netcom.com This report contains: top six finishers, four top decks, play-by-play analysis, Monster Man. On Sunday, May 24th, a regional qualifier for the Canadian Nationals was held in London, Ontario. This is the first time that any pro-level tournament has happened in London, my home town, so I was obliged to attend. We were playing eight rounds of Swiss with the top six qualifying. Mike Donais was head judge. What a super guy. To give you a little perspective, I've been playing Magic since Mirage and have done well at a number of smaller local tournaments. I am not a pro player. Things have been busy for me lately and I've only been able to play Magic on two occasions in the last month. So, the day before the tournament I was building decks and putting them through a few goldfish tests. I had played the Zvi and Donais decks but didn't want to go with either. I whipped up Godzilla, Vineyard/Bridge, and a red burn deck, based mostly on Dojo listings. Of course putting together decks the day before a tournament is hardly ideal, and cruising into the hall on under two hours' sleep is almost stupid, but I feel that both have given me the right to put together a tournament report! The gig was held at Somerville House on the campus of The University of Western Ontario. The room in question is called The Great Hall, and lives up to its name, with very high windows, wood trim, and large paintings of past university presidents. Some of these are rather scary, but added an imposing air of grandeur to the occasion. The last time I was in this room I was writing a final exam, oh so many years ago. At the Hall the crew I had come with -- Rick, Jeff, and Alvaro -- met up with other local players and got down to the "exciting" deck registration process. Since a mistake here is actually more critical than a mistake during game play I was totally focused and didn't even notice if the tournament started at 10am as scheduled. I had brought four decks (all but the Donais mentioned above) and still didn't know what I was going to play. I wanted each of the London contingent to be playing a different deck, to maximise our chances depending on the field. Someone at the table was playing red burn, Jeff Olsen went with red/black, and Alvaro chose Zvi. Also present were John Hong, Matt Stapleford, Jeff Roulston, and others I am sorry to forget (stupid brain -- doh!). Ultimately I thought that Vineyard would have to get lucky against Sligh to outrace it in the life wars, so I went with Godzilla. Godzilla is the reanimator deck created by Alan Comer that did so well in Southern California. Here's the deck as I played it: 4 Verdant Force 2 Sliver Queen 3 Shivan Dragon 2 Necrosavant 4 Hidden Horror 4 Merfolk Traders 4 Dark Ritual 4 Animate Dead 4 Necromancy 4 Firestorm 4 Mana Leak 2 Disenchant 6 Swamp 3 Gemstone Mine 2 Undiscovered Paradise 2 City of Brass 3 Reflecting Pool 2 Underground River 1 Sulphurous Springs The only real change I made was to include two Disenchants instead of Living Death. I felt that there were just too many artifacts around for me to completely ignore them in the main deck. Ensnaring Bridge in particular completely hoses Godzilla. My sideboard was quite different from that used in California, and would no doubt be different again somewhere else, so I leave it as an exercise for the reader. Here's a brief run-down of how things went. --- Round 1 vs. Stuart Wilton playing a red creature-based deck. This was a great first match-up for me. Red doesn't do so well when creatures of more than 4 toughness start bearing down on them. This particular red deck had Flunkies but also some rather poor choices in spells. In one game I was facing five creatures before getting out a Verdant Force so that was game -- in my favour! 1-0-0 --- Round 2 vs. Sam Lau playing white weenie. I've seen Sam in Toronto and for some reason (faulty memory at work) regard him as a strong player. In the first game he's mana screwed and I start with 2 Reflecting Pools. But his small white creatures can't deal with Verdant Force beatdown. In the second game he has me at 10 life with a pro-red Falcon and Soltari Trooper in play. I have nothing so he Armageddons. That's game -- for me! Here's how my next turn looks: Swamp, Dark Ritual, Animate a Force, burn for 1, go! 2-0-0 --- Round 3 vs. Nick Chen playing red/green weenie. It's really difficult for weenies to deal with a 7/7 creature, and really difficult for spot removal to deal with ten little saprolings. In one game he gets out three Wall of Blossoms and two River Boas but can't stop little green guys from running all over him. In both games I Mana Leak a Lhurgoyf with exactly two open mana -- key plays which seal his fate. Mana Leak is excellent in this deck. 3-0-0 --- Round 4 vs. Bill Ruderman playing red/blue. After a very bad first draw I lose to Wildfire Emissaries and stuff. But I don't see much of his deck in the next two games as Godzilla and friends have a picnic lunch. Really a better name for this deck is Monster Island, because it's not so much the single Godzilla as the hordes of horrible beasties that do your opponent in. Merfolk beats can be strong at times. 4-0-0 --- Round 5 vs. Richard Nowak playing red burn. This red deck was way better than the one I faced in round one. In the first game he gets me down to 8 thanks to a Ball Lightning with 2 Flunkies on board and a Force plus several Saprolings on my side. Being at 8 versus burn is very, very, scary. He's got 2 Mountains he can sac for a Fireblast, which I know he must have (all red players have Fireblasts in their hands at all times). I have a Shivan in my graveyard and two animate spells in my hand. The Shivan is nice because it will be able to fly over his Flunkies, which will, in any case, be blocking my Force for a couple of turns. But that's going to give him 4 turns in which to draw enough burn to do me in. Not to mention I play the entire game with only 2 lands, 1 of which hurts me. So what would you do? Think carefully. I always play slowly -- not unbelievably slow, and certainly not to stall, but slowly enough to consider all the options. On this occasion I look at my hand, look at my opponent's hand (the side he's showing me, anyway!), my graveyard (yep, there's a Shivan), and my opponent's graveyard. So now you know what to do. I animate the Ball Lightning and attack with everything. Boom! On his turn he does something and plays Invasion Plans. Why he does this is beyond me. Next turn, I animate the Ball Lightning AGAIN and attack with everything. His Flunkies get to block one of my Saprolings. He is forced to Fireblast his own Ball Lightning. James Snook, playing beside me, almost cheers -- he HATES Sligh. Actually, I lied when I said I attacked with everything. I held back two creatures as blockers. My opponent is at 2. Had I not been so cautious he would have been dead, but now he gets another turn. But with 1 Wasteland there's not much he can do. 5-0-0 Around this time my lack of sleep begins to catch up with me. I start making growling noises and say things like, "Godzilla eats London!" --- Round 6 vs. Derek Levesque playing blue/green Vineyard bounce. Though he had Tradewinds in his deck I didn't see a single one, but I did see many, many Walls. In the first game I choke on mana from a single Vineyard being unable to draw anything. Second game I march right over with the following second turn: tap a Swamp, Ritual, play Hidden Horror, discard Force, tap a Gemstone, Ritual, animate the Force, burn for 1. He sees no Vineyards and that's game. The third game is more of a competition. He gets two Vineyards and a Cursed Scroll. Not great for me. I resort to doing things like animating his Wall of Blossoms just to get a card draw. My hand is full of land and I need big creatures. Finally I see them, wipe away his Scroll, and inflict the killing blow before he can. 6-0-0 --- Round 7 vs. James Snook playing white weenie. Since we are the only two undefeated players we take the draw. 6-0-1 --- Round 8 vs. Dale Kennedy playing white weenie. This is where Godzilla rolls over and plays dead. All day I've been getting less than ideal draws and have mulliganed about a third of the time, only to find things like single Reflecting Pools in my hand. But here my draws really suck. First game he goes land, Mox Diamond, Shadow weenie. I play a pain land. He goes Wasteland, strip my land, Shadow weenie. I play a land. He goes land, Shadow weenie. I pack up my cards shortly thereafter. In the second game I draw 3 Hidden Horrors but no Godzilla. Nonetheless the game is close and I could have won had I been prescient and known I was going to top deck the only card that could save me. 6-1-1 After all of the scores were totalled the top six were as follows: James Snook (Mississauga): 20 points Paul Johnson (Georgetown): 19 points Steven Wolfman (North York): 19 points Robin Parmar (London): 19 points John Robertson (Toronto): 19 points Tom Byrne (Windsor): 18 points (edging out many others) Some of the top six consented to having their decks listed here, while others preferred to keep quiet until after the nationals, an attitude I can completely sympathise with. Steven Wolfman was playing a cool bounce deck with one of my favourite cards, Awakening. 4 Tradewind Rider 3 Wall of Blossoms 3 Wall of Roots 2 Man o' War 2 Spike Feeder (Peaches) 2 Uktabi Orangutan 4 Counterspell 4 Dissipate 4 Whispers of the Muse 2 Capsize 3 Awakening 3 Impulse 3 Gaea's Blessing 3 Quicksand 3 Reflecting Pool 8 Island 7 Forest Sideboard: 2 Emerald Charm 2 Legacy's Allure 3 Phyrexian Furnace 2 Hydroblast 3 Chill 3 Barbed Foliage -- what a wild choice Tom Byrne was playing Trap. 4 Pendrell Mists 4 Nature's Revolt 4 Intuition 4 Counterspell 4 Impulse 3 Propaganda 3 Memory Lapse 2 Wall of Blossoms 2 Mana Leak 1 Capsize 4 Sky Diamond 1 Mox Diamond 10 Forest 14 Island Sideboard: 4 Interdict 4 Chill 2 Hydroblast 2 Wasteland 2 Maze of Shadow 1 Rebound James Snook beat the field with a white weenie variant. 3 Earthquake 2 Terror 2 Firestorm 2 Winter Orb 3 Empyrial Armor 4 Disenchant 4 Tithe 4 Soltari Priest 4 Warrior En-Kor 4 Soltari Monk 4 White Knight 4 Freewind Falcon 2 Mox Diamond 10 Plains 4 Undiscovered Paradise 2 Gemstone Mine 3 Wasteland Sideboard: 2 Aura of Silence 2 Sleight of Mind 2 Armageddon 3 Wrath of God 4 Propaganda 1 Winter Orb 1 Firestorm All in all this tournament went smoothly. One player in the top six got a match loss for an incorrectly recorded card, then a disqualification because he made the same error in his last tournament. Two players received match losses for playing with snow-covered islands. These penalties seemed rather harsh to me when other infractions go unchecked. I believe it's simply a matter of strongly enforcing the rules that can be enforced. I'm not sure what can be done about it. There was a great variety of decks present. Though I faced two mono-red decks others commented upon the complete absence of "Sligh". There was a fair percentage of white weenie, and these decks did very well. The Mox Diamond allows some completely insane starts for these decks and the great shadow creatures are very difficult to stop. You must be prepared to deal with these decks. As for Godzilla, I was very pleased with its performance considering: 1. I had never played it before the tournament 2. I had less than stellar draws (but that's just me!) 3. I had not tuned it for the field Overall, I think that the deck revolves around Verdant Force. If it comes out, you win. If it doesn't, good luck. The low mana ratio makes this deck nerve-wracking to play, but I found that it does quite well with only two lands. Thanks go out to all my opponents, the London crew (especially Rick and Jeff from St. Thomas, Jeff Olsen, and Alvaro -- bearer of Verdant Forces), Katherine (for wearing the lucky bat earrings), Mike Donais, and Howard Devoto. Cheers, robin +----------------------------+------------------------------------+ | Robin Parmar | signal:noise | | robin@execulink.com | publishers of innovative new media | | www.execulink.com/~robin/ | fiction and electronic art | +----------------------------+------------------------------------+ | -- Eluard | +-----------------------------------------------------------------+