Subject: [TOURNAMENT] CT states 11/7 Date: Sun, 08 Nov 1998 15:02:25 -0500 From: Polar Kraken To: fkusumot@ix.netcom.com See Attachement -------------------------------------------------------------------- Hi, I'm Nigel Stuke and I went to Connecticut's States (T2) up at the university of hartford and i bombed (25th) =( .There were 92 people there, so i was almost in the top 25%. The top 10% was basically the top 8. When i went to my first sanctioned tourney in october of last year (Tempest Pre-Release), there were only 68 or so ranked players in Connecticut, so I guess magic isn't dying. I'm still not good at constructed, considering this was my 3rd sanctioned constructed tournament. Anyways, Here's my deck: Counter Phoenix 4 Shard Phoenix Lands: 3 Incinerate 12 Island 2 Earthquake 7 Mountain 4 Nevinyrral's Disks 2 Remote Isle 4 Whispers of the muse 1 Smoldering Crater 1 Capsize 2 Caldera Lake 2 Annul 2 Reflecting Pool 4 Counterspell Sideboard: 2 Mana Leak 4 Pyroblast 4 Forbid 2 Hydroblast 2 Rewind 3 Wasteland 2 Dismiss 2 Searing Touch 1 Disintegrate 1 Shattering Pulse 1 Thalakos Drifters 1 Chill Improvements: Don't use the urza's lands. I lost a match because of those. Use meltdown instead of shattering pulse in sb, Thalakos Drifters are pretty much useless now because WW is gone, but I guess you could use them against suicide black (I didn't). Use Douse. The main reason for the chill is because i couldn't get 4 wastelands before the 1st match. But of course, I get 4 right after the 1st match, because the magic luck god hates me. Maybe I should give him some more human sacrifices... The deck is pretty easy to play, get beatdown for a while, then earthquake, disk or phoenix, then counter everything, and whip out some phoenixes and beat them down. Anyways, here's my match report: Round 1 Tom Lavoie (Academy) Game 1 He's playing academy. I counter his intuition, he power sinks it, I lose. Game 2 I Sideboard in 4 pyroblasts, 3 wastelands, and shattering pulse. I disk once, he scroll racks his whole hand, and pretty much recovers. So I play another disk, i counter his MoMa, he power sinks it, i pyroblast it, and now i am pretty much out of mana. So he Time Spirals and wins. I noticed that his deck didn't have worbs...There was another academy deck there with fireballs, and another one with claws of gix. I didn't see worbs out with any of them. The one with claws of gix made it to the top 8. Match Record 0-1 Game Record 0-2 Round 2 (Vineyard geddon) I noticed this was an original deck. He would vineyard, then catastrophe or geddon, and whip out something big with his mana birds and elfs. It didn't quite work right... Game 1 He takes out first turn vineyard. I take some mana burn, then cast a shard phoenix. He catastrophe's, and kills it. So then i cast a disk, and then use it. Then i bring the shard phoenix back and he dies. Game 2 I side in the 2 Hydroblasts. I don't see either of them. He gets another first turn vineyard, followed by a second turn vineyard. He tries to geddon. I say no. I disk. He takes out a shivan hellkite, and I don't have a counterspell. So I capsize it with buyback. Then I pummel him with phoenixes. Match Record 1-1 Game Record 2-2 Round 3 (Sliver) There were two sliver decks at the tournament. I didn't expect anything like a sliver deck. Game 1 He gets out a first turn winged sliver, which isn't good. I get a disk and use it. Luckily he didn't have a clot sliver. Then he gets a clot sliver out, so I incinerate it. I take out some shard phoenixes and nuke everything. Then I beat him with him. Game 2 I sideboard in 2 Searing Touches and side out a incinerate and an annul. That was a mistake. He gets a first turn Muscle Sliver (Mox diamond), and 2nd turn horned sliver. I lose. Game 3 I sideboard back in a Incinerate for the other annul. That was a good choice. He gets me down to 12, but then I disk and kill him with phoenixes. Match Record 2-1 Game Record 4-3 Round 4 Tom (Suicide Black) Game 1 He plays first turn Ritual, Slayer, Sarcomancy. I get beatdown for a little, but then i capsize the token, and incinerate the slayer. He tries taking more creatures out but he never had more than one out at a time after that. Game 2 I sideboard nothing and he Sideboards nothing. He gets first turn ritual, ritual, slayer, slayer, carnophage. I proceed to get killed. Game 3 He plays a volraths stronghold on me. I get a shard phoenix. He keeps using the stronghold against me, so I keep phoenixing. I continue to draw and he doesn't, so I win. Match Record 3-1 Game Record 6-4 Round 5 Jayson ( Draw Go / Wrath of God / Phyrexian Processor ) Game 1 Nothing happens. I get 1 attack in with a phoenix, he gets 2 in with spire owl. Then he plays Phyrexian Proccessor and pays 10 life. So I attack, incinerate, counter his counterspell, and then earthquake him to death. Game 2 I sideboard in 3 Pyroblasts and 1 shattering pulse. Nothing much happens, besides us countering each other. He beats me down to 8 with spire owls, but then i kill him with my shard phoenixes. Match Record 4-1 Game Record 8-4 Round 6 Nelson (Suicide Black w/ Hatred) Game One I paris and he parises. I started with no lands, and ended up with one. He beats me with some creatures, and I have two lands out when I die. Game Two See Game one. Repeat that, and place it here. Match Record 4-2 Game Record 8-6 Round 7 Nelson's friend..can't remember his name (Suicide Black w/ Hatred) I keep playing because technically i have a chance at the top 8, but not in reality. So I play for points. Game One Oh look, the same deck I just played against. Oh look, I start with no lands. I paris and get 2. Thats a good sign. He beats me down to 12, and then I earthquake for 3 killing his army. He doesn't get to play anything else due to countermagic, and his sarco takes care of most of his life. Game Two I start to get beat. It is turn 4 I have 2 islands out, and a reflecting pool. I have a reflecting pool and smoldering crater in my hand. I play the smoldering crater, hoping to play phoenix and pop him next turn. He plays hatred and kills me. Game Three I get an opening hand of all blue cards and one mountain. I paris and get one reflecting pool and an island. I never draw a land. I lose. Final Match Record 4-3 Final Game Record 9-8 I wasn't the only person who played counterphoenix. Two other people played counterphoenix. One of them got into the top 4, but i left before he finished that game. His deck used kindles, force spikes, and intuitions. The other kid used 30 lands, and I'm not sure what else. Please visit http://polar.home.ml.org Written by Nigel Stuke