From: Sean "Bad Mojo" McKeown To: Frank Kusumoto Re: 3/21/98 PTQ Philadelphia/"Grand Prix Jersey" Bad Mojo strikes again... It's more than a team name, it's a way of life! I have a nice little spring break, doing absolutely nothing for a week, and on Friday night when I head back to NYC I have to scope around to figure out how I'm going to get to Cherry Hill, NJ for the nice l'il 4-slot Pro Tour Qualifier. I figured beforehand I'd be taking a bus or train directly to Cherry Hill, so I head up to the Port Authority and check for buses. No luck. So I go to Penn Station, check for train...again, none. I find out I will have to go to Philadelphia, then take a bus out to Cherry Hill... I find out the train leaves at 6:15, convenient enough for me. Around midnight, I get back to the dorm (10th St/5th Ave) and after a while I call the Amtrak line to check...and find out the train is $37 one-way, most of my wallet. SO I strap on my Rollerblades and head back to the Port Authority like a bat out of hell (or a scarecrow out of hell, if you've ever seen me on blades ;), and end up with a 2:15 AM bus ticket to Philly. If I hadn't pre-registered, I probably would have given up at that point, but I am so I go. NO SLEEP FOR YOU!!! I do the morning routine in my dorm at about one in the morning, breakfast and all that. I pack my M:tG gear, food, schedules, and umbrella (foreshadowing??) and head off at an ungodly hour. I get about ten minutes of sleep on the bus to Philadelphia, because the bus is rocking and the jerks behind me refused to shaddap. At around 4:15, I get to the Greyhound station in Philadelphia, and lounge around for a couple of hours, reading book 5 of Chung Kuo, "Beneath the Tree of Heaven" (by David Windgrove, for the diehard SF fans only). After an hour, the booth opens and I buy my transfer ticket. By seven, I come to the realization that the bus don't stop where I am, so I start to plot how to get myself to Camden, NJ to catch the first bus to Cherry Hill (to be referred to as 'Podunk' here on in!)... I wander the dreary streets of Philly trying to get my act together in the area around City Hall, for the life of me feeling like some wayward character from a bad Anne Rice vampy ripoff, seeing as I always dress in all-black for tourneys of late. I manage to catch a subway ("Patco" technically, but who cares?) and catch the bus with all of two minutes to spare. The story doesn't end there, of course, or this isn't an official Team Bad Mojo! tourney report...my life is rarely simple. The bus drops me off at Podunk Mall around 8:30, and I call the hotel for directions. I find out the hotel is more than FIVE MILES down Route 70, and I have to get there first... I figure if I'm lucky I can hitch some or most of the way down, or walk it all and get there around ten (there are advantages to being 6'3", such as l-o-n-g legs). I hike east for about a mile, and hit an unmarked junction (fuck??)... I ask a guy working in a liquor store for directions, and he sends me down one of the roads, tells me to keep going until I hit King's Road. I smile and nod, then run down the road a bit :o). After about three miles, I'll be damned if I didn't hit King's Highway, so I do what he said. Another 3½ miles or so brings me to Route 70, where I stop at a convenient Dunkin' Donuts for some more breakfast. It's 9:50 at this point, and I still think I have another five miles to go, so I am pretty confident that I am *totally* screwed. I whip out the umbrella, as it is now raining (of course!), and I have fun munching on white powdery donuts with one hand that I can't wipe on ANYTHING because the napkin blew away and I'm in my black finery, of course. Buggers. I'm walking along, thinking this is going to be a long, sucky four miles. I stop at the first phone along the way, and dial up the hotel again to see if I can ask one of the NG guys running the tourney if someone could reg a deck for me, seeing as I am pre-regged for the tourney and all. First I get told the tourney started at 9:00 (WTF?), then they tell me that it's running late (that's not the Andon *I* heard about...) and if I get there in the next ½ hour or so I'm good. So, I start running my ass off, crazily hoping that I can run 4 miles in the wind and rain within thirty minutes. After thirty seconds, reality strikes again and I'm just walking again ;). By strange luck, I get to the hotel five minutes later, tired, wet, and frozen to the bone. But in time! (Thanks, Kristen, for all the walking company WBW), and I'd hope so, I left for the damn thing at two in the morning. "But I'm Not Bitter", he says darkly. After the chaos has begun to settle, and I can move my hands again, they hand out the first decks and I register a beauty... Broken Fall, Fury, 2 Scragnoth, Trumpeting Armodon, Dirtcowl, Rootbreaker, some smaller Green, Banish, Edict, Justice, strong Shadows/weenied + the Stalker, 2 187 Eagles, Anoint, Pacifism...every color playable, great as G/B/w. AKA, "This is the deck that will qualify me for PT:NY". As you all knew, I didn't get it back, here's what I got instead... It's main weakness is that (like my deck two weeks ago) most of its critterkill is critter-dependent. Much stronger though, so I figured my chances for Top 8 were pretty decent. Dauthi Mercenary Dauthi Mindripper Knight of Dusk Screeching Harpy 2x Servant of Volrath 2x Wind Drake Mawcor Rootwater Tim! Wall of Diffusion Lightning Elemental Starke of Rath RATHI BEATDOWN Lowland Giant 3!x Canyon Wildcat Lightning Blast Gaseous Form 2x Spell Blast Evincar's Justice Essence Bottle Cinder Marsh 5x Islands 6x Swamps 6x Mountains I ran 18/41 Lands because the deck is all 2 => 5 casting-cost spells, only moderately color-intensive, but it needs to hit 4 mana rapidly or die trying. A few cards you'd expect to see in Sealed Deck that I would have loved are Dark Banishing, Diabolic Edict, Kindle, Gravedigger, Disturbed Burial, Rollo Gigante (Thunder)... but it is basically a solid SD, as 3 of my Rares were strong creatures I was able to use. Evasion creatures: 11 Critter-killers: 9 (including countermagic) Justice survivors: 9 Some of the cards I didn't use, AKA Sideboard: Perish (SB MVP) 2x Spinal Graft Pacifism Mounted Archers Angelic Protector 2x Hero's Pants Watchdog 2x Elvish Fury Ba-Roken! Fall Apes of Rath Shatter Disenchant Steal Enchantment Light of Day Blood Frenzy Metallic Sliver Dauthi Slayer CoP: Shadow, Green, White, White. I chose U over W or G because of the added critter-control and the three Fliers. No regrets, although I would have liked to have worked in the Furies and Fall somehow. Oh well. On to the rounds...they announced we'd be doing 8 rounds, split to top 8. Round 1: Tim McClain (Red/Green/Black) # 1285103 Both games were essentially critter staring-contests, his fate decided by my trio of Mountainwalking Kitties. I had a bit of difficulty dealing with black Shadows, but that's what the Tims are for. Game record: 2-0 Match Record: 1-0 Round 2: Eric Wolarsky (Red/Blue/White) # 125217 He has Mountains, meaning I had 11 hard-to-block creatures for him to have fun with. Second game he is able to hold off my army and eventually win the stalemate, but in both games one and three I get my deck running like it's supposed to, with blockers meaning little to me. Rathi Beatdown showed up game three, bashing in the opponent's head bigtime. Game record: 4-1 Match Record: 2-0 Round 3: Sebastien Sauve (U/G/B "Reanimator") # 652668 I win game one with a squad of Fliers that give him fits; game two he had beatdown control, as he manages to reanimate his Tradewind Rider 4 times (I spell blasted the Burial as soon as I could).. he uses Gravedigger, Coffin Queen, Reanimate, and Disturbed Burial maindeck. Game three he Gaseous Forms my Rathi Beatdown and gains control; he power sinks my Evincar's Justice for 4 when I have an Island untapped (OK, buddy), and he gets to keep his swarm and Coffin Queen. How do you say "I lose" in French, I wonder.. Game record: 5-3 Match Record: 2-1 Round 4: Greg Bole (Black/Red/Green) # 125911 Game one, I take a Paris Mulligan (having decided to draw first), find an OK hand in my 6 cards, and get served a slow beatdown mostly at the hands of Puppet Strings. I SB in Shatter and Perish for the second game, I get a hand of 2x Swamp, Mountain, Island, Shatter, some Fliers. He Coercions me, taking my Harpie, and for several turns wonders what that one card in my hand was... Justice? Banishing? Thunder? Counterspell? He draws his Puppet Strings, and remembers it's just a Shatter. He stops holding back and weenie-rushes me to death. Game record: 5-5 (ick) Match Record: 2-2 (even more ick) Round 5: Micul Spector (scrubby B/G/?) # 128582 Games one and three I serve massively, with several undealt-with Servants followed with unblockable beatdowns...Perish sealed the match game three. I lose game 2 because I accidentally sideboarded out Blue without putting any cards in, I play 12 consecutive Lands and get stomped. **TIME TO WAKE UP** I tell myself. Game record: 7-6 Match Record: 3-2 Things are looking terrible, the two losses means I'm already eliminated, and if I'm taking COLORS out of my deck with no replacement, I am starting to feel the effects of that whole no-sleep thing. Round 6: David Pilgert (Blue/Green/White) # 522422 Game one, I slowly gain control of the board, eliminating most of his army except for a Horned Turtle, casting Justice and killing his Monk with my Starke. That leaves me a Wall on the board, and some fat goodness in hand like Servant and Mawcor. Beating ensues. Game two, he goes "Conscript, Pup, Raider" and attacks the hell out of me, I say, "Excuse me, but did you just sideboard in your Sligh deck?" He smiles and nods, I play Tim and blockers, finally stabilizing at around eight life and serve with Harpie and Mawcor. Game record: 9-6 Match Record: 4-2 (better!) Round 7: David Collins (Red/Green/Blue) # 4712 I lose two fast games to overdrawing Lands and not getting any of my fun tricks to work; I get a fatty loving into oblivion by some green goodness, and game two he Power Sinks my game-swinging Evincar's Justice to go on for the win. He had a good deck, but I got Bad Mojo draws as I am fated to do...seems that even the Curse of X-and-2 didn't hold tight, to finish me at 6-2 for the day... Game record: 9-8 Match Record: 4-3 Round Eight: James McSwain (Red/Green/Black) # 1200782 Game one, I establish total board control at one life, and just try to race the damage in before he can draw a direct-damage spell. When he is at five life (dead next turn), he manages to Thunder me for 2, when I could have Spell Blasted if he only Thundered for one. If it were the greatly-superior Power Sink instead, I would have won the first game. Game two, I Justice early to kill his l'il dudes and Fireslinger, I play my Tim, a Shadow, and Fliers to work on his life totals, he kills Tim somehow, leaving me with a Wall and Drake. I attack, he Banishes the Drake, I Summon Four-Turn Victory. His jaw drops to the floor, I wish I had a camera. Game three goes: Turn Him Me 1: Mountain Swamp 2: Forest Mountain, Wildcat 3: Forest, Trained Armodon Mountain, attack (18) 4: Swamp, Shadow, attack (17) Mountain, Lightning Elemental, attack (12) Beatdown continues as I play another Canyon Wildcat, and summon Rathi Dragon when he is at three life to add violation to injury. This was THE best match of the day for me, it's the second time now I've played James in the late rounds of an all-TE sealed deck tournament, and the matches are always close and challenging...but what can you say to an angry 5/5 Flier? Game Record: 12-9 Match Record: 5-3 (not great, but not terrible!) Final statistics: Total stretch without sleep: 39 hours. Total miles walked: 10+. Food eaten on Saturday: Sandwitch, bowl of cereal, 2 candy bars. *Strong*..Oh, I mean Smurfy ;) Total sanity: ~0 %, about average. (but you knew that, didn't you) Final match record: 5-3-0 (Hope this isn't turning into the Curse of X-and-3!) Luckily, I am able to catch a ride back to NYC with NG'ers Tony Parodi and Glen!, rather than try to get back the way I'd come, because I'd still be there ;). A few notes on how Andon ran the tourney, as opposed to how NGround/Gray Matter usually does... I've heard good things about Andon tourneys in the past, but now I am wondering if we're all talking about the same Andon. The pairings system is abysmal, they give you a general area where players of your points level are playing, and you mill around the tables until you find your card. Gray Matter's system, where they assign seat numbers in advance, call out names off match cards, etc. is just sooo superior it's not even funny. I just promised I'd mention that, and I don't think I'll be going to another Andon tourney until I hear about some improvements...OK so I live in NYC, and Andon works the midwest, but what's your point, eh?? It's the thought that counts. I finally get home at around one thirty in the morning, and I basically sleep till four in the afternoon. AAaaaaahhhh..... One more shot at PT:NY before I have to commit hari kiri, I get an appearance at a 2-slotter in East Brunswick, NJ before I have to slit my wrists with the aforementioned Rathi Dragon. --Sean McKeown --Gandalf@BDominia.com "it seems so bizarre, but none of this matters thoughts disappear, hope has died now i am safe, nothing can hurt me here Why can't you see my need for forgiveness? the truth and the lies, confused as one... i can't believe in anything sacred, when i don't believe in anything..." --Stabbing Westward, "Why"--====================987654321_0==_ Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"