Subject: Regionals Top 8 report.....damn tired
Date: Mon, 18 May 1998 04:37:23 -0500 (CDT)
From: sheckman@ix.netcom.com
To: webmaster@classicdojo.org
NE Regionals Tournament Report
by Sam Heckman
The Crew decided to avoid the crowds and expected White Weenie at Chicago
Regionals and we all went out to Lincoln Nebraska and got to kick it with
our friends from Minnesota, Missouri and Iowa.
Sorry this is so short you can expect details and pictures in the next few
days on our home page at: http://www.geocities.com/~flipperized/
The deck I played was mostly set up by Ron and Max who did all they could to
talk me into Mono-Red again this year...I guess it worked.
Crew Hammersligh
4 Hammer of Bogardan
4 Mogg Fanatic
4 Jackal Pup
4 Dwarven Miner
4 Fireslinger
4 Incinerate
4 Ironclaw Orcs
4 Viashino Sandstalker
4 Cursed Scroll
3 Fireblasts
1 Quicksand
4 Wastelands
16 Mountain
SB:
4 Nevinyrral's Disk
4 Pyroblast
3 Serrated Biskelion
3 Shatter
1 Firestorm
Round 1: Chris Rocco
Chris appeared to be playing a 5 color green variant with Winter Orb and Mox
Diamond. Chris seemed unfamiliar with some of the cards I played so we had
to get a judge a couple of times, but the match went pretty smooth.
Game 1: Chris discards his only land for a mox diamond which he used to cast
2 Quirion Rangers. They both died sorta quickly to Fireslinger and Mogg
Fanatic while an Ironclaw Orc finished the game shortly after he got a 2nd
land to cast Muscle Sliver. I sideboarded out a Fireblast for a Firestorm
the 2nd game.
Game 2: Once again Chris is stuck with a Diamond and no 2nd land on the
draw, but 3rd turn he is able to cast Harvest Wurm to get his discarded
Forest back. I have a quick start with a 1st turn Mogg Fanatic and 2nd turn
Ironclaw. I Hammer of Bogardan the Harvest Wurm and get in a ton of early
damage. He casts a winter orb that slows me down, while I use Fireslinger
to kill a ton of his creatures. He casts a Lurgoyf that stays on the
defensive, but I get enough creatures through that I can finish him with
burn.
Match 1-0
Round 2: Jared Price
Jared is playing Falcon Armor with Sleights. His deck included nightmare
cards for me: Sea Sprite, Repentant Blacksmith, Freewind Falcon, Hazerider
Drake. He also ran Emperial Armors to make them next to invincible and his
other creatures: White Knights and Duskriders could be Sleighted as well.
This by far was my worst matchup all day.
Game 1: I get out an early Ironclaw Orc while he has nothing early at all.
He casts a Sea Sprite and I start casting Viashino Sandstalker so I can get
my Ironclaw in for some damage. He plays a COP: Black and my assault
continues. He eventually dies to a swarm of creatures.
Game 2: He gets out a Armored Falcon that I try to outrace, but he is able
to get out a COP: Red and stops my last ditch Cursed Scroll with a
Counterspell.
Game 3: Once again it's a creature race, I have to disk to get rid of a
Sleighted Knight and a Falcon, I get down some creatures and he plays a
Light of Day and Sleights it the turn before I can attack to kill him. I
draw some more damage and was able to finish him with Fireslinger, Fanatic
Scroll and Burn. I can't believe I won this matchup.
Match 2-0
Round 3: Kirby Kozel
Kirby is using a Steel Necro with Dauthi Mindrippers, Corpse Dance and
Bottle Gnomes .
Game 1: I get Stupored a couple of times early and he is able to kill an
Iron Claw Orc and a Sandstalker with a Corpse Danced Nekratall. Kirby is
able to get down a Gnomes and a Steel Golem, I kill the Golem trying to stay
alive and he plays another Gnomes and a new Steel Golem. I get him down to
1, but can't finish him due since he has the potential to gain 6 life and
Dance for more. He kills me with a Dancing Steel Golem when I have no
chance of chump blocking all the damage.
Game 2: I have a very quick start with a Jackal Pup followed by an Orc next
turn. He tries to Disk to kill my assault team, but took too much damage
early and he dies to Sandstalker.
Game 3: Awwww Horseshit!!!! My 37 damage isn't enough this game to kill
him, he gets double Corpse Dance Gnomes out and kills me with a Drain Life
that left his final life total at 22.
Match 2-1
Round 4: John Jorgensen
John has a classic Green/Blue/White Tradewind Wall Geddon.
Game 1: He gets out more Walls than I have creatures and Armageddons with a
Tradewind Rider in play. I can't get any offense going and I concede in
response to him casting a 2nd Tradewind Rider.
Game 2: He is able to get down some walls and plays a 6 or so Maro that
stays on the defensive for a few turns, finally he is able to attack and
Geddons with 4 cards in hand, I Fireblast the Maro and eventually swarm past
the walls as he doesn't get much land after the Geddon.
Game 3: Here's the play by play.. Turn 1 Him Land, Me Mountain, Jackal Pup.
Turn 2 Him Land Wall of Roots, Me mountain, Fireslinger. Turn 3 Him land
Propaganda. Me Jackal Pup. Turn 4 Him Gemstone Mine, Geddon. In response
I Pyroblast the Propaganda Fireslinger him at end of turn. He never sees
another land while I play lands like a fiend, kill the Wall of Roots and the
Pups go all the way.
Match 3-1
Round 5: Doug Freeman
Doug has a 5 Color Vineyard deck with Mox Diamonds, Cursed Scrolls,
Ensnaring Bridge, Bottle Gnomes, Spike Feeders and Birds of Paradise.
Game 1: I'm able to get a damn quick start with a Fanatic 1st turn, Ironclaw
Orc 2nd Turn, and Viashino Sandstalker 3rd Turn. The early damage was too
much and I was able to win on the 7th turn.
Game 2: I kill off early birds to keep him color screwed but he is able to
kling to life long enough with Bottle Gnomes and Spike Feeder to play a Mox
Diamond and cast COP: Red after I disk away 2 of his creatures, a COP: Red,
a Cursed Scroll, and a Vineyard. So much for card advantage, I die to his
Cursed Scroll.
Game 3: He gets 2 Gemstones, a forest and a City of Brass as his only lands
and uses them to activate COP: Red to try to suppress my onslaught of
creatures. It doesn't really work, and I'm able to kill him fairly quickly
despite the COP.
Match 4-1
Round 6: Jeff Medding
Jeff is playing 5 color red with Barrow Ghoul, Diabolic Edict and Granger
Guildmage.
Game 1: Dwarven Miner and Wastelands ruin every land he plays except for a
basic Mountain. Ironclaw Orc finish the job as he still manages to kill my
1/1's with Fanatics and Shocks.
Game 2: He puts out an early Winter Orb that makes me feel sorta bad looking
at 3 Cursed Scrolls and 2 Sandstalkers in my hand. He plays a Barrow Ghoul
and protects it with Honorable Passage when I attempt to Fireblast it and
Fireblasts me. Taking 12 damage in 1 turn sucks.
Game 3: He gets out an early COP: Red with only a City of Brass and
Undiscovered to run it with. That's not a combo, and I swarm right past it
like it's nothing.
Match 5-1
Round 7: Alex Smith
Alex is a cool guy from KC that I hadn't seen in a while. We chat for a bit
while we get deck checked and he tells me he's been having a lot more fun
with the game lately and stopped playing just to win money. That's the type
of thing I like to hear... you know people playing for the love of the game.
He is using from what I can tell a very stock Donais U5C.
Game 1: He gets out more basic land than I would expect, but I'm able to
Waste Enough to stop him from Dismissing and I get a Hammer to go through.
The combination of the Hammer recursion, and a few creatures is able to
overrun him to the point I can finish with a Fireblast.
Game 2: This is the very definition of me losing. He plays 2nd turn Sacred
Ground and I draw nothing but lands for a few (5 or so) turns. All my
threats are meaningless after he wraths away my offense and gets his
Gerrards Wisdom/Whispers of the Muse/Gaea's Blessing engine on. I concede e
with 0 cards in hand when he's at 36 with a full hand.
Game 3: I go Jackal Pup, he plays City of Brass. I Waste the City and play
another Pup. He plays another land and gets Warmth. I Waste again and play
Fanatic. He plays a land and says done. I cast a Viashino Sandstalker and
attack for 9. He Impulses, untaps and concedes. This just in....Wasteland
is Amazing!!! Alex was cool about the loss, even though I had arguably the
perfect draw against him that game.
Match 6-1
Round 8: Scott Lipp "Spanky"
Right away this kid wants to draw with me, but I have no sure way of making
it in if I draw. I'm not gonna let my Nationals slot go to a tiebreaker so
I tell him I came to play. Scott is playing Burn with Ball Lightnings and
Mogg Fanatic as his only creatures.
Game 1: I get out some early creatures and he just starts burning the hell
out of me ignoring my creatures entirely. A Ball Lightning when I was
tapped out gives him the edge and he's able to finish me the turn before I
kill him. I side in some shatters in order to take care of his Cursed
Scrolls.
Game 2: I get some early creatures and Shatter his Scroll while using mine.
He dies when I'm at 14, he had one card in hand and no non-mountain
permanents, but he felt it was a close game.
Game 3: Once again he ignores my creatures in favor of burning me. I do a
ton of early damage and he dies. I'm pretty psyched at this point since I
had the slot at Nationals, but I still wanted to do well in top 8 to get
some money to cover the trip.
Match 7-1
The Top 8 was:
1 Austin Vaughan
2 Mike Reinking
3 Sam Rapson
4 me
5 Travis Jones
6 Doung Rodewald
7 Eric Fink
8 Shawn Smart
Top 8: Travis Jones "Public School"
Travis was using WW/x although I never saw any color but White used.
Game 1: I'm able to use Direct Damage to kill all of his creatures with the
exception of 1 Priest that I easily outrace. I sb out 4 Dwarven Miners, 3
Fireblasts for 4 Nevinyrral's Disk and 3 Serrated Biskelion. At this point
I'm confident I can suppress his Priests and hold him off from killing me.
Game 2: I get 2 Sandstalkers going but he uses Honorable Passages to protect
himself while I try to outrace his priest that I never drew an answer for.
Taking 8 from the Passages is what eventually does me in.
Game 3: I empty my hand to set up a situation where I can use Cursed Scroll.
He gets down a Soltari Priest and a Freewind Falcon right away. I'm only
able to scroll once before he disenchants it and I take out the Falcon so I
can attack for 5 a turn and outrace him. He proceeds to play a ton of
knights and protect them with multiple Honorable Passages and despite
getting a Serrated Biskelion I have no chance of winning.
Well I get my consolation Box of Tempest and the Invitation to Nationals. I
guess no new shoes for me this time. =( I had to get some TGI Fridays right
away so I didn't get to watch the rest of Top 8.
Sam Heckman
Team Member - The Crew
www.geocities.com/~flipperized/