Subject: [TOURNAMENT]
Date: Wed, 09 Sep 1998 02:29:31 -0400
From: Christopher DAndrea 
To: webmaster@classicdojo.org

It was a small tournament for a PTQ, having only sixty-some people. There were six rounds of swiss with Rochester Draft for the final 8. I was there with my teammate Mike Tidrick (Team Twisty). We drove down from South Bend along some back country roads where the speed limits changed every mile or so. It seemed to take longer than it should have to get there. The REALLY strange thing about this tournament was that both Mike and I had gotten a good night's sleep the night before.

Well we arrive and do all the usual stuff. Then the cards get passed out and its time to register. I didn't pay much attention to the deck I was registering besides noting that there were few buybacks or broken cards. I had a very low opinion of this deck and kind of hoped that I wouldn't get it back. Well we all passes our decks in and I was selected as one of the people to get their original decks back. Well I threw down my pencil in frustration and stomped up to the front to pick up my deck. When I sat back down with it and REALLY started looking at it, I became more and more pleased. Here are all the cards:
Aftershock
Canyon Drake
Cinder Crawler
Enraging Licid
Fling
Lightning Blast
Lowland Giant
Mob Justice
Reckless Ogre
Shatter
Wall Of Diffusion
COP: Shadow
COP: White
Hero's Resolve
Lancers-en-Kor
Master Decoy
Nomads en-Kor
Reaping the Rewards
Repentance
Samite Blessing
Shield Mate
Smite
Soltari Champion
Avenging Druid
bayou Dragonfly
Broken Fall
Choke
Constant Mists
Krakilin
Natural Spring
Predatory hunger
Reality Anchor
Respite
Rootwater Alligator
Skyshroud Ranger
Skyshroud Troopers
Spike Worker
Counterspell
Dream Prowler
Fade Away
Fylamarid
Leap
Legacy's Allure
Manta Riders
Thalakos Mistfolk
Theft Of Dreams
Treasure Trove
Wind Drake
Carnophage
Clot Sliver
Dark Banishing
Dauthi Horror
Dauthi Marauder
Dauthi Slayer
Lab Rats
Necrologia
Perish
Serpent Warrior
Spinal Graft
Vampire Hounds
Wall Of Souls
Booby Trap
Coiled Tinviper
Skyshaper
Thopter Squadron
Dracoplasm
Spontaneous Combustion
Vec Townships

Here's the deck I finally went with (and why I picked the cards):
Aftershock - GREAT removal
Lightning Blast - Direct Damage (duh)
Lowland Giant -Nice Big Creature
Reckless Ogre - Big Creature, even though his toughness is 1
Shatter - Nothing wrong with artifact removal
Wall Of Diffusion - A big wall that can block shadow creatures is always handy
Lancers-en-Kor - Very Nice Creature
Master Decoy - Good for getting things out of your way (like walls)
Reaping the Rewards - Good surprise value. Let's you survive those extra couple turns
Shield Mate - I needed another creature (he usually was the card I would sideboard out)
Smite - Removal (duh)
Soltari Champion - Fun creature to have around when attacking (people forget about his ability)
Carnophage - A good creature to hoard in your hand or get out early
Clot Sliver - Regeneration. Also combos well with the Lancers and the Spontaneous Combustion
Dark Banishing - Removal (duh)
Dauthi Horror - He's got shadow
Dauthi Marauder - He's got shadow (he also seems to have a big bulls eye painted on him too)
Dauthi Slayer - He's got shadow (and he makes Mike and I snicker)
Lab Rats - Gets you lots of creatures in the late game when all your doing is laying land
Serpent Warrior - A big creature. Worth the three damage in my opinion
Wall Of Souls - A wall that deters people from attacking at all
Coiled Tinviper - An all around good creature
Thopter Squadron - I needed another creature and thought that a 3/3 flier was alright
Spontaneous Combustion - Mass Removal.
6 Mountains
5 Plains
5 Swamps

I wanted to squeeze in the repentance and the skyshaper but I just didn't have the room. All of the non-creatures in this deck are removal of some sort except for the lab rats (which kinda counts as a creature). About the only cards that I ever sideboarded in were the Repentance and the Perish (of course)

ROUND 1 vs. Jeff Bryant

Jeff was also playing a red / white / black deck

Game 1- I had a slow draw in the beginning of this one and he got out a carnophage and started whooping up with it. I aftershocked that. He cast some more creatures. Eventually I cast Spontaneous Combustion and then just got out a bunch of creatures and attacked.

Game 2 - He got no swamps and probably a fist full of black cards. It's kind of hard to defend when you can't cast a large portion of your deck.

Match 1-0-0
Game 2-0

ROUND 2 vs. Joseph Wimmer

Joe was playing White and some other colors. It was the white that really irritated me though. That's why I remember it.

Game 1 - Ah, mana screw strikes me hard and fast. I mount some kind of floundery defense but its all to no avail as he pacifies my only good blocker and takes me down.

Game 2 - He seems to have a hard time drawing creatures in the early game. I manage to beat him down to three life before the tide turns the other way and he starts hitting me. He pacifies one of my creatures and bullwhips some others into destruction. All this time I'm sitting there with a Lightning Blast in my hand and no mountains anywhere in sight. My life total gets lower and lower and LOWER. He gets me down to seven before the damn mountain showed up. If he had any sort of life gaining I think I would have just cried.

Game 3 - He gets mana screwed early on and then we go back and forth for a while. The pacifism and Bullwhip make another obnoxious appearance. I also make my bonehead move of the day. I have a master decoy and some shadow creatures out. He has out one non-shadow creature (his only creature). So what do I, in my infinite wisdom, do? Well I proudly tap a white mana and tap my decoy and say I'll tap your creature and attack. Well what the #&!! was the point in that? Fortunately it didn't cost me the game but it was still a dumb move.

Match 2-0-0
Game 4-1

ROUND 3 vs.Jeff Kuc (or Kue or something, I can't read my writing)

Game 1 - Well the early game really sucked as he got out a veritable parade of rootwallas and other obnoxious things. I get out a wall, the lancers en-Kor, a clot sliver, and enough other stuff to force an unsteady stalemate. Finally I draw a Spontaneous Combustion. I attack with everything and cast the combustion. redirect all the damage from the Kor to the sliver and regenerate it. I cast some other creature I'd been hoarding and claw my way to a win.

Game 2 - I get out a bunch of shadow he gets out a Wall of Diffusion. Figures. I finally scrounge up one of my own and we sit there and glare at each other over our walls for a while. He aftershocks my wall and comes over for a while. The master decoy comes to my rescue and allows me to tap his wall and attack with the pair of giants that had been twiddling their thumbs most of the game. I believe that a perish was involved in this game somewhere too.

Match 3-0-0
Game 6-1

ROUND 4 - Mike Livengood

Game 1 - He gets out some creatures and I think that I'm going to be all clever and Spontaneous Combustion them away. I'm pretty pleased with myself until he counters the combustion. So I'm forced to resort to slowly doing away with his creatures. He knocks me down to 3 life before I can finally keep him off of me. Then the lab rats come to my rescue and overwhelm him.

Game 2 - I start off with a carnophage and am able to do some damage when out pops a paladin en-Vec. Sigh. Oh well. So then he gets out a couple of mean green creatures of some sort and slaps like hero's resolve and some other enchantment on them. Well that was a great time to perish. *whew*. We went back and forth with creatures for a while and I eventually won.

Match 4-0-0
Game 7-1

ROUND 5 - Rob Wagner

So Rob says to the four of us who are 4 - 0, "If we all take intentional draws for the next two rounds we will all be in the final 8." So we go back and forth for a while. My opinion is that I'll do what everybody else wants to do. Finally the four of us decide to take the draws. According to Rob, the plan couldn't lose. Of course the next two hours found me nervously scanning the rankings sheet and scribbling down scores and trying to make absolutely, positively, sure that everything would work out okay. One of the other two guys was deck checked during our discussion and it was discovered that he was missing an island or something dumb like that (a case where the person dropped a card or something). He was penalized by the loss of a game (as is customary). His opponent COULD HAVE decided not to draw and would have probably won. But he didn't and that was a pretty cool thing to do. Some of the judges and "spectators" were a little critical of that decision and thought that it was silly and he should have played it out. The judges were also convinced that the one of the four of us had screwed ourselves out of final eight by our actions. (Actually the math DID work out and all my worrying was for nothing).

Match 4-0-1
Game 8-1

ROUND 6 vs. Rob Gardner

I think the judges didn't like our colluding crap too much because this time they took each of the top four matches aside privately and asked each pair if they were going to play or draw (so to speak). Well Rob and I looked at our sheet and decided that we would still draw (trusting on the others to draw as well). Well everything fell the way it was supposed to and everyone was happy. Well, except maybe for Rob Wagner who was forced to play a 4-1-0 game. I wonder if that match up was assigned since he was the one who came up with this whole scheme. The taking each pair individually thing was a really good idea to prevent this sort of situation and should probably be done in the near final rounds of most major tournaments.

Match 4-0-2
Game 8-1

Well I somehow bumbled my way into the final eight as the fifth seed. This was the first time I had ever been in the final eight of a PTQ so I was pretty excited. It was also the first time I had ever Rochester Drafted. I understood the mechanics of the draft already. Just not the strategy. My drafting skills are horrible anyway. Some people like to complain how the guy next to them would screw them over by drafting all "their" cards or all the good cards or something. Well, NO KIDDING. That's the way the game is played. People did that to me the whole time. That's the point! You have to be able to do well even with those hardships. One strangely odd thing was how everyone came clustering around the drafting table. I was at a PTQ in Akron a while back (the Game Trader people run some FINE tournaments by the way) and they kept all spectators away from the drafting table. It was kind of weird having people hovering over me. But if you can't take the heat....
I was really lousy at drafting since it was my first time (it was the first time for a lot of people at that table). Here's what I drafted so you can laugh at me.

Craven Giant
Duct Crawler
Flowstone Hellion
Flowstone Shambler
Mogg Maniac
Price Of Progress
Raging Goblin
Ravenous Baboons
Wall Of Diffusion
Hero's Resolve
Bequeathal
Broken Fall
Charging Rhino
Rootbreaker Wurm
Rabid Wolverines
Spined Wurm
Wall Of Blossoms
Contempt
Counterspell
Dream Cache
Ertai, Wizard Adept
Fade Away
Forbid (2)
Fylamarid
Killer Whale
Leap (2)
Mnemonic Sliver
Shadow Rift
Sift
Spell Blast
Theft Of Dreams
Crovax The Cursed
Cursed Flesh
Dark Banishing
Dauthi Ghoul
Dauthi Jackal
Death's Duet
Lab Rats (2)
Serpent Warrior
Thrull Surgeon
Coiled Tinviper
Lotus Petal

Here's the deck: (such as it is)
Broken Fall
Charging Rhino
Rootbreaker Wurm
Rabid Wolverines
Spined Wurm
Wall Of Blossoms
Counterspell
Dream Cache
Ertai, Wizard Adept
Forbid (2)
Fylamarid
Killer Whale
Mnemonic Sliver
Sift
Crovax The Cursed
Dark Banishing
Dauthi Ghoul
Dauthi Jackal
Death's Duet
Lab Rats
Serpent Warrior
Thrull Surgeon
Coiled Tinviper
5 Forests
7 Islands
4 Swamps
Here's a tip kids: Playing three colors in drafting is a BAD idea.

QUARTER FINALS vs. Rob Gardner

I was supposed to play Rob before but we drew. Now we finally get to face off. this was his first time in the final eight too.

Game 1 - He crushed me. He got out all sorts of stuff and I just Sat There And Cried (TM).

Game 2 - Another good buttkicking. I almost had enough mana to do something until he stone rained my swamp. Then I was all set for a buyback forbid stall tactic. Except I couldn't draw a second island to save my life. He beat on me and I just Sat There And Cried (TM).

Matches 4-1-2
Games 8-3

Oh well. For my troubles I got half a box of Tempest Starters. Half of which went to my teammate and good buddy Mike Tidrick. Unfortunately there was nothing overly spectacular in the boxes, except for maybe a Rathi Dragon and a Verdant Force. The tournament was run well except that some of the lower level judges didn't know what they were talking about sometimes. Everyone I played against was really cool and I will definitely have to go to the next tournament that's in the area.

Chris D'Andrea
Team Twisty