Subject: [REPORT] WW/u 6/12/98 Date: Thu, 18 Jun 98 09:16:00 PDT From: Bob Mungovan - To: Tournament Report June 12, 1998; The Jester’s Court; Phoenix, Arizona I’ve only started playing in tournaments over the last 3-4 months, and then I only play every other week or so. Adulthood can be so demanding. I’ve always intended to write tourney reports, because when I first started checking out magic resources on the ‘net, they were my favorite. I always saw them as “how the rest of the world plays magic.” I’ve been playing casually for about two years. At any rate, here’s the deck: 15 Plains 2 Adarkar Wastes 1 Gemstone Mine 2 Mox Diamond 2 Lotus Petal 4 Soltari Priest 4 White Knight 4 Soltari Foot Soldier 3 Soltari Monk 3 Warrior en-Kor 3 Freewind Falcon 3 Tithe 2 Disenchant 3 Armageddon 4 Crusade 3 Empyrial Armor 2 Aura of Silence Sideboard (as always, very specific to environment) 4 Sleight of Mind 3 Honorable Passage 2 Wrath of God 2 Cursed Totem 2 Disenchant 2 Aura of Silence This is the most recent incarnation of an ever-evolving deck that has been tweaked little by little over my last few visits to Jester’s. I generally expect a lot of Red (But it’s a dry heat) and like to be prepared for combo driven decks. Suicide Black has reared it’s head lately, but already seems to be on the decline. I hate Tradewinds. The Sleights, Blue mana and artifact mana are the most recent additions. Some say the sleights should be main deck, but the main deck is set for Red and Black, which I’m usually going to face. It’s been a few days, so I won’t go on about how miserable the bus system is in Phoenix, but I almost missed the tournament. Not the usual turnout because Arizona Collector’s Paradise was running some sort of big-money weekend long tournament so some of the top players were absent. There were 26 people, usually it’s 36-40. Round 1 Randy Powell U/R Counter-Frenetic The game of dumb mistakes. Game 1 I put out an Aura of Silence just in case and maybe to draw a counter. Next turn I try to drop a Diamond and then ‘geddon. I realize the Aura is out and back it up. I could have grabbed control here, but didn’t. I lose the second game by panicking. I have a Freewind out and maybe a Crusade. He has a Frenetic and an Air Elemental. He’s tapped out, so I slight the Falcon to blue in order to block the Elemental. He incinerates the chicken and wins the match. 0-1, 0-2 Round 2 Lephi Multi-color Green I forget most except that I beat him 2-0 pretty quickly. Shadow beatdown pretty much I think. I saw some MOWs, Spike feeders and Sex monkeys, but that’s all I really remember. I vaguely recall not seeing a Tradewind, one of my deck’s biggest problems. 1-1, 2-2 Round 3 Royal Typical Celerity-Sligh A tight match. I win the first when he’s a little land screwed. He never sees a 4th mountain. He wins the second when he out races me. Third game: I’m at 11 he’s at 5 (so we’re both pretty low) he has 3 creatures out, 2 Mogg Fanatics, a Suq’ata Lancer, then he casts a Ball Lightning. He attacks and I Passage the Ball. Good Match. 2-1, 4-3 Round 4 T.J. Mono-Green Fat/Overrun I hear that there’s going to be top 8 elimination after the 4 rounds Swiss. So there’s an outside chance I can actually make the elimination rounds. My opponent starts by asking if I will be flexible in letting him do some of the mana-math and allow him to take it back if he screws up. I agree, I’m a flexible enough guy. I win the first game with an Armageddon. He could have returned two forests with his Quirion Elves, but doesn’t. Beatdown commences. He wins the second with a fat Llanowar Behemoth. Third game: I have a White Knight sleighted to pro-green. He casts Overrun and attacks with 2 Behemoths, and an elf. I block a behemoth, leaving me at one life. He’s pretty upset, because he’s under the impression that the knight should take damage, die and then I should take the trample. I argue the damage is reduced to zero. The Judge agrees with me. He’s still in disbelief. I try to explain all the aspects of protection from color. At any rate I win. 3-1, 6-4. I come in 9th place, as all my opponents had lousy win percentages. At least one dropped early. Oh well. It was my best showing. I don’t know if I have any plans to tweak before next time. I can’t wait to get back. Pat O’Boyle, my teammate on our little low-profile Team Cranberry Lambic went through the elimination rounds starting with the seventh seed, to finish second. Pat was running a fairly typical Suicide Black that amazingly beat 2 red decks to make the finals, losing to Eric Householder’s Burn/Tongs/Scroll/Ensnaring Bridge. A pretty wicked design. Well, a good showing all in all. I think I’m really ready to take up the mantle of White Weenie player, as a teammate yesterday was ready to give me a lot of his whit Exodus commons, “I’ll never use them,” he says, assuming I’ll want them. I also like it because, at Jester’s it’s a “rogue” deck no one else really plays. Take it easy, Bob Mungovan