De: Carlos Mao Para: Frank Kusumoto Data: Domingo, 30 de Agosto de 1998 11:58 Assunto: Extended tournament report Dear Frank: It was a pleasure to meet you in person at Seattle during Worlds. I am writing this report because you complained that I had not sent you anything for a while, so here it goes. I took my son Felipe to see the Worlds as a birthday gift. I roomed at UW with all the other Brazilians, including the Brazilian team and had a great time. Packing some decks to participate in the side events, I decided to adapt a type 2 countersliver deck used by Mani in the Brazilian Nationals to extended. With this deck I played 2 side tournaments and won them both. My son used it twice and won one, and lost in the semifinals to a deck heavily sideboarded against it (4 pyroblasts and 4 pyroclasms). So its record until now was 11-1-1. This weekend I went to play in an extremely tough extended tournament at Merlin. There were 89 players competing for only 1 spot in the final 16 tournament that qualifies one player for GP Lisbon. In this 89, there were a lot of top level players from several Brazilian cities, not just S.Paulo. While in Seattle, two of my friends who were playing in the Brazilian team took an interest in the deck. Marco Machado (Pirajinha) decided to use it in this Merlin tournament and Marcello Leone made his own version of it to play in the final 16 tournament. For this Merlin tournament he loaned the deck to another friend of ours, who was a member of the Brazilian team at Worlds last year, Thomas Felsberg. Attesting to the qualities of Leone as a deckbuilder and Thomas as a player, Thomas placed first after the 5-round Swiss. Pirajinha and I also qualified for the direct elimination rounds after the Swiss. The deck: 4 crystal slivers 4 muscle slivers 3 flying slivers 3 victual slivers 4 counterspell 2 mana leak 2 force of will 3 tradewind riders 3 men of war 2 disenchant 2 armaggedon 2 uktabi monkeys 2 firestorm 3 tithe 4 savannah 4 tundra 2 volcanic island 2 tropical island 2 flood plains 1 plains 4 island 1 undiscovered 1 city of brass Sideboard: As always, varies. Since I expected a lot of Sligh, some discard and some Living death, I played this tournament with 4 hydroblasts, 2 disenchant, 2 honorable passages, 2 disrupts, 2 Mangara's blessing, 2 Tormod's crypt and 1 winter orb. First round: Tiago from Guarulhos, with a RGu land destruction deck with Ernhams. First game: Deal with land destruction with a couple of tithes. Put out some slivers, I am slowed down by propaganda, have to chump block an Ernham, but eventually win at 5 life. Second game: Put in more disenchants, hydros and disrupts, have an easier time and win at 13 life. Matches: 1-0 Games: 2-0 Second round: Xuxa, excellent player from Rio playing white weenie with red splash First game: Lose the toss, but open an excellent hand with city, tundra, mana leak, counterspell, crystal, muscle and tradewind. He lays down plains, I play the tundra, it is wastelanded, I draw monkey, geddon, geddon, tradewind, and die to an armored priest. Xuxa smartly plays only plains so I only sideboard the extra disenchants for the second game, since I saw only white. Second game: I mulligan and go with a four land, 2 man of war hand. Don't draw a counter, get a crystal sliver pyroblasted once, am wrathed twice for 5 creatures and lose again. Matches: 1-1 Games: 2-2 Third round: Pedro with a scrubbish BW deck with knights and Serra angels, swords and banishings First game: I am doing quite well after laying down a crystal, a victual and a muscle sliver. After Pedro is at 7 life, he summons a Serra, I don't have a counter and don't draw a flying sliver, firestorm or counter to stop the angel even though I had a couple of men of war to slow things down. I lose. Second game: I lay down a sliver, man of war a knight, summon a tradewind, geddon and win easily. Third game: Pedro rituals 2 black pumpknights and I have only 2 crystal slivers!, so I am taking 5 per turn. I chump block once with a flying sliver to keep alive, topdeck a firestorm and win one that I thought was gone. Matches: 2-1 Games: 4-3 Fourth round: Daniel with a straight blue counter deck First game: Sneak in a couple of slivers past a barrage of counters. Daniel gets down 3 Mishra's and we are beating each other. Get Daniel to 2 cards in hand and do the lay down the sixth land, geddon, counter your counter thing for the win. Second game: Put in the disrupts and the orb. Pull some counters out with creatures, manage to put down a couple of them, geddon with a counter and a force of will backup (needed to use both) for the win. Matches: 3-1 Games: 6-3 Fifth round: Intentional draw since 32 would go to the direct elimination rounds Matches: 3-1-1 Games: 6-3 Direct elimination rounds: First round: Tiago, with a straight green oath of druids deck, no big creatures, just gnomes and feeders, with cursed scrolls, ensnaring bridges, scalding tongs, null brooch, creeping molds, vineyards. First game: It is a looong game. I start out good, but no flying sliver means I bog down after he lays out the first oath. I just keep drawing slivers with no disenchants or tradewinds while he eventually lays down 4 oaths and controls the game at 40+ life, despite my by now massive sliver beatdown. I give up to try to have time for another game, although I thought that time would end before we could finish a second game. Tiago, to his credit, did not stall while sideboarding and shuffling. Second game: Tiago draws 3 wastelands (!) in the first 4-5 turns and leaves me with only a tropical island. He makes an error and plays a vineyard. I use it to destroy a scroll with a monkey, man of war my monkey to destroy a bridge, hit him with my creatures, until a turn before he dies, he topdecks a bridge with no cards in hand. I in turn, topdeck a disenchant for a 5-minute win. Third game: Tiago opens with mox, land, oath. He gets a feeder and a scragnoth, gains life, when time is up. We draw, but I am eliminated for having less life than him. Matches:3-1-2 Games:7-4-1. So now I am retiring this deck, but it performed credibly, with a match record of 14-2-3. Pirajinha beat Tiago in the next round, avenging my loss, but the winner of this tournament turned out to be Thomas with Leone's deck. Next day Leone would win the final 16 tournament and win the trip to the Lisbon GP using his deck, an outgrowth of mine, and clearly a better version. Best regards, Carlos Mao