Subject: Team Deadguy Uber Alles, a tourney report From: David Price Date: 1997/02/09 Message-Id: <32FE4422.6F1F@cornell.edu> Team Deadguy visits the city of brotherly love: We show up the night before the Philly PT Qualifier and $1,000 tournament. Chris Pikula, David Bartholow, Tony Tsai, and I drive down from Ithaca, NY, and we meet Worth Wollpert (who rolled in from Pittsburg) and Bob Kline, who drove all of the way up from Tennessee. Much playtesting and Rochester drafting goes on, and everyone makes last minute deck decisions but me. I'm happy with what I have together. The next morning, after too little sleep, the tournaments begin. Bob, Worth, and I are all playing in the Paris PTQ; David Bartholow and Tony are playing in the Sealed Deck; and I convince Chris to play "Black Ice" in the new Type II tournament. I'm playing my Sligh deck in expectation that alot of people will copy Chris' Black/Red Necro deck from the Duelist Sideboard... 1st round vs. B/W deck I'm not too clear on the details, here, but I beat him 2-0. The first game, he actually managed to play an Ivory Gargoyle and a Serra Angel, but I just bolted him to death the turn after he played the Angel. The second game, he gets somewhat mana-screwed and I run him over with Gorilla Shamans and Ironclaw Orcs. Match record: 1-0 Game record: 2-0 2nd round vs. B/u deck The deck was bizarre; it had Hypnotic Spectres, Icequakes, a Hymn, a Rack, a Zur's Weirding, Mystical Tutors, Pumpknights, Lakes, and Drain Lifes... I handily beat him 2-0, although the second game wasn't much of a contest because he got a Lake of the Dead draw. I checked after the match, and he was not playing with Necropotence. Match record: 2-0 Game record: 4-0 3rd round vs. Erik Lauer's mono-black Necro deck Erik Lauer has recently been rocking the Gray Matter tournament scene with his mono-blue type II deck. He's an excellent player, and I expected a close contest. The first game was really close; he Necro'd down to 10 life, and I had out a Dwarven Miner, an Ironclaw Orc, a Dragon Whelp, and 4 mountains. Erik had no blockers up, and he realized he made a mistake; if I drew a mountain, I could do 10 points of damage. However, I only drew a Goblin Balloon Brigade, and he Drain Life'd me to death the next turn. I sideboarded in 4 Pyrokinesis, and I won the next two games. Between Pillages and Erik's bad luck, Erik had mana problems, and I managed to overwhelm him fairly quickly. Match record: 3-0 Game record: 6-1 4th round vs. fellow Team Deadguy member, Worth Wollpert Worth was playing a W/u Winter Orb deck which was very similar to the one used in Dallas by Mario Robaina and Jason Zila. I knew I would have problems against it. I managed to win the first game, although the last 3 points of damage was excruciatingly painful. I sideboarded in Anarchies, Goblin Tinkerers, and more Dwarven Miners, and I took out the Dragon Whelps, the Hammers, and the Fireball. The next game Worth was able to deck me with the help of restricted card madness (Balance/Zuran Orb). In the third game, I had a little restricted card madness of my own, with a first turn Black Vise and a second turn Strip Mine. The Vise ended up doing at least 8 points of damage, and I finished him off with a few weenies and bolts. Match record: 4-0 Game record: 8-2 5th round vs. mono-red burn: At this point, the entire head table (the top 6) was playing mono-red. There were 4 Sligh decks and 2 Burn decks. I got to play one of the burn decks. The kid was pretty young, but he seemed to know what he was doing. We split the first two games; I Black Vised him the first game, and he Vised me the second game. The little extra damage of a first turn Black Vise did the trick with mono-red on mono-red. The third game was a nailbiter; I have out a Goblin Tinkerer and an Ironclaw Orc, and he goes, "Volcanic Dragon, attack you for 4." Scary. So I'm hitting him for three a turn, and he's hitting me for 4 a turn. I bring my Hammer back to my hand when I'm at 8 life, and I'm praying he doesn't have any direct damage to finish me off. He doesn't. He hits me with the Dragon, bringing me down to 4, and the next turn, I attack with my trusty Orc and Goblin, and follow it up with a Hammer and an Incinerate. Match record: 5-0 Game record: 10-3 6th round vs. Joe Weber playing a Sligh deck: I see Joe alot up at the touraments in Syracuse, NY, and I've got alot of respect for him. He is 4-0-1 at this point, and we are allowed to intentional draw. We do. Match record: 5-0-1 So I'm in the final 8. The final 8 decks are really bizarre; they consist of one G/W Armageddon deck, one Necro deck, one W/u Winter Orb deck, and 5 mono-red decks. Wierd, wierd, wierd... Round of 8 vs. Necro deck: My opponent was a really nice guy. He appeared to be playing McCabe's Necro deck. He told me that he was more of a spectator than serious tournament player, and that he watched me play some at PT-Columbus. That made me happy, that Magic actually had the potential of being a spectator sport... My opponent played well, but he didn't manage to get his Drain Life's. He won the first game with a 5/5 Sengir Vampire (damn Contagioning my Dragon Whelps). The next two games were very close, but the McCabe Necro deck has so few creatures, that against a deck with as much removal as the Sligh deck, it *needs* the Drain Lifes in order to win. He didn't get them. He impressed me, however, in that he didn't sideboard out the Necros against me. Many players sideboard the Necros out against Sligh, and its a mistake. Anyway, I won 2-1. Quarterfinals vs. Worth, again, playing W/u Winter Orb: The games go pretty much the same. I manage to squeak out a victory in the first game. During the second game, Worth shut me down with a protected COP:Red (after he Hydroblasted my first two Anarchies, I conceided). In the final game I manage to pull a first turn Black Vise against him, which did 5 points of damage to him before he was forced to Disenchant it. Meanwhile, I was giving him the beatdown with Goblin Tinkerers and Gorilla Shamans. Two or three turns and a Pillage later, I won. I definitely got lucky pulls vs. Worth, and he had the added disadvantage of being sick that day. Finals vs. some guy from Seattle playing mono-red: Earlier in the day, when I was playing Worth in the Swiss, and Bob Kline was playing Joe Weber (we were all undefeated at that point), this guy came over and started watching our games (he was undefeated, as well). I said to him, "You probably shouldn't watch our matches, because some people consider that to be scouting." He said, "okay," and he kept watching. A minute or two later, Worth said to him, "I'd appreciate it if you would leave." He said, "okay," and he kept on watching. Finally, we had to call over a judge to make him leave. Well this is the guy I had to play in the finals; it annoyed me that before both my match and his match before mine against Joe Weber (I was sitting next to them), he told both myself and Joe Weber what we were playing. Those games that he had watched were Joe and I playing against Winter Orb decks, so most of our deck was out on the table. Irritating. Anway, I played this guy, whose name I don't happen to remember, and he beat me down 2-0. He was trash talking alittle during the match, which irritated me, as well; he would try to rush me, but I don't think I let it affect my playing. He played Ball Lightenings, direct damage, Disks, Mishra's, and Wildfire Emissaries. He thought it was an original deck design. I was happy for him. So anyway, I qualified for Paris, minus the $500. Such is life. Hopefully, I'll win alittle more than that in either Paris or LA. As for the others, David Bartholow gave Tony Tsai the beat-down on his way to winning the $1,000 tournament (although he split with his opponent in the finals). Tony later redeemed himself by winning a Type II side tournament. Bob Kline just barely missed the cut for the final 8 in the PTQ. Chris Pikula sucked it up with "Black Ice," going 3-2 in the Type II due to one horrible draw and one horrible matchup. He later proved that he is truly a Pro Player by losing $40 in ante to the New Jersey kids. And that's all, folks. David Price Team Deadguy dep6@cornell.edu