From: Stephen Edney Subject: Regional report NSW Regionals Report A tournament report that was originally intended to be brief more for my record than anything else, but here it is if anyone is interested. Didn't come in for the Friday night festivities so I turned up at about 8:30 and registered then. I was anxious to start. We got into the deck registration which was done pretty effieciently and then got our decks back and began building. I was pretty happy with my deck. Not as good as the one I got in Paris, but it had definite possibilities. Particularly nice was 3 big flyers, 2 Breezekeepers and a Cerulean Wyvern, a rockslide, green guildmage, a Reckless Embermage and a Quiron Ranger and Quiron Druid. Still I had no direct damage but I did have a number of solid creatures, as well as some fast ones- Lancers & Mtenda Lions that always seemed to come out first turn. First round my opponent didn't turn up. Pretty strange as he paid his money, had been there the night before and in the morning, and just didn't turn up. Apparently he played on day 2 and I don't know what the reason was for his absence on day 1. 2nd Round Eddy Lee I won 2-0 3rd Round Jim Bandas I won 2-0 4th Round Simon Leung I won 2-1 - I lost the first game, with a large part of it being due to the fact that I took six points of mana burn when I tried to Rockslide 2 flying creatures. Fortunately I won the 2nd 2 games so I managed to not be punished too hard for my stupidity. 5th Round Rod Ho I lost 0-2 can't remember too many specifics except that Rod managed to Ray of Command my Breezekeeper and kill my Kukemssa Serpent and both games ended with large torch. curse all those fortunate enough to get direct damage. I also remeber that when I phased out my breezekeeper I began doing the same to my lancer, until Rod stopped me. He then gave shit about it all weekend (I probably deserved it too :-) ) 6th Round Egidio De Gois I won 2-0 7th Round Wayne Lawson I lose 2-1 I win the first and am 1 turn away from killing him in both last 2 games but I get Incinerated/Fireblasted and Volcanic Geysered/Fireblasted for 12. Bloody direct damage grumble grumble. I'm 9th after day 1, 5-2, I would have liked to go 6-1 after having started 4-0 but I'm reasonably happy. I decide to go home and get some sleep rather than play all night. I decide to play the deck I played at SAGA last monday, the one that Greg Cantori thought his deck was superior to. Next morning, arrive about 8:40 register the deck. Apparently there has been a bit of a stuff up about what time we were meant to start so we start about 20 minutes late. 1st Round Kevin Cheng I win 2-0. Kev's playing the Red 'Cheese' deck, a deck I was to see quite a bit more of later in the day. Can't remember many specifics about the games 2nd Round Kim Brebach I win 2-0. Kim's playing a UGW? deck that bounces creatures and locks you down. I win the first game in a fairly protracted game. 2nd Game Kim is Mana screwed and I win easily. 3rd Round Rod Ho I win 2-0. Rod's also playing the Red 'Cheese' deck some good attackers (centaurs I think) deal a bit of damage and then I finish him off he fails to draw much burn. 2nd Game after a defensive start I draw lots of burn (I sided in my X spells) and double incinerate, Torch eaarthquake Rod to death. A different play on his part could have forced a draw given the cards I had, but Rod guessed wrong in a toough judgment call. 4th Round Jamie May I win 2-0. Jamie is playing a Black weenie deck (necro?) with drains. This is my decks favourite fodder. All my main deck weenie cards are useful for a change. I win the first when after pecking away with a couple of river boas I go for a 12pt rush with 2 sandstalkers and both boas to win game 1. 2nd game Jamie is mana screwed I assist him by pillaging a land and he vampiric tutors for one. I win after he never gets a go on. 5th Round Lenny Collins I lose 1-0. A long first game sees me knock lenny down to 1 and just fail in doing the last point of damage. We don't finish the second game, where a well protected Cop Red shuts me down. 6th Round Darren Williams I lose 2-0. Darren is also playing the Red 'Cheese' deck. He burns me both games assisted in one by my not drawing anything that could impede or kill a sandstalker. 7th Round Howard Mak playing Mono blue. After realising that we will make the team no matter what we do and possibly top 8 for the winner we play and I win 2-0. Howard seems to believe he can't win these games but in reality I'm scared of Big blue (even though I usually seem to beat it) and he appears to give up a bit. I don't think he was playing his best. After a short delay while the organisers compute and check the combined tallies the top 8 and top 18 are announced. 10-4 makes top 8, 9-5 makes top 18 (with one 8-3-2) almost exactly as I had predicted last week. It was now a battle for bragging rights. 1/4 final I play Darren Williams again. First game Darren tries to get some Sandstalkers though, but I deal with them and then begin hitting him with my creatures and then burn him to death. 2nd Game Darren manages to slip through some early damage. A Sibliant Spirit stops my attack and then Darren blows away my green blockers and starts hitting me with it until I get low enough for the inevitable cheesy end. Third game I get hit early by Sandstalkers but then manage to kill them and begin hiting him with burn and a Storm Shaman. In the end I need to do 4 damage I pump the shaman by 4 taking 2 damage he holding 4 cards and I expect a response, either nuking the shaman or possibly forcing a draw then he shows me his hand - 4 land. I win. woo woo. I'm paired to play Rod again after he beat Michael Landers. Rod and I chat for a while about what we have to do to beat each others decks. We eventually decide to play even though the Lenny-Ben 1/4 final hasn't finished. We play and Rod wins the first. He gets a couple of hits in on me with Sandstalkers. I have an Orgg and a puny Lhurgoyf (2/3). Orgg hits home Rod is down to 14. My go I have possibly 8 points of creature damage and 2 Hammers in Hand = 14 points, but only 5 Mana! I hit him with Orgg and hope I don't die before my next turn. It's in vain as I die to a combination of Fireblast and other burn. 2nd Game Rod is Mana screwed slightly at first. but he pyrokinesis my sandstalker, I draw few creatures with which to take advantage of the Mana screw, but instead draw 4 Incinerates, 1 Torch and an Earthquake. I incinerate him once at the end of his turn. Next turn I Incinerate him 3 times at the end of his turn. He is on 7 (took a Mana burn early on) I'm on 13 I attack with a Sandstalker I have 2 Land untapped Mountain, forest and wall of roots. I hadn't played a land. Rod Incinerates the Sandstalker, otherwise there was a risk I could play a land and burn him to death. I torch him for 2 putting him on 5. In his turn he does nothing except play land. I quake for 5, and Rod fireblasts me 3 times (last unnecessary) to draw the game. It's now 1.5 - 0.5. 3rd game I stall at 3 land, I take a risk and play a Sylvan rather than discard. Stupid. I should have discarded it to make sure I can Incinerate any passing Ball Lightning or sandstalker. I get hit by a Ball lightning. I'm now in strike range I have a jokulhaups in hand and can see from my sylvan that I can cast it in 3 turns holding a land and glacier in hand. I don't last that long and I die the turn before I can pull it off. I can write this game down to a stupid mistake. Rod wins 2.5 - 0.5. So I'm out and if Lenny beats Phil, come in 3rd because of swiss ranking. I consider staying to find out the result of the other semi is but decide to go home instead. A good tournament. Thanks to the organisers, sponsers etc and hope the nationals run just as smoothly. Steve Edney