From: mablake@indyvax.iupui.edu (MAJ) Newsgroups: rec.games.trading-cards.magic.strategy Subject: [Report]You have to read it to believe it! Date: 3 Aug 97 23:46:18 -0500 The thursday before the state championships I tried to get anyone and everyone to play me in magic. Unfortunatly college students have sucky summer jobs that require them to work second shift or night shift. So the only person I had to practice against was my friend Don. He was going to the tourney also so I figured he would make a good opponent. He has a very strategic mind and his magic decks are usually really good. He brought a red/green deck over to play me with. I had the two decks I posted on here except the maro/geddon deck had more maros and less creeping molds and both sideboards were totally revamped and rocked. So it was maro/geddon and straight red versus red/green. Well to make a long story short, I won some god awfull number of games. Only losing once to a mana screw with the maro deck. I think I won 9 games. Only two were with the red deck. For some reason he refused to play it. I'm feeling pretty confident my deck just worked like 7 times so I chose green/white. Don claims he hates his deck and ask to borrow my red one for the tounament. I loan it to him and think (foolishly) that two decks I designed may have a shot at the tourney. Saturday: The Goal line always runs excellent tourneys and this was no exception. Before round one I give Don some money to run to mcdonalds since we both figure his match should take at most ten minutes. Round 1 Red/Green My opponent seemed a little nervous thoughtout the match but so was I. First turn he starts and drops a forest. I have (the only) cop:red in my deck in my hand and I pray he is playing red green. My prayers are answered and he drops a second turn mountain. I am sitting there thinking I have him. Little did he know that I was holding two disenchants and a feldons cane in my hand. (All worthless against his deck) He proceeds to bloodlust and giant growth his way to victory. I drew no swords(had 4) One wrath(which I used but it didn't matter he dropped a creature next turn) and finally no caps(4) and no barbed foliage(1) He kept attacking me with lions and little critters. Sideboard in all stuff to kill him sideout all worthless cards(disenchants) Game 2: I wrath I geddon he discards I furnace. This goes on until I remove 30 or so of his cards from the game including capping 3 land. I am loving it until my deck self destructs again. I drew one wrath and no swords in this game and no other creature stoppers(icys, 2 from sideboard) He gets a forest. plays Sprite:Sprite:giant growth and kills me again. I count my wraths and swords and sure enough I have 4 of each. Whats up with that? I just lost to red/green which I beat repeatedly on thursday. This guy beat me with one land.......AAAGGGGHHHHH!!!!!! Match 0-2 points:zip Match 2: I seem to always lose my first match. Not always, I won in the first tourney first match but every tourney after round 3 I have always been 2-1 so I think no problem. Game 1: I draw my cop:red. He plays a forest.(guess where I am going with this) Second turn he plays a mountain. I play my Cop:red. He casts little critters. First a centaur, then a giant mantis. At this point I asked him his tournament experience. This is his first tourney. He cast some little creature and then sacks it to natural order for a shambling strider. I die. I believe in all honesty I had the same cards I drew in game one against my first opponent. You know 2 disenchants and a feldons and a ton of mana. Not to mention the furnace. What the heck is wrong with my deck? I haven't seen maro geddon yet. I swear I had four of each in there. Game 2: I sideboard exactly like first match. He plays a bunch of critters. I hold him off. I am holding no creature removal when he plays sentinel and brings out all 4. I draw a wrath when he has 7 creatures on the table. I smile play it. He draws shambling plays it. I die four turns later. Match 0-2 Games0-4 Points don't ask Now heres the funny part: After round 3 I looked at my previous two opponents records. They were both 1-2. Match 3 versus Don: Let me for the record just say that I never claimed I was a good deck builder. Don ran into cop:red standard in his first opponents deck and an even faster deck then mine in round 2. I didn't see it. I don't know. I did see his first match, well some of it anyway and he did make alot of playing mistakes. By the way: I was the one that went to mcdonalds because Don's match lasted longer then mine. We joked before the first game and I should have conceeded. I didn't. He double fireblasted me to death on round 5. The second game I sideboard in my whole sideboard, almost. I took out the swords and wraths cause I knew they were useless. Game 2 I drew cop red and then geddon, then maro. Oh my gosh. I won. Game 3: I drew no cop:red (3 total) Against straight red burn your thinking I was toast right????? Come on with my luck???? Well my luck changed cause I drew 3 armeggedons and then an icy and managed to keep don mana screwed long enough to win. I had 2 life left. Don curses my deckbuilding and drops out of tourney to play in sealed where he makes final 4. Match 1-2 Games 2-5 points 3 Match 4: This guy I had played before and he was a good player. His deck also made half my cards worthless as he had no creatures. He played a breathstealers crypt puzzlebox deck with wands. The funniest thing about this game was he played three puzzleboxes. The draw phase took forever. He managed to counterspell or wand every good card in my deck. Then I decked him. I had only played one Jesters cap on him. It was enough. Game 2: If you blinked or walked away you missed this game. I geddoned maroed turns 3 and 4 while he drew all puzzleboxes in his opening hand. Match 2-2 Games 4-5 Points 6 Round 5 I faced big blue. Although I didn't realize it until late into the match. It took my opponent awhile to draw a creature. I actually beat him down pretty far with a first turn elf. He counterspelled everything else. Well this game I kept holding the 3 wraths I had. He played a air elemental. I wrathed three times, he counterspelled I died. Game 2 sideboard in Abeyance I cap him, no counterspell, I remove 3 of his 5 or 6 creatures. I geddon no counter. I draw some ungodly amount of land. He draws 2 creatures. I draw no swords and no wraths. I die. He showed me his hand. Not one counterspell. He had 26 in his deck. The Magic gods were sure getting a good laugh today. Match 2-3 Games 4-7 Points 6 Match 6 Final Match thankfully: Falcon/armour deck. I can do this. I geddon early in game one. He plays more land and beats me down with his deck. I cap him before dieing to see how to sideboard. Game 2: I draw 2 forest and all 4 casting cost cards, swords, you get the idea. Game 2 doesn't last to round 7 or so as he plays three knights. I ended up somewhere this side of dead-last. I had a great time but I swear I had the lousiest luck anybody could ever dream of. So if any of you visit Indy for the August 16th PTQ and see your opponents Mike Blake you can relax, the Magic gods have taken a liking to you. Ps anyone wanna play for ante????????????