From: Sean McKeown To: Frank Kusumoto Subject: TE Sealed Report, 1101 Hey all, I attended the Neutral Ground "Unlimited Possibilities" tournament on Saturday, with the format being Tempest sealed deck, and the coveted prize an Unlimited set, or $1400. I registered a deck with Dark Banishing, good Black creatures, some Burn and a Dregs of Sorrow. I kiss it goodbye, and get my *real* deck... I don't have the entirety of my deck, so I am just going to list what I played with... Disenchant 2x Master Decoy (hee hee!) Angelic Protector Pacifism Rolling Thunder Canyon Wildcats 2x Lightning Blast (hee hee!) Wall of Diffusion Lowland Giant Lightning Elemental (shouldn't have used...) Sandstone Warrior Bayou Dragonfly (I had another against Black) Apes of Rath Heartwood Treefolk Skyshroud Troll Elvish Fury (more on this later...) Ba-Roken Fall Trained Armodon Elven WarHounds (sweet!) Canopy Spider Skyshroud Elf Cinder Marsh 5x Mountains 4x Plains 8x Forests (I only got 4 ea. of the Lands in my main colors, so I had to improvise...) I had some good sideboard cards, such as CoP: White, Blue, Black; Light of Day, and a good assortment of Creatures I was able to pull from later...in one match I morphed the White to Black for Knight of Dusk, 2 shadowers, Diabolic Edict etc. I forgot they were there against Schepp, but I could have morphed in 2x Endless Scream to deal with his 2x Orim's Prayer. (I hate Orim's Prayer when I don't get any...) I don't remember the details of most of my games, but here is who I played and how I did against them if nothing else: Round One: Alex Berzing [133752], playing B/G/W. Win, lose, win. Match Record: 1-0, Game Record: 2-1 Round Two: Geoff Allen [655353], playing B/G/U. Lose, win, win. All I remember is that I throw in Sudden Impact on a chump move, because I see he likes to hold cards in his hand. Game 3, I do the last 4 points of damage with the Impact, because he was holding Lands. That's got to sting... Match record: 2-0, Game Record: 4-2 Round Three: Adam Schepp [125987], my Minion, playing B/G/W. Game one, I get color-screwed for my main color, Green. Unfortunately, he is able to punish color-screws effectively, as he has 2x Orim's Prayer and a Marble Titan to deal with my creatures, and he kills by Shadow. I manage to thunder away most of his creatures, and hold some down with the Decoy, but I get eaten by Shadows before I get any Green to mount a comeback. When I finally draw some of my 8x Forests...remind me to play with all 18 Forests next time!!...I get some fatties out, but he has the Titan and I can't find a Lightning Blast. I lose. Game two, I get a *normal* draw and kick the tar out of him. He gets a Prayer to stop my early weenies, but I hold off his shadow force and eat him with a 3/4 Forestwalker. Game three, I have drawn all 4 Plains, 4 Mountains and the Cinder Marsh before I draw a single Forest. I need another to mount my offense, as he has Prayer action going and I am holding Treefolk, Trolls, and the Grapes of Wrath in my hand. As I had some decent Red and White creatures going, the Elvish Fury or Rolling Thunder would have helped to get around that damned Prayer, or even my Disenchant would have been nice. I draw nada, and die horribly for the first time EVER to my Minion. He ends up going 4-0 before dropping the next 3 matches, finishing at 4-3. So I lose to strange luck. I *always* lose to strange luck...ack. Match Record: 2-1, Game Record: 5-4 Round Four: Pat Donovan [10929], playing R/G/U. Win, lose, win. He's heard of my name somewhere, and we spend the first 5 minutes of the round discovering that he knows me as Gandalf@BDominia.com. Cool! heh heh. He had some annoying stuff to go with a solid creature base, such as a Torture Chamber to deal with all my one- and two-toughness Weenies, and a Tim besides. Good stuff, but I guess it was a little slow...plus I got Decoys early and often each game. In every game, he used Scorched Earth to pare off one of my colors, and me without my Elf. Game three, he was waiting to hit my Mountains AND Plains, when I draw another Mountain and Thunder his critters away for the win. I moved my deck to B/G/R game 3 because he has no way to deal with shadowbastards asides from how he deals with normal creatures. Again, I forgot the Endless Screams. Ack. Match Record: 3-1, Game Record: 7-5 Round Five: John Chinnock [10253], playing B/U/W. Win, win. First game, John Coerces me to have to choose between my 2 Lightning Blasts and the Rolling Thunder. *ouch*. I didn't have a problem finding an offense, and I drew heavy Burn both games. Sorry, John..at least this won't hurt your ratings towards a free Mainz invite. Match Record: 4-1, Game Record: 9-5 Round Six: Dan McGloin [125143], playing R/G/W. Win, win. Previously undefeated, as I was the best-ranked 4-1 player (I guess..funny stuff happened twice!) and there were an odd number of 5-0's. He had some *nice* stuff going, but I had too much Burn, plus Landwalkers for 2 of his 3 colors. He gets Splicer, and could have done *some*thing with it, but it doesn't make my Heartwood Treefolk or Canyon Wildcats blockable. I get mad Decoy action on him too... Match Record: 5-1, Game Record: 11-5 I do the math, and I calculate that either a Draw or a Win gets me in. I *really* want to Draw, because [as usual] I am very tired, under-fed (breakfast + Halloween candy...strong!!), etc...sooner or later I will learn not to abuse my over-tall, over-skinny body. Round Seven: Mark Lepine [12965], playing U/G/W. I ask for an Intentional Draw...who would refuse an Intentional Draw last round when in the top echelons of a long tournament? I don't want to risk a Loss. Of course, 'Strange Luck' kicks in HARD right now...again, I am the best-rated 5-1 player, so I get to play someone who is 5-0-1. He's in, win lose or draw. So he insists we play it out...prick. He kicks the s*it out of me two straight, game one because I draw no fancy tricks, and game 2 because I draw no Forests, or any offense whatsoever... just little creatures, CoP's, Disenchant, a Lightning Blast, and Pacifism. I had the sweet Treefolk, but without any trees he's going to stay in the hand. Of course, he was rushing me all the time because he insited that "all of his other games took very long, almost to the time limit". Match Record: 5-2, Game Record: 11-7 One 5-2 will get in, by the calculations we do. It's not me. Props: Adam Schepp, O Minion My Minion (#1): You beat me, 'fair' and square. You did make a good deck, but you have your own twisted luck, just like me. That's what I get for being player #13...remind me to draw against you next time, no matter how early or late. 4-3, you're getting better man! Kevin Wu, O Minion My Minion (#2): Solid record, you'll get there yet. Nice deck...Dregs, banishing, Edict, Enfeeblement, shadows up the wazoo... but shit does happen sometimes. 4-3 is still good... Master Decoy: How many games did I have a turn 2 Decoy, turn 3 Ba-Roken Fall, turn 4 Decoy?? More than once. Thanx a lot, dude...couldn't have done it without you guys. Slops: (Yes, for the first time ever *I*, Mr. Nice Guy, have SLOPS to hand out!) Mark Lepine: 6-0-1 or not, you still suck balls. Elvish Fury: 18 games, and I never drew you. Thanx. My Shuffling Skillz: Will someone *please* teach me how to riffle-shuffle?? This is the 3rd straight tourney where I have lost 2 matches thanx to a screwy mana distribution...who ever heard of not drawing a card you had 8 of in a 41-card deck??? --Sean "Strange Luck" McKeown --Gandalf@BDominia.com "Too late to turn back now, I'm running out of sound and I am changing, changing... And if we died right now, this fool you love somehow is here with you... I won't deny the pain I won't deny the change And should I fall from grace here with you would you leave me too?" --Smashing Pumpkins, 'Galapagos'--====================987654321_0==_ Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"