2001)

I arrived at Neutral Ground Detroit with plenty of time to spare, and quickly registered. Waiting for the tournament to start was grueling. I had come alone, and, while I recognized several people from previous tournaments, I didn’t feel comfortable approaching them. That gave me thirty minutes to kill.

After a wait, deck registration began. I opened what I felt was quite a nice set of cards, including the following:

Tahngarth, Talruum Hero
Annihilate
Plague Spores
Fires of Yavigmaya
Several Kavu, in both green and red.

It looked like a strong G/R/B deck, and I hoped to get it back, but didn’t. What I received also looked promising:

White:
Invasion:
Ardent Soldier
Benalish Lancer
Capashen Unicorn
Death or Glory
Glimmering Angel
Obsidian Acolyte
Orim’s Touch
Strength of Unity
Teferi’s Care

Planeshift:
Disciple of Kangee
2:Heroic Defiance
Hobble
Liberate
Pollen Remedy
Voice of All

Blue:
Invasion:
Barrin’s Unmaking
Dream Thrush
Exclude
Vodalian Hypnotist
Worldly Council

Planeshift:
Arctic Merfolk
Hunting Drake
Sisay’s Ingenuity
Sleeping Potion
Stormscape Familiar

Black:
Invasion:
Duskwalker
Phyrexian Slayer
Reckless Spite
Scavenged Weaponry
Urborg Phantom
Urborg Shambler
Urborg Skeleton

Planeshift:
Nightscape Familiar
Noxious Vapors

Red:
Invasion:
Ancient Kavu
Halam Djinn
Maniacal Rage
Rogue Kavu
Scarred Puma
Scorching Lava
Stun
Turf Wound

Planeshift:
Caldera Kavu
Flametongue Kavu
Magma Burst
Mire Kavu

Green:
Invasion:
Aggressive Urge
Elfhame Sanctuary
Explosive Growth
Kavu Climber
Nomadic Elf
Utopia Tree
Vigorous Charge

Planeshift:
Falling Timber
Nemata, Grove Guardian
Primal Growth
Pygmy Kavu
Quirion Explorer
Skyshroud Blessing
Stone Kavu
Thornscape Battlemage

Gold:
Invasion:
Angelic Shield
Captain Sisay
Cinder Shade
Recoil
Shivan Zombie
Wings of Hope
Yavimaya Barbarian

Planeshift:
Daring Leap
Horned Kavu
Silver Drake
Urza’s Guilt

Artifacts:
Invasion:
Darigaaz’s Attendant

Looking at the cards, there is a lot of good stuff here. The bomb count is pretty low: Reckless Spite, Cinder Shade, and maybe Nemata, Halam Djinn, Flametongue Kavu, and Magma Burst. Perhaps they aren’t must-plays, but they’re strong, and playing them would be preferable to not playing them. At the same time, there are a lot of really solid, playable cards.

These bombs lead me to play R/B/G, a color combination I feel is quite strong. I really feel like my style is W/U/B, and I think a playable deck can be made from this pool, but the only of the cards above I could play would be Reckless Spite. U/B/R did not look promising, as it seemed like the majority of the strong blue supported playing white. From this pool, however, a really solid R/B/G deck can be built. I was playing so many creatures, and I had plenty of access to off color mana, so I splashed white for Death or Glory, which was probably a mistake:

Red:
Ancient Kavu
Halam Djinn
Caldera Kavu
Flametongue Kavu
Magma Burst
Mire Kavu
Scorching Lava

Black:
Phyrexian Slayer
Reckless Spite
Urborg Skeleton
Nightscape Familiar

Green:
Nomadic Elf
Utopia Tree
Nemata, Grove Guardian
Quirion Explorer
Stone Kavu
Thornscape Battlemage

Gold:
Cinder Shade
Shivan Zombie
Yavimaya Barbarian
Horned Kavu

White:
White:

Death or Glory

Artifact:
Darigaaz’s Attendant

Land:
6:Mountain
5:Swamp
5:Forest
1:Plains

There were a few cards that were almost included, but I felt I just had to cut, including Aggressive Urge, Explosive Growth, Duskwalker, and Kavu Climber. You’ll note that this deck has 19 creatures, 3 removal, 1 trick (the Death or Glory), and 17 land. In draft, I have a tendency to take 20 removal, 2 tricks and a creature, so this was a little out of character for me. I should also point out that some of my creatures function as removal (the Flametongue Kavu, Cinder Shade, and Thornscape Battlemage) so my deck wasn’t as ´´pure-beatdown´´ as I’ve implied.

You might note that I’m playing a lot of 2-drops, and several 2/2’s for 2 mana. I was hoping to get going quickly and roll over my opponents. I felt pretty confident going into the matches, but looking back I see some serious weaknesses. This deck has a hard time with fliers, especially black fliers. There’s 7 ways to deal with fliers (including playing my own flier to block), and one of those doesn’t work on black fliers.

Match 1: Chad Stout (G/WU)

Chad was pretty young, I’d say an underclassman in high school. He seemed perhaps a little self-conscious about it, but responded by playing in an extremely tight and professional manner.

Chad won the flip and opted to play first. He and I both took a mulligan, and my second hand left me a tiny bit color screwed for a couple of turns, but Chad seemed to have nothing but mana. He played a couple of creatures, but I just kept playing my cheap creatures and shooting his with removal. It was over pretty quickly, and my deck worked exactly as I had hoped, just rolling over Chad.

Chad again opted to play, and again seemed to draw too much mana. I moved quickly and got into a good position: Chad had 5 lands, 6 life, and no creatures. I had Utopia Tree, Shivan Zombie and Ancient Kavu in play, along with Phyrexian Slayer and the legendary Nemata, Grove Guardian in my hand, and plenty of mana. I consider playing a Nemata, but I’m worried about Chad playing Rout or some other mass removal if I over commit, so I pass the turn.

Chad draws, plays a land, and then taps out to play Nemata, Grove Guardian. That’s not so good. On my next few turns, I play and then attack with the Phyrexian Slayer for the eventual win, but it was pretty tense.

I’m pretty sure holding back was appropriate, as I had a large advantage. My plan if he played any huge creature was to drop Nemata. Unfortunately, he played one first and I was unable to join.

It’s worth noting a play in game two. I attacked with Yavimaya Barbarian while Chad had an Amphibious Kavu and Disciple of Kangee in play, a combination I hadn’t noticed. Fortunately, the combination isn’t too effective, as the Kavu gets the bonus when blockers are declared. Chad blocked with the Kavu, then used Disciple of Kangee to make the Barbarian fly and become blue, but I recognized that the bonus doesn’t take place (please correct me if I’m wrong) and we traded creatures without a problem.

Chad was very pleasant in a match that he lost in large part to mana flooding.

Match 2: Gary Smolinski (5cG)

In the first game, I applied early pressure with quick green creatures. I brought Gary to 12 and then he played Dromar, the Banisher. Things looked pretty bad. There’s one card in my deck that can single-handedly deal with Dromar, and then only with some difficulty: Cinder Shade. Gary quickly defeated me.

I sided in Pygmy Hippo, Urborg Shambler, and, in a desperation move, Hobble. I again applied early pressure, and Gary had trouble getting white mana. Gary played, at 5 land, Dromar’s Attendant. The next turn, Gary played a land, sacrificed the Attendant, and played Dromar. I’m sitting looking at the Hobble in my hand, and think:

´´Ancestral Recall for 1W. Excellent.´´

On my turn, I untap, then tap two mana to play my startlingly useful sideboard card.

Greg Confounds. Bugger.
I lose promptly.

I was keeping track of my mistakes, and I made one in this match. Greg played Urborg Emissary. The next turn, I play and attack with Halam Djinn, with red being the most popular color. I was thinking that his Emissary was a Phantom, which are also 3/1, but cannot block. It was a pretty silly mistake.

Match 3: Steve (Didn’t catch the last name. Sorry) (G/R/B)

Steve and I quickly traded matches to mana screw, so it came to a third game. In the third game, we both drew well, but I seemed to have the better creatures, and more of them, allowing me to win. I made two mistakes in this match, or three if you look at them a little more closely. First, I was pretty dejected about losing the first game to mana screw after being soundly trounced in round 2, and I quickly shuffled up for game 2, as did Steve. We both forgot to sideboard. We did the same after the second game. That’s a pretty silly mistake. Second, at one point I play and attack with my Halam Djinn, with something like 2 red permanents, 2 green permanents, and 3 black permanents, one of which is a 3/3 creature Steve controlled. If Steve had used it to block the Djinn, it would have dealt 3 points of damage before dying, making red to most common color for permanents and making the Djinn 4/3, killing it. Fortunately, Steve missed this. He blocked it the next turn with his 3/3 and a 2/2, a trade I was quite happy about.

Finally, I made a serious mistake I didn’t notice until the next day. In the third game, I was dominant until Steve played a Keldon Mantle on his Amphibious Kavu, pretty much locking up the ground. I drew Thornscape Battlemage, and tapped 2WGR to play it with both kickers, to deal 2 damage to his Kavu with the red kicker and to destroy his Keldon Mantle with the white. Steve made the correct play and put a regeneration shield on the Kavu before losing the Mantle, a play I was expecting. Tapping the Kavu allowed me to get an attack in, and having it no longer rule the ground made things easier for me. It wasn’t until much later that I noticed that Thornscape Battlemage doesn’t kill enchantments. It kills artifacts. Pbbt. I think I still would have won the match, but it’s certainly possible I stole this one from Steve.

Match 4: Troy Skinner (B/U/R)

We played a pretty even first game. I think I drew a little too mach mana, something like 60% of my 15 cards. I demonstrated how weak my deck is against fliers by taking something like 10 damage from a Phyrexian Battleflies. I had Troy at 9 life when he defeated me.

The second game was a rout. I drew too little mana, and it was in the wrong colors. Troy went berserk and won on the forth turn.

No, not really, but it was still pretty quick.

At 2-2, I dropped since it was impossible to make top eight at that point.

There’s a few things I’d like to point out. First, in my deck that was almost half creatures, Death or Glory was totally, totally ass. I couldn’t have been much worse. Playing the Hobble in my main deck would have been a better idea. It seemed like it was always in my opening hand, and I cast it twice, one in a game I would have won anyway, and once in a game I lost anyway. It looked good, but it was useless.

Secondly, I think I should have been bolder in side-boarding in round 2. I think it would have been appropriate to switch into W/U/B after losing game 1 to Dromar. His deck was controlling enough that I couldn’t roll over him quickly, and I didn’t have to worry about him doing the same to me.

Third, I made too many mistakes. Far too many. I need to operate at 0 mistakes, and I made 4. Not so good. Those are just play mistakes. Looking at deck building mistakes could be far worse. I’m pretty sure I shouldn’t have played any white, and that change would have made a significant impact of the way my deck performed. On the other hand, none of my play mistakes cost me games, so that’s some relief.

Finally, Flametongue Kavu is a serious contender for MVP, as is Magma Burst. Your opponent will always be playing creatures, and with Flametongue Kavu you can probably kill his biggest one then block his second biggest one, or burn his only creature then apply some serious pressure. Magma burst looks like a strong card, and it turns out that it is. I’d like to think the Flametongue Kavu will appear in standard, as I think everyone is playing creatures. I’m not so convinced about Magma burst, as I think it’s a little over-costed for standard, or at least there’s no deck into which it fits comfortably.

I also played against a couple of decks with Terminal Moraine, and it looked very effective. I think it is a Planeshift card that will seriously impact standard.

Good luck to everyone.

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