2001)

TITLE: PTQ New Orleans at GP Denver (8.19.01)

Well, I didn't do as well as I wanted to but I did learn a lot and had a blast (especially in match #4). Also, I guess 5-3 and 22nd out of 145 or so players isn't horrible, as I was only 5 places away from an amateur prize. Plus, the way my tie-breakers were, had I won just one more match I would most likely have made it in to the top 8.

Anyway, I had been playing RGu at previous tournaments, but this weekend I decided to switch. The main reason for this was all the hate and bad match-ups (especially The Solution and Call) I keep running into in the Toronto PTQs. I had played against a UGr deck there and liked it, so that's what I decided to play, with some tweaks of my own, particularly in the sideboard. I'll present the deck commentary first, followed by summaries of my matches, followed by the overall results of the PTQ. Here is the deck that I used (though there may be a few cards different as I kept revising the deck leading up to the PTQ and since then):

Main Deck:
4 Blurred Mongoose
4 Gaea's Skyfolk
4 Kavu Titan

4 Mystic Snake
4 Exclude
4 Repulse
4 Fact or Fiction

4 Fire/Ice
3 Urza's Rage
1 Flametongue Kavu

7 Island
6 Forest
4 Shivan Oasis
4 Yavimaya Coast
4 Shivan Reef

Sideboard:
4 Gainsay
4 Jungle Barrier
3 Dodecapod
2 Thunderscape Battlemage
2 Thornscape Battlemage

Comments on the deck and some of the main choices made:

1) Fact or Fiction over Prophetic Bolt:
I can see going with the Bolt, but I felt the cheaper cost, less restrictive color requirements, and greater card selection (5 vs. 4) and card advantage (AT LEAST 1 as opposed to ONLY 1) of Fact or Fiction made it the better choice.

2) Only 1 Flametongue Kavu?
As I said in my last report, I just think these sit in your hand too often in too many matchups. But one is often useful.

3) No Ghitu Fire?:
Ghitu Fire just seems to require tapping out during your main phase, which this deck generally does not want to do.

4) Land:
As I did with my RGu deck, I just wanted in between 24 and 25 lands, so call me crazy but I took the unconventional route of running 25 land out of 61 cards.

MATCHES:
OK, now on to the matches. This time, I did a MUCH better time keeping notes of my opponents' name and match details, so hopefully it shows in the match reports. I'll talk about what decks I faced as well as the interesting highlights.

There were around 145 players which meant 8 rounds of swiss followed by a cut to the top 8.

Match 1 vs. UGr (mirror match), played by Charlie Hodges:

I lost 1-2. I was bummed about losing my first match, but at least I took some comfort in that Charlie ended up going on to win the whole PTQ. Anyway, game 1 I look at my first 7 cards and they consist of Island, Shivan Reef, Repulse, Exclude, Fact or Fiction, and 2 Blurred Mongoose. I think for a bit but decide to keep it, since as long as I get any land in my first three turns I'm OK. Unfortunately I don't see that third land until about the 5th turn. Charlie, meanwhile, sees plenty of land so that even though I ended up holding him off for a while he eventually Raged with kicker me for the win. Game 2 I manage to win relatively easily. However, in game 3 he wrecks me with some surprise Evasive Actions. This was an interesting choice on his part, as was his inclusion of Lay of the Land.

Match Record: 0-1

Match 2 vs. GR Turbo-Obliterate, played by Matt Benjamin:

I won 2-0. Game 1 he did manage to Obliterate, but I had been holding land in my hand so was able to recover even faster than he was, as he was stuck on 1 land after he Obliterated. Game 2 he cast Overabundance which really had me worried, and we both had kicked Titans on the board. However, I was able to Ice his Titan THREE times in order to hit him with mine for the win.

Match Record: 1-1

Match 3 vs. RG, played by Max Unger:

I lost 1-2. Max is from the San Francisco Bay Area like myself, so I knew him from local tournaments. He had won a trial for GP Denver in L.A. with his ´´No-Mar´´ deck and had also made top 8 at a recent PTQ in Las Vegas, so he was definitely a good player. Game 1 he just came out too fast and hard for me and I lost. Game 2 I had to take a double-mulligan due to 2 one-land hands and the hand that I kept also only had one land. Luckily, I did draw some more land and just played really conservatively until I could take control. Game 3 he cast Overabundance which ended up wrecking me and enabling him to Ghitu Fire me for the win. Max did manage to make yet another top 8 at this PTQ, though, so he definitely helped my tie-breakers.

Match Record: 1-2

Match 4 vs. RW Goblins, played by The Mad Hatter:

I won 2-1. However, probably more importantly I played what was the most fun match of tournament Magic I had played in a LONG time, if not ever! You may have heard of The Mad Hatter (yes, that's his legal name and it's first name ´´The´´, middle name ´´Mad´´, and last name ´´Hatter´´). The Mad Hatter was playing a theme deck of his own design that had everything to do with goblins. He was playing every Red or Red-White goblin: Goblin Legionnare, Goblin Ringleader (of course!), Mogg Jailer, Mogg Sentry, Slingshot Goblin, and he even had the balls to play Goblin Spy! Of course, he also had Goblin Trenches, which is a pretty tough card to deal with.

Well, I won game 1 reasonably easily, but game 2 was totally nuts! He got out the Trenches early and then brought in 2 copies of Rewards of Diversity!!! So if I wanted to cast a Skyfolk it would give him 8 life and take 4 more turns to bring him back down. Or Snaking something also would give him 8 life! In any event, I was beating him down reasonable well with a kicked Titan but I had to counter something, thus giving him 8 life. That allowed him to last long enough to really get the Trenches going. And he even had NAMED Unglued Goblin Tokens. I wish I could remember the names, but I do remember that they were quite fun indeed! Anyway, I was forced to cast more multicolored spells to defend myself and that allowed him enough time to create even more Tokens. I was able to take one Trenches out but he was able to replace it and just overran me with Tokens before I could kill him.

In game 3 it was pretty close as he did have the Trenches going again, but I finally killed him on the LAST turn of extra turns by top-decking a Fire! All-in-all it was a fantastic match!

Match Record: 2-2

Match 5 vs. RGb, played by Bob Bonner:

I won 2-0. Bob had a variant of the standard RG beatdown deck in which he splashed black for Spiritmonger (and maybe some other stuff as well). He told me afterwards that the black was mainly for sideboard options against The Solution, which is of course otherwise a bad match-up for him. Anyway, I got some pretty good draws against Bob, even though in game 2 I stalled on 3 land for a while.

Match Record: 3-2

Match 6 vs. UGr (mirror match), played by Charles Badinski

I lost 0-2. I really don't like the mirror match, as you likely both have similar answers both main deck and sideboard and it often all comes down to the draws. I thought I had the first game won when I had a kicked Titan vs. his Blurred Mongoose, but he Repulsed my Titan THREE TIMES in a row all the while casting more bears and I couldn't draw enough answers.

Match Record: 3-3

Match 7 vs. BRU, played by Greg Hules:

I won 2-0. Greg had a very interesting BRU variant but unfortunately for him he kept drawing lots of land and not too many threats or answers. One interesting twist in his deck was Collective Restraint, even though he was not in any way playing Domain. Luckily I had the Snake for the Restraint when I saw it in game 1. I was rather worried. Game 2: When he cast Breath of Darigaaz without the kicker, killing both my Blurred Mongeese. However, I had another in my hand and then continued to draw more good stuff.

Match Record: 4-3

Match 8 vs. BW, played by Jeff Muhlestein:
I won 2-0. Jeff's deck had the standard BW good stuff in it, and I remember seeing multiple Lynxes both games. Luckily my Skyfolk came out to fly above the Lynxes until I was able to either deal with them or else just outrace them.

Match Record: 5-3

METAGAME AND RECAP:
Throughout the weekend, I made notes of what decks people were playing around me. Here are my totally unscientific non-statistically significant results of the major decks:

RG: 16%
UGr: 11%
No-Mar: 10%
Go-Mar: 8%
BRU: 6%
RWU: 6%
UG: 6%
BRG: 5%
BWg: 5%

As you can see, when even the most popular deck type is just 16% of the field, the metagame really is wide-open.

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