Dave’s Personal Blog

Superstars held a Type 2 $1K prize pool event today. I went, taking Jerry’s deck (that he’ll write up shortly). I didn’t do so well.. going 1-2-2 before bailing. I learned a lot about the deck, had loads of fun, and got some trading in.

I heard we had 40 players out for the 1K, and there was a Yugioh tourny going on at the same time, as well as some drafting on the side. It was a busy place. Pics below.

This is a bit delayed… I forgot I got some pics.

I did better on day 2 at Superstars. My first pool was pretty good, including a Blood Tyrant, that turned out to be MVP. I ended up building a solid Gryxis deck. I ended up going 2-2, with a 4th round game deciding between 3-1 and 2-2 for both of us. Game three went to the end.. with both of us at 2 life before the final blow.

The second flight was far less satisfying.

You can see Gerry Thompson in the shot below (watching the game on the right)… LSV is elsewhere:

I took my TPS deck to a Vintage $1K tourney yesterday. I went 0-3-2. Not bad considering I’m still learning the ins & outs of the deck. One game was pretty cool. It was one of the cases of game 3 going to time and resulting in a draw.

I tendrilsed (Tendrils of Agony), stormed to 5 for 10 life drain. A while later he played Tendrils stormed to 7. A few turns later, compliments of Yawgmoth’s Will, I did the same. What fun!

I in either game 2 or 3 of the same match I played Gifts Ungiven. I pulled out 3 things I could use, and Tinker. Now, I’d won game one by Tinkering into Darksteel Colossus. What he didn’t know was that I had the Colossus stuck in my hand, making Tinker pretty much useless… at least compared to the others I’d picked out. As hoped, he chose the Tinker and another card to bury. Heh. Psych. Great games though. Nicely played on both sides.

I had a good day today.

First, I played my first EDH game with my new (and fairly raw) deck. And won.

Then I took part in a sealed tournament. The deck I build was a somewhat random collection of decent cards… which garnered appreciative comments from friends.

I’m not sure how many players started, but when the standings were posted after round 4 (5 rounds total), there were 42 names on the list.

Round 1 went pretty quickly to me 2-0. Round 2 started with a loss, followed by 2 decisive victories to end at 2-1. I lost the next round 0-2… I hate being on the wrong end of a Realm Razer. But the loss was to the fellow who went on to the top-8 finals.. and may have won.. I left before that match ended. The next round was again a fairly sound defeat at 0-2.

So I was 2-2 after round 4. I was surprised when the standings went up that I was in 8th place.. leading the pack of folks with 6 points due to my tie breakers… if you have to loose, loose to someone good.

Round 5 was intense, as it was likely that only one of us would make top-8 and be in line for prizes. Game 1 went to me quickly in what looks like 6 turns (based on my life totals record) with me still at 20. Game two was hard fought but again only 6 or 7 turns, with me loosing while my opponent was still at 5. Now things got intense… game 3. Once again, in what looks like 8 turns, I’d pulled off another win with the help of Broodmate Dragon who was my MVP all day.

So I was into the Top-8. My first Top-8!

The draft went well… giving me with a strong esper/gryxis hybrid.. with 2 Master of Etherium and a Prince of Thralls and a pile of other fun artifact cards. I’ve started picking colour fixers (tri-lands, panorams, and obilisks) earlier, and the decks are proving easier to build and play.

Alas… in the quarterfinals I found myself seated across the table from Mr. Realm Razer that I lost to in round 3 of the swiss. And guess what.. he’d drafted a realmrazor. Sigh. Anyway… I made top-8, had a full day of fun magic, came out a few $ ahead (so… really… I can claim that I’ve made money playing magic), and left with a few nice rares for trade use.

This was a rather frustrating weekend overall. Another cruise qualifier on Saturday. I managed not to win a single match. Mana flood, mana screw, color screw, you name it. A string of bad draws. And my deck dominated in pre-tournament testing. Frustrating.

Sunday was a regular draft followed by a double draft: 2 drafts in a row with a cumulative record. I drafted good decks but again fell victim to bad draws (Eric watched a few of my games and commented afterward that I’d made all the right plays given what I was drawing). I did manage to win one match 2-0 in the morning draft.

Frustrating, but I did get some nice rares.

I’m on my way home as I write this. Today was States in the US (Champs in Canada) and I was at Superstars for it. I got to Starbucks (a couple doors down from the shop) at 9:00 for coffee and breakfast. There was already a group waiting for the shop to open and starbucks was full of magic players.

It took a while to get everyone registered. Here’s the line when we joined it.

And they had to send some away… Only so many will physically fit in the building. In the end I heard there were 279 players.

Here’s a couple pics to give an idea. One toward the back of the room and one toward the front:

There were the usual regulars, yours truely included, plenty of folks from around the state, and the occasional celebraty… namely Luis Scott-Vargas, recent winner protour champion.

I ran Patrick Chapin’s latest take on 5 Color Control. I went 1-2-2 before dropping. Both draws were 1-1 with third game going to time without a winner.

After a burrito I drafted and started league play.

It was an awesome day! Played a bunch of Magic and got to meet one of the top players in the world.

Tomorrow I’ll be back for more league play and maybe some draft and/or team sealed.

Just a quick update: 26.5 hours of playing Magic this week. That’s not counting time reading about Magic or listening to Magic podcasts, or working on decks ideas.

Since I’ve started tracking it (on Oct. 12), I’ve played 165 hours of Magic… that’s 23.6 hrs/week on average.

This week the guys came over to do some T2 playtesting for the upcoming States. I was running a mostly mono red deck.

I took the deck to the Cruise Qualifier on Saturday and went 1-3 before dropping. Ugh. Started redesigning the deck when I got home, into a blue/red control/burn deal… “Controlled Burn”.

Sunday was all about limited: 2 drafts & a sealed flight. That was better… not great, but both drafts went 2-1 and the sealed was 0-2-1. I totally prefer draft to sealed. If you get a suck pool you pretty much just do badly.

Saturday saw me at Superstars (where else) playing in my very first PTQ. It was a blast. 185 players in total. Everything seemed to run smoothly.

My first match was with Lokman… one of the better players in the area… certainly well placed among the Superstars regulars. I actually won that round! Yay for me. OK.. that was the high point of the day.

After loosing the next 3 rounds, I dropped and signed up for the next draft queue. the rest of the day consisted of a second draft, some casual type 2 play, and watching some of the PTQ top-8.

I was at Superstars for this morning’s draft. It went pretty well. I drafted an Esper theme… artifacts. The packs were good, and other than a Tower Gargoyle that Josh hate drafted from me, I had good options. Here’s the build I went with:

Basic Lands (17) 6 Island 5 Plains 6 Swamp Creatures (12) 2 Etherium Sculptor 2 Thoughtcutter Agent 3 Tidehollow Strix 1 Tidehollow Sculler 1 Windwright Mage 2 Cloudheath Drake 1 Steelclad Serpent Artifacts (6) 1 Obelisk of Esper 1 Scourglass 2 Executioners Capsule 2 Couriers Capsule Sorceries (1) 1 Covenant of Minds Instants (4) 1 Agony Warp 1 Hindering Light 2 Resounding Wave

Rather annoyingly, we had 9 people drafting and I got stuck with the bye in the first round. I did well second round, with a decisive 2-0 showing. Third round was against one of the stronger players in the area. Games 1 & 2 both went to him, although they were both hard won victories for him and enjoyable games. I made a few misplays in game 2 that would probably finished it in my favor leading to game 3 and a potential 3-0 record. I’ll take 2-1 though. Far better than my drafting record a couple months ago.

Next weekend is the local Pro Tour Kyoto qualifier at Superstars (go Jon & crew… you guys are rocking!). I’ll be there. I don’t really expect to top-8, but anything is possible. A ProTour appearance is definitely in my plans for next year.

Yesterday I took Pat Chapin’s “Reflecting Cruel” 5 colour control control deck to Superstars’ $1000 tournament. (You need a premium StarCity membership to access that link… if you’re serious about Magic, it’s worth it)

After 5 rounds I was 3-2 and in 12th place.

I lost round 1 to an expertly played UBR faerie deck. My opponent went on to make top 8.

I lost round 3 to one of the Superstars regulars who was piloting an elf deck. Game 1 taught me not to Esper Charm an elf player to discard. He had two Wilt-Leaf Lieges in hand which he could choose to discard and put onto play. I lost in combat after passing the turn. I won game 2 and lost the third from combat from a superior board.

The three rounds I won were fairly one sided games.