While my U.S. Nationals trip started off pretty well, it did not end up going according to plan. After starting the tournament off at 7-1, I ended with a paltry 8-5 record, dropping before playing the last round. My Constructed deck might have been the root of my failure, but the logic that dictated that choice is where my first mistake occurred. I chose a deck based on bad information. But it was ultimately my own fault for not recognizing that the playtesting results were skewed due to the lack of real competition. For what it’s worth, I played Esper Control, which was basically just a UW Control deck without Tectonic Edge, playing Esper Charm as a utility spell with three very relevant abilities. While the choice seemed logical at the time, there were a lot of factors contributing to this erroneous decision-making process, including my overall unfamiliarity with the new Standard format. I knew what the popular decks were, but I was not prepared to handle fringe strategies in the least, and was finding my results against things like Pyromancer’s Ascension and Destructive Force less than optimal.
While I had battled with a lot of decks I hated, I never quite found one that I really loved, which is really bad for me when I’m preparing for a Constructed tournament. Before the event, I almost jumped onto the Boros Bandwagon with Charles Gindy, which might have ended up being an amazing idea, but I couldn’t quite get myself to play the deck at Nationals with zero games under my belt, even though the deck hadn’t changed much since last November. I had played with the Esper deck, and watched friends play with it a decent amount, and it never seemed like there were situations you couldn’t get out of. However, therein lies the trap, and especially so when trying to innovate upon a list which you have very little practice with. After trying to find a good answer to Fauna Shaman, I deduced that Journey to Nowhere was more important than Condemn, failing to realize that I had very few answers to Person-Lands anymore. With the lack of Spreading Seas and Tectonic Edge, it was very likely that I was going to get bashed to death by a Raging Ravine. Which I did. Multiple times.
Kali ended up getting judge sponsorship to Nationals, which was quite wonderful considering she hasn’t gotten to go on many of these trips lately. Columbus was a fantastic exception, but Nationals was where she really wanted to go. We left for the airport Wednesday morning, and flew out of Birmingham to connect in Memphis around 11am. After multiple delays, our flight finally left Memphis around 6:30pm, a paltry four hours after our scheduled departure time. But things could have been worse, as I heard Patrick Chapin had a horrible flight experience, getting stuck on the Red-Eye on Thursday evening. After much frustration, as well as the airport sending our luggage out with the wrong plane, we had a lot of stress to relieve. We met up with fellow cohort Will Cruse in one of the local bars for dinner and drinks, while the Minnesota Twins game flooded the streets with Baseball fans. The next morning we woke up in a panic, as the airline had promised us that our bags would be delivered to our hotel as soon as possible, but they still had not arrived by the time Kali needed to head to the event site for the judge meeting on Thursday morning. The verdict? Judging in blue jeans!
After they finally dropped our bag off at the hotel, I wandered to the event site with her Judge attire and Andes Mint Chocolate Chip Cookies (a.k.a. ridiculous), and I was off to find a good deck to play. I borrowed a few decks to battle with, including Jund, Naya, Bant, UW Control, and even Valakut, but none of the matches seemed good enough for me to really jump on any of them. I was stuck in a rut, and I almost decided to bash with Mono Red. However, I knew that I would hate myself for playing that deck, and couldn’t bring myself to it. I think that Boros had a bit more potential to catch people off guard, and I definitely would have rather played that than the Esper deck I had decided upon. Alas, things didn’t start off so bad!
Thursday night, after acquiring alcohol and food, I also acquired a mostly foil version of the Esper deck from Will, who had lost in the finals of his last Grinder. I registered the following list:
Creatures (8)
Planeswalkers (8)
Lands (26)
Spells (18)
Sideboard
I was quite confident in the list once I had finished writing it down, but I had made a lot of changes without realizing exactly what I was doing. The Journey to Nowhere change was the biggest mistake of all, since it basically kolded me to Person-Lands. Overall, I felt like the deck was fine, but definitely could have been better. Hindsight is always 20/20, and people (especially me) tend to make mistakes. Here’s how it went.
Round 1 against RUG Destructive Force
This matchup was particularly heartbreaking, since it was the first match of the day and I had built my deck with the specific plan of not playing against Destructive Force, hence the quad Baneslayer Angels as the finishers. My opponent began by ramping up with Cultivates and whatnot, but my ultimate demise both games came from him casting Destructive Force and Frost Titan in games 1 and 3. When he’s attacking my lands with Tectonic Edge, Frost Titan, and Destructive Force, it is really hard for me to counter spells and interact in any real way. Frost Titan is especially brutal after a Destructive Force, since you will very rarely be able to target it afterwards with a removal spell.
0-1
Round 2 against Jund
This was not a real match. It began with him casting no spells until I cast Jace, the Mind Sculptor, using his +2 ability targeting myself. My opponent used a Maelstrom Pulse to kill it, but then had no answer to my follow-up Baneslayer Angel and died quickly after.
Game 2 was relatively the same, with me playing Baneslayer after he used a Maelstrom Pulse on a Planeswalker, followed by him not drawing a removal spell.
1-1
Round 3 against Naya Allies
I did not expect to play against this deck, but he had changed it a bit, adding in the Fauna Shaman/Vengevine engine, giving the deck a bit more gas against decks featuring Day of Judgment. This matchup is where the Journey to Nowhere really shone, allowing me to kill a Fauna Shaman on the draw without giving my opponent a land in the process. I was quite proud of myself at this moment, but didn’t realize my mistakes until a little later in the tournament. Even though we went to three games, he lost the two games where I wasn’t stuck on one White mana source, since he admitted to having no outs to Baneslayer Angel.
2-1
Round 4 against Christian Calcano with UW Control
This round I had an interesting pseudo-mirror against Christian Calcano, a friend from NY who is a bit of a shark. He’s a nice guy, but he beat me in a previous PTQ and I was out for revenge. He ended up crushing me the first game when he stuck a Jace Beleren with an Oblivion Ring for my Oblivion Ring. I was out of cards, and out of options, a few turns later when he had a full grip and an Elspeth going.
Games 2 and 3 revolved around me sticking Luminarch Ascension and protecting it with Counters and Baneslayer Angel. He was not able to race with his Celestial Colonnades, and my Esper Charms mixed with my counters and removal kept him from doing much of anything against my stellar draw.
3-1
Drafto!
In the first draft, I picked up a really sick UG deck featuring Sleep, Cudgel Troll, Mind Control, double Aether Adept, and double Mana Leak. Sword of Vengeance made an appearance, which was pretty amazing, and I had a few fatties to fill out the curve and was very happy about the deck.
Round 5 (Draft 1 Round 1) against Tom Raney with UG
Tom had beaten me in the semifinals of the same PTQ as Christian, and I was again out for blood. Tom didn’t do much in the first game, and I stole his Cyclops Gladiator with Mind Control and killed him in a few swings. He tried to put up a fight but flooded uncontrollably.
Game 2 was a bit of the same, and involved a few Aether Adepts combined with Sword of Vengeance and him not being able to block profitably.
4-1
Round 6 against UR (Draft 1 Round 2)
Games 1 and 3 involved me casting Mind Control on his Harbor Serpent. Won those. The game I lost I had two Plummets stuck in hand the entire time, while his Blue deck never cast a flier. I sided those out for game 3, seeing as his only Blue creatures stayed on the ground.
5-1
Round 7 (Draft 1 Round 3)
Cudgel Troll got equipped with a Sword of Vengeance in Game 1. Game 2 was a bit more interactive, but involved me playing double Aether Adept and a few counterspells to tempo him out of the game. Sorry for the poor notes during the draft portion. It is much more difficult to recall particular game-states since the whole point of Limited is to create more diverse interactions than Constructed.
6-1
After wrecking the rest of the day since losing first round, I ended up in 15th place at 6-1. I was pretty excited to say the least, since my opening loss had been pretty demoralizing. After regaining my confidence, we ate at Ichiban, which was a slightly overpriced Hibachi restaurant right across the street from our hotel. I thought it was delicious, but Kali said her chicken was overcooked. Every time we eat Hibachi she gets the chicken, always hates it, but loves to take bites of my steak. I always tell her to just order the steak! You can’t go wrong with beef, baby! After getting a “good night’s sleep,” by which I mean we went out and partied with some friends and did some “break-dancing” in a Chinese-restaurant/bar/club, I awoke the next morning oddly refreshed and ready for battle.
After downing a few bananas and Red Bulls, the second draft started and we were off. I opened a Lightning Bolt, and was passed a few solid Red cards but nothing of value from any other color. After opening Vengeful Archon in the second pack, I moved into White, and was shipped an exorbitant amount of it, while Red seemed to be getting cut off. I ended up with a very nice WR deck featuring a plethora of removal, though I was maindecking double Combust (which were awesome in 2/3 matches). I had a third Combust in the board, which came in handy too. I also had Serra Angel, a second Archon, and a Chandra’s Outrage to top off “the goods.”
Round 8 (Draft 2 Round 1)
I played against a Black/Red deck, and luckily didn’t draw any of my Combusts in game 1. I ended up putting him very low on life with a few Earth Servants and fliers, while he eventually killed the fliers and left the board with a ground stall. I got a Chandra’s Spitfire, which he tried to kill with Triskelion during combat, but I used a Mighty Leap to save it. Later on he used a Quag Sickness on it, but I followed up with a Serra Angel backed up by Mystifying Maze to race.
Game 2 I mulliganed to five and didn’t do much, while Game 3 was quite the opposite. He mulliganed once, and kept a hand with Sword of Vengeance and not much else, while I kept a hand with Manic Vandal. He cast maybe one spell after that, and he died to a few Grizzled Veteran-Bears.
7-1
Round 9 against Conrad Kolos (Draft 2 Round 2)
Conrad threw me for a loop in the first game, having the perfect answer to every play I made. He had double Mana Leak and Cancel for my three bombs, as well as Mind Control to lock things up. I did get to destroy another Sword of Vengeance with a Manic Vandal, but lost anyway.
Game 2 I showed him how my deck was supposed to work, killing pretty much every creature he played, and using Solemn Offering to kill his Mind Control.
Game 3 was much the same as Game 2, but he used a Foresee to dig for answers when I cast Vengeful Archon. He ended up drawing a Doom Blade for the first one after putting 4 cards on the bottom, and then followed that up with a Mind Control on my second Vengeful Archon. I had 2 turns to draw a Solemn Offering but drew blanks instead and died to my own bomb.
7-2
Round 10 against Josh Ravitz (Draft 2 Round 3)
Josh was actually tardy for the match, giving him a game loss. He started off Game 2 with a pretty aggressive draw, but I drew plenty of removal spells to slow him down. After things became stalled, I was able to stick a flier and ride it to victory while he drew a ton of lands.
8-2
Round 11 against Gerard Fabiano (Standard Round 5)
This is really where the wheels started to fall off. I won the first game pretty handily with a few Esper Charms to gain card advantage while we built up lands. He cast a few Baneslayer Angels while I played removal spells to kill them. After I stuck a few Planeswalkers, he died to a Gideon and Baneslayer Angel.
Game 2 I mulliganed to four, and might have won had I drawn a White source in the first two draws to cast the Luminarch Ascension. He tapped out on the second turn to cast Preordain, which gave me a sick window, but I blanked and durdled while he cast Jace and counterspells.
Game 3 he aggroed me pretty badly with Meddling Mage and Calcite Snapper. I had sided out Day of Judgment, since they are usually pretty mediocre in the mirror, but ended up getting destroyed by his 1/4 with Shroud. When I cast Baneslayer to block, he had Jace to bounce it and seal the deal.
8-3
Round 12 against GR Valakut Ramp
I somehow won Game 1 by jumping Solider Tokens with Elspeth, putting him at a point where he had to topdeck a Primeval Titan to kill me. However, he missed his window, and my Cancel stopped his Harrow from killing me while Baneslayer and Celestial Colonnade finished him off.
In the second game, I started with a Leyline of Sanctity in play, but he killed it with Acidic Slime when I tapped out for an Elspeth. It was pretty sickening, since the Leyline of Sanctity was supposed to be a real dagger against Valakut. He did some beating down with Bloodbraid Elves, and I eventually died to a Primeval Titan when I had to tap out for Day of Judgment.
Game 3 he mulliganed to 5, but I didn’t draw a Black source to rip his hand apart with double Esper Charm until Turn 5. I used Mana Leak early on a Cultivate, but his Bloodbraid Elf the next turn hit another Cultivate, and he was officially in the game. I cast an Elspeth since I had no Counterspells in hand, and he just rammed his Primeval Titan down my throat.
8-4
At this point I’m out of Top 8 and Top 16 contention since I have horrible tiebreakers, which sucks. The next round I get paired up against Tom Ross, and something really strange happens.
I scooped.
While we played the first game, I overheard Ben Lundquist and Owen Turtenwald talking about Ben scooping to Owen to help him get Pro Points because he “deserved a good level”, and I asked Tom how many points he had. He said 14, and with the upcoming Pro Tours he really only needed two more to qualify him for the rest of next year. I scooped to him since I couldn’t make Top 16 and he potentially could, and he could use it more than me since I just had 10, and wasn’t planning on going to many more events this year. Unfortunately he ended up in the Top 20 but missed out on Pro Points, but that isn’t the point. If you are ever in a situation where your opponent, especially one you consider a friend, can benefit greatly from a win, and you have very little to gain, maybe you should do the right thing. I’ve been trying really hard lately to become a better person, and I think this might have been a good start. Hopefully I’ll be able to afford a trip to a Grand Prix soon, but even then I’ll have to put up stellar results in order to get on the train.
Maybe this year isn’t going to be my year. Maybe no year will be. All I know is that I have a lot of fun playing this game, and I really like the people with which I’m surrounding myself. Hopefully I’ll be able to put a run together, instead of just a smattering of decent finishes. Maybe I’ll just have to start Grindin’ all over again. Who knows? Maybe I just enjoy the grind. If that’s what it takes, then bring on the pain.
Thanks for reading.
Todd
strong sad on MTGO
PS – We got to go to Fogo. I ate Filet wrapped in Bacon encrusted with Parmesan. It. Was. Ridiculous. Getting meat-drunk is one of my favorite things in the whole world.