Well, let’s get straight to it: I didn’t qualify on Saturday. My day went as follows: 1-0, 2-0, 2-1, 3-1, 3-2, 3-3, drop.
Dagnabbit!
The games I won, I won convincingly. The three games I lost were against B/G Monger, a mirror match, and Black/Green Control. I won against Wildfire and two Sligh decks.
A tourney report probably won’t help anyone out – and so this article will look at the deck I played and outline its problems. I’ll follow this with a breakdown of the decks that showed up on the day (we had 109 players, so it should be useful).
On Friday I got up around 10 a.m. – I had the day off – and my team mate Andy Smith and I got some decks together and wondered down to the pub to test. We tested from around 11 a.m. to 7 p.m.: Eight whole hours. Our main goal was to see if we could put a ‘Tog deck together that I was happy with and that would do well. I’d had a lot of emails about Tog and it was reportedly doing very well… But with so little playing time on the newer designs, I didn’t just want to put it together and play. At the end of the day, we’d built a deck incorporating aspects of several of the top ‘Tog decks. It was doing well against the field of decks we expected, but had no sideboard and I was still a little uncomfortable with some of the card choices.
All this meant that I had to play my G/R Beats deck – not something I was too happy with, but the deck was beating pretty much everything apart from B/G Monger. Here’s the deck I played:
G/R/x Beats:
Creatures (20):
3x Birds of Paradise
3x Llanowar Elves
4x Wild Mongrel
2x Kavu Titan
4x Raging Kavu
4x Flametongue Kavu
Other Spells (18):
4x Call of the Herd
4x Fire/Ice
4x Urza’s Rage
3x Beast Attack
3x Shock
Land (22):
4x Karplusan Forest
4x City of Brass
1x Mossfire Valley
1x Urborg Volcano
8x Forest
4x Mountain
I was playing with three Firebolts… But wandering around on the day, I saw so many Braids I figured that using Shock instead save me a few embarrassing losses instead. I didn’t see any Braids, but I stand by the choice. The main deck has been changed to give my creatures a better curve: Six one-drops, six two-drops and eight three-drops. The idea is that against control, I can drop a threat each turn – whilst against other G/R decks and Sligh decks, I quickly start to cast bigger creatures than they have. I beat two Sligh decks 2-0, and so I guess that aspect of the deck worked.
One Urborg Volcano in the main deck gives me one more source of black mana to help with my sideboard. I found in testing that I often needed a Bird to survive summoning sickness – something that rarely happens – or another land. I didn’t feel that the Volcano slowed me down at all throughout the day, and it certainly helped me Terminate and cast Spiritmonger a few times – I’d keep it in if I played the same deck again.
I did find the Cities of Brass hurting more than you’d expect. The deck was originally based on a fast, Reckless Charge-filled R/G deck played at San Diego’s Masters tourney… And a deck that fast can play the suicide game. My deck is a little slower, and they’re probably the most questionable aspect of the deck, as their presence is really only for Ice and potential sideboard cards. On to the other important fifteen cards:
Sideboard:
3x Obliterate
2x Terminate
3x Compost
2x Spiritmonger
1x Shivan Dragon
2x Hull Breach
1x Spellbane Centaur
1x Moment’s Peace
The sideboard only used to have two Obliterates… But seeing a lot of control and Spiritmongers, I brought in an extra one, taking out one Spellbane Centaur. In retrospect, I should have dropped both Centaurs for a third and fourth Terminate.
I didn’t use the Spellbane Centaur at all, and I only used two Obliterates all day; finding a slot for the third was too hard. I found that I could get up to Obliterate mana reliably, but I was often nearly dead by the time I cast it and couldn’t wait for a Land and a mana creature before I cast it – often meaning that my opponent recovered quicker than I did.
The Spiritmongers were great, as were the Terminates. The Shivan Dragon didn’t live very long, and so I don’t know how good he was. I had to use the Hull Breaches on Ensnaring Bridges… And the Composts helped, but not as much as the hype would let you believe. Even when I saw all three against the mono Black control player, I still lost 2-0 after drawing an extra ten cards!
If I had to play again, I think the most important creature to consider is Spiritmonger. How do you cope with your opponent’s ‘Monger? Can you cope with it with your main deck?
If my deck gets a fast, uninterrupted start, I can deal enough damage that one Spiritmonger isn’t a problem. If I start of too slowly, it is. If my opponent sees two ‘Mongers, I’m in trouble. After sideboarding, things look a little better, since I can kill their ‘Mongers and I have my own to block with.
In the last tourney I played, I stocked three Terminates in the main deck. In this environment, I would advocate dropping the Shocks and playing Terminates instead, with a fourth in the sideboard. In fact, I’d try and play two or three ‘Mongers in the main deck, probably dropping the Beast Attacks. At the end of the day I think my deck would end up looking something like Carl Jarrell’s Hot Garbage – a deck he’s been doing very well with. Probably not card for card, but certainly along those lines.
Failing that, I think I’d probably play a version of B/G ‘Monger myself. Why? Well, here is a breakdown of the decks that showed up on the day:
Deck | Played | Percentage of field |
B/G Monger | 15 | 14 |
G/R Beats | 12 | 11 |
UG Tempo | 9 | 8.5 |
Sligh | 9 | 8.5 |
BW Control | 8 | 7.5 |
UWx Control | 7 | 5.5 |
BR Control | 5 | 5.5 |
Life | 4 | 3.5 |
Junk | 3 | 2.5 |
SnakeTongue | 3 | 2.5 |
Tings | 3 | 2.5 |
Tog | 3 | 2.5 |
BUG | 3 | 2.5 |
Mono B Control | 2 | 2 |
2 | 2 | |
Mono B Beats | 2 | 2 |
Counter Burn | 1 | 1 |
1 | 1 | |
Rogue | 17 | 15.5 |
Totals | 109 | 100% |
Here is a breakdown of those that qualified, with what percentage of the total qualified. I’ll follow with a top eight breakdown.
Deck | Qualified | Qualification Rate |
Tog | 2 | 67% |
BR Control | 3 | 60% |
BG Monger | 5 | 33% |
Junk | 1 | 33% |
Tings | 1 | 33% |
Mono B Beats | 1 | 33% |
BUG | 1 | 33% |
G/R beats | 3 | 25% |
UG Tempo | 2 | 22% |
Rogue | 2 | 11% |
Sligh | 1 | 11% |
Totals | 22 |
|
In the table above the qualification rate is the percentage of decks of that type that qualified. For example, of the fifteen B/G Deed/Monger decks that showed up five qualified that’s gives us a rough 33% qualification rate. The formula used to work out how many people qualify is simple:
Top 8 players + one player for each eight players or part thereof.
So, 109 players divided by 8 is 13 5/8ths; that’s rounded up to fourteen, and we add the top eight to give us twenty-two.
We must be careful when looking at the statistics above. When only a few of a given deck, like Tings, Junk or Tog show up, it’s difficult to say that they really are as good as they look – as one deck could have been played by the best player in the world and the other two by merely good players who didn’t make it. There isn’t really enough data to make a decision – but they are looking strong.
All the decks you’d expect are present – with three major surprises. Firstly, no U/W/x Control deck qualified. Not a single one. Secondly, no B/W Control deck qualified, either. Finally, no Mono-B Control deck qualified. Since nearly a quarter of the field of players will qualify, this is a very important result.
One other surprise is the rise of B/R control. These decks encompass both more controlling versions based on Kibler’s BR design, and older designs based around Machinehead. They did very well in a field full of G/R Beats, Sligh, and B/G Monger.
For those of you where only the top eight make it, here’s our top eight:
- Junk
- Tings
- Mono B Beats
- Tog (Zevatog)
- B/G Monger
- Machinehead
- B/G Monger
- B/G Monger
This shows you something very obvious: B/G Monger is good. Fifteen players played the deck; a third of those made it into the top quarter of the field, and a fifth of them made top eight. Not bad at all.
What does this mean?
Well, I fully expect the metagame to change a little, as players take the relative strengths of the decks into account. But you must be able to beat everything in the list above where more than four players showed up with it. You can also assume that a lot of people will have to be playing G/R Beats for anyone to qualify with it – as 11% of the field played it and none of them made top eight!
I’d love to list the top eight decks… But many of the players have asked for their decks to remain a secret until after the Regionals is over, and I must respect their wishes. All I can say is that in the top eight decks, there really are no surprises and very little tech. The decks are just consistent and well built, and those that did very well had well thought-out sideboards that fitted the metagame on the day.
After the tourney, I was feeling very down, as it looked like I wouldn’t get another chance to qualify. I’ve been told that at least one tourney I couldn’t make has been rescheduled to a date I can make, and so it looks like I’ll get a second chance. The tourney will be on the 21st April in Bristol, not far from Bath. I’m going to spend a little time taking useless decks apart and building up some of the more successful decks I’ve seen, effectively putting my own deckbuilding on hold for a couple of weeks. If I do qualify, I’ll then have a whole month to come up with a deck of my own design to play to Nationals.
So, a big”Thanks!” to everyone who emailed me with suggestions of decks to play, cards for sideboards and decks not to play; I simply didn’t have time to test a deck to the level I’d be happy playing it with. I hope the info above helps you all prepare for the Regionals a little better than I managed too first time around.
Part two of this article will appear in two weeks’ time, after my second attempt to qualify.
Cheers, Jim.
Team PhatBeats.
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