It all started with “I Touch Myself” by The Divinyls.
I was sitting in The Game Academy in Tampa, Florida ordering some cards for a Prossh Commander deck. I figured this would be the most exciting part of my weekend.
I was wrong.
Dead wrong.
A man stumbles in the door and sits down right next to me. He is possibly homeless, but that’s OK with me.
“Hey man…would you do me a favor.”
I pause my search for Food Chain and tell him that it would be my pleasure to help him with something.
“Would you mind playing a song for me on your phone, dude? It would really turn my night around.”
I tell him that I’d be happy to and ask him what song I should play for him.
“It’s an old song, man… really old. It was in that Austin Powers movie I think… touching something or…?”
I think I frowned.
“You want me to play ‘I Touch Myself’ by The Divinyls, don’t you?”
“Yea, man! That’s the song!!! Would you play that for me??”
Clearly we’re in pretty deep here, so I oblige him and fire up the song.
He stares off into space intently, bobbing his head to the music, but his expression is serious and unflinching. After a few tense minutes, the song ends. I comment that this is the weirdest ****ing thing that has ever happened to me. He laughs, gets up, and leaves. After explaining what happened to my traveling partners, we decided that I needed a drink pretty badly. I indulged in Texas de Brazil and Ketel One the night before the second-to-last PTQ in Florida. It was important that I relax.
The last PTQ I played in was my first since returning to Magic several months ago, and the thirteenth-place finish stung. I lost my win-and-in, just as I had several times before I took my sabbatical. I resolved that this time would be different: I wouldn’t just play a deck I was comfortable with, I’d play whatever deck I felt would give me the best chance to win.
It was clear to me that R/W Aggro was the best deck to come out of the Open Series in Washington DC a couple of weeks back. Yes, Gerard and his Sultai Control deck won the tournament, but I felt like Danny Goldstein played too conservatively. It was a match that was his for the taking, but he let a long-game deck go long instead of exploiting the Sultai deck’s inherent sloth with the sheer speed and efficiency of his R/W deck. That FNM, I sleeved up a reliable Abzan Midrange deck that I figured I’d play at the PTQ the next day. I started 3-0 and drew with my friend Colt. Colt was on R/W, so I figured we could play for fun to test the matchup. He obliterated me in two games that took maybe fifteen minutes. His deck heavily punished a slow start and had a glut of ways to finish off the game once I was hovering around ten life. I thanked him for the games.
In the back of my head, I wanted to play R/W Aggro the whole time but was too nervous to play a deck completely out of my comfort zone at a tournament with such a huge prize at stake. When we finally made it to Tampa, I sleeved up Danny Goldstein’s R/W deck to test against a few different decks my friends were playing in order to help them gain a deeper understanding of the matchup. When I kept winning, I knew I was onto something.
Abzan Midrange would have been a crutch for me. It would have been me leaning on what I was always did: staying in the safe zone and never venturing out of it. I decided to break from tradition and jam R/W. But what version?
Danny’s deck was obviously very good, but it couldn’t win a game from behind very well. Cards like Goblin Rabblemaster, Seeker of the Way, and Hordeling Outburst were a great starting point. The burn spells like Stoke the Flames and Lightning Strike had to be in it, but from there it felt like it could be customized. I built Ross Merriam’s R/W list from his article last week as a starting point, and then started making changes from there.
Creatures (17)
- 4 Stormbreath Dragon
- 4 Goblin Rabblemaster
- 2 Ashcloud Phoenix
- 4 Seeker of the Way
- 2 Monastery Mentor
- 1 Soulfire Grand Master
Lands (24)
Spells (19)
I thought Ross and his list were great. The only big change I made was replacing Chandra, Pyromaster after playing about fifty games with Outpost Siege.
Unlike the other enchantments in the cycle, Outpost Siege has an immediate impact on a game the turn it is played. Choosing Dragons mode means your board full of creatures becomes twice as deadly. When you’re at parity, it can completely shift the dynamics of the game in your favor by creating terrible blocking situations for your opponent. If they are at a low life total, Dragons is a death sentence.
However, my mode of choice for most of the tournament was Khans. Khans mode is like having a Phyrexian Arena in play. When I was behind, it brought me back into the game, and when I was even, it locked things up and propelled me to an end-game most players couldn’t keep up with. And when I was ahead, I’d just name Dragons. Without a doubt, Outpost Siege was the best card in my deck for the entire tournament. I do not make that statement lightly.
Monastery Mentor was a card I had high hopes for, but it was often disappointing. Ross pointed out that it had over-performed for him, but for me it played out very poorly. Turn three usually saw me wanting Rabblemaster in play instead, and when Mentor hit the battlefield it was either outclassed or killed on sight. I was only able to get Mentor going a couple of times, but even when he was snowballing downhill, I still wished he was a Goblin Rabblemaster. Going forward, two might be the right number, but I’d still consider cutting him.
The tag team of Ashcloud Phoenix and Stormbreath Dragon were like Tom Glavine and Greg Maddux. They closed out games early, middle, and late – and they’re virtually unstoppable together. The alteration of the deck from Danny’s version to Ross’s felt like night and day in terms of power level. Where Danny’s deck was fantastic at going under the opponent, it was less capable of taking a game to the later stages while Ross’s deck had the ability to close the game out from multiple angles.
I cut Erase because I really enjoyed the benefits afforded by Abzan Advantage. The Bolster 1 was quite relevant each time I utilized it. End Hostilities was something in Danny’s sideboard I was fond of, so I carried it over to this deck. Hushwing Gryff was one of the best cards in my entire 75, and again I had the opposite experience that Ross had in that I was always impressed with it. Lastly, Sarkhan impressed me more than I could have ever expected. My inexperience with casting him was short-lived as he helped me win many, many games.
The tournament would be seven rounds, and I would play each one of them like my life depended on it.
Round 1: Joe Sweat – Abzan Control. 2-1
Round 2: Jeff Mathis – Ensoul Artifact. 2-0
Round 3: Cameron McMillion – Sultai Reanimator. 2-1
Round 4: John Sweet – Sultai Control. 2-0
Round 5: Michael Letsch – Sultai Reanimator. 2-1.
Round 6: Draw
Round 7: Draw
I felt good going in to the Top Eight. My rounds were usually over pretty quickly, and all of my game losses came in game one. After sideboarding, I was always extremely confident that I would be able to take the match, and I was able to pick apart my opponents with cards like Hushwing Gryff and Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker.
My biggest obstacle would come in the quarterfinals as I was pitted against one of my best friends and lifemate, Brennan DeCandio.
Brennan had come to the tournament with a very powerful G/R Monsters deck that abused the newly-printed Shaman of the Great Hunt along with other impressive threats such as Polukranos, Arbor Colossus, Genesis Hydra and more. The list was also handed off to my good friend Paul who played it straight in to the Top Eight as well. This deck was very strong, and here it was piloted by arguably one of the best players in the state.
I jumped out to an early lead in game one after Brennan stumbled quite a bit on mana. By the time his deck started to get going, I already had a large life lead. His deck began to spiral out of control at the end of the game, but by then he was in burn range and I was able to finish him off. Game two was a mauling as Brennan curved into turn-two Courser of Kruphix and turn-three Polukranos. Those were followed by double Arbor Colossus and I was done for.
I was on the play in our final game of the match, and I burned away two mana accelerants before committing any threats to the board. Brennan tried to stabilize, but I continued to remove his creatures with Chained to the Rocks and finished him off with Stormbreath Dragon. I’d be lying if I said it felt good. Brennan is such a good friend to me, though, and he assured me that I needed to win this thing and make him proud.
I battled against a gentleman named John Bueno in the semifinals. He was piloting Abzan Aggro, and it was probably the easiest match I played all day, as none of his threats were able to gain traction against me. At a certain point he had a Siege Rhino and a Sorin that he had just +1’d, but Outpost Siege set to Dragons plus my field of creatures killed his Rhino and his planeswalker. He was unable to generate much more of an offense, and from there I beat him pretty quickly.
After sideboarding I brought in my copies of End Hostilities, Hushwing Gryff, Glare of Heresy, Abzan Advantage, and Sarkhan. I kept the board clear before landing a Sarkhan to kill his last creature, and from there he just drew and passed. At that point, I knew the game was over when I jammed a Rabblemaster in play and he let me go to combat. Within two turns, John was dead and I was off to the finals.
I went outside to clear my head. I had been in this spot before, so I knew I could handle the disappointment. I believed I was playing very well, and I had a deck that was capable of winning. I was hungry for this Pro Tour. I was starving for this Pro Tour. Feast or Famine time was upon me.
In my way was Tom Maney playing Jeskai Tokens. I hated playing against this deck because of how powerful it is, but I believed R/W Aggro to be the more efficient weapon. We both stumbled on mana early in the first game, but I drew out of it and Tom didn’t. I hit five mana and started pouring Stormbreath Dragons onto the battlefield, and before I knew it we were on to the second game. My heart was pounding in my chest.
I brought in Scouring Sands, two Glare of Heresy, and three copies of Arc Lightning. Again Tom and I both had mana issues early, but we both drew out of it in the mid-game. I was beating him down with two Seeker of the Ways before getting him to seven life. After they died, I refueled with a Hordeling Outburst and he followed up with his own Hordeling Outburst and passed the turn. I dropped Outpost Siege in play naming Dragons and attacked, with Tom taking the damage and going down to four. I could feel it. This was it. I don’t even remember what Tom did… I think he cast a Treasure Cruise? It was all starting to blur. He tapped mana, though.
I looked down at my hand at the second Outpost Siege. It was finally going to happen.
I calmly drew my card and put the second Outpost Siege in play naming Dragons. Tom sacrificed his Flooded Strand and then extended his hand. I shook it and immediately pounded my fist on the table. About twenty people behind me started clapping. Michael Reilly hugged me from behind and bent my Ray-Bans. Brennan was smiling like crazy. Paul and Bronson were clapping and hooting and hollering. I had to be reminded to tell my opponent “good game.” I didn’t even know what the hell was going on.
We didn’t get to stay long since Bronson and I had to be at work so early the next morning. We stopped, ate dinner, then drove back talking about the event and how none of it had hit me yet. Everything was surreal.
When I finally got home around midnight, I remember climbing in to my bed and falling asleep almost instantly from the exhaustion of the last few days.
This weekend kind of felt like a dream. When I woke up on Monday, sure enough, 121 notifications on Facebook let me know that it was reality. No need to pinch myself: it actually happened.
I’ll see you in Brussels.
I’m going to the Pro Tour.