Ah, I feel like a new man. Refreshed, renewed, and downright relaxed.
I’d love to say that my exhibition is going off without a hitch as we speak…
(Well, I type, you read, it’s the same thing if we don’t admit otherwise.)
…But it’s not. The hitches are queuing up out into the street, and my inner Bruce is having a field day.
Nobody can claim my work is rubbish… If they can’t see it.
At least I know Bruce when I hear him, though, and isn’t that just the first step to beating that guy into submission?
(If you haven’t already, read about Bruce here. That man Rizzo is apparently capable of winning writer’s wars and stuff. Can’t you just see him stabbing that Malka guy with a pen?)
(“Ha! Take that, Sol!”)
(“Ooo, Rizzo, you have sorted me out right and proper sir, and no mistake.”)
(What on earth makes me think that either of those two scholarly chaps speaks with an English accent?)
(This is evidenced in the above characterization of one Sol Malka, especially where he says, and I quote,”…right and proper sir, and no mistake.”)
(Isn’t it odd that I’m quoting something I made up?)
(And isn’t it also odd, that I mention”one Sol Malka” – as if I expect another to suddenly appear from somewhere?)
(Yes. Yes it is.)
You see, ladies and gentlemen, it goes a little something like this…
“Now once upon a time there was a man named Jed.”
“Poor mountaineer, barely kept his…”
No wait. No it doesn’t.
It goes a little something like this.
For the last three weeks…
(Ooops! I did it again.)
I’ve been trying to do, oh I don’t know…
(I played with your heart,)
About half a year’s school work…
(Got lost in the game.)
In the space of the above mentioned…
(Oh baby, baby.)
Three weeks.
(Ooops!…You think I’m in love.)
…And play Magic…
(That I’m sent from above.)
…And have a social life.
(I’m not that…)
Well, obviously the bit about a social life is a savage lie.
(…Innocent…)
I practically locked myself away…
(You see my problem is this.)
Writing these articles for the Ferrett.
(I’m dreaming away.)
The man keeps sending these two guys…
(Wishing that heroes…)
“Big John” and”Fat Tony” around…
(…They truly exist.)
Hang on…
(I cry, watching the days.)
…Why can I hear Britney?
(Can’t you see I’m a fool…)
Why young lady, yes we can.
(…In so many ways.)
(Thwack!)
(Thud…)
Somebody should have done that long ago…
Anyway.
“Big Tony” and”Fat John,” no wait…”Fit Tony” and”Bag John”…
(I think…)
…They keep threatening me.
“The Big Rodent says you’re behind on your StarCity deadlines…”
“So watch your kneecaps, chief…”
“And don’t you dare talk about multiplayer without consulting me first.”
Yes”Fig Tony.” Yes,”Bat John.” Please don’t hesitate to let the door smack you on the way out.
“That’s it, chief, I’m a-pullin’ the gang signs on yo ass!”
Stop that,”Bit John,” it tickles!
(…erm.)
So maybe I get a bit behind here and there, it’s no biggy.
You see, I’ve got this thing… This kinda… You know… A bit…A bit of um…
(Ahem.)
(You know, I clear my throat quite a bit while I write don’t you think?)
…A touch of…
(Hehe.)
Of writer’s block.
(There.)
(I said it.)
(And let’s face it, you could probably tell that by now, too.)
(I mean come on, seven hundred-plus words without making a point?)
(Actually, you’d be thinking,”writer’s block doesn’t usually result in seven hundred-plus words.”)
(And I guess you’d be right.)
Hmmm.
Maybe I don’t need inspiration to just prattle on endlessly.
(Mmmmm. Good word,”prattle”…)
So, what am I doing now that I’ve finished my schoolwork for a while?
(A while being give or take ten minutes…)
(…About ten minutes.)
(But what can you do?)
I’m practicing for this week’s FNM.
I know this sounds a bit like heresy, like practicing for the Invitational, which we all know happens even though nobody ever admits it.
But the problem is this. If I do anything less than three wins and one loss, I lose ratings points. Last time I finished 2-1-1 due a sealed deck that apparently came with no cards…
(No playable cards, anyway…)
(I mean, I got three Verdant Successions!)
(I don’t care if one of them was foil, it’s still useless!!)
…And I lost four points.
(Grrrr…)
I lost six points in the round I lost.
(My, what a lovely Roar of the Wurm/Call of the Heard/Elephant Ambush/Syncopate/Cephalid Looter you have, Grandma-ma!)
(All the better to rob you of your DCI ratings points with…)
I gained two points in each of the rounds that I won, and then lost two when my last round ended in a draw. I’m just relieved it was only an 8k event…
I’ve worked reasonably hard to get my Limited rating to where it is.
(Well, I’ve played in a not-too-sucky manner for several years to get it to where it is.)
And I’m not so keen to flush it all away.
I even go as far as telling Alice,
“I’m gonna win this week!”
“Yes, dear.” She said, smiling meekly because she really doesn’t care.
(Just once, she’d like me to go out with her on a Friday night, instead of playing with my nerdy friends and spending money on stupid cards.)
(“Just once, spend money on me – me!”)
(Hands off the keyboard, dear, there’s a good girl…)
(Ahem…)
So let the most frowned on practice of… practice, begin!
Onto mIRC I go, doo doot dee-doo.
Into #netdraft, #e-draft, #wiredraft, #mtgwacky, and #mtgpro I go, doo doot dee-doodledoo.
Sure enough, I’m promptly kicked from #mtgpro for being an”imposter” by some”op” by the name of”mise.”
(Seriously, that’s what it said, and it’s not that funny.)
(No, it isn’t.)
I frequent #mtgpro quite frequently, so to speak, and this savage”mise” person has never kicked me before. I think maybe they thought I wasn’t actually the great writer”blisterguy” or something, and I was impostering him because I’m clearly not very funny in chats, LOL.
(I’m such an imposterer…)
The first draft I land in has six randoms, BabyHuey, and me. After a few picks, someone drops and a bunch of randoms begin to swear a lot. Before anyone with a brain has a chance to say,”No, this is Netdraft 1.41, dropping doesn’t crash it!” four other people drop, too.
(Idiots.)
So someone else hosts it.
(Not technically a rehost, due to it being a different host. Capice?)
And this time, the man with a website dedicated to him, Geddes Cooper, manages to crash the host’s version of Netdraft, which is, conveniently, not 1.41.
There is much discussion about how much GeDDeS sucks ec-tech.
I try to start my own draft, but I too suck. Before it matters, someone else has one ready…
…And it crashes.
Which was good actually, because against my better judgement I had begun to draft green and it was going horribly…
(Roar of the Wurm.)
(Elephant Ambush.)
(Krosan Archer.)
(No green card.)
(No green card.)
(Simplify.)
(No green card…)
(…Crash.)
While everyone else bemoans the crash of the draft, boasting about how good their draft deck was promising to be, I sit quietly, writing on my wall,
“I will not draft green. I will not draft green…”
(If I had a digital camera and a landlord who didn’t mind marker pen on the wall, I’d have one funny, funny, funny (dot)jpeg for you all.)
Finally a draft gets going in #e-draft again, with one or two people from other channels to make up numbers. And this time, I don’t draft green. Instead, I’m loving the red/white stylings of, erm… Red/white. At the very least, I figure R/W are my initials, so how can I go wrong?
Doo doot dee-doodle-ee-dooo.
(Aven Archer.)
(Chainflinger.)
(Chainflinger.)
(Mystic Zealot.)
(Abandoned Outpost.)
(Crash.)
And I’m telling ya, no one had opened a pack of Masques by mistake.
Then I was kicked from #netdraft by an over-zealous”op” called”plag,” who also happened to be part of the draft, for advertising a draft from #e-draft in his channel.
Fair enough really, but”plag” had just asked,
<plag> rehost?
<plag> anybody?
And I had replied,
<blistrguy> in #e-draft
(Where the draft originally started.)
So he bans me.
(I bet he gets beaten up at school.)
By now, I’m getting tired so I vow the next draft is the last one for tonight.
I start off white, and head into blue.
I touch green in case things dry up in the other colors.
I almost rare-draft a Seton, Krosan Protector that I need for Allan’s green set, but think better of it.
(Luckily.)
And go back for a white card over a Springing Tiger, because green is green.
Then a Diligent Farmhand sends me back into green, and so does a second one.
And then all of a sudden, there’s no green, white, or blue card worth choosing. My brain freezes for a second, and then I figure I’ll just hate draft a good red card…
(Barbarian Lunatic.)
…instead.
Oh well, maybe I can spend the first round of packs picking all the good cards across all of the colors and then I’ll solidify my choices in packs two and three.
(When will WOTC print a card called”Solidify”?)
(I wonder what it would do?)
(Ahem.)
(Off come my pants…)
(…And on go Buehler’s.)
(Buehler’s pants fall off, despite several belts…)
(I’m not a large man by any stretch of the imagination.)
(Actually,”stretch” might be a fitting description…)
(…So I don Rosewater’s pants instead.)
(Because after all…)
(…You’re my”wonder wall.”)
(Er, no…)
(Ahem.)
(Because after all, it was Mark Rosewater that designed Odyssey, not”Ferris” Buehler, as earlier speculated by many of my fellow StarCity columnists.)
(Here goes…)
Solidify.
2R
Sorcery.
Target creature loses all of its abilities and becomes a basic Mountain. It no longer counts as a creature.
Artist; Ray Walkinshaw.
(Hey, I can be the artist if I want to. In two weeks I’ll complete my design degree, in which I have studied drawing, graphics, and illustration.)
(At some point along the way, anyway…)
(Another ahem.)
Early in the second pack, I draft another Farmhand, and weird 5 color ideas begin to dance in front of my eyes like little, wet, sparkly things.
(That might be from lack of sleep, but who knows?)
Further into the pack, I draft a fourth Farmhand, and begin to seriously wonder which color to leave in the sideboard. I even last-pick an Abandoned Outpost, which is in one of my main colors. T’rrific!
The last pack has a Tarnished Citadel as its rare, but my brain helpfully chips in with,
“Best not first pick the Citadel.”
(That’s what it says in my notes, anyway.)
I even get passed a Wild Mongrel, which I find pleasing. Almost as pleasing as the following deck, which is the result of this draft.
//NAME: NetDraft deck 23/10/2001 21:24:41
4 Diligent Farmhand
1 Wild Mongrel
2 Cephalid Scout
1 Cephalid Looter
3 Barbarian Lunatic
4 Dreamwinder
1 Springing Tiger
1 Rabid Elephant
2 Scrivener
1 Firebolt
3 Second Thoughts
1 Timberland Ruins
2 Seafloor Debris
2 Abandoned Outpost
2 Mountain
1 Plains
6 Forest
3 Island
SB: 2 Kirtar’s Desire
SB: 1 Aven Cloudchaser
SB: 2 Dematerialize
SB: 3 Scrivener
SB: 1 Zombie Assassin
SB: 1 Childhood Horror
SB: 1 Acceptable Losses
SB: 1 Earth Rift (Bit of an anti-draft…)
Note such interesting synergy as:
3 Second Thoughts + 5 Scrivener.
4 Diligent Farmhand + My mana base.
4 Dreamwinder + My need to not be attacked by anything, ever.
The deck itself seems to be low on threats, but the games I played with this thing were just plain hilarious. I didn’t lose one, it was that good.
(Well, I only played like, three.)
But it has to be said.
“Kids, don’t try this at home.”
(Five-color drafting in Odyssey that is…)
The next day, I log on and quickly join a draft.
My first pick is obvious. I click on the Iridescent Angel, and before I click the”draft” button, I double-check to see if there isn’t a more deserving pick. But of course, whom am I kidding? I scoop up the Angel and get ready for pack two…
…Which, naturally, is never opened because some idiot dropped, and Server = not 1.41.
I guess that had to happen if I was going to get a first-pick Angel.
I almost miss the start of the next draft, but I apologize and we’re off.
And then three people drop.
(Sigh.)
The next draft presents me with a small problem; first-pick Mystic Enforcer or no? I could conceivably draft a Patchwork Gnomes instead, which would allow me to slide into my colors slowly, going with the flow of the draft.
Instead of leaping straight into green.
(Which is bad, oh so bad.)
Green may well be the best color in Odyssey limited. Well, okay – it is. But that doesn’t mean you should draft it, since you’ll be competing with every chump at the table and even the best green can only go so far.
Then again, what if everyone stays out of green because they think it will be overdrafted? Well then, your green deck will be chock full of fatty goodness.
But what if everyone thinks everyone else is staying out of green, and then they’re all back fighting over green?
What then?
Hedge your bets and splash green.
This means you can’t play Elephant Ambush, and you’re not likely to truly abuse Wild Mongrel on the second turn. But people will still be hesitant about blocking it late in the game, and they certainly won’t be blocking your Rabid Elephants. They will be blocking your Wurm tokens, though. Chump blocking, that is…
So I drafted the Mystic Enforcer with the intent to splash.
The next pack was pretty dismal, so I drafted an Æther Burst. I like blue in Odyssey, I really do. Quite possibly the second-best color in the set for limited. That said, it too can be a tad heavily drafted. But bounce in this set is notoriously expensive, costing around four…
(Well, exactly four.)
(Dematerialize and Repel.)
…And Æther Burst costs only two. If I’m not mistaken, there could be some advantage in having a few of them, but I’m not sure…
Hmmm, now what’s going to be my third pick? Here it comes, it’s going to be…
…No, really, why is there a Wild Mongrel in this pack?
Soooo, neither of the chaps to my right want to play green, eh?
SCOOP!
I follow that up with the underrated by everyone and overrated by me, Dematerialize.
(I figure it’s seriously good against any kind of tokeny things.)
You have to play with it to see that it’s not that bad.
Next I pick an Embolden, and then a Sungrass Egg. Mmmm, mana smoothing…
(I could go on like this for a while you know, I have all of my draft picks written in order…)
(With notes…)
(Totally geekier than thou…)
(It’s odd, but I always seem to get last-pick Ray of Distortion.)
(Gotta love those”Ray” cards…)
But to spare you the torture, here is the final deck.
//NAME: NetDraft deck 24/10/2001 15:02:43
2 Wild Mongrel
1 Angelic Wall
1 Mystic Enforcer
1 Krosan Archer
1 Scrivener
1 Aven Windreader
1 Rabid Elephant
1 Aven Cloudchaser
2 AEther Burst
1 Dematerialize
1 Fervent Denial
2 Embolden
1 Second Thoughts
1 Shelter
1 Words of Wisdom
1 Sungrass Egg
2 Mossfire Egg
2 Rites of Spring
1 Seafloor Debris
1 Cephalid Coliseum
1 Timberland Ruins
5 Forest
4 Island
5 Plains
SB: Some stuff.
As you can see, I clearly failed to draft enough creatures. I wouldn’t be unhappy running so few creatures, though, as Enforcer, Elephant, 2x Mongrel is still very good. The mana fixing is quite extensive, and should help the Threshold cause as well as getting me to four or five mana in as many turns. The end result here is that it isn’t as horrible as it seems.
I try one more draft for the day, but you’ll never guess what happened to it…
I get up on Thursday, consider doing some schoolwork, and promptly open mIRC instead.
Instead of first picking one of the following:
Wild Mongrel
Werebear
Rabid Elephant
I pick a Skeletal Scrying. If I pick one of those cards, and let the other two go, there would be a very good chance that I’d get shafted for green in the seond run of packs. Add that to the strong possibility that I won’t be getting much green to follow it up, I let them all go.
(Run free, little ones…)
So I end up with the following deck instead. Which is lucky because, as if on cue, the green dried up like it had been left in the sun on a purposefully-built drying rack.
//NAME: NetDraft deck 24/10/2001 22:58:01
1 Crypt Creeper
1 Frightcrawler
2 Fledgling Imp
1 Dusk Imp
1 Painbringer
3 Aven Fisher
2 Dirty Wererat
2 Gravedigger
3 Zombie Assassin
1 Morgue Theft
2 Repel
1 Diabolic Tutor
1 Screams of the Damned
1 Morbid Hunger
1 Skeletal Scrying
2 Bog Wreckage
7 Island
8 Swamp
SB: 1 Time Stretch
SB: 1 Treetop Sentinel
SB: 1 Careful Study
SB: 1 Cephalid Scout
SB: 1 Coffin Purge
SB: 2 Rites of Refusal
SB: 1 Fervent Denial
SB: 1 Beast Attack
Okay, so I blatantly hatedrafted a Beast Attack, but it’s better than seeing it played against me. The deck itself isn’t bad; I almost ran the Time Stretch, but it just didn’t twist my arm hard enough. The Treetop Sentinel was left out because of the UU in its casting cost.
(Smart people will note that Time Stretch also has UU in its casting cost.)
(Smarter people will then note that I couldn’t cast Time Stretch until I reached ten mana anyway.)
(The smartest people will tell you that this is why the Time Stretch was closer to making it into my deck than the Treetop Sentinel. I don’t take two extra turns when I finally draw my second Island with the 2/3 blue flyer…)
So after that, I decided to dip into black again. Just to see if it was as underdrafted as I thought it might be.
//NAME: NetDraft deck 25/10/2001 10:49:58
1 Crypt Creeper
1 Frightcrawler
1 Filthy Cur
1 Barbarian Lunatic
2 Patchwork Gnomes
1 Dirty Wererat
2 Gravedigger
1 Chainflinger
1 Famished Ghoul
1 Sadistic Hypnotist
1 Zombie Assassin
2 Firebolt
1 Ghastly Demise
2 Malevolent Awakening
2 Afflict
1 Patriarch’s Desire
1 Zombify
1 Petrified Field
2 Bog Wreckage
1 Cabal Pit
6 Swamp
8 Mountain
SB: 1 Innocent Blood
SB: 1 Dwarven Recruiter
SB: 1 Dwarven Grunt
SB: 1 Zombie Cannibal
SB: 1 Volcanic Spray
SB: 1 Earth Rift
SB: 1 Magma Vein
SB: 1 Scorching Missile
SB: 1 Burning Sands
SB: 1 Buried Alive
SB: 1 Last Rites
SB: 1 Syncopate (In case I get enough blue to splash.)
SB: 1 Phantatog
SB: 1 Springing Tiger (Hate draft.)
What?
You’re not impressed?
Ah, you haven’t had to play out the mid/late game versus Malevolent Awakening/Gravedigger recursion! What happens if I don’t get to the mid/late game? Oh, so you didn’t see the 2x Firebolt/Afflict and the 1x Ghastly Demise/Patriarch’s Desire, either?
That said, it still might lack the power to deal with fast and large green beats.
(Which is perhaps why black is so underdrafted.)
I entered a few more drafts, and they all crashed. So without further procrastination…
(I’m the State Procrastination Champion.)
…I set to writing my research up into an article.
(It had nothing to do with the fact that John Chuberson and Tony Fatty-Patty are staring at me through the window…)
(“‘ Sup, chief?”)
(The sky, Johno.)
(“Can I have a pie?”)
(No, Tony. No you can’t.)
I figure I’ll get some mileage out of this,”some draft practice advice”…
(No matter how weak it is.)
…Followed by article number 2,”How I Did On The Night, FNM Tourney Report”.
But of course, before I knew it, it was Friday lunchtime and there was no way I was going to get it done before the actual tournament.
(Sigh.)
It’s now Sunday evening, so here comes a brief tourney report of the FNM draft I played in not two days ago.
(Sigh.)
So I’m late to the draft, which isn’t a surprise. I’d paid my entry fee in an early manner, however, so they had waited for me. This didn’t stop them from trying to fill the air with jocularity and general laughiness.
“We’ve already started, you’re going to get the last fifteen cards from each pack that nobody wants.”
Yes yes, I believe you.
“Haha, the last fifteen cards!“
You’re not funny. You think you are, but you’re not.
We’re seated and even though I’d just finished my dinner…
(An excellent excuse for being late, I’d think.)
…I was still being fed by Pete of”beat Pete” fame.
(Some of you will note that in any draft, you will be fed by the person on your right for quite a sizeable portion of said draft.)
First pack is opened. I’m trying pretty hard to not feel too confident. Practice or no, bad things can, will, and do, happen.
Like for instance, the lack of bombs in my first pack.
Not just the lack of bombs, but the lack of good cards.
I like Shelter, but I don’t like having to first-pick it.
But I do.
Next, I pick an Æther Burst. Which is much better.
But the Shelter still hurts a bit.
(Well, it is a good card…)
Third pick is a <insert random blue or white card here>.
(I wasn’t overly inspired to remember anything by this point.)
(In fact at this point, I’m beginning to see why people whine about luck.)
(Blah.)
(Blah.)
(Blah.)
Then comes the fourth pick.
The fourth pick.
(You get the picture?)
(I’m telling you, this is the fourth pick.)
I scoop up the 12 cards waiting for me, and begin to thumb through the pack. Commons first, then the uncommons. The rare is gone. I thumb through the commons again, then again, the uncommons.
I double check the uncommons.
I look up at the three people to my right.
(Am I building the anticipation well enough for you?)
I tell my brain,
“Lift jaw back into place.”
“Check cards at the back of the pack again.”
“Frown at the three players – nae, fools – to your right.”
“Place the second card from the back down in front of you.”
“This one?” My brain asks.
“That one.” I say.
(Silence while I wait for everyone else to draft their card.)
(Puzzled silence.)
(Now this is obviously not very fair on you, the reader.)
(You’d be thinking,”What has he drafted?”)
(The best uncommon in the set, and perhaps one of the best cards in the set, is Shower of Coals.)
(Nobody passed me a Shower of Coals.)
(Unfortunately.)
When I pick up the next eleven cards, I immediately take the Springing Tiger. Because it’s in my colors.
(Hmmm… So green is now one of my colors?)
(What on earth could my excellent green uncommon 4th pick be?)
(Don’t worry if you can’t work it out, there will be a decklist later.)
Several picks later, and we’re opening our second pack.
If I thought my first-pick Shelter was a tad on the nose…
(In the same way a punch would be on the nose.)
…My first-pick Sungrass Egg also stung in a very unpleasant kind of way.
The pack was that bad.
But the guy on my left? His pack was pretty good. He certainly didn’t want the Beast Attack he passed me for some reason. This makes me a very happy fellow. Yes indeed. Who isn’t happy with two Beast Attacks?
(Whoops – maybe I’ve said too much…)
(Not that there were any prizes for getting it right or anything…)
I was perhaps lacking in information about this draft earlier, because I was perhaps a tad unhappy with the apparent outcome that was bound to befall me. I was now lacking in information that you could perhaps find helpful, because I was quite over the moon and still accelerating.
By the time everyone is ready to open their last pack, I’m laughing openly. I joke with Digby as he watches over my shoulder,
“Yeah, a Call of the Herd would be good.”
“Heh – that would be strong.”
“Call of the Herd, Call of the Herd.”
We begin to chant.
You’ll never guess what I found when I tore open my pack.
<Insert smiley face here.>
Digby, Martin, and Giles, my erstwhile team mates that are oh-so in the house, go nuts behind me.
And I giggle a bit.
<Ah, I’ll go nuts too. Another smiley face, right here.>
I get a couple of Wild Mongrels somewhere amongst it all, and a couple of Scriveners that promise such silliness with my Beast Attack duo.
Here’s that decklist I promised you – behold its nuttiness!
(Perhaps…)
(Macadamia?)
//NAME: FNMDraft deck 27/10/2001 18:15:00 (Ish…)
2 Wild Mongrel
2 Cephalid Scout
1 Hallowed Healer
1 Call of the Herd
1 Cephalid Looter
1 Springing Tiger
1 Dreamwinder
1 Aven Fisher
2 Krosan Archer
2 Beast Attack
1 Rabid Elephant
1 Gorilla Titan
2 Scrivener
1 Sungrass Egg
1 Æther Burst
1 Rites of Spring
1 Embolden
1 Deluge
1 Timberland Ruins
1 Seafloor Debris
1 Abandoned Outpost
8 Forest
5 Island
1 Plains
(Cards that were sideboarded in…)
SB: 1x Moment’s Peace
SB: 1x Leaf Dancer
SB: 1x Sphere of Duty
(Cards that were drafted with the best intent…)
SB: 2x Kirtar’s Desire
SB: 1x Shelter
SB: 1x Patrol Hound
SB: 1x Aven Flock
SB: 1x Shelter
SB: 1x Careful Study
SB: 1x Words of Wisdom
(Cards that were drafted with the intent that the only time I would see them, would be when I was sideboarding, and I could chuckle about all the players who weren’t playing with them in their decks…)
SB: 1x Morbid Hunger
SB: 1x Filthy Cur
SB: 1x Coffin Purge
SB: 1x Ghastly Demise
SB: 1x Psychatog
Now all I have to do is win all my matches.
(Frown.)
(DingDing!)
(Round 1…)
(In the blue/white corner…)
(Trrrrrrrrevorrrrrrrr, Partridgggggggggge!)
Trevor mulligans.
Trevor plays an Island.
I play Call of the Herd, Flash it back, and cast a Gorilla Titan.
Trevor plays his second Island.
He Æther Bursts my Gorilla, but we both know it’s futile.
(So I get the broken draw, and Trevor gets a draw that is beatable by a goldfish.)
The next game is better for Trevor, as he has lands with which he can play his spells. I have this one spell that turns his peeps sideways, and I draw two Scriveners so I can cast it many times. Not good, but a win is a win, innit?
While I play Trevor, I notice Jimmy, who is sitting next to us, has a Call of the Herd of his own and three Syncopates.
(Hmmm. Jimmy has Bad4me dot dec.)
(Here are my results thus far, just like everyone else does in their tournament reports.)
1-0 in matches, 2-0 in games.
(Here are my results thus far, just like nobody does in their tournament reports.)
One dash nil in matches…
(Which are not to be played with.)
Two dash nil in games…
(Which are to be played in.)
Round 2 brings a nasty surprise, I’m paired against my employer, local TO Chris Williams.
Chris mentions something about the master and his apprentice…
(I usually judge Chris’s events, where he is almost always the head judge.)
…But he doesn’t play much these days, so I know he’s rustier than a piece of rust that’s been left out in the rain, near the sea, where things rust with particular enthusiasm.
His deck is full of bears. Bears and cheap burn. So obviously when I keep a slow hand in game 1, I’m eventually beaten down in a way that only a beatdown deck can manage.
I side in the Moment’s Peace, and I’m promptly rewarded by finding it in my opening hand. Chris tries to play around it with his Crypt Keeper, but he wasn’t to know about the Beast Attack that was waiting in my hand for him to do such a play. I try to look dejected when he Keepers the Moment’s Peace, but how can you when you know you’re about to slap him senseless with creatures that are twice the size of his?
(“Go on, block with the Filthy Cur!” encouraged Martin from the sidelines…)
(I’m pretty sure Chris didn’t think blocking with the Filthy Cur was a good idea, nobody blocks Rabid Elephants anyway…)
The next game is even worse for Chris. My opening hand is 4x land, 2x Wild Mongrel, and Moment’s Peace. I even draw into the Beast Attacks…
(Sigh.)
Two dash nil in Matches
(Which are soooo not to be played with.)
Four dash one in games…
(Which are to be somewhat played in.)
Round 3.
Jimmieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee.
(And his deck full o’ Syncopateness.)
Game 1, I play Wild Mongrel, followed by Hallowed Healer. Jimmy is not inclined to block, funnily enough…
I’m playing main-phase Beast Attacks whenever he taps out, and making sure he knows I won’t let him Syncopate them. When he tries to gang block a Beast token with seven power worth of blockers…
(To play around my Healer.)
…I sac a Timberland Ruins to play a Cephalid Scout’s ability, sacrificing an Island, draw the card, discard two to the Wild Mongrel and whoa, I have Threshold. The Healer works her wonderful stuff and Jimmy is looking to be in bad shape. He taps out to play some blockers, so I attack and cast Deluge once all my animals are safely swinging.
Game 2, my hand is sweeter than the sweetest thing that was ever described as sweet. Scrivener, Beast Attack, Call of the Herd and some land. I draw a Wild Mongrel and play it turn 2 into Jimmy’s two untapped Forests.
(Hmmm, they’re not very good for Syncopating with, Jimmy…)
Next turn he plays an Island and ends.
(Hmmm… But now you can, can’t you?)
I hold off with the Call and the Beast Attack, and instead I play an Aven Fisher. Jimmy Syncopates. Next turn I play a Dreamwinder…
(Hmmm, nice Islands, Jimmy…)
…Jimmy Syncopates.
(Two down…)
From here, there’s really no way he can stop the large and in charge animals I play out.
Three dash nil in matches…
(Which are not to be played with, because they burn, BURNNN!!!!!.)
Six dash one in games…
(Which are to be played in, because they are fun, FUNNN!!!!!.)
(I’m three and uh-oh, I’m three and uh-oh!)
(Gloat, gloat, gloat.)
Final round.
Round 4.
The round where I play James. James Wilson.
(Or Jamie, as he prefers to be called.)
I saw his deck as it was being built. Green/black with an Overrun.
(Everyone’s worst limited nightmare!)
I figure I have one counter for it maindeck with Deluge, and another in the side with Moment’s Peace. If given the choice, I’ll draw so I have a better chance at having it handy when he tries anything silly.
James wins the flip and choses to play.
(Haha, sucker!)
He has many 2/2s, which are obviously nasty if they happen to receive +3/+3 and trample, but are somewhat silly next to my big ‘uns when they don’t. My draw in game 1 is impeccable…
(I’m thinking maybe the deck is just that good…)
Even though Jamie gets a Rabid Elephant along with his bears, I get Beasts and Gorillas. Soon he has to attempt a mass combat trade to survive, and who am I to stop him?
Oh no wait, I cast Embolden and wreck him.
Oh well.
Sucks to be him.
Game 2, Jamie choses to play again.
(Ok then, if you want me to win…)
Beast Attack. Scrivener the Beast Attack. Use my Seafood Looter, draw the second Beast Attack. Apply some hideous beats that really should be left undescribed, for fear of young children hearing, and then having nightmares.
Four dash nil in matches…
(Which are not to be foil Carnophage with.)
Eight dash one in games…
(Which foil Carnophage to be foil Carnophage foil Carnophage.)
(Foil Carnophage.)
(For me, even…)
(Smile.)
I show James the savage Sphere of Duty I sideboarded in versus him. He says it wouldn’t have bothered him, much to Digby’s shock.
“It smashes you!” he proclaimed.
And I have to agree with him.
(Which is why I sided it in, really…)
Then Pete the shop guy draws the random prize winner, and it’s me!
(Haha! What are the odds.)
But the rules are the rules, so he redraws and gets Jamie.
(Smile.)
Then he draws the second winner, and it’s me again!
(An absolute”LOL” moment, I’m sure you’ll agree…)
But this time I’m laughing too hard to hear whom the redraw bestowed the award upon.
(Hehe.)
So how about that, eh?
Of course you don’t have to believe that I said I was going to win before I actually did, but I know it’s true.
Hehe, I’m pretty sure my rating won’t go down after that one…
<Another gratuitous smiley face…>
But then there’s next week…
(Sigh.)
Maybe I’ll take Alice out for dinner instead…
(Yeah right!)
Until next time, my fellow geeky, nerdy, people with no lives…
(And loving it, of course.)
Look after each other.
Lotsa loverly love,
Ray.
(beep)
(Put down the pie, Tony.)
(“Sorry…”.)