For my last day, I’m going to be a bit more lighthearted. I’m going to respond to some forum comments and e-mails that the first three or four days generated, and I’ll tell some actual game-play stories. Some are funny. Some are sad. Some are brilliant. Some are head-scratchers. All are true, even if I get the details a bit munched up. In the end, there’ll be a bonus, too!
This series generated a lot of comments and e-mails. I didn’t expect it to. I don’t know why. I figured it was a quick, little, daily thing, so, why would it? I clearly touched a nerve or some other body part for some folks. oOxAtogxOo, for example, wanted to know “what kinda guitar was it that you got?” It was an Ibanez Roadstar II. I believe it was the same kind that Robert Cray was using, though I didn’t play it anywhere near as well. I still don’t, although I still have the same guitar.
Noumenon wrote that I could have gotten “five ten-year-old Tauruses for” the price of our Scion. “[E]veryone thinks two-and-a-half times their income is all anybody needs and people who spend more are just wasting it.” Which, of course, is true, or it feels that way, at least. Part of the reason for this is that most people learn to live within their means (sometimes just barely). If we earn a little bit more, our expenses mysteriously go up to fill in that space. Almost everyone I know spends everything they have each month. Double my family’s income, and we’d have no problems. All of our bills would go away. Everyone I know thinks that, too. It’s probably true, but only if our income was doubled overnight. Do it gradually, through small raises here and there, and we’ll always find a way to eat that right up. I got a whopping twenty-dollar-per-week raise last year. Wow! A thousand dollars! As one lump sum, that would have been great. As fifteen bucks (take home) each week, it got lost in the higher cost for, well, everything.
In regards to my desire to beat powerful, expensive decks with cheap ones, JMGK wrote “Let’s hear it for ignorant arrogance.” Okay. “Yeah!” As I said yesterday, I’m an egomaniac with a chip on my shoulder. You can call it ignorant arrogance if you want. That’s fine with me. Just don’t call me late for dinner.
Jeremy N. wrote to me and said “while I hadn’t made a judgement of your character prior to [your SCG Daily piece], I do now have a sentence to sum you up as: Mr. Romeo is an intelligent, down-to-earth, easy-going, nice guy. How close am I?” See what I mean about people being able to sum you up in once sentence even if they barely know you? Just add “good-lookin’,” and he’d be right on the money. That’s just scary.
Ants in the Pants, the deck I took to 2001 Regionals and that went undefeated against Fires of Yavimaya decks, was a popular topic. Talen Lee wanted to know the decklist. As I remember it:
Ants in the Pants
23 Lands
3 Elfhame Palace
3 Brushland
10 Forest
7 Plains
23 Creatures
4 Birds of Paradise
4 Vine Trellis
4 Benalish Trapper
4 Saber Ants
4 Ancient Spider
3 Blinding Angel
14 Other Spells
4 Pacifism
4 Armadillo Cloak
4 Wave of Reckoning
2 Armageddon
If I did it over, I’d use Shackles instead of Pacifism. That way, I could reuse it after a Wave of Reckoning (presuming I had the extra White mana to save it).
Worst. Bluff. Ever.
We all know about bluffs. (These are not the same as Jedi Mind tricks, by the way.) The worst bluff I ever saw came in a Standard tourney when Nemesis was still legal. One guy was playing Blasto-geddon, the other some sort of Mono-Blue Control. Now, before I go on, do nothing for twenty seconds and time it.
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That’s a long time, isn’t it? Anyway, Blasto-geddon Guy had gone first. Thanks to Llanowar Elves or Birds of Paradise, he had gotten a third-turn Blastoderm. On his fourth turn, he cast Armageddon. The Blue player had three Islands up and nothing else on the board. Blue Guy kinda looked at his hand, scrunched up his face, looked at the table, looked at his hand, looked at the table. This went on for twenty seconds. “Okay, I’ll let it hit.” Dude, you’re playing a mana-hungry control deck. You’re about to have all of your lands wiped out, and you’re staring down a 5/5 that you can’t bounce because it can’t be targeted. If you had Counterspell, you would have used it. I guarantee it. Worst. Bluff. Ever. (Now, why a Blue player would keep a hand that could not counter a turn 3 Blastoderm or a turn 4 Armageddon, I don’t know.)
Best Use of Crypt Rats Other Than as a Book Mark
A lot of the best plays that I’ve seen have to do with multi-player Chaos games. (Our group hasn’t yet become sophisticated enough to hold down our spell range to one or two players or anything. If you cast Armageddon, everyone gets pi$$ed off at you, not just the guy to the right and the guy to the left.) The reigning king of our multi-player games is Jeff Wiles, who also happens to be a judge extraordinaire. Jeff has a multi-player deck that is both Highlander (Singleton for you MTGO-only folks) and 5-Color legal. It’s a work of art, really. Like many multi-player geniuses (genii?), Jeff likes his huge beasties. When he has to, though, he knows how to make due with some weenies. One fine summer evening a couple of years ago, there were six of us playing a long game that had stalled out. Everyone had creatures, and no one wanted to attack. Jeff cast Crypt Rats. No one stopped him. Next, he cast Soul Link targeting his Crypt Rats. “Any responses?” All of us passed. Jeff looked around and noticed that the biggest creature was a X/6 of some sort (most likely a Towering Baloth that Jason had dropped). Jeff’s smart. He didn’t get greedy. He activated the Crypt Rats for six. “Any responses?”
Nothing. I looked around the table. “Come on, folks. No one has Terminate? Shock? Fault Line? Not even a friggin’ Zap?” Nope. Good thing Jeff’s a professor of something having to do with math or using math because he had to figure out how much life he gained from the Crypt Rats hitting each creature for six plus each player plus the six for the second triggered ability on the Soul Link. He gained hundreds of points of life and wiped out the board.
Best Recovery from a Devastating Turn of Events
This was followed by the best recovery ever. The very next turn, Charles, our host, cast Llanowar Elves and then Biorhythm. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him happier. He looked like Jim Carrey through most of Dumb and Dumber. He’d been hoping to pull off that trick for months. He never did, though, because the board was never empty. Thanks to Jeff, it finally was, and Charles pulled off the rarest of multiplayer wins, beating five other players, simultaneously, and doing it while at one life.
I Got Yer Number Right Here
I don’t play Limited much. If you’ve been reading the last few days, you’d probably guess that money is an issue. During Invasion block, I did a fair bit of drafting, though. You know how there’s always a person who has your number and another one whose number you have? In drafts – only in drafts – I have Stacey Allen’s number. I say it that way because anyone who knows the two of us will tell you without hesitation that she is about eleventy-million times better than I am at every aspect of this game (except for coming up with cute names for decks). When it comes to drafts, though, something happens when we play. Almost without exception, no matter how unfocused my deck is, no matter how hinky the mana base is, I beat her.
Case in point: an Invasion/Invasion/Planeshift draft. I was in Green and White, which, I’m pretty sure anyone will tell you, was not a very good combination in Invasion block. However, it was open, and I had grabbed an Armadillo Cloak and a Charging Troll. Things could definitely have been worse. In the second pack, I was passed Rith. Now, I don’t know what the guy feeding me was playing, but I couldn’t pass up Rith. I was almost in all three of those colors. I’d just need to splash Red, and I was already playing Green, the color of mana fixing. I had to have him.
Problem was that I had failed to get any mana fixing. I didn’t get a Fertile Ground or a Harrow or even a Primal Growth. Heck, I hadn’t even gotten a Nomadic Freakin’ Elf. Oh, well, I could just stay Green and White adding one Mountain and Rith. I wasn’t going to win anyway.
Stacey, meanwhile, had a tight Red/Black deck with lots of removal. I remember seeing Terminate and Agonizing Demise both used to remove roadblocks that I’d put up. Of course, I beat her two games to none. In both games – honest to goodness, twice – I got the single Mountain just in time to cast Rith and put an Armadillo Cloak on him. In both games, she had me thisclose to dead. I mean, twice, had I not gotten Rith wearing the Cloak right when I did, I was dead the next turn, no questions asked. In both games, I gained tons of life back with a Cloaked Rith for which she drew no removal. I’m so bad I’m good.
(I can confidently boast about this because Stacey gave birth to a new baby Magic player named Nora Marie Allen this Tuesday, June 7th, the same birthday as my brother and Prince. So, I’m pretty sure she won’t be reading this. Even if she does, she’ll be too tired to kick my azz.)
Thicket Elemental. ‘Nuff Said?
Speaking of bad, one deck that I tried to make work when Invasion was Standard legal was a Thicket Elemental deck. My ambition was to load the deck up with mana acceleration to cast the Elemental with kicker. That way I could get a Dromar or Rith or something else in play for free. The trouble was making sure that I had mana acceleration without having too many mana weenies to do it. There’s nothing like paying the kicker on a Thicket Elemental and hitting an Urborg Elf or something. The only mana creature in the deck was Llanowar Elves, supplemented with Harrow and Rampant Growth. (There wouldn’t be any Birds of Paradise because (a) they cost too much and (b) I didn’t want to double my chances of hitting a mana bug with the Thicket Elemental.)
I tested the deck, and it was wonderful. Mana acceleration meant quick Thicket Elementals. Fogs kept the game in hand. So, I packed it up for a Saturday tourney. My first game, I got a fifth-turn Elemental with kicker thanks to Llanowar Elves and Harrow. Of course, I turned over another Llanowar Elves even though there were only three left in the deck. Lovely. I lost that game. In game two, I did even better. I got what was essentially a God draw with double Elves, giving me a fourth-turn Thicket Elemental with kicker. This time, there were only two Elves left in the deck. I hit one. Seeing the writing on the wall, I packed up the deck, left for the day, and never saw it again until I was rummaging through my stuff while working on this week’s SCG Daily. For gits and shiggles, I brought it out and tested it. As if mocking me, I consistently got fifth-turn Elementals with kicker and powered out Dragon after Dragon. I put it way back in the back of the closet, hoping to teach it a lesson, like Mark Fidrych used to do with baseballs that gave up hits. (He’d give them back to the umpire to put back in the ball bag in the hopes that they’d get some sense knocked into them as they banged around with the other balls.)
I May Not Be a Pro, But, Sometimes, I Am Right
One of the most recent horrible plays I witnessed involved a Shrine deck and Mirror Gallery. I was playing online with my R/G Fork You deck (featuring Forked-Branch Garami, Pain Kami, and others), waiting for a Standard game, when a guy joined me. Turns out he was a fan. He thought I’d love his Shrine deck. (Of course, I’ve written about Shrines before. So, yes, I probably would.) He had out four Shrines, among them the Honden of Infinite Rage and the Honden of Seeing Winds. On his next turn, he dropped Mirror Gallery. The turn after that he dropped another Red and another Blue Shrine. “:)” he typed. On my turn, I dropped a Hearth Kami and then popped it off to kill his Mirror Gallery. A five-for-one trade. “:(” I typed. He said, “Well, I see what you meant about the Mirror Gallery.”
The Worst Deck Ever to Win a Game in Any Format
One of the drawbacks of my affliction (i.e. that I feel the need to build a deck for every card I own) is that I have to use some very, very bad cards. The worst cards in Magic, of course, are the coin-flipping cards. No matter how you try to work them into a deck, they introduce an element of randomness that goes way beyond the randomness inherent in this game. You just can’t get one or two coin flippers into a deck. They just ruin it. Your deck could be going along just fine and then *bam* time to flip coins. Then, one day, it struck me. Why not make a deck of almost exclusively coin-flipping cards? I’d get them into a deck, and it would be focused . . . well, in a way. Don’t get me wrong. It was a purely casual deck. Even I wouldn’t try to play it at a sanctioned tourney. I called it Pokemon because of all of the coin flipping.
I played it one night at one of our Saturday evening Magic/beer fests. It was a multi-player game with me, John, and Jason. Thanks to Crazed Firecat and Chance Encounter, I actually won. Yes, the coin-flipping deck beat two other players at the same time. I figured 1-0 was a good time to retire that deck.
Telling on Myself
A month or so ago, I played Adam G’s B/R Isochron Scepter deck. In game two against Bill Bryant, I made one of the stupidest decisions I’ve ever made. It was so bad, that I repeated it while laughing like a madman. In game two, I kept a zero-land hand. Yep. No lands. I did, however, have two Chrome Moxes with plenty of colored spells to Imprint. He dropped an Island and passed. I drew, put out both Moxes with Imprint. On his turn, he cast Echoing Truth on my Moxes. Doh! In an effort to prove that my decision wasn’t a mistake, I did it again. I dropped two Chrome Moxes on my turn, still without a land. He won game two.
Pyroclasm is Not an Instant,
Charles.
BONUS SECTION: Being Prepared for Regionals
Every year, I write something about being prepares for Regionals. In most Regions, it’s a long, long day. The shortest one I ever played in was eleven rounds. [They will be shorter this year because there are twice as many venues. Expect 9-10 rounds plus an elimination round. – Knut] If you’re not ready for that, you’re toast even if you’re playing The Best Deck Ever. Follow these simple, easy rules, and you’ll be better off for it.
Number One – Get a Good Night’s Sleep: Your mind needs rest to work properly. I don’t care if you get a hotel room on the site and arrive the night before or if you get a good night’s sleep at home and drive up (although a long drive the morning of the tourney is also discouraged). If you would write a tourney report that starts “My friends and I stayed up all night testing then left at 3:45 A.M. to get to the tournament site,” just stay home.
Number Two – Bring Real Food: Chips and soda / pop / Coke won’t rejuvenate you. Bring a cooler, and have some friends help fill it with sandwich fixin’s and fruit. Drink water and juice. If you want to snack between rounds, try cereal or granola bars or even the high-protein sports bars.
Number Three – Bring Air Freshener: I have stopped thinking that all of the Magic players are going to shower and put on deodorant at these things. A lot of the players are teenage boys. I was a teenage boy. I remember being a teenage boy. We stunk, and yet we couldn’t smell ourselves. So, bring some sort of air freshener with you. I’m getting into the Yankee Candle hanging ones myself. Got the Mango in my car right now. [I have the Fresh Laundry one in my glovebox… – Same dude as before]
Number Four – Keep Score with Pen and Paper: Dice can roll over. Even if they don’t, you can’t track how your opponent got from sixteen to fourteen. (“You tapped two City of Brass to play Slith Firewalker.”) In addition, in the event that you need to call a judge, you are much more persuasive, being able to track life totals up and down that your opponent who says, “Well, I think it went like this.”
Number Five – Call the Judge: You will face off against a cheater at some point in your Magic career. I guarantee it. Don’t let “little things” like looking at an extra card go by. That could be the guy’s style. He “accidentally” looks at extra cards all day long. He should be called on it all day long so that the tourney organizer and judges can see a pattern and kick him out. Whenever you have any rules questions or see anything that looks suspicious, call the judge. And count your opponent’s cards, especially after sideboarding.
Number Six – Have the Cards You Need Before You Go to the Tournament: I feel so bad for people who are scurrying at the tourney site to get cards for their deck. If you need cards that late, you are not prepared.
Number Seven – Keep an Eye on Your Stuff: Cards and backpacks grow legs at these things and walk away. A corollary to this is to not bring too much stuff. I see people walking around these very crowded events with four binders and two boxes of cards. Why? Oh, and if you bring a cooler of food (rule number two, above), leave the cooler in the car.
As usual, you’ve been a great audience. So great, in fact, that I’m already psyched for my next week of SCG Daily.
Chris Romeo
CBRomeo-at-Travelers-dot-com