Check out these two snips from GP: NO match coverage on the Sideboard by "Randy" Randy Buehler (1/06/01):
"Twelve players were 6-0 going into the last round on Saturday. Seven of them were playing blue/black/red."
"Zvi followed "the rule" for this format and built a blue/black/red Sealed deck."
Then check out this credenza:
"Black/blue/red was my agenda…Akron, Ohio was where I would take my stand."
-FrigginRizzo, um, 10/23/00
"Go B/U/R, which has a tendency to hit so many def lines you have to rewind."
-FrigginRizzo, yawn, 1/02/01
Point: I am right way too often. Why do I still suck?
(Begin worst tournament report, ever)
PTQ – Barcelona, Pittsburgh, 1/06/01
People that were here to mise:
CMU guys: Mike Patnik, Nate Heiss, Scott Teamann, and Andrew Cuneo. Mike Turian and Aaron Forsythe also made contractually obligated appearances.
Evil minions: Chas Tressler, Curtis Sproul, Broken Bryan Bandes, Antonio "23-7-1 Extended season" Powell
Chiropractors: Tyson Swigart
I think there were other misers here too.
My stuff, with what I mised in parenthesis:
Black: Bog Initiate, Urborg Phantom (Recover, Nightscape Apprentice, Plague Spitter, Tsabo’s Assassin, Firescreamer, two Phyrexian Slayers, Agonizing Demise, Mourning)
Red: Maniacal Rage, Overload, Goblin Spy, Scarred Puma, two Turf
Wounds, Stun, Zap (Viashino Grappler, Thunderscape Apprentice, Scorching Lava, Tribal Flames, Kavu Runner, Slimy Kavu)
Green: Tranquility, Wandering Stream, two Fertile Grounds, Llanowar
Cavalry, Llanowar Elite, Thornscape Apprentice (Explosive Growth, Kavu Chameleon, Quirion Elves, Quirion Sentinel, Thornscape Master, Wax/Wane)
Blue: Phantasmal Terrain, Temporal Distortion, Tower Drake, Opt,
Traveler’s Cloak, two Tidal Visionaries, Exclude, Vodalian Merchant,
Fact or Fiction
White: Harsh Judgment, Protective Sphere, Reviving Dose, Teferi’s Care, Strength of Unity, Ruham Djinn, Restrain, Shackles, Glimmering Angel, Benalish Trapper, Crimson Acolyte, Ardent Soldier
Gold: Aura Shards, Yavimaya Kavu, Heroes’ Reunion, Wings of Hope, Urborg Drake, Spinal Embrace, Charging Troll (Plague Spores, Yavimaya Barbarian)
Brown: Bloodstone Cameo, Seashell Cameo
Lands: Elfhame Palace, Tinder Farm, 2 Irrigation Ditch (6 Swamp, 6 Forest, 5 Mountain)
Space for you to think that I might’ve mised some of the white as well as a few of the blue instead of the green:
(mise)
Hindsight is all Hugh Downs up in here. But, FoF and Exclude do not make a blue mise necessarily worth it. Even I realize that I should’ve at least considered mising white, which I almost did. It took thirty-eight minutes to mise my deck; everything was considered, but, frankly, it all was considered to suck (very non-miseable) no matter which way I went. And it did suck.
This report is dedicated to all you aspiring writers; learn well, young grasshoppers.
Round 1: Troy Krzysiak, he had a sealed deck with him
Games 1 and 2: I mise.
1-0
Me: "Dude, is it okay to mise a pic for Star City?"
Troy: "Yes, you may mise."
My camera: "I can’t mise with a dead battery."
Round 2: Anthony Florian, he had every good card in the set
Game 1: He mises.
Game 2: I mise.
Game 3: He mises.
I tried to mise a jump start from someone’s car battery for my camera; there would be no battery mise for Johnny.
1-1
Round 3: David McElhatten, Invasion cards and stuff
Games 1 and 2: He mises.
1-2
(mise for no reason)
Round 4: Jason Spudich, Big.dec
Games 1 and 2: He mises.
1-3
I drop to go mise in a side T2 tourney. All I have with me are two multiplayer T2 mise decks. Coincidentally (not really), both are versions of the decks I was thinking about mising at States. I mised with this:
Automatically Called A Void/Machine Head Deck Cause I Friggin’
Mise Void.dec:
4x Shivan Zombie (mise)
4x Scorching Lava (mise)
4x Seal of Fire (mise)
3x Skizzik (mise)
3x Blazing Specter (mise)
3x Void (mise)
3x Chilling Apparition (mise)
3x Abyssal Specter (mise)
3x Pyre Zombie (mise)
2x Urza’s Rage (mise)
1x Ascendant Evincar (mise)
1x Greel, Mind Raker (mise)
1x Earthquake (mise)
1x Strands of Night (super mise)
11x Mountain (mise)
12x Swamp (mise)
3x Urborg Volcano (mise)
In testing, this deck mised against Andy’s 145-card Vise deck and Sean’s hundred-card Enchantress deck. So there. If you aren’t playing
Strands of Night, start mising right now. It’s that damned good to mise with.
Round 1: Vince, Collective Restraint/Dragon.dec
Game 1: I mise.
Game 2: I mise.
Round 2: Mike Turian, G/W that he used in PT: Chicago. Fair, huh?
Game 1: He mises.
Game 2: He mises.
The T.O. mised ten bucks from me, and Mike mised yet another box.
I mised a few games against Aaron and his fun decks:
Townsfolk.dec (yes, it’s all Townsfolk, but it can mise)
BeebleSift/Dream Prowler.dec (it doesn’t mise as well)
Props: Anyone who can mise.
Slops: Anyone who can’t mise.
(End worst tournament report, ever)
I wish I could say that I learned something from this dismal experience, but I certainly didn’t learn anything on site. What I realized, after I got home and gave it another go, is that sometimes you have to go balls-out and hope it all works out.
When I got home, I rebuilt my deck for at least three hours and came up with nothing even remotely close to being very good. Conclusion: sometimes you get a very average deck, even if you’ve eaten all your peas.
Another try:
Black: Bog Initiate, Urborg Phantom (Recover, Nightscape Apprentice, Plague Spitter, Tsabo’s Assassin, Firescreamer, two Phyrexian Slayers, Agonizing Demise, Mourning)
Demise, Assassin, the Slayers, and Recover must go into virtually
any deck. Mourning and the Spitter are good enough to make most
decks. Firescreamer sucks, I don’t care what anyone says. Really.
Red: Maniacal Rage, Overload, Goblin Spy, Scarred Puma, two Turf
Wounds, Stun, Zap (Viashino Grappler, Thunderscape Apprentice, Scorching Lava, Tribal Flames, Kavu Runner, Slimy Kavu)
Rage and Zap probably should’ve found their way into the deck, but the cards I did use are pretty much no-brainers. Well, except for the Grappler, who really needs the Rage to truly shine.
Green: Tranquility, Wandering Stream, two Fertile Grounds, Llanowar Cavalry, Llanowar Elite, Thornscape Apprentice (Explosive Growth, Kavu Chameleon, Quirion Elves, Quirion Sentinel, Thornscape Master, Wax/Wane)
I sort of wanted to use the Grounds to splash a couple neato things, but I figured they would be better served by being sub-par creatures. Oops. The Growth and Wax were additional removal, and the Kavu was my fat threat. My only fat threat.
Blue: Phantasmal Terrain, Temporal Distortion, Tower Drake, Opt, Traveler’s Cloak, two Tidal Visionaries, Exclude, Vodalian Merchant, Fact or Fiction
Going blue for FoF, Exclude, and maybe the Visionary and Merchant just didn’t appeal to me…But maybe they should have.
White: Harsh Judgment, Protective Sphere, Reviving Dose, Teferi’s Care, Strength of Unity, Ruham Djinn, Restrain, Shackles, Glimmering Angel, Benalish Trapper, Crimson Acolyte, Ardent Soldier
There is a pretty good core of white here, which coupled with green, might’ve been more consistent if not spectacular. The Djinn, Shackles, Angel, Trapper, Soldier and Acolyte are good enough that – I hate to say it – I should have used some white. On purpose. But the red and black removal would’ve needed to be splashed as well. Four or five colors might have needed more than two Fertile Grounds and a Quirion. Or maybe it wouldn’t.
Damn. W/G/B/r was probably the ticket, with, perhaps, a tad of blue for fun.
Gold: Aura Shards, Yavimaya Kavu, Heroes’ Reunion, Wings of Hope,
Urborg Drake, Spinal Embrace, Charging Troll (Plague Spores, Yavimaya Barbarian)
If I majored G/W, I would’ve picked up the Troll and Shards which are pretty good beatings. I really wanted to play the Embrace and Drake, and, now that I think about it, they were enough reason to try to go B/U/R. But there are no monsters. A 2/3 flyer is probably not going to be enough to smash faces for long; he’d need some support, which was not there at all without adding white for the Djinn, or double green for the Kavu. See the dilemma? B/U/R seemed pretty sound with the removal/tricks, but was seriously creature-deficient. What a friggin’ fatless deck no matter how I sliced it.
Brown: Bloodstone Cameo, Seashell Cameo
Lands: Elfhame Palace, Tinder Farm, 2 Irrigation Ditch (6 Swamp, 6 Forest, 5 Mountain)
Was there enough reason to go four or five colors? Maybe. While the mana problems would’ve been evident, there would be many more bombs mid to late game, instead of the severe averageness early-, mid-, AND late-game that I built. It seems the cards pushed me into a "win early or not at all" mindset, although there was also the "survive early and win late" option available; I’m becoming convinced that was the way to go, as most decks don’t punish enough for a lacking early game.
I would’ve liked this better, I think:
1x Thornscape Apprentice
1x Quirion Sentinel
1x Quirion Elves
1x Thornscape Master
1x Kavu Chameleon
1x Explosive Growth
2x Fertile Ground
1x Benalish Trapper
1x Ardent Soldier
1x Glimmering Angel
1x Crimson Acolyte
1x Ruham Djinn
1x Shackles
1x Agonizing Demise
1x Recover
2x Phyrexian Slayer
1x Scorching Lava
1x Tribal Flames
1x Plague Spores
1x Charging Troll
1x Wax/Wane
6x Forest
5x Plains
3x Swamp
2x Mountain
1x Elfhame Palace
Top Eight material? Probably not. Better than 1-3? Hella likely.
Lesson: it might be worth playing a mana-challenged deck with a bunch of good cards rather than a mana-tight deck with a bunch of average cards. If you don’t open up the "four Repulse" deck, you might as well take a few calculated risks – which might smack you in the face, but you were gonna suck anyway, so might as well (mise) give her hell.
And that’s my final judgment,
Peace,
Thanks for reading,
Ciao Babies,
Hugs ’til net time,
Mise,
John Friggin’ Rizzo