I’m continuing with the Ultimate Extended Tournament. The concept is simple – take two dozen of the best Extended decks from seasons past, add some of the best decks from this season, and let them all battle it out. Round one is now over. We have upsets! The number one seed – JarGrim – is out!
Here are the results so far. Match by match coverage is below (or in previous articles). If people disagree with any results, let me know – but I want facts and figures on why the results are wrong. “But I like deck X better” ain’t gonna cut it. I say that about Turboland, and look how that came out.
| Enchantress | Enchantress | ||
| UW Tron | |||
| Trix | Trix | ||
| Twiddle / Desire | |||
| Stasis | Stasis | ||
| CMU Gun | |||
| GobVantage | High Tide | ||
| High Tide | |||
| Maher Oath | Maher Oath | ||
| Angry Ghoul | |||
| Turboland | Beat Stick | ||
| Beat Stick | |||
| Benzo | The Clock | ||
| The Clock | |||
| SuperGro | SuperGro | ||
| Affinity | |||
| Legion Land Loss | Legion Land Loss | ||
| TEPS | |||
| Jar Grim | PT Junk | ||
| PT Junk | |||
| RDW2k | RDW2K | ||
| Aggro Loam | |||
| Academy | Academy | ||
| Cephalid Life | |||
| Gaea’s Might Get There | Pandeburst | ||
| Pandeburst | |||
| Counterslivers | Counterslivers | ||
| Psychatog | |||
| Free Spell Necro | Balancing Tings | ||
| Balancing Tings | |||
| George W. Bosh | Survival | ||
| Survival | |||
I explained the tournament here. The decklists, for the most part, are here. Better decklists for PT Junk and Cephalid Life are in the forum discussion for that article. For those too lazy to click the link, it’s a 32-deck single elimination tournament. It’s 27 of the best historical Extended decks (played in major events), plus five decks from the Extended season just past. Matches are two games without sideboards, alternating starts, then sideboarded games continuing until one deck has three wins.
Here are the matches I didn’t cover two weeks ago:
Trix shows Twiddle Desire why Combo Needs Duress
I wrote about this one a couple weeks ago. We finally played it out. This had been an incredibly swingy matchup and after a couple dozen games – a few of which hindsight said might have involved debatable strategic choices – we decided to call the two unsideboarded 1-1 and move on to sideboarding. Trix brought in four Pyroblasts for the two Firestorms and two Hoodwinks. Twiddle Desire brought in three Chain of Vapor for the two Trade Secrets and one Chrome Mox. Chain of Vapor targeting Illusions of Grandeur when the life gain is on the stack is game over for Trix, if it resolves.
Game 1 Trix mulliganed, laid a Volcanic Island, and said go. Twiddle Desire also mulliganed, but began with Ancient Tomb, Grim Monolith, Chrome Mox (imprinting Burst of Energy), Tinker (going for Gilded Lotus and sacrificing the Mox) – whereupon Trix Pyroblasts the Tinker. Next turn, Trix dropped an Underground River, cast Ritual, Ritual, Duress (taking Diminishing Returns out of Twiddle / Desire’s hand), Necro, Mana Vault. It then Necroed for nine new cards and discarded two lands.
You just don’t get broken plays like this anymore.
Twiddle / Desire ripped another Ancient Tomb and passed. Trix had the trifecta: Illusions, Donate, and Pyroblast; the mana to cast them; and Force of Will backup, so it won game 1.
Game 2 Trix was on the play and had the god draw: Underground Sea, Ritual, Ritual, Duress, Duress, Necro. Twiddle Desire had mulliganed and was left with garbage after the Duresses. Trix won quickly, but these two games were all about lucky draws. We decided to play one more. In the extra game, Twiddle Desire managed to combo on turn 1 (Ancient Tomb, Chrome Mox, Tinker, Gilded Lotus, Twiddle, Twiddle, Diminishing Returns, etc.) Again, super lucky, so we played yet one more to decide it.
This game took longer, with a couple swings. Trix got a quick Necro and was set to go off, but Twiddle on a Mana Vault set it back at least a turn and the lost life to the tapped Vault meant fewer cards off Necro. Then Twiddle / Desire started recovering from early Duresses and tried a Brainstorm / Tinker combo. Trix had Pyroblast for the Tinker. Now Trix was set up to combo, but a quick Duress showed that Twiddle Desire had two Chains of Vapor in hand, along with two Diminishing Returns. By now, Trix had mana in play, so it could easily pay upkeep on Illusions for a turn, then Donate it, provided Twiddle / Desire could not cast Chain of Vapor. Trix cast Vampiric Tutor after the Duress, then Necroed that card.
Twiddle Desire had to try to cast Diminishing Returns on its turn, although that tapped all its Blue sources. (Reasoning: if Trix had cast Vampiric for Duress, then it could take the Chain, cast Illusions, then Necro for 20 and have both Force of Will and Donate for the following turn. If Trix had fetched Force of Will, it might have to pitch a valuable card to stop the Diminishing Returns. If it had fetched Pyroblast, Twiddle just lost, period. In any case, Twiddle / Desire’s only chance was to cast Diminishing Returns, have it resolve and hope Necro got a suboptimal new seven cards. Necro was at five, with a tapped Vault, so it did not have a lot of recovery room if it drew badly.)
As it played out, Trix’s hand was triple Force of Will, Illusions, Donate, Ritual, Pyroblast, so the Diminishing Returns did not resolve.
Necroing to refill your hand to eight or nine cards every turn is amazingly powerful.
Trix advances.
The Clock Times Out Benzo
Bleah. I hate both these decks. They are just a pain to proxy, and to play. Searching for proxies is far slower than searching for real cards, with real artwork.
Benzo is a Reanimator deck that abuses the now-banned Entomb. It has a raft of smashers and a cute little lock with Contamination and either Verdant Force or Nether Spirit. Benzo also has Vampiric Tutors and the Squee / Zombie Infestation engine.
The Clock is a combo deck from PT Tinker. It cast artifact mana, gets a Goblin Charbelcher into play, then casts Mana Severance to remove all the lands from it’s deck. At that point, activating Goblin Charbelcher is automatically lethal.
Game 1 Benzo managed some potent Duress wreckage, followed by Entombing and Exhuming an Avatar of Woe. The Avatar, plus some Ancient Tomb damage, was enough. Game 2 The Clock got hit with Duress, but still topdecked Tinker and Mana Severance on consecutive turns, and went off.
Sideboarding is a joke: Benzo gets Null Rod, which totally destroys The Clock if it resolves. Benzo can also dump the contamination lock (since The Clock has tons of artifact mana), the Nether Spirit and Multani for Phyrexian Negators. The Clock gets one Chain of Vapor, three Annul, and one Ensnaring Bridge. Unfortunately, it has little to take out: Mindslaver gets swapped for the Bridge.
Post-sideboard game 1 Benzo cast Vampiric Tutor for Null Rod at end of turn, and The Clock did not have U up. Null Rod was followed a turn later by Zombie Infestation, discarding Squee, a second Infestation, and Avatar of Woe – and Reanimate targeting the Avatar.
Post-sideboard game 2 Benzo had to wait until turn 2 to Vampiric (it Duressed turn 1), and then dropped Null Rod with a Swamp up for Force Spike. A quick Entomb Avatar of Woe, Exhume and it was over in short order: just not the way it looked. The Clock cast Mana Severance, to help its draws, Brainstormed into Tinker and Tinkered for Ensnaring Bridge. Once the Bridge hits, so long as The Clock keeps less than two cards in hand, Benzo has no way of winning, and no way of eliminating the Bridge. The Clock set up the combo, drew Mystical to bounce the Null Rod and went off.
That meant it was all tied at 2-2. Game the last: Benzo on the play, no mulligans.
Benzo: Swamp, go
Clock: Island, go (Benzo: Vampiric EoT, Clock: Force Spike)
Benzo: Swamp, Zombie Infestation, discard Verdant Force, go
Clock: Ancient Tomb, Grim Monolith, Voltaic Key, Talisman, Tinker away Talisman for Charbelcher, go
Benzo: Vampiric Tutor for Duress during upkeep, Duress sees Mystical Tutor and Mana Severance. Take Mana Severance. Beat for two.
Clock: untap Monolith, draw and play Rishadan Port.
Benzo: beat for two, Exhume Verdant Force. (Clock, Mystical Tutor for Mana Severance EoT.)
Clock: Mana Severance, activate Charbelcher. With no lands left in its deck, that’s automatically lethal.
The Clock moves on to round 2.
JarGrim and PT Junk in a Nail-Biter!
I have fond memories of PT Junk. My fondest is destroying Adrian at a PTQ, when I played Wasteland about two dozen times. (Hey, Cartographer & Recurring Nightmare were in the deck for a reason.) I also remember that Adrian was smiling and laughing when any normal human being would be plotting murder.
I just wish Adrian’s deck had a better matchup.
Game 1 PT Junk mulliganed, on the draw. Here’s the game. JG = JarGrim.
JG: Underground Sea, Mana Vault, Mox Diamond, Lotus Petal (hold Vampiric Tutor.)
PT Junk: Savannah, Mox Diamond, River Boa (Vampiric for Tinker EoT)
JG: Ancient Tomb, tap Mana Vault & Mox, Tinker Mox for Memory Jar
Blow Jar (Both players set aside their hands and draw seven new cards)
JG continuing: Brainstorm Tinker to next draw, Lotus Petal, blow it, Dark Ritual, Mana Vault, Mana Vault, Mox Diamond, Memory Jar
Blow Jar #2
Vault, tap Mox Diamond for U, Tinker Vault for Lion’s Eye Diamond.
Yawgmoth’s Will, blow LED for mana in response. Discard hand.
In play: Mox Diamond untapped, Underground Sea and Ancient Tomb untapped.
Play LED from graveyard, tap for BBB
Play from Graveyard: 3 * Lotus Petal, Dark Ritual, Vault, tap Mox Diamond for U, Tinker tapped Vault for Memory Jar, Vampiric Tutor for Megrim, blow Memory Jar # 3, play Megrim. Play LED, LED, Lotus Petal, Defense Grid.
Go to end step.
Memory Jar #3 EoT trigger resolves: PT Junk discards the seven cards drawn from that Jar, and takes 14 from Megrim. JG discards three cards, but Megrim only hits opponents.
Memory Jar #2 EoT trigger resolves: PT Junk discards the seven cards drawn from that Jar, and takes 14 from Megrim. That’s game — but if not, Memory Jar #1 is waiting to whack him for another 14.
I played Jar Grim against all comers the other day at the store, including a very similar start against Levy’s Gaea’s Might Get There. Comparing those games shows the “difference” between old and new beatdown decks. Both decks lost the coin flip. PT Junk played a land, a Mox Diamond and a 2/1 on its first turn. Doing that cost it an extra land card, to pay for Mox Diamond. GMGT, on the other hand, only had to pay 2 life for it’s 2/1 — although Isamaru does not Islandwalk or regenerate.
Another similarity: both decks were dead before they could untap for turn 2.
Game 2 PT Junk is on the play, with a Seal of Cleansing in hand, but no Duress. It keeps. JarGrim mulligans to five.
Junk: Bayou, go
JG: Underground River, go
Junk: Scrubland[/author]“][author name="Scrubland"]Scrubland[/author], Seal of Cleansing, go (JG Brainstorms EoT)
JG: Vampiric Tutor (for Underground Sea) during upkeep, Underground Sea, go
Junk: Wasteland, waste Underground Sea, River Boa, go
JG: Dark Ritual, Defense Grid, go (burn for 1)
Junk: beat for 2, Savannah, Phyrexian Negator, go
JG: nothing
Junk: beat for 7, Negator #2 go (JG: Vampiric for land EoT)
JG: Ritual, Tinker Defense Grid for Memory Jar, Mox Diamond, Lotus Petal, Ritual, tap Mox for U, Tinker Mox for Memory Jar
Blow Jar
LED, LED, Ritual off Petal, Megrim.
Announce end of Main Phase. Junk blows Seal of Cleansing to kill Megrim.
Junk: beat for 12. Lethal.
Junk wins! Was it close? Well, JarGrim did mulligan to five, and blew two Vampiric Tutors for lands. Junk needed to have the Seal, both Negators and the River Boa, because JarGrim had two cards in hand when the game ended. Those two cards would be banned or restricted in every format henceforth. They were Tinker and Yawgmoth’s Will. JG’s next turn would have been, assuming it drew land or a mana source:
Will, blow LEDs with Will on the stack.
From graveyard, play LED, blow it. Play LED #2, blow it.
Play 3 Dark Rituals, Lotus Petal, Megrim, Memory Jar, Memory Jar. Win.
JarGrim is absolutely ridiculous. Junk may get some help in sideboarding, but I really expected Junk to desperately need that help, because I expected it to go into the post sideboard world down two. A split was surprising.
Sideboarding: Junk brings in three Wax / Wane for the three Swords, and Ebony Charms for Cursed Scrolls. Ebony Charm removes cards from the graveyard before they can be played again via Yawgmoth’s Will. I still don’t have Randy Buehler’s GP: Vienna sideboard, but other JarGrim decks from the era tended to run Perish, Gloom, Erase (for the mirror), Chill, Lobotomy and Defense Grid. (I would have a second Megrim somewhere, to protect against Disenchants, but I could not find any decklists that ran one, so I did not include it.) Randy Buehler had the Defense Grids maindeck. They come out. Two Erase and two Perish come in. Overall, PT Junk gets a lot more from its sideboard than JarGrim.
Post sideboard game 1: (Since the decks split, they alternated starts in games 3 & 4.) JG played first; no mulligans.
JG: Underground River
Junk: Grassland, Mox Diamond, Duress (JG Mystical Tutors for Tinker in response, Duress sees Vampiric Tutor, Mana Vault, Memory Jar, Ancient Tomb. Takes Jar.)
JG: Ancient Tomb, Vault, Tinker for Jar, blow Jar, Vault, Vault, Jar, blow Jar, LED *2, go
Junk: Wasteland, Negator, go.
JG: Gemstone Mine, go
Junk: smash for 5, go (JG: Vampiric EoT for Yawgmoth’s Will)
JG: Underground River, tap Mine and Tomb for Yawgmoth’s Will, blow 2 * LED in response. (Playing from the graveyard now) play 2 LEDs, blow them, play 2 Vaults, tap them, Tinker (sac Vaults for Memory Jar), LED, Ritual, Brainstorm, Lotus Petal, Mox Diamond, Tinker Vault for Lotus Petal (burning mana — a lot in pool, and life total is nine — seven after Vampiric Tutor), V-Tutor for Megrim, blow Jar, Lotus Petal, Megrim, Ritual, Memory Jar, Memory Jar, go to EoT
Junk Waxes Megrim in response. Since the Yawgmoth’s Will effect removes Megrim from the game, JarGrim loses it’s only win condition, and that’s game.
2-1 PT Junk — I wouldn’t have predicted that. Junk was on the play game 4r, and it mulliganed to six. JarGrim kept its seven.
Junk: Mox Diamond, go (sitting on Tithe)
JG: Underground Sea, Lotus Petal, go (sitting on Brainstorm, Vampiric — Junk Tithes EoT)
Junk: Savannah, Seal of Cleansing (JG: Brainstorm EoT)
JG: Vampiric for Tinker on upkeep, Underground Sea, Lotus Petal, Tinker Petal for Memory Jar (tap lands, blow Petal to pay for Tinker), Blow Jar, blow LED for UUU in response (discarding Perish)
After everyone draws a new seven: Mana Vault and tap, Brainstorm, Mox Diamond, Erase targeting Seal, (Seal kills Vault in response), Vault # 2, tap, Tinker for Jar, 3 colorless floating.
(Note on possible errors — it is tricky playing this deck. It is a lot trickier recreating the games from graveyards and partial notes. My handwriting sux.)
To continue: blow Jar, Vault, tap Vault, Memory Jar, go. (we had a debate about this, but it seems better to get an untap next turn than to draw seven blind with no colorless mana floating, even though it leaves Junk a turn to untap)
Junk: untap, go
JG: Ritual , Vampiric for Yawgmoth’s Will, blow Jar, Ancient Tomb, Petal, LED, Tinker Vault for LED, cast Will, in response, blow Jar, blow both LEDs.
Junk: in response to Will, after Jar and LEDs go to the graveyard, cast 2 Ebony Charms removing 3 Memory Jars and 3 Vampiric Tutors from JG’s graveyard.
(Yawgmoth’s Will resolves.)
JG: play (from graveyard) 3*Vault, Ritual, Brainstorm into Vault #4, tap Vault, Tinker (sacrificing Vault for the last Jar), blow Jar (No Megrim), LED, Ritual, Tinker, Brainstorm (No Megrim, keep Mystical Tutor), Mystical Tutor for Tinker, Brainstorm (Tinker on top, no Megrim), Tinker, Brainstorm (MEGRIM!) Megrim, go to EoT.
Junk: Trash in first seven, discard, take 14. Wax/Wane is in the second five. With Memory Jar # 2’s discard effect on the stack, Junk Waxes Megrim, then discards — and takes no damage. With seven cards left in it’s library, and with all of its Memory Jars and its Megrim removed from game, JarGrim scoops!
PT Junk went 3-1 against JarGrim in a stunner!
It stunned me, at least. JarGrim is the fastest combo deck I have seen outside of Vintage. But PT Junk beat it. (There’s a lesson, and a future article, in there somewhere.)
RDW2k does, Aggro Loam does not.
Aggro Loam is a fast aggro deck with mana control strategies – and a lot of Burning Wish and Life from the Loam / cycling lands tricks to back that up. RDW2K is old school aggro, with fast creatures, some burn and lots of land kill. Aggro Loam has more powerful cards, and a more flexible strategy. RDW2k just does two things – inflict damage and mess with mana.
Game 1 RDW2k won the flip and played a turn 1 Jackal Pup, turn 2 Rishadan Port. Aggro Loam had mulliganed and was short of lands. It remained Port locked for several turns, and RDW2k just killed it. A Slith Firewalker ate chunks from the life total, then burn finished the game.
Game 2 Aggro Loam mulliganed a no land hand into one with Bloodstained Mire and a Swamp. It went for Stomping Grounds, but RDW2k had a Wasteland. RDW2K also had speed, burn and Rishadan Ports. Aggro Loam does not do well when stuck at one non-Green land.
Sideboarding: RDW2k replaced the Shattering Pulses with Psychogenic Probe. Yes, I had to look that one up, too. (Psy Probe: 2 mana artifact, Whenever a spell or ability causes a player to shuffle his or her library, Psychogenic Probe deals 2 damage to him or her.) Aggro Loam brought in a Smother for either Putrefy or Seismic Assault. I’m not sure which is correct – but we agreed to cut the Putrefy first, deciding to switch to Assault if Psy Probe ever resolved.
Game 3: Aggro Loam mulliganed a one land hand into one with three lands, Engineered Explosive, Seismic Assault and a Wall of Roots. RDW2K had a Lavamancer, some Seals of Fire, fetchlands and Wasteland. About turn 6, RDW2K had three Mountains (tapped for a Pillage) and a Rishadan Port, while Aggro Loam had a single Mountain. Several turns later, RDW2k had a Slith Firewalker with two counters, a Grim Lavamancer, Rishadan Port, lands and Tangle Wire. Aggro Loam had a Forest, Mountain and Tranquil Grove in play – all tapped – and Seismic Assault, 3 Cabal Therapies and 2 Burning Wishes in hand.
Red Deck Wins lives up to its name.
Counterslivers versus Psychatog
I have to admit to being highly biased in this matchup. Ingrid played Counterslivers in PTQs for as long as the deck existed. I have played it off and on since Exodus was brand new. I have also played Tog – and hated it. I still play it, but I consider Tog and Upheaval among the worst cards Wizards has ever printed. They push my hot button. They are examples of Blue getting good stuff it should not have (like global resets and the best creature in the format.) I’m not the only person that felt that way. A lot of people volunteered to play Counterslivers. No one volunteered to play Tog.
Game 1 Slivers was on the play and opened with a turn 1 Flood Plain, turn 2 Muscle Sliver. Tog opened with Polluted Delta into Watery Grave, Opt, and a turn 2 Island. That’s basically where the game ended. Tog did a lot of digging and managed to counter additional slivers. It also bounced the Muscle at one point, but Slivers just replayed it and forced it through. Tog managed to play a lot of lands and card drawing, but lost the counter war over Tog. Turn 8, Tog resolved a Fact or Fiction EoT and saw nothing but Standing Stones to save it. Tog had to tap out to activate a Stalking Stones to try to block. Slivers Consulted for a Swords to Plowshares (Tog had Wonder in the graveyard, so Winged Sliver didn’t help). Since Tog was tapped out, Slivers could resolve a Crystalline Sliver, Swords the Stones and swing. Tog had no outs and died the following turn.
Game 2 Tog mulliganed into a hand with Smother, Opt, Delta, Swamp, Counterspell, and Mental Note. It opened with Delta fetching Watery Grave, Opt into Gifts Ungiven. Turn 2 it had to play the Swamp, and Counterslivers resolved a Crystalline Sliver. Crystalline is the nuts here, because it invalidates all of Tog’s removal. Tog also had problems getting a second Blue source, and Counterslivers managed to resolve another Crystalline and a Muscle. At the end of this game, on turn 5, Tog had to hard cast Wonder to chump, but Counterslivers could Consult for Swords and remove it, then attack for eight and the win.
Sideboarding: Counterslivers got Pyroblasts and two more Swords to Plowshares. It took out the useless Disenchants and the Duresses, since Counterslivers is fighting only over the creatures, not card drawing. (The theory is to fight only the fights you can win…) Psychatog brought in Meloku the Clouded Mirror, but all its removal, including Razormane Masticore, is targeted. That means that the Crystalline Sliver is the key to the matchup. Counterslivers really only had to stick an early Crystalline once in three games to win the match.
Which it did.
Balancing Tings unbalances Free Spell Necro
Free Spell Necro (FSN) is all about Necropotence. It draws lots of cards, and drains life, which lets it draw more cards. The Free Spell part refers to the alternative casting costs of a lot of its cards: Unmask, Contagion and Spinning Darkness can all be cast without actually spending mana. Its main downside in this matchup is that it has a lot of creature kill that cannot off a Terravore, and its sideboard does not offer much help.
This build of Balancing Tings, on the other hand, is just complex. It has the signature Tings play of sacrifice four Invasion sac-lands to cast Balancing Tings, then Terravore. It also has Remands, and Orim’s Chants, and Burning Wish, and even the stack-your-deck-with-Erratic-Explosion-and-reveal-Draco combo. It just has way more tools, albeit a bit less focus, than most other decks. Certainly more than FSN.
Game 1, FSN played first. Both decks had good opening hands. FSN opened with Swamp, Duress, Unmask. At that point, Tings no longer had a good hand. FSN had a turn 2 Skittering Skirge, which beat Tings down to eight before Tings ripped Burning Wish for Pyroclasm. The next turn, however, FSN ripped Consult, got Necro and Necroed into Corrupt. Tings had to Balance with no follow-up play, just to keep FSN from being able to cast Corrupt, but FSN managed to Necro into just enough Drains to drop Swamps and squeak it out.
Game 2 Tings had to mulligan (three Terravore, Draco, lands), then got hit with Duress on turns 1 and 2 – taking a Balancing Act both times. FSN got the Necro on turn 4 – it would have been turn 3 but Tings Iced a Swamp. However, Tings managed to rip lands, then Act, and turn 5 was the sacrifice all your lands for Balancing Act, drop land and Terravore dream-wrecker. FSN was left with two cards in hand, Necro in play and nothing to do but curse its luck. Tings saw twelve cards that game, but they include all three maindeck Balancing Acts.
Sideboarding: Tings brought in the Extirpate, Ray of Revelation, and a Krosan Grip for the Orim’s Chants. FSN brought in Planar Voids for the Spinning Darkness, and two Perish and two Persecutes for the Contagions.
Game 3: FSN mulliganed, on the play. Turn 1 Unmask, taking Extirpate. It followed up with a couple of Wastelands, then Consulted for Necro. Tings played Archeological Digs and Terrarions, but kept losing lands to Wasteland. FSN Necroed into Unmask and Planar Void, but no Swamps. Wasteland killed Tings’s last land, but Tings had only one counter on a suspended Bloom. FSN then proceeded to Necro seventeen cards over several turns and found only one Swamp. Eventually, Tings used Fire / Ice to deal two damage and Necro lock FSN. FSN – still on two Swamps – cast Dark Ritual, Disk, allowing it to break the Necro on its next upkeep, but by then Tings had drawn a Terravore and a Balancing Act.
Game 4: FSN mulled into Swamp, Ritual, Necro. The power of Necro produced discard, Planar Void and similar good stuff, but eventually Tings ripped an Act, and blew its lands – all its permanents- to make FSN sacrifice Disk, Necro, six lands, Planar Void, and the game. In that respect Balancing Act is more brutal than Balance itself – Balancing Act requires you to match total number of permanents. Remand was also a key to that game – it delayed a couple of drain spells, leaving FSN unable to refill as often as it wanted.
Balancing Tings advances.
George W. Bosh does not find Weapons of Mass Destruction, Fails to Survive G/B Survival
I was quite biased in this match-up as well. It pitted my favorite old Survival deck against a broken Welder deck from PT Tinker. We played this one out a couple times, just to make sure I wasn’t favoring Survival. I do know I got incredibly frustrated playing against the Bosh deck. Mike, especially, could draw exactly the card he needed so many times. Part of that is a function of just how broken this deck is, but he still had the turn 1 Welders to negate my Duresses, or ripped Tinker the turn after Duress, in game after game. Anyway, after a half dozen unsideboarded games, the results were dead even. Sometimes Bosh would get the insane turn 1 Ancient Tomb, Monolith, Key, Gilded Lotus, Thirst for Knowledge discarding Pentavus, turn 2 Goblin Welder, Lightning Greaves starts, and then start swapping Tangle Wires around. In those games, Survival had no chance. In other games, if Bosh could not win quickly, Survival would eventually get Survival going, then get Recurring Nightmare and start swapping Uktabi Orangutans and Cartographers (to recur Wasteland), and eventually leave Bosh with no permanents in play.
Mindslaver was not really a factor, because Survival actually cannot hurt itself that badly. It has enchantment removal (Elvish Lyrist), but that requires multiple turns of Mindslaver. Bosh had generally won or lost long before it could get that going.
Sideboarding involved Survival taking out the Elvish Lyrist, Yavimaya Ants, Spike Weaver, Spike Feeder and the Negator for the Ebony Charms (which break up the Welder recursion), the Woodripper, the other Uktabi and the Oath of Ghouls. Bosh brought in Triskelion to replace its namesake. We also experimented with a Welding Jar for a Chromatic Sphere or Metalworker, but it did not have a huge effect. Another half dozen practice games, and we were pretty sure we knew the matchup. Results were dead even, or maybe slightly in Survival’s favor. At that point, we decided to play the tourney. It came down to game 3. Both decks mulliganed. Survival was on the play.
Survival had a hand with Survival, Wall of Roots, two Bayou, Forest, and Swamp. It played a Bayou and passed. Bosh had a spicier turn 1: Ancient Tomb, Monolith, Key, Lightning Greaves.
Survival had a choice on turn 2: Wall of Roots or Survival. Survival allows for a safer turn 3: Survival away Wall, for Squee, go nuts later. Playing Wall of Roots, on the other hand, allows an insane turn 3 (play Survival, survival a creature for Krovikan Horror, Survival Horror for Squee using Wall mana, on the opponent’s turn Survival Squee, and get back Krovikan Horror EoT). This only works, of course, it Survival draws a creatures.
It cast the Wall.
Bosh’s turn 2 was Shivan Reef, Tinker for Platinum Angel, Greaves it, fly over for four.
Survival drew lands for several turns, and no creatures. So did Bosh. Finally, with Survival at four life, it drew a creature. GB Survival played its sixth land, Survivaled for Woodripper, cast Woodripper and removed three fading counters to kill the Greaves, the Angel and the Key. (This sort of last minute save was common, even pre-sideboarded, in this matchup. In earlier games, the turn before Survival would die, it managed to Survival for Spike Weaver – a.k.a. fog machine – or the like several times.)
A couple of turns later, after a lot more land was played, Bosh got two Tangle Wires going, then a Welder to make them sick (note – by then an Ebony Charm had removed Platinum Angel from the graveyard, so Tangle Wire was the only choice for the Welder.) Survival got Recurring Nightmare, and eventually managed to swap the turn 2 Wall of Roots for Woodripper and kill all the artifacts in play. A few turns later Survival finally drew a creature, Survivaled it for Squee, Survivaled Squee for Krovikan Horror, played the Horror and sacrificed it to shoot the Welder (having a ton of lands is, eventually, good for something.) After that, Survival could get Deranged Hermit, pitch that for Wall of Roots, cast Wall of Roots and Recurring Nightmare, then use Recurring Nightmare to turn Wall of Roots into Deranged Hermit. Once that was started, Survival could start smashing with Squirrels. Bosh drew some temporary answers, but by then Survival could get Woodripper into play a couple of times a turn, so even Masticore could not save the game. (Recurring Nightmare plus Deranged Hermit plus mana equals good times.)
Survival manages to squeak past George W. Bosh in a truly tight match.
Which makes me really happy.
Next week – Round 2 action!
PRJ
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