|
Author
|
Topic: PTQ San Diego *9th*
|
gaeacradle
Member
|
posted October 24, 2001 05:30 PM
        
I, Jeff, and Joseph arrived at Holiday Inn at about 7:30. Little we know that we were early about 2 hours. Then 15 minutes later, Nathaniel(The Ravyn) showed up and we started to talk. Later, more people showed up and we traded a little bit while waiting for the TO to show up. When he finally showed up at 9:30, we got right down to business. I handed in 25 bucks and get my packs and starter. As I sat down the table, the other guy also got their stuff in already. My packs had very solid green and blue cards, alone in those 2 colors, there are about 22 playable cards, more than enough. There were very little red and black card, almost no removal or burn in those colors. White was a different story however, as it had Second Thought, some good Mystic Creature, and some flyers. Green was concentrated with goodness as it has Werebear, Springing Tiger, Rabid Elephant, Crashing Centaur, Muscle Burst, Diligent Farmhand, Wild Mongrel, Sylvan Might, Elephant Ambush, Overrun, Seton's Desire and few more solid cards like 2 Refresh... Blue also shined as it had Cephalid Looter, Cephalid Scout, Standstill, Words of Wisdom, Careful Study, Aven Windreader, Aven Fisher, Repel, Dematerialize, and some other good cards also. It also came with 2 Centaur Garden. What a crazy deck! As I handed in my packs, I prayed to get my deck back. However, that did not happen and I got somebody else's deck. The first card that hit me was the Vampiric Dragon. Great! So I skipped white and blue to look at black and red. There, I found Stalking Bloodsucker, Ghastly Demise, Gravedigger, 2 Thermal Blast, 2 Acceptable Losses, Blazing Salvo, Flameburst, Minotaur Explorer, Ember Beast... So with those nice cards, I decided to play Red/Black and I needed to find another color that will give me early creature to stop the fast beast before I got my big creature out. There was nothing in blue, not even a flyer. And all white had was Second Thought and 3 Aven Flock. Therefore, I looked to my last choice in Green, luckily, Green gave me some very good creature like 2 Diligent Farmhand, Rabid Elephant, Gorilla Titan, Elephant Ambush and tricks like Moment's Peace, Muscle Burst and Sylvan Might. So this is the deck that I ended up with:
GREEN(10)
2 Diligent Farmhand
Sylvan Might
Muscle Burst
Moment's Peace
Rabid Elephant
Gorilla Titan
Elephant Ambush
Chatter of the Squirrel
RED(7)
Blazing Salvo
Flameburst
Minotaur Explorer
Ember Beast
2 Thermal Blast
Acceptable Losses
BLACK(6)
Stalking Bloodsucker
Ghastly Demise
Gravedigger
Morbig Hunger
Painbringer
Zombie Assassin
GOLD(1)
Vampiric Dragon
LAND(17)
5 Mountain
6 Forest
6 Swamp
And the PTQ has begun with 63 people in it.
1st round-David Yanes
David had a crazy deck, Iridescent Angel, Wayward Angel, 3 Second Thought, Aether Burst, Repel, Chamber of Manipulation, 2 Blessed Orator, Flameburst, Firebolt,....
Game one
He played some early creature, I played some creature also. And then I burned out most of his army or remove them via Painbringer. And then I brought out Vampiric Dragon and started to control the board. But he casted Chamer of Manipulation right after that so I hold the dragon back and started to ping his army. After my Rabid Elphant died to a Second Though, he casted one of his angel, the Wayward Angel. I answered with Gorilla Titan, then tried to kill his Angel with Painbringer and Vampiric Dragon. In response, he returned it to his hand with Aether Burst. But then he did not cast it again so I know he has some tricks in his hand. I declared my attack phase and he did not bother to use his Chamber, so I attacked with 3 creatures. He burned out Gravedigger with Flameburst, remove Vampiric Dragon with Second Thought, but take 8 by Gorilla Titan. This brought him down to 5 while I was sitting at 14. He then cast his Wayward Angel, attacked with it. Then he achieved threshold and the angel brought me down to dangerously low life at 2. But I attacked in order to get some cards in my library and I removed his Bomb Squad with Painbringer and burned out the other creature. With no other creature beside the Angel and no cards in hand to use the Chamber, he forced to sacrifice it and I rode to victory with my army.
Game two
I got the control of the game first as I casted Diligent Farmhand and Chatter of the Squirrel. They tooked away few life and then got hold back by his creature. So I kept burning his creature and brought own my own creature. Then came my Rabid Elephant. But he Second Thought my creature and casted Iridescent Angel. The next turn, he casted Chamer of Manipulation to further control the board. I tried my best and brought him down to 1, and I was at 7. He attacked with angel, but I played Moment's Peace. I declared my attack phase, he discared Syncopate and surpised me because I had a Morbid Hunger in my graveyard with enought mana to cast it. So I decided not to cast the hunger but casted the dragon instead. Then, he brought me down to 3 via angel and killed me with Flameburst for 3 as I casted a Flameburst earlier. He revealed to me that he made a mistake discarding the Syncopate but as it turned out, his mistake turned out to save him. Time was called 2 turns earlier so we took a tie. I knew this is not a good start but it's better than a loss.
Game 1-1 Match 0-0-1
2nd round-Navin Kaneshan
I did not remember much about his deck as I crushed him really fast compare to my first round. He dealt only 1 damage to me in 2 games. His deck was an okay blue/white/x deck with Second Thought, Mystic Zealot, Aven Cloudchase, Persuasion, Syncopate....
Game 1
I opted to draw after the winning the die roll. It turned out bad for him as all he got was 3 islands and I casted Diligent Farmhand. That little took 5 damages from him. Then as he played some creature, I removed them. Casted some creatures, I won the game.
Game 2
He was mana screwed again as he could not get a plain until much later. I already controlled the board and killed him with Gorilla Titan with Painbringer on the board. What a crazy combo! After the game was over, he reveald Second Thought, Mystic Zealot, Aven Cloudchaser, and 2 more white cards.
Game 3-1 Match 1-0-1
3rd round-Chris Strange
I did not remember much in this match neither, I even forgot what color he was playing. Arggg! Gotta pay attention more next time! All I remember was he playing with another white deck with more SECOND THOUGHT! And I won the second game in 5 minutes because he was mana screwed.
Game 5-1 Match 2-0-1
4th round-Jeremy Simmons
Jeremy got a very good red/blue/green deck, 2 Firebolt, 2 Pardic Firecat, Flameburst, SHOWER OF COAL, Anarchist, some good blue spell and some good green creature.
Game 1
This game was the best example of how my deck suppose to work. He played so mana creatures early on and took me down to 11 before I got some little defense. Then I used all my removals on his creatures, gained some life with Morbid Hunger, then casted few creatures and rode out to victory. He tried to mount some defense via creatures and removal but I removed his creatures and played other creatures to the one that got killed.
Game 2
He played first and again, he casted so many creatures in the early game. I did not have that much removal to deal with them. And when I got some defenses, he casted Shower of Coal with kicker. Great! Take me down to 5. I casted some more creatures to hold up the attacks again. But he Anarchisted the Shower of Coal back and killed me.
Game 3
Since I knew his deck was too fast for me. I took a chance and played first. The plan worked out as I casted Chatter of the Squireel and Diligent Farmhand to hold off any early offense he might have. However, he burned them out via Flameburst and Firebolt. Then he casted some creatures, which I removed a few. I casted my own creature but was behind in the damage race. Then he got Shower of Coal again and dealt some big damage to me again. Taken the chance he being nearly tapped out, I casted my big Vampiric Dragon with 2 mana left to Moment's Peace. He hold off his creature, then I picked them off one by one and won. He had the chance to Anarchist the Shower of Coal but he tapped the wrong mana the earlier turn, so he had to sacrificed one of his land. And that land turned out to be important as he could not Anarchist and Shower of Coal all in one turn.
Game 7-2 Match 3-0-1
Sitting at a comfortable pace to make top 8, I knew that to be sure in top 8, I need to win the next match.
5th round-Jason Fanning
Jason Fanning had an amazing blue/white/red deck. He got a few burn, 2 Kirtar's Desire, Mystic Zealot, Aven Flock, 2 Cephalid Lotter, Cephalid Broker, Aven Windereader.....
Game 1
He won the dice roll and went first. He played out some creatures. I casted Ember Beast hoping to get another creature later. But all I drew is either mountain or swamp, or pump spell. I also had only 1 forest so I could not cast the Elephant Ambush earlier so I could block. His lotter AND broker came active and soon he overwhelmed me with card advantage. I succesfully casted Vampiric Dragon and Gorilla Titan so I was thinking, "yay, the board had turned for me." But he ended my joy fast with 2 Kirtar's Desire on the Gorilla Titan and Vampiric Dragon and he had achieved threshold so fast through the cephalid. So my only creature left was my Ember Beast which been out there since turn 3, and I died in the ensuing attack.
Game 2
This game is a little more even. Since I had Diligent Farmhand so I kept it even I had Morbid Hunger in my hand with so swamp. I got some creature out to defend his army that kept getting bigger and bigger. He then cast his Lotter and Broker again, I killed the Broker but had no answer to the Lotter. I also only stuck on one swamp, which I searched out via Diligent Farmhand, and hold Morbid Hunger and Painbringer in my hand. His Lotter kept giving him more creature and spell to remove my defense like Repel, Kirtar's Desire, Flameburst, Firebolt.... And he killed me easily.
Game 7-4 Match 3-1-1
The lost put me in a pretty bad situation. Sitting at the 11th position, with 10 players before me all had better record than me with at least 12 points. But I figured that if most my opponents would win, I would have a very good chance of getting into Top 8.
6th round-Ryan Harvey
This was the first tournament Ryan played in 3 years. A friend of his got him out of retirement. He was also sitting at 3-1-1, very good for a guy who had not played Magic for a long time. I had saw his deck before so I had an advantage knowing what is in his deck. He had the combo of Chamer of Manipulation and Animal Boneyard, plus Kirtar's Wrath, Shower of Coal and Anarchist, also 2 Aven Cloudchaser and 2 Cephalid Lotter.
Game 1
My deck worked exactly like it did. He played some creatures, I killed them off and put out my own creatures to finish him off. He did have 2 Lotters active and crazily searching for his Shower of Coal or Kirtar's Wrath to stop my army. But even drawing 3 cards a turn for 3 turns did not help him so he lost to my Stalking Blooksucker, Rabid Elephant and other creature.
Game 2
Game 2 was just like game 1. He casted creatures, I removed them. I played my creatures and he had nothing to kill them with. He tried searching again with 2 Lotters but no luck turned to him, only with Shower of Coal without Threshold to killed some small creature. So he died with Kirtar's Wrath at the bottom of his library.
Great! I won 2-0! Yay, I should have a very good chance of getting into Top 8. However when the final standing came out, I got 9th place. I lost by 3 tiebreakers point. Me, 7th and 8th place all had 13 points. 7th got 61 tiebraker points, 8th got 60, and I got only 57. Maybe I should have put down 2-1 so I helped me on my tiebreaker, or would that help me at all?
I got 9 packs for my work, gave 4 to Joseph for the ride, did not get anything nice beside Devoted Caretaker in those packs. I hoped I get better luck next time I played.
One question: Would a 2-0 win help me more for my tiebreaker or a 2-1 would?This is my first article so if I missed out anything, please help me fix it. Thank you for reading my articles. And wait for my next article on new deck in T2 pretty soon if I'm not too busy on school work. Props
I got 9th place.
I was able to meet some very nice guy, Jason Fanning and some other.
I made some ok trade and sold some cards for money I need.
Joesph got a Shadowmage Infiltrator.
Slops
Joseph, Jeff, and Nathaniel only went 3-3.
I got 9th place.
The tournament was started late and poorly ran.
Gah, I hate Second Thought. I saw it in 5 ouf 6 matches. __________________
ICQ me @81221303
AIM me @gaeacradle
email me @ dung10031958@hotmail.com
  |
leocrazy
Member
|
posted October 31, 2001 04:57 AM
I finish PTQ San Diego 9th too
with result 4-0-3
I lost 0 matches, and i`m stay 9th
Ironic  __________________
Leonid Cheorny
DCI Level 1 Judge
Captain Leocrazy, GAB PURPLE HAZE Team
| |
Magic Online Trading League Bulletin Board
UBBFriend: Email This Page to Someone! 
