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By: walkerdog, Tyler Walker
Jan 26 2009 1:43am
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Hey Luis,

Thanks for taking the time to talk. So, mostly I'd like to hit Classic stuff, and your opinions on Classic (With maybe a few other subjects thrown in for fun). To start it off, congratulations on your successes the last couple of years, especially this year in making Level Eight. Tell us a little about yourself:

I graduated from the University of California, Davis with a B.A. in Political Science, although as of yet haven't put said degree to use. Currently I'm gaming full-time, and its really awesome, although not sure how long all that can go on for. The level system of course does help quite a bit.

What drew you to Classic? I'm guessing a desire to continue playing your beloved Rock staples, but was there more to it than that?
 
I like Force of Will and Sensei's Divining Top, as well as just classic-type formats in general like Legacy or Vintage. The games are more in-depth, and the cards are just much more fun.
 
What is your favorite online format?

It would be Classic if there were more tournaments, but I have been enjoying Extended lately.

 
You have been consistently improving the last two+ years, going from National Champ to winning GP and finally a PT AND GP in the same year in back-to-back tournaments. What are some of the keys to your success across the board in virtually every format you try your hand at?

It might sound standard, but practice and passion are really the keys. If you are enjoying yourself, you will apply yourself and do better in any endeavor. In terms of something more direct, I would say playing with players who are ideally equal to or better than yourself helps quite a bit. A good test group is very important.

How do you prepare for (relatively) smaller tournaments like online PEs? Do you have any particular testing routine or animal sacrifices?

Actually, for PE's I tend to just play whatever sounds fun. I usually build a Classic deck right before the PE, just using my experience with the format to "theory test" and figure what sounds good (and fun). In summary, for small tournaments I usually don't test much directly, just use my accumulated knowledge as a guide.
 
What deck do you feel is the best in the format?
 
Necro most likely.  Very fast, very hard to stop, and its best draws are nigh-unbeatable. Daze might change that some, I haven't played Classic since JvC decks came out.
 
Do you feel like RDW/Burn can remain viable in Classic, at least as a foil to NecroStorm?

Burn is ok, but the advent of real dual lands makes it just that much worse. I don't even particularly see it as good v Necrostorm, since Necro is just so fast.

Does the B/R list need any changes right now in your eyes?  How long does Burning Wish survive before it gets the axe? And should we just go ahead and take out Necropotence now, or wait and see? It appears to be the best combo deck in the format, but not unstoppable, judging by results at the World Q tournaments and in tournaments since.

I don't understand why both Consultation and Necro are unrestricted, it makes little sense to me. Both do seem too broken, but I guess they aren't dominating tournaments so maybe they are ok.

Are the insane dual prices affecting even the very dedicated players like yourself, or have you been able to get all of yours?

I wish the duals were cheaper just so more people had access to the format, although it isn't a problem for me to buy the cards I need (except Daze, which apparently just isn't for sale).

At what point do you feel like a Classic/Legacy split should occur without too much disruption to either format?

Right now Classic doesn't feel like Legacy, which it did before Necro. A split would be fine now, although I don't know if that would fragment the community too much, since it isn't big enough as is.

How do you feel about the various "Weekend Events"? Do theyhave any appeal to you, and will they help motivate you to try formats you normally wouldn't?

I like the idea, but I usually don't have time to play in Weekend events of any kind, due to IRL events occurring only on weekends.
 
Let's jump over to Extended. What decks are acceptable to you right now, and does Elves warp the format to the point of needing a B/R action? If you were to ban a card from Elves, what would it be to try to keep the deck competitive without being broken? My suggestion would be one of the support cards, like Wirewood Hivemaster or MAYBE one of the two "tap creatures for mana" Elves if WotC felt like a card needed to go.

Elves doesn't need anything banned, the deck isn't dominating by any stretch of the imagination.

People have said that "The Pros knew about Elves," at PT Berlin. Do you agree with that, given that Zoo didn't have Fanatics/Guildmages in their decks (mostly) and Tezzerator was the only deck that really attacked a deck like Elves (Seemingly as a by-product of hating on Zoo).

Pretty much all the pros knew, but bear in mind my definition of "pro" extends to like 15% of the tournament maybe, so the number of people who didn't know (and were playing all these unprepared decks) was still quite large. 
 
Why, in your opinion, is Tezzerator almost never played, online at least?

It isn't good, simple as that.
 
Going back to Classic-legal, have you tried out Pauper yet? Any thoughts on the format?

I haven't tried it. 

What are your thoughts on the Classic Player of the Year contest? Details here:
http://classicquarter.com/poty.asp if you haven't seen it.

Seems pretty awesome, although I doubt I will be too competitive in it, sadly.

How long can you keep up this crazy run with Magic? Do you plan to ride it out until it's not feasible, or do you have an early exit planned?

No real plans either way as of yet.

I've seen you testing in the Tournament Practice room fairly often. Is that your main mode of testing?

It will do sometimes, isn't my main mode.

Thanks for your time! I appreciate you talking with me. Good luck to you in the next year!

I do have one other thing I'd like to cover.  As a testing tool, and a way to keep track of winnings, I've recently set up a simple data-base to track my decks, Win/Loss ratio, Opponent's decks, and random notes on the matchups, with signifigant plays and the like.  Sam Black mentioned in an article that he did this, and I really liked the idea.  It has been VERY useful.  I'll give my method here if it sounds like a useful tool.

For example, one entry has my opponent's name, then their deck.  This is to provide easy reference if I'm paired with this opponent again.  I'll usually note any special tricks to their deck, or variant builds. "Pauper Grapeshot-Kill, W/ Empty MD."  Next I have my deck listed (This isn't as important on-the-fly and is more for studying my deck's performance after 10+ queues).  Finally I have a result column, where I enter the Win/Loss results and any notes about the match.  "W 2-0 I win G1 when he mulls to 4 on the play.  G2 I Rats and Wrench away two cards total.  He tries to go off on his Turn 3, on the draw, and fizzles at 18 storm with 1 red mana in pool, 8 cards in hand, 6 that were lands."

This helps me remember when I win or loose to a misplay on either my or my opponent's part (so I can tell who probably should have won), gives me an idea of key plays in the matchup, and helps me figure out a deck for a particular meta.  All of these things are thing that I'm trying to do anyway, but this helps me organize my thoughts, and remember ALL of the results, not just the time that I got stormed out on turn three with double grapeshot both games.

If you don't have Microsoft Excel, or another speadsheeting option, you have other options.  You can take notes by hand, or use something like Notepad in Windows, or even download the free Open Office suite, which is an excellent alternative to Microsoft Office's suite of programs.  One can expand this to playtesting and games they watch and have access to a lot of information about various matchups and opponents at your fingertips.  It has helped me a lot, and I recommend it.

I hope you enjoyed this, and I hope it helps!

27 Comments

game tracking by whiffy at Mon, 01/26/2009 - 13:48
whiffy's picture
5

I fully agree that this mode of recording is useful. I have been doing it since july. Every single classic pe i attend gets its own date floowed by the number of players and my deck for the event then its pretty much as you described it although i also write down my sb for every sb game that i make changes. This has helped emeasurably on multiple fronts. I can see match up percentages for large chunks of the meta, i can see where my luck is up or down(i also track my rating through each rd)and lots of other things.

oh and LSV your doing a great job and wearing out my little flag that i hold up when watching coverage. Its too bad your so good cause you have no time for classic.

dissapointing by dangerlinto at Mon, 01/26/2009 - 16:18
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Looks to me like you asked LSV a lot of questions about classic that he either had very little opinion about or simply didn't care.

All the best answers he gave were in those questions which had nothing to do with classic...

that would be because he is a by Anonymous (not verified) at Mon, 01/26/2009 - 20:16
Anonymous's picture

that would be because he is a classic player. walkerdog is obv going to ask classic questions.

thanks guys by walkerdog at Mon, 01/26/2009 - 22:34
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5

I think what DL meant was that LSV's most interesting responses were to non-classic questions, not that he was mad/confused about asking Classic questions. Either way, I really appreciate Luis taking the time from his busy schedule of winning GPs/PTs to talk.

Just curious. WHat is by Anonymous (not verified) at Wed, 01/28/2009 - 21:01
Anonymous's picture

Just curious. WHat is Vargas's MTGO name. I would like to play him sometime.

Heh by walkerdog at Thu, 01/29/2009 - 09:40
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I don't want to give all of them out, but his obvious one is LSV :)

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