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By: walkerdog, Tyler Walker
Mar 29 2013 12:16pm
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Last weekend, there was a Montana-based PTQ.  I'm not sure how familiar everyone is with the Montana/Wyoming/Dakotas areas, but we don't get a lot of PTQs.  We don't have a huge population base to draw from, but still, 2 PTQs within 6 hours in a given year isn't a lot.  That seems to be changing somewhat.  This event was a Modern format PTQ in Missoula, which is in the Western part of the state.  I live about 5-.5.5 hours away (that's if you go ~80/mph the whole way, and there are enough passes and random wildlife spottings that it is hard to go much faster than that, even in a Mustang). 

The week before the event, there was a local Modern tournament.  It was designed as a warm-up for the PTQ, and first place paid out store credit plus took care of your entry fee.   I had built my list approximately like this:

 

 

 

 

I was fairly happy with the list going into the tournament.  Sometimes I feel a lot of doubt or uncertainty about how I've built a deck, but this time the only thing I really wasn't sure about was the main-deck Supreme Verdict.  The reasoning behind it was I wanted to hedge my aggro matchup just a little, and I wanted to be able to side into a fairly controlling deck (see Dan Unwin's article from 3/20 on Starcitygames - he had the same thought, and probably did it better), and I wanted to be slightly "pre-boarded" to free up one more sideboard card.

I anticipated lots of aggressive decks for the local tournament.  Modern is a relatively young format, and I expected people to throw together Burn, Gruul, Affinity, and I was also looking out for Pod and Tron decks.  I didn't expect much in the way of Jund (or at least not fully-powered Jund) or much in the way of UWR decks.

In the first round, I was paired against J.R.  I don't think he appeared on Dallas, but maybe he had.  He showed me a turn one Darkslick Shores and a Delver.  I immediately put him on Zac Hill/Drew Levin's Grixis deck - however, this was a more focused Fish-style build, with Vapor Snags and Judge's Familiar to disrupt and race.  I Bolted the Delver, and he played an Owl, then Inquisitioned me.  I don't remember what he took, but he saw my Cryptic Command.  Luckily, I drew more removal, and my deck had Snapcasters to 2-for-1 him all day, and I won the game fairly easily.

Game two was slightly closer.  He played two Delvers, Inquisitioned me pretty good, and had a Negate for removal.  Unfortunately for him, his Delvers didn't become Aberrations for the first 3-4 turns, and my Batterskull following by Restoration Angel was enough to beat him, even through a Vapor Snag or two on my Germ Token.  He got me down to 3-4 twice though.

 

Round two I was paired against Felipe.  Felipe is generally a good dude, but he also tends to tilt pretty hard.   It makes it kind of uncomfortable to play him as you're watching him do the art from
right in front of you.  He was with Gruul (although he may have been close to Naya Zoo as I saw at least one Sacred Foundry from him).  He started us off with Experiment One.


I dropped a fetchland and passed back.  He played Burning-Tree Emissary, so I Bolted his Experiment.  He followed with Flinthoof Boar.  I untapped and played Celestial Colonnade, and Bolted his Boar in case he had Giant Growth or some other nonsense.  He untapped and ran Ash Zealot and the Emissary at me.  I played another land, holding Snapcaster Mage (the most relevant card, who I happen to remember).  He played another Boar, turned it on, and attacked. I Snapped back Bolt (I think we forgot that I should have taken 3, but it didn't end up being very relevant) and shot his pig and blocked the Emissary.  He had no follow-up.  I Electrolyzed his Zealot and had Path to cover myself.  He played some dude (can't remember) and I Pathed it.  I passed again, and Cliqued him on his upkeep.  He didn't have much, but I put something on the bottom, and he had Searing Blaze to clear my guy out.  This didn't get him very far - he had no creatures still, and I started attacking with Colonnade, then burned him out from seven life.

If game one was upsetting for him, game two didn't appear to be improving his chances.  I sided out something like -2 Mana Leak, -2 Clique, +2 Revelation, +1 Verdict, +1 Batterskull.  We saw a similar scenario play out in game two to the start of game 1.  He had a 1-drop that grew, and I had the turn 1 Lightning Bolt, followed by Snapcaster Mage for the Bolt on turn 3.  He was able to attack me down to around 10, but my attrition was running him out of cards, and then I fired off a Sphinx's Revelation for 4-5, and the game was over.

 It took a few more turns of Mutilate (I think we were foiled out by the end), but we got there.

I'm not sure why Gruul was ever a thing, because it appears to be a worse Affinity.  With both decks you can have nutty second turns, but at least Affinity has Thoughtcast, Ravager, and Cranial Plating, plus 6-8 manlands.  It does more unfair things than Gruul, and attacks almost as well.

 

Round three was Thomas Putachickeninpot.  That is not how he spells it, but that's how his friend pronounced it.  I incredulously asked, "Really?  Put-a-chicken-in-pot?" and they both busted up laughing, "No, no...  well now that you mention it, it does sound REALLY close to that."

He was rocking Jund (and I knew it ahead of time, having been one of the few games I'd scouted.).   I felt like this is probably the hardest matchup for me because their discard combined with Bob or LotV tend to bury you really quickly. 

I was also on the draw for game one, which is pretty awful too!  He had a couple of Deathrite Shamans to start the game, and I had Lightning Bolts for them.  Lilianna joined his board, but my Angel followed by burn cleaned her up.  He killed the Angel, but I'd hit my 6th land with a Colonnade out, and I turned into a burn deck and killed him while he flooded a little.

I sided in Batterskull, two Finks and a Sphinx's Revelation if I recall correctly, while dropping a Verdict and 3 Cliques (might have been Remand since it's not great on the draw).  He again established early Lilvantage, but I was able to run a Snapcaster + a flashed-back Bolt to clean her up again.  I got to get a bit aggressive with Snapcaster, while he landed a Dark Confidant.  I was ahead on life, so I let Bob still, planning to outrace him.  He was in the awkward position of needing the cards from Bob, but really wanting him to die at the same time.  I started attacking with Tiago+Colonnade, and he revealed land, Thundermaw Hellkite (as he slammed it quickly).  I crapped my pants a bit, then looked at the Path to Exile I could cast off of the untapped Colonnade!  He traded Bob for Snapcaster, but then I ripped Batterskull like a champ, and he was done.


I drew the fourth round with someone else playing UWR.


In the top eight, I was matched up with Dan.  He was playing Doran (or Junk with Doran, or whatever you like to call it.  Aggro Rock, the Rock, whatever.).  I didn't feel great about the matchup.  He has the cards that make Jund a tough match (Bob, Lilianna, Deathrite Shaman) AND Elspeth and Lingering Souls.

We didn't do much the first few turns.  I was able to chip away at his life a little bit with the help of his lands, a Clique attack, and a Bolt.  The key turn went like this: it is his turn, and he has Lingering Souls tokens (with a copy in the GY to flash back), Elspeth, a large-enough Goyf, and a Deathrite Shaman active.

I have Clique and Geist out.  My hand is Cryptic, Helix, Snapcaster, and something irrelevant (Maybe a land, so I hit my drop next turn either way?).  I have 5 mana open, and here's where I screw up pretty good.  He pumps Goyf with Elspeth, and attacks.  I decide I have to go for it the next turn - he is at 12, so I can attack with Geist/Clique/Snapcaster (if I play him) for 11 total, and he can't really block it since I have Cryptic (although removal has to be considered).  He has a card or two.  I have Helix in my hand, so I can drop him as low as 9.  I'm going to go to 3 if I Helix him now and take the Goyf attack.  However, if I can Path Goyf, I can alpha/near alpha, and he doesn't have enough presence to lethal me next turn.  So I Snapcaster, target Path, and he removes it in response with Deathrite Shaman and I fail pretty hard.  I still Helix him to stay alive (dropping to 1).  I can kill him if he has no removal.  I untap, draw a land, Cryptic for tapping his team + drawing  a card, (drawing another Cryptic!!!!!), and attack.  He has Abrupt Decay for my Clique, and lives with 2 life, killing me on his next turn.  Had I drawn a Bolt on my draw step or off of the Cryptic draw, I would have killed him, but I screwed up. 

The better line of play was: Helix the Deathrite Shaman.  If he goes for my Path, I can flash it back with Tiago in response, and if he doesn't, I'm fine too, since I'll still Path Goyf to stop his attack.  Then I draw for my turn, pass to him, and can take whatever attack he makes (I mean, I did already anyway).  I can then tap his team EOT if he makes more blockers, untap and attack for a bunch (and I would have drawn another Cryptic) so I could chain it into a second attack for a bit.

I was a bit frustrated, but bad play is bad play.  I dropped Cliques for Batterskull and Sphinx's Revelations.


I kept a 2-lander, and never drew another land.  Oh.  The eventual winner was Brook, who I had drawn in with into the T8. 

After the event, I was mostly happy with the deck, but I wanted to adjust it a little.  The Mystic Gate was basically like peeing blood every time I drew it - immediately concerning, and possibly fatal.  Instead, I wanted a WR land.  I settled on Rugged Prairie, but that was probably incorrect.  I think it actually should be Clifftop Retreat. I also went -2 Mana Leak, -1 Supreme Verdict for +1 Geist of Saint Traft, +1 Path to Exile, and +1 Lightning Helix. 

My sideboard dropped 2 Leylines for 1 more Supreme Verdict (the copy that I had in the maindeck basically) and 1 more Aven Mindcensor.

 

For the PTQ, I rode with Paul, who was on Goblins.  I wasn't sure I agreed with his build; he had Vials and Goblin Grenades, and the pure creatures stack otherwise.  I felt like Lightning Bolts and some of the more inefficient but still important one-drops might be wise, but having not played it, it's hard to say for sure.

 

We left Billings at 4:30ish AM, arriving at Missoula at 9:30.  Registration was open from 10-11, with the player's meeting at 11:30.  Obviously we played pretty badly to wake up that early and get there over an hour before the end of registration.  Let's just say the event didn't start until noonish.

 

One of the Billings locals was able to ship me a Rugged Prairie as the last card I really wanted to MD.  I wouldn't have hated a fourth Cryptic Command, but I was happy with the configuration right then.


Round one saw me paired against Hunter.  He was leading off with cards such as Birds of Paradise and Wall of Roots, indicating that he was either some sort of awful ramp thing or some sort of Pod deck.  I like my matchup against Pod alright because I have tons of removal.  I know that every Pod player ever thinks that if you have removal, they'll just "grind you out with value," but I honestly feel that's only true of some draws.  If I have Path to Exile and Snapcaster Mage, plus any reasonable combination of cards, it's pretty hard for Pod to win.  I can Path away Spellskite, which is the best way for them to shut off my burn-based removal. 

Anyway, I kept a solid mixture of burn spells, Snapcasters and lands. I burned his Bird.  He kept Wall in play, using it to get his Pod out and start cycling through Finks into an attempt at Restoration Angel.  I used Path + Snappy to clean up that mess, and started attacking.  A second Tiago gave me another use of some spell, and then I started attacking.  He ripped a Zealous Conscripts off the top of the pile, and used it and Snapcaster to get an attack on my - I used a Bolt to take the Conscripts out, then continued to attack with both Snapcasters.  He flooded a bit, and Snapcasters finished the job.

 

I sided in Torpor Orbs and Batterskull for Remands.  I'm not sure how I should side here.  I want Orbs because it shuts down his comboability - at the same time, it tends to blank my Snapcasters somewhat.  I maybe should have cut Snapcasters for Supreme Verdicts and Sphinx's Revelation, going the full control route.

 

Game two saw Hunter drop the ominous Spellskite which did a fine job of protecting his dudes.  He was able to work up the chain and Kiki-Jiki/Angel me out.  At the end of this game, I asked a judge how much time we had left - 6 minutes.  Huh, sure went quick!  I opted against re-siding, since I didn't want to time out and draw if I could help it.  I opened my hand to see - Path to Exile, Restoration Angel, and 5 lands (Celestial Colonnade among them).  This is a mulligan if I'm not an idiot, but I was feeling that this was better than shuffling up.  He played some dudes, including Spellskite, who ate a Path.  We both had Restoration Angels, while he had Izzet Straticaster, and I had Colonnade going.  He then used Phantasmal Image to clone a Restoration Angel and got aggressive.  I traded my Colonnade for a ping + his Angel, then held back with mine, waiting to draw one of literally 1.5 dozen (7 1CC removal spells left, 4 Helix, 3 Electrolyze, 3 Cryptic, Batterskull) cards that would put me in a good place.  Instead, for the rest of the game, I drew exactly Remand.  I died on turn 4 of turns.


My bad on the lack of a mulligan, but at that point I had 10 lands in play and one in my graveyard (Colonnade) plus having fetched out 5-6 of them, I had accounted for something like 15 lands out of 25 in the deck.  Frustrating, but on to round two.

 

I was paired with Bryan in round two.  He won the play, and started off with an Affinity start, land, Springleaf Drum.  I don't remember (or have notes) on the exact start of creatures for him, but it went roughly Memnite, Ravager (which got Pathed, so he couldn't pump up his other dudes with it), him getting two Mountains from my two Paths, and Resto, Helix, and Electrolyze cleaning up the board and killing him.  He did mull to five this game, I think, so it was a rough one for him.

I sided in two Stony Silence, two Supreme Verdict, and a  Sphinx's Revelation, cutting Remands on the draw.

 

His start was much better this game.  He even got to keep 7!  He beat me up with a few early dudes, then fired a Galvanic Blast to take me to 9.  I was able to stabilize the board at that point. I cracked a fetchland, cast Restoration Angel, and ended his turn... eating two more Galvanic Blasts in response, at 8 life.

 

Got me!  He remarked that I probably should have suspected when he was flinging the first one at my face, but I'm not sure I can win there anyway without the Restoration Angel - but maybe I could have played it better.

 

Game three was one of those "Affinity dumps it's hand" draws, with 3 1 or 0-drops on turn two with Cranial in play.  I was able to shoot the first equipped monster, then shoot the next one with Snapcaster Mage (and trade with another attacker, giving him one less equippee) the next turn.  I took a swing from a Plating'd dude, Sphinx'd for three, and untapped, killing his equipped hero and slamming the Stony Silence I'd draw off of the Revelation. He was able to reload with 3 more x/1s, but Electrolyze was enough to clean up most of that, and my dudes started killing him right off.

 

Okay, that's better, back on the road.  My third round saw me paired with Corey.  He was playing a Birds of Paradise deck of the sort I disdain - sure, you can ramp into Thragtusk and Restoration Angel, but if that's only barely good enough in standard, why do it in Modern?  Game one was long and drawn out, and I had to Path a few Thrags, but in the end, Restoration Angel is just better in my deck (since I play Cryptics and amazing removal and can re-use it on a whim) and killed him from 25 (total, off a Thragtusk heal).

I honestly don't remember my siding in this game - I think Batterskull came in, and probably Finks, cutting Remands, but I'm not sure.  He gained 9 life this game - 2 Finks (that were Pathed) and a Thragtusk resolved.  On my end, my life total went like this - 20-17-13-12-11-14 (Helix) 16 (Finks)-15-18(Helix again)-20(Finks comes back)-19-18.  Geist tore him up even with him going to almost 30, as I was able to clear out a board for him to attack into, and attack he did.

 

In the fourth round, I was paired against Francais (I called him Frank, after asking for, and not getting, his permission).  He seemed like a decent sort, except he was playing Jund.  There wasn't much going on here.  He destroyed me with a classic "Lilianna + 2 manlands, along with other cards that do things," draw both games.  I did have a pretty amazingly bad misplay though - I had 2 cards in hand against his active Lil, Tiago and Bolt, with 4 mana up - Island/UW/UR/WR lands.  He +1'd her, I Bolted her, and deliberated, then Tiago'd for Bolt (not Path) so I can kill either man-land he sends or I can just Bolt Lil at EOT if he holds back.  I then looked at my untapped UW land and vomited inside my brain.

 

I don't think it makes a big difference, as I was not drawing particularly well, and Jund is REALLY hard to beat if they get a great draw, but it was pretty bad.

I was virtually dead, but played the last 3 rounds for prizes.  I beat Burn (Rwb) pretty easily, winning G1 on a mull to 5 thanks to 4 Lightning Helix (thanks to Tiago for the two extra copies) and thank you Goblin Guide for YOUR help my friend.  Game two had a funny moment - he plays Torpor Orb + Vexing Devil to be SURE he got the 4/3 beater for one.  He also messed up game one, if I remember right, using a Skullcrack on his turn instead of waiting for my Helix which had been revealed to the Guide.  I might be wrong, but that sticks out to me.

I then was paired with Alex, a Billings local, and briefly a former co-worker (and all-around good person to be around) playing Tron.  I didn't actually know he was Tron going in, but his T1 Tron land let me Bolt him on his end step, T3 Tiago + Bolt his face, T4 go for it with Geist, Path his Wurmcoil on his EOT, and Cryptic the next Wurmcoil to kill him.  I sided in Mindcensors for Electrolyzes and POSSIBLY Stony Silence on the play in game three?

Anyway, game two was a Karn game where he was able to T4 Karn, with a second in hand, and Oblivion Stone to protect him and kill my board, plus Pyroclasm in his hand.  GGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG

Game three though, I kept a Remand/Mindcensor hand.  I Remanded something on turn two, then he played a Map.  Let's just say that he didn't crack til turn three... and I got him good with the Mindcensor (he found some Green-producing land).  He still had 2/3 of Tron out.  On his next turn, he played the Greenland, probably Grove of the Burnwillows iirc, then played some sort of dig for his Tron piece.  He found it and realized he'd already landed for the turn, and did a mental vomit (think Mutilate again).


I untapped, beat some with Aven, then added Geist (with Remand backup).  Geist and Remand were enough, as he didn't find the Pyroclasm until the turn after (and only had one Red source).

 

Finally I was paired with a player named Robert (I think, I'm pretty sure he was saying Robert but the T was a soft/near-silent T).  He scooped to go eat - he felt that playing Pod against me was pretty bad for him, and didn't want to mess with it.

 

I'm not sure if the prize payout was as awful as it felt, but 5 packs for 13th didn't feel great.  Dan2, another Billings resident made T8 with Tron, after learning the game like a year ago, so that was pretty sick, and some random won with UWR, I believe.

 

As far as Modern goes, I'm sad to see the season end - both Standard and Modern are in good places right now, even if I cannot figure out how to make the BGx decks a good matchup for Modern URW.  Maybe I just need to pick up the fourth Cryptic and play the deck Wafo-Tapa-style URW, which is almost entirely creatureless.

I hope you've enjoyed the report, and thanks for reading!

3 Comments

Tyler where are these by country hillbilly at Mon, 04/01/2013 - 20:29
country hillbilly's picture

Tyler where are these Sphinx's Revelations you keep referring to? Were they supposed to be in board?

yup, there is only 11 cards by bread expert at Tue, 04/02/2013 - 18:06
bread expert's picture

yup, there is only 11 cards in SB

Good point! by walkerdog at Thu, 04/04/2013 - 10:52
walkerdog's picture

Yes they are in the board - dunno how that happened.

Thanks Hoff.