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By: Lord Erman, Nafiz Erman
Nov 16 2010 2:44am
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ROGUE PLAY
BYOS Season Three Wrap Up
Part I

by Nafiz Erman

Hello dear readers and welcome back to your weekly addiction; welcome back to Rogue Play. This week we will dive into the wonderful world of BYOS. To me this unofficial format is one of the hottest formats of the PRE scene and this week I'm going to tell you what happens in BYOS tournaments. I will show you what people are playing and which decks are winning.

In case you missed my older articles about this format and have no idea what the heck I'm talking about, here are a few links for you:

Rogue Play - Season Two Wrap Up: This article shows you what happened in Season Two of BYOS. It also has some useful links to my previous articles about the format. Do you want to know the rules of the format? Do you want to know when and where the tournaments take place? That article has the links answers to all of your questions.
Rogue Play - Season Two Finale: This is the report of the tournament that determined the champion of Season Two. 

Okay so now I assume that you know everything there is to know about the format. The rules, where to play it, what happened in season one and two etc...  Therefore I will start immediately with the first week of the season.

 

SEASON THREE - WEEK ONE

Before I start talking about Season Three, let me remind you that Season Two was a tremendous success for me. Not only because I became the champion of it but also the whole sixteen weeks long season went quite well for me.

But a new season was starting and all those things were belonging to the past now. One should always remember the past but as you know, you cannot live in the past. So I had a more heavier burden on my shoulders; I had a title to defend this season.

And with these thoughts I started Season Three. The first week of this new season had a very big crowd and even before registering for the tournament I knew that this was going to be the most successful season of BYOS. The interest was huge and that made me very happy.

The high number of players also meant a high level of competition. But I had a nice deck and I was confident that I was at least going to make to Top-8. Oh, and here's the deck I took to the tournament.

Destructive Burnwillows - TSP / ZEN / M11
A BYOS Deck by Nafiz Erman
Creatures
4 Wall of Roots
4 Primeval Titan
8 cards

Other Spells
4 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
4 Ancestral Vision
4 Punishing Fire
4 Mana Leak
3 Explore
3 Destructive Force
3 Garruk Wildspeaker
2 Cultivate
27 cards
 
Lands
4 Grove of the Burnwillows
3 Misty Rainforest
3 Scalding Tarn
2 Raging Ravine
2 Halimar Depths
5 Forest
4 Island
2 Mountain
25 cards

Sideboard
4 Negate
3 Krosan Grip
3 Lightning Bolt
3 Tormod's Crypt
2 Pyroclasm
15 cards
 
Destructive Force

 

I know that  is very hot these days in Standard but please do remember that this tournament took place one month ago. And back then this deck type was one of those "under the radar" ones.

So what I did here was simple. I took my Standard  deck and tweaked it so that I could fit the Punishing Fire / Grove of the Burnwillows combo into it. Those two cards meant that I had to be in Time Spiral and Zendikar blocks, and Destructive Force forced me to stay in M11.

Actually I was thinking of building a deck for the "Burning Willows" combo for a long time but I wasn't happy with none of the previous "experiments" of mine. But this deck looked very nice to me and testing didn't prove otherwise. So I was ready for the battle.

 

ROUND 1 - Opponent: JustSin - Playing: Esper Control

JustSin was playing a very nice Esper Control deck that week that had cards like Vindicate, Absorb, Undermine from Invasion, the perfect mana base of Ravnica to cast those spells and Baneslayer Angel from M11 as a finisher. His deck was really nice but apparently mine was not the best match-up for him. Our meeting ended 2-0 to my favor and I'm sure JustSin would also agree that both games were a bit one sided.

Looking good.

 

ROUND 2 - Opponent: SupergrooveRock - Playing: Garga-Geddon (Cascade into Restore Balance)

SupergrooveRock was a new face to the BYOS scene and those new faces always scare me. Surely there is a chance that they come to these tournaments with their Standard Pauper decks hoping to win everything with it, but there is also a (much bigger) chance that they found the next broken thing while browsing their collection and now they want to test it. Unfortunately for me, the situation was the latter.

Long story short, I lost both games and have been crushed 0-2 in a short time. He suspended his Greater Gargadon, played tons of artifact mana and played only one or two "real" lands, played his cascade spell and cleared my side of the table with Restore Balance and killed me with his 9/7 monster.

 

ROUND 3 - Opponent: bluedragon123 - Playing: Sea Stompy

Bluedragon was playing his famous  Sea Stompy deck and that week I was also playing a  Control deck. Even though our colors were the same, our decks were absolutely very different and in no way this was a mirror match. His was an Aggro deck with some burn and counter back-up, and mine was a Control deck with some flashy win conditions. It was a very challenging match but bluedragon123's creatures suffered a lot from my never-ending Punishing Fires and at the end I managed to win 2-1.

And so I was in Top-8. I was very satisfied with the way the deck performed that far but my next opponent was Jiggywiggy with his Mirari's Wake deck, and to be honest I wasn't very optimistic against that deck.

 

TOP-8 - Opponent: Jiggywiggy - Playing: Classic Wake Control

Mirari's Wake is a very dangerous enchantment; especially when played in multiples. My misfortune was the fact that I never got to play one Destructive Force in both games and thus the loss was inevitable. Jiggywiggy destroyed me in both games with his huge Decree of Justices after generating tons of mana with Mirari's Wakes.

Well, that was the end of the road for me that week. Even though I didn't win, I was still satisfied with the result. There were still fifteen more weeks to go, and this Top-8 performance was a good start to the season for me.

Oh and what happened then? Who won?

Well, Jiggywiggy won this event with this deck:

 

A very powerful deck that doesn't need any explanation in my opinion.

Jiggywiggy's opponent in the final was JustSin. He lost the first round against me but didn't gave up and managed to go all the way to the final. Here's his Esper Control deck.

Esper Control - INV / RAV / M11
As played by JustSin
Creatures
4 Baneslayer Angel
4 Court Hussar
3 Meddling Mage
2 Skeletal Vampire
13 cards

Other Spells
4 Absorb
4 Undermine
4 Vindicate
4 Castigate
4 Remand
3 Pillory of the Sleepless
23 cards
 
Lands
4 Drowned Catacomb
4 Glacial Fortress
4 Godless Shrine
4 Hallowed Fountain
4 Watery Grave
2 Plains
2 Island
24 cards

Absorb

 

I personally wouldn't play Undermine at all and I would definately add four Day of Judgments instead of it. Undermine is a good spell if you're playing , but in a three color deck I would play Cancel over it because it's easier to cast.

I would also add two Routs to the sideboard because Elves and Goblins are common "visitors" of BYOS tournaments and they're almost impossible to get rid of without mass removal. But don't mind me; with this deck JustSin managed to go all the way to the final, so it must be good.

The final deck I want to show you from this event is this:

Garga-Geddon - TSP / ALA / M11
As played by SupergrooveRock
Creatures
4 Greater Gargadon
4 Riftwing Cloudskate
8 cards

Other Spells
4 Firewild Borderpost
4 Wildfield Borderpost
4 Fieldmist Borderpost
4 Ardent Plea
4 Oblivion Ring
4 Bant Charm
4 Violent Outburst
4 Foresee
4 Restore Balance
4 Search for Tomorrow
40 cards
 
Lands
4 Forest
3 Island
3 Mountain
2 Plains
12 cards

Restore Balance

 

I always tell you that you don't have to spend tons of money to be successful in BYOS. And this above deck is another proof of that. I mean look at it. How much does the whole deck cost? Two tickets? Five tickets? And this deck went all the way up to Top-4 and only lost to Jiggywiggy at the semi final. So yes, money isn't an issue in BYOS. But good ideas are.

And thus week one was over. A Top-8 performance was enough for me and it was time to switch to another deck.

 

SEASON THREE - WEEK TWO

For this week I prepared a deck I had in mind for a very long time. The main engine of this deck was going to be this card:

Goblin Trenches

And that meant that I was going to be in Invasion. Then I was going to use Crucible of Worlds to get my discarded lands back. And that meant either Mirrodin or Tenth Edition. I went over Mirrodin for options but found nothing. So it was going to be an Invasion - Something - Tenth Edition deck. But the question was this: What was that "Something" going to be?

As a matter of fact, I wanted to build this deck a long time ago during the very first weeks of Season Two. I tried many blocks (I tried TSP, LRW, ZEN, RAV), but couldn't find the best one. I knew I wanted this to be a  deck thus turning it into the known "Counter Trenches" deck, but I wasn't able to find the best second block for it. Normally Counter Trenches decks play cards from many different blocks and building it with just two main blocks and one core set was really a big challenge.

As I said, I tried this idea back in the early days of the last season but after some time I gave up the idea. But now I once again found myself looking at Goblin Trenches and Crucible of Worlds. Long story short, after intensely testing Ravnica's duals, Tempest's counterspells and Zendikar's Jace, the Mind Sculptor, I decided to use Lorwyn as my second main block. And thus, the deck looked like this:

 

Very nice, no?

This was an interesting week. There were some really good players in the tournament and all were playing really good decks. The moment I saw the player list, I knew that I had to be at my best in this tournament or I wouldn't even make to Top-4. And let's see what happened.

 

ROUND 1 - Opponent: KillerOwen - Playing: Cycling Combo

My first opponent of the tournament was KillerOwen. He is the leader of clan Yawgmoth and the man behind all of this BYOS action. He and bluedragon123 are running the show but you don't always see KillerOwen playing in BYOS tournaments. He is also an avid eternal formats player, a writer over at mtgoacademy.com and a very nice guy I like to chat with from time to time. So yes, I was playing against a tough opponent.

Owen started the game by cycling Urza's cards. I didn't understand what he was up to but I knew that he was up to something big. He Force of Will'ed a few of my spells and then played his Fluctuator and started cycling for free! At one point I thought he was going to deck himself but just before getting there, he played Songs of the Damned and killed me with a huge Consume Spirit.

So now I knew what his plan was and therefore I brought in my Meddling Mages and my two Negates. And as expected, those Meddling Mages shut him down completely and I won the next two games by playing patiently and slowly and carefully.

 

ROUND 2 - Opponent: DirtyDuck - Playing: Affinity

I don't remember what happened in this match but all I remember is that my opponent managed to get his important artifact spells through and managed to beat me 1-2.

 

ROUND 3 - Opponent: JustSin - Playing: Tooth and Nail

I played carefully against JustSin's Tooth and Nail deck and my counters were enough to repel his threats in both games. At the end, this was another satisfying 2-0 victory.

 

TOP-4 - Opponent: DirtyDuck - Playing: Affinity

I once again had to play against DirtyDuck and his Affinity deck. This time I played much more carefully and after two really long games, I managed to win 2-0 against him.

My nice(!) little green army.

 

FINAL - Opponent: ChristopherKool - Playing: Goblins

ChristopherKool (aka ChrisKool) is another writer over mtgoacademy.com and an avid 100 Card Singleton player. After playing against KillerOwen in the first round, now I was playing against another Mtgoacademy writer and this whole tournament felt like Puremtgo vs. Mtgoacademy to me!

Anyway, Chris was playing Goblins and I knew that this was going to be a hard match for me. Actually Goblins are a piece of cake once they lose steam. But the problem is you don't always "get there". Most of the time you just die before they lose steam. And exactly that happened in game one. Just when I was about to gain control of the board, Chris killed me with his Goblin horde.

For game two and three I was more prepared because I also had my Pyroclasms in those games. Absorb and Ajani Goldmane kept me alive, Pyroclasm and Wrath of God kept the board clear and ironically I won against his Goblin deck with my own Goblins!

Goblins for the win!

And so I won the event. It was definitely a hard win but an earned one nevertheless. I battled against some really good players playing excellent decks, and at the end I emerged victorious.

And here are a few good decks seen in this tournament:

Goblins - UZ / ZEN / M10
As played by ChristopherKool
Creatures
4 Goblin Lackey
4 Warren Instigator
4 Goblin Chieftain
4 Goblin Shortcutter
4 Goblin Matron
4 Goblin Guide
4 Siege-Gang Commander
3 Goblin Bushwhacker
31 cards

Other Spells
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Burst Lightning
6 cards
 
Lands
2 Ghitu Encampment
1 Teetering Peaks
20 Mountain
23 cards

Goblin Matron

 

This is the deck that Chris managed to take to the final. Very fast and deadly. Oh and by the way I was just about to die to his Ghitu Encampment in our third game. I managed to kill it after I topdecked a Fire/Ice. It was really close and I was really lucky.

The next deck I'm going to show you is this one:

 

Fliebana is having really good results with this deck and each week he perfects it and makes it even better. This week he reached to Top-4 with this deck and lost to ChristopherKool's Goblins. I would personally suggest a few Knight of the Reliquarys and Rhox War Monks here and there but even without them, this is a very good and deadly deck.

The final deck from this week is DirtyDuck's affinity.dec:

 

This is actually an interesting Affinity deck. It uses Stoneforge Mystic to assemble the Kaldra artifacts and I've witnessed firsthand that it really does happen. Also one other interesting thing is that the deck plays as a Blue Affinity deck with a splash to White in the first game but then you see Smothers and Cunning Sparkmages and Back to Natures flying all over the place in game two and three! So yes, it's a nice deck. 

Okay let's move forward and see what happened in week three.

 

SEASON THREE - WEEK THREE

I didn't play in this week's tournament. Actually I was going to play in it and my deck was also ready but due to the different day light savings between US and the rest of the world, I just couldn't. When I joined the /join BYOS chatroom, I saw that the tournament was already going on and that it was even round two. Ah well!

So the fine players of BYOS did battle that week without me and at the end these four decks below emerged victorious.

 

Apparently Jiggywiggy is a true lover of Odyssey block. In Season Two he played a Psychatog deck and this season his pet card seems to be Mirari's Wake. He made some major changes in his deck and Top-4'ed in this tournament with it. I see two scary Eldrazi in there which seem to have replaced his Decree of Justices. Red gives him Burning Wish and his Wake Control deck looks even more scarier than ever.

 

Just like Jiggywiggy, bluedragon123 also has his pet block which seems to be Champions of Kamigawa. After playing his Sea Stompy deck non-stop for two seasons, bluedragon123 decided to switch decks and played the one you see above. Result? A soft and fuzzy spot in Top-4.

Merfolk - CHK / LRW / 7th Ed.
As played by gamemaster32
Creatures
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Cursecatcher
4 Merrow Reejerey
4 Silvergill Adept
3 Stonybrook Banneret
3 Wake Thrasher
22 cards

Other Spells
4 Cryptic Command
4 Counterspell
3 Opposition
3 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Summon the School
15 cards
 
Lands
4 Wanderwine Hub
4 Mutavault
3 Adarkar Wastes
12 Island
23 cards

Lord of Atlantis

 

I always thought that without Aether Vial it's very hard to play the Merfolk; especially in BYOS. But apparently gamemaster32 doesn't think like me and he has his reasons. He took this above deck way up to the final and came second. To be honest after seeing this list, I am a bit surprised that his fish deck didn't win the event but you know what they say: There is always a bigger fish.

And here's that bigger fish:

Kiss My Vat - ZEN / SOM / M11
As played by mangiafuoco
Creatures
4 Skinrender
4 Gatekeeper of Malakir
4 Vampire Nighthawk
2 Wurmcoil Engine
2 Grave Titan
16 cards

Other Spells
4 Mimic Vat
4 Doom Blade
4 Consuming Vapors
4 Sign in Blood
3 Ratchet Bomb
19 cards
 
Lands
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Tectonic Edge
17 Swamp
25 cards

Sideboard
4 Liliana's Specter
4 Vampire Hexmage
4 Duress
3 Mind Rot
15 cards
 
Mimic Vat

 

Very simple, very straightforward and apparently very "unstoppable". This was the first week that Scars of Mirrodin was seen in BYOS tournaments and what a first showing this was! Mangiafuoco brewed a very nice midrange mono Black deck around Mimic Vat and no one, not even the dreaded Merfolk, could stop him.

And that was week three. I hope the boys had their fun without me because next week it was going to be once again "my turn".

 

SEASON THREE - WEEK FOUR

After a one week break, I was once again ready to rock and roll. For this week I had a very different deck ready. Actually there was nothing different about the deck itself nor it was slightly interesting, but the odd part was that I was playing it. I mean, you may expect anything from me but most definately not this one. Oh and what did I play?

I played a pure mono Red Aggro deck. A deck I called the "Koth Red". 

Koth Red - ZEN / SOM / M11
A BYOS Deck by Nafiz Erman
Creatures
4 Goblin Guide
4 Plated Geopede
4 Kargan Dragonlord
4 Ember Hauler
16 cards

Other Spells
4 Koth of the Hammer
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Staggershock
3 Chandra Nalaar
3 Burst Lightning
2 Arc Trail
19 cards
 
Lands
4 Scalding Tarn
4 Arid Mesa
2 Teetering Peaks
15 Mountain
25 cards

Koth of the Hammer

 

I say that I'm a Blue mage on every occasion (and I just said it again), and look what I played. Goblin Guides? Staggershocks? Me?! Well yes, apparently the Spike in me doesn't care about my favorite color or anything alike. All he cares is winning and that week I thought I could satisfy him with this above Koth Red deck.

The only thing I wasn't sure of was those four Leyline of Punishments. I had those four slots in my sideboard empty until the last minute. It was going to be either the Leyline or Nihil Spellbomb against graveyard manipulation. I joined the /join BYOS chat room and examined the players.

There first I saw Jiggywiggy. He was most probably playing his Mirari's Wake deck and that meant Moment's Peace. Which of course meant damage prevention and that was my first reason to play Leyline of Punishment. Then I saw fliebana and he was also playing his Bant deck since the first weeks. Which of course meant life gain. So I had two reasons to play Leyline of Punishment. I saw no reason to fear graveyard manipulation and started playing.

And here's what happened.

 

ROUND 1 - Opponent: bluedragon123 - Playing: Dredge

So much for guessing the correct sideboard card! The moment I saw his Magus of the Bazaar I said "Oh sh*t!" and realized that mine was the wrong decision. But of course I wasn't going to give up without a fight and started playing.

By the way bluedragon123 is the host of the event and apparently I have to play against him in every tournament. I don't know why this happens but in almost every tournament we play against each other. Sometimes in the final and sometimes, just like this week, in the first round.

Anyway, I won the first game by frying his precious discard creatures and simply by being too fast for him. Then in game two he was the one who was too fast. He ended the game on turn four and we moved onto the final game. In the final game I had a good starting hand and started with Goblin Guide and then Ember Hauler joined him as well. He filled his graveyard with scary things but just before he was about to "go off", I managed to deal the lethal damage and won.

Whew! That was close.

 

ROUND 2 - Opponent: porretas22 - Playing:  Discard n' Burn

Porretas22 is another new face in the BYOS scene and as I said somewhere above, I always fear new faces. Porretas22 was playing a discard deck that week and unfortunately for him (and of course fortunately for me!) I was simply too fast for him and won our first meeting in BYOS tournaments 2-0.

As a matter of fact, our both games were almost exactly the same: Goblin Guide turn one, Plated Geopede turn two, some fetchland action on turn three followed by an Ember Hauler (who then destroys the blocker upon entering the battlefield and clears the path for my gigantic Plated Geopede) and then Koth of the Hammer

Exactly the same things happened in both games but at least my opponent wasn't too unhappy with this loss as you can see above.

 

ROUND 3 - Opponent: DirtyDuck - Playing: Affinity

I played against DirtyDuck in previous weeks and I knew his Affinity deck well. My Red dudes were simply too fast for him and at the end I won the match 2-1.

 

TOP-4 - Opponent: BaneslayerChimneyImp - Playing: Poison

I was surely expecting to see some Poison decks in BYOS tournaments and here it was. Surprisingly it even managed to go up to the Top-4 but I was confident that I would win against it. I did indeed win at the end but no way it was easy. I even won one of those games just when I was at nine poison counters!

Epic win! I'm about to deal lethal damage but look at my poison counters.

Oh yes, that was close. Way too close.

 

FINAL - Opponent: Jiggywiggy - Playing: 4 Color Wake Control

Jiggywiggy was playing his beloved Mirari's Wake deck and I knew that I had to be extra fast against him. There was no way I could handle his Eldrazi titans and therefore I decided to hit hard and hit fast. And exactly that was what I did in both games.

The funny thing was that in the second game my Koth of the Hammer somehow managed to reach to his ultimate and yeah, it was "gg" right at that moment.

And so once again I won the event. I was simply too fast in this tournament and that speed of mine was the reason I was successful. I was fearing to play against some dedicated anti-Red sideboards but I didn't come against any. During my playtesting before the event, I intentionally tested against Circle of Protection: Red and Kor Firewalker, and while they were slowing me down (as expected), they weren't enough to shut me down completely (Ratchet Bomb and Molten-Tail Masticore say hi!). I didn't play against any of them in this tournament but I was ready to fight Red hate nevertheless.

Okay normally now I would show you the other decks from this tournament but you already saw Jiggywiggy's Wake Control deck and DirtyDuck's Affinity deck above. That leaves us only with BaneslayerChimneyImp's Poison deck. Which happens to be this:

Poison - ZEN / SOM / M10
As played by BaneslayerChimneyImp
Creatures
4 Ichorclaw Myr
4 Necropede
4 Plague Stinger
4 Blight Mamba
3 Cystbearer
19 cards

Other Spells
4 Doom Blade
4 Vines of Vastwood
4 Giant Growth
3 Contagion Clasp
2 Groundswell
17 cards
 
Lands
13 Forest
10 Swamp
23 cards

Sideboard
4 Naturalize
4 Pithing Needle
4 Disfigure
3 Duress
15 cards
 
Ichorclaw Myr

 

This is one card short from sixty cards but that's the list I got.

Surely there are tons of great other cards that would turn this deck into a much more dangerous one, but this Top-4 performance shows that Poison can really be scary even when it's on a budget.

 

WRAP UP

And that was all what happened during the first four weeks of Season Three. There are still twelve weeks to go and many things can change. I hope that one of those changes would be that we would start seeing YOU in BYOS tournaments.

Do you have an old pet deck? Do you ever wonder what would have happened if you combine two completely different blocks? Do you think you are a good deck builder? If your answers are yes (to at least one of those questions), then BYOS is definitely the place for you.

As for me, I am very satisfied with my start to the season. I played in three tournaments and won two of them and Top-8'ed in the other one.

Don't mind me, I'm just a placeholder. That should actually be your name writing there.

And the best thing is that I have still tons of deck ideas I want to play. Some are really good and some are not so good, but I will give them all a shot nevertheless.

 

NEXT WEEK ON ROGUE PLAY
Big Fish in a Small Pond

As a matter of fact next week's Rogue Play will be related to this week's article. Next week I will tell you why I like playing in PRE's so much. I chose long time ago to be the "Big Fish in a Small Pond". Which means instead of being no one in Dailies and other sanctioned events, I decided to be someone important in the "dark alleys" of Magic.

If you are an excellent Magic player with an unlimited amount of time, then I will have nothing interesting for you next week. If you, however, are at least above average at playing this game and have a limited time, then you may find next week's article interesting and even useful.

Oh and a note: Part two of this week's article will come in one month. In that article I will tell you what happened between week five and eight.

Thanks for reading.

See you online
Nafiz Erman, aka Lord Erman

13 Comments

Fun looking decks, grats on by Paul Leicht at Tue, 11/16/2010 - 03:40
Paul Leicht's picture
5

Fun looking decks, grats on another win. :)

RE: Next--> what if you're a mediocre player with unlimited time?

Well, if the mediocre player by Lord Erman at Tue, 11/16/2010 - 05:19
Lord Erman's picture

Well, if the mediocre player with unlimited time is a Spike, then by all means should he use that time to perfect his game. If he's a Timmy or Johnny, he should enjoy his big spells and fun combos as much as he can.

Considering the amount of cards available, I don't think playing for fun can get boring. I mean, there's always the next fun idea to test.

LE

This latter point is by AJ_Impy at Tue, 11/16/2010 - 05:26
AJ_Impy's picture

This latter point is absolutely true.

If you are an excellent Magic by Paul Leicht at Tue, 11/16/2010 - 06:05
Paul Leicht's picture

If you are an excellent Magic player with an unlimited amount of time, then I will have nothing interesting for you next week. <--this is what I was replying to. :)

Hi LE by fliebana at Tue, 11/16/2010 - 06:38
fliebana's picture

Thx for your nice words & the advice. :)

See you in the battlefield. I think we haven't played each other this season yet.

Greetings. Fliebana

To be honest, I'm watching by Lord Erman at Tue, 11/16/2010 - 07:01
Lord Erman's picture

To be honest, I'm watching you and your deck's progress since the beginning of the season. This past weekend (week 5) I was so sure that you were going to win but I saw that it didn't happen. Ah well, there's always next week.

LE

I had a bad matchup by fliebana at Tue, 11/16/2010 - 07:08
fliebana's picture

Ranth's deck was too fast for mine. Also I think I didn't draw any dojs & that was the nail in the coffin.

As you say, there's always next week.

See you online.

Your articles/coverage always by MMogg at Tue, 11/16/2010 - 08:20
MMogg's picture
5

Your articles/coverage always makes me want to try playing the format. I'm always finding myself caught up in your enthusiasm. =) So many formats, so little time. =(

Love the look of that Cascade --> Restore Balance deck. Looks like fun.

I always like the look of by StealthBadger at Tue, 11/16/2010 - 09:40
StealthBadger's picture

I always like the look of this event, but it's not at a convenient time for me. To be honest, I'd probably use it as an excuse to build and play old standard decks, rather than build something new (just because of time constraints). I would dearly love to play U/R tron again though...

thx for the comments, I built by JustSin at Tue, 11/16/2010 - 10:06
JustSin's picture
5

thx for the comments, I built that control deck with the entire purpose of running 4x undermine and 4x absorb, just seemed like fun and honestly with all those dual lands I never ran into color issues, but yes I will agree it was a horrific rd 1 match, I was surprised after that start the deck took me so far, it was one of my fav decks so far and I'd def rework some of it, the pillory main deck seemed to be weak, I sided it out most games

and my tooth deck also did horrible, which was quite unfortunate, like you said vs. you I didn't get any spell off, quite frustrating

though I am surprised that there was a week where we didn't end up playing each other lol, didn't miss much I think that was the week I ran RG madness aggro and it failed miserably

oddly I've been putting together an article where I was going to cover each deck I played for BYOS, though seems you beat me to it by breaking it into parts lol its also become harder to run a different deck each week on no money lol

@StealthBadger: I was actually having this convo with JiggyWiggy the other day, it seems in a majority of games the decks that were not former std decks perform better then those from stds past, example would be I tried playing TarmoBlink in last season's finals and got owned hard by everything I played against

MMogg I understand you by Lord Erman at Tue, 11/16/2010 - 10:44
Lord Erman's picture

MMogg I understand you completely. There are also a few other formats I would love to try but as you say; so many things to do and yet so little time :(.

U/R Tron is such a good deck and I want to play it sometime too. But my version would be "Some Unknown Block (most probably TSP or TE (because of buyback obviously)) / ZEN (*cough*bigjace*cough*) / 9th Ed.".

JustSin I think you're doing great so far in season three. Just remember; all we do is to gather points so that we get an invite to the big season finale. Finishing the season on top of everyone is surely a big achievement but all that matters is that final tournament. Just look at what Flippers did in season one. He barely got the invite but then came and won the title!

So gather as many points as you can during the season, get your invite and then be at your best in the season finale tournament.

LE

oh I know it's all pride and by JustSin at Tue, 11/16/2010 - 21:12
JustSin's picture

oh I know it's all pride and no one will outscore blue just off the fact he makes it to every event :P

if i was more creative id offer a suggestion to blue on how to change things because everyone basically makes it to the final by playing like 2 weeks a season, seems there should be more to it, but i dunno what and im not criticizing at all cuz I love the format

Our-Lord-Erman, pretty evil by Xaoslegend at Tue, 11/16/2010 - 16:29
Xaoslegend's picture
5

Our-Lord-Erman,

pretty evil format, I really like these alternative formats that challenge you to think in new ways about magic, it's only too bad that we don't have some of the broken sets before INV to balance out the power creep that seems to have occurred since then in certain ways.

Pretty cool to see infect do so well with only one set of it out so far.

Really well done article in general as always, shows me how far I have to go from my skill at it so far.

X-