Here it is folks, my first steps back into the world of real life Magic: the Gathering.
I'd dropped by the venue (Magic Comics & Hobbies) on Thursday (11/3) to buy the cards for my deck and to see if anyone was around who could offer words of encouragement or advice. I was lucky enough to run into the fella who organizes the card games at the shop as well as the owner. They were both extremely helpful and even suggested essentially what I had planned to do from the beginning: Buy an event deck and upgrade it along the way.
I had Friday off from work (I typically work Sunday - Thursday) and slept late. After eating dinner with my wife Noelle I was lucky enough to stumble onto a set of sleeves left over from my Lord of the Rings TCG years. I had a set of nice, green Dragonshields to protect my brand new deck! Sleeving up the cards brought me right back to the hours I used to spend test drawing in front of the TV. I probably drove Noelle right up to the edge of insanity with my constant shuffling as we watched 30 Rock. I'm just thankful she didn't feed my deck to the guinea pigs.
I left home around 6:30 PM and headed over to the shop, the posted start time was 7:00 PM and I still wanted to try and track down a few more cards before it was too late. Magic Comics is about 5 minutes from home so I got there in plenty of time and was able to pick up a 4th Champion of the Parish but didn't have any luck getting Mirran Crusaders #3 and 4. Still, I felt pretty good about my deck and was just excited to get to play Magic in person for the first time in several years.
A couple of the local folks were really nice from the get-go and offered to play some warm-up games with me to shake off the cobwebs. I managed to beat a Blue/Black Infect deck 2 games to 1 and stomped all over another Blue/Black deck, this one a lot more controlling, 3 or 4 games in a row. I was pretty surprised to be winning like that but chalked it up to these guys not being prepared for my speedy little deck.
The event started just a little late, par for the course when it comes to local events in my experience, and I fought to keep the tummy butterflies under control as the pairings were announced. Magic Comics has a nice, big Flatscreen TV set up on the wall where they show the tournament software. It gives everyone a place to look for the time left to play and it made me feel like the owner really wants players to feel special. It's also got to make things a lot easier on tournament directors!
Round 1 - Josh
Josh was really friendly, he had a Black deck full of scary Vampires, Zombies and other nasty stuff. He was also playing a splash of Green out of the sideboard to shore up some of Black's weaknesses. Josh told me that he had just started playing fairly recently and we talked for a while about how he got started.
Good Stuff - My deck ran very smoothly against Josh and I managed to beat him in 2 games.
Bad Stuff - Mirran Crusader with 2 Bonds of Faith killed him in once shot, before he could get his Bloodline Keeper active. That's a scary vampire and I don't know how I would have handled it if Mirran Crusader hadn't been waiting on top of my deck.
What I Learned - Bonds of Faith makes a decent ghetto version of equipment when you know your opponent can't target Mirran Crusader!
Josh and I played a couple more games after the round, we were done in about 10 minutes, and it was fun to see more of what his deck was capable of. Josh had a great attitude about playing Magic, he wasn't there strictly to win but to have a good time playing, and I hope I can learn from him and stay positive once the losses begin.
Round 2 - Aaron
Aaron was also extremely nice to me, someone he'd never seen before, and even sold me a Mirran Crusader after our match for a great price. Aaron ran a neat Blue & Red deck full of instants and small, hard to block guys with Curse of Stalked Prey to make his small guys bigger and bigger. He also ran Runechanter's Pike as an additional way to juice up his Invisible Stalker.
Good Stuff - I won in 2 games as my deck gave me creature after creature to outlast his removal spells.
Bad Stuff In one game we both drew about 8 straight lands to the point where each turn we would just flip our draw onto the table. I got through my stack of lands first and a Mirran Crusader went all the way. It's no fun to win just because your opponent didn't get to play their cards and that's what happened in 50% of our match.
What I Learned - My deck probably had too much land in it. When all of your spells cost 3 or less you don't need 10 lands in play.
Aaron was nice enough to show my how his deck was supposed to work after the match and we wished each other luck for the rest of the night.
Round 3 - Mike
Mike was once of folks who played a few games with me before the tournament so we both knew what to expect going into the match. We talked easily and comfortably throughout the whole match and, even though things were close at times, I never felt anything more than a healthy competitiveness between us. Mike's deck was a Black/Blue control deck with no creatures and piles of removal spells.
Good Stuff - I won the match 2-1, mostly on the back of Mirran Crusader who was immune to almost all of Mike's removal spells. Game 1 saw my little guys dying left and right until Mike ran out of removal and counterspells.
Bad Stuff - Game 2 saw Mike win with back-to-back Sorin's Vengeance after a top-decked Life's Finale offed my Mirran Crusader and took the last one out of my deck. This was obviously very bad for me but it's the kind of thing that makes me happy to see.
What I Learned - I am very unlikely to win any games that go on past turn 7 or 8, especially against opponents who play big, nasty spells like Mike did.
Mike and I kept up with each other for the rest of the tournament and I was grateful to have someone to look for after each round. He ended up placing in the top 8 and getting some pretty decent stuff out of his prize packs.
Round 4 - Connor
Connor had a Green/White deck that was very similar to Martin Juza's recent 1st place list at Pro Tour Hiroshima. His deck was the most focused one I'd seen all night and he'd definitely spent a lot of time putting it together right. Connor continued the streak of smiling, friendly opponents and he clearly knew what he was doing.
Good Stuff - I won the match 2-1 thanks to Gideon's Lawkeeper and his ability to keep Connor's Hero of Bladehold from spewing out tokens at will. The Flying Spirit Token left behind by a dying Doomed Traveler was instrumental in flying over his army of tokens to get the last points in.
Bad Stuff - I kept a 1 land hand in game 2 and was quickly run over by a turn 3 Hero of Bladehold while Oblivion Rings and Fiend Hunters cried from my hand. Connor's sideboarded Naturalizes killed by Honor of the Pure every time I drew one.
What I Learned - There are some very complex choices to be made in games like this. Both players had 7 or more creatures on the board at different times and the number of different attacks or blocks that were possible made my head spin. I think I made the right choices this time but it could have gone either way.
Connor seemed a little upset after the match but he kept a good attitude and wished me luck. I complimented him on his deck and told him that, if I had the money, I'd probably be running the same thing. At this point I was feeling pretty good at 4 wins and, frankly, I couldn't believe it.
Round 5 - Matthew
Matthew made my first Friday Night Magic experience 5 for 5 on nice opponents and we talked between games about getting back in to Magic and what things were like around the shop. He said he and some buddies had gotten back into the game back in July after being away for a while, a very similar to story to mine, and it made me smile to realize I wasn't the only "old newbie".
Good Stuff - I got Matthew down to a very low life total in both games we played, unfortunately...
Bad Stuff - I had no answer to his Phyrexian Crusader with a Lashwrithe that was able to kill me in one swing enough poison to end it in both games. Matthew was smart enough not to play the Lashwrithe before he had the kill and my Oblivion Rings and sideboarded Relic Warders were useless.
What I Learned - Some answer to a Phyrexian Crusader in play is definitely needed. Now I am seeing what the benefits would be if I play Green for Beast Within or Blue for Mana Leak .
Matthew ended up winning the tournament with 4 wins, 0 losses, 1 Bye. He invited me to come back next week for a Grand Prix Trial (I will definitely be there!) and was really impressed with the Event Deck doing so well with so few changes from the stock list.
In the end I placed 3rd out of over 20 people, certainly a lot better than expected to do. Magic Comics gave out quite a lot of store credit as well as some very nice alternate art foil promo cards to the top 8 players. I got $25 which I poured back into a different Event Deck to play around with. I don't expect to be playing anything different for a while but it's always nice to have some options!
I had an absolute blast at the Friday Night Magic tournament and I'm already looking forward to playing at next week's FNM as well as the Grand Prix Trial. I've got some tweaks to make to my deck and some more compulsive shuffling to annoy my wife so I'll be signing off for now.
As always you can send questions, comments or hate mail to me on twitter @rexplode or feel free to post here. Please spread the word if you like what you see, the more folks who see this the more excited I'll get about doing it!
No comments:
Post a Comment