It's time for another adventure in the land of nerds and Magical Cards!
After playing Mono Black and having a pretty miserable time on Wednesday I wanted to play something else. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that I gave up on Mono Black hastily but it's hard to get past a set of bad feelings. Those bad feelings can lead to you giving up on games before they're lost and even throwing away ones that are way ahead in.
I was waffling back and forth, trying to land on something interesting, when I saw a set of videos that Sam Black posted on Starcitygames.com with the Mono Blue deck. I love Sam's style of recording and will watch him play essentially any deck because I always find I learn a lot. This is how I came to play Mono Blue on Friday.
I liked the game plan against Mono Black which was to sideboard up to 4 Bidents along with just a couple of cheap counterspells like DIspel and Negate to get your creatures to whack them a few times. I also liked that Esper, Mono Blue's worst matchup, would likely be pushed out of the winning bracket by the heavy presence of Mono Black.
Here is the list I played, lifted directly from Sam's article:
4 Judge's Familiar
4 Cloudfin Raptor
4 Tidebinder Mage
4 Frostburn Weird
4 Nightveil Specter
4 Thass
4 Master of Waves
3 Bident
1 Jace, Archie
1 Rapid Hybridization
2 Cyclonic Rift
20 Island
4 Mutavault
1 Nykthos
Sideboard
2 Rapid Hybridization
1 Cyclonic Rift
2 Jace, Archie
2 Jace, Millhouse
1 Dissolve
1 Negate
1 Dispel
3 Gainsay
1 Bident
1 Nykthos
Overall I was pretty happy with the list. I think the maindeck is exactly where you want to be but I question the 2 Millhouse and the Nykthos in the sideboard. While I was all on board the Jace plan against Esper at States this year I didn't find it was actually all that good. I want to try Aetherling in that spot. The Nykthos seems like a strange choice to me and I want to replace it with perhaps a Domestication in case the mirror happens to crop up in the future.
I got out of the house pretty early (for a day I didn't work) and went to lunch and a movie some of the Magical People. Starting off the weekend with a delicious steak and 1.5 hours of Johnny Knoxville abusing a child is definitely my idea of a good time.
After the credits finished rolling we headed over to the shop where I spent the better part of an hour digging for cards out of the massive and slightly unorganized boxes of non-rares that the shop has stacked up. I found most of what I needed and finished slapping together a brand new Commander deck which will be the subject of my next post, Gods Willing.
I got to play 3 different 4 player Commander games that were largely enjoyable. That's saying a lot since one of them involved Achille Fink killing the whole table on his turn 7 and another involved a massive Debt to the Deathless that Kyle Colosino used to murder 2 players in one go. Commander is such a strange and wonderful format.
Eventually the time came and up went the pairings.
Round 1 - Jack w/ Mono Black
It was a rematch against the evil bastard that sent me on my downward spiral at WNM. I told Jack it was time for me to get some payback and we both laughed. I felt pretty good going into the match, after all I chose my deck specifically to be strong against the deck he was running.
Game 1 - I kept 5 lands, Cloudfin, Master of Waves on the play. I was close to mulliganing but decided that I would keep the same hand at 6. I'm still not sure what was right. After being Thoughtseized out of my Master and missing a 2 drop I died relatively quickly.
Game 2 - I curved out smoothly topping out of Bident. Jack kept killing my dudes but Bident kept the sweet candy coming and I won pretty decisively.
Game 3 - I had another pretty decent curve of guys into Bident but where I drew a good mix of lands and spells in Game 2, Bident kept on feeding me Islands. I think I drew 6 or 7 extra cards this game and all of them were basic Islands. Eventually I ran out of dudes and died to Desecration Demon and Pack Rat.
Round 2 - The Bye.
Usually I'd make a joke here about how badly I defeated my opponent but I was pretty irritated to lose round 1 and immediately get the Bye. A Round 2 Bye is basically the worst possible way to get a win, it all but eliminates you from any chance at prizes in such a short (4 rounds) tournament, and it kills your spirit by keeping your momentum from building back up from a loss.
I wandered around, toyed with the idea of going home early and eventually settled into some trading which lifted my spirits considerably.
Round 3 - Ryan w/ BWR Midrangey
Ryan is just about the worst possible person you can imagine. Think of a bowl of poop mixed together with broken glass. Now turn it into a person. I would rather hang out with that than Ryan. He's one of my best friends!
Game 1 - I mulliganed to 4 on the draw and kept a hand with zero lands. I was able to cast a Judge's Familiar and Rapid Hybridization on a Boros Reckoner before I died to mutliple large things.
Game 2 - I kept 7 cards this game, 3 of which were Judge's Familiar. I was able to just barely kill Ryan through a wacky combination of bad creatures before he could effectively cast Anger of the Gods through my Daze Birds. This game was sweet.
Game 3 - Ryan stalled on 2 lands while I curved out pretty smoothly. Judge's Familiar was again pretty awesome for me soaking up a removal spell that let my Nightveil Specter continue to chomp lands from Ryan's library.
Ryan was a pretty good sport about it, especially considering he's History's Greatest Living Monster.
Round 4 - Nick w/ Esper Control
When I heard I was battling Nick this round I felt pretty down. You see everyone in the room knew what Nick was playing because the poor bastard had gotten 2 unintentional draws playing my worst possible matchup. I tried not to give up before the match started but I honestly didn't have much hope.
Game 1 - I had a reasonable draw with a Bident that started on 1 and I played very conservatively, attacking for a while with a 1/2 Raptor, a Familiar and a Mutavault when the coast was clear. Bident drew me some cards and eventually Nick played first 1 then 2 Supreme Verdicts. Nightveil Specter came down and found me a couple of Swampy lands that would eventually be important as well as a Hero's Downfall. When Nick jammed Aetherling I was a bit worried but thankfully I drew a Rapid Hybridization that worked together with the Downfall to murder the shapeshifter just in time.
I struggled with my sideboard since I wanted to bring in the 2 Jace, Millhouse along with all of the counterspells but couldn't quite figure out what to remove. In the end I settled on leaving them in the sideboard and relying on my creatures to finish the job.
Game 2 - This game hinged on my correct use of counterspells and not overextending into a sweeper. I jammed a Tidebinder Mage and held up mana for 4 turns in a row without playing anything. Eventually Nick had to do something and I got to counter a Revelation. The next turn I was again able to counter a Revelation, this time I had to choice of using a Gainsay or a Negate and I struggled with which one was correct. I used the Gainsay but I could see Negate being correct as Negate cannot counter Aetherling. Nick answered my question for me on the next turn when he Thoughtseized me...something I was able to Negate to save my Bident. I was able to attack for small amounts of damage over many turns and eventually Nick threw in the towel.
Nick seemed extremely frustrated by our games and I was just stunned to have beaten Esper 2-0 with Mono Blue.
As I predicted I finished in 8th place as the lowest of 3-1 players earning myself a promo Phalanx Leader. While I didn't get any store credit I did battle through a very tough matchup and largely redeem the Mono Blue deck in my own eyes. I had essentially written it off after it's performance against Supreme Verdict at States but it turns out my sideboard plan was just all wrong.
This Wednesday Night Magic we get to play Modern Format!
Modern is my second favorite way to play Magic, beaten out only by Commander, and I'm pretty excited to Birth Some Pods, Splinter Some Twins and Tarmo some Goyfs. I'm not 100% sure what I'll be playing this week since there are 2 whole days between now and then but I can't wait to shuffle up and battle Modern style!
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