Tuesday, April 16, 2013

Brain Status: Power Conservation Mode

So the plan was to get some practice in with my Esper Control deck for the SCG Open in Milwaukee this last weekend. Then after last Tuesday didn't go so well, I figured I'd just stay home and do something more fun than get my butt kicked at Magic. Then a local Magic-friend messaged me to try to talk me into going. So I figured, why not. I'll go, play some Magic, maybe win some, maybe lose some, no expectations, no big whoop. I talked to the Level 2 Judge I've been working with at FNM the night before, and he suggested that if I "scrub out," I could just drop and take my L1 test at the event. Okay!

It was pretty cool, too, Mike at Mox Mania gave a bunch of us t-shirts, with the promise of store credit if we appeared on camera. Free t-shirts for us, free advertising for him. Well, t-shirts cost money .. but .. yeah. But it was good advertising for him--lots of Madison players showed up in Mox Mania t-shirts, and lots of us got questions about it. I hear one guy even made top 8 at one of the events, so it was right there on SCG's website. Cool! Spoiler alert .. the guy wasn't me. :)

Anyway, the deck I played was pretty similar to that listed previously. Very heavy on the spells, with a full playset of Augurs to find them. Primary win condition is mill, via Drownyards and/or Jace.

Here's a brief rundown of how it went:

Round 1: vs. Orzhov Midrange.
Interesting guy. Very chatty and friendly. But each play he made was very dramatic and serious and pointed. He complimented my "tight play," which resulted in us going to time. I had my first of many brain farts of the day as I thought it was game two when it was in fact game three. So I just slow-rolled the last couple minutes and the extra turns. Had I tried to actually win, though, honestly, I don't think I would have gotten there anyway. Oh yeah. I did make a key mistake ... I played my third land (Watery Grave) tapped, and my opponent subsequently resolved Liliana of the Veil on me. I managed to play through it and mount a comeback, but ... yeah. Time. Draw, 1-1-1. Record: 0-0-1.

Round 2: vs. Selesnya Aggro.
This guy was really quiet and kinda pokey with his play. His deck was kinda mediocre, with stuff like Judge's Familiar and Fencing Ace (without much of anything other than Rancor to boost him). I was able to keep his stuff under control pretty easily with spot removal and sweepers. One game I actually finished him off with damage. The other memorable thing about this match: being at The Draw Table. Seatings were sorted by Swiss ranking, so everyone in the draw bracket played next to each other. And guess what I saw at every other match at the table: other Esper Control decks. :) Win, 2-0. Record: 1-0-1.

Round 3: vs. Junk Rites.
This guy looked familiar, but I don't remember where I played him previously. Maybe it was at a PTQ or a prerelease? Well, he was playing what looked like a pretty stock Junk Rites list, but he seemed to be somewhat inexperienced with it. He didn't quite understand the rules about what happens with I kill Angel of Serenity in response to her enter-the-battlefield trigger. He called a judge, who explained how the triggers stack, and how the second ability ends up happening first. He assumed that it meant that his creatures were exiled forever. Of course, being a competitive tournament, I didn't want to tell him about the "may" thing (when the ability resolves, you can choose not to use the ability). I was happy to see his Thragtusks and Craterhoofs gone forever. After the match, I explained the whole thing while we were gathering our things. He seemed a little confused about it, and he stopped me in the hallway later after a different match to have me explain it again. Hopefully I helped him not have that happen to him again ... Anyway, I won the match, but I don't remember for sure if it was 2-1 or 2-0. My plan worked very well: kill everything ASAP, draw a million cards, mill, rinse, repeat. Win, 2-0 (or 2-1). Record: 2-0-1.

Round 4: vs. Junk Rites. This was over pretty fast. He knew his deck pretty well, and I got stomped. I don't remember much about the match other than that. Loss, 0-2. Record: 2-1-1.

Round 5: vs. Jund Midrange.
Again, I was on the Jerk plan, just try to stop anything he did, draw a million cards, mill him, etc. Unfortunately for him, again, he seemed like maybe he was kinda new to the deck. He seemed to play into all of my tricks, and I was able to card-advantage him to death and mill pretty easily. He miracle'd about 4 or 5 Bonfires over the course of the match, and most of the time it either didn't matter, or I had counters. Win, 2-0 (or 2-1). Record: 3-1-1.

So my record is pretty good at this point, but it's also one of those things where the matches I won were against players and/or decks that weren't great. Kinda the story of my competitive playing career, really. I do fine against newer players or against not-great decks, but lose to good players playing decks. But, I'm still in it, so let's see how it goes.

Round 6: vs. Junk Rites.
Again. And this player was one of the good ones. It was another stomping. I had weird draws and may or may not have misplayed. Honestly, I don't really remember. My brain was starting to get tired. I violated one of the cardinal rules of Magic tournaments: take care of yourself. I didn't have any real food on me, and my brain started fogging up. Loss, 0-2. Record: 3-2-1.

Round 7: vs. Jund.
Water is really important. Everything I read says that it's really good to stay hydrated. Not just for the body, but for mental health. Long-term and short-term. I drank some before and/or after every round, but it probably wasn't enough. I don't remember how this match went other than that I lost. I remember Rakdos's Return, and that's about it. Loss, 0-2 (or 1-2). Record: 3-3-1.

So I'm definitely not gonna make top 8, but if I win out, I might be able to cash this thing. Unfortunately, my brain was just about done for the day. I felt my CPU go into power-saving mode. Which isn't really good when playing a Control deck.

Round 8: vs. Prime Speaker Bant.
Maybe with Wolf Run? I forget. Well, this was actually a pretty good match. Lots of back & forth. Well, at least the first two games were. Third game, he resolved Jace, Memory Adept on turn 4 or 5, and I had no answer. Three turns later it was all over. Loss, 1-2. Record: 3-4-1.

So my traveling buddy find me, and was also experiencing several tough losses in a row. We decided to call it a night, save the remainder of our mental capabilities, and head home.

By the time I got back to Madison to meet up with my girlfriend and her boss (they had been working that day, doing a big office move), I felt like a walking vegetable. Fortunately, my girlfriend had some leftover pasta, which I promptly devoured very vigorously. But unfortunately, I wasn't in the best frame of mind to make a great first impression on her boss. Thankfully, he seemed to be pretty easy-going, so I don't think I was judged too harshly. The following day, I woke up with a massive headache that took all day to get rid of. I blame dehydration. And a lapse in my high-blood pressure medication.

Since I ended up playing most of the day Saturday, and because the judge staff was pretty busy anyway, I didn't end up testing at the event. It's for the best anyway .. I wasn't in any condition to take a judge test after that 6th or 7th match anyway. But I'll probably do it this Friday. Gotta study up and make sure I have the basics down for the thing.

Oh yeah, so I got to play my red/green "Judge Duty Aggro" deck at FNM while I was .. well .. on Judge Duty. And I went 3-1 with it. It was pretty cool. I just dump my hand and hope for the best. My only loss was against a Wolf Run Bant kinda deck that landed two Rhoxen against me. I probably should have just scooped, but I wanted to see how it played out. One round I got to play against the Werewolves deck that my Esper deck lost to a couple weeks ago, and I won pretty easily. It was weird .. the red/green deck did a better job at being a control deck than Esper did. I even had a planeswalker to provide me with card advantage (Domri Rade). Wacky.

Cool. Well, thanks for reading!

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