Grand Times at Grand Prix Columbus

This weekend was amaaaaaaaaazing.

Seriously, I went 3-3 in the Grand Prix and had a total blast despite that.

The excitement really started for me on Thursday night when Nam Q. Tran asked me about my UWB Vial Fish deck from the last Meandeck Open. He’d had trouble deciding on a deck and decided to use mine. We talked about the deck for a while and came to a consensus on this build maindeck. At least, I think we agreed the same list. Here's mine anyway.

4x Aether Vial
4x Force of Will
4x Brainstorm
3x Daze
3x Stifle
3x Cabal Therapy
3x Swords to Plowshares

4x Dark Confidant
4x Serendib Efreet
4x Mother of Runes
3x Jotun Grunt
3x Mother of Runes

4x Polluted Delta
3x Flooded Strand
4x Underground Sea
3x Tundra
2x Island
1x Swamp
1x Plains

My biggest beef with the previous list is that I really still hate Daze. It always seems weak early-game, and then it just gets weaker. I wanted to replace the four Dazes from the Meandeck Open with Stifles straight-up because I had a feeling that Stifle was just as good against Flash and because I felt Stifle was good against the Legacy manabase of huge numbers of fetchlands. Nam agreed with my reasoning, but neither of us could be convinced to drop Daze, so we went with the wimpy and slightly weaker choice of three and three.

To make room for those Stifles (or Dazes, depending on your point of view), we ended up cutting the three Duresses. That also made room for a third Cabal Therapy, which I also felt was good against the format because it can hit creatures as well as spells.

Everything else is pretty standard UWB Fish choices except for Aether Vial (which was there because it could get Mages and Confidants in past counters and because it doubled the threats I can play per turn against other creature decks) and Serendib Efreet (which was there because I own them and because they made me less susceptible to Lightning Bolt and Engineered Explosives).

So that was it. With my maindeck thus decided, I went to bed Thursday night.

Friday was really long. Work was really boring as the afternoon consisted of me formatting text in a list of real-estate agents in the Dayton area. There are a lot of real-estate agents in the Dayton area. A lot. Sixty-two pages in three columns and probably fourteen or fifteen agents per column, all with contact information.

Finally that was done and I got to wait in high anticipation for the Cleveland gamers to get to my house. I watched some TV and did some reading, but it wasn’t until after Nam, Brad, Jeff (Ed, Brain, Eddie Brain, Edward P. Brain Jr., whatever), and Juan knocked on my door (bearing ribs!) that I picked up cards and made the changes that Nam and I talked about and put together a sideboard.

Perhaps that was a mistake.

I’ve played more Magic in the past month and a half than I have ever before. I still love the game, but lately, until I start playing the game, I don’t want to put as much time into it as I should or usually do. Maybe it’s affected my performances. I dunno.

Anyway, here’s the sideboard I cobbled together to go with the list above:

4x Engineered Plague
3x Samurai of the Pale Curtain
3x Umezawa’s Jitte
3x Kataki, War’s Wage
2x Dimir Cutpurse

Nam chose different sideboard cards than I. In place of the two Cutpurse, he had the fourth Swords to Plowshares and the fourth Stifle. That probably worked too, especially considering that he would finish higher than I. Dimir Cutpurses were good enough for me that I actually feel now that I want two or three maindeck.

Everything else was fine, though I wish in retrospect that I had played Silver Knight over Katai since I saw far more red cards than artifacts. A different tournament lineup could have changed that sentiment, though.

The biggest development of the night was getting Jeff to audible from the Belcher list he was going to play into the all-but-confirmed best deck in the format, Hulk Flash. Testing wasn’t feeling right, so the call wasn’t too hard for anyone to make. Even Brad woke himself up from a half-sleep on the floor of my apartment to say to Jeff, “You’re playing Belcher and not Flash? Play Flash!”

After that it was just a few more games of playtesting and then a few hours of sleep.

The morning was busy, but unhurried. We got our decks together, piled into my car, had a fantastic breakfast at Bob Evans and headed downtown to the Arena District.

Right into the middle of a cancer walk.

Luckily, parking is plentiful near the Columbus Convention Center, and I think we actually arrived late enough to not run into most of the traffic and crowd. We unloaded the car and ambled on in. It was the longest walk through the most boring, hugest hallway I’ve ever been through.

The hall was packed. Near 900 gamers were spread out all over, laying out cards, registering, shuffling, playing, drafting, trading, eating, chatting. It was huge! Easily twice as big as I expected. We found our various groups of friends—Trogdon and Yang, Twaun, Matt Hazard, Eric and Ben from Sandusky—and fit ourselves nito the gamer actions listed above.

After a half hour or so, we got seating assignments. Flash seemed to be the topic of choice around me, though everyone wanted to know where everyone else came from and what they were expecting and hoping for from the tournament. I was seated across from a guy from Pennsylvania who got into Ohio at around 3 the previous morning and crashed in his car. On either side of me were guys from Indiana and Wisconsin who hadn’t slept in more than 18 hours.

Pre-tournament excitement was everywhere.

Then they told us that we were being repaired thanks to some problems computing byes. I was sent to table fourteen, the highest position I would hold that day.

Round 1 – Jared – Boros with Suppression Field

Jared was just the beginning of a series of friendly opponents. After the match, he and I talked a little about his deck and the format in general Boros always seems so good when I play against it, and I said that he could have a really good day. I hadn’t even considered that Suppression Field helps stop Hulk Flash if they’re using the Kiki-Jiki combo.

In game one, I played a land and past, while he played a first turn Savannah Lions off of a shockland. I played Bob, which kept me drawing into mana and threats despite his Wastelands. He attacked with the kitties and a True Believer, but I drew three out of four Serendibs and the race was on. With me on four life and him at eight going into my last turn, I Stifled two Efreet Upkeeps to stay out of burn range and hold up Force of Will for any tricks. It was close, but the Efreets knocked him down.

I sided in Samurai because they attack and block bigger than all of the creatures I saw from him, and I brought in Jittes as well because I am an idiot. I found and played a Jitte in the second game only to get the opportunity to point from that to the dual Suppression Fields he’d brought in against me and say, “Combo!” I never did find the sixth land to equip, but luckily I wasn’t hampered by fetchlands either.

Game two was close as well, but Serendib was again a big player for me in the endgame. Mother of Runes took a Lightning Bolt before becoming active, and I set out a Mage chanting Lightning Helix (only to find out after the game that he wasn’t running them, believing them too slow). The next turn I cooked up an Engineered Plague on Knights (since 1/1 first striking Silver Knights are not as scary as 2/2s, and because he could have been playing Goblin Legionnaires). He played out two True Believers, but we stalled on the ground as I played another Mage. Efreet broke the stall and killed him despite a desperate attempt on his part to get through for 10 damage with Reckless Charge on his True Believers.

Not a bad way to start the day. You could say I got lucky by seeing so many Serendib Efreets, but there’s a reason I play four of them. They’re really big and cheap!

Matches – 1-0-0
Games – 2-0-0

Round 2 – Allen – RGB Zoo

This matchup was a total beating. He asked what I played first round so I told him, and when he finished stomping me a new Mudhole, he asked, “How’d that deck beat Boros?”

Anyway, in game one he led with a Skyshroud elite that stayed at 1/1 for a few turns because I only had one land and it was an Island. The Aether Vial I’d played first turn let me play a Mother of Runes and a Meddling Mage, but was erased by a Tin-Street Hooligan. He took total control with some Cursed Scrolls, and the Elves, the Goblin, and a Kird Ape caved in my skull.

I boarded into the man plan, taking out Forces (which are really bad with Dark Confidant in a game like this) and put in Katakis and Samurai and Jittes.

The second game was a little less lopsided as I found my friends, two Serendib Efreets. Unfortunately they helped him as well by dealing me three free damage. Again it was Skyshroud Elite and Tin-Street Hooligan, and when I tried to send one of my own Serendibs to stay alive, he REB’d it in response, so I died.

I wondered while I boarded whether I should even be trying to compete with him on the ground, but I wasn’t sure how I’d be able to gain an edge otherwise. My control cards aren’t much made for a Zoo deck of many different creature types, otherwise I would have brought in the E-Plagues.

Oh well. Like I said, it didn’t work.

Matches – 1-1-0
Games – 2-2-0

Round 3 – Grant – The Epic Storm

Grant had a pretty good game-face for the first game, but he lightened up as things went on. I had to ask him at the end what he was playing, since I at first suspected IGGy Pop but a rogue build. He was pretty cool about everything that happened, though, even the emotional melodrama building at the table next to us.

In game one, pretty much all you have to know is that I drew three Cabal Therapies and hit with all of them. I guessed at and hit Brainstorm first, and saw his hand of Lion’s Eye Diamond, Infernal Tutor, Burning Wish, Plunge into Darkness, and Dark Ritual. Next turn I put a Mage on LED. Then, with the beats thus commenced, I Therapied Infernal Tutor, drew Therapy three and took Plunge as well. Another Mage named Dark Ritual. When he finally built up the resources for Burning Wish, I Force of Willed and he conceded.

I brought in either Samurais or Katakis (probably not both, and I don’t remember which I thought would help more) and Dimir Cutpurses. I thought about Engineered Plagues, suspecting Empty the Warrens, but I ultimately left them on the bench.

On his first turn in game two, he took my Stifle. Then he took my Brainstorm. I played a Dark Confidant, hoping to get back into the game, but he Emptied the Warrens on turn three for eight goblins. Two Mothers of Runes and two guys named Bob tried their darnedest to hold off the rampaging green horde, but it was no use. When I left up blockers, he just let Dark Confidants kill me.

I sided in Engineered Plagues.

I played a land, holding two Brainstorms, and his first turn Duress whiffed, seeing nothing but creatures. I left Brainstorm next on top and Engineered Plague as the second card down. Next turn, I again held up mana for Brainstorm, as he Emptied again, this time for 12. I thought about flipping Engineered Plague directly into play but decided not to be a jerk. With his hand depleted, I played Engineered Plague, Dimir Cutpurse, Dimir Cutpurse on the next three turns—pretty good. When he played a desperate Empty the Warrens, goblins were still Plagued, and he graciously conceded.

Match – 2-1-0
Games – 4-3-0

So, doing okay.

Anyway, going on next to us was this little vignette between some guy playing what looked like a substandard UWB Fish list and a guy playing Hulk Flash.

Emo Fish: [testily] So you went online, you found a list, you played it, and you won. How creative!
Netdecker: What?
Emo Fish: You couldn’t come up with a deck of your own?
Netdecker: There are almost 900 people here, and a lot of them will be playing this list. You lost, you don’t need to be rude about it.
Emo Fish: Rude?! I sat down and said, “Hello,” to you, and your first reaction was to put the earbud from your iPod in your ear.

From there it pretty much degenerated into, “I’m rude, but you’re ruder!” from both sides, but I kind of had to pay attention to my match. I was just amazed that that was how things were going to go for those two.

Whether you lose to a rogue deck or a netdeck, I really don’t think you can berate or begrudge someone for beating you at Magic. First of all, as Jerry Yang pointed out to me on day two, “It’s a game! I throw around little pieces of cardboard. I like using the ones with scantily-clad women on them!” Secondly, if you decide to go rogue, you should at least plan on being able to beat the popular decks (or plan on losing to them). And if you netdeck, at least be willing to admit it and able to explain your choice (since there are dozens of “netdecks” for every format).

Oh well, whatever.

I’m going to cut off here for tonight. I’ll get the rest of the tournament up soon—the exciting Belcher mirror on Saturday afternoon, the rest of the GP experience (including The Dime Under the Table), and proving myself as advertised: “Good at cooking, bad at Magic.”