Tri-lands vs Scry lands

Today on Twitter, StarCityGames.com editor Cedric Phillips had this to say:

Flying across the country editing articles and working on decklists for #SCGPORT. Step one = Get these Nomad Outposts out of Mardu ASAP.
— Cedric Phillips (@CedricAPhillips) December 1, 2014

This sparked a brief back and forth with some of his followers, including myself. I thought I would make a post to clarify my viewpoint and explain my reasoning.

Note: Cedric is not suggesting cutting Outpost from the deck to play more basics, or to play Mana Confluence. He is only comparing it to playing additional scry lands.

My official position is this: Tri-lands are awesome and you should play four of them.

To explain my reasoning, there are a few assumptions I will be making. First, we are talking about 60 card constructed decks. If you have both tri-lands and scry lands in your draft deck, you should just play all of them. Second, current standard decks are mostly homogeneous when it comes to spell power level. If there was a specific card that you HAD to draw in order to win, scry lands are a lot better. The function of scry lands in standard is mostly one of avoiding mana flood, or pushing slightly inferior / matchup dependent cards to the bottom in hopes of drawing better options. Third, you want to play somewhere between 23-26 lands. Many color source balancing issues can be fixed by simply playing more lands (a good trick to remember for limited), but at some point mana flood becomes a real issue.

So starting with the basics. How many colors can you play in a 60 card deck if you only have basic lands? The spells you want to play determine the number of required colored sources you want, and then you add lands to meet those requirements. Frank Karsten did the hard work already. This article shows that if you have double colored mana requirements in two colors and want to play these spells by turn 4, you would need 12 lands of each color. With only basics, this is 24 lands total, and pretty much limits deck construction to two colors. This is also the reason that the conventional wisdom is to draft two color decks in most formats. Without access to common mana fixing like in Khans or RTR block, playing 3 colors requires 19-21 total lands.

As you allow access to dual colored lands, it becomes much easier to meet the minimum requirements set in Franks article. With dual lands available in each color combination, the 12 dual land and 4 of each basic gives you 12 sources of each of three colors while still within 24 land slots. If you allow the tri-land of those three colors, you could end up with 15 sources in each color easily. Franks math was only done to ensure 90% certainity. With more sources you can be more certain of having the colored mana you need. Brad Nelson has shown that when you add enough tri-lands, four color decks become possible!

Unfortunately, tri-lands aren't all upside. They enter the battlefied tapped, but so do scry lands! The issue comes down to how many ETB tapped lands we can afford to play. Another way to look at it is how many untapped sources do we need to play, since we can always play more tapped lands instead of spells. The typical standard Mardu deck plays 9-10 tapped lands.

I love scry lands. I was one of the few people in my play group not disappointed when they were spoiled. New Benalia was always a card I loved. That said, I think they are worse than tri-lands.

What advantages do scry lands have? They help mitigate flood, and the more you play the better they are. However, Most decks in standard also run fetchlands, which undo the scrying you have already achieved in the game. A deck like Blue-White Heroic shouldn't play Windswept Heath because it scrys so much that it would do more harm than good, even considering that it adds to delve to reduce the cost of Treasure Cruise. Scrying can also be used to "fix" your mana, digging you for the colored source you are missing. This isn't an advantage over tri-lands though, since tri-lands already provide the missing source. Deciphering between which land you want to keep and which land to push is another added level of complexity to the deck that might lead to more mistakes. Having to keep a land on top because its the color you need when you already have drawn plenty of mana sources is not taking full advantage of the scrys you get.

It is completely possible to get the mana ratios right using less than 4 copies of a tri-land. With each copy you don't play, you are increasing the liklihood of not having the mana you need. In return, you get to scry. Is the likelihood of the scry helping you out higher than the likelihood of running into mana issues?

@ceciliajupe @liam_ggwp @aulowry I think it is lazy deckbuilding to assume 4 tri-lands is the place to start. It probably isn't.
— Cedric Phillips (@CedricAPhillips) December 1, 2014

Maybe it is lazy deckbuilding, but it's something I've spent lots of time thinking about before. What tri-lands do is very unique and it's hard to find something to compare it to. From the Seaside Citadels of Brian Kibler's Next Level Bant, to the Savage Lands (instead of extra man lands!) of Simon Gortzen's Jund deck, they have a place in deck construction. I think 4 is the starting number, and I wonder how many more I would be willing to play.

Another way to think about tri-lands and their importance is to look at fetch lands in formats where dual lands are fetchable. In a typical Legacy deck, you run many more fetches than duals, many times not even running the full 4 copies of any one dual. This is because fecth lands that can get any of the 3 dual lands you use function as tri-lands until you fetch them. A fetch land in your hand with and single other colored land gives you access to all three colors of mana for your deck. Waiting to crack fetchlands is very important not just for brainstorming, but also so you don't restrict the colors of mana you have access to. Similarly, it is also important to not fetch the last copy of a dual land in your deck unless you have a good reason to. Not having a Tundra to get with Scalding Tarn the turn you need to cast Swords to Plowshares will cost you.

Bonus Top Ten - Top Ten Dual Land Cycles

1.Tundra
2. Hallowed Fountain
3. Adarkar Wastes
4. Mystic Gate
5. Seachrome Coast
6. Celestial Colonade
7. Temple of Enlightenment
8. Glacial Fortress
9. Flooded Strand (number 1 if tundra / hallowed fountain are legal)
10. Skycloud Expanse

Reminder that fetchlands aren't as good without dual lands!

Team Pats Games GP Nashville Report

[Editor's Note: This was originally published on the Pat's Games website in November 2014 (maybe?). Sharing here for archival purposes.]

I was really looking forward to GP Nashville. The last Grand Prix I played in was almost a year ago at GP Dallas. This was the longest time I have gone between GPs since I moved back to Texas. Originally, the plan was for Haibing and me to team with Will Lowry once again, just like at GP San Jose. When a scheduling conflict came up for Will, we contacted the best player in Texas, Robert Berni, and he agreed to be the third player. There are a lot of different theories on who you should team with. Some people want to include players with varied play styles so that each deck has a dedicated pilot, while others say to play with your friends. My theory is to get two people that are better than me, so even if I lose, we could still win the round. Haibing is the best drafter in Texas, and no one is hotter than Berni right now, so this team met my criteria.

The travel to Nashville was uneventful. I had to bring my winter coat since it was much colder than in Houston. Berni arrived in just shorts and flip-flops, but claimed it was no big deal. I guess it was more important to him to pack light. We had dinner with one of the other Texas teams (Chris Mabry, Tony Ho, Nick Lavender), then did a quick draft before heading to bed for the evening. All together I think there were 6 or 7 teams representing the Lone Star State at the tournament, a much higher turnout that I expected. 

I really like sealed deck, probably more than any non-eternal format. Team sealed is usually just as good, if not better, but after doing several practice sealeds and building the pool at the GP, I think this team format might be worse than others. In theory, all 5 wedges should be equally represented, and in individual sealed this is close. As more packs are added to the pool, you start to see some common themes. Abzan is by far the best clan, and almost all of the teams we played against or talked to had an Abzan deck. These decks were usually base Black and Green, but often evenly split across the three colors. The clan tends to play out slow and grindy, so the aggressive white and green cards usually end up in the other two decks. This leads to White/Red aggro, with either blue or black splash, and a Temur deck than is mostly Blue and Green with red splash. I would say 75% of the pools I saw were built Abzan/Mardu/Temur or Abzan/Jeskai/Temur. The only Sultai cards I saw played were splashed into an Abzan deck to take advantage of the powerful blue delve spells. I can’t say for certain that all pools will split this way, but it is the impression I currently have.

We split our pool Abzan/Temur/Jeskai. I played the Abzan deck, which was unimpressive but not terrible. End Hostilities was the only bomb, but it had enough other removal and large enough creatures to play the long game fairly well. The mana was very great: nine non-basic lands made getting the ratios correct very easy. This was probably the worst thing about our sealed pool was that a majority of our lands only went into the one deck. The other two decks played seven non-basic lands combined. The best cards for me were Mardu Skullhunter and Rakshasa’s Secret. I chose to draw first several times against other Abzan decks to take advantage of all the card advantage created by these cards. Haibing played the Temur deck that included Savage Knuckleblade, Clever Impersonator, Rattleclaw Mystic, and two Sagu Mauler. It was missing early removal like Savage Punch, and lacked a way to break through like Roar of the Challenge or Barrage of Boulders. Berni played Jeskai that included the aggressive white cards that didn’t make it into the Abzan deck, and the majority of the red removal. The blue splash was for some morphs, Sage of the Inward Eye, and Jeskai Charm. The deck was fine, but nothing special. It was unfortunate that almost all our great cards ended up in the Temur deck, and our lack of mana fixing took away options from playing different combinations. The only other combination we looked at was BW, UR, and GU based decks. We did mis-build by a few cards. Suspension Field was in the Abzan deck, but should have gone into the Jeskai deck, that would have freed a red removal spell for the Temur deck. The Abzan deck has extra removal in the sideboard like Throttle and Rite of the Serpent that would have been just as good. The Temur deck also should have played at least one of the three Crippling Chill that we left in the sideboard. We chose to play two Force Away instead, but the format wasn’t as fast as we anticipated and the card that didn’t cost us card advantage would have been better.

Our matches were covered by Berni’s updates throughout the day. We were quickly in a 1-2 hole, needing to win out to make day 2. We finished the day at 5-4, well short of the goal. I think most of our opponents had better decks than us, except maybe round 1 and round 4. We played okay for the most part, but did mess up a few turns in round 3 that put us in the 1-2 hole. I was playing against a Temur deck with Sagu Mauler and Pearl Lake Ancient. I won game 1 by forcing him to bounce the Ancient and racing, but lost game 2 when Ancient raced my flying tokens from Abzan Ascendancy. Game 3 was very close. After I cleared the board with End Hostilities, he drew and played Sagu Mauler. At this point, life totals were 18-10 in my favor, and I had Alpine Grizzly in play. My hand was full of useless removal spells, but I drew a Wooly Loxodon that I played face down. On his turn, he attacked. With all the removal in my hand, I chose to take 6 damage, and very likely attack for lethal the next turn if he had follow up blockers. He had no play on his turn, but did have Crippling Chill on the Grizzly to stay alive. I attacked him to 4 life, and another attack from him put me to 6 life. A Force Away on my Loxodon kept him alive another turn, and when I chose to block only with the 6/7, the second Force Away killed me exactly. Blocking earlier would have worked out, but at the time I was worried about possible pump spell. I’m still not sure what the right play was, but I think not double-blocking on the last turn was definitely a mistake.

So even though the main event was a disappointment, the weekend was still a blast. That is the best thing about team events. They are tons of fun, win or lose. When you are winning at an individual event, you experience it alone, as most of your friends are probably not losing. Similarly, when you lose at an individual event, people will listen to your story, but they don’t really care. At a team event, you get to share in the thrill of victory, and commiserate in defeat. Combined this with two other players that are always ready to side draft, since you have to drop at the same time, and you get a recipe for a great weekend. The GP was very smoothly run. It was much smoother than the last team GP I attended. I was worried that the rounds would take forever as they often do at team events, but it moved at a reasonable enough pace. 

I had a great time at GP Nashville despite a poor finish. Thanks to Pat’s Games for sponsoring us, and to all the support we got from the people back home. Also thanks to Haibing Hu and Robert Berni for being awesome teammates.  Also congrats to Mabry-Lavender-Ho team for finishing in the money! 

Old PTQ Reports Part 2

The second PTQ report comes from Mirrodin-Darksteel Sealed deck tournament in Austin in 2004. This was my 4th PTQ top 8 in a year time span. I guess I was better at the game than I remember?



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San Diego is in the country, so of course you have to work hard to qualify. It's an easy trip.

I went to Austin late Thursday night after the type 2 tournament. We arrived around 330 am Friday morning, went to IHOP and stuff. Friday was a hang out day, and I got to see all my friends who sold out and went to UT.

Saturday morning was the most beautiful day ever. It had snowed overnight, and now the sun was out. Driving around the snow was melting off the hood of my car and flying up into my windshield. It was really cool.

When we got to the tournament, it looked like the snow had kept some of the other out of towners from showing up. There was only 61 people there, and the quality of competition was slightly lacking. I know for a fact some of my friends got in an accident just south of Austin on their way and missed the tournament, how unfortunate.

The deck I opened was pretty poor I think, I didn't pay too much attention because I was hoping I wouldn't get it back. Luckily, i got a ridiculous deck passed to me. Here is what I played:

Island x6

Plains x6

Swamp

Vault of Whispers

Arrest

Blinding Beam

Raise the Alarm

Neurok Spy

Thirst for Knowledge

Terror

Aether Spellbomb

Clockwork Condor

Crystal Shard

Frogmite

Gold Myr

Isochron Scepter

Leaden Myr

Soldier Replica

Wizard Replica

Pteron Ghost x2

Test of Faith

Quicksilver Behemoth

Vedalken Engineer

Echoing Decay

Arcbound Stinger

Razor Golem

Specter’s Shroud

Spire Golem

Vulshok Morningstar

Notable sideboard cards included Goblin Dirigible, Yotian Soldier, and Goblin Replica. If I could do it again, I wouldn't play the engineer and would add in Scavenging Scarab and some more black mana. However, I was really happy. This is the kind of deck I like to play: cheap creatures and blinding beams. The rinky dink strategy. The nickel and dime strategy. The stealing blinds strategy.

Round 1 - Mike Lynch

He is playing black green and he mentions having 18 lands. 18 lands?!?! Thats 4 more than I am playing. Mirrodin is all about the really low land counts and it shows. both games I stop at 4 lands and deal with hes few threats then win. One game involves scepter-raise the alarm. Not much to say, my deck was a lot better.

1-0 2-0

Round 2 - David Cerda

David is playing green something, I don't remember. I do remember that he is one of two opponents to ever play artifact removal against me, creeping molding my crystal shard in the first 2 games which we split. Game 3 he stalls on lands and my 1/1's get in some beats. Eventually he gets out empyrial plate and equips, but i have the blinding beam for just enough.

2-0 4-1

Round 3 - Steven Livingston

Steven is a good player and he beat me last time I was in Austin. This was going to be tough. Mulliganing to 5 didn't help either. I get some early beats, and my Pteron Ghosts are getting through unblocked. One of them stays back to block a turn, and then has a test of faith, and then is much bigger allowing me to win the race. 5 card hand wins. Game 2 we trade early dudes, then i make a mistake and attack after arresting his bonesplitter elf replica. I forgot he could move the bonesplitter to his myr and attack, so I take 2 more than i should have. This turns out to be crucial as right when I thirst into total gas, he draws the last land he needs to fireball me. Game 3 I once again start the beatdown, and he has to fireball to stabilize. Eventually I run out of gas, but my Spire Golem is holding his team off. We sit for a few turns when he maybe should of been attacking with dirigible, maybe not, but time is called and he is 1 point short of killing me and decides to play i! t safe and stay back in case i have something. All I have is lands, so it is a draw.

2-0-1 5-2-1

Round 4 - Paul M Hagan

Game 1 he is land screwed, so my cheap beat sticks do 20 really quick. Game 2 he mulligans to 4. And he lost. Coincidence?

3-0-1 7-2-1

Round 5 - Damien W Mayfield

Game 1 I keep a 5 land, myr, crystal shard hand. I draw 3 more land and only 1 more creature, and I can't keep up. Game 2 my deck plays like it does, and doesn't meet too much resistance. Game 3 I play some early fliers, and he has turn 3 Warhammer. If you know me, you know I love to race Warhammer, and without any artifact removal, it looked like i would have to. I put spectral Shroud on a flier and he discards land. Then he plays Wand of the Elements. Ok, this might be tricky. Luckily, I have crystal shard, and after he discards another land, i play some more guys for more pressure. He plays Myr Enforcer, which i bounce on my turn with Aether Spellbomb, then attack with the team. Then he plays Spikeshot, and it looks like he might gain control. Unfortunately for him, he has to go to my dome because i can bounce any of my guys with crystal shard if he tries to get them. Anyway it turns out he taps out somewhere, i have raise the alarm, he kills my condor with spikeshot, i attack him down to 3 after sharding his blockers, then cast the 2nd ability only of blinding beam to keep the spikeshot down. He can only play 2 blockers, and i have 5 dudes, so i get just enough and notch another win vs. the big dumb elephant.

4-0-1 9-3-1

Round 6 - Alex Duran ID

We draw because there is no reason to play really with random top 8 seating, and I am exhausted after racing warhammer.

4-0-2

Basically my top 8 draft boiled down to my first pick. The relevant cards were Bosh, Iron Golem, Viridian Shaman, and Myr Enforcer. The guy to my right seemed kinda random, so I didn't want to take the Shaman in case he went green. Bosh is terrible if you are like me and play 14 lands as much as possible. So I took myr enforcer hoping to put Jeff Meyerson to my left in green and then draft affinity. But somehow he doesn't take the shaman, and instead takes bosh, and we end up in the exact same colors. Looking over the deck lists, it seems that whoever got the shaman didn't play it. And i got a lot of late green picks, meaning i probably screwed this one up. Oh well. I think Jason Krysak had a good point though. How can you take Bosh, and pass Altar of Shadows?

Deck lists are here http://www.ehevents.com/eh2003/articles/article_00034.asp

My deck isn't really as bad as it says, i think my registration sheet may have been hard to read because i kept messing up.

Island x5 *

Swamp x4 *

Mountain x2 *

Tree of Tales

Vault of Whispers

Mirrodin’s Core

Neurok Spy x2

Thoughtcast x2

Moriok Scavenger

Woebearer

Electrostatic Bolt

Frogmite

Goblin Replica

Iron Myr x2

Lifespark Spellbomb

Mask of Memory

Myr Enforcer

Sunbeam Spellbomb

Vulshok Gauntlets

Wizard Replica

Psychic Overload

Nim Abomination

Scavenging Scarab

Echoing Ruin

Arcbound Bruiser

Arcbound Stinger x2

Genesis Chamber

This is what i really played, and I never drew my 3rd pick mask of memory, and well, my opponents deck was a lot better. Because the guy to his right had never seen the set before. Both sets. So his deck is pretty yummy, and mine is one step away from being completely weak.

Anyway, I lost in 2 quick games, despite how slow I was playing to make it last. But I had a good time, and learned a lot.

Maybe next time I can make the final push in the top 8, and not have to play mirrodin sealed again.

Old PTQ Reports

I found a couple of my old PTQ reports hiding on the internet archive. I'm reposting them here as an interesting look back in time. The first comes from a pre-banning extended ptq in 2003 (right after PT Tinker) that I played in New Orleans. Enjoy!


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'Twas the night before Christmas when I realized I had gone a week without playing Magic. This was very odd, and it didn't look like i would be able to play until the Friday night draft. What to my wondering eye should appear? An email from my buddy Justin Hohenstein. It seems that some of the crew were going to make the trip to Louisiana and play in the last PTQ where all the brokeness was legal. I sent a reply saying I would go if I was back from the family trip to Dallas.

I returned Thursday evening, so then on Friday I had to find a deck to play. I toyed with the idea of playing the mono-blue Nether-Go deck like we played last year, but I was soon persuaded to play Red Deck Wins. Unfortunately, Michael Musser was out of town and I couldn't borrow cards. I made a few calls and soon had the cards for this list:

4 Jackal Pup

4 Slith Firewalker

4 Grim Lavamancer

4 Blistering Firecat

4 Volcanic Hammer

4 Firebolt

4 Seal of Fire

4 Pillage

4 Tangle Wire

4 Chrome Mox

4 Wooded Foothills

2 Bloodstained Mire

6 Mountain

4 Rishadan Port

4 Wasteland

Sideboard:

1 Forest

4 Naturalize

4 Lava Dart

3 Sulfuric Vortex

2 Psychogenic Probe

1 Rack and Ruin

The maindeck is pretty standard, and probably perfect given the expected metagame. The sideboard is pretty janky because I had a limited card pool. Naturalize is to bring in against decks that want you to Chill out, Lava Dart is my favorite burn spell so I had to play 4, though 2 or 3 is probably right. I played Vortex because I didn't have access to Cursed Scrolls, but it gave me something to bring in against the rock or dump truck decks, as well as when scroll would normally come in. The probes were there for Twiddle-Desire, so they were pretty useless.

The metagame was really odd considering that this was the last time people could play decks with Tinker, Monolith, and such. (As an aside about the bannings, I feel most everything was covered, though I still think Chrome Mox, Mind's Desire, and Mana Severance should have been on the list as well. See my last article.) There were maybe 4 Tinker decks, 2 of those the Welder version, and 1 a crazy white version with Enlightened Tutor and Leonin Abunas played by Taylor Williams, who was in my car on the ride over. There was no Twiddle-Desire, Angry Hermit, or Oath at all. The rest of the field was RDW, Psychatog, and the Rock, as well as the above average amount of rogue decks, because this was Baton Rouge. There was also 5 or 6 people playing Dump Truck.

Round 1 - Jackson Price - Psychatog

Game 1 he gets a turn 1 scepter on fire/ice, and then has the mana leak for both of my pillages even though he was stuck on 1 land and a mox. My continuous drawing of the mana sources did not help. Game 2 I force through a vortex, and when he is at 11 I cast a morph. He has scepter on counterspell, but only 3 land open. He brainstorms in response, then says that it resolves. He had no red mana open, so he could be trying to ice or edict my firecat. I think about it and call his bluff (he may have just forgot to counter it) and he had nothing and took 7. 2 turns later vortex did him in. Game three my early beats don't look to be enough when he gets 2 togs out, but he can't get lethal damage fast enough, and is one point short when I attack for the win. He double blocks my jackal pup, and pumps his tog so that i will die. I explain that my firecat kills him first before the ability triggers, and I start my day with a match win.

2-1

1-0

Round 2 - Teddy Morrow - The Rock

This guy stayed in our room at regionals this past year, so i wasn't completely unfamiliar with him. Game 1 I play a turn 1 slith with 2 moxes because i had no red lands. All that i had left in hand was a wasteland and a port, but after I topdeck tangle wire, he dies while only casting 2 spells. Game 2 was much the same, as a few wastelands and ports keep him from casting anything more than 3cc stuff. There wasn't much he could do either game. When I turn in the result slip, I see that I am the first one done. I like this deck!

2-0

2-0

Round 3 - Ronnie Jones - Psychatog

Ronnie is from Dallas, and I know from playing him at states he's a pretty good player. Game 1 wasn't that interesting, as I get him to 2 before he kills me. Game 2 is only interesting because I forced through a turn 3 vortex, but he wishes for boomerang right before he dies and kills me. I am not sure who is favored in this matchup.

0-2

2-1

Round 4 - Carlos Moreno - Tinker Stax

At the beginning of the match he complains when I pile shuffle his deck, and asks a judge to shuffle my deck. I feel this is kind of insulting, especially considering he was using transparent sleaves and had several cards that were beat up and easily distinguishable in his deck, so I tell the judge and get him to change sleaves. Game 1 he draws 4 Welders, and I draw 3 Tangle Wires to keep them from doing anything. Game 2 I lose to Platinum Angel - Lightning Greaves, and I realize I need to board in my lava darts to kill his welders. Game 3 I destroy his first 3 or so artifacts and we both end up in topdeck mode. He gets a Masticore out, but then I draw Naturalize and am able to use it when he attempts to untap his monolith end of my turn, leaving only 1 mana open to regenerate. Then he draws Bosh, but I top deck once again with Pillage. Soon a couple of Lavamancers take him down. After the match we both apologize about the pre-match shenanigans, and return to friendly terms ! later on in the day when we play a few games for fun. So the lesson is when you make someone spend ten dollars on new sleaves, try to at least act like you are sorry. Or something like that.

2-1

3-1

Round 5 - Devin Manuel - The Rock

He cast a total of 2 spells the entire match. Game 1 he didn't draw a green source until really late, and I had drawn all 4 of my ports. Game 2 is fairly similar as he is discarding cards from his hand due to lack of mana on turn 5. This lets my creatures do whatever they want, and they want to kill him.

2-0

4-1

Round 6 - Joseph Falcon - The Rock

I check the standings because my travel buddies want me to play so they could have a chance at 4-2, but I don't think either of them will make it, and I would much rather have the Rock be one of my opponents in the top 8 than either of their decks, so we ID.

ID

4-1-1

Quarter Finals - Adam Case - Monogreen Beatdown

I am the 6th seed in the top 8, so I get to play the Mono Green beatdown deck. I am worried about this matchup because he has Nimble Mongoose and Troll Ascetics. Game 1 I kill his early mongrel with a hammer, and then get a Tangle Wire to resolve. This clears ths way for my Slith Firewalker who gets to be a 4/4 by the time he can cast his troll. He doesn't have regeneration mana so he has to chump. Game 2 i draw all 4 Jackal Pups, but his 2 Trolls let him stabalize. He can never attack though without me killing him on my turn. At some point he looks to plow under 2 of my 4 mountains to buy some time. I use the 2 lava darts in my hand and then flash them both back to keep from getting time walk twice. 2 turns later i draw the 2nd seal of fire i need to kill him.

Semifinals - Jason Tate - Dump Truck

I played against Jason last time I was in Baton Rouge for a qualifier when he beat me in the Astral Slide mirror. This time we are playing decks that aren't boring to play. Playing first game 1 I mulligan to a 6 card hand with 2 pups, Slith, but only 1 mountain. The other 2 cards were firecats. I keep hoping to draw some land, but all i get is a wasteland before he vindicates my only red source and i die. Game 2 he draws 3 chills, but I had the naturalize for 2 of them, and then I can cast what I want fairly easily. Game 3 he gets turn 1, 2, and 3 chill, and then follows it up with triple vindicate. I only drew 1 naturalize, and soon my only green source was gone.

So I lost in the semifinals of a constructed PTQ again. This time it wasn't due to a huge play mistake on my part, though it may have been because of a mulliganing mistake Game 1. I did have a good time which always seems to happen when you do fairly well. Maybe I can win the next one in Houston. Maybe not.

Time Travel to a Pro Tour in the past?

Earlier today I asked a question on Twitter that I think needs to be discussed in greater than 140 characters. The question was “Knowing what you know now, which PT from the past would you go back to play and have the highest EV?” I had a certain one in mind that I think is best, but I received many responses and I wanted to cover them here.

The “Time Travel to a PT” has been an interesting thought experiment of mine for several years. There are many ways that you can exploit your knowledge gap to gain an edge at these past tournaments. The most obvious way is to just play the deck that won the tournament. If I went to PT Paris with Caw Blade, I would have a very good shot of making the money. But the best team in the world also had Caw Blade for the PT, so it would be a stretch to say I would be a favorite to beat all of them.

Another way to exploit the knowledge gap is to travel to a time where players just weren’t as good. The first PT didn’t require anything other than a phone call to qualify. Early limited PTs are notorious for just an elite few players actually knowing how to draft.

The best way to exploit the knowledge would be to play a deck that is absolutely head and shoulders better than the rest that no one else has. This has actually happened a couple of times, and leads to some of the better scenarios.

I’ve ranked the top options here, with some explanation on each.

6. Worlds 2010 – Any Worlds would be very difficult to get an edge in because of the nature of the multiple formats. 2010 was mentioned because you could play Stoneforge Mystic and Jace, TMS, and no one really did. However, instead of Batterskull or Sword of Feast and Famine you would be limited to Sword of Body and Mind. This might be good enough, and I’m sure playing some games against the winning UB lists you could tell quickly if this was a good idea.

5. Any Limited PT before Tempest –This includes LA 96, Atlanta 96, LA 97, and NY 97. I can’t really say first hand that people were bad at limited before this, and it might be tough going back to a time when sets were designed differently, but I think 20 years of draft theory would help immensely in these tournaments. Maybe not Atlanta since it was sealed deck, but I included it the same.  Tempest release coincided with a pretty sick run of limited PT winners that might be difficult to get through, even with the extra experience: Matt Place (R&D member), Jon Finkel, Dirk Baberowski, Steve OMS (All HoF), with a down tournament of Trevor Blackwell winnings before Michael Pustilnik and Kai Budde. Limited is quite a difficult thing to get an edge on, so I would advise against trying these.

4. PT Austin 2009 – More recent PTs have the problem of being split format, so even if you show up to Austin with Thepths (truly the best deck of the format and for the PT), you would still need to know something about ZZZ draft. I’d say playing Thepths optimally would guarantee a top 50 finish, and if you manage to 4-2 or better the draft you could top 8 and probably easily win the PT. This is a good choice.

3. PT 1 – Play Necro (any build is good enough). Play against a weak field. You could probably top 8 this with several different decks, given the leaps that deck construction theory has gone through since then. Only a couple of factors keep it from being the top spot: the Paris Mulligan rule had not been implemented yet, so more variance, and judging was still poor, so you could just get cheated and not be able to do anything about it (probably a risk for any PT before 2000 based on what I’ve heard over the years). Also the prize money wasn’t as large as the later PTs.

2. PT Chicago 1999 – Bob Maher won with Oath of Druids defeated Free-Spell Necro in the Finals. Both of these decks are pretty good, but not as good as fully powered Illusions-Donate.  I’m not sure you always win the PT, since Duress and Unmask were widely played, but you probably win more often than not.

1. PT Los Angeles 2005 – Sometimes I think about it, and I’m surprised it took two months for Dredge to be the best deck, but some of the PT lists were pretty close. Billy Moreno made the finals on the strength of dredge, and Craig Jones was undefeated day one with a similar list. Kenji’s Dredgeatog list from the top 8 wasn’t really a dredge deck but it recognized some of the broken aspects of the mechanic. However, none of these decks were Friggorid. There also wasn’t any graveyard hate available since Leyline of the Void wasn’t printed until the next set. I think the Ichorid deck would top 8 99+% of the time, and win the tournament 95% of the time. This is the best bet. All of the deck lists for the tournament are available on the coverage site, so if you want to prove me wrong you just have to play 2000 matches or so. 

Houston PTQ Report

I remember a phone call I had with fellow SCG Open Series Winner Nathan Zamora back in 2008. We had both just won our respective Regionals tournament (him in Texas, me in Hawaii), and we were sharing the stories of the day. We laughed at our opponents misplays, patted ourselves on the back for our clever plays, and just shared a feeling that you don't usually get to share with others in the moment (there is only one winner after all). Nathan put it best when, in the middle of the conversation, he said "Winning tournaments is awesome." I agreed then, and I still agree today.

I won the PTQ for Journey into Nyx that Asgard Games held in Houston this past Saturday. I played Mono Black Devotion. There isn't any new tech in this report, just some stories from the day. I like writing about tournaments I play in, especially the good stories, but lately I haven't had the time. 

After Owen Turtenwald won the StarCityGames Open with Mono Black at the start of 2014, I finally was convinced it was the deck to play. I didn’t have much experience with the deck, only experience against it. I played the San Antonio PTQ and went 6-2, and learned quite a bit about the deck. With the knowledge I gained, I registered this list for the Houston PTQ:

18 Swamp

4 Temple of Deceit

4 Mutavault

4 Pack Rat

4 Nightveil Specter

4 Desecration Demon

4 Gray Merchant of Asphodel

4 Underworld Connections

4 Thoughtsieze

4 Hero’s Downfall

4 Devour Flesh

2 Pharika’s Cure

Sideboard

4 Duress

2 Erebos, God of the Dead

2 Lifebane Zombie

2 Dark Betrayal

2 Shrivel

1 Pharika’s Cure

1 Doom Blade

1 Pithing Needle

The main deck removal spells could be anything really, as long as it kills something. The rest of the deck is that good.

I added a Shrivel after the one I played in San Antonio was better than I thought. This meant cutting a Lifebane Zombie since that is a nonbo and you bring zombie in for the shrivel matchups usually. I also put the Needle in so to have the same amount of tools vs UW as well as for the RG planeswalkers. The Doom Blade went in instead of 4^th Pharika’s Cure because it was easier to cast and killed Stormbreath Dragon. I still think I might want the 3^rd Erebos, and I’m not sure Dark Betrayal is that necessary (it doesn’t really make the mirror any easier, but it is good to have).

Playing the deck reminds me a lot of playing Caw Blade. It’s clearly the best deck, the mirror match is skill intensive, and the game situations are different than normal games of Magic. This is why I think I had success – playing well in new situations. However, the deck isn’t nearly as fun as CawBlade – you don’t get to bounce their blocker with Jace and hit them with Sword of Feast and Famine untapping all your lands and casting Gideon Jura in the second main phase. All you get to do is make more rats.

Round 1 – Henry Vi, Mono Black

Second week in a row I start against the mirror. Game 1 he misses land drops and I pull ahead with Underworld Connections. Game 2 he has Erebos and answers for my first two Pack Rats, but I draw a third Rat and it goes the distance.

1-0   (2-0)

I don’t side out Demon in the mirror as seems to be popular. I want to do lots of damage to minimize the effectiveness of Connections and Erebos, plus overload on threats to make their removal not as great. I’m still not sure it’s right, but that is my thinking.

Round 2 – Christopher Boehm, UW Control

Game 1 I start attacking with Mutavault on turn 2, and do enough damage over the course of the game that he’s at 4 life after he cast his 3^rd Sphinx’s Revelation. On his turn, he casts Aetherling and Detention Sphere on my Gray Merchant, leaving one blue mana untapped. On my turn, I Devour Flesh targeting him, he phases out Aetherling, so I activate and kill him with two Mutavaults. Game 2 I Duress and Thoughtsieze a few times, and control the pace of the game with which spells I let him keep. He makes a questionable play of leaving up Dissolve instead of tapping out for Elspeth, which gives me more free attacks with Mutavault. Eventually I resolve Gray Merchant for the last 7 life points.

2-0   (4-0)

I think UW Control is a good matchup, mostly because the post board games are way in the favor of the Mono Black deck. I beat Sidd Rao easily in the last round of the PTQ in San Antonio, afterwards he told me how it changed his perspective of the matchup that he had previously thought was a good one. I know when I was playing UW I would have been scared of a good player with Mono Black.

Round 3 – Johnathan Hiett, Black White Blood Baron

Game 1 he Thoughtsiezed my Pack Rat, leaving me with Connections that he never caught up with. Game 2 was more of the same, but I Devour Flesh a couple of Blood Baron on the way to victory.

3-0   (6-0)

Round 4 – Jared LaCombe, Esper Humans

This deck was one of my two losses the previous weekend, so I was worried. Game 1 was one of the more interesting games I’ve played. I kept three Pack Rats and four lands on the play. I lead off with Temple, which he did the same. I then played a Rat, and he made a BW Temple. I attacked on turn 3 and discarded Pharika’s Cure to make a second rat. He played a Mutavault and Detention Sphere on my rats. I made a Desecration Demon, and he made two Daring Skyjeks. I attacked for 6 putting him to 10 (he payed 2 life earlier for a shockland). I played a second Demon, he detained it with Skyknight and swung for 8 with the creatures and Mutavualt. I was at 12. I attacked him to 4 after much deliberation, then cast Thoughtseize and took his only spell, a Soldier of the Pantheon. He drew Imposing Sovereign, played a scry land, kept the card on top, and then attacked with the team, sacking the Sovereign to tap my other Demon. I had Hero’s Downfall to stay alive, leaving me at 2 life. He sacked both his Skyjeks to keep from dying, but the Skyknight on top of his library wasn’t enough to get his Mutavault through the two Pack Rats I cast with my four lands. Game 2 he kept a two land hand, but never drew a third and I killed him with some Demons.

4-0   (8-0)

Round 5 – Jason Herren, Esper Humans

I’m out for revenge, as Jason was the one that knocked me out of top 8 contention in round 7 the weekend before. Game 1 he mulligans so I keep a very sketchy hand of 5 lands, Connections, Gray Merchant, but he doesn’t have white mana. His Dimir Aggro wasn’t good enough once I drew into a couple of removal spells. Game 2 I don’t remember what happened, I think I grinded him out through his Whip with my multiple Connections and Gray Merchants.

5-0   (10-0)

Round 6 – Johnathan Unknown (that’s what the PWP site says), Wr Aggro

Game 1 I kill a couple of guys, use Gray Merchant to stabilize, and kill him with Demon. Game 2 is closer, I hold off on Shrivel for several turns, trying to make a Rat Token first, but he had Banisher Priest and Precinct Captain to cause trouble. Eventually I chump with my Rat, use Shrivel on his tokens, and leave back the Pack Rat and Mutavault after I kill the Priest. I’m at 4 life, but he has no red mana. I have a Gray Merchant to get out of charm range, and keep my multiple Mutavaults back on defense to play around Brave the Elements. I kill him with Demon the turn before he untaps his red source.

6-0   (12-0)

Round 7 – Karthik Manohar, MonoBlack

I have to explain the top 8 math to Karthik and Matt Oakley before this round, we were the only undefeateds. Matt was paired down and couldn’t draw, but it was safe for Karthik and I to ID twice, knowing that we’d end up in bottom half of the standings. I’d been winning games on the draw all day, so I didn’t think it would be a big deal to not have the play in the top 8, so I agreed to a draw.

6-0-1 (12-0)

Round 8 – Austin Bursavich, UW Control

We ID, locking me for 5^th/6^th, and Austin as 7^th or 8^th, depending on tiebreakers. Derrek Steele convinced his opponent to concede instead of drawing in extra turns this round, thinking he would be 8^th place, but he ended up in 9^th.

Standings for top 8:

1 Tom Ross – Mono Black

2 Matt Oakley – Burn

3 Allan Sjue – Boros Aggro

4 Chris Trevino – BW Blood Baron

5 Karthik Manohar – Mono Black

6 Timothy Thomason – Mono Black

7 Austin Bursavich – UW Control

8 Randall Gay – GR Monsters

The bracket couldn’t have been more perfect for me. I’m on the other side from Tom “The Boss” Ross, I get a good matchup in quarterfinals, and winning would let me play either Burn or UW, both of which I felt good about. I was kind of worried about GR Monsters, but mostly because I hadn’t played against it at all. I felt confidant, I hadn’t lost a game all day.

Quarterfinals – Allan Sjue, Boros Aggro

He’s on the play, but mulligans to 6. He starts with Boros Elite, but I Thoughtsieze his Ajani and Cure his Captain, then kill him with Demons. Game 2 I mulligan to 6, and keep 5 lands and Shrivel. I use the Shrivel on turn 2 to kill a Skyjek and a Dryad Militant, but he has a backup army of additional X/1s that I could have killed had I waited. I didn’t draw much of anything, and died a few turns later. Game 3 showed the problem with over sideboarding. I Thoughtsieze turn 1 and see Boros Charm, Last Breath, Mizzium Mortars, Skyjek, and 3 lands. I take the creature, and kill him with Demons. I think he was worried about Pack Rat, but I actually sided some out since I don’t think they are very good in the matchup.

7-0-2 (14-1)

Semifinals – Austin Bursavich, UW Control

Game 1 I mulligan, keep a playable hand, but it goes nowhere fast. He’s firmly in control, I’m just playing it out to make him spend the effort. He’s talking quite a bit (we know each other and are friendly towards each other), but the judge watching wasn’t comfortable with the language Austin was using. Austin apologized, but a few turns later another F bomb got him a Warning for Unsporting Conduct. Just one more and he’d receive a game loss! He stopped talking as much after that, and killed me after the 3^rd Sphinx’s Revelation easily.

Game 2 was most epic. I stripped his hand with discard and set up Connections, but he had Sphere off the top before it got out of hand. He then ripped Elspeth, which I killed with Downfall, but not before it made three soliders. I killed one with Mutavault, but had to trade with his Mutavault on the next attack. I was at low life from multiple Thoughtsieze, and we both kept drawing lands while I took two damage a turn from soldiers. I drew Erebos, which I played, but held off on activating it. He attacked me down to 5 and passed the turn. I drew an Underworld Connections, which I immediately activated. Now at 4 life, I had three lands in hand and eight lands untapped. I could pay 2 life to draw a card, hoping to hit any permanent to immediately win the game, since he was at 5 life with no blockers. Or I could wait a turn and draw two cards next turn, one from my draw step and one from my Connections. This would give my opponent an extra draw step as well. I started doing the math. 3 Desecration Demon, 3 Gray Merchant, 1 Underworld Connection, 1 Pack Rat, 4 Nightveil Specter all were left in my 36 card library. That was only 33% chance I win. Waiting lets me see two more cards (55.555% to turn on Erebos), but gave him another draw step that could ruin my plans. After thinking for quite some time, even discussing the odds with my opponent, the judge finally prompted me to make a play. I passed the turn. Now it was Austin’s turn to think .His draw was a blank, and he needed to decide to attack with both soliders (a two turn clock) or just one and have a blocker for a possible Erebos attack on the next turn. He initially sent in both, but immediately changed his mind and held one back. I went to 3 life. My draw step yielded nothing, so I activated Connections. I drew Mutavault. Now I could block his attack and not die since he didn’t attack with both soldiers. Looking back, this was probably a mistake, as most of the cards I draw to win probably win eventually through the chump blocker. His turn was nothing, as he left both soldiers back. My turn had Nightveil Specter, and attack with Erebos. He blocked. His turn was attack with solider, which I blocked with Specter and then he cast Supreme Verdict. My draw was nothing, but I attacked him to 3 with Mutavault. He went draw go again. I drew Underworld Connections, and he slammed Negate to the delight of the watching crowd. I still attacked him down to 1. He passed again. I drew Nightveil Specter, which he had Dissolve for, but the Mutavault attacked him for the last point.

The spectators were dismayed to find we still had another game to play before the finals. While shuffling for Game 3, we found out that Chris Trevino had defeated Randall Gay to make it to the finals. We both were happy to not be facing the GR Monsters deck, as well as avoiding Tom Ross. I made the comment that the winner of this game would most likely win the PTQ, since I respect Austin as a player and didn’t know who Chris was. Then I mulliganed to 5. I felt dismayed, but knew that a quick Underworld Connections could get me out of it, as long as I didn’t get to far behind. We played land-go for two turns before I started with Thoughtsieze on turn 3. He revealed Jace, Jace, Elspeth, Revelation, Verdict, Verdict. His lands were Plains, Hallowed Fountain, and Mutavault. I realized I had a chance to win if he misses land drops, but I couldn’t take Jace to keep him off of additional lands since he had a backup. I couldn’t really decide on a good card to take, so I took Elspeth in case the game went long. His turn 3 he had no land drop. I played Underworld Connections and drew a card. He had Detention Sphere, but no land. I played Nightveil Specter. He had another Sphere, but still no land. I had Desecration Demon. He had no land. I attacked him to 12 with Mutavault, and played a second demon. When he missed his fourth land drop again, I had advanced to the finals!

8-0-2 (16-2)

Finals – Chris Trevino, BW Blood Baron

I offer everything I can (both boxes of Theros), but he wants to play. I’m beginning to think all those times I conceded in the finals of PTQs I was getting ripped off. Oh well, I never expect it to actually happen. I try to get into his head by asking “Have you ever been in the finals of a PTQ before?” He hasn’t, but doesn’t seem fazed. Game 1 I have a solid hand with two Pack Rats and Underworld Connections, but he Thoughtsiezes the enchantment and has Ratchet Bomb on turn two. I start attacking with a pair of Mutavaults and my lone Rat, getting him to 6 life before he resolves back to back Blood Barons, followed up by Elspeth. I die shortly after. I think I might have done better if I had forced him to use Ratchet Bomb and then played the second Rat, but he would have had more life and a Connections in play so I’m not sure it would have been a different result. I offer the product again after game 1, mostly as a joke, but it never hurts to ask. Game 2 he keeps a one lander with a scry land, but manages to draw out of it. My draw was very good, and he died to Demon before he could completely recover. Once again I offered the boxes for a concession and got nowhere.

Game 3 was the hardest game I played all day. I had an okay start with Thoughtsieze Erebos followed by Nightveil Specter., but he drew Elspeth off the top and I had a tough decision. I had taken a bunch of damage from Mutavault early, so my life was low and he was still at 20. My hand was two Underworld Connections and a Gray Merchant. Eventually, I decided to attack him with the Specter, which revealed a Duress. I saw his hand was just lands, and played Gray Merchant to stabilize at 12 life. He continued to make soldiers, and I tried to get ahead with Specter attacks and Erebos activations. Once he was low enough and I had the board clogged with Pack Rats, I started attacking with a couple of rats and Erebos as well to keep the soldier count down while Gray Merchant and a couple of Mutavaults held back on defense. Specter kept Elspeth from ultimating, and he keep blanking on draw steps. I made a mistake one turn by going down to 5 life and making a 4^th rat token. Neither one was a misplay by itself, but doing both together left me vunerable to a removal spell and -3 from Elspeth to kill my blockers and get exactly 5 damage through. His draw step was Dark Betrayal, which he used on my Gray Merchant, but he failed to attack with everyone. I traded my two Mutavaults for his two Mutavaults, then he wrathed my Rats with Elspeth. I had a backup pack rat in hand, and kept getting damage in with Nightveil Specter. Eventually the Specter went all the way, doing 12 damage over 8 attacks and he never drew an answer. I won!

So I’m qualified for the next two Pro Tours. This is the second time I’ve been in this situation, hopefully I can take better advantage of it this time. And after my streak of making top 8 of at least one PTQ a year since 2003 came to an end after last year, I can start a new streak with an exclamation mark.

Punt of the day:

I’d like to put my punt in game 3 of the finals, followed by the punt of my opponent to not kill me, but it was pretty hard to see and I think most spectators missed it too. So punt of the day is my Round 2 opponent tapping out at 4 life to blink his Aetherling in response to my Devour Flesh, letting me attack him for lethal with my two Mutavaults.