If you are unaware of what Old School Magic is, check out Eternal Central. I've been aware of the format for a few years now. I've played a few games for fun with other people's decks, and even attempted to build a deck a few years back. I never got around to finishing the deck since I didn't really have an opportunity to play. Because of a variety of factors, I finally got the chance this past Saturday.
Nostalgia
A big draw to the format for a lot of the players is the nostalgia. You get to play with cards that you haven't played with in 20 years, or maybe never got to play with before but always wanted to. Once I had decided to play the event, I began looking at decklists. One neat feature of the community is all the decklists are shared as photographs of the actual decks. This way you get to see all the cool old cards.
I was looking through lists while on a road trip back from Illinois. With the SiriusXM station Lithium playing non-stop 90s Alternative and Grunge music on the radio, looking at the decklists brought back the strongest sense of nostalgia. I felt like I was back in middle school, sitting in my bedroom just sorting and looking at all the cards I had collected. Or playing the Microprose Magic: The Gathering computer game. Some of the magic of the feeling is certainly the fond memories, but I like to think there is something inherent in the way the older cards look and feel that is very special.
My Deck
4-2 in my first old school event @AlamoCityOS . Format is interesting. pic.twitter.com/BwGI0ROXhv— Ty Thomason (@ceciliajupe) August 17, 2019
4 Initiates of the Ebon Hand
4 Order of the Ebon Hand
4 Black Knight
4 Erg Raiders
4 Hypnotic Spector
1 Royal Assassin
4 Bad Moon
4 Hymn to Tourach
3 Paralyze
1 Mind Twist
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Chaos Orb
4 Dark Ritual
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Jet
1 Urborg
2 Strip Mine
4 Mishra's Factory
12 Swamp
Sideboad:
4 The Rack
4 Disrupting Scepter
1 Sol Ring
1 Strip Mine
1 Icy Manipulater
1 Royal Assassin
1 The Abyss
2 Gloom
I really wanted to play Bad Moon for some reason. I had seen a lot of Mono Black lists, but most were slightly more midrange with fewer creatures, no Bad Moon, and The Rack maindeck. I have fond memories of casting Erg Raiders so it made sense as an additional creature to help make Bad Moon worth it. I tried some Stone-Throwing Devils at first, but quickly realized they just don't do enough on their own. After playing the event, I would say Bad Moon isn't worth it. It still dies to Disenchant, so overall I think The Rack is better.
A big part of the OS metagame is the 4 Stip Mine 4 Mishra's Factory that everyone seems to have to play. There are different variants in different parts of the community that have other rules, but the event I was at allowed all of the Strip Mines. Since I'm always very concerned about the manabase of the decks I build, and having to face opponents with 4 Strip Mine, I wanted to make sure I could cast my spells. This is why Initiats of the Ebon Hand made the cut over Stone-Throwing Devils. Also I kept the bigger spells out of the main deck: No Juzam Djinn or Sengir Vampire, no Icy Manipulator or Nevinyrral's Disk. Without those, the only card I'm realistically using Sol Ring for is Mind Twist, so I decided to leave Sol Ring in the sideboard. I think this was a fine choice, but once you go back to The Rack main you obviously would play Sol Ring main.
As for the rest of the weird cards, I wanted to play the cards I actually owned. The event was allowing for up to 10 proxies, but I only played the one Icy because it is the only one I owned that is legal. Same with the Royal Assassins: I have a Beta and an FBB and wanted to play them, but didn't play the white border ones. The 4th Strip Mine would have been a 4th Edition one, so I also didn't play that.
The Event
The event was held at the Freetail Brewery in San Antonio. One nice thing about the Old School community is having the events at bars or breweries. I enjoy having a beer or two when I play Magic, but too often its unavailable at the tournament site or I want to do well in the event so I save the drinks for afterwards. Freetail was a nice space with a good patio that somehow wasn't too hot despite being the middle of August in Texas. The beer was only okay, but the food they served was above average.
We played six rounds of swiss (the Swiss +1 format). I went 4-2. I'll try to recap what I remember.
R1 vs Jund LD
My low curve helped me win games 1 and 3 when we both end up mana screwed after some mutual Strip Mine. Hymn to Tourach also MVP.
1-0
R2 vs Troll-less Disco Troll
I quickly learn that I can't beat Nevinyrral's Disk, especially in conjunction with Rukh Egg.
1-1
R3 vs Mono Green Aggro
I draw enough creatures and Bad Moon to make my army bigger than his. I'm winning combat and he has to use Giant Growth to not die but that means I'm never in any danger from dying myself.
2-1
R4 vs Workshop Prison
I mulligan to five game one and he has Howling Mine plus Relic Barrier and I can't keep up. Game two I land a turn one Hyppie and he doesn't have the white mana for his Plow. The Hyppie goes all the way. Game three I have a very fast start with three dudes on turn two, plus a Hymn. I'm able to get him low enough before he can Fireball the team away that he's dead on the backswing to my Factories.
3-1
R5 vs RW Burn Control
He's got all the Bolts and Ball Lightning plus Wrath of God, etc. I win game one with Bad Moon plus Erg Raiders. Game two is very close, he top decks Wrath on the last possible turn and starts attacking back with factory, throwing some bolts at my face. I struggle to draw another creature but eventually land a Hyppie with him at 2 life. Unfortunately he top decks Lightning Bolt and it is enough to kill me. I win game three by casting two Hymns and he never draws enough action afterwards.
4-1
R6 vs Workshop Copy Artifact
I can't beat Triskelion plus Copy Artifact. I should probably be splashing blue for Energy Flux if I play the deck again.
4-2
I finished in 6th place, tied with 6 other people for 3rd-9th.
Thoughts on the Format
A few thoughts on stuff I like or don't like:
Having Chaos Orb flips to determine winner at the end of extra turns is fun, and I like that draws aren't allowed.
I've never been a fan of Swiss +1. I don't really see how it is better than normal Swiss once you eliminate draws. I dislike using tiebreakers in tournaments that are very short (6 or fewer rounds). I've spent many years trying to think of better tiebreaker systems (as have a lot of people) and never come up with better alternatives, but I do think doing prizes by final records without tiebreakers can work at casual events like these.
I think Strip Mine should be restricted. If that means restricting Mishra's Factory, that's probably also fine.
On the subject of Mishra's Factory, I had three opponents attempt to animate, block, and pump itself the turn they played their factory (you can't activate the pump ability because the creature has summoning sickness). This surprised me that it happened so frequently since it is such a commonly played card. I don't think there was any ill intentions and I hope everyone learns the way it works the more they play the format.
Playing Magic in the pre-Duress environment is so different. It's probably the single card that changed the way Magic was played the most (even over Force of Will).
The card pool is deep, but only for certain deck styles. I think aggro decks are at a huge disadvantage, with the number of playable creatures so low. I remember having fun on the Microprose game building 40 card decks with a 4 card limit. I think this is actually a pretty cool deck building challenge, as the difference between 2 and 3 and 4 really matters, you don't just jam 4 of all the good stuff and then enough filler to make the deck playable. I don't know if it could be a viable change to the format to do 40 card constructed, but maybe a special event or two could use that variant.
I like that the events are infrequent and there isn't much as far as playing online to help tune your deck. It's a lot more challenging (to me at least) without the reps, and feels closer to the old days of anything is possible and no real defined metagame.
More Old School?
I think I enjoyed the event enough to want to play Old School again. I don't know when the time will happen next but I'll keep my eye out for other events. With Vintage being in a bad place at the moment, maybe I'll prioritize Old School. I'm also more willing to check out the Middle School retro format now that I understand more what the events are all about. Unlike something like Frontier, the people playing Old School seem to really have a passion for the actually game play.
Thanks to Alamo City Old School for hosting the event. Props to Simon for winning with his sick miscuts and everyone else that showed up with the wide variety of decks.
Thanks
-Ty
