I hate you Silvergill Adept, and the decks you belong to.













It was another long week in Magic. I played in 3 events: Standard at Guardian Games on Friday, Legacy at Portal on Saturday, and Standard again at Guardian Games on Sunday. I played a lot of Magic, and I'm definitely feeling a little burnt out.

FNM

I ran my usual Jund Wolf Run deck on Friday, despite recent suggestions that I should try something different. I scored 3-1-1, placing 4th after losing to Henry Romero in the finals.


The draw came from Zach Ledesma running U/W Delver in Round 2. Zach seemed to be running the usual goodies, but my deck performed subpar. Our match went to time control and we were unable to finish. However, I think I would have won the match if we had had more time; my board position was dominant when the last of the five turns expired.


This was my first “non-win” against Delver in seven matches.


Zach beat me at last week’s FNM with RUG Ramp, so this draw was particularly painful because I really wanted to get revenge.

"I'll have my revenge if I have to call on every force from above and below."


You tell 'em, Kaalia.


Anyway,



I continued winning until I met Henry Romero in the finals. This particular tournament, Henry was undefeated with his BUG Zombie Pod list. I was 3-0-1, and thus, declined Henry’s draw offer when he presented it.


I won the first game of the match, but simply could not get past the speed and strength of Henry's deck in Games 2 and 3, and thus, I lost the match 1-2. Henry went undefeated, and I claimed fourth place.

Not terrible, but not great either.  I picked up a Chrome Mox.

Legacy

What a fucked up format. This was my first Legacy tournament ever, and my first time visiting Portal Games in downtown Portland. I had played a bunch of Legacy online, but OTB (“over the board”) play is always more intense.


I chose to play Legacy because I want to start testing for the SCG Open. The SCG Open prize pool is simply too high to miss out on—$2,400 for first place. Need to practice.


I played Merfolk because I had no idea what else to play, and I should probably try everything at least once. So me and the fishies tried our luck at Portal.


In Legacy, some decks are just unbeatable in Game 1.


Case in point: Dredge. On the play, turn 1, my opponent casts Lion's EyeDiamond, sacrifices it, and flashes back Faithless Looting, dredging a ton. I was just too far behind and conceded soon thereafter. I don’t know if there was really anything I could have done.


Game 2 was hilarious because (after removing my opponent's graveyard from the game with a Relic of Progenitus and with three cards left in my opponent's deck) I cast a Standstill, then a Coralhelm Commander. My opponent was forced to draw the remaining cards in his deck, and therefore, lost the game on the following turn. Death by milling is always fun.


Game 3 was more straightforward, as I drew enough Relics of Progenitus and Tormod’s Crypts to keep my opponent from gaining any traction. I won the match 2-0.


I played 2 additional opponents in this tournament, losing to RUG Delver and B/W Stoneblade before dropping. I made several mistakes along the way, but learned a lot about this format and the various card interactions involved.

Sunday Funday

Sunday came and it was time for another Standard tournament at Guardian Games. After brewing the night before I concluded that Jund Ramp was still the deck I wanted to play. However, having been soundly beaten by Romero on Friday, I made some adjustments to the sideboard to deal with the anticipated prevalence of Zombies. Specifically, I added 2 copies of Grafdigger’s Cage.


Unfortunately, I didn’t really play against Zombies the entire tournament. Instead, I played against three U/W Delver decks and a U/B Heartless Summoning deck. My path to the top was especially difficult in this tournament—I played against Adam Brown, Glesty Waters, Henry Freedman, and David Stroud; all veteran opponents. I drew with Ryan Engbrecht in the finals to take a share of first place.


I don’t really feel like describing the Delver matchups because I’ve done so in past entries and it should be obvious by now that I just prey on those decks. Once I play a Cavern of Souls (naming “Giant”) and resolve a PrimevalTitan fetching Glimmerpost, I feel like the game is just over for U/W Delver. Vapor Snag doesn’t really help as I just resolve the same Titan on the following turn, gaining even more life. Honestly, if I were playing Delver right now, I’d seriously consider going back to the Esper version for removal.


I played against David Stroud in the semi-finals. His deck was insanely fast and I’m honestly not sure how I survived game 1. David played a Heartless Summoning and a Myr Superion on turn 2, and another Heartless Summoning and 2 Solemn Simulacrums on turn 3. All the card draw meant that David was able to cast a Wurmcoil Engine and 2 Phyrexian Metamorphs on turn 4. I could do nothing but throw blockers in front of his Wurmcoils until I had enough mana to kill him with an Inkmoth Nexus and Kessig Wolf Run. A timely Beast Within destroyed the Staff of Nin and cleared the path to victory. The game was kind of epic.


Game 2 was basically won with a Blasphemous Act. David said that I should have sideboarded the Blasphemous Act out, but I think that was just emotion talking. Being able to kill all your opponent’s creatures for almost no mana, and then casting an Inferno Titan to kill three little Wurm tokens is pretty damn good. We ended up in a position where neither one of us had cards in our hand, and we were just topdecking for the win. I drew the first threat, a Solemn, and then a Green Sun’s Zenith on the next turn sealed the win.


I drew with Ryan in the finals, saving the Zombie rematch for another time.


I received two Goblin Piledrivers as a prize. More legacy tasties.


There you have it. Another weekend of MTG in the books. Until next time….