The Road to 
Snowbraska
Hello
everyone and welcome back to Write of Consumption! First, I want to say thanks
to everyone who attended the, uh, ‘Farm tick’ (I can’t resist, Dave. I’m
actually starting to warm up to it now. It burrows into your brain and just
stays there like a, well, you know…). [Ed: gots to get a new acronym…] Congratulations are in order for On the Boat,
the winning team, who bested the team from Enchanted Grounds, Jeff’s Private
Reserve in the draft. Well done guys. I myself was battered and bruised by the
experience, going 4-4 in the Swiss. I want to say that it was an honor to
represent the
This edition marks the first installment of ‘The
Road to
On this trip: The almost unsolvable at 20 questions
Conley Woods, Raine Lourie fresh from his top 8 at the Denver PTQ earlier in
the season, and Conley’s good friend Mark. I’d only met him the week before
when I had been testing with them in
A gamer games always
If
you’ve never played the mana cost game on a road trip with a bunch of Magic
players then I suggest you do so as it is challenging, absurdly time consuming,
and an absolute blasty blast. It’s very simple: one person names a mana cost,
say 1B, and names a card at that cost, like bitterblossom. Each player takes
turns naming a card at that exact cost and is out if they cannot in a
reasonable amount of time (one of us would just shout out “ten!” to clock the
person who hadn’t produced a card after a random period of silence, followed by
“five!” a few moments later). You have to have a name; a description of the
card does not count. Now, outside the basics there are some strategic moments
that can be utilized. “Coat-tailing” is taking the obvious next card in a cycle
or series of analogous cards instead of the obscure backbreaker you’re sitting
on. You say cruel edict, I say chainer’s edict and hold nightscape familiar or
whatever until later. We used up several hours at a clip playing, only to
discover the car was cold to Conley’s superior recall.
After
everyone was tired of taking a beating, we switched it up. Magic 20 questions.
We stumbled through Conley’s first card, Wee Dragonauts, for what seemed like
hours, asking terrible question after terrible question, allowing Conley to
assimilate what he was hearing and promptly bust the format. It wasn’t long
before the whole thing degenerated into attempt after attempt at trying to
stump Conley, and the theme would continue the whole trip. We were gonna get
him, it was just a question of finding the right card…
A robot in winter
Like
you all I was under the impression it was like, what, May or June here in the
My
list this time out:
4 ornithopter
4 arcbound worker
4 arcbound ravager
4 master of etherium
4 frogmite
4 myr enforcer
4 springleaf drum
4 cranial plating
4 thoughtseize
3 thoughtcast
3 chromatic star
16 artifact lands
2 glimmervoid
sideboard:
4 ethersworn canonist
3 path to exile
3 krark-clan shaman
3 hurkyl’s recall
2 stifle
Tarmo- what? Is that a breakfast food…?
This is probably the most well developed build I’ve
ever played with the deck, and I have to give a shout out to Eric Weeden and
Brett Piazza for their overall input and insight, as well as continuing to
support the Thoughtseizes main. Game 1, turn 1 Thoughtseize happened a lot
throughout the day, and it was ridiculous almost all the time. In fact, one of
the times I could have cast it on turn 1 but didn’t it actually cost me a game,
and possibly the match…
Round 1 – Donnie playing mono U faeries (hmm…seems
familiar somehow)
Game 1: I keep a one lander on the play and make a
worker, and he suspends ancestral visions. I draw a land on my next turn just
like I planned and he is crestfallen as a cranial plating materializes in front
of him. Several Ornithopters later he succumbs. Then comes the first bad
decision: I don’t board in the Paths, which is terrible since the plan is to
keep Sower of Temptation from blowing me out, and be able to save Thoughtseize
for Hurkyl’s Recall and the like, but I just let it ride. But what’s far worse
is what it could have done for me in game 2…
Game 2: I have a vault and Thoughtseize in my
opener, and hold off seizing to deploy artifacts instead. He fetches for a
Hallowed Fountain and untaps, and I am utterly devastated to see Kataki appear
before me. And I’m not drawing an out anytime soon either. Punt number 2.
Game 3: On the play I seize a Spell Snare, which
paves the way for a Plating to resolve, and my mistake is illustrated to me
again. 2 seizes later and he’s still managed a Spellstutter Sprite holding a
mother-loving Jitte with 4 counters. But I’ve drawn literally a squadron of Myr
Enforcers, so this is a situation where I should be able to race. But then the
final, sickening, fate-sealing punt: I have 4 or 5 lands, two Enforcers, one
wearing plate. Before combat I play some small artifacts and bash, and his
Jitte proceeds to kill the plated Enforcer, and he takes 4. I look down at my
untapped Glimmervoid, and then over to the tapped Vault of Whispers I used to
play some trinkets, and then the surviving Enforcer…
L 1-2, (0-1) – It’s disappointing when your deck
gives you the tools to win, and you don’t have the vision to use them…
Round 2 – Dustin playing affinity
My opponent this round was a nice kid, and a casual
player who didn’t have a firm grasp on how to use the stack during combat. Once
I understood that, I tried to be the helpful older player/teacher, explaining
why his attacker didn’t deal any damage to me even after he Pathed my blocker
away after it had been declared as a blocker. He was receptive, thanking me for
setting him straight. I came away feeling like I had helped a younger player
gain insight on the game (all together now: aawwwww…).
W 2-0, (1-1) – I didn’t even sideboard against him.
It seemed mean.
Round 3 – Jerry playing mono U faeries
Game
1: I played 20 power in robots by turn 3, and in response he began to
sideboard.
Game
2: I walk a Worker, Frogmite and Master into Damnation, and once again a Sprite
carrying a legendary pointy stick makes surprisingly quick work of me.
Game
3: My favorite game of the whole tournament. Turn 1 and 2 Thoughtseize strip
him of a Hurkyl’s Recall and Engineered Explosives and I dance around the
counters I left in his hand while deploying my threats (which really is nothing
more than dropping the Frogmites in my hand onto the table). I fight through a
Cryptic Command and a freshly drawn Recall, which stops his life from falling
past zero. Defiantly I press on, becoming more determined and deciding I’m
going to win no matter what. We go back and forth, trading game-breaking plays
and last second answers, and the war of attrition leaves us both in topdeck
mode with nothing in play. My deck rewards my faith with a fresh Master of
Etherium, and a stream of Mutavaults from the top of his deck save him over and
over, until I finally attack into an empty board and he extends his hand.
Nonchalantly he looks at the top of his deck: Riptide Laboratory. Oh yeah.
W 2-1, (2-1) – That win wouldn’t have been even
close to possible without Path to Exile. It did exactly what it was supposed to
do and it did it well.
Round 4 – Cody playing affinity
This
match was less compelling so I won’t break it down in the interest of saving
space, but unlike round 2 my opponent was not a casual player. I was given even
more evidence that Thoughtseize in game 1 really is the business, as I took a
Fatal Frenzy a turn before I would have died, and it took a Hurkyl’s Recall
from him in game 2. With a little acting about how surprised and devastated I
am to see that in the mirror, I walk him into my own Recall and a blowout of
epic proportions.
W 2-0, (3-1) – I really wouldn’t mind seeing the
mirror more this season.
Round 5 – Zac playing Slide (Osyp’s list exactly)
This
seems to be a horrific matchup for me, especially if he sees an actual Astral
Slide. Combat comes to halt, his evoked Cloudthresher deals me 4 and stays
around to party, while all my relevant cards are removed from the game. Just
awful. Not a lot to say here.
L 0-2, (3-2) – If I wasn’t an idiot this would have
been my only loss so far, but now I’m out of it. Zac proceeded to top 8 and
knock Raine out in the quarterfinals. What a jerk, man…
Round 6 – Jim playing uh, “Stuffed swans” – his
words not mine
Game
1: Another turn 1 seize shows me 2 Stuffy Dolls, 2 Chain of Plasma, a Skred and
some lands, but no red sources, making it even easier to take a Doll.
Unfortunately my hand is a little slow and if he can get the other Doll online
there could be trouble. He Rune Snags my first couple plays all while not
drawing any more land, and when my threats finally start resolving they are of
the bigger variety. When a Snow-Covered Mountain finally shows up his Skreds
can do nothing more than kill Frogmites. He obviously should have shipped that
hand.
Game
2: Yet ANOTHER turn 1 seize, and I see a Stuffy Doll, a Guilty Conscience (!!),
and 5 lands. Alright then. I leave him with his enchantment and go to work.
Another Thoughtseize and wrapping it up is academic.
W 2-0, (4-2) – This version of swans seemed clunky,
like it was trying to achieve too many combos in one deck.
Round 7 – Jason playing Bant aggro
I
had been reading that I was considered to be favored in this match-up, but
things did not bear out that way. I started off in game 1 with a turn 1 Thoughtseize
(yeah really) that took a Trygon Predator (!?), only to have him rip another. I
actually outraced it with triple Master, and while he was killing them all my
other men managed to get him too low for him to stop a timely Ravager from
finishing it.
I’m a game
away from salvaging a respectable 5-2 record, and wouldn’t you know who shows
up to dash my hopes and dreams. The last turn 1 Thoughtseize of the day (I
swear it’s true. I’m not fudging it for the sake of the story) shows me 2
Katakis, and they would lead him to victory in that game and the third as well.
L 1-2, (4-3) – Final record
The wages of sin is death
It’s
a fallacy now to assume I’ll only see the bogeyman out of aggressive strategies,
and not something like the Fae (although to be fair, extended faeries is more
aggro-control than true control). My approach has to adjust again, and our next
stop is
The card that felled a tree
Squandered
Resources: 14 questions.
Elder
Pine of Jukai: 17 questions.
Puppet
Conjurer: 19 questions.
Basic
Mountain : 4 questions (we tried to get cute. Bad strategy).
I
actually took Conley to 20 on the most savage decoy in the legal format (you
had to think of card from Extended). Black creature for 5, power of 3, toughness of 2,
has evasion and a triggered ability. He even got the set: Lorwyn/Shadowmoor
block. It’s got to be Shriekmaw, right? No sir.
Without
looking, take a guess…
Go
on, I’ll wait.
Did
you say Nightshade Schemers? That’s a good guess but it would be wrong.
He
used up all 20 questions and thought long and hard about it before uttering
“…Is it Puppeteer Clique?”
Damn
it all to hell.
No,
the credit for busting Conley would go to Eric Weeden, for sinking him at Old
Chicago’s after the tournament while we were throwing down on some delicious pizza
and thirst-quenching barley pop.
Aven
Mindcensor, ladies and gentlemen. He’s mortal after all.
Something
about that gas station seems off…
In
the deep of the night on the way back, hundreds of miles from safety, running
low on gas, we had no choice but to venture upon a dimly-lit, ancient looking
gas station sitting against the edge of a misty patch of foreboding woods with
ghostly, pale white trees. It was one of those gas stations with the old analog
pumps that look like big white robots out of some 50’s science fiction movie.
We pulled up closer to the door in the low dusky light, the hair standing up on
our necks, not sure if it was open or not. It occurred to me the scene wouldn’t
have been out of place in the video games Resident Evil or Silent Hill.
I
wasn’t sure if I was actually seeing dark, shambling forms slowly shuffling out
of the woods or if it was in my head, but judging by the wide eyes of my
car-mates it seemed to be a distinct possibility.
In
a crazed moment of pseudo-panic Conley, who was driving and may have seen the
same things I was seeing, cranked the wheel and sped us out of there, not
willing to entertain the notion a moment longer. We were in no position to
battle zombies at that hour, low on gas and flame rounds.
We
made it out of
Next: The glorious destruction of
Until then, play tight, draw well, and I’ll see you
on the beach.
JD- Team
Respond to this article in the forums here!