Friday Night Magic at Montag’s Games. I did play last week, but never got around to writing it up. The week before the field was thick with UW control, so I made the metagame choice and played Esper Control. This was a bad plan, as everyone else also had the notion that playing something bad for UW control was worth playing, and I never saw UW at all. It was ugly. I really should know better…
Anyway, I thought I should try Dredgevine once since I don’t have a lot of experience playing graveyard decks. The list:
Creatures
4 Birds of Paradise
4 Noble Hierarch
4 Hedron Crab
4 Fauna Shaman
4 Renegade Doppleganger
3 Merfolk Looter
4 Sedraxis Spectre
2 Bloodbraid Elf
4 Vengevine
4 Extractor Demon
Land
3 Forest
5 Island
1 Mountain
2 Swamp
2 Ancient Ziggurat
4 Misty Rainforest
2 Scalding Tarn
4 Verdant Catacombs
Sideboard
2 Pithing Needle
3 Calcite Snapper
2 Obstinate Baloth
3 Unified Will
3 Marsh Casualties
2 Back to Nature
My 9-year-old son is learning to play and he asked me before I left what colors I was playing, and I told him “everything but white.” Even he thought that sounded like a bad idea. Too funny.
Round 1: Tony playing Jund
Game 1 I took a one-lander because I had multiple mana dorks. He got a turn 3 Sparkmage. It took me a very long time to draw another land, though I drew a lot of mana dorks, all of which he killed. Just dumb. Game 2 I won. Game 3 was my karmic payback for game 1. On turn 2 I cracked a fetch with a Crab in play and hit 3 Vengevines. Needless to say, I won this one.
1-0 matches (2-0 games)
Round 2: Kris playing Esper Control
Game 1 I just rolled him, blowing up with Extractor Demons and such. Game 2 was my punt of the day (maybe). Pretty drawn out game, but he got my board cleared except for a Crab with him at 6. He started beating me up with manlands and had me down to 3. I was dead next turn and needed some action. I drew a fetch, and scooped. Today’s lesson: do not scoop! I should have played the fetch, because I had the mana available to unearth two Extractors or an Extractor and a Spectre. My library wasn’t that big and had probably two of each left. Dumb. Karmic retribution was swift. Game 3 I saw 17 cards, 15 of which were land and mana dorks. Gah.
1-1 (3-2)
Round 4: Hunter, playing UG Ramp
I saw basically none of his deck. I killed him on turn 4 or 5 in the first game, then on like turn 6 in the second game. Literally the only thing he ever did in the entire match was ramp. Deck was smokin’.
2-1 (5-2)
Round 5: Joe Bass, playing Wr control
I always get the worst draws against Joe. Game 1 he got Ajani Vengeant out and went ultimate as I wasn’t drawing enough heat. That was a reasonable scoop. Game 2 he dropped a Relic of Progenitus on the first turn. Urk. I had a great mill the first turn with two Vengevines and an Extractor, but I never got to use them. I did make a sideboarding mistake, though, so it wasn’t just that Joe lucksacked. I didn’t side in the Back to Natures, which I should have, since at one point I had I think two Vengevines under O Rings. Doh. Anyway, it was awful, and it meant I would miss the top 8 since my tiebreakers sucked (Tony went 1-2 drop).
2-2 (5-4)
Round 6: Doug, playing Dredgevine
I won the die roll, and game 1 we both got early Crabs and dumped stuff and it was just a simple race, which I won very narrowly. If I hadn’t killed him that turn he had lethal ready to go on the swingback. Blocking? What’s blocking? Anyway, Game 2 I boarded in 3 Marsh Casualties and he had a bad start: he had three Crabs but only 2 land for a two turns. He finally drew land, but then I kicked a Marsh Casualties and cleared his board, then swung in for the win since he had no blockers.
3-2 (7-4)
I finished 12th out of 27, I think. What really ticked me off is that the top 8 was really weak, including Kris. I think playing not just different decks, but completely different styles of deck every week, is not doing anything great for my development of play skill, since I seem to be making more mistakes in constructed than in limited of late, which is unlike me—I’m usually better at constructed. Need to go back to something familiar next week for the last hurrah of Alara block. I’m thinking Mythic, since I’ve seen exactly nobody playing it of late.