Favourite Deck: Elves (Modern & Legacy)
Standard: New Perspectives Combo
Modern: GW Hatebears | Death and Taxes | Eldrazi and Taxes | Abzan Liege | Abzan Company
Commander: The Gitrog Monster (Combo) | Noyan Dar, Roil Shaper (Control) | RIP Leovold Sultai (Elvestorm, no unfair locks) | Mono G (Yisan or Titania)
Tiny Leaders: Too many decks to keep track of
Pauper: RIP UR Drake | Mono B | GBx Goodstuff | Jund "Melira"
Finished a disappointing 9-6 at GP Vancouver. Here are the decks I faced:
Day 1
Round 1 - Beat Jund 2-0
Round 2 - Beat Abzan Midrage 2-0
Round 3 - Lost to Infect 1-2
Round 4 - Beat Mono Red Burn 2-1
Round 5 - Beat Dredge 2-1
Round 6 - Lost to a weird Jund deck 1-2
Round 7 - Lost to Mono Red Burn 0-2
Round 8 - Beat Merfolk 2-0
Round 9 - Beat Abzan Midrange 2-1
Day 2
Round 10 - Opponent failed to show. Won by forfeit 2-0.
Round 11 - Lost to Eldrazi Tron 0-2
Round 12 - Beat Ad Nauseum 2-1
Round 13 - Beat Boggles 1-0 (its a lengthy story with me winning with :40 seconds left in the round)
Round 14 - Lost to Ad Nauseum 0-2
Round 15 - Lost to a strange Naya Midrange deck 0-2
If anyone wants specifics on any particular match, I did a short one or two paragraph write up in my notes.
After a 4-1 solid start, I finished a disappointing 5-5 in the remaining matches. Overall for the tournament, 9-6 matches, 19-16 games.
Boy, after watching all the Death's Shadow Aggro at the Vancouver Top 8, I'm grateful we have Elvish Champion. That would be a staple in going up against DSA.
Actually, it seems like a fast go-wide strategy like ours may be decent against the deck generally. Depends on how fast they can race, I guess. Or maybe the hand disruption is just too much for Elves to deal with?
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Playing UX Mana Denial until Modern gets the answers it needs.
WUBRG Humans BRW Mardu Pyromancer UW UW "Control" UR Blue Moon
Boy, after watching all the Death's Shadow Aggro at the Vancouver Top 8, I'm grateful we have Elvish Champion. That would be a staple in going up against DSA.
Actually, it seems like a fast go-wide strategy like ours may be decent against the deck generally. Depends on how fast they can race, I guess. Or maybe the hand disruption is just too much for Elves to deal with?
So the new Death's Shadow deck is much more like an aggressive variant of Jund. It has disruption, removal, and a couple threats. We tend to be very good against this style of strategy. Elves is redundant enough to deal with the hand hate and removal, as we have learned from playing jund. Yes, this deck is faster, but without Temur Battlerage (they only play two) I don't see it being a bad matchup. But this is all speculation.
I see a few lists popping up without caverns these days. Maybe I'm answering my own question, but with the lack of counterspells in the meta do people feel pretty comfortable without them?
I see a few lists popping up without caverns these days. Maybe I'm answering my own question, but with the lack of counterspells in the meta do people feel pretty comfortable without them?
Possibly, but with the recent popularity of Chalice of the Void, cutting them sounds dicey to me. That alone would be enough for me to run full set if I had $250 to drop on it.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Playing UX Mana Denial until Modern gets the answers it needs.
WUBRG Humans BRW Mardu Pyromancer UW UW "Control" UR Blue Moon
I finished 12-3 at GP Vancouver this weekend, playing Abzan Elves, and squeaking in to Top 32 at 29th place. Super happy with my second 12-3/Top 32 with the deck (came in 32nd at GP Indianapolis last year, playing G/W)!
I didn't take notes throughout the tournament, but I'll try to recall as many details as I can here. I came in with two byes, won round 3, and faced a friend on Ad Nauseam in round 4. Game 1 was very close, I had a fast start, but with no way to disrupt his combo maindeck (other than Shaman of the Pack's favorable interaction with Angel's Grace), I lost. In Game 2, I was faced with the decision on my turn 4 of playing a Phyrexian Revoker to stop him from using his Lotus Bloom that was about to come off suspend, and Chording for the win on my next turn, or passing after attacking and likely needing to use the Chord for an Eidolon of Rhetoric if he tried to go off. I chose to play the Revoker, but with him having had three lands in play and a Pentad Prism on 2, I should have more strongly considered the options, as all it took was him playing a land to win with Angel's Grace/Ad Naus.
Round 6 I played against Boggles. He won the die roll and took a quick game 1, as did I for game 2. Game 3 I was faced with the most difficult mulliganing decision I think I've ever made – after going to 6, my hand was: Chord of Calling, Llanowar Elves, Dwynen's Elite, 2x Heritage Druid, and a Fracturing Gust. Now I, like many of you I'm sure, keep one-land hands all the time, but I think this is the first time I've kept a no-land hand, especially at an important tournament like this. My reasoning, which I stand behind, was that I was unlikely to win on a mulligan to 5, and this hand was pretty great both in general and for this matchup. If I hit my first and third land drop (with a scry, mind you), I would have a turn 3 Fracturing Gust, if I hit my first and second, I'd have that option or a turn 3 Chord for 3. Long story short, I kept, scried an Ezuri, Renegade Leader to the bottom, his turn one Boggle was followed by a draw... Cavern of Souls! My amazing luck ran out quickly enough, however, when he played a turn 3 Gaddock Teeg (which used to be a mainstay of Elves sideboards as well), and I lost the game with four non-creature spells stuck in my hand.
I finished Day 1 7-2 after rattling off a few more wins (in no particular order, my other matches that day were Burn, Merfolk, Grixis Control, G/B Tron, and Titan Shift), and was hopeful going into Day 2 – I had gone into Day 2 of GP Indianapolis with the same record, and won five matches in a row before falling to 12-3 in the final round. I started Day 2 with two wins, then in round 12 played against an Eternal Command desk (list was similar to this, for those unfamiliar with the deck). My opponent won the die roll, and must have resolved Electrolyze against me over ten times throughout the match through various Aether Vial, Eternal Witness, and Snapcaster Mage shenanigans. Needless to say, I lost, the matchup seemed terrible, so although my Top 8 dreams were dashed, I didn't feel as if there was much I could have done and went into Round 13 as clear-headed as I could. I played another friend, this time on Jund, and got quite lucky when his draw step Kolaghan's Command to make me discard and shock my Dwynen's Elite revealed a topdecked Chord for Ezuri to regenerate the Elite. Round 14 I overran Shaun McLaren on Eldrazi Tron, and to round out my luck beat R/G Tron (what an awful matchup) in the final round.
I'm fairly exhausted now after a long weekend and drive back home, but I'm happy to answer any questions you all have tomorrow, and if there's interest I can do a run-through of my deck-building decisions after a lot of testing (the TL;DR is that Copperhorn Scout is the real deal and I highly suggest trying it out). Cheers!
Nice job Duckalope with the finish! Interesting list with Copperhorn in there. Had you already decided to eschew Nettle Sentinels and were looking for something better there? I know that it has been debated for awhile now that they're not as necessary as once thought, and I could see the Scout being more effective if you get the chance to swing with it. I play just the GB list that's extremely close to Syreal94's and like the idea of staying to just 2 colors but man...white has SB options that really just take care of anything you need it to. My SB really has no good way to deal with Storm, although in my meta it's not very popular(especially now post ban) but it's still a rough one. Because of how much tron is out there I have been using a few Beast Within to attack their mana but as mentioned a few pages ago I think Fulminator Mage would be much better since I can hit it with Coco or Chord it out.
Guys, i have debated on this same forum months and months ago about including 1x Magus of the moon into the main deck and 1x in the sideboard. I am seeing alot of weird and non-basic manabase in the meta at the moment. It could give us an edge over them very quickly and ensure a game 1. What do you guys think? And how can we include this in our deck without screwing our manabase? Any suggestions would be much appreciated.
And wanted to do something like that but trying to add black into the mix for the shaman. But i dunno if it is possible. If you guys see it viable and if anyone can help give insight on this/Any suggestions would be much appreciated
Unless your opponent is using red spells based deck or at leats 1 or 2 basic lands which i am not seeing in the meta at the moment..i doubt they will have the means to destroy the creature. And most probably they are dead by the time they manage to get the means to destroy the magus.
First image is myself and Taufik from Indonesia facing off in the feature match area at 8-0. He beat me 2-0 with Cheerios, having the Echoing Truths for my Eidolon in G2!
The second imagine is starting Round 12 10-1 on table one against none other than Lee Shi Tian.
I'll cherish these memories and use them to drive me further. Gotta love the boys in green!
First image is myself and Taufik from Indonesia facing off in the feature match area at 8-0. He beat me 2-0 with Cheerios, having the Echoing Truths for my Eidolon in G2!
The second imagine is starting Round 12 10-1 on table one against none other than Lee Shi Tian.
I'll cherish these memories and use them to drive me further. Gotta love the boys in green!
Still in post-GP depression myself.
Unrelated upside: Match report coming sometime tomorrow. Going to be entertaining to read I hope.
I am very interesting in your deck with the Copperhorn Scout.
So this night I tried it (more or less) on Xmage. Only three games. Three win against Merfolk (2-0) GW Soul Sisters (2-0) and affinity (2-1).
In the first game against GW Soul Sisters I had two scout on the board and playing with them I was able to activate ezuri's overrun seven times
Never had before a 22/22 Elvish Mystic
Main Differences:
1) Manabase
2) Main Selfless spirit
3) Bestiary instead of Lead (For my first test better respect to Grixis Jund/Abzan and especially against all midrange/control decks)
Let me know what you think about these changes
Well in theory i'm liking the deck. Seems weird for me not to have nettle sentinel but i have been thinking about adding copperhorn scout for awhile now because they give us a way to block, convoke for chord or adding mana with heritage druid and re-use archdruid after attacking thus giving us an edge over certain decks. I could see this working out. Need to test it out. In MB i would: -1 chord of calling, +1 lead the stampeede. Regarding the manabase...i dunno, i fell in love with westvale abbey, i have my doubts if nykthos really adds to the deck...i don't know if fetches are really necessary. Regarding SB i would do the following: -1 viscera seer, -2 fracturing gust, +1 reclamation sage, +1 chord of calling, -1 lifecrater's bestiary, +2 stain the mind (i can't tell how many times it saved games).
Hey guys, long time reader and first time post. I've been playing Elves for the better part of 7 months now and just finished 6-0-2 at the Hobbytown Open in Lincoln, NE. Up until last week I had been playing G/W Elves with a Reid Duke-esque type sideboard with Pay No Heeds, Paths, Stony, and RIP. After going 4-4 drop at regionals in Minneapolis, I made the decision to switch to the G/B build. I decided this week I would test out the pokedex in the main to see if it could replace Lead the Stampede. I saw some earlier posts in this forum where people were having success and decided to test it against a sizable meta.
Hobbytown was 7 round swiss and then cut to top 8 with a healthy attendance of 122 people. Here's the list I ran
Alright so as I said, I had a pretty successful Sunday. I only lost two games on the day and went undefeated to a top 4 split. The two biggest things I took away from this tournament is that I'm now a believer in Shaman of the Pack and the pokedex seems really good. I was skeptical about pokedex before the tournament, but I was proven wrong every time I had it on the board. I even got comments from a couple opponents on how insane the pokedex is for Elves.
Round 1 - Merfolk 2-1
I was on the play and was able to company into an ezuri. By turn 4 I was able to swing for 40+.
The second game, the merfolk player was able to get 3 lords and a couple master of waves. I was unable to handle it. The third game I was able to coco and disrupt his early board (he had metallic mimic that I rec saged). After that I was able to get a wide board and cast a shaman of the pack to drain him.
Sideboard: In 2 Inquisition of Kozilek, 2 Reclamation Sage; Out 2 Lifecrafter's Beastiary, 2 Nettle Sentinel. I kept the same sideboard for game 3.
Round 2 - Affinity 2-0
I was able to steal game 1 on an amazing turn 3. By the end of turn 3 I had a three archdruids, an ezuri and a wide board. I was able to get him down to 4 and passed the turn. He was only able to hit me for 15 (while I was at 16 life) and scooped. The second game the pokedex and shaman helped me. I was able to scry away lands and top deck pokedex gas to draw two companys. Once the companies went off, I was able to destroy a steel overseer (rec sage) and take over the board.
Sideboard: In 2 Fracturing Gust, 2 Reclamation Sage; Out 2 Lifecrafter's Bestiary, 2 Nettle.
Round 3 - G/R Tron 2-0
I am quite lucky to get the 2-0 on this match up. Fortunately Shaman of the pack did wonders in these games. The first game I have a good opening hand with archdruid and shaman, the tron player nevers saw an O-stone or a pyroclasm so I was able to buld my board. On turn 3 I cast shaman to drain him for 7 life down to 13. On his turn he had tron and cast wurmcoil engine and passed back. On my turn 4 I drew a coco and passed turn, because I didn't want to swing into his wurmcoil. On his turn he cast Karn to exile my archdruid, in response I tapped and cast coco to find another archdruid and another shaman. So he goes down to 4 life. He passes the turn and I top deck a shaman to drain him. Game two he was able to pyroclasm turn 2 but I had the tools to refill my board. I was able to get in damage before tron and play shaman to take game 2.
Sideboard: In 2 Thoughtseize, 2 Heroic Intervention; Out 4 Nettles (I was planning on putting the nettles in for game 3 to up the chances of combo.)
Round 4 - Abzan Company 2-0
I was able to double company and overrun with Ezuri in game 1. Game 2 I was able to turn 1 inquisition to find a e. witness and a Orzhov in hand. I had him pitch the E. Witness. I very carefully was able to play around pontiff. He had it go three times to clear my board, but my conservative play allowed to refill. He fortunately wasn't hitting any of his threats on top deck and only hit a wall of roots on his first coco. I cast lifecrafter's after pontiff was off the board and was able to unload and refill my hand. I drew a chord and two shaman off the bestiary and bottomed lands on the upkeep scry. I was able to chord for a shaman for 8 life loss.He was able to coco again and found a anafenza with a seer already on the board for him. Fortunately he passed it back and I was able to cast double shaman for the win.
Sideboard: In 2 Inquisition, 1 Relic of Progenitus; Out 2 Nettle, 1 Lifecrafter's.
Round 5 - Merfolk 2-1
This one was not looking good from the start. I was on the draw and I got hosed the first game with a waves, two lords, and spreading seas for islandwalk. The second game I was able to get pokedex out and let it do its thing. This probably is the reason I won the second game. I was able to chain off draws on turn three that let me go nuts on turn 4 to seal the win. The third game I got the pokedex out and got value off the scry and was able to double cast shaman of the pack for the win.
Sideboard: Actually made a mistake here. I had the pile of what I was putting in and taking out of sideboard and I accidently kept my main the same and kept the sideboard cards out. Which thinking about it wouldn't be bad for when I was on the play game 2, but really got fortunate with being on the draw game 3. So no sideboard for these games.
Round 6 & 7 - ID'd
There were only 4 people left at x-0 and we did the math and we were able to draw out to top 8.
Top 8 - Grixis Control 2-0
Game one was typical of my first rounds with control. I was able to beat down before they could do much of anything. The second game I kept my opening 7 as I had a Overgrown Tomb, Horizon Canopy, heroic intervention, visionary, two dorks, and a shaman of the pack. I slow rolled putting out an elf a turn and keeping mana open for the heroic intervention. He had an unusual start where he thought scoured twice and serum visioned, while playing two islands. I was able to get an early cavern in play for any protection from counters. He missed his third land drop, which afforded to me to get a decent amount of damage in. He was able to bolt my archdruid, but I held out the intervention for an anger of the gods. By turn 6 he dropped his 5th land and passed the turn. He failed to cryptic the turn before, but I suspected he had cryptic in hand. At this point I was going in on the heroic intervention and really wanted to bait him into it. So my opponent is at 11 life and I cast Shaman with cavern mana, which drops his life to 4. Before combat he cryptic taps and draws a card. I have two mana open. I pass the turn and my opponent drops his sixth land and remarks "I might as well do it now" and plays Anger. I cast heroic intervention in response and my opponent is silent for a few moments and calmy remarks he made a mistake. My opponent had collective brutality in hand and a snapcaster, which he didn't have a spell (didn't have the mana for cryptic) in his yard to deal with the intervention or my board the next turn. I'm not sure what else he would been able to do. Unable to stop the lethal damage next turn, my opponent scoops.
Sideboard: In 2 Inquisition, 2 Heroic Intervention, 2 Guttural Response, 1 Chameleon Colossus; Out 4 Nettle, 2 Company, 1 Elvish Visionary
How to lose games and alienate your chances of Top 8 - a match report for GP Brisbane 2017 [LENGTH WARNING: THIS IS PRETTY LONG BUT STICK IT OUT ANYWAY CAUSE I LOVE YOU]
I get to write this one with a day or two of hindsight so it might be a little more somber than my last report. The day before of course, always consists of magically losing $200 on foils, this time on foil Thoughtseizes and a foil OG set Spellskite to get me closer to foiling out the list. At this point I had settled on the following list for the weekend:
This time we had two rooms of four - and we were all hung over for the most part heading into Day 1 of the GP. I came in with some expectations but not many; I didn’t think Elves was particularly well placed due to my concern of an abundance of Valakut and Tron, and for the most part playing Elves was a last minute decision for me. I was going to play Nahiri Jeskai, then moved to Ad Nauseam before finally saying **** it and going with what I knew best.
The player meeting was about as awkward as it gets as Ricardo Tessatori goes on about how he loves Australia and about the dangerous animals…and by the time I woke up from it the pairings were up on the boards.
Round 1 - Red Bull playing Caffinated Beverage
Matchup was easy. Turn one open prepurchased can, turn two pour into electrolyte drink of choice, turn three drink till satisfied. Easy stuff. The key is not to buy the can at the venue but instead at the supermarket before you get there.
SB:
+Mild alertness
+Caffeine jitters
+Feeling of satisfaction
-Hangover
-Years of life
Wings-0
1-0
Round 2 - Grixis Control
Now to the actual magic. This is always the game with the most detail as I win the die roll and start with the classic Mystic. Watery Grave comes in untapped and I slowly drag my Mystic to the bin where he surprises me with a Serum Visions. My turn two Archdruid gets Terminated and I chip for one the next turn and follow up with multiple dorks the next turn. He tries to Kommand killing a dork and making me discard before I crush him with a Company that does a chunk of damage. He misses a land drop and goes to game 2.
Game 2, he keeps a shaky hand with 1 land, double Thoughtscour and Tasigur, and it doesn’t work out for him as I curve out and take the game.
SB:
+3 Lead the Stampede
+3 Kitchen Finks
+1 Thoughtseize
-4 Nettle Sentinel
-3 Chord of Calling
2-0
2-0
Round 3 - GB Elves
I go back to my group of mates, some wins and losses across the board but everyone is still alive. The Pharaoh himself (pbuh, being a Millenium item holder and blessed with two byes) asks me about the Elves mirror and I go into detail about how it's just about being a sack and how it's likely I won’t play it today. He walks over to the L stand, I walk over to C, see my opponent then begin my waddle to my probable L.
Then shock horror. I roll the dice. This was way more important then I knew it, but I was on the play. I play turn one Elf. She plays turn one Elf. The rest is a blur as she misses a couple Nettle Sentinel triggers and still wins the game two while I win games one and three. I told her game one that casting Visionary, and saying draw means she doesn’t get to untap the Nettle but I’d let her off this time. Nothing is really notable about these games...its just the same as any other mirror you’ve played. I drew more Cocos, was on the play first, and was a better pilot for the most part.
As per usual, I turn around to discover that the clock was still in the thirty minute range, so I go over to the bathroom for a number one (the first of many) before heading back to see the boys who appear to be in good spirits after that round.
Round 4 - GB Tron
I take a breather as I sit down and then proceed to stop breathing as I see turn one Map off a Tron piece. He then proceeds to stop breathing as I turn four kill him and he does nothing to stop me. Game two I keep a slow hand (Visionary, four land, Archdruid, Ezuri) and draw a Thoughtseize off the to reveal two Oblivion Stones, one Fatal Push, Urza’s Mine and Sanctum of Ugin. I take one of the Oblivion Stones. He plays Sanctum and plays the Karn off the top and fetches an Ulamog. I let him attack with the Ulamog once before I move to game three. Game three is basically the perfect game against Tron. Turn one, dork. Turn two dork + Heritage Druid + Archdruid which eats a Push, but then I fatally push him out of the game with an Ezuri the following turns.
Round 5 - Boggles
Bathroom break count at two before I walk over to the pairings board. It’s been a steady climb from table 159 to table 52, and the second I saw turn one Slippery Boggle, a mental fistpump went up as I knew I was disgustingly favoured in this matchup. I then proceed to run him down with three Shamans and outrace his Daybreak’d Boggle to win game one. Game two, his quick start put me on the backfoot and I couldn’t assemble enough Elves to break through a double Daybreak.
Game three, I blow him out with a two turn setup. The previous turn, I Abrupt Decay the Ethereal Armor from this triple suited Boggle to take less damage. He goes to 19 and I sink to 11. In my turn, I hold up the Chord for three to punish a greedy play, and he walks straight into it with the juiciest enchantment in the deck - another Daybreak. He casts Daybreak and I slam down the Chord for three, pull the Reclamation Sage out of the deck killing the Hyena Umbra. The current Daybreak Coronet falls off, and the one on the stack has an illegal target and fizzles. His 1/1 looks awful in the face of a Shaman for 8, followed by a swing that takes him to 7. Another Shaman seals the deal the following turn.
Round 6 - BW Tokens
I get to table 23 and once again fistpump as I see turn one Shambling Vent, turn two Bitterblossom. I play some amount of dudes that walks into a Path + Zealous Persecution blowout, then the two anthems he has in play take over the game as the race becomes his Bitterblossom triggers against Bitterblossom tokens swinging for 3. While shuffling for sideboarded games, he proceeds to try and start some banter and says “I can’t believe I’m doing so well playing a rogue deck?”
I ignore him and move to game two and three where I summarily kill him. My notes literally say “drew coco, won game two and three”. No sigh of relief this year as I sign the match slip, I had already been here before.
SB:
+3 Lead the Stampede
+1 Abrupt Decay
+1 Reclamation Sage
+1 Fracturing Gust
-3 Chord of Calling
-3 Nettle Sentinel
2-1
6-0
Round 7 - GR Madcap Ponza
Between this round and last, I go back to the Pharaoh (pictured) and unsurprisingly he’s also 6-0. Everyone in the team is also still alive for day two at this point, so I’m pretty ecstatic - especially for the no-bye people. Then I shake my opponents hand and start shuffling for game two as I get Bonfire’d for 1 into Madcap with no main deck outs. Games two and three, much like any Ponza scheme, it fell apart after enough dudes started knocking on the doors and I swiftly kill him with turn two Archdruid into t3 eot Ezuri off a Chord.
I find out that the Pharaoh is also 7-0, along with like half of Sydney being X-1 and above. I jokingly say I can’t wait to get paired into him like last year, for the free bye. Turns out I was just a table off…
Round 8 - RW Burn
I sit down to a very familiar face in the Sydney scene and the banter begins straight away as the Pharaoh himself is sitting one table up and diagonally from me. I cast a dork straight away and the Pharaoh’s opponent speaks up.
“Are you Syreal?”
“Yeah…”
He then plays his own dork off a Razorverge Thicket. I managed to sit next to VIPOwl on the 7-0 tables - and he managed to get paired against the 80-20 matchup in Eldrazi and Taxes. I proceed to go down to 10 after a brief amount of Swiftspear hits and a Searing Blaze and then win game one despite that via double Shamans for 16. Game two, an early Eidolon makes me take 4 and that was enough for me to get out raced by a flurry of burn spells. Game three, I get an early Kitchen Finks Skullcracked. I proceed to Company into two Shamans for 8 life total and then they concede, out of resources while staring down a full board in play.
Meanwhile, I watch as my friend punts against VIPOwl as he takes something else over the Nissa, Vital Force in his hand and watch as the Nissa takes over the game entirely and he quickly moves to concede.
VIPOwl signs his matchslip and we talk shop to pass the time between the rounds. I thank him for delivering justice by crushing my mate and I amble off back to the C board just as the clocks reset and begin mentally preparing for the 9-0 matchup.
Round 9 - Esper Delve (30th)
For those keeping track at home, bathroom break count was now at 7.
I didn’t know the deck he was playing, but I did know he was Japanese, so I began counting my sideboard on the table and braced myself for bedlam. I win the die roll and start with the classic Llanowar start, which he responds with a shock’d Watery Grave into Fatal Push. I knew I was in for a grind and I started to grind him down. He eventually ran down to one card in hand and I snuck in 2 points of damage and Shaman’d him for 3 for lethal. Game two, a turn one Thoughtseize off a shock takes a Company and we take him down to 6, but its not enough as his combination of Tasigur and Creeping Tar Pit finish us off before we manage to draw any more things that help turn the corner.
Game three, I punt. I keep a hand of:
Forest
Llanowar Elf
Heritage Druid
Elvish Archdruid
Ezuri, Renegade Leader
Collected Company
Lead the Stampede
I proceed to miss the second land for multiple turns (10) and die to a Tasigur and Gurmag Angler.
SB:
+3 Lead the Stampede
+3 Kitchen Finks
+2 Thoughtseize
-4 Nettle Sentinel
-3 Chord of Calling
-1 Ezuri, Mirror Breaker
Punt count: 1
1-2
8-1
I get the consolation shoulder tap ten minutes after I lose (a brief reminder that Iron does infact help us play) and I try to make myself feel better about it; 8-0 into 8-1, on table 1, against a Japanese player who’s either on the tour or used to be on the tour, for two years running at the Australian Modern GP. I tried to be happy with it but things were looking eerily similar to last year. I could almost taste the X-5 coming from a mile away.
It only took a few beers (Coopers Pale, because people in the room wanted to look more civilized than if I was to buy Toohey’s New) to put this behind me as I looked forward to a fresh start in day two in a good position, and a bad night’s sleep disrupted by a building evacuation due to a drier (not ours) catching fire probably didn’t help too much.
Day 2, or how I learned to get bodied repeatedly in slow motion:
Round 10 - Nacatl Burn
I walk over to my table excited, and we get off to the races fairly quickly as he wins the die roll and starts with a Goblin Guide. He crashes in with Guide, Double Taytay the following turn taking me to 14. At this point my board is now a Mystic, 2 Nettle Sentinels and a Forest and I pass the turn back. My hand consists of Heritage Druid, 2 Companies and a Chord plus an Archdruid and Ezuri. Opponent plays a fetch, and attacks me with everything. He has some amount of cards in hand.
Take a moment and figure out what the play is if you’re playing along at home. I’ll write the answer in a spoiler below.
The things you’re worried about here are Atarka’s Command, or a removal spell that eats one of your dudes so you can’t untap and go ham with Heritage Druid. You have to choose to play around one.
After some discussion with VIPOwl while chilling in the airport, and with the team, the best line was to just not block, and pray they don’t have Atarka’s plus one CMC burn spell. Atarka’s does 12 damage total here taking you to 2, and if they have the 1 mana burn spell whatever, you’re dead - but if they don’t have the 1 mana burn spell you have a chance of actually just turning the corner and hitting double Shaman for lethal.
Taking the line I took to play around Atarka’s Command was just a losing game, but I must have been locked in on playing around Atarka’s Command at the time.
I moved to blocks and put my two Nettles in the way of the Guide to play around Atarka’s Command after it reveals a non-land ontop of my library. He then Searing Blazes the Elvish Mystic, and having only one Elf in play I can’t go off anymore and move to game two after a few more combat steps. Game two, I die haplessly as he plays an Eidolon early and two Searing Blazes make me lose the race relatively quickly.
Just as a side note, the Nacatl Burn deck is much harder to deal with than the RW deck as the higher creature density means they can afford to point more burn at my dudes - which is a ballbreaker.
Round 11 - Eldrazi Tron
I try to shake off the ghosts of GP’s past but I’m a little jilted walking over to my next match. An early Eldrazi Temple brings all the memories back and I’m found wanting after two Endbringers shoot down my Archdruid, followed by shooting down the rest of my board. I go ham in game two as my life notation seems to indicate he went from 14 life to concession. It was a turn four Ezuri into turn five fifth land. Game three starts with a on the draw shock into Thoughtseize to find Pithing Needle, Walking Ballista, Ratchet Bomb, Power Plant and one card I seem to forget. I took the Walking Ballista, then went ballistic on the board after baiting the Ratchet Bomb to explode on 2 to take out two Visionaries.
I go and get to the Pharoah’s table where he’s struggling against Abzan. He proceeds to turn on his Millenium item (pictured) and draw Rest in Peace (while staring down two Goyfs) into Wasteland Strangler into Flickerwisp into Eldrazi Displacer. Needless to say, he won that game and moved to 10-1
The Pharoah activating his millenium item to draw perfectly.
Round 12 - The Bye (aka, Merfolk)
Sort of stabilized now, I move to the next match with the bathroom break count hitting double digits for the first time. This match was a real blur as I saw him on the play turn one, Island, Aether Vial and I effectively blacked out till the end of the match where I was signing match slips. The game featured a few Shamans for 6, 7 and 8 and him feebly trying to out race me. It's just not the matchup the Fish player ever wants to play against.
I felt pretty good about the double digit win count but I also felt an ominous, looming sense of dread. Maybe this was it, the end of my luck.
Round 13 - Jund (10th)
This is why the sense of dread was there. I saw I was paired up against a mate. He was playing Jund. We also couldn’t do anything in terms of ID’ing here as it would both **** us. We had to bash.
Game one, the lowest I got him to was 12 as a Scooze got bigger and bigger after an early flurry of removal. Game two, I play a turn two Skite in an attempt to protect a turn three Ezuri, but multiple removal spells and Collective Brutalities ravaged my life total and my hand as I died a very quick death.
I brushed this one off pretty easily. It was a mate, we were both in contention for top 8 at the time, I couldn’t have played any better with what I was given. Not much to do here, just had to dust off for the next round and try and psych him up for his next round.
SB:
+3 Kitchen Finks
+3 Lead the Stampede
+1 Abrupt Decay
-4 Nettle Sentinel
-3 Chord of Calling
0-2
10-3
Round 14 - Eldrazi Tron (12th)
I lose the die roll and proceed to get him with the Company into Shaman into Chord for a Shaman for 18. He concedes on 2. Game two, I mulligan to six and keep a hand with Thoughtseize and see Ghost Quarter, Thoughtknot, Eldrazi Temple and another card, then I get beat down by the Reality Smasher off the top and Thoughtknot already in play. Game three, he gets a turn four All is Dust, and as the card suggests my game was dust as he plays a Karn the turn after.
During the entire match for the most part, he stared longingly into my soul as if he wanted to bang. That was very confusing. The day began moving fast at this point as the Pharaoh took his third loss against the top 8’ing Sun and Moon deck with an incredible turn two Stony into turn four Blood Moon into THREE planeswalkers while he was stuck on two Caves of Koilos and an Aether Vial, getting knocked out of top 8 with 2 win and ins. In the other tables, VIPOwl got paired against Lantern for a second time and had stalled long enough that a Fracturing Gust would end the game. He plays a Lantern, and there's a Fracturing Gust on top, ending his chances of winning the game.
Round 15 - UW Control
I swallow my nerves as I move to my do or die game. I mulligan to six but its enough as my opponent stumbles for multiple turns on land drops and I slowly chip him away. Game two, he moves to 24 as I move to 24 as we both play and trade Kitchen Finks. A Shaman plus a massive attack takes him to two, but he manages to Verdict away my board and a fetch takes him to 1. I then proceed to punt in my recovery phase as he plays a Gideon Jura, and I let my mana dorks walk into his Kitchen Finks when I could have been tapping them for mana. I then proceed to realize this multiple turns too late as I eventually draw a Shaman that takes him from 9 to 6 after a Blessed Alliance and a Resto Angel blinked Kitchen Finks helps him stabilize. If I tapped my dorks the Shaman would have been way bigger and I might have had a chance to win the game. Instead I lose game two, and move to a game three where I get him to six after grinding through multiple removal spells (and Thoughtseizing away a Verdict) but he kills me with a Resto Angel and Colonnade.
SB:
+3 Thoughtseize
+3 Kitchen Finks
+3 Lead the Stampede
-4 Nettle Sentinel
-3 Chord of Calling
-2 Ezuri, Hedron Grinder
1-2
10-5
Epilogue -
It was a pretty wild weekend. Devastated to not at least cash. But there’s more tournaments around the corner so it's not the worst feeling. I’m almost certainly heading to Kobe in May, so here’s to hoping that I can rep the boys in green much better then. I’ve been very disappointed in Lead the Stampede in the board, mostly because I never draw it! I’m likely going to experiment with one Lifecrafter and Nissa, Vital Force in the board after seeing it do a lot of work.
I've spent the large part of today reading "The Way of Kings" by Brandon Sanderson (absolutely epic fantasy book, must read), and this is still the greatest thing I've read today.
Let me give you guys some context on the guy above me; he is a living legend - on and off the forums. People consistently seek out his advice here, and let me tell you that the man in person is just as affable and clutch. He's an incredibly solid player and it is no surprise to me that he has gone 8-1 back to back Day 1s of the last two Australian Modern GPs. I thought I was doing okay after a victory against burn to put myself up 9-1, but watching my match Albern (Sy) remarked that I had missed lethal, and on asking him how, he re-assembled my board state and showed me the line. As a person who prides myself on playing really tightly, I was disappointed not to see the line but happy I had Albern to help me realise my mistake. Sometimes in the heat of the moment, against burn especially, you get in the mindset of fighting to survive - rather than seeing the win.
I have laughed so much reading this tournament report. GPs seriously take a toll on your energy levels, and reading this has helped put a smile after myself after also failing to cash/top8. Especially after such a good start like my GB friend here.
Well done again, dude. Easily the Aussie elf master in my eyes <3
P.S. Once you go Nissa, you won't wanna dismiss-er
5/5 haste creatures are pretty good, so are walkers on 6 Loyality which means ultimate if you need to.
Favourite Deck: Elves (Modern & Legacy)
Standard: New Perspectives Combo
Modern: GW Hatebears | Death and Taxes | Eldrazi and Taxes | Abzan Liege | Abzan Company
Commander: The Gitrog Monster (Combo) | Noyan Dar, Roil Shaper (Control) | RIP Leovold Sultai (Elvestorm, no unfair locks) | Mono G (Yisan or Titania)
Tiny Leaders: Too many decks to keep track of
Pauper: RIP UR Drake | Mono B | GBx Goodstuff | Jund "Melira"
Day 1
Round 1 - Beat Jund 2-0
Round 2 - Beat Abzan Midrage 2-0
Round 3 - Lost to Infect 1-2
Round 4 - Beat Mono Red Burn 2-1
Round 5 - Beat Dredge 2-1
Round 6 - Lost to a weird Jund deck 1-2
Round 7 - Lost to Mono Red Burn 0-2
Round 8 - Beat Merfolk 2-0
Round 9 - Beat Abzan Midrange 2-1
Day 2
Round 10 - Opponent failed to show. Won by forfeit 2-0.
Round 11 - Lost to Eldrazi Tron 0-2
Round 12 - Beat Ad Nauseum 2-1
Round 13 - Beat Boggles 1-0 (its a lengthy story with me winning with :40 seconds left in the round)
Round 14 - Lost to Ad Nauseum 0-2
Round 15 - Lost to a strange Naya Midrange deck 0-2
If anyone wants specifics on any particular match, I did a short one or two paragraph write up in my notes.
After a 4-1 solid start, I finished a disappointing 5-5 in the remaining matches. Overall for the tournament, 9-6 matches, 19-16 games.
Actually, it seems like a fast go-wide strategy like ours may be decent against the deck generally. Depends on how fast they can race, I guess. Or maybe the hand disruption is just too much for Elves to deal with?
WUBRG Humans
BRW Mardu Pyromancer
UW UW "Control"
UR Blue Moon
So the new Death's Shadow deck is much more like an aggressive variant of Jund. It has disruption, removal, and a couple threats. We tend to be very good against this style of strategy. Elves is redundant enough to deal with the hand hate and removal, as we have learned from playing jund. Yes, this deck is faster, but without Temur Battlerage (they only play two) I don't see it being a bad matchup. But this is all speculation.
Edit: clarified a sentence
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BLiliana, Heretical HealerB| |GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
GWBDoom Plane EnchantressBWG
Possibly, but with the recent popularity of Chalice of the Void, cutting them sounds dicey to me. That alone would be enough for me to run full set if I had $250 to drop on it.
WUBRG Humans
BRW Mardu Pyromancer
UW UW "Control"
UR Blue Moon
I didn't take notes throughout the tournament, but I'll try to recall as many details as I can here. I came in with two byes, won round 3, and faced a friend on Ad Nauseam in round 4. Game 1 was very close, I had a fast start, but with no way to disrupt his combo maindeck (other than Shaman of the Pack's favorable interaction with Angel's Grace), I lost. In Game 2, I was faced with the decision on my turn 4 of playing a Phyrexian Revoker to stop him from using his Lotus Bloom that was about to come off suspend, and Chording for the win on my next turn, or passing after attacking and likely needing to use the Chord for an Eidolon of Rhetoric if he tried to go off. I chose to play the Revoker, but with him having had three lands in play and a Pentad Prism on 2, I should have more strongly considered the options, as all it took was him playing a land to win with Angel's Grace/Ad Naus.
Round 6 I played against Boggles. He won the die roll and took a quick game 1, as did I for game 2. Game 3 I was faced with the most difficult mulliganing decision I think I've ever made – after going to 6, my hand was: Chord of Calling, Llanowar Elves, Dwynen's Elite, 2x Heritage Druid, and a Fracturing Gust. Now I, like many of you I'm sure, keep one-land hands all the time, but I think this is the first time I've kept a no-land hand, especially at an important tournament like this. My reasoning, which I stand behind, was that I was unlikely to win on a mulligan to 5, and this hand was pretty great both in general and for this matchup. If I hit my first and third land drop (with a scry, mind you), I would have a turn 3 Fracturing Gust, if I hit my first and second, I'd have that option or a turn 3 Chord for 3. Long story short, I kept, scried an Ezuri, Renegade Leader to the bottom, his turn one Boggle was followed by a draw... Cavern of Souls! My amazing luck ran out quickly enough, however, when he played a turn 3 Gaddock Teeg (which used to be a mainstay of Elves sideboards as well), and I lost the game with four non-creature spells stuck in my hand.
I finished Day 1 7-2 after rattling off a few more wins (in no particular order, my other matches that day were Burn, Merfolk, Grixis Control, G/B Tron, and Titan Shift), and was hopeful going into Day 2 – I had gone into Day 2 of GP Indianapolis with the same record, and won five matches in a row before falling to 12-3 in the final round. I started Day 2 with two wins, then in round 12 played against an Eternal Command desk (list was similar to this, for those unfamiliar with the deck). My opponent won the die roll, and must have resolved Electrolyze against me over ten times throughout the match through various Aether Vial, Eternal Witness, and Snapcaster Mage shenanigans. Needless to say, I lost, the matchup seemed terrible, so although my Top 8 dreams were dashed, I didn't feel as if there was much I could have done and went into Round 13 as clear-headed as I could. I played another friend, this time on Jund, and got quite lucky when his draw step Kolaghan's Command to make me discard and shock my Dwynen's Elite revealed a topdecked Chord for Ezuri to regenerate the Elite. Round 14 I overran Shaun McLaren on Eldrazi Tron, and to round out my luck beat R/G Tron (what an awful matchup) in the final round.
I'm fairly exhausted now after a long weekend and drive back home, but I'm happy to answer any questions you all have tomorrow, and if there's interest I can do a run-through of my deck-building decisions after a lot of testing (the TL;DR is that Copperhorn Scout is the real deal and I highly suggest trying it out). Cheers!
4 Elvish Archdruid
3 Ezuri, Renegade Leader
4 Shaman of the Pack
4 Dwynen's Elite
4 Llanowar Elves
4 Heritage Druid
3 Elvish Visionary
4 Copperhorn Scout
4 Chord of Calling
4 Horizon Canopy
4 Cavern of Souls
4 Gilt-Leaf Palace
2 Forest
1 Pendelhaven
1 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
2 Razorverge Thicket
1 Eidolon of Rhetoric
2 Essence Warden
2 Fracturing Gust
1 Kataki, War's Wage
3 Lead the Stampede
1 Phyrexian Revoker
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Selfless Spirit
1 Spellskite
I was checking on this old decklist:
https://deckstats.net/decks/4459/308069-naya-elves/en
And wanted to do something like that but trying to add black into the mix for the shaman. But i dunno if it is possible. If you guys see it viable and if anyone can help give insight on this/Any suggestions would be much appreciated
A run-through of your decision making sounds sick, would be much appreciated
http://m.imgur.com/a/2Evec
First image is myself and Taufik from Indonesia facing off in the feature match area at 8-0. He beat me 2-0 with Cheerios, having the Echoing Truths for my Eidolon in G2!
The second imagine is starting Round 12 10-1 on table one against none other than Lee Shi Tian.
I'll cherish these memories and use them to drive me further. Gotta love the boys in green!
Still in post-GP depression myself.
Unrelated upside: Match report coming sometime tomorrow. Going to be entertaining to read I hope.
Well in theory i'm liking the deck. Seems weird for me not to have nettle sentinel but i have been thinking about adding copperhorn scout for awhile now because they give us a way to block, convoke for chord or adding mana with heritage druid and re-use archdruid after attacking thus giving us an edge over certain decks. I could see this working out. Need to test it out. In MB i would: -1 chord of calling, +1 lead the stampeede. Regarding the manabase...i dunno, i fell in love with westvale abbey, i have my doubts if nykthos really adds to the deck...i don't know if fetches are really necessary. Regarding SB i would do the following: -1 viscera seer, -2 fracturing gust, +1 reclamation sage, +1 chord of calling, -1 lifecrater's bestiary, +2 stain the mind (i can't tell how many times it saved games).
WUBRG Humans
BRW Mardu Pyromancer
UW UW "Control"
UR Blue Moon
Hobbytown was 7 round swiss and then cut to top 8 with a healthy attendance of 122 people. Here's the list I ran
3 Lifecrafter's Bestiary
Creature
4 Dwynen's Elite
1 Elves of Deep Shadow
4 Elvish Archdruid
3 Elvish Mystic
3 Elvish Visionary
2 Ezuri, Renegade Leader
4 Heritage Druid
4 Llanowar Elves
4 Nettle Sentinel
4 Shaman of the Pack
1 Chord of Calling
4 Collected Company
Land
4 Blooming Marsh
2 Cavern of Souls
3 Forest
2 Horizon Canopy
1 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
2 Overgrown Tomb
1 Pendelhaven
2 Verdant Catacombs
1 Windswept Heath
1 Wooded Foothills
1 Chameleon Colossus
1 Dismember
2 Fracturing Gust
2 Guttural Response
2 Heroic Intervention
2 Inquisition of Kozilek
2 Reclamation Sage
1 Relic of Progenitus
2 Thoughtseize
Alright so as I said, I had a pretty successful Sunday. I only lost two games on the day and went undefeated to a top 4 split. The two biggest things I took away from this tournament is that I'm now a believer in Shaman of the Pack and the pokedex seems really good. I was skeptical about pokedex before the tournament, but I was proven wrong every time I had it on the board. I even got comments from a couple opponents on how insane the pokedex is for Elves.
Round 1 - Merfolk 2-1
I was on the play and was able to company into an ezuri. By turn 4 I was able to swing for 40+.
The second game, the merfolk player was able to get 3 lords and a couple master of waves. I was unable to handle it. The third game I was able to coco and disrupt his early board (he had metallic mimic that I rec saged). After that I was able to get a wide board and cast a shaman of the pack to drain him.
Sideboard: In 2 Inquisition of Kozilek, 2 Reclamation Sage; Out 2 Lifecrafter's Beastiary, 2 Nettle Sentinel. I kept the same sideboard for game 3.
Round 2 - Affinity 2-0
I was able to steal game 1 on an amazing turn 3. By the end of turn 3 I had a three archdruids, an ezuri and a wide board. I was able to get him down to 4 and passed the turn. He was only able to hit me for 15 (while I was at 16 life) and scooped. The second game the pokedex and shaman helped me. I was able to scry away lands and top deck pokedex gas to draw two companys. Once the companies went off, I was able to destroy a steel overseer (rec sage) and take over the board.
Sideboard: In 2 Fracturing Gust, 2 Reclamation Sage; Out 2 Lifecrafter's Bestiary, 2 Nettle.
Round 3 - G/R Tron 2-0
I am quite lucky to get the 2-0 on this match up. Fortunately Shaman of the pack did wonders in these games. The first game I have a good opening hand with archdruid and shaman, the tron player nevers saw an O-stone or a pyroclasm so I was able to buld my board. On turn 3 I cast shaman to drain him for 7 life down to 13. On his turn he had tron and cast wurmcoil engine and passed back. On my turn 4 I drew a coco and passed turn, because I didn't want to swing into his wurmcoil. On his turn he cast Karn to exile my archdruid, in response I tapped and cast coco to find another archdruid and another shaman. So he goes down to 4 life. He passes the turn and I top deck a shaman to drain him. Game two he was able to pyroclasm turn 2 but I had the tools to refill my board. I was able to get in damage before tron and play shaman to take game 2.
Sideboard: In 2 Thoughtseize, 2 Heroic Intervention; Out 4 Nettles (I was planning on putting the nettles in for game 3 to up the chances of combo.)
Round 4 - Abzan Company 2-0
I was able to double company and overrun with Ezuri in game 1. Game 2 I was able to turn 1 inquisition to find a e. witness and a Orzhov in hand. I had him pitch the E. Witness. I very carefully was able to play around pontiff. He had it go three times to clear my board, but my conservative play allowed to refill. He fortunately wasn't hitting any of his threats on top deck and only hit a wall of roots on his first coco. I cast lifecrafter's after pontiff was off the board and was able to unload and refill my hand. I drew a chord and two shaman off the bestiary and bottomed lands on the upkeep scry. I was able to chord for a shaman for 8 life loss.He was able to coco again and found a anafenza with a seer already on the board for him. Fortunately he passed it back and I was able to cast double shaman for the win.
Sideboard: In 2 Inquisition, 1 Relic of Progenitus; Out 2 Nettle, 1 Lifecrafter's.
Round 5 - Merfolk 2-1
This one was not looking good from the start. I was on the draw and I got hosed the first game with a waves, two lords, and spreading seas for islandwalk. The second game I was able to get pokedex out and let it do its thing. This probably is the reason I won the second game. I was able to chain off draws on turn three that let me go nuts on turn 4 to seal the win. The third game I got the pokedex out and got value off the scry and was able to double cast shaman of the pack for the win.
Sideboard: Actually made a mistake here. I had the pile of what I was putting in and taking out of sideboard and I accidently kept my main the same and kept the sideboard cards out. Which thinking about it wouldn't be bad for when I was on the play game 2, but really got fortunate with being on the draw game 3. So no sideboard for these games.
Round 6 & 7 - ID'd
There were only 4 people left at x-0 and we did the math and we were able to draw out to top 8.
Top 8 - Grixis Control 2-0
Game one was typical of my first rounds with control. I was able to beat down before they could do much of anything. The second game I kept my opening 7 as I had a Overgrown Tomb, Horizon Canopy, heroic intervention, visionary, two dorks, and a shaman of the pack. I slow rolled putting out an elf a turn and keeping mana open for the heroic intervention. He had an unusual start where he thought scoured twice and serum visioned, while playing two islands. I was able to get an early cavern in play for any protection from counters. He missed his third land drop, which afforded to me to get a decent amount of damage in. He was able to bolt my archdruid, but I held out the intervention for an anger of the gods. By turn 6 he dropped his 5th land and passed the turn. He failed to cryptic the turn before, but I suspected he had cryptic in hand. At this point I was going in on the heroic intervention and really wanted to bait him into it. So my opponent is at 11 life and I cast Shaman with cavern mana, which drops his life to 4. Before combat he cryptic taps and draws a card. I have two mana open. I pass the turn and my opponent drops his sixth land and remarks "I might as well do it now" and plays Anger. I cast heroic intervention in response and my opponent is silent for a few moments and calmy remarks he made a mistake. My opponent had collective brutality in hand and a snapcaster, which he didn't have a spell (didn't have the mana for cryptic) in his yard to deal with the intervention or my board the next turn. I'm not sure what else he would been able to do. Unable to stop the lethal damage next turn, my opponent scoops.
Sideboard: In 2 Inquisition, 2 Heroic Intervention, 2 Guttural Response, 1 Chameleon Colossus; Out 4 Nettle, 2 Company, 1 Elvish Visionary
[LENGTH WARNING: THIS IS PRETTY LONG BUT STICK IT OUT ANYWAY CAUSE I LOVE YOU]
I get to write this one with a day or two of hindsight so it might be a little more somber than my last report. The day before of course, always consists of magically losing $200 on foils, this time on foil Thoughtseizes and a foil OG set Spellskite to get me closer to foiling out the list. At this point I had settled on the following list for the weekend:
4 Forest
4 Blooming Marsh
4 Gilt-Leaf Palace
4 Verdant Catacombs
1 Overgrown Tomb
1 Pendelhaven
//35 - 53
4 Elvish Mystic
4 Heritage Druid
4 Llanowar Elves
4 Nettle Sentinel
4 Dwynen’s Elite
4 Elvish Visionary
4 Elvish Archdruid
4 Shaman of the Pack
3 Ezuri, Renegade Leader
4 Collected Company
3 Chord of Calling
3 Thoughtseize
3 Kitchen Finks
3 Lead the Stampede
1 Abrupt Decay
1 Phyrexian Revoker
1 Spellskite
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Creeping Corrosion
1 Fracturing Gust
This time we had two rooms of four - and we were all hung over for the most part heading into Day 1 of the GP. I came in with some expectations but not many; I didn’t think Elves was particularly well placed due to my concern of an abundance of Valakut and Tron, and for the most part playing Elves was a last minute decision for me. I was going to play Nahiri Jeskai, then moved to Ad Nauseam before finally saying **** it and going with what I knew best.
The player meeting was about as awkward as it gets as Ricardo Tessatori goes on about how he loves Australia and about the dangerous animals…and by the time I woke up from it the pairings were up on the boards.
Round 1 - Red Bull playing Caffinated Beverage
Matchup was easy. Turn one open prepurchased can, turn two pour into electrolyte drink of choice, turn three drink till satisfied. Easy stuff. The key is not to buy the can at the venue but instead at the supermarket before you get there.
SB:
+Mild alertness
+Caffeine jitters
+Feeling of satisfaction
-Hangover
-Years of life
Wings-0
1-0
Round 2 - Grixis Control
Now to the actual magic. This is always the game with the most detail as I win the die roll and start with the classic Mystic. Watery Grave comes in untapped and I slowly drag my Mystic to the bin where he surprises me with a Serum Visions. My turn two Archdruid gets Terminated and I chip for one the next turn and follow up with multiple dorks the next turn. He tries to Kommand killing a dork and making me discard before I crush him with a Company that does a chunk of damage. He misses a land drop and goes to game 2.
Game 2, he keeps a shaky hand with 1 land, double Thoughtscour and Tasigur, and it doesn’t work out for him as I curve out and take the game.
SB:
+3 Lead the Stampede
+3 Kitchen Finks
+1 Thoughtseize
-4 Nettle Sentinel
-3 Chord of Calling
2-0
2-0
Round 3 - GB Elves
I go back to my group of mates, some wins and losses across the board but everyone is still alive. The Pharaoh himself (pbuh, being a Millenium item holder and blessed with two byes) asks me about the Elves mirror and I go into detail about how it's just about being a sack and how it's likely I won’t play it today. He walks over to the L stand, I walk over to C, see my opponent then begin my waddle to my probable L.
Then shock horror. I roll the dice. This was way more important then I knew it, but I was on the play. I play turn one Elf. She plays turn one Elf. The rest is a blur as she misses a couple Nettle Sentinel triggers and still wins the game two while I win games one and three. I told her game one that casting Visionary, and saying draw means she doesn’t get to untap the Nettle but I’d let her off this time. Nothing is really notable about these games...its just the same as any other mirror you’ve played. I drew more Cocos, was on the play first, and was a better pilot for the most part.
Sideboard:
+1 Abrupt Decay
+1 Phyrexian Revoker
-2 Nettle Sentinel
2-1
3-0
As per usual, I turn around to discover that the clock was still in the thirty minute range, so I go over to the bathroom for a number one (the first of many) before heading back to see the boys who appear to be in good spirits after that round.
Round 4 - GB Tron
I take a breather as I sit down and then proceed to stop breathing as I see turn one Map off a Tron piece. He then proceeds to stop breathing as I turn four kill him and he does nothing to stop me. Game two I keep a slow hand (Visionary, four land, Archdruid, Ezuri) and draw a Thoughtseize off the to reveal two Oblivion Stones, one Fatal Push, Urza’s Mine and Sanctum of Ugin. I take one of the Oblivion Stones. He plays Sanctum and plays the Karn off the top and fetches an Ulamog. I let him attack with the Ulamog once before I move to game three. Game three is basically the perfect game against Tron. Turn one, dork. Turn two dork + Heritage Druid + Archdruid which eats a Push, but then I fatally push him out of the game with an Ezuri the following turns.
SB:
+3 Thoughtseize
+1 Phyrexian Revoker
+1 Reclamation Sage
-4 Nettle Sentinel
-1 Ezuri, Ram Gang
2-1
4-0
Round 5 - Boggles
Bathroom break count at two before I walk over to the pairings board. It’s been a steady climb from table 159 to table 52, and the second I saw turn one Slippery Boggle, a mental fistpump went up as I knew I was disgustingly favoured in this matchup. I then proceed to run him down with three Shamans and outrace his Daybreak’d Boggle to win game one. Game two, his quick start put me on the backfoot and I couldn’t assemble enough Elves to break through a double Daybreak.
Game three, I blow him out with a two turn setup. The previous turn, I Abrupt Decay the Ethereal Armor from this triple suited Boggle to take less damage. He goes to 19 and I sink to 11. In my turn, I hold up the Chord for three to punish a greedy play, and he walks straight into it with the juiciest enchantment in the deck - another Daybreak. He casts Daybreak and I slam down the Chord for three, pull the Reclamation Sage out of the deck killing the Hyena Umbra. The current Daybreak Coronet falls off, and the one on the stack has an illegal target and fizzles. His 1/1 looks awful in the face of a Shaman for 8, followed by a swing that takes him to 7. Another Shaman seals the deal the following turn.
SB:
+1 Spellskite
+1 Reclamation Sage
+1 Fracturing Gust
-3 Nettle Sentinel
2-1
5-0
Round 6 - BW Tokens
I get to table 23 and once again fistpump as I see turn one Shambling Vent, turn two Bitterblossom. I play some amount of dudes that walks into a Path + Zealous Persecution blowout, then the two anthems he has in play take over the game as the race becomes his Bitterblossom triggers against Bitterblossom tokens swinging for 3. While shuffling for sideboarded games, he proceeds to try and start some banter and says “I can’t believe I’m doing so well playing a rogue deck?”
I ignore him and move to game two and three where I summarily kill him. My notes literally say “drew coco, won game two and three”. No sigh of relief this year as I sign the match slip, I had already been here before.
SB:
+3 Lead the Stampede
+1 Abrupt Decay
+1 Reclamation Sage
+1 Fracturing Gust
-3 Chord of Calling
-3 Nettle Sentinel
2-1
6-0
Round 7 - GR Madcap Ponza
Between this round and last, I go back to the Pharaoh (pictured) and unsurprisingly he’s also 6-0. Everyone in the team is also still alive for day two at this point, so I’m pretty ecstatic - especially for the no-bye people. Then I shake my opponents hand and start shuffling for game two as I get Bonfire’d for 1 into Madcap with no main deck outs. Games two and three, much like any Ponza scheme, it fell apart after enough dudes started knocking on the doors and I swiftly kill him with turn two Archdruid into t3 eot Ezuri off a Chord.
The Pharaoh
SB:
+1 Reclamation Sage
+1 Fracturing Gust
-2 Nettle Sentinel
2-1
7-0
I find out that the Pharaoh is also 7-0, along with like half of Sydney being X-1 and above. I jokingly say I can’t wait to get paired into him like last year, for the free bye. Turns out I was just a table off…
Round 8 - RW Burn
I sit down to a very familiar face in the Sydney scene and the banter begins straight away as the Pharaoh himself is sitting one table up and diagonally from me. I cast a dork straight away and the Pharaoh’s opponent speaks up.
“Are you Syreal?”
“Yeah…”
He then plays his own dork off a Razorverge Thicket. I managed to sit next to VIPOwl on the 7-0 tables - and he managed to get paired against the 80-20 matchup in Eldrazi and Taxes. I proceed to go down to 10 after a brief amount of Swiftspear hits and a Searing Blaze and then win game one despite that via double Shamans for 16. Game two, an early Eidolon makes me take 4 and that was enough for me to get out raced by a flurry of burn spells. Game three, I get an early Kitchen Finks Skullcracked. I proceed to Company into two Shamans for 8 life total and then they concede, out of resources while staring down a full board in play.
SB:
+3 Kitchen Finks
+1 Abrupt Decay
+1 Spellskite
+1 Reclamation Sage
-4 Elvish Visionary
-2 Ezuri, Rabblemaster
Meanwhile, I watch as my friend punts against VIPOwl as he takes something else over the Nissa, Vital Force in his hand and watch as the Nissa takes over the game entirely and he quickly moves to concede.
VIPOwl signs his matchslip and we talk shop to pass the time between the rounds. I thank him for delivering justice by crushing my mate and I amble off back to the C board just as the clocks reset and begin mentally preparing for the 9-0 matchup.
Round 9 - Esper Delve (30th)
For those keeping track at home, bathroom break count was now at 7.
I didn’t know the deck he was playing, but I did know he was Japanese, so I began counting my sideboard on the table and braced myself for bedlam. I win the die roll and start with the classic Llanowar start, which he responds with a shock’d Watery Grave into Fatal Push. I knew I was in for a grind and I started to grind him down. He eventually ran down to one card in hand and I snuck in 2 points of damage and Shaman’d him for 3 for lethal. Game two, a turn one Thoughtseize off a shock takes a Company and we take him down to 6, but its not enough as his combination of Tasigur and Creeping Tar Pit finish us off before we manage to draw any more things that help turn the corner.
Game three, I punt. I keep a hand of:
Forest
Llanowar Elf
Heritage Druid
Elvish Archdruid
Ezuri, Renegade Leader
Collected Company
Lead the Stampede
I proceed to miss the second land for multiple turns (10) and die to a Tasigur and Gurmag Angler.
SB:
+3 Lead the Stampede
+3 Kitchen Finks
+2 Thoughtseize
-4 Nettle Sentinel
-3 Chord of Calling
-1 Ezuri, Mirror Breaker
Punt count: 1
1-2
8-1
I get the consolation shoulder tap ten minutes after I lose (a brief reminder that Iron does infact help us play) and I try to make myself feel better about it; 8-0 into 8-1, on table 1, against a Japanese player who’s either on the tour or used to be on the tour, for two years running at the Australian Modern GP. I tried to be happy with it but things were looking eerily similar to last year. I could almost taste the X-5 coming from a mile away.
It only took a few beers (Coopers Pale, because people in the room wanted to look more civilized than if I was to buy Toohey’s New) to put this behind me as I looked forward to a fresh start in day two in a good position, and a bad night’s sleep disrupted by a building evacuation due to a drier (not ours) catching fire probably didn’t help too much.
Day 2, or how I learned to get bodied repeatedly in slow motion:
Round 10 - Nacatl Burn
I walk over to my table excited, and we get off to the races fairly quickly as he wins the die roll and starts with a Goblin Guide. He crashes in with Guide, Double Taytay the following turn taking me to 14. At this point my board is now a Mystic, 2 Nettle Sentinels and a Forest and I pass the turn back. My hand consists of Heritage Druid, 2 Companies and a Chord plus an Archdruid and Ezuri. Opponent plays a fetch, and attacks me with everything. He has some amount of cards in hand.
Take a moment and figure out what the play is if you’re playing along at home. I’ll write the answer in a spoiler below.
The things you’re worried about here are Atarka’s Command, or a removal spell that eats one of your dudes so you can’t untap and go ham with Heritage Druid. You have to choose to play around one.
After some discussion with VIPOwl while chilling in the airport, and with the team, the best line was to just not block, and pray they don’t have Atarka’s plus one CMC burn spell. Atarka’s does 12 damage total here taking you to 2, and if they have the 1 mana burn spell whatever, you’re dead - but if they don’t have the 1 mana burn spell you have a chance of actually just turning the corner and hitting double Shaman for lethal.
Taking the line I took to play around Atarka’s Command was just a losing game, but I must have been locked in on playing around Atarka’s Command at the time.
I moved to blocks and put my two Nettles in the way of the Guide to play around Atarka’s Command after it reveals a non-land ontop of my library. He then Searing Blazes the Elvish Mystic, and having only one Elf in play I can’t go off anymore and move to game two after a few more combat steps. Game two, I die haplessly as he plays an Eidolon early and two Searing Blazes make me lose the race relatively quickly.
Just as a side note, the Nacatl Burn deck is much harder to deal with than the RW deck as the higher creature density means they can afford to point more burn at my dudes - which is a ballbreaker.
Punt count: 2
SB:
+3 Kitchen Finks
+1 Abrupt Decay
+1 Spellskite
+1 Reclamation Sage
-4 Elvish Visionary
-2 Ezuri, Renegade Leader
0-2
8-2
Round 11 - Eldrazi Tron
I try to shake off the ghosts of GP’s past but I’m a little jilted walking over to my next match. An early Eldrazi Temple brings all the memories back and I’m found wanting after two Endbringers shoot down my Archdruid, followed by shooting down the rest of my board. I go ham in game two as my life notation seems to indicate he went from 14 life to concession. It was a turn four Ezuri into turn five fifth land. Game three starts with a on the draw shock into Thoughtseize to find Pithing Needle, Walking Ballista, Ratchet Bomb, Power Plant and one card I seem to forget. I took the Walking Ballista, then went ballistic on the board after baiting the Ratchet Bomb to explode on 2 to take out two Visionaries.
SB:
+3 Thoughtseize
+1 Phyrexian Revoker
+1 Reclamation Sage
-4 Nettle Sentinel
-1 Ezuri, the Raidmother
2-1
9-2
I go and get to the Pharoah’s table where he’s struggling against Abzan. He proceeds to turn on his Millenium item (pictured) and draw Rest in Peace (while staring down two Goyfs) into Wasteland Strangler into Flickerwisp into Eldrazi Displacer. Needless to say, he won that game and moved to 10-1
The Pharoah activating his millenium item to draw perfectly.
Round 12 - The Bye (aka, Merfolk)
Sort of stabilized now, I move to the next match with the bathroom break count hitting double digits for the first time. This match was a real blur as I saw him on the play turn one, Island, Aether Vial and I effectively blacked out till the end of the match where I was signing match slips. The game featured a few Shamans for 6, 7 and 8 and him feebly trying to out race me. It's just not the matchup the Fish player ever wants to play against.
SB:
+1 Abrupt Decay
+1 Reclamation Sage
-2 Nettle Sentinel
2-0
10-2
I felt pretty good about the double digit win count but I also felt an ominous, looming sense of dread. Maybe this was it, the end of my luck.
Round 13 - Jund (10th)
This is why the sense of dread was there. I saw I was paired up against a mate. He was playing Jund. We also couldn’t do anything in terms of ID’ing here as it would both **** us. We had to bash.
Game one, the lowest I got him to was 12 as a Scooze got bigger and bigger after an early flurry of removal. Game two, I play a turn two Skite in an attempt to protect a turn three Ezuri, but multiple removal spells and Collective Brutalities ravaged my life total and my hand as I died a very quick death.
I brushed this one off pretty easily. It was a mate, we were both in contention for top 8 at the time, I couldn’t have played any better with what I was given. Not much to do here, just had to dust off for the next round and try and psych him up for his next round.
SB:
+3 Kitchen Finks
+3 Lead the Stampede
+1 Abrupt Decay
-4 Nettle Sentinel
-3 Chord of Calling
0-2
10-3
Round 14 - Eldrazi Tron (12th)
I lose the die roll and proceed to get him with the Company into Shaman into Chord for a Shaman for 18. He concedes on 2. Game two, I mulligan to six and keep a hand with Thoughtseize and see Ghost Quarter, Thoughtknot, Eldrazi Temple and another card, then I get beat down by the Reality Smasher off the top and Thoughtknot already in play. Game three, he gets a turn four All is Dust, and as the card suggests my game was dust as he plays a Karn the turn after.
SB:
+3 Thoughtseize
+1 Phyrexian Revoker
+1 Reclamation Sage
-4 Nettle Sentinel
-1 Ezuri, Mob Boss
1-2
10-4
During the entire match for the most part, he stared longingly into my soul as if he wanted to bang. That was very confusing. The day began moving fast at this point as the Pharaoh took his third loss against the top 8’ing Sun and Moon deck with an incredible turn two Stony into turn four Blood Moon into THREE planeswalkers while he was stuck on two Caves of Koilos and an Aether Vial, getting knocked out of top 8 with 2 win and ins. In the other tables, VIPOwl got paired against Lantern for a second time and had stalled long enough that a Fracturing Gust would end the game. He plays a Lantern, and there's a Fracturing Gust on top, ending his chances of winning the game.
Round 15 - UW Control
I swallow my nerves as I move to my do or die game. I mulligan to six but its enough as my opponent stumbles for multiple turns on land drops and I slowly chip him away. Game two, he moves to 24 as I move to 24 as we both play and trade Kitchen Finks. A Shaman plus a massive attack takes him to two, but he manages to Verdict away my board and a fetch takes him to 1. I then proceed to punt in my recovery phase as he plays a Gideon Jura, and I let my mana dorks walk into his Kitchen Finks when I could have been tapping them for mana. I then proceed to realize this multiple turns too late as I eventually draw a Shaman that takes him from 9 to 6 after a Blessed Alliance and a Resto Angel blinked Kitchen Finks helps him stabilize. If I tapped my dorks the Shaman would have been way bigger and I might have had a chance to win the game. Instead I lose game two, and move to a game three where I get him to six after grinding through multiple removal spells (and Thoughtseizing away a Verdict) but he kills me with a Resto Angel and Colonnade.
SB:
+3 Thoughtseize
+3 Kitchen Finks
+3 Lead the Stampede
-4 Nettle Sentinel
-3 Chord of Calling
-2 Ezuri, Hedron Grinder
1-2
10-5
Epilogue -
It was a pretty wild weekend. Devastated to not at least cash. But there’s more tournaments around the corner so it's not the worst feeling. I’m almost certainly heading to Kobe in May, so here’s to hoping that I can rep the boys in green much better then. I’ve been very disappointed in Lead the Stampede in the board, mostly because I never draw it! I’m likely going to experiment with one Lifecrafter and Nissa, Vital Force in the board after seeing it do a lot of work.
My list from now on, for reference:
4 Blooming Marsh
4 Cavern of Souls
4 Forest
4 Gilt-Leaf Palace
1 Overgrown Tomb
1 Pendelhaven
//35 - 52
4 Elvish Mystic
4 Heritage Druid
4 Llanowar Elves
4 Nettle Sentinel
4 Dwynen’s Elite
4 Elvish Visionary
4 Elvish Archdruid
4 Shaman of the Pack
2 Ezuri, Renegade Leader
1 Eternal Witness
4 Collected Company
3 Chord of Calling
3 Thoughtseize
3 Kitchen Finks
1 <anti graveyard card/tentative open slot>
1 Phyrexian Revoker
1 Spellskite
1 Lifecrafter’s Bestiary
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Chameleon Colossus
1 Creeping Corrosion
1 Fracturing Gust
1 Nissa, Vital Force
If push comes to shove, then I’ll default back to Lead but for the mean time, I might as well experiment.
Hope it was readable.
I've spent the large part of today reading "The Way of Kings" by Brandon Sanderson (absolutely epic fantasy book, must read), and this is still the greatest thing I've read today.
Let me give you guys some context on the guy above me; he is a living legend - on and off the forums. People consistently seek out his advice here, and let me tell you that the man in person is just as affable and clutch. He's an incredibly solid player and it is no surprise to me that he has gone 8-1 back to back Day 1s of the last two Australian Modern GPs. I thought I was doing okay after a victory against burn to put myself up 9-1, but watching my match Albern (Sy) remarked that I had missed lethal, and on asking him how, he re-assembled my board state and showed me the line. As a person who prides myself on playing really tightly, I was disappointed not to see the line but happy I had Albern to help me realise my mistake. Sometimes in the heat of the moment, against burn especially, you get in the mindset of fighting to survive - rather than seeing the win.
I have laughed so much reading this tournament report. GPs seriously take a toll on your energy levels, and reading this has helped put a smile after myself after also failing to cash/top8. Especially after such a good start like my GB friend here.
Well done again, dude. Easily the Aussie elf master in my eyes <3
P.S. Once you go Nissa, you won't wanna dismiss-er
WBG Elves WBG
Cheeri0s
EDH:
RG Omnath, Locus of Rage RG || GWUB Atraxa, Praetors' Voice GWUB
R Zo-Zu the Punisher R || WU Brago, King Eternal WU
UB Gisa and Geralf UB || BGW Ghave, Guru of Spores BGW