MTG Salvation

Quote from Basky45 »

Quote from Sparki »

Okie Dokie. Report from memory time. Made it to the venue pretty late, bringing along 4 other people, barely had time to scribble down my list and hope nothing was wrong.

Round 1: RW Walker Control Shenanigans.

G1: My opponent is actually a friend of mine who has a huge love for the card blood moon. I am scared. I lead fetch go, and he leads with arid mesa, cracks and grabs a plateau. I am more scared. He casts faithless looting, tossing a land and an Elesh Norn into the graveyard. I am confused. Game continues a bit with him casting a Nahiri, the Harbinger, and I intuition for Karakas, Loam and Ghost Quarter. I start to quarter him out and he gets a sanctum prelate in play on 2, but I have the Barbarian Ring and take it out, taking the Nahiri out with an EE on 4. I ghost quarter a mountain, he fetches another, and on the next turn I ghost quarter again and he fails to find and scoops it up. I also saw ensnaring bridges and Chandra, Torch of Defiance this game.

G2: I get a super early tireless tracker that continuously grows and beats face, all the way down to 5. He lands an ensnaring bridge, but I have the grip in hand, as well as the capability to make a Marit lage that seals the game away. I did see him looting away a Loyal Retainers this game, which I guess goes with the Norn, and Iona in the deck that I saw afterwards. Emrakul as well for the Nahiri combo.

Round 2: Eldrazi and Taxes

G1: I draw 7 and have a super sweet hand. I go -> Fetch, Mox Diamond, Pitch Maze of Ith, wasteland, cast loam, go. My opponent goes plains go. I dredge tabernacle, another maze of ith and something else. Cast loam, put tabernacle and maze in play and pass. My opponent drops a wasteland, thinks for a minute and scoops. Huh?

G2: I board like D&T since thats what I'm assuming it is, bringing in 3 grips, 3 tracker and the Tremors. My opponent keeps 7 and opens with a Leyline of the Void. Oh. He goes Ancient Tomb, go, and I know what I'm playing against. I exploration waste the tomb to keep him off mana, but he draws some basics and deploys a thalia, which I have a karakas to keep in check. He also plays a thought-knot seer, but my hand is triple life from the loam + Mox diamond so he can take whatever he wants. I draw a Tireless Tracker, slam it into play and play a land to make a clue. I have a Maze keeping the Thought-knot back, so I simply chain land afer land until tracker is 9/8 or so and just crash into his blockers until he dies. He tells me he had no idea about the trackers post board and had boarded out dismembers. I'm lucky I didn't see an eldrazi displacer.

Round 3: Mentor Miracles

G1: The game goes super long, but I never feel out of control, assembling an EE lock as soon as possible, and notice he's on the mentor build, which I punishing fire. I EE away three counterbalances and start to ghost quarter away his white sources until he realizes his efforts are futile and scoops it up.

OUT: 4 Crop Rotation, 2 Gamble, 1 Glacial Chasm, 1 Bojuka Bog, 2 Maze of Ith, 1 Tabernacle
IN: 3 Tireless Tracker, 3 Chalice of the Void, 3 Krosan Grip, 2 Surgical Extraction

G2: I have a decent hand with loam going, and he is stuck on 2 mana. I play an exploration which he wear/tears, but I have a second one. I draw a chalice and chalice for 1. It resolves and I feel a lot safer about jamming loams without having to worry about surgical. I start to assemble the combo, and he snapcaster + wear/tears my chalice again. He goes to surgical my loams and I in response surgical my own loam and fail to find. He is surprised. He blood moons me and I actually miss the chance to make a marit lage in response to kill since he tapped out for it, but I have the EE3 for it with the basic forest and mox diamond and am able to pull a win around afterwards.

Round 4: Burn

G1: My opponent is actually 2-1 in record so I get the pair down. I've seen and played against him before but can't remember what he's on. He leads with mountain (revised, mind you), suspend rift bolt, go. Ugh. Why. He tosses a lot of burn spells at my face while I simply make land drops with exploration and hold a crop rotation for dear life. I get to resolve Intuition, finding me Loam, double Thespian's Stage to start to set up a lock but I feel like I'm a bit late. I untap, cast loam, drop both stages and cast crop rotation and 4 life, which resolves. From there I simple chasm lock and start to slowly ghost quarter him out. A few turns later, I draw crucible which should definitely seal the deal and he scoops it up after asking if he's locked.

G2: He has a quick start again and I find myself at a super low life total after a rift bolt, flame rift and some goblin guide. I drop glacial chasm to give me a tiny bit of breathing room with stage in play and depths in hand. I pay the two life upkeep and drop down to 6, passing the turn with the board of Mox Diamond x 2, Stage, Depths, Chasm. He draw and passes and with three cards in hand, I decide to go for it, and hope that he just has a fireblast and only sorcery spells. I make the marit lage, untap, sac chasm to upkeep and swing in and he dies. He shows me a hand of Fireblast + Chain Lightning + Price, but I only had two mox diamonds! He also tells me he had fireblast in game 1 when I crop roto'ed at 4 life and just blanked out. I'll take it.

Round 5: RG Lands (Tropical island + explosives MD)

G1: These games are pretty quick, and weird. We get off to the exact same start, tropical island -> Exploration -> land, and he wastelands me and casts a loam, to which I wasteland his karakas back and then bog him. He promptly bogs me back once I get my own loam in the yard and we're now both starved for resources at around 3-4 lands. I rip Intuition off the top, opting for another loam, ghost quarter and wasteland and he scoops it up. I noticed he had also played a port so it put me to believe he wasn't on ghost quarters.

G2: I have the option for a turn 2 tireless tracker, but mise it so I can crack a clue in case of a punishing fire. I get two clues from it, and swing in, and he punishing fires it. I crack a clue, and in response he fires it again. Boo. We get into resource battles again, and he goes to bog me. I crack my last clue in response to dredge my loam, and then ghost quarter out his basic forest and start to work on his other lands before I bog myself and he packs it up.

Round 6: ID
Round 7: ID

Quarterfinals: Goblins

G1: Ahh goblins. I've met this player in the top 8 and swiss here at CFB more times than I can count and they're always pretty swingy. He's on the play, and leads with Vial go. I have a fairly slow hand that was probably dead to Lackey but had stage + depths in it which they can't beat, so I kept. I go land drops while he adds another turn 2 vial, and on my third turn, I EE1 while his board is Vial@1, Vial@2 and nothing else. I figured if he had a lackey he would've dropped it ages ago and I don't really care about anything else. It's just a Mogg War Marshall, and although I have the depths, I drop a wasteland with a crop rotation in hand to EOT make a token for the win.

G2: I mull and find a really sketch hand with only two mana producing lands, being stage and grove, but also have a copy of EE and the Subterranean Tremors. He goes T1 lackey and I am really scared. I play grove go, and he attacks with lackey, putting in another one. He plays a port and says go. Ports me on upkeep and I am forced to stage and pass. He swings in with both lackeys and I am fortunate enough to only see a gempalm incinerator from them. He taps and plays Rest in Peace. Since this is the only window I really have, I tremors for 1, wiping his board, only for him to cast Magus of the Moon next turn, followed by a Goblin Chieftain which chip my life total away by 4. I eventually draw a punishing fire, and kill the magus, and then mazing the chieftain to preserve my life total, but he has ANOTHER magus following, in which I ghost quarter myself to get the basic forest in response. I draw a gamble before dying, and quickly gamble for anther PFire to deal with the magus again, and get to keep it off the 75% chance, pitching the EE. I grip the Rest in Peace, and punishing fire the magus again, and maze the chieftain again keeping myself at 3. My plan is to grove back the fire and kill the chieftain next turn and try to stabilize off the maze. I also have the stage depths combo in play but can't go due to wasteland. He ends up wastelanding my maze and hits me down to 3, and passes the turn with no cards in hand, porting on my upkeep, and in response I slam Marit Lage into play. I basically give him "Find Stingscourger or lose" and he draw an Arid Mesa. I guess with both magus of the moon, he had forgotten about the stage/depths since they were irrelevant and was focusing on getting through the maze since I was so low. Either way, punts were had.

Top 4 graciously split so I could go grab some delicious ramen with a group of friends, one who also made the top 4 split.

What did you board out against the the Eldrazi and Taxes deck? I understand that you boarded like it was normal D&T, but I can't figure out how you found 7 cards to cut. I've been playtesting with a RG list on cockatrice for a little bit know, and always try to board minimally, except against Storm, which seems like an incorrect strategy, seeing as how you also boarded in 11 cards against Miracles.

Referring to how you boarded against Miracles, why do you think that Chalice is more important than Crop Rotation? Also, if you don't see a Mentor G1, are you likely to board out some or all of the Punishing Fires?

Quote from SteelBloodNinja »

At least 2 people on this page are or are considering going up to 62+ cards in order to play Nahiri. Seriously? If you guys can't find any cards that Nahiri is better than to cut, she isn't good enough. Kiki chord already has a high curve in modern, don't exacerbate that issue.

Quote from Niallplaysmagic »

Quote from Daeyel »

There is a difference between an alpha dual and a scalding tarn expedition. One is highly unlikely to find an Alpha dual in pristine mint condition unless he/she looks specifically for it. One would be unlikely to put a pristine alpha into play, because you'd just find a worn yet serviceable copy, and it would be magnitudes cheaper. Expeditions are a different story. Those buying them are either collecting them, or want to pimp out a certain deck, and theres not really any condition variety out there yet, so no price differential. My guess is the collectors outnumber the pimps, even if all we see is in our local trade groups is pimpers. There is a lot of online sales with collectors.
I won't play with mine, and I'm hanging onto them for a while. To me, it's like a Treasury CD.

I have a number of friends with full sets of expeditions in their decks - I haven't seen anyone show any restraint towards playing with expeditions, as long as they pulled ones that are in decks they are running.