Fate Reforged Game Day

What happens when a limited player tries to play some standard? He goes to Game Day!

WOTC Game Day link

But what to play? Well, since it was both Saturday and Sunday, I could play two decks. One of them was a lot better than the other. See if you can tell.

Rolled into Mythic on a beautiful sunny February day and signed up for $6. Got a full art promo for playing (the Shadowspear), but would have to top 8 to get the other (Sup' Plantform).

My deck for Saturday was UB Mill. Yes, you read that right. Mill in standard. Check it:

Millers
Ashiok, Altar of the Brood, Pyxis of Pandemonium
Removals
Bile Blight, Drown in Sorrow, Hero's Downfall
Bouncers
Aetherspouts, Whelming Wave
Walls
Wall of Frost, Dragon's Eye Savants
Carddrawers
Dictate of Kruphix
Devotioners
Master of Waves, Nykthos Shrine to Nyx

This was mostly a TWoo concoction, but he admitted it wasn't very good. Do you see the sweet devotion combo? Get out an Altar and cards with blue symbols (like the walls and Dictates), then hit a Master to spring forth multiple elementals. Each one mills your opponent. Buy time for this awesomeness with removal and bounce. What could go wrong? 11 players for this tourney. Didn't get the bye.

Round one vs. Yvonne: She was playing RW aggro and started with a (Taylor) Swiftspear. Then Hammerhand made it bigger. Then a Phalanx Leader joined up and she Launched the Fleet. Ouch. Game two, I got out some walls and Dictates, then two Masters in a row for 19 total horses.

Not bad in multiples...

Game three, she was stuck on 3 lands and I did the two Masters trick again for 11 this time. 1-0

Rd. 2 vs. Riley playing Abzan. I have never seen so many Rhinos in one place. Like a crash of rhinos. Seriously. Game two, played Hero's Downfall on my Ashiok, Stain the Mind'd my Master of W and finished me off with a pair of Wingmate Rocs. Such dirty birds. 1-1

Rd. 3 vs Alex also playing Abzan, His deck played Heir of the Wilds, that just got bigger after the Rhinos. Game two was longer and I stabilized at 4 life and with 14 devotion on board, played two Masters to mill him for 28. Woo! My success was short-lived, since game three, he got out Garruk Apex and the Banana Boy (Tasigur). It was ugly. 1-2

Okay, well, I didn't think I was winning it today with a mill deck. Game Day is a cool vibe where guys like me play funky decks like this. Everyone likes to see what people are brewing. Is there an anti-Rhino card?

Rd. 4 vs. Holden playing green devotion. He said he chose it when he heard it won a GP recently. Gulp. We agreed to split the prize packs (5 for 2-2 record) and play for the extra one. His deck played Voyaging Satyr to untap Nykthos and then the Bounce Kitty (Temur Sabertooth) to repeat it. And Temur Ascendancy for good (hasty) measure. I lasted about 2 minutes each game until his combo went off both times. Dang! 1-3

This kitty is no joke!

So, not a winning record, but I got two packs and a promo. Made some fun trades too. The top deck of the day was RW control with Chandra, Chained, Stormbreaths and Rabbles.

I wanted a new deck for Sunday, so time to hit the books. This is what I decided on:

Jeskai Control
3 Anger of the Gods, 3 Divinations, 3 End Hostilities
2 Banishing Lights, 4 Chained to the Rocks, 3 Mastery of the Unseens
2 Dig Thru Times, many counters (Disdain, Dissolve, Negate)
Card drawers and 3 Wild Slashes

The win condition? Manifest dudes. Don't laugh! It went 3-1 online, so it's got to be good... right?

It's my destiny to manifest.

I needed a few of the cards, so I got to Mythic early on Sunday. Conor was good enough to ring me up.

$1.36 for an uncommon? Ha!

Nine players today, so win a match and get into top 8 and a promo. Sweet! My first opponent was Kirin playing UW Heroic. There were Hoplites and Ordeals flying around like crazy and he got me down to 6 life, but I was able to come back by Ending the Hostilities and Mastering the Unseen twelve times. Game two, he played a Dictate of Heliod, but all his dudes were chained to the rocks. Made more manifesters and got him. 1-0

Round 2 vs. Sam, also playing a control grinder. It's like we were camping, because these games were intense! Game one he played a Perilous Vault, but I Banished it. After like 10 turns, I finally played the Mastery with counter backup, but he had two! Mastery -> he counters -> I counter his counter -> he counters my counter. What?!? Then Mr. Garruk Apex showed up and made many beasts. Game two I was lucky and drew a Mastery in my starting seven. After four attacking manifests per turn that I protected with counters, he conceded. Game three was another early Mastery and I rode it to the win. 2-0

Well, this is much better than yesterday. Bonus promo!

Round 3 vs. Bryce playing RW aggro, and I mean AGGRO. Seekers, Hordeling Outbursts, Rabblemasters and Brimaz. And lots of burn. Game one I faced all these wonderful cards with two Disdaining Strokes in hand, which laughed at my misfortune. Game two I sided in two Prognostic Sphinxes. Try to burn that guy!

Sweet beard, bro!

He got me to two life, but I had a Sphinx out and was drawing counters to his burn. The Sphinx got there. Game three, no Sphinx and many Stoke the Flames to my chagrin. 2-1

My final opponent, Zack was playing a Conor special. He played Hero of Iroas and Sylvan Carytids and proceeded to enchant them many times to draw cards. Then a Sage's Reverie would make things crazy.

Who thinks of these things?

I held my ground by drawing cards and countering spells until my Mastery took over. Game two, he joined the counter party by using Swan Song on my Dig and Chained. This made two swans for me and with a few manifests, I eventually got there. Whew! 3-1 We agreed beforehand to split the packs and play for the extra one (3-1 got 5 packs today).

Swans for the win.

Wow, what a wild weekend! 1-3 day one, 3-1 day two. Got the Sup' Plantform promo! No playmat, but hey, that's something for next time. If you are a limited player like I was, I would encourage you to try constructed. Sure, the decks can be expensive, but I traded and sold some cards to get some staples. Reading tech online helped on the metagame. And for $12 buy-in, I got 5 packs and some fun games. I wish there were more limited tourneys like GP San Jose was, but there's lots of standard ones.

Props:
Mythic and the staff for a fun, on-time event
Mastery of the Unseen as a sweet new card
Conor and Riley for awesome trades

Slops:
Rhino, oh Rhino, why u b so mean?
Mill decks - don't do it!

Grand Prix San Jose 2015

Khans and Fate Sealed format for GP San Jose. Russell, Ryan, Jason and I met in the big tent on Friday, a day before the main event. For signing up, $50 got you entry, a playmat, ten PrizeWall tix (more on this later), sleeves, tokens, packs and a Griselbrand promo. And a man hand.

The VIP reg was actually a sweet deal since for $100, you got everything above and 3 more playmats, that were selling for $30-50 total. Also, a water bottle, a pin, 100 PrizeWall tix and lounge access. Russell told us about his value all day!

We wanted to play in the free Mini-Masters event and then practice a team sealed too. The GP wasn't in the main convention hall, but in the "south hall", which is a big tent in back. It made for terrible acoustics all weekend. And don't get me started on the porta-potties outside.

I opened a Daghatar rare in my first MM Fate pack and proceeded to win the next two rounds with a Citadel Siege and Wildcall. For the sealed, it was $25 each, single-elimination for 8 teams and you got a playmat. Didn't have to pass the pools, but we did need to register all the cards. I opened some decent cards including 2x Dragon-Style Twins, Arcbond and Ghastly Conscription! Not. Luckily, Jason and Russ' cards were better than that and we made it to the finals and won it in three rounds. That was 360 PrizeWall tix, which is basically a booster box. We drove back to Santa Cruz victorious, feeling great about the main event. We met up at Jeff's to playtest with Ryan and Greg.

Russell pulled up the Nerd Party Van (TM) at 7:15am the next morning to pick me up. The newest edition to his family's transportation, it easily fit the six magical, conquering wizards. Team MacDonaldSmith and team LallaSmithMuscles. First stop was SV Market for sandwiches and snacks. Thanks to Jason for his Pepper Plant sauce purchase and sharing! Up and over Hwy 17, we parked in an all-day $5 lot near the event.

665 teams showed up and the place was mostly full. In the tent, there was a single row between all the aisles, which made walking through a jam-packed hassle. Since the tables were so long, dancing through the chairs became an Olympic-style event. Good thing I'm nimble.

Seatings were posted about 40 minutes late (which we are all used to now), and we shambled through the crowd. Black bags containing the 12 packs were distributed by the judges. We split them up 4 between us. On the "go" signal, we cracked and sorted. Russell wrote all the cards down for our team, then we exchanged pools with our neighbor. That was it - one pass! A mediocre pool - we had 2 1/2 decks.

I took the aggro Mardu deck (good), Russell got the Temur beats (good) and Spencer took Sultai delve (not so good)... sorry Spence! The first guys we played said it was their first GP. My Mardu Ascendancy spewed out goblins and Warflare finished him off both games. Russell won and Spencer struggled and lost, but 2 out of 3 is a win.

Round 2 was against some guys from Denmark. They spoke Danish while crushing our decks. Fun times! Round 3 was versus some Chinese guys. We lost. Mob Rule had something to do with it. We need to learn another language. Klingon?

Sitting at 1-2, we knew the odds were against us. But we shook it off and bolstered the team. We won the next 4 rounds to be at 5-2. Bubble babies! Hogan got us some Vietnamese sandwiches, which were awesome! His team was with Jordan and Stephan, down from SacTown. Hey guys!

Round 8 - fight!
Our opponents had Anime Imports shirts on and were from SF. Their middle player was friendly and talkative, but mine was silent and solemn. First game, my army got him down to 3 life and then I chose Dragons on my Outpost Siege with three guys out. He blocked my attackers and the Siege did the last points of damage. Game two, he stalled and traded guys until his dragons came out. Last game, I made some questionable trades, when I think I should have been attacking YOLO. Again, his dragons got me in the late game. Spencer and Russell had split their games, so it was up to me, but I lost. It's good to have the team all making the decisions together. That way, they don't ask "what happened?". Rough match.

It was 10pm when we got knocked out. Team MacDonaldSmith also lost that round. We all walked to the PrizeWall to trade in our tickets. They had all kinds of crazy stuff for sale. Oversized Siege Rhino and Treasure Cruise cards, playmats, figures, old cards, packs and boxes. They even had some uncut foil sheets from Wizards. Shiny! I got an Odyssey and an Avacyn Restored pack for a future chaos draft some time.

Fate and Khans packs were 10 PW tix each, so about $4 equivalent. Older packs were between 20 (Theros) and 200 (Urza's Saga). Check out the website for all the prizes: www.gpsanjose.com

I believe I played fairly tight and made only few mistakes. 5-3 is disappointing, but we all know about the randomness in the game. Sometime you're the windshield, baby, sometimes you're the ball.

Next West Coast limited GP is Vegas Modern Masters II in May. See you then!