Yawgmoth’s Whimsy #168 - Pairings Are Up!

What is the best Extended deck ever played? How do current Tier 1 decks fare against the decks your grandparents played? We’re about to find out. It’s a single elimination tournament featuring 32 of the best Extended decks ever, going head to head.

I talked about the origin of this idea last week. Basically, the idea is to take the best / most broken Extended decks for years past, and bang them up against the top of the current Extended crop. It’s single elimination (unless I can find a ton of people willing to help play this out). Single elimination means that individual bad draws can have a much larger impact that in a Swiss tournament, so I think best of five game matches will be necessary. Sideboarding is also going to be really hit or miss, since many of these decks were never intended to face one another. Playing two games unsideboarded and three with sideboards will help balance that out, too.

I got a lot of help and recommendations from the forums, and I had to really battle to cut the list to 32 decks. (Originally, I planned on 16.) The end result was that I had to cut some solid contenders. I ended up listing the decks that simply had to be in the event. They totaled 26. Then I listed the next ten best decks, including my personal favorites like Enchantress, and randomly sorted them. The top six were in, the other four were not.

Next up was to establish the pairings. I took all 32 decks, and did a random sort. I wanted random pairings, but I had a few rules.

* Try to keep the current decks in separate brackets, as much as possible.

* Try to avoid pairings that recreated events. (e.g. don’t replay the finals of PT: Rome)

* Don’t have too many of the current decks face insanity round 1.

The first random sort I did violated all the rules. The first bracket had Aggro Loam playing Gaea’s Might Get There. The Cheon versus Levy finals from GP: Dallas — but it would not be played by Cheon or Levy. Would we learn much from having me play out that match-up? Which brings up another issue. From the forums:

“I think the hardest thing will be to play the tournament without having familiarity / play skill skewing the results too much. I know that I personally can play about half those decks at or around 100% and the other half around 50% playskill.”- cromulantkeith

Yes, I think that will be a problem. Personally, I doubt I could play more than a couple of these decks at even 90%, I’m also sure I’m subpar with the others. It will take some practice and some goldfishing just to remember how to make these decks sit up and beg. Making sure I play them well is going to be a whole ‘nother thing.

Another good piece of advice from the forums:

“PRJ: just get forum posters to play it out for you” – jkyu

I’d had that thought as well. I will provide decklists for all the matches. (Originally, I was going to just provide a few decklists, week by week, but I weakened. They are all below.) If people want to play out the matches, go for it. Best of five, first two games without sideboarding, playtest mulligans — and post your results, including any interesting comments, in the forums. And if you have a lot of experience with one side of the matchup, and your opponent is inexperienced with the other deck, you should probably note that, too.

As I said, the first random pairings had a ton of problems. I restorted, and found that four of the five current decks were all in the third bracket. Another resort, and it looked okay. I tweaked a couple matchups — my G/B Survival deck was paired against Pandeburst. No way — I played that matchup, and lost game 3 in the finals of a PTQ. It’s the closest I’ve ever been to qualifying, and I do not want to relive that loss again. Not in the first round.

Anyway, with the third resort and a little minor tweaking, I have pairings. I have broken the pairings down into four eight-deck brackets. I’ll cover them bracket by bracket, with some thoughts about the probable outcome. I’m guessing here — I haven’t even finished loading some of these decks into MWS, much less played them out. That wasn’t the plan, but I spent way too much of the week, and weekend, doing real work. I’m behind, and Craig is standing behind me with his virtual Taser at my neck. No time, no time. [No need to type that twice, Jahn! *bzzzzzz* – Craig.]

Anyway, here’s the Ultimate Extended Tournament pairings. These are the matchups that have never been — and maybe should never be.

Let’s see which deck is the most powerful, ever.

“Mmmmm bench-racing irrelevant matchups – this is gonna be FUN!” – ellomdian

That’s the idea.

A quick note: two of these decks are personal favorites. If you don’t like those choices… tough. Well, okay, if people really have a problem, substitute Full English Breakfast for my G/B Survival deck. Substitute anything you like for Enchantress.

Here that — if you think your favorite / pet deck belongs in this event, substitute it for Enchantress. You play U/W Tron round 1, the winner of Trix & Twiddle Desire round 2, the winner of Stasis / CMU Gun / GobVantage / High Tide round 3, etc.

NE Bracket

Enchantress versus U/W Tron
Trix versus Twiddle Desire
Stasis versus CMU Gun
GobVantage versus High Tide

Notes on the bracket: Nazdakka wrote “U/W Tron? Seriously? Isn’t it a bye for… almost everything in this tournament?” in the forums. Well, maybe not for Enchantress. I was really torn between Trained Seals (a really bad beatdown Enchantress, but my own) and a combo version. I chose the combo version. Trix should demolish Twiddle. Trix has five kinds of counters, and Duress. Twiddle has five kinds of, well, Twiddle. CMU Gun is, IMHO, as outclassed as running a Model T at Daytona. Finally — I have no idea how High Tide fairs against GobVantage. Maybe Legacy players can guess, but the High Tide has some stuff Legacy has never seen. The sideboard should be relevant — it almost has to start with 4 Chills.

Overall, I’m betting on Trix for this bracket.

NW Bracket

Maher Oath versus Angry Ghoul
Turboland versus Beat Stick
Benzo versus The Clock
SuperGro versus Affinity

Notes on the bracket: The first match-up is amusing, mainly because both decklists are those played by Bob Maher. Oath should take it, unless Ghoul gets the turn 2 kill three times. Turboland should out counter Beat Stick, because I’m using the Force of Will version of Turboland. Benzo, the deck that got Entomb banned, faces The Clock, one of the decks that got Tinker banned. No bets there. And Supergro verses Affinity is something I will have to play out. I just don’t know. I do know that I hated to play against any of them.

I’m not calling this bracket. I still remember playtesting Turboland against Maher Oath, and that was always close. I have never played Affinity against Winter Orb, or Oath against either one. Should be interesting.

SE Bracket

Legion Land Loss versus TEPS
Jar Grim versus PT Junk
RDW2k versus Aggro Loam
Academy versus Cephalid Life

Notes on the bracket: The first slot was just listed as “Green deck” in the pairings sorter. I was waffling between Jamie Wakefield Secret Force, 9 Land Stompy, and Legion Land Loss. Secret Force was my choice, because “It’s All About the Dinosaurs” is just a great read — unquestionably one of the most purely enjoyable tourney reports I have ever seen. However, pitting Jamie’s creation against a slew of combo decks most featuring Urza’s block brokenness just seems wrong. Instead, I opted for Legion Land Loss, a deck that has appeared in PTs, GPs, and several times in the Masters. LLL should slaughter TEPS, because TEPS manabase is weak to begin with, and it has not counters. It is an interesting racket, because LLL, RDW2k, and PT Junk all rely on mana denial, to some extent. However, Academy, and especially JarGrim are so fast, that mana denial is probably not enough. I expect that the finals for this bracket will be Academy versus JarGrim, and that will be a toss-up. Academy should have had four Annuls in the sideboard, but it doesn’t. However, Academy does have Power Sink and Abeyance — while all Jargrim has is Defense Grid.

I’ll go with Academy in five.

SW Bracket

Gaea’s Might Get There versus Pandeburst
Counterslivers versus Psychatog
Free Spell Necro versus Balancing Tings
George W. Bosh versus G/B Survival

Notes on the Bracket: Raphael Levy has now won two straight Extended GPs with Gaea’s Might Get There. It is a powerful deck — but so is Pandeburst. I have no idea which deck wins, here. This bracket is also unique in that it has two current Extended decks: Levy’s and the new Balancing Tings build from GP: Singapore. That slot was originally going to be Flow Rock, but it did so badly at the GPs that I audibled into Tings. The hardest part of this bracket was choosing the Tog deck. In the end I went with the version that won a PT. I used the same principle in choosing among the various Tinker builds: George W. Bosh won the PT. I have already explained why my G/B Survival deck is in there.

I’ll call one for the home team: GB Survival takes the bracket. I’m betting Pandeburst takes GMGT. I know Counterslivers can beat Pandeburst, and G/B Survival can beat Slivers. If Silvers loses to Tog, however, Tog wins the bracket.

Now I just have to start playing these matches out. Of course, if anyone wants to play any of these, go ahead. I’d be glad of the help. As Mono79 put it in the forums, “Holy handgrenades, that’s a lot of effort.” So help me out.

Next week, as much of round 1 as I can complete and write up.

Here are the decklists.

The Decklists: NE Bracket

Enchantress
Gabriel Nassif, 2nd Yokohama Masters

10 Forest
6 Island
4 Yavimaya Coast
2 Serra’s Sanctum

4 Argothian Enchantress
2 Cloud of Faeries
4 Wall of Blossoms
1 Yavimaya Enchantress

3 Exploration
4 Wild Growth
4 Fertile Ground
4 Enchantress’ Presence
4 Seal of Removal
4 Frantic Search
3 Words of Winds
1 Trade Routes

Sideboard
3 Ray of Revelation
3 Deep Analysis
3 Gainsay
2 Masticore
2 Yavimaya Enchantress
1 Bind
1 Worship

versus

U/W Tron
Paul Nguyen, GP: Dallas Top 8 (current deck)

4 Urza’s Power Plant
4 Urza’s Tower
4 Urza’s Mine
4 Hallowed Fountain
3 Island
2 Plains
1 Academy Ruins
1 Adarkar Wastes