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The story so far...
I first started playing Magic back in 1994 at Braintree High. I played before, during and after school, mostly in multi-player free for alls. In college, I got into the tournament scene under the wing of YMG during its heyday, finally making it to the Pro Tour a few times and finishing in the money, but never breaking into the Top 32. For the last few years I have been drafting mostly online (username “Manning”), only attending PTs here and there when I could. Nationals 2005 was in driving distance and I was qualified on rating, so I decided to give it a go.
Having done a ton of drafting online and at Neutral Ground in NYC (I live on the same block), I felt like I had a good handle on that aspect of the tournament. I wouldn’t force any particular color scheme; I would just take the best of what’s around (as Dave Matthews suggested).
What I had no clue about was Constructed, since I hadn’t played Standard for at least a year except for the occasional foray into WW with Arrest online. I knew from the start that I wouldn’t run Tooth and Nail. It was just too overexposed with its amazing performance in Regionals and foreign Nationals. Even as the best deck I would be facing players who had tested for hours against me and who had sideboard cards specifically targeted for my deck. Without much time and only a loose team (most of my playing was solitaire with two Apprentice programs open), I wanted something more rogue so that what little testing I did would give me an advantage against an unprepared opponent. They might make mistakes because they would not understand what made my deck function as well as I understood theirs.
With that in mind, I tried every Standard list that I saw, using speedy Red burn as a gauge for whether the rogue deck could keep up. What I found was that Red just kept on winning! So I reluctantly decided to go with that as my backup plan — it was consistent and it could get free wins with a Mox start. Still, this was not exactly an unknown strategy and I was hoping for something a bit more unusual. Mike Flores gave me his Red list the night before I left for Baltimore and it looked very solid (it would take Josh Ravitz to a Top 8 berth), but when I played it out, it just didn’t feel right for my style.
When I got to the site I watched some of the grinders and was particularly intrigued by a mono Blue deck that Craig Edwards was running based on the French Top 8 list. It played very smoothly and I felt like I understood how it worked (Neil Reeves wound up running a modified version of the French list to take 2nd). But I lost a little faith when Craig didn’t manage to grind in, plus I was having some trouble finding all the cards.
Salvation finally arrived when I saw that Brian “B Man” Robinson, an old pal from MA, had won a 6-round grinder with B/G Death Cloud built by Lucas Glavin. I had talked about the deck a bit with Tom Guevin over IM and it seemed like a natural foil to Tooth (i.e. they want lots of land to play out a few key creatures and Cloud handles all of that). The problem I had before was just that the numbers were off and it could get a lot of clunky draws with Cloud, Plow Under and Reach that would get run over by Red. Lucas had tuned the deck pretty well, adding 3 Chrome Mox and cutting down on some of the clunkier spells like Solemn Simulacrum. LCG (as Lucas is often called) was an old teammate of mine from PT Boston (where we ground in together).
Here’s the list:
| G/B Death Cloud A Standard deck, by Chris Manning 7th place at a Nationals tournament in Baltimore, Maryland, United States on 2005-08-14 | ||
Artifacts 3 Chrome Mox 4 Sensei's Divining Top Artifact Creatures 2 Solemn Simulacrum Creatures 4 Eternal Witness 4 Sakura-Tribe Elder 3 Viridian Shaman Instants 3 Echoing Decay |
Legendary Creatures 1 Ink-Eyes, Servant of Oni 3 Kokusho, the Evening Star Sorceries 4 Death Cloud 4 Kodama's Reach 4 Plow Under Basic Lands 12 Forest 7 Swamp Legendary Lands 1 Okina, Temple to the Grandfathers 1 Shizo, Death's Storehouse | 3 Circle of Protection: Red 2 Hideous Laughter 3 Cranial Extraction 2 Persecute 2 Sylvan Scrying 1 Plains 2 Boseiju, Who Shelters All |
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| Download this deck in Apprentice format! |
Download this deck in Magic Online Text format! | |
For those of you unfamiliar with the deck, the basic goal is to break the symmetry of Death Cloud by primarily investing in one of the resources it destroys — namely, land. Other players will play creatures and have cards in hand when Death Cloud resolves and you will gain card advantage. What is somewhat odd about the deck is that you don’t “just win” after you resolve its signature card. You are often just in a favorable position with 3-4 lands and a Sensei’s Divining Top when they have nothing. Kokusho is used both as a finisher and as a way to get very far ahead in life after a Death Cloud to magnify your advantage further.
I play a few practice games with the deck against Mark Schmit, my roommate for the weekend, who had just won a Grinder playing Red Burn ala the Irish Nationals build. Ironically enough for the hype about the CMU — YMG antagonism ballied about later in the weekend, Mark is a CMU grad who helped me test and theorize all through the event. Unfortunately, it was late so I only get to play a few games with the deck before Day 1.
For each match I list my opponent, how/where they qualified, their relevant rating, and the % chance that I should beat them according to the Elo system that Wizards uses to determine how ratings should move after each match.
Round 1: Williams, Blaine Hartford 1861 Elo Prediction: 56%
Blaine won Hartford Regionals with Beacon Green, but I guess he decided that the metagame had changed since he was now playing mono-Blue Urzatron. In game one, I thought my draw was decent with early mana and multiple Plow Unders, a Cloud and Kokusho, but he had triple Condescend and double Rewind. He Mindslavers me after but can't really do much other than empty my hand and shuffle away Top. Eventually he finds Meloku and I realize just how good that card is against me. I draw Cloud, but Meloku would let him create enough tokens so that he could save Meloku and fill his hand. My only out at that point was to cast Death Cloud with two mana up -- he would create tokens and then I Echoing Decay them all away. But this would require him to have no permission. It doesn't happen and I lose a very long game one.
Sideboard: -3 Echo Decay, -1 Forest, -1 Swamp, -1 Eternal Witness, +2 Boseiju, +2 Sylvan Scrying, +2 Persecute
Decays out and the uncounterable package in along with a little extra discard.
Game two he tapped out on turn 5 or so for Meloku and I Death Cloud away his hand and board. I recover much faster than he does and after a Viridian Shaman kills an Oblivion Stone it's on to game three.
Game three I get an early Elder and Witness it back. I could go for Cloud but I haven't found Boseiju yet and he has a full grip with all his mana untapped. I ninja Witness into Ink-Eyes getting aggressive because there are only a few minutes left in the round, but I only have 6 lands, so I don't have enough to regenerate. He has the Oblivion Stone and mana to use it so away goes the Servant of Oni. After that I Cloud, but there just isn't enough time for either player to win and it goes to a draw.
0-0-1
Paul "Little Darwin" Rietzl comes over after the match and tells me all I need to do from here is go 10-3 to make Top 8. No sweat!
Round 2: Caveny, Erek Denver 1869 Elo Prediction: 55%
Erik also played Beacon Green to top 8 his Regionals, but decided to switch to U/G control. Game one I get an early Plow Under Condescended, but my turn 5 Kokusho sticks. He casts Gifts Ungiven getting Crystal Shard, Eternal Witness, Plow Under, and Meloku. I'm not sure what else was in his deck to get, but this Gifts seems pretty straightforward for me. I can't give him Shard because he just bounces Kokusho. Meloku, as described in the last match, is one of my worst nightmares. Eternal Witness is good, but he only has four lands out so it will most likely be too slow to matter. Plow Under is terrible for him here as he is staring down a Dragon - taking a full turn to put some lands on my deck will not slow his imminent demise. If he had Echoing Truth, that would have been much better than the Plow. I'm not sure his list, so maybe he didn't have it, but it just goes to show how carefully you have to build your deck when you run Gifts - one card can change everything. I would want to think about every possible situation type (e.g. ahead on tempo, behind on tempo, etc) and have the possibility to make a powerful Gifts for that occasion. He untaps and Witness grabs Meloku. I hit for 5. Caveny taps out to play Meloku. I hit for 5 and Kokusho number two is game.
Sideboard: -3 Echo Decay, -1 Forest, -1 Swamp, -1 Viridian Shaman, +2 Boseiju, +2 Sylvan Scrying, +2 Persecute
Similar SB'ing to round one except now he has a lot fewer artifacts to worry about so I can cut a Shaman instead of a Witness. How Caveny-ient (sorry the pun was begging to be made).
I got an early Boseiju and ramping such that I was able to Plow Under when he only had three Forests out (the Boseiju is actually a liability for me just because he didn't have the Blue mana yet). I Plowed again next turn. Then Witness/Persecute Blue to knock out his whole hand except for a single Plow of his own. I'm not sure why he didn't concede when I played a Dragon the next turn, but it was over soon enough.
1-0-1
Round 3: Mangner, Sean Player's Club 1866 Elo Prediction: 55%
Sean starts with a plains and a Hawk. I kept a hand with multiple Plows not knowing the matchup and I get overrun by the swarm of small Birds and Hounds.
Sideboard: -4 Plow Under, +2 Persecute, +2 Hideous Laughter
An easy sideboard choice, since tapping five mana for a play that doesn't stop creatures seems bad against a deck that can just drop Hokori for the lock the next turn.
Early Decays/Laughter kept his team in check so that I could actually outrace him with Kokusho afterwards. A Viridian Shaman had to step in at some point to take out a Jitte.
Game three I got an early Laughter to sweep his board, but I didn't draw any pressure for a long time afterwards. Eventually he had a Hawk and a Nexus plinking away at my life. I drew Persecute and since he had 3 cards in hand I went for it... turns out he had double Charge Across the Araba in hand! One of those might have been good enough for the win, but after I cleared his hand and Witnessed the Laughter back, he had run out of steam and a Dragon a few turns later was good for the match.
2-0-1
On to the draft! The format I have actually practiced! It started with a nice surprise in Kokusho, the Evening Star - how fitting to play it in both Limited and Constructed. From there I was pretty much mono-Black through the first pack grabbing a pair of Demons and a late Villainous Ogre to help mitigate their drawbacks. Pack two is unexciting with a better than usual Takenuma Bleeder. The next pick was the tough one... Takenuma Bleeder number two, Patron of the Moon, or Shimmering Glasskite. Bleeder was clearly the safe pick and it would up the consistency of the deck for sure. The two Blue cards were a fairly clear signal, however, so I didn't want to miss out on the power of these cards if more Blue was coming to complement them. I wavered and finally just grabbed the 5/4 flyer, which was almost certainly wrong given the deck so far - I have a weakness for huge flyers, I'll admit. I almost immediately regretted it, however, as my deck could have really used the extra three-drop and I got passed a Waxmane Baku and a Moonlit Strider just after so I might not even be playing Blue. I snag a few Genju and settled into B/W for the last pack, but do grab a late Shinen of Flight’s Wings just in case.
Here's the deck I assembled and registered:
2 Kitsune Loreweaver
1 Ashen-Skin Zubera
1 Hand of Cruelty
1 Kuro's Taken
1 Villainous Ogre
1 Takenuma Bleeder
1 Shinen of Star's Light
1 Waxmane Baku
1 Gibbering Kami
1 Razorjaw Oni
1 Moonlit Strider
1 Painwracker Oni
1 Gutwrencher Oni
1 Kokusho, the Evening Star
1 Genju of the Fens
1 Genju of the Fields
1 Soulless Revival
1 Kagemaro's Clutch
1 Call for Blood (ouch)
1 Pull Under
1 Death Denied
10 Swamps
8 Plains
This deck was reasonable with one definite bomb in Kokusho. It came up a few cards short, however, as a result of my waffling on a second color so it had to play some suboptimal cards like Villainous Ogre (who is there mostly to help turn off the drawbacks of Demons) and Call for Blood (which I thought could be good to sacrifice Kokusho to drain for 5 or Razorjaw Oni for a surprise block - it ended up being utterly mediocre).
I often sideboarded to the following:
1 Ashen-Skin Zubera
1 Minamo Scrollkeeper
1 Kaijin of the Vanishing Touch
1 Hand of Cruelty
1 Kuro's Taken
1 Villainous Ogre
1 Takenuma Bleeder
1 Graceful Adept
1 Gibbering Kami
1 Shimmering Glasskite
1 Razorjaw Oni
1 Shinen of Flight's Wing
1 Painwracker Oni
1 Gutwrencher Oni
1 Kokusho, the Evening Star
1 Patron of the Moon
1 Genju of the Fens
1 Soulless Revival
1 Hinder
1 Kagemaro's Clutch
1 Pull Under
1 Death Denied
10 Swamps
8 Islands
The White had more "Bears" and Waxmane, but the Blue had more reach for the long game with multiple flyers and a hard counter. Graceful Adept is by no means great, but if your opponent insists on running a bunch of 2/1's, then he gets the job done. I'm actually happier to have him in the deck than a 3/1 that just gets First Volley'ed or Frostling'ed.
Round 4: Kolos, John C. Philadelphia 1845 Elo Prediction: 76%
“Call me Conrad”
John told me that he prefers to go by his middle name, Conrad as we shuffled up. I got some early bear action and he was just playing out his lands including Forests, Plains, *and* a Mountain. A Waxmane on his side was troubling, but not really doing anything yet. Sokenzan Spellbade is summoned by Conrad and my offense is starting to look shaky. When he spliced Glacial Ray onto Hundred-Talon Strike and then played Ghost-Lit Raider (Lord Tim?) the next turn my chances of winning were looking very slim. The next turn he attacked with Sniper even though I could block it without losing a creature just so that he could tap down my team with the Ray/Waxmane next turn for the Spellblade win. I was in such a bad position that I decided to block anyway, since I had Kokusho in hand and if I drew Clutch I could kill the Spellblade and this might have been my only chance to kill the Sniper with the Dragon as my best shot for long term victory.
I sideboarded to the Blue, since it had more three-toughness against the Raider/Ray and I had little chance of winning a ground war against his Green cards.
Unfortunately I kept a mediocre starting hand with Death Denied, Veil of Secrecy and Pull Under with 4 lands (sketchy, I know) drawing first and I drew ten straight lands! Maybe I didn't shuffle enough after the big transformational sideboard? Nah... I piled and riffled 3-4 times. Conrad shuffled too. Just seems like some old-fashioned bad luck.
The horror! (Another shameless Joseph Conrad reference I had to fit in somewhere).
2-1-1
Round 5: Cuenca, Nicolas Last Chance 1808 Elo Prediction: 79%
Nick was donning a YMG shirt. He had no idea who I was, as far as I could tell. He is part of the next generation of YMG, the Riker to Edwards’ Picard. I played at the store regularly from 1998 or so through to 2002, from college to the first few years out in my Somerville apartment just a few blocks away from Davis Square (where YMG is located — notice a pattern in my living arrangements? What a junkie!). But I've been away from the YMG store for a long time.
Nick had a lot of flyers, including multiple Floodbringahs (Boston accent added for nostalgia’s sake) so my Genju were not as good as usual. He won game one by outracing in the air and a Higure (who never grabs any other Ninja).
Paris Hilton’s reaction to Higure with no other Ninja: That’s hot!
Off I went into the wild Blue yonder. I took out both Genju and all the White, added the Blue well and went to 19 lands, adding two Forest for a Gale Force (which I never drew, but would have been great at many points during the games)
Both games two and three went fairly the same way. I got an early Ogre backed by Gutwrencher Oni and manage to hold off his flyers with my own. Without the ability to race in the air with his smaller flyers my ground team was able to win the race. His biggest threat was a Teller of Tales and I had the Pull Under.
3-1-1
Round 6: Del Degan, Colin Orlando 1731 Elo Prediction: 86%
Colin wins the award for the nicest opponent I've ever had. He enthusiastically shook my hand before the match and he just seemed happy to be playing Magic at Nationals.
Game one was interesting in that he develops a board that would be very difficult for me to ever punch through with Indebted Samurai and Kitsune Blademaster on the ground along with Moonwing Moth and a flipped Faithful Squire in the air. My board was good, however, with Kokusho, Painwracker Oni, Takenuma Bleeder, and Moonlit Strider. All would be fine, actually, if he didn't have a Kami of the Empty Graves to be able to block my Painwracker (and he could use Squire to save his guy anyways). Moonlit could save the Oni once, but Squire could save his Kami twice. What was good for me, however, was that Colin was only on 10 life.
POP QUIZ: Can you see what needed to happen?
Takenuma Bleeder needed to die! Or more importantly, Kokusho did. Then I could sacrifice my Strider to give Protection from Black to my Painwracker and sneak in for the final 5. If Bleeder was gone, then I could sacrifice Kokusho to upkeep the Oni. This all required him to have no damage prevention/lifegain, but no plan is perfect. I sent the Bleeder into his side, hoping he just blocks it not seeing what is going on. He blocked with a 2/2 however so I think he must have known what was going on here. You can imagine my surprise then when he drew his card for the next turn and then Rend Fleshes my Bleeder. What? That alone was enough to almost put him on a Haze. But I didn't have a much better plan so I just went for it and he had nothing so he scoops. Hrmmm...
I sideboarded to the Blue again, he has too many good ground blockers for the White.
Game two he got a good curve early and I was under pressure just playing a Shimmering Glasskite as my first guy. Gutwrencher was next for me and he was basically acting as a giant wall. I start discarding, but luckily drew an Ogre a turn or two later to stop it. He never got a way to bust through the Oni and I eventually got Patron of the Moon to make the clock a lot shorter.
Colin shook my hand after and really was a great sport about it all. He wasn't so upset to lose since he could still play in the JSS. He ended up finishing 67th in the JSS, just out of the money, but I'm sure he learned a lot about the game and he looked like he had a lot of fun, which is the reason why we all are playing in the first place.
4-1-1
Interesting quote from my PT: San Diego report:
"This is where I make my worst play of the tournament. I send the Psychatog, he blocks with Cephalid Looter and then takes a long time after using it to decide what to discard. He then looks back to me expectantly. I read this as him waiting for me to end my turn (in a mental lapse) and say "Shouldn't your Looter be dead?" He replies, "Shouldn't your Psychatog be dead?"" (I went on to win the match, but that didn’t make it any easier.)
Antonino is a good guy, but as he himself confesses he is a “tricky man.” So I went in a little warier than against my previous opponents.
Antonino's deck was crazy good. He was R.G with multiple Spiraling Embers, Torrent of Stone, Kodama's Might, and Glacial Ray along with very solid creatures like Budoka Pupil, Burning-Eye Zubera, and Okina Nightwatch and Homura!
Game one was close as my Painwracker Oni threatens to win the race before it gets Spiraled away. I blocked well using Ashen Skin to offset Okina math and managed to Death Denied back Painwracker and a few good chump blockers, but a Torrent splicing Glacial Ray and Might the next turn was “game over man, game over.”
I sideboarded to Blue again, I came to the realization that build was just better. Antonino suggested I call a judge over to help me sleeve up all the extra cards. Somewhere in the mix, a Genju of the Fields doesn't get sideboarded out, and when I drew my opening hand of Island, Swamp, Swamp, Takenuma Bleeder, GENJU of the FIELDS, Kokusho, Pull Under I decided to keep, even knowing I have no way to ever cast the "Enchant Plains". I never got to six mana until I was at a point where tapping out would put me dead on the board, so Antonino takes the match along with my hopes of 3-1'ing the draft.
4-2-1
I was a little disappointed after that last loss, since I was relying on draft to be my stronger format and I only managed a paltry .500 average. I would need to 6-1 on Saturday to make Sunday, something that seemed just a little two optimistic.
I go back to the hotel and run a few MTGO drafts with Mark Schmit and we lose both in round one, so my confidence is not any higher, but we do dissect the drafts afterwards and I do think that in the end those drafts and talks helped set me straight for Day 2...
