Hello and welcome to my PTQ tourney report, held at Crossroad Games in Maine.

Before I go any further here's the obligatory background information. I've been playing Magic for twelve years, attending PTQs for ten, and scrubbing out in Top 8s for the past five. This past year, I took Magic more seriously than at any other time. I attended six different Grand Prix tournaments, making Day 2 at three of them. I had no Pro Tour slot to show for it, and only made money at one.

After the Grand Prix grind, I relaxed a little. I started playing Type 1 a great deal, and I also drafted locally with friends. I found myself enjoying this set and my play skill seemed to increase with each draft I played. Although this set is limited in what you can successfully win with, due to Guilds, it’s still a great set for Draft and Sealed. It’ll only improve once the expansions are released. This season could not start fast enough.

Maine is a hike, but I decided to drive the three-hour trip with friends. They are:
Andrew Probasco/Brass Man (Type 1 legend and all-round good guy, looking to break into other formats)
Angelo Santiago (PTQ regular famous for ‘extra-curricular’ activities involving alcohol)
Brad Ruxton (famous for being a royal pain in my ass)

We arrive at the PTQ with time to spare, and meet up with a long-lost friend: Toothless Jeff Fairfield. Toothless Jeff was a local at my store and recently moved to Maine, which sucked for the rest of us. Seeing him was actually the main reason I went o this PTQ.

The tournament was huge, given the remote location. Over a hundred people attended and I recognized the majority of the competitors, which is not a good thing. I said hello to other PTQ regulars, such as the New Hampshire crew; Jim Dyke / Chris Roy / Brian Siu / Alex Batista. There was the Small Child crew; Ben Ashman / Dominic Menucci / Ryan Durney, and last but not certainly least, "Mouth", arguably the friendliest and most polite Magic player in the game today.

The tourney started without delay. The card pool I registered was nothing spectacular, and I knew I could get better. The pool I received, and would be playing, is the following:

Red
Barbarian Riftcutter
Coalhauler Swine
Fiery Conclusion
Galvanic Arc
Greater Forgeling
Indentured Oaf
Instilled Furor
Ordruun Commando
Seismic Spike
Surge of Zeal
Torpid Moloch
Viashino Slasher

Green
Bramble Elemental
Doubling Season
Elves of Deep Shadow
Elvish Skysweeper
Farseek
Gaze of the Gorgon
Greater Mossdog
Hunted Troll
Sundering Vitae
Transluminant
Trophy Hunter
Siege Wurm
Ursapine

White
Benevolent Ancestor
Caregiver
Courier Hawk
Gate Hound
Nightguard Patrol
Oathsworn Giant
Votary of the Conclave
Wojek Siren

Blue
2 Dizzy Spell
Drift of Phantasm
Flight of Fancy
Halcyon Glaze
Induce Paranoia
Muddle the Mixture
Snapping Drake
Stasis Cell
Surveilling Sprite
Terraformer
Zephyr Spirit

Black
Carrion Howler
Clinging Darkness
Disembowel
Infectious Host
Mortipede
Stinkweed Imp
2 Thoughtpicker Witch
Undercity Shade

Hybrid
Boros Guildmage
Lurking Informant

Gold
Consult the Necrosages
Drooling Groodion
Golgari Germination
Guardian of Vitu-Ghazi
2 Tolsimir Wolfblood (!)
Rally the Righteous

Artifacts/Non-Basic Lands
2 Boros Signet
Dimir Signet
Leashling
2 Selesnya Signet
Terrarion
Voyager Staff
Boros Garrison
Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion
2 Vitu-Ghazi, the City Tree

Take a moment to envision what you'd play if you want.

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…

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Keep thinking.

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This is the deck I ended up using:

Artifacts
Terrarion
Voyager Staff
2 Selesnya Signet

Gold
2 Tolsimir Wolfblood
Guardian of Vitu-Ghazi
Boros Guildmage

White
Oathsworn Giant
Nightguard Patrol
Courier Hawk

Green
Bramble Elemental
Elves of Deep Shadow
Elvish Skysweeper
Farseek
Gaze of the Gorgon
Greater Mossdog
Transluminant
Trophy Hunter
Siege Wurm
Ursapine

Black
Disembowel
Stinkweed Imp

Land
7 Forest
7 Plains
2 Vitu-Ghazi, the City Tree
1 Swamp

The correct way to build this card-pool is to concentrate on the bombs. There are three: double Tolsimir Wolfblood, and an Ursapine. Given that base, it's clear that you're going to be Green White for your two main colors. The only real issue with this pool is the splash color.

I showed this pool to my friends, and besides receiving several rolls of the eye, they were completely split on what the splash color should be. Half agreed with my small Black splash, while the rest thought I should run the Red splash instead. This would include some combination of Boros Signets, Galvanic Arc, Fiery Conclusion and possibly Indentured Oaf. My argument for the small Black splash is that it's very easy to fit into my mana base, as I have Elves of Deep Shadow, Farseek and Terrarion. I don't want additional Signets, as two is more than enough. Stinkweed Imp helps the Convoke curve more than the Red-side, whose only creature of worth is the Oaf… and I don't think I'd maindeck him if I went Red. Had I gone the Red splash, I would have been unable to play with Voyager Staff.

When showing this pool to people, almost everyone pulled the Staff to the side and looked for something else to play. Besides my ridiculous rares, the Staff was my MVP for the day. The deck had no sacrifice outlet, which can be key in Limited. I place a high value on cards that allow you to remove a creature from play (even if only temporary) at little or no cost. Being able to do that in this format is paramount, as it lets you fizzle silly things like Brightflame. Most sac outlets, like Dimir House Guard or Golgari Rot-Wurm, offer a clear benefit when the creature is sacrificed. Voyager Staff is much trickier: it will sit there and you may use it, or you may not. Just having the Staff out there, with two mana open, is pure gold. Chances are, you're preventing a removal spell that would be cast otherwise. In addition, the Staff can always phase out that crucial blocker / attacker when you need win the game.

Ok, so I made Voyager Staff sound like God's Gift to Limited, but it's not. Frankly, I almost never play it in Draft… but in Sealed, it's definitely playable. More people should give it a try.

My play-by-play of the Swiss rounds is short and sweet. I don't remember much, and most of my matches were done in under twenty minutes.

Round 1: Ryan with Golgari
I watched Ryan Team-Draft against some friends of mine at the last PTQ, and after watching him I knew he was a good player.

Game 1, and we are both stuck on two lands. Thankfully, I have a Signet out. Sometime during the game, Ryan accidentally drops a Primordial Sage on the board before quickly picking it up. This was pretty big, as it determined whether I led with Tolsimir or Oathsworn Giant. Normally, I'd lead with the Giant: his grip was full and I want to bait with the less powerful creature. Because he was still short of casting the Sage at this point, I wanted to pound him before the Sage hit. Hopefully by the time it did, he would be low enough on life that he would have to block something with it… and I could use Gaze of the Gorgon. Thankfully, that's pretty much what happened. Somewhere in here Ryan played a Selesnya Guildmage and pump-guys, but at that point he was too far behind to stabilize.

Game 2, I flew out the gates while he didn't drop creatures. Finally, he had to commit something to the board. Down came a Shambling Shell. I kept pounding in, taking him to two life. I had five creatures in play, and was about to lay my sixth, when it occurred to me that I was being set up for a Hex. Instead, I leave White mana open (with Transluminant in play), and pass the turn. Ryan does cast Hex, as he has Shambling Shell, but I respond by sacrificing the Tranny. The token finishes him off.

Ryan shows me his deck afterwards, and it was a pure monster: Hex, Grave-Shell Scarab, Primordial Sage, 2 Shambling Shell, 2 Disembowel and a host of other goodies. I was very fortunate to win this match.
Matches: 1-0, Games: 2-0

Round 2: Ken Krouner with Selesnya
I'm a fan of Ken's old articles, and really wish he'd continue to write. [Seconded- Craig]. There's currently a drought of quality Limited articles, since the majority are written by an individual who I think is terrible, a guy who purposefully misinforms his readers. His name will go unmentioned for the sake of tact (and I want this report to be published, heh). I was looking forward to my match with Ken because I had played several of his friends. This was the first time we'd meet.

Game 1, I keep a one land Farseek / Signet draw on the play… and luck out. Ken keeps a one-lander on the draw, and I win in short order.

Game 2, I keep a hand that enables turn 4 Tolsimir. I run him out quick, as I fear only Faith's Fetters from the Selesnyan arsenal. Ken runs out a quick Selesnya Evangel, but I have the Disembowel, and he drew nothing else ov value.

Ken was a very gracious opponent, despite having terrible draws in our match with mine being fantastic. We wished each other good luck and went our separate ways.
Matches: 2-0, Games: 4-0

Round 3: Mike Vischanti (last name probably spelt incorrectly) with Boros
Mike's a good kid and a PTQ regular.

Game 1, and Mike come out screaming with Skyknight Legionnaire and Screeching Griffin. I start to stabilize with my silly bombs. The key moment is when I swing with a bunch of guys, and he gang-blocks a Conclave Equenaut while I have Voyager Staff out. Before we stack damage, he casts Boros Fury-Shield. I’m holding Gaze of the Gorgon so I could simply let it resolve and still take out his guys through Gaze... but instead I respond by casting the Gaze, letting it resolve with Fury-Shield on the stack, and then Staff out my Equenaut. This means I take zero damage from the Fury-Shield - I was at low life - yet kill his blockers with the Gaze. The judge verified this, and I win in short order.

Game 2: Turn 4 Ursapine, Turn 5 Tolsimir, Turn 6 Good Game.
Matches: 3-0, Games: 6-0

Round 4: Jake with Golgari
I didn't know Jake, but he recognized me and we made small-talk. He mentioned that his deck wasn't great… he was hoping to lose this match so he needn't deal with the overpowered decks at the top tables.

Works for me.

Game 1, he leads with Selesnya Evangel, following it up with Selesnya Guildmage. Despite this, I manage to stabilize and I somehow “out-token” him with dual-action Vitu-Ghazis. I start to swing, since by this point both of his token makers were dead, but he is actually winning the race with Undercity Shade. The turn before I kill him, he topdecks a Swamp to swing for exactly lethal damage.

Game 2, I come out strongly with lots of little beaters. He starts off sluggish. Turn 5, he drops Golgari Rot-Wurm and follows it up with Gleancrawler. I have Voyager Staff, and continue to lay guys. After a brief stalemate, he starts swinging. I make a few one-for-one blocks and successfully stack / resolve damage. In his second main phase, I Staff out his Gleancrawler. This seems like an obvious play, but I almost missed it. On my turn his Gleancrawler comes back into play but I still have lots of little creatures left over and win shortly after.

Game 3: We're low on time but I get the nut Ursapine-into-Tolsimir draw, winning in about ten turns.
Matches: 4-0, Games: 7-1

Round 5: Mike with Selesnya/Boros
Mike was very young and was overjoyed to be at the top table. I had a feeling his deck was pure gold, and this was confirmed when he told me it was his first PTQ. Both our games were very short, as he didn't draw anything. Afterwards, spectators told me his deck featured three Siege Wurms, two Selesnya Guildmages, three Screeching Griffins and a Tolsimir of his own.

I was happy to avoid seeing all of that.
Matches: 5-0 Games: 9-1

At this point I knew I could draw into top 8, but there was a chance that I would play the next round. One of the undefeated players would be the winner of the Mouth / Jackie match next to me. This is significant, as I would almost always intentionally draw with one of these players, while I would almost certainly play it out under any circumstance with the other (for personal reasons). I'll let you figure out who is who.

Jackie is a YMG regular who is friendly, polite and an excellent player. Mouth needs no further introduction.

Their game 3 was a collection of Mouth’s greatest hits, which included:

“You’re so lucky, I can’t believe I’m losing,”
“You’re so awful, I can’t believe you’re winning,” and the perennial classic:
“You’re terrible.”

Why he didn’t get a verbal warning astounded me.

After the match, I asked the table judge why nothing happened. Normally, I don't approach judges about decisions if it doesn't directly involve me, but this one’s a good friend of mine. He said he was inches away from giving at least a game loss, but because Jackie ignored the comments the whole time, he didn’t want the match result to come down to that kind of ruling. I respect that, and Jackie won anyway, but I personally feel behavior like this needs to be completely eliminated from PTQs once and for all. Making jokes is fine. Making an off-handed (or even insulting) comment due to frustration could be viewed as tolerable... if done sparingly. Constantly berating your opponent, from one minute to the next, should not be tolerated. At any level, of any event, anywhere, anytime.

Rounds 6 and 7 I drew, with Toothless Jeff and Andy Stokinger.

I entered Top 8 as third seed, which was then bumped up to second when Mike Emerett dropped from Top 8 in order to boost his brother Jeff. The Top 8 of the Draft was solid, with a good amount of PTQ regulars getting in (such as Alex O'Connell and Dave Shiels, coming off a Grand Prix Top 4 that qualified him for Honolulu). I had Jake from round 4 passing to me, and I was passing to Jeff Emerett.

The first pick of the draft define me. My choice was between Snapping Drake, Dimir Guildmage and Viashino Fangtail. Either the Drake or the Guildmage are safe picks, allowing me to wade in the friendly waters of Dimir, Golgari or a combination of both. Blue, Green and Black are so deep that it's very hard not to get a playable deck from those colors. The other road is picking the Fangtail and trying for the nut Boros deck.

One of my best friends, Will Yeung, regularly drafts on MTGO and swears by Boros. I hate the guild with a burning passion. Many people do, with good reason. It's not a deep Guild, and it has little staying-power. With that said, I chose the damn Fangtail. By picking it, I took the gamble that my deck would either be total crap, or ridiculously overpowered because no one wanted to touch Boros with a ten-foot pole.

My second pick was a Galvanic Arc.
My third pick was another Fangtail.
My fourth pick was another Arc.

I'm not going to continue with draft pick analysis, because the picks were very straightforward. I ended up with this Nuclear Bomb:

Flame-Kin Zealot
Lightning Helix
2 Fiery Conclusion
3 Galvanic Arc
Sabertooth Alley Cat
Sell-Sword Brute
2 Viashino Fangtail
Greater Forgeling
3 Courier Hawk
Bathe in Light
2 Nightguard Patrol
2 Conclave Equenaut
Screeching Griffin
Auratouched Mage
Boros Signet
8 Mountain
8 Plains
Boros Garrison

This deck is a monster. With that said, I still felt uncomfortable. I hate this Guild, and if I don't come out of the gates swinging, that could spell doom. My only controversial decision was whether to run my pack 2, pick 4 Razia, Boros Archangel. I kept her in the board, instead running the Sabretooth Alley Cat, because I wanted a consistent curve. The Cat can be an effective finisher… if it's useless I can feed it to a Fiery Conclusion, or use it to power out turn 4 Conclave Equenauts.

Top 8: Alex O'Connell with Selesnya
Alex is a very good player who's been to the mountain-top before. He came to the table absolutely giddy. When he showed his deck to his friends, I saw the expressions on their faces and knew the winner of this match was winning the PTQ.

He asked how my deck was.
“Not as good as yours,” I replied.

Game 1, Alex leads with Selesnya Evangel. I keep a one-lander on the draw, with 2 Nightguard Patrols and a Boros Signet. I skip my second land drop.
“That's too bad,” he says in a sarcastic manner, which set me off.
As he's beating my skull, he makes an Auratouched Mage and fetches Pollenbright Wings. Then he says, “Let's move onto game 2” and starts scooping up his cards. I jokingly respond with “I'll take it.” He immediately stops gathering his cards.

I could have shut up and watched him scoop his cards, which may have led to me being awarded the game. That's not how I do things, although I admit I was tempted to stay quiet. I was frustrated.

We continue playing and I actually draw some lands and run a Fangtail out there… but it's Too Little Too Late and he owns me, as expected.

Game 2, I lead out with some dorks. This ramps me up to turn 4 Conclave Equenaut. Alex makes an army of 1/1s, and I wish I had taken some of those 20,000 Rain of Embers that were flying around. I say this out-loud, and he responds by saying he hated 19,999 of them.

He Moldervine Cloaks one of his dorks, but the Equenaut goes all the way the turn before he would win.

Game 3, Alex is forced to mulligan to five on the play. He is visibly upset. I lead out with a bunch of quick beaters. He drops a Selesnya Evangel and starts to make a few 1/1s. I figure the writing's on the wall, and just keep running guys out there. The only ones left in my hand are Greater Forgeling and Viashino Fangtail, which probably won't matter, but I have no second Red to cast them. The turn before I would swing for the win, Alex draws his card… and pauses.
“I guess you drew the Wrath of God Convoke card,” I say. He nods, and taps the guys to cast it.

My board is wiped clean and Alex still has tokens left over. I'm suddenly on the defense, as I can't draw a second Red to save my life. Alex goes to town with tokens. I draw my Auratouched Mage and grab a Galvanic Arc, which is immediately met with a Faith's Fetters. He casts his own Mage, which I try to Fiery Conclusion by sacking my Fettered copy… but Alex saves it with a Seeds of Strength. He searches for Moldervine Cloak, and passes the turn. I draw another Plains. On his following turn, he drops Pollenbright Wings and swings. I'm forced to cast Bathe in Light, giving it protection from Green. Both the enchantments fall off, but he's obviously going to dredge back his Moldervine Cloak.

I need to find a second Red source fast, or I'm toast.

It finally comes, and I run out my Greater Forgeling. Alex dredges back the Moldervine Cloak, and swings for six. I'm forced to take it, dropping to eight life. Alex casts a Civic Wayfinder for chump duty. I topdeck a Galvanic Arc like a champion, nail the Wayfinder, and swing back for six of my own.

Alex is now forced to either draw a blocker for my Forgeling, or hold back as he cannot survive another swing. He draws, sighs and passes the turn.

Two turns later, my First-Striking Greater Forgeling wins me the game, in what was the match of the tournament for me.

Semifinals: Andy Stokinger
Sadly, this wasn't a match at all. I wish I could say something more constructive, but my draws were beyond insane. In total, Andy played three creatures over both games. We were done in under five minutes.

I wander over to the other semi-finals, and it’s Toothless Jeff versus Dave Shiels. I’m watching the match for what seems an age, and Dave wins a close one. After the match, the Head Judge comes over and gives Dave permission to scout me because I saw his final game. No one, including myself, had realized during the match that I should not have been watching, gaining unentitled knowledge . I wanted to watch Jeff, as he’s a close friend.

This ruling surprised both Dave and myself, and Dave was uncomfortable with openly scouting me through spectators. I wasn’t thrilled by it either, so we agreed to show each other our decks before the finals.

His enthusiasm in making the finals visibly dropped when he saw my deck.

He asked if I planned to go to Prague. I told him that winning this Pro Tour Qualifier would mean more to me than anything else I’ve done in Magic, so we play.

Ten minutes later, I’m qualified!

Dave was very gracious about the match, as there’s nothing he could do with his mishmash Golgari/Dimir deck. During the draft, he’d fought with almost the entire table.

My Boros gamble paid off, and I'm very excited to be headed to Prague. Thanks to YMG for running a smooth event, and thanks to my friends for being very supportive (probably because they were waiting for a ride home).

And finally, thank you all for reading. I hope you enjoyed it.

Dave Feinstein
(Dxfiler on StarCityGames and TMD forums)