I made top eight of the StarCityGames.com Invitational playing polar opposites—G/W Beatdown and Five-Color Control.
Lauren Lee: Got time for some quick questions?
Me: Sure.
Lauren: What cards, if any, overlap in your Standard and Legacy decks?
I thought for a while, and the answer was zero! Between the two decks I had all five basic lands, but not a single one overlapped.
Last weekend, I went over the card choices for MJ’s and my Five-Color Control deck. Call it U/W/R if you want, call it Solar Flare, or whatever; I don’t care. However, we are actively trying to produce all five colors of mana in order to shore up our bad matchups, so I feel like 5CC is an applicable description.
The major breakthrough for the Invitational was Pristine Talisman. I played Talisman at SCG Open: Baltimore, where I went 1-2, but the idea was good. Later, Ian Spaulding played it at Worlds, and we hadn’t forgotten about it.
Easily the best part about Talisman is the life gain. By itself, you can ignore Moorland Haunt for several turns while you dig for a real answer. The extra bonus of accelerating your mana is something that a control deck always wants too. Ramping from three to five is much worse than ramping from two to four. However, most of the time I’d play Talisman on turn four with a two-drop, and then a Titan on turn six.
Our G/W deck was a fairly stock “Maverick” deck splashing Punishing Fire. We expected a lot of Delver decks, other random blue decks, and some creature decks. Combo didn’t seem well represented, so we went with the aggro deck.
Michael Jacob, Ben Hayes, and I were playing mostly the same decks. Josh Cho was playing U/R Delver in Legacy and our 5cc deck in Standard, although we both agreed that he’d probably do better with Illusions.
I started with two byes, which are always nice, and then I headed to the feature match area for my first Legacy match.
Creatures (23)
- 4 Mother of Runes
- 1 Birds of Paradise
- 1 Scryb Ranger
- 2 Aven Mindcensor
- 1 Tarmogoyf
- 1 Gaddock Teeg
- 3 Noble Hierarch
- 4 Knight of the Reliquary
- 2 Qasali Pridemage
- 3 Stoneforge Mystic
- 1 Scavenging Ooze
Lands (23)
Spells (14)
Round Three: Matt Sitarski, Hive Mind
This was definitely not a deck I expected to face, and because of that, I didn’t include any cool tutor target in the sideboard like Sundial of the Infinite. MJ and I decided to ignore it.
First game, I got crushed. Oddly enough, in games two and three I was able to get to five mana with Knight of the Reliquary and was able to pay for his Pact of the Titans. How lucky!
3-0 in matches, 2-1 in games
Round Four: Mat Mansoor, Sneak and Show
He resolved an early Show and Tell, putting in Emrakul, while I put in Knight of the Reliquary. Karakas sent Emrakul packing, and he couldn’t recover.
Second game might have been the craziest game I played all tournament. On his first turn, he went turn one Lotus Petal, Ancient Tomb, Blood Moon. I was drawing to one out but continued playing since we had plenty of time, and I wanted to see if he had any spice in his deck. Also, he didn’t seem to have non-red mana either, so maybe I was on even footing?
We played draw-go until I had nine land in play before he finally found a Sneak Attack. Emrakul ate most of my permanents, but miraculously, I didn’t die on Mat’s next turn. A few turns later, after discarding, I peeled the Forest!
I did some quick math, as I needed to kill him as quickly as possible. The next few turns involved me getting some stuff Force of Willed, Qasali Pridemage-ing his Sneak Attack, and getting Gaddock Teeg in play to stop any future Sneak Attacks.
On the turn before I killed him, he declared that if he drew a Progenitus, he could win. He drew Intuition, Shoal and Telled in Sneak Attack, and killed me a hasty Progenitus.
I almost certainly messed up that game by discarding a Green Sun’s Zenith over an Enlightened Tutor. I figured I was going to lose and didn’t want to show him the Tutor, but I could have won had I did. How was I supposed to know that I’d find my one-outer before he killed me?
Third game involved him casting Show and Tell, but this time, his Progenitus trumped my Knight of the Reliquary. Thankfully, I was able to Enlightened Tutor for Phyrexian Metamorph and kill him before he could re-combo.
4-0, 4-2
Escaping Legacy with a 4-0 record was awesome. MJ was also 4-0, while Ben and Cho were 3-1.
Creatures (6)
Lands (18)
Spells (36)
Round Five: Adam Yurchick, Wolf Run Ramp
This round was great. We were on camera, and I got to showcase all the sweet cards in my deck. In game one, we traded cards until he hit me with a Devil’s Play. Thankfully I had a Pristine Talisman, and he could never flash it back to kill me.
Both games proved that Sun Titan trumps basically their entire strategy.
5-0, 6-2
Round Six: Eli Kassis, Mono-Red
Mono-Red can be a pretty easy matchup if you draw the right cards, and I did. Game one, Pristine Talisman preserved my life total while I dug for answers to his guys. Second game, I was able to Ancient Grudge his Shrine of Burning Rage and Oblivion Ring his Chandra’s Phoenix. After that, I was drawing cards and getting way ahead.
6-0, 8-2
Round Seven: Adam Prosak, Illusions
Prosak’s deck was very good against mine but also very weak to Talisman. He wasn’t playing Lord of the Unreal at all and instead had troublesome cards like Midnight Haunting and Merfolk Looter.
I won game one but struggled the next two games. I thought I was winning game two, but my end of turn flashback-ed Alchemy and main phase Desperate Ravings didn’t turn up anything noteworthy. Game three I mulliganed and got crushed.
Sometimes that’s all the games are about. You kill their guys, and they start to rebuild while you try to stick something that makes a lot of their cards irrelevant. For the most part, Adam was sitting on hard counters each game. I needed something to bait him with end of turn or some cheap threats that he’d have to counter. Otherwise, I was stuck to dropping one bomb per turn, which he would counter and then continue crushing me.
6-1, 9-4
Round Eight: Brian Eason, Illusions
Brian, in a word, is “deliberate.” He had seen my hand over the course of the match with Gitaxian Probes. All I had was a Blue Sun’s Zenith and an Unburial Rites, neither of which I could cast. Still, he chose to take a very large amount of time, agonizing over each decision. I didn’t want to go to time, and I felt like he was out of line, so I decided to confront him about it.
His draw did not contain “a lot of decisions” like he told me; it was two Mana Leaks and all creatures. If he wasn’t Probe-ing me every single turn, then I might have let it slide, but he had perfect information and was still taking forever.
Brian: Aren’t you the one who gives people crap for complaining?
Me: Yes, when they are babywhining about stuff that isn’t valid.
Brian: Oh, so only your complaints are valid?
Me: In this case, YES.
I won that game after playing around his Mana Leaks (and I didn’t even need Probe!). Second game, I drew all three Talismans and soon had a Sun Titan with Ratchet Bomb, aka the dream.
It might seem dick-ish to tell someone to play faster, but there’s only so much time in the round.
7-1, 11-4
Finishing the day at 7-1 felt great. Nobody’s lists impressed me except for the 8-0s, but at least I had already played one of them. I liked both of my decks but had the sneaking suspicion that my Legacy deck was far better than my Standard deck.
MJ started 5-0 but went 0-3 from there.
Round Nine: Dan Jordan, Wolf Run Ramp
This match was unfortunate. Over the course of our three games, I cast zero Mana Leaks and Dissipates, cast Desperate Ravings three times when I had a card I didn’t want to hit in my hand and then did; DJ always had Ramp into Solemn, and I ended up losing a very close one.
That said, Dan played very well, and it was sad to see him not make top eight. It seems like whenever we play, he is cursed afterwards.
7-2, 12-6
Round Ten: Ben Friedman, Tempered Steel
He played three creatures on the first turn after I mulliganed into Mana Leak, Pristine Talisman, and lands. He drew Tempered Steel on turn five, cast it with three open, and I died without ever playing a spell.
Post-board is much easier against Tempered Steel, especially when you draw Ancient Grudge. Day of Judgment, and Oblivion Ring; Grudge tore him apart, and I escaped a potentially bad matchup.
8-2, 14-7
Round Eleven: David Bauer, Illusions
This round was not without controversy. We had three tight games, and after I won, I stepped outside. Soon after, Jake Van Lunen, one of the commentators from SCGLive, joined me, but he brought some bad news.
Apparently, some judges were getting involved over something I allegedly did, and I just kind of laughed it off. If you’ve ever been playing a match and a judge or player stops your game and tries to correct something they think is wrong when they’re actually wrong, you know how I felt. I couldn’t think of anything I did that would be even remotely close to requiring an investigation.
Jake told me that I used the same Grotto to cast a Grudge and use Nihil Spellbomb to draw a card in the same turn, but I told him he was wrong. I told him that I never flashed Grudge back that game. He explained what actually happened, and I was confused.
I asked him, “If that WAS what happened, why didn’t anyone say anything?” He shrugged and said that they didn’t catch it, but the judges were reviewing the tapes. I bolted back inside, and when I got back to the tournament hall, I ran into a judge who was sent to find me. I hurried up to the judge stand to talk to head judge Chris Richter.
I still wasn’t sure that Jake was telling the truth, and Chris didn’t allude to anything. He just asked me what happened in my game three. I started to re-create it in my head. Turn one Glacial Fortress, turn two Shimmering Grotto. Did I play anything turn two? Yeah, I played a Ratchet Bomb and killed his two guys before playing Seachrome Coast, Pristine Talisman, and Nihil Spellbomb.
He played a Geist of Saint Traft, which was bad news for me, since I didn’t have an answer in my hand. I played an Island and passed the turn. I could just feel that he had Sword of War and Peace in his hand and was pretty excited when he played it pre-combat, since I knew I was going to blow him out with the singleton Ancient Grudge I boarded in.
He equipped, tapping out, and I started to Grudge his Sword. I started tapping my lands, took a cursory glance at his graveyard, and realized that while I wanted to save that Spellbomb for Snapcaster Mage, I would probably have to cash in my Spellbomb that turn. I knew I needed to keep a black open, so I kept my Grotto untapped.
I certainly gained an advantage. That much was clear, but the head judge believed what I was saying, and I was issued a warning. I’d say that normally, that type of thing wouldn’t even cross my mind, and the fact that I did it is surprising to me. It was a high-pressure match, and I was under the gun in a tough matchup, and my only rationale is that I wasn’t thinking straight.
Later, in the top eight against Adam Prosak, I did a similar thing. I was winning game two, and like most players do, I got sloppy when I knew I was winning. I tapped the four lands nearest my graveyard to flashback Unburial Rites despite none of those lands producing white mana. One of them made black, and the rest made red, and not only did I not gain an advantage there, I made a minor mistake.
I had two Desperate Ravings in my hand that I wanted to cast but couldn’t because now I only had Pristine Talisman, Sulfur Falls, and two blue/white lands untapped. I was just being sloppy.
Both of them were mistakes, and I’m not a cheater. I’ve been playing Magic for over ten years, and I dare anyone to find any instance of me cheating or doing anything shady. I pride myself on being one of the “good guys.” Anyone who knew me five years ago could probably tell you that I was cocky, arrogant, and probably an asshole, but cheating just isn’t me.
9-2, 16-8
After all that craziness, it was back to Legacy!
Round Twelve: Ken Adams, U/R Painter
I felt pretty good against permanent-based combo decks, but he won the die roll (aww hell) and played turn-one Grindstone. The only thing I had was a turn-one Mother of Runes (pleaaase don’t have Painter and Lion’s Eye Diamond), and he played a Painter’s Servant. I played Dryad Arbor and Swords to Plowshares (pleaaase don’t have Force of Will and a land), which resolved. Next turn he only played a Top, while I played a land and a Pridemage (if this resolves I think I’m winning…), and he died a few turns later.
In reality, Ken said that he made a few mistakes that caused him to lose, but I couldn’t see everything from his side. Second game, I tried to KO him with Stony Silence, but he Brainstormed into Force of Will and a blue card. That didn’t stop me though, as Scryb Ranger and a tutored Umezawa’s Jitte put a clock on him.
Kenny mostly drew the answer portion of his deck, but he drew the wrong ones. The single Auriok Salvagers he did draw, I Pathed.
Overall, these combo matchups are a huge sweat, but that’s pretty cool. At the end of the day, G/W is still favored against them.
10-2, 18-8
Round Thirteen: Caleb Durward, G/B Rock
I had no idea what Caleb was on, but I kept a solid hand of Noble Hierarch, Stoneforge Mystic, and five lands on the play, including Wasteland and Horizon Canopy. I didn’t think that a card like Blood Moon was really in Caleb’s range, but I fetched basic Forest on turn one anyway. What could he possibly have to punish me?
Turns out, I lost a lot of value when he played a turn-one Veteran Explorer off a Bayou. I didn’t mind, since I got to Waste him and tutor up Sword of Feast and Famine. Next turn, he played a colorless land, paused, but I didn’t know what for. I thought I saw a Volrath’s Stronghold and chuckled. I had an easy win!
That wasn’t quite the case, as what I thought was a Stronghold was actually a Phyrexian Tower, and I was in a lot of trouble. He got lands off his Explorer while I got nothing. Nice card!
After I Stoneforged in Sword and hit him with it, he made some comment about, “Why did I think you got Batterskull? That was bad…” Alarm bells rang. That situation was what some of my friends would call Bush-league and is what basically every opponent tries to do on MTGO.
They’ll complain about something or other—being mana flooded, mana screwed, “maybe I should have mulliganed,” etc., and then they’ll fire off a Blasphemous Act or Divine Reckoning. They always hope that you’ll overcommit based on their superb acting, but this is not my first rodeo.
Despite that, my hand was garbage, and I wasn’t going to beat a Deed anyway, so I hoped that his doofus act wasn’t an act.
It was.
Much like MJ’s and my Hive Mind discussion, we decided that no one would have Pernicious Deed. I mean, what were we going to do, Tutor for a Pithing Needle or Phyrexian Revoker? That seemed flimsy at best, so we just hoped that we’d avoid them.
Game two was actually a game, but mostly because he didn’t draw Pernicious Deed or Damnation until later. Overall, it was a classic matchup where I was a huge underdog.
10-3, 18-10
Round Fourteen: Kristopher Hackelman, Dredge
After a brief chat, Kris agreed to scoop me into top eight. Thanks again!
Ben Hayes finished 11-3 as well but got ninth on tiebreakers.
Top Eight: Adam Prosak, Illusions
The first two games were straightforward, and game three had basically one interesting point. At the end of his turn, I cast Forbidden Alchemy seeing:
I have seven land in play and can cast any of those spells but have nothing in hand that’s relevant. If I take Unburial Rites and draw a land, he needs a single Dissipate to beat me. If I don’t draw a land, I lose to Mana Leak and Negate. I’m losing to Mana Leak and Negate (or Dissipate) if I take either of the creatures, so I decide to take Sun Titan.
I untap, flashback Unburial Rites, and lose to his combination of Negate and Mana Leak over the next few turns. The way it turned out, because I did draw the land and he had his one-of Negate instead of one of his two Dissipates, I would have won if I took Unburial Rites. That doesn’t seem correct though.
It’s hard to be unhappy with my finish, but it always feels so much better to finish the tournament with a win than a loss. I liked both of my decks; although if I could do it again, I’d probably play a combination of Andrew’s and Prosak’s Illusion deck rather than 5cc. Playing G/W in Legacy gave me a good feeling, and I think I’m going to work on playing those types of decks in Standard as well.
Prosak’s Illusions deck was pretty much the only one that made me struggle constantly, although that could also be because of the pilot.
If ya’ll are interested in the evolution of either of the decks I played, MJ will probably do some Standard videos at some point with 5cc, and I’ll be writing some in-depth articles this week or next.
The support throughout the weekend was amazing everyone. Thank you so much!
GerryT