Name: Peter Sauer
Date: 12/15/01
Location: Comic City Cards, St Louis, Missouri, USA
Tournament Organizer: Scott Elliot (http://hannahsgames.tripod.com)
Entrants: 36
Number of rounds: 6 (34 is the cut line)
Who makes it? (2 4-2s will make it to the top 8)

I had this cool WW/r deck that performed well at States, so I was testing a random match online against someone who hadn’t played in months. He was playing Brian Kibler’s winning States deck, and crushed me 2-0. I immediately decided to play Kibler’s deck without a second thought.

Testing was minimal; I tested about fifteen matches with my two teammates from the newly-established Team Kirkwood High School (named after our high school... I make a point of teaming up with new people for each JSS season). So with that out of the way, here’s what I played... The main deck is straight off the net, while the sideboard I just threw together (which will be important later).

4 Counterspell
3 Syncopate
4 Call of the Herd
3 Beast Attack
4 Fact or Fiction
4 Fire/Ice
4 Flametongue Kavu
2 Opposition
4 Llanowar Elves
4 Birds of Paradise
4 Yavimaya Coast
3 Shivan Reef
2 Karplusan Forest
2 Mossfire Valley
1 City of Brass
6 Island
6 Forest

Sideboard:
4 Disrupt (Rice Snack, Braids, Gomar)
4 Jungle Barrier (Blitz)
2 Gainsay (Blue/x control)
2 Teferi’s Response (Opposition)
3 Thunderscape Battlemage (Opposition, Teferi’s Moat...)

I didn’t really know how this deck would do against anything. I had two assurances, though: Netdeck assurance (it won States, so how could it be bad?), and JSS assurance... I’ve played in four JSS tournaments in my life, and all four of my finishes have been in the top 8 (6^th, 3^rd, 3^rd, 2^nd)

Here’s how the tournament went:

Round 1: Five-Color Burn
Game 1: These are really the kind of decks you see in the JSS round 1. I get Opposition out and play a cautious game. He gets me down to ten before I realize he isn’t going to cast any devastating spells, and I start attacking.

Game 2: Disrupts come in, and I get a fast draw with two Calls of the Herd.

(1-0, 2-0)

Round 2: R/G Small-Creature Blitz
Game 1: He gets some small guys out, then two Calls of the Herd. I’m stuck drawing land after land after land. I keep hoping every draw is a Fact or Fiction, but none are. Remember those games where you Fact or Fiction and turn over four lands and a useless card or five lands and go whew? Well, it was like that except without the Fact of Fiction.

Game 2: I get Call of the Herd out and hold off his army of small creatures. I draw about three Counterspells, counter a few creatures, then draw a Beast Attack and win.

Game 3: I get fast acceleration, Flametongue Kavu, and a Beast Attack. Meanwhile, he draws 1/1s, and then a Call of the Herd at the end. Not gonna do it.

(2-0, 4-1)

Round 3: Andy Miller, Modified Gomar
Game 1: Andy is one of the three members of team Kirkwood ... I know his play style, and figure he will Wrath of God aggressively. He casts a main step Vindicate on a bird, so I am able to get Beast Attack through. He Wraths away the token and an elf. I recast the Beast Attack and just sit back and counter his attempts to kill it.

Game 2: He Duresses me and sees two Fire/Ice and two Beast Attacks. Well, geez, what do you do? I draw into some acceleration and he has no real way to stop 4/4 tokens.

(3-0, 6-1)

Round 4: John Lawrence, U/G Tempo
Game 1: This is going to be one heck of a hard matchup. John gets mana screwed, though, and draws only islands. I don’t capitalize on this right away... But after a few turns I get some threats out, and all he can do is bounce them. By the end of the game, all he has in play are three islands.

Game 2: The first game where Opposition becomes a major player is one of the toughest. I get opposition out and a few creatures. He has three islands and three forests, so I’m tapping down the islands every turn. My life is pretty low, and I keep topdecking counterspells the turn before he draws some bounce. I finally draw a Call of the Herd, which makes me able to attack with a Beast Attack token every turn. It ends shortly after.

(4-0, 8-1)

Round 5: Gerrod Heise — R/G Blitz
ID

We play for fun and it turns out 2-0 me.

Round 6: John MacKesson - Gomar
He’s the third guy on team Kirkwood.

ID

We also play for fun, and again it’s 2-0 me.

Top 8 (seed 2): R/B Braids
Game 1: I can’t really say much about this deck since I didn’t see much of it... The last three JSS tournaments, I’ve played some form of R/B in the quarterfinals! I’ve won them all, so why should this be any different? My deck gets a great Opposition draw. Turn 1 Birds, turn 2 Call of the Herd, turn 3 Opposition. Apparently, the first (and last) card he will play this game is a Rager.

Game 2: I get three Elves and a Bird, but nothing else. I topdeck none other than Fact or Fiction, and turn over none other than Opposition. Opposition is brutal.

(5-0-2, 10-1)

Top 4: John MacKesson
Game 1: A Kirkwood showdown! I get some 3/3 Elephants out with Call, then Fire/Ice away two Birds. He Wraths my elephants away. I cast Beast Attack next turn, and get him down to four before it gets Vindicated. Hey look, I have another one in my graveyard!

Game 2: I side in four Disrupts and two Thunderscape Battlemages for four Flametongue Kavu, one Fire/Ice, and one Syncopate. This game doesn’t go quite as well; I have a Disrupt in hand and a Fire/Ice, but only one island for lands. I play the island and Disrupt a Tainted Pact... But still no mana. I get a city finally, but start taking major damage from it. He gets a few Lynxes and beats me down before I can do anything about it.

Game 3: It comes down to this, the third game, to see if I can break the top 4 curse. It turns out to be an exciting game. I have multiple Counterspells, a Fact or Fiction, and an Opposition. We go seven turns of consecutive land drops with no plays. I cast some little stuff like Birds and Elves. He casts Fact or Fiction and we have a counter war over it. Then next turn he casts Moat, which we have another counter war over... Uh oh, I’m out of counters now besides a stupid disrupt... He casts Dromar.

Ugh.

Well, now I know my only hope in the whole deck is Opposition. I cast three more Fact or Fictions, two in the same turn. I’m down to seven, and I finally get Opposition into play with a Bird. He Vindicates it. I’m screwed again... He casts Fact or Fiction and gets a Haunting Echoes, casting to leave me with one Opposition, three Elves, and basic land in my library; in my hand, I have Beast Attack and a bird. He thinks he has this for sure, but I’m thinking nope, I can still pull it off. I cast Beast Attack twice, and the math says I can win this!!

Well, unless he has Hibernation. I scoop.

(5-1-2, 11-3)

Fun times! Here’s the big lesson I learned about winning and losing with netdecks:

You have to sideboard right.

If I had sideboarded right against John, I would’ve probably won. Thinking back on my other matches, I sideboarded wrong against a lot of them too. In every single JSS loss in the T8, I’ve won the first game. Look at my deck; it’s really hard to find cards to take out. Against control, you can obviously take out the Flametongues... But against something like R/G Blitz, it’s much harder to decide what to do. Against John, I should’ve taken out the four Flametongues and one Syncopate for two Gainsays, one Thunderscape Battlemage, and two Disrupts.

When I think about it, Gainsay is much better against Gomar (I should’ve played four!). I’m mainly worried about Moat and Dromar... You can’t Disrupt either of those. My deck would survive a turn 3 Vindicate on a land, so it isn’t like Disrupt is necessary against Gomar. My mistake was figuring these things out after the tournament, not before. It isn’t that hard to find a good netdeck, and play it very well. The thing I see a lot of people do is say,"Yeah, I just threw together this sideboard - whatever." I’m sure most of you can think of at least one tournament where you did that... And it probably affected you more than you think. I’ve done it a few tournaments, but the mistake wasn’t really isolated until this one. If you’re going to directly copy a net sideboard without metagaming it toward your environment, make sure you have a plan. Disrupt seems like it would be good against almost every deck, but there are usually better things. And if you see your opponent playing in a different style (for example not casting Vindicate third turn or not casting burn aggressively), then maybe Disrupt isn’t a good idea at all. These little choices can make a huge difference. The turn he cast the Dromar against me, I had two land open and a Disrupt in hand. Had it been a Gainsay I might have - and probably would have - won the match.

On a slightly more positive note, I recommend this deck to you if you were considering playing any form of Opposition or U/G, U/R-based control. The deck is not only a great deal of fun to play, but has a good chance against almost any matchup.

Quick Props:
Comic City: good environment, if you live in Saint Louis, stop by here.
Scott Elliot: A great TO. Again, if you live in or around Saint Louis, check out his website: http://hannahsgames.tripod.com
Team Kirkwood and Embargo (Shawn Phelan, Eric Axelson)

Quick Slops:
Wizards, for making JSS kids have birth certificates or birth-dated IDs. What’s up with that?