I was looking forward to PTQ: New Orleans with the hope of advancing myself to the next level of play, competition-wise. I have been at a plateau for a few months where I can do well but not quite qualify for the Tour; the fact is, I could never win when it counted.

I had toyed with a few decks in testing, but three different decks grabbed my attention: B/W Control, Goblins, and Bad Form. I quickly eliminated Goblins from contention when I saw that every deck was bringing something to the table to stop the little red men. B/W Control seemed the choice for me, until I realized that two of the other people I was going up with would be playing it, and between that fact and someone stealing the cards out of my car there were not enough Eternal Dragons and Akroma's Vengances to go around. This left me playing Bad Form.

I had did some testing with the deck right after the decklists for Detroit were posted, but I seemed to have some really bad matchups with R/W and MWC, mostly due to Vengeance and Wipe Clean. I changed a few things in the deck Friday night and left early Saturday morning for Butler.

My friend John and I arrived around 9:00 and discovered that no one else from our group was there, and that PES had the only vendor around. We waited as long as possible but 10:00 rolled around, so we turned in our decklists and got pairings.

Here is the decklist I registered:

4 Shock
4 Lay Waste
4 Lightning Rift
4 Starstorm
4 Gempalm Incinerator
4 Spark Spray
4 Solar Blast
3 Form of the Dragon
2 Rorix Bladewing
1 Decree of Annihilation
4 Forgotten Cave
3 Temple of the False God
19 Mountain

Sideboard:
4 Ark of Blight
4 Menacing Ogre
4 Misguided Rage
1 Rorix Bladewing
1 Decree of Annihilation
1 Insurrection

Round 1: R/W control
Game 1: I laid down an early Lightning Rift and got him to six before a Vengeance cleared the board. I looked at his six lands and played a Form of the Dragon with a Spark Spray in my hand to finish it. He untapped, drew, got a big smile on his face, and slammed down a Temple of the False God - and then slammed an Akroma, Angel of Wrath and proceeds to smash my face.

Game 2: I sideboarded in all my LD and Ogres and took out Starstorm, Gempalm Incinerator, Shock.

My opponent led with a turn 2 Silver Knight. I went through three Misguided Rages, an Ark, and two Lay Wastes and he still didn't lose tempo and I never saw a Form.

(0-1)

Losing 0-2 doesn't look like a good start to my road to winning, but I suck it up and head to round 2.

Round 2: Zombies
Game 1: It went like it should have; horribly in my favor. I removed all of the viable threats on the board until I had the mana need to cast Form of the Dragon. I won three turns later.

Game 2: I sideboarded in four Arks for a Decree, two Solar Blasts, and a Shock.

I dropped three Rifts early and proceeded to burn my opponent out quickly.

(1-1)

Round 3: Zombie Bidding
Game 1: This game was basically the same as last round: I kept myself alive until I could play Form. My opponent looked at it, thought for a bit, and said,"There is no way I can beat you." We proceeded to game 2.

Game 2: Once again, I sideboarded out four Arks for a Decree, two Solar Blasts, and a Shock.

My opponent hits me with a turn 5 Head Games, followed by a massive Patriarch's Bidding. I can do nothing but die.

Game 3: I get to drop a turn 5 and turn 6 Form and win easily.

(2-1)

Round 4: R/W Control
Game 1: My opponent played a turn 2 Silver Knight and not much else. I played two Rifts early - and between his cycling to avoid missing a land drop and my cyclers, I burned him out.

Game 2: Same sideboarding as round 1.

I had a Form out against his lone Silver Knight. I looked at life totals and saw that he was at ten - so for a very stupid reason, I decided to play the other Form in my hand. He smiled, untapped, and Vengeanced, of course. I lost to another Silver Knight, losing my composure for the rest of the tournament along the way.

Game 3: I was still pissed at myself for the horrible play the last round, and didn't even pay much attention to the game. I even missed Rifting him a few times when he cycled. Needless to say, I lost.

(2-2)

By this point I knew I had almost no chance of making top 8, but I decided to play on, because my other friends had shown up and started playing in the Grand Prix trial and I didn't really feel like waiting for them with nothing to do.

Round 5: Goblins
Game 1: He did whole second-turn Dark Ritual out a Goblin Warchief with a Skirk Prospector, but I Shocked it. He followed with two Goblin Goons that I couldn't deal with; I never got the mana for Form.

Game 2: One Insurrection for one Decree of Annihilation

I dropped a turn 2 Rift and proceeded to cycle into the Form for the win. My opponent never seemed to get off the ground in this game.

Game 3: We both got slow starts, and I drop a Form; on his turn, he dropped a Siege-Gang Commander and a Goblin Piledriver, hoping to fling them at me on next turn. He thought he had won when I used Form on him, dropping him to nine - but I tapped all my mana and showed him the Insurrection.

(3-2)

Round 6: U/W control
Game 1: I dropped two early Rifts and proceeded to burn him out. He Chain of Vapored a Rift, but it wasn't enough to keep him alive.

Game 2: Four Arks, four Misguided Rage, for four Starstorms and four Gempalm Incinerators.

I mulliganed down to four and never really recovered. I attempted to hard-cast Decree of Annihilation once, but it was Complicated and I scooped.

Game 3: We traded damage for a while until I was at six and he was at seven. A Vengeance had reset the board to an Exalted Angel and two Soldier tokens on his side and two Lightning Rifts on mine. He attacked and I Rifted a token, bringing me to one and him to nine. He tapped out to play an Eternal Dragon, and my hopes of playing Form of the Dragon went up in flames.

I drew a Spark Spray, looked at the eight mana available, and prayed. I cycled the Spray, doing four to him, drawing into a Forgotten Cave and cycling that to deal four more to him, putting him to one. I prayed a bit and drew my card off of cycling; it was a Spark Spray, which I promptly showed him. Somehow, I had pulled out the win.

(4-2)

Round 7
After talking to my opponent, I discover he has an outside chance at making top 8 with a win since he got paired down. I conceded to him and wished him luck.

(4-3)

Once again, my astounding run of mediocrity demonstrated itself. I am still farming that medium-level plateau, though I am getting a little better. I guess until I find out what's holding me back it will just be me and that bucket, a mop, and an illustrated book about birds.

Props:

• My friend Patrick, for winning the GPT with Red/Green.
• Mike Guptil, Brian Rogers, and the rest of the PES crew for running a timely and overall very nice event.

Slops:

• Me, for my horrible misplay with Form of the Dragon.
• Whoever decided to that PES would be the only dealers there.
• The person who stole the cards out of my car; I hope you get syphilis.