Magic Monday Recap #21 (Commenting is allowed, see link at the bottom...)

To begin, I have to apologize for the continued deception this blog continues to hide behind. We have yet again met on a Saturday instead of a Monday. So yes, I realize that this blog is currently a lie. Our shirts are a lie, and I suppose the cake is a lie too but only if you understand the reference. For everyone else who does not, I apologize for using obscure recent cult references that will most likely have to be googled for clarification rather than understood on the spot. When a reference is used in the context of a blog such as this, it is suppose to create a link between the people reading the blog, and the person writing the blog; as if to say "Hey! I'm really knowledgable about obscure cultural references, and I just wanted you to be aware of how cool and pretentious I am. I really get off on rattling off useless facts about subjects only I, and maybe 0.001% of the entire world's population, care about and I thought the people reading this blog should know." Instead, when the reference fails to communicate properly to its audience, it leaves a lingering void filled with confusion and irritation. The link is not established between the author and the audience and the rest of the article, and the risk of the remainder of the article (which may be hilarious and brilliant) not getting read is extremely high.

Where was I now?

Right...playing Magic: the Gathering on Saturday. Still on temporary Saturday status, we gathered again to play some more cards. Why else would I be writing this? Paul was back in town, so we were able to use Snape's main basement dwelling to duel. It was another wet dreary winter day in the Pacific Northwest, and no better way to spend the waning hours of the day than in a basement filled with your fellow nerds, (casual nerds, not professional nerds). Paul, in a token of extreme hospitality had prepared the basement ahead of time by opening up the vents and pumping the basement full of nice warm air. We are, however, still waiting on the all-you-can-eat dinner buffet to be installed in the basement opposet from the gaming area.

The group consisted of some well-worn faces, moderately new faces, and a brand new victim...I mean joiner. So let us all say ni hao, to Xiao Yu and give him a very warm huan ying. (Only Paul would read that last line and think of something inappropriate). Paul and Halo were in attendance, as was I and our fine friends, Matt and Don. It is nice to keep seeing new faces, and people interested in learning the game. It seems that the more people we have the more consistant we are as a group in getting good turnouts for game days to provide a nice mix of competition. Since this group was started last summer, we have steadily expanded as the word has been spreading. I must admit, and I'm sure all who have been participating since the inception of our gathering can concur, that it is very satisfying to see the group self-perpetuate itself in this manner.

Boring says all of you? You do not care much for the social dynamics of the game and for me waxing poetically about the people, the weather, and some sort of cake? Fine. I'll get to the actual games and my weekly observations.

To go against the grain, we did not start off with an epic free for all as is usually the case when Halo is playing with us, because he loves that type of game (and maybe because he secretly enjoys seeing Paul getting ganged up on by everyone). Well we did not do that, because we split up into heads-up games to start.

Don wanted to play Xiao so he could teach him the basics. Don got to see his own deck from a new perspective has he allowed Xiao to play his deck Vertigris Vitae, a white and green aggro/lifegain deck. Don played his newly revamped black and red burn deck, Fire and Brimstone. Don and Xiao were locked in some pretty epic battles for two straight games. Xiao kept on the pressure with attackers and trying to offset the loss of life with enchantments and artifacts. Don kept the pressure at bay with burn spells, Prodigal Pyromancer's and Brimstone Mages. The battles were slow and methodical yet Don seemed to have the edge over his own deck and Xiao in both and was able to drop the hammer in both games.

Matt played his all black legacy deck The Black Market against Halo and his mono-blue colored Goodbye deck, featuring Halo's favorite Stormtide Leviathan and all of its Merfolk pets. Matt has really consolidated his deck to ramp up the black mana very quickly to spit out giant ugly black demons, and with that ability he was able to overpower Halo. Halo certainly did his best to make Matt ask permission to do anything, but Matt was swimming in swamps before too long which gave him far too much to work with and Halo was unable to contend.

Paul and I played each other as well with me in charge of Parody of Parity (everyone's new favorite) and Paul playing I Hate Lands (Paul's foray into Standard land destruction). I have to admit that I have been feeling a little bit cocky when playing my Parody of Parity deck lately because I have been performing extremely well, and extremely consistent with it. I keep going back to the deck, sure that I've been lucky and that the "parity" of the game will catch up to it. Unlucky for Paul was that this seems not to be the case. However, the game was a battle and I saw victory slipping through my fingers on multiple occasions only to have lady luck cradle me in her arms throughout. The game started normally. We traded lands drops for the first few turns, and on turn two I played a Wall of Omens, even though I knew it likely would not help me much. It did provide me with an extra draw from my library. I attack with my remaining Ichorclaw Myr which Paul decides to block. The pump triggers giving it a boost until the end of the turn, but sends the Manic Vandal to the graveyard. I choose it for my Mimic Vat knowing that I can destroy Paul's artifacts he is planning on using for Metalcraft. Paul looks defeated about the situation, although I do not know why as he has plenty of mountains available in my estimated opinion. A few turns go by and I manage to hit Paul for three lousy poison counters when Paul draws and plays a land giving him enough fuel to cast Destructive Force. Kiss all of my lands goodbye and all of my creatures. My sole possession in the game was a single Mimic Vat with the ability to produce an Ichorclaw Myr. Bit by bit I slowly climbed back into the game. Paul got out some dudes to attack with, and he did killing my Mimic Vat in the process. Finally I get another Necropede out and a fourth land and I've given Paul a couple of counters. Paul has me outmatched and attacks. I do not block. The next turn I drop an armored ascension on my creature. Game over. The second game is quicker, though stall Paul knows how to live up to his name. In this game I am able to get Paul with enough creatures coming through with using Emerge Unscathed to give them protection from Paul's treachery. I spent the entire game slow playing my hand worrying about Destructive Force from the previous game, even though he never drew it. I must have had a look of relief across my face, and Paul looked sick...and I do not think it was from the poison counters. Though, I cannot say that with any certainty.

Next Don challenged me, or rather, he challenged my Parody of Parity against his Fire and Brimstone deck. Having just won two straight against Paul I should have been feeling a bit more confident but those games were long and I felt a little taxed after having played them. Plus I was still convinced my luck could only last so long. I was also taking into consideration that the burn content of Paul's deck had really done a number on my infect creatures and I was sure that I would fare even worse against a deck that was entirely burn-based. Worries aside Don and I dueled, and the first game was a thrill ride. I had to battle with every bit of power my deck could muster. I started slow, wary of the death that could become my creatures should I play them too hastily. Don reached enough mana to spill a couple of Pyretic Rituals into the game and used the instant mana to play a Fireservant. I felt the vice tighten down. I had a mimic vat, and I had a Tempered Steel enchantment ready to pump up my creatures. I decided to play a second Tempered Steel enchantment on my turn leaving me defenseless again, except for a single wall. Don took some pot shots at me whittling my health down as much as he could each turn. I risked playing two infect creatures on the same turn because they each gained +4/+4 bonuses from my enchantments. It was a good move as Don had nothing to answer them. He had to chump block to save himself, but it only saved him a turn. The second game was a nail biter with me destroying his fireservant early on to prevent the damage from coming my way only to see fireservant appear in the battlefield again. I thought I saw my doom to a deadly fireball because Don was stockpiling so much land on his side of the table. As it turns out he was trying to hard-cast the Demon that I had Ousted earlier in the game. It had been so long throughout the game that I had forgotten that he still had him in his hand. I was playing it safe thinking that Don was poised to drop a bomb on me for the win as I only had 9 life points left, but as I was racing my infect creatures across at him to give him more poison counters he threw up his hands indicating to me that he had no play. I felt shocked, and relieved. He had bluffed me, possibly unintentionally, by offhandedly saying something about '...only needing one more land...' and that had me on the ropes for many turns worrying about it. It can be pretty funny how psychological the game can get sometimes, even when it was not intended.

Don versus Paul was an interesting match as well. Paul unveiled a new surprise twist to his deck Giddy Up. I will not spoil the surprise, but I admit to being surprised and I will leave it at that. Paul was not lucky in his first game as Don picked off his creatures and took him down incrementally with Fireservants and direct damage. Paul was not taking it too well. The second gamed changed the tide of the evening for Paul though, as it seemed that his deck was drawing to its strength finally and in approximately (I was not counting) six turns Paul had overwhelmed Don before Don could really muster a defense. The third game started out a little bit slower with Paul getting a couple of creatures out only to see them disappear but soon Don was unable to pick off the attackers as they had gained indestructibility from the Knight Exemplar and Paul was steadily overwhelming Don for a third victory.

On the other side of the table Matt and I were battling with mono-black against mono-black. Typically this is a terrible match up to play as many of the strengths that black has do not always work well against itself. That being said, I hardly remember the first game as it came and went before I could really get my cards organized in my hand. One second I was playing some land and the next I see a 6/6 flying and supposedly grinning demon coming over and destroying me. I think it was easily the worst loss of the night for me, and I had a decent starting hand. I just got completely annihilated. So give a hand to Matt for thoroughly handing me my ass in that game. However, not to be bested so easily, I was determined to give him more of a challenge in the second game. The game started out similarly with Matt pumping out some quick creatures, but I was discarding him down slowly as well which seemed to be slowing him down some, and giving me time to combo my Legendary Snow-Land into a 20/20 indestructible black flying token creature. And yes, if it sounded half as ridiculous to read as it did to type, it surely is ridiculous. It's the most ridiculous turn three combo, that is fun. I especially love to see people when they read the card for the first time. 20/20...ok...black token...ok...legendary...ok...INDESTRUCTIBLE!...um...ok...FLYING!...What the...It never gets old. Suffice it to say that game two went my way. The decisive game three was a little closer as we both battled back and forth with both of us scoring some cheap shots only to see me pull my black planeswalker Liliana Vess and start picking away Matt's hand. Then I was able to tutor my library for my Vampire Hexmage and grab my...well the land. From there, I simply had to march through some of the fodder in my way. Though I did win the match, I am still smarting from the beat down I took in game one.

Another game that is worth noting is the free for all match that we played with Xiao, Don, Paul, Matt and me. Don played his Green/White deck, I played Mono-Black, Xiao played Blue/White, Paul played Green/White and Matt played Mono-Black. It was early on in the game that Xiao painted himself public enemy number one with Luminarch Ascension in the battlefield on turn two. I had a creature out turn one so I was prepared to chip away at him and prevent the enchantment from getting counters. Unfortunately Matt had different plans, and killed my creature only to give Xiao the power he needed without anyone else attacking him. Soon his enchantment was fully powered and Angels were flying out of it quicker than Snape can finish a half rack of PBR. (That's fast in case anybody was wondering). Things were looking bleak and I couldn't do anything to Xiao so I went after Paul with my vampires. I forced him to sacrifice one creature, giving Paul a lot of pause before he made his decision, and then after that tough decision I attacked him as well which somehow caused him to instantly lose. Actually he conceded at that point, but no one knew why. Something about keeping his deck a secret...The rest of us were still feeling a bit bleak because of the angels, but then Don came along and naturalized the hell out of it, and the game was new again. Then I became the number one enemy of the game. I did my best to take Xiao down with the opening that was given but I was not able to finish the job. Then just when I was getting my feat under me, Xiao dumps a bomb on the table destroying all of the creatures and resetting the game again. I was able to quickly get another creature into play, but Matt was ahead of me and had a creature that was going to kill mine, but that was not all. Matt had to go so he made one final mark on the game by killing my creature and departing. Reset the game again. Now it was Don, Xiao and me. Xiao got out another Ascension and it was primed to start getting counters. Then Xiao drops another bomb. Jace, the Mind Sculptor. What? Paul, the hater of all planeswalkers, begins coach Xiao through the usage of the planeswalker in all the ways it could screw my game. Paul seemed pleased, I had to suffer the fate of drawing land nearly every turn unless I was lucky, and Don and I were helpless because of all the fogs and safe passages being played. Needless to say Xiao continued to spit out angels and continued to seal my fate. Don and I fought valiantly, mostly against each other because we were the only people we could fight against. In the end Don got destroyed by one thousand angels and I was killed by having my entire library exiled. Xiao prevailed over all of us.

I did not intend to write that much at the outset of this recap, but I seem to remember a lot more than I originally gave myself credit for.

Thanks to Paul for hosting (hinting at that all-you-can-eat buffet again).
Thanks to all who could attend. To those who could not attend; we all hope you can make it out soon as we will soon be getting some draft dates set up to draft the new Mirrodin Besieged set.

Until the next duel! I will be ready.