PTQ-Kyoto At Superstars

This past Saturday I had the great pleasure to compete in the Pro Tour Qualifier: Kyoto at Superstars in San Jose. We had a pretty good turnout considering there was a PTQ: Kyoto a few weeks ago in Sacramento–I wasn’t able to go. I believe there were 188 players; I finished 16th which I was pretty surprised about considering I had a few early match losses that were pretty devastating.

A bit about my deck since that’s what’s interesting. Before getting into a decklist (I forgot to write it down before taking it apart, I’ll be better about that next time, sorry), a few quick notes/observations:

I hadn’t had any real Shards of Alara sealed exposure before this PTQ–I’d purchased a few tourney-packs and boosters to open up and “see what the pools would be like” because I’d heard that most people were building pretty slow, clunky decks. That definitely proved true but with a cause. With all the mana fixing available, people are very inclined to go for four and five colored decks. This is just crazy to me. Even in my limited exposure with sealed, the best decks seem to stick with two colors and a splash. (Has anyone won any big, highly competitive tournaments with a four or five color deck?–and I’m talking about Shards here.) As I mentioned, I’ve not been able to compete in any sealed Shard tournaments but I have drafted a few times and keep coming back to a blend of Bant-Naya as the best combination. I can see Jund + X also making a great combination. Cards like Drumhunter in combination with exalted-Bant affects make for nastiness once we’re able to plop down a 5-powered creature (which is easily accomplished on turn 5 with Drumhunter in play. I drafted a very sub-par Esper deck for my first draft but find that the good comons like the Tidehollow Strix are always nabbed up early.

On to the deck and then onto more specific notes about my play and card MVPs.

First the bombs: Battlegrace Angel, Sigil of Distinction, Wildnactal, 2x Knight of the Skyward Eye, Sight-Caste Sorcerer (I’ll explain why I like this guy so much in a second), list of MVPs is rounded out by the Drumhunter which in my opinion has to be one of the better cards to nab in any limited deck.

Deck-specific notes: Obviously the Battlegrace Angel and the Sigil of Distinction are straightup bombs–but I’m not convinced they’re not even close to the most powerful of the cards available in Shards (limited play). There are so many ways around both of those cards–and that’s where the design of the set is really well done. I have to hand it to Wizards that they did well makign sure the set had plenty of limited bombs to attract the masochistic side of all Magic players with the work-arounds with commons that balances the game and provides players with the comfort that their deck “can compete.”

I was talking with a few players and they don’t seem to value exalted creatures as highly as I do. The entire day, keeping my exalted creatures on the board not only allowed me to get in a few early pings while my opponents were busy playing obelixs and land-sacrificing but also mid-to-late game, allowed me to squeeze attackers through, avoiding blockers because the additional +1/+1 (or +2/+2 when I had two on the board) was too overpowering. All the great articles I’ve read in the past (by far more experienced players than myself) always indicate it’s only about the extra one or two we can squeeze through each turn. I’m pretty convinced that my deck was extremely efficient and were it not for a few mistakes, it was a much better deck than 16th (probably not top-8 though).

My biggest play mistake was swinging in a turn too early in Match 3. (My first two matches were total blow-outs, lasting 15 min max). My opponent, later discussing the game with me, admits that he was very quickly losing board control because of the Drumhunter and the two 5 powered creatures I had on the board. My mistake was attacking into him, leaving myself completely exposed to get attacked. I saw that he had a 5/5 on the board (the Feral Hydra) but had forgotten that it’s pump-able. I was at 6 life, he pumped the Feral Hydra and swung for 6. This game loss cost me the match because the next game was a total-mana screw.

The next match which I lost followed this one. I started with a game loss for showing up two minutes late. (Is this normal? I thought I got more like five minutes or something and ten minutes for a match loss). Either way, I was upset and not clear-headed and stayed in on a hand I should have mulligan’d due to color/land issues (right curve but wrong colors–doh!).

Next four matches, I blew my opponents out of the water. Just totally steam-rolled them. I think one of the matches went to three games.

I had a great time but kinda kick myself still now for messing up on the play mistake; live and learn. In the end, it was amazing getting to play and discuss Magic with all the great players. I even made a couple of new friends!

Tags: limited, protour qualifier, ptq, sealed, shards of alara, superstars