all your report are belong to us

First, this is only my 2nd major tournament. My first was a Waterbury last year.
I took a horrible U/W Isochron deck mostly to have fun and learn a bit about the
meta and players. I went in with 2 goals:
1) Place top 8. I thought I had a solid chance if I could just keep my head on.
2) If I miss top 8, then at the very least, keep a winning record

While I would have preferred to accomplish goal 1, I can't complain about a 5-2
record, except for my own sloppy play in one round (which I'll get into later).


On to the report
Round 1 vs Ray (Iamfishman) with 2 land Belcher (belcher, a recurring theme for
me that day)
Round 1 (0-2) (0-1)
Easily my worst overall round and worst beating of the day. I roll a 1, he rolls
a 4. He leads with Land Grant revealing Black Lotus, Cabal Ritual, Dark Ritual,
Goblin Welder and Chromatic Sphere (I think he had played a mox, my notes aren't
as complete as I thought). A few quick turns later, it's over.
Game 2 I have a good opening hand including Orchard, Oath and a second land. I
play that land, Go. He duresses, I have no counter. He takes the oath. A few
short turns later, it's over.

Round 2 vs Corey playing 2 land belcher 2-1 (1-1)
Corey was a great guy to play against and I think my most intense game of the
day was here.
Game 1, he leads Mox Emerald, LED, Tinderwall. I drop land go. He gets nothing
to do on turn 2. I drop land go. He attempts a chromatic sphere which I mana
leak. Back to me, I get Oath w/ orchard go. He passes the turn w/ nothing (got
mana screwed). I oath in Akroma. Game.
Game 2, he gets a great hand and it's over on I believe turn 2. He stomped me as
hard as I stomped him in game 1.
Game 3, this was the big match. I open with Oath, Orchard, Emerald, Naturalize,
Polluted Delta, Gaea's blessing, Intuition. I have some decent countermagic that
helps stall him. A well timed leak on his LED keeps him from going off. But he
still gets the Yawg's will and is set up for the next turn. Meanwhile, he had
Necropotence in play and took himself down to 13. I Oathed in Ancient Hydra the
turn after his set up and pop his welder (leaving him with 2 orchard tokens and
me tapped out). I pass with a prayer.
He tinkers in Charbelcher and activates taking me from 19 down to 4! He attacks
with both orchard tokens, I take it down to 2. He runs out of gas and passes the
turn.
I Oath in Akroma, draw a stifle for the turn. Attack and win.

Round 3 (Smmemen with MWS/Stax control) 1-2 (1-2)
Game 1, I Mulligan my opening hand and redraw....7 without thinking. I catch it
and tell my opponent. He calls a judge to be sure who has me Mulligan down to
5...which is fine. I was going to Mulligan anyway cause my second hand was crap.
I draw orchard, fetch another land Oath along with 2 other cards. I lead Fetch.
He leads MWS trinisphere. I play land, go. He plays land go. I play orchard
Oath. A few turns later I have game 1.
We side, but he simply out-sidedboarded me and outdrew me in game 2.
Game 3, I get opening hand with 2 lands an energy flux. I think I'm set playing
against an artifact heavy deck. I play flux turn 2 before he has any artifacts
on the table (we both had pretty slow hands). Turn 3 I lose my own mox to flux.
We play draw go for the longest time and I never see an Oath (though he ends up
with a handful Seal of cleansing one of which takes out my flux). He starts to
draw into lock pieces faster than I can draw an Oath or counter. Eventually he's
got Choke, a few Seals, sphere, 2 chalices, stax, in the eye of chaos. Of
course, he beats himself down to 4 life using his Cities of Brass to do so. I
try to force an answer to his lock pieces and give him an orchard token. A few
turns later, I sloppily try to play a naturalize with 3 orchards giving him an
army which he beats me down with.
If I had given him no creatures, he probably would drawn into a tutor or tinker
and brought in Karn to beat on me with. But we were short on time and I may have
also, at the least forced a draw. Sloppy play and bad technical decisions by
myself coupled with smart play from my opponent cost me this round.

Round 4 vs Terry playing Gifts Belcher 2-0 (2-2)
Game I confuse my opponent dropping Mox Emerald, Waste, Sensei's Diving top.
Next turn I make it clear what I'm playing when I drop Oath. He had led his turn
1 with a Goblin Welder.
On my next turn I oath in Ancient Hydra and pop the welder. The old one goes all
the way.
Game 2 is pretty much just as lopsided. I have heavy countermagic with an early
oath for very quick beats.

Things had been looking grim. After round 3, I was 1-2, as was one of my
friends. My other friend was 2-1. After this round I was feeling much more
confident. Play testing had shown U/W fish and belcher variants to be my worst
match ups. So far I had gone 2-1 vs Belcher.

On to round 5.

Round 5 vs Chris playing....Belcher Gifts (of course) 2-1 (3-2)
I lead and drop Island go. He drops Island, Ancestral Recall. I misdirect
pitching Serum Visions. 3 cards refills my hand. I have a plat angel in hand.
Ramp up to 7 mana, hard cast (praying he doesn't have mana drain) and get the
win.
Game 2 doesn't go quite as well. We play back and forth for a while not going
anywhere. I do get an Oath on the table, but no orchard. Finally he tinkers in
Colossus with Time walk [thanks to Y's Will]. I think it's ok, he'll hit me once
with Colossus and I can hopefully Oath up Platty. His time walk turn comes, he
attacks. Then casts Burning Wish for Time Walk.
Game 3 must have been very frustrating for my opponent. I play island go with a
Stifle in hand. He drops a fetch, I stifle it. We go back and forth for a bit,
but I feel pretty confident throughout as I'm drawing a good mix of lands and
countermagic. His friend stops by to watch and we tell him about the turn 1
misdirect w/ recall. 2 turns later, he draws his recall...I misdirect. We have a
counter war which I win. I get his recall again. A few turns later, I get the
oath and still have plenty of counter back up. He makes a good showing, trying
to cast his spells. But he ran into a wall of counter magic. Even if he managed
to tinker or hardcast in a belcher, I had Stifle in hand.

Great, 5 rounds and I finally have a winning record and am feeling confident.
Belcher played me tough all day and I'm convinced I cannot possibly see anymore
of it. I've got a 40th ranking and am effectively eliminated from top 8. But I
have a good chance of a winning record.

Round 6 Jay playing Kobold-Clamp Glimpse (2-0) (4-2)
Game 1 he plays first turn glimpse. Forced. Second turn Glimpse. Counterspell. A
few turns later his 3rd glimpse Forced. We play draw go. He loads the board up
with 0/1 and 0/2's but no Clamp. I get a mid game Oath and win shortly after.
Game 2 he plays a first turn glimpse. Forced. I get a quick Oath. It's game.
Unfortunately my 2 travel partners are playing each other right next to me and I
see one fall to 2-4, though the other is at 4-2 with me.

At this point I'm ranked 26. I'm guaranteed a winning record and am very happy.
But I see a chance for a top 16 and a prize.

Round 7 Chad (oldbsturgeon) playing WGD 2-1 (5-2)
Game 1 I don't know what he's playing and keep a so-so hand. I do have a
creature in it, but I've got some digging and a bit of countermagic.
Unfortunately my digging (serum visions and brainstorm) draw me into Plat angel,
ancient hydra and a gaea's blessing. No oath. This is about turn 4. I know it's
game over, but I play it out to see more of my opponent's deck. He had a welder
on the board and used it to bring in 2 Trikes. I hard cast an ancient hydra just
to make a showing and have no mana left over. He pops the 5/1 with a trike
counter and beats me down like I'm Rodney King at a policeman's ball.
I do the lightest siding of the day, bringing in 3 Tormod's crypts and 1 arcane
lab. Game 2 is tough and long but goes well. I get the oath online in game 2
with an opening hand that includes Forbidden Orchard, Black Lotus, Oath of
Druids, Gaea's Blessing no other land and some countermagic. I pop the Lotus for
green, tap the orchard play the oath and gaea's blessing targeting the lotus to
shuffle it back in and avoid mana burn.
On to game 3. My opening hand includes mox sapphire, arcane lab, 2 lands and
oath. Turn 1 drop the Oath. Turn 2 I drop the lab. I draw into a tormod's crypt
and drop that as my opponent filled his graveyard looking for an answer. He
finally gets one in ray of revelation, popping my lab through 0 countermagic. I
remove his gy, he flashes back ray and pops my oath. Unfortunately, I've had a
plat angel on the table already from oathing the prior turn.
I draw for my next turn...another crypt. Drop it. Attack, pass. Meanwhile, he
has an army of 6 orchard tokens and I'm at 6 life. All he needs to do is draw an
answer for plat angel. I sweat out his turn...and he doesn't draw it. I attack
next turn for the win.

In all I'm 5-2. I finish in 16 place and claim my prize. Now the excitement
begins. I see the top card in my pack as a UU casting cost and starts with (what
looks like) Br.
I rip it open, only to find that the R mana symbol does not show through the
wrappers very well. No Italian mana drain for me. But a great tournament
experience. A great trip and a very solid showing. I'm hoping the next Waterbury
doesn't fall on my Storm Duty week at work where I'm on call. I'm psyched to go
to another tournament and improve my finishing spot.

I played Meandeck Oath skeleton and made some changes. Some of the changes were
based on my card pool and a 5 card proxy tournament. When I found out this was
10, it was too late to overhaul the deck. Proxies are marked with a *

Countermagic:
4x Force of Will
4x Counterspell
1x Mana Drain
2x Mana Leak
2x Stifle
1x Misdirect

Drawing/digging/Searching
4x Brainstorm
4x Serum Visions (scry 2 is nice)
2x Sensei's Divining top
2x Intuition
1x Ancestral Recall*

Creature base
1x Akroma, Angel of Wrath
1x Ancient Hydra
1x Platinum Angel

Combo
4x Oath of Druids
4x Forbidden Orchard
2x Gaea's Blessing

Utility/Recovery
1x Time Walk*
1x Rushing River

Mana base
1x Black Lotus*
1x Mox Emerald
1x Mox Pearl*
1x Mox Sapphire*
1x Forest
4x Island
4x Polluted Delta
2x Tropical Island
1x Stripmine
2x Wasteland


Sideboard
2x Null Rod
2x Naturalize
2x Chalice of the Void
2x Energy Flux
2x Arcane Lab
3x Tormod's Crypt
1x Iridescent Angel
1x Living wish

The last 2 were for any match up where I might see Swords to Plowshares. Didn't
see a single deck all day that would play them. Kind of tough when you face 4
belcher variants in 7 rounds. But my 2 loses, I can honestly say I got
outplayed. No whining about bad draws, mana screw, bad matchups, etc. Ray and
Steve outplayed me, plain and simple.

Props/Slops

Props
-To my wife for watching our 2 year old and 4 year old all day Saturday
-To Wayne for suggesting and arranging our trip
-To Wayne for extensive playtesting and deck tuning
-To every player I came across. Every single was was a gracious winner or loser.
All were friendly and made the whole tournament experience great
-To Klepp who I never met and can't say I know. Didn't even see him at the
tournament. But he proved to be a stand-up guy after.

Slops
My only real slop is to myself for my round 3 play vs Smmemen in game 3. I had
an opening hand energy flux vs his artifact heavy deck. Rather than waiting and
playing it after he had stuff on the board, I dropped it asap and gave him the
opportunity to play around it...an opportunity he took full advantage of.
My other slop, comes again in game 3 of round 3 vs Smmemen. He outplayed me and
I let him outplay and made a few sloppy mistakes in procedure. Without these
mistakes, I had a realistic chance of a draw (though there was still no
guarantee).