all your report are belong to us

From: s henderson 
Subject: Inquest $1000 Open tournament report
Date: Thu, 17 Jul 1997 09:42:41 GMT

Last weekend my brother and I went to the inquest
open classic in Salt Lake City.  After alot of 
playtesting and the restriction of the vise we
decided it was time for necro to rear its abusive
head once again.  I played a B/U necro with the 
power cards and control magics.  My brother Robert
played a B/R necro with bolts and mox monkeys.
Here is the deck we came up with:

Black:
 4 Hymn to Tourach
 4 Agonizing Memories
 3 Necropotence
 3 Dark Ritual
 1 Demonic Tutor
 3 Contagion
 1 Ishan Shade
 4 Hypnotic Specter
Blue:
 1 Ancestral Recall
 1 Timewalk
 2 Control Magic
Artifacts:
 3 Disk
 1 Ivory Tower
 1 Zorb
 1 Mirror Universe
Mana+Stuff:
 1 Sol Ring
 1 Mox Jet
 1 Mox Sapphire
 1 Black Lotus
 1 Library of Alexandria
 4 Strip Mine
 4 Mishra Factory
 4 Underground Sea
 4 Underground River
 6 Swamp

The Sideboard was set up to beat the big
creature and burn type decks we excepted 
to see:
 4 Hydroblast
 1 Blue Elemental Blast
 2 Dystopia
 1 Gloom
 2 Nekrataal
 1 Snakebasket
 4 Sinkholes 

The sinkholes came in to replace the hymn to
tourachs in games 2 and 3 against players who
I thought would side heavily against discard.

The turnout at the tournament was pretty small 
( 22 players ) so the format was four rounds of
swiss breaking to a single elmination top eight.

Round 1 v. Dan Obergfell - Five Color Good Stuff
Game 1 I Get out a library and a ivory tower.  After
getting up to about forty life I go potent and kill
Dan with a Ishans Shade and a controlled Serra Angel.
Game 2 I destroy all of Dans land and permanents with
strips, sinks, and a disk.  I kill him with mishras. 
Sad.
1 - 0

Round 2 v. Phoung Chou - R/U Frenetic Burn
Game 1  He beats me pretty low I top deck a zorb go
potent and beat him down.
Game 2  He beats me pretty low I drop a mirror, swap
lives and kill him with a mishra.
2 - 0

Round 3 v. Robert Muranaka my brother - B/R Necro
Just as a sidenote here I always end up playing 
my brother at tournaments.  It doesn't matter if
its a ten player tournament or a thousand player
tournament its as if my brother and I are destined
to swap DCI points.  If we are at the same tournament
we will play.
Game 1  I feel good after first turn ritual necro.
I draw nothing and get beat so low by my brothers
hypno and mishra I can't even bust a contagion without
dying.
Game 2 We both drop early specters.  I tutor for
a control magic and control his.  I win.
Game 3 My brother is slightly manascrewed and I 
am able to bust out a early agonizing memories and
shut him down.
3 - 0

Round 4 v. Jack Stanton 
Jack is a good friend from Idaho.  We are both
hungry so we draw, hangout for a little and then
go and grab lunch.  In other good news my 
brother wins his round by strip mining a lotus
vale ( mondo combo ) and also makes it into the 
top eight.  More on Jacks deck later.
3 - 0 - 1

Quarterfinals v. Michael Freed Manadrain - Big Creature-
Burn
Game 1  He drains a early agonizing memories and puts
out a mahamoti.  I control magic it and use it to hold
off two ernham djinns until I can mirror necro him.
Game 2  He puts out a first turn ernham.  I drop a mox
sapphire, lotus, and a  strip mine.  I strip his land
and control his ernham feeling like a major badass.  The
next turn he drops a land disenchants my control and the
ernham pummels me into the ground.
Game 3  I drop a first turn necro and am able to 
contagion his ernham and beat him down with mishras.

Semifinals v. Jack Stanton - Zoo remains
Before the game starts Jack whines and bitches about
how his dwarven miner has sucked.  He is only playing
one and it has not even reared its ugly head yet.
Game 1  Jack plays a second turn miner and looks pretty
happy as I have out a lot of non basic land.  On my turn
the miner turns traitor and joins the forces of evil.  
Not only does it not blow up any of my lands but in an
ironic twist of fate it is also able to hold off Jacks
1/1 kird ape and to later on draw a incinerate to save
the lives of a hypnotic that is played later.  Jacks draws
only four bolts the whole game ( two of which were
hymned from his hand ) and needless to say loses to my
hypnotic specters.
Game 2 We both have pretty bad draws.  Jack plays a early
savannah lion and I nekrataal it.  Jack bolts the nekrataal
and we both do nothing for a while. Jacks wheels and I get 3 
agonizing memories and a hypnotic. I agonize, then 
agonize again, and then agonize again. Jack loses to two 
hypnotics.  This is a game where the sinkholes swap in the
sideboard came in handy.  As I was able to keep Jack low
on mana and also because after agonizing Jack I saw he
had sided in four sand golems which were basically too 
expensive to cast with the addition of the land destruction.

Finals v Tony Lau - R/B/U Bazaar of Baghdad Reanimator deck
I dont feel very confident playing against Tony as my
hymns just feed his graveyard and he had also beaten
my brother earlier in the top eight.  So I feel pretty
happy when he offers to split the money ( $400 each ).
We decide just to play for the product and for pride.
Game 1 Tony gets a bad draws and bazaars alot of creatures
into his graveyard but doesn't get any retrieval.  I am
able to kill him with a mirror universe.
Game 2 On turn one Tony bazaars a Nicol Bolas into his 
graveyard. Scary.  On Turn two Tony animates the Nicol
Bolas and I am facing down the flying mindtwist of doom.
On turn three Tony forgets to upkeep the Nicol Bolas. Joy.
Nicol Bolas flys into the graveyard instead of drilling a hole
in my head.  Woohoo.  I have a library out and draw a bunch
of cards and eventually kill Tony with a hypnotic and a Ishans.
I win the invitational and my first ever type one tournament.

Some notes on the deck:

The real stars of the deck were the agonizing memories.
In type one with all the fast mana avaiable a turn one or
two agonizing is entirely possible and will usually severly
hamper your opponent.  Also if your opponent is even manascrewed
or you have multiple stripmines in your opening hand a 
early agonizing can often win you the game.  As an example
of the power of the agonizing memories in game 2 of my
semifinals match Jack Stanton was stalled out at three mana,
and despite ancestral recalling twice he was unable to get
over the three mana hump.

Oh well its late and I'm tired as always questions or 
comments are welcome,

Aaron Muranaka
shender1@ix.netcom.com