The Event:

Last Saturday, 34 eternal enthusiasts showed up at Collector Legion in sunny SoCal to sling expensive cardboard for a chance to win play-sets of fetch lands and the grand prize of a Revised Tropical Island. 2 players over the 32 player mark brought the tournament up to 6 rounds – a full day of Legacy magic.

My Deck Choice:

Having been out of practice and out of touch with the recent legacy scene, I decided to hedge my bets and pilot my most faithful deck, Sneak and Show. While I enjoy playing this deck, I mainly chose it for it’s linear game plan and forgiving nature. One or two piloting errors doesn’t mean I won’t just top deck a flying spaghetti monster and ruin my opponents day, and trust me, I planned on making some errors. Here is the list I chose to pilot:

Sideboard:

Round 1: vs. Burn

I went into round 1 feeling nervous and shaky after not having played for a long time.

Game 1: My opponent deployed a turn 1 Goblin Guide and proceeded to chip away with 2 damage attacks and a suspended Rift Bolt. I went for an early Show and Tell to cheat in a Sneak Attack, to which my opponent put in a Sulfuric Vortex, seriously increasing the clock. I did not have a threat to sneak in, but my plan was to find it with the help of Goblin Guide. I narrowly lost when my opponent attacked with a freshly summoned Monastery Swiftspear, Goblin Guide (revealing the Emrakul, the Aeons Torn I was looking for), and cast a Lightning Bolt at my face, triggering Prowess for the exact damage needed to steal the game.

Game 2: The second game consisted of a pretty standard slew of burn spells and attacks from little red creatures putting me to 4 life. At the last moment I was able to sneak in a Griselbrand and stabilize long enough to clean up with Emrakul, the Aeons Torn.

Game 3: Summoning all of my skill, I draw my opening hand to find a City of Traitors + Lotus Petal alongside Show and Tell + Emrakul, the Aeons Torn. After a moment of nervous deliberation, I showed him my big spaghetti monster, he showed me his goblin holding a lantern, and then he conceded.

Record: (1-0)

Round 2: vs. RUG Shardless

This was my first time playing on camera during a live event. I was paired against an opponent who I’ve played before. I told him I recognized him, but not enough to remember what deck he was on. He did not return the sentiment (implying that he knew exactly what I was up to). I eventually learned he was playing “RUG Shardless”, making use of legacy newcomers Dreadhorde Arcanist and Force of Negation. You can view the full match below.

Game 1:

I won the dice roll and lead with a turn 1 Preordain. Francis played a Volcanic Island and passed the turn back. My turn two was a Scalding Tarn followed by a Ponder to set up a big turn three play. Francis played a Dreadhorde Arcanist and passed back. My hand was strong enough to beat a Force of Will/Negation so I decided to combo off and go for the throat. I played Show and Tell, he tried to Force of Negation so I Force of Willed back, and then put Sneak Attack into play, another Dreadhorde Arcanist for Francis. I played Lotus Petal and sneak in Griselbrand. Redundancy rewarded me with a Lotus Petal and Emrakul, the Aeons Torn in the first 7 that I drew with Griselbrand‘s ability. I ended the game with the second Lotus Petal and a swing for 22 damage.

Game 2:

The second game began with Francis destroying my Volcanic Island with a Wasteland on the draw. This would normally be bad news for most decks, but this absolute unit of a combo deck shrugged it off with a turn 2 Anceint Tomb + Lotus Petal into Show and Tell. I put Griselbrand into play, he gambled on Cindervines (assuming I’d play Sneak Attack like last game), and promptly conceded. Francis was as a complete gentleman and good sport about the whole thing which I appreciated greatly.

Record: (2-0)

Round 3: vs. 4C Loam

This was my second time playing on camera and I was unfortunately paired against my friend Corey who I came to the event with. He had spent the last week talking about how he hoped to dodge me in the pairings since he felt like our match was auto-loss for him. I jokingly told him not to underestimate my ability to get nervous and make mistakes on camera so he still had a chance. Something something, self-fulfilling prophecy something….

Game 1:

Corey won the dice roll and led turn 1 with a Mox Diamond into Chalice of the Void to which I promptly said, “No thank you kind sir, but thanks for asking” in the form of Force of Will (not that it matters, but if you watch the video the commentators think I pitched a promo art Ponder, but the trained eye will recognize it was a Duel Decks version of Preordain). I spent my turn 1 Pondering and deployed a Lotus Petal to dodge any potential discard. I spent the next couple turns carving my hand and developing my lands while Corey summoned Scavenging Ooze and Dark Confidant, chipping away at my life. I managed to hard-cast a Sneak Attack without a threat as Corey brought me down to 4 life. The fates favored me as I peeled an Emrakul, the Aeons Torn off the top, reset his board and shuffled my deck. Thankfully Corey cut my deck so that Emrakul, the Aeons Torn was sitting on top for an easy game 1 steal. At this point in the video, you can see me writing on a slip of paper for the camera, but unfortunately it was not able to pick up what I wrote, which was “You don’t have to be good if you top-deck runner-runner Emrakul”.

Game 2:

I kept a shaky hand that had turn 1 graveyard hate in it. Corey led game 2 with a turn 1 Dark Confidant and I responded with a turn 1 Grafdigger’s Cage, a piece of sideboard tech that I thought was going to be way more devastating to his strategy than it was. Corey tries to resolve a Chalice of the Void on turn 2, but I once again rejected his offer with a polite Force of Will. Corey resolved a Gaddock Teeg a turn later, shutting off my ability to hard-cast Sneak Attack. This threat registered at about 3.6 Roentgen (not great, not terrible), so I decided to let it resolve. Then he dropped a Knight of the Reliquary and Sylvan Library and passed back to me where I proceeded to Brainstorm-lock myself out of the game. Corey later told me that the Grafdigger’s Cage was useless since he took out his Green Sun’s Zeniths for this event.

Game 3:

We went into game 3 with me on the play and a turn 1 Blood Moon play available in my hand. I mentally deliberated over this as my hand was pretty weak other than the turn 1 Blood Moon, but turning off 3/4 colors in a 4-color deck is pretty backbreaking, so I decided to roll with my plan, especially since I had Force of Will back up. I deployed my turn 1 Blood Moon and started mentally filling out the match-slip. Corey then responded by playing a land (read: Mountain) and droped a Mox Diamond right next to it. This is where the reactor exploded. Having played against Corey and his Mox Diamonds a million times, you’d think I’d have been more ready to counter it, but feeling too comfortable with my opponent and cock-sure in my turn 1 play, I casually nodded my head in approval, letting it resolve without fulling realizing my error. The rest of the game looked like Corey resolving a multitude of different colored 2-drop threats while I drew blanks, and then him stomping my face in. The tilt arrived in full force and I never recovered mentally for the rest of the event.

Record: (2-1)

Round 4: vs. Death’s Shadow

Feeling tilted but still hopeful, I got paired against one of the shop’s team players who was wearing a snazzy jersey.

Game 1:

The first game was short-lived and deceptively played by my opponent. He deployed a turn 1 Delver of Secrets off an Underground Sea and failed to flip it twice. I kept a mediocre hand and tried to Show and Tell but was stopped by his Daze. He only showed me another and a [card]Brainstorm the rest of that game before I was dead to the flying insect.

Game 2:

I incorrectly placed my opponent on Grixis Delver and aggressively sideboarded in preparation for a counter-spell war. Turns out I missed the memo on how hot Death’s Shadow is right now, but quickly learned of my mistake when he dropped a turn 2 Watery Grave. He unceremoniously Thoughtseized away my combo piece, deployed a Delver of Secrets, did a few other things that dropped his life total down below 5, then showed me a big Death’s Shadow. I never really stood a chance, but we did have fun bantering about my horrible predicament as my dreams of Top 8 slipped away.

Record: (2-2)

Round 5: vs. BUG Shardless

I was pretty down on myself by this point and almost dropped the event, but was encouraged by friends to keep playing. I was paired against a BUG Shardless player who was also part of the shop team sporting another snazzy jersey.

Game 1:

The first game was fairly straightforward for my deck. He deployed a few cantrips and a Baleful Strix, I deployed a Sneak Attack through Show and Tell, sneaked in a Griselbrand, drew 7 cards, found an Emrakul, the Aeons Torn and hastily swung in for a smooth 22 points to take the game.

Game 2:

My opponent got some payback for my smooth game 1 curve in the form of completely stripping me of all my resources in game 2. Turn 1 Thoughtseize into turn 2 Hymn to Tourach into turn 3 Liliana of the Veil +1 ravaged my chances of doing anything unfair this game. He eventually closed the game with some Tarmogoyf beats and sent us to game 3.

Game 3:

Our last game is a little fuzzy in my head, but it consisted of us trading threats for discard spells until I was able to carve out a hand worthy of going off with. I passed the Force of Will test with one of my own and was able to deploy an Omniscience through Show and Tell. Lucky for me the flying spaghetti monster was in hand already, so I hard cast it, took an extra turn, blessed my opponent with his noodly appendage and proceeded to steal the match.

Record: (3-2)

Round 6: vs. The Gulag (Red Prison)

After pairings were posted, I was sitting solid at 13th place. I was ready to call it a day, but one of the shopkeepers told me I was till in contention for Top 8 if I won the last round, so I begrudgingly sat down in front of my opponent. I remember once hearing Maro talk on a podcast about how Magic was such a universal game that two people who didn’t speak the same language could sit down and play a full game without speaking. Well, now I know he is right, as I got to experience the quietest game of Magic I’ve ever played against my opponent who did not speak English.

Game 1:

Game 1 consisted of a solid 5 minutes of shuffling and taking mulligans down to 5 cards for each of us. Unfortunately, he won the dice roll (essentially winning on the spot) and went first. His turn 1 was Ancient Tomb, Chrome Mox into Ensnaring Bridge. I played a Misty Rainforest and used it to search through my library to confirm that I had zero answers to that card in the main deck and promptly conceded in order to protect any further information about my deck. Language barrier aside, a turn 1 concession to Ensnaring Bridge gives away quite a bit of information on what deck I’m likely on.

Game 2:

Our second and final game of the day also started with lots of shuffling and mulligans down to 6 for each of us. I am in no way a professional, but I am experienced enough to realize that my opponent would likely mulligan for the same cards that won him an instant concession in the last game, so I played an untapped Island and held up a Spell Pierce for the inevitable Ensnaring Bridge. As expected, my opponent goes for the same turn 1 Ensnaring Bridge play which I promptly pierce away. Unfortunately, my second turn was spent cantripping and trying to improve my hand, while my opponents turn 2 was to resolve a Magus of the Moon, drastically slowing down the Sol lands in my hand. He followed that up with a Chalice of the Void on 1, then a Trinisphere, another Blood Moon for good measure, a second Magus of the Moon for great measure, and then proceeded to beat me to death while my hands were tied behind my back. Fortunately for him, he won, unfortunately for him, his victory only landed him in 9th place.

Final Record: (3-3)

Top 8 & Payout:

Corey Armstrong (in the Naughty Sauce shirt) won the Tropical Island in commanding fashion.

Photo courtesy of Collector Legion Facebook Page.

There was some disappointing news circulating around the fourth round that the tournament organizer was not going to be prizing out past the Top 4 players due to player turnout. Most competitive legacy players have experienced this at some point, but it never feels good to go all the way to Top 8 only to leave empty handed. One clever player suggested a payout strategy using the current prize pool that would expand all the way out to 8th place, but unfortunately not all players were in agreement and places 5-8 went home empty handed. This sparked an interesting discussion among the peanut gallery about this particular problem with prizes being based on player turnout. On the one hand, I understand the event organizers don’t want to lose money and thus can’t guarantee a payout, but doing this also prevents players from showing up for fear of reduced chance of prizing – a definite double-edged sword. Some players agreed that dividing up the prizes would be the best solution, others sided with the Top 4 payout if only to encourage people to voice dissent about this practice and to encourage guaranteed prizing for future events. Personally, I think this is a “between a rock and a hard place” kind of situation, but I do think there is a more elegant solution. What if future tournament organizers guaranteed a payout up to Top 8 that they were comfortable paying out regardless of the player turnout, only to increase the value of those stated prizes if turnout is above expectation. In other words, guarantee prizing to Top 8 in some form (5-8 gets their entry fee back, wins a pack of cards, wins some card sleeves, etc.), but also offer “potential prizes” based on player turnout to incentivize players to not only come out, but to bring their friends. Seems like an easy fix to me…

Lessons Learned:

I started writing this report as a way to look back and see what lessons I had learned from the day so I can improve for next time. The most important takeaway is probably to not let my competitive mindset slip when paired against a friend, or more honestly, not to get so confident in the results just based on the deck archetypes. I think I got it into my head that his deck was an auto-win and my performance showed that. Kenny really does mean it when he says “you never count your money when you’re sitting at the table”. I also look at this event as a reminder of how tilt can really ruin your ability to perform properly and am going to try and use it as a learning experience for next time. I also feel like maybe I need a Finding Nemo-like mantra along the lines of “Mox Diamonds are Artifacts, Not Lands” after this event.

For my fellow pilots – The Arcane Artisan Debate:

Like most Sneak and Show players, I was pretty excited when Arcane Artisan was spoiled – it seemed like it was made for our sideboard. I immediately bought a play-set, put them in my binder, and promptly forgot about them. Months later when I began preparing for this event, I did some research to see how other players were utilizing this new tech and what I noticed was a steady decline in usage in winning lists from when it launched. Originally decks were playing an average of 2 in the sideboard, but now only a smattering of lists seem to play one if any at all. I consulted resident MODO Sneak and Show expert JPA93’s most recent list and he has completely omitted the card from the entire 75. Ultimately I followed his lead and did not include the new tech in my list, but I am left wondering what everyone’s thoughts are on this card and where it belongs in the current meta.

Thanks for reading my report and be sure to check out all the coverage from this event on the Collector Legion stream!