The Cleveland Rocs recently hosted another Middle School event in Cleveland during GP Cleveland weekend, held at Mars Bar on Friday, April 5, 2019.



We will be hosting a private and free #MiddleSchoolMTG tournament on Friday April 5th at 7pm at Mars Bar in Lakewood, OH. Everyone takes home a prize, with some special prizes for most creative and first place. DM us ASAP to register for Middle School if you'd like to play! pic.twitter.com/r1IsSBdLi6 — Cleveland Rocs (@ClevelandRocsOG) March 21, 2019

Tournament Structure and Prizing

This event was run as straight Swiss, with 5 rounds total, with no draws allowed. If a round would end in a draw, these rules are used after 5 additional turns:

“If the game would end in a draw after 5 turns, put aside all cards and note the life totals of each player. The player with the lowest life total is designated as flipper. If tied, the active player on turn 5 is designated as flipper. Begin a Game of Chaos, each player starting with the life total as noted. In-game effects do not apply here; this is a subgame with only these defined rules, based on the card Game of Chaos. Flipper flips a coin. The other player calls heads or tails while coin is in the air. The loser of the flip loses 1 life, the winner of the flip gains 1 life. If a player would die after any flip, they lose the match. Repeat this process, alternating flippers. Double the stakes each time.”

There was a large stack of Middle School staples that people could choose from before the tournament, and each player chose one card, and then everyone else would end up signing that card by the end of the event. Additionally, there was a GP Cleveland playmat to both the 1st place and Most Creative deck!

Final Standings After Swiss+1

1. Jacob Hilty (5-0) – Enchantress

2. Steve McGrew (4-1) – Pattern Rector

3. Frank Singel (4-1) – The Rock

4. Phil Thornson (3-2) – Survival SqueeBind

5. Sean Uridil (3-2) – Mono Green Land Destruction

6. Pete Harlan (3-2) – Star Spangled Slaughter (UWR) *MOST CREATIVE DECK WINNER*

7. Adam Fronsee (3-2) – Stasis

8. Nat Moes (3-2) – Eggs

9. David Lance (3-2) – Cartographer Slide

10. Matt (2-3) – Madness UG

11. Nam Tran (2-3) – Landstill UW

12. Chase Masters (2-3) – Madness UG

13. Craig (2-3) – Elves

14. John (2-3) – ProsBloom

15. Roger (1-4) – Miracle Gro

16. Randal Witherell (1-4) – Mono Red Land Destruction

17. Vinny Samoly (1-4) – Entomb Control

18. Wiley (0-5) – Maher Oath

The event reached its capped capacity of 18 players, with people coming in from across Ohio mainly. Madness was the only overlapping strategy! There was a huge diversity in control, combo, and aggro strategies.

We will not be posting many decklists from these events here on EC in the near future, but will instead continue to post full metagame breakdowns for each event, in order to give people a more general idea of what people are experimenting with and playing in events. It’s a relatively new format to most people, so it is very much in the discovery and exploratory phases of Middle School deck development, which is very exciting.

For deck ideas see our Introducing Middle School article, which has links to the rules and a number of historical events and decks of their respective eras, to get the creative juices flowing. From there you can begin to engineer some decklists, and then test and tune as you iterate!

Tournament Action

While we will not be publishing decklists from this event, below you can find plenty of pics from the games during the tournament, and see many of the cards in action.

Thorson (Survival SqueeBind) vs. McGrew (Pattern Rector)



Masters (Madness UG) vs. Hilty (Enchantress)



Craig (Elves) vs. Roger (Miracle Gro)



Singel (The Rock) vs. Harlan (Star Spangled Slaughter)



Tournament Action!



For any corrections, comments, follow up, or to send us any action shots to add to this report, please email support@eternalcentral.com. Thanks for reading, and we’ll catch you next time.