Friday, August 19, 2011

Elves: Modo Tournament Results

I played a bunch of events last night. Mostly 8 mans, but I didn't want to wait to win one as the night got later so I played a couple 2 mans as well. In total I went 6-4 which was a lot worse than the practice room but the people here actually seemed semi-competent so it's not too surprising. One thing I discovered is I simply can't beat Valakut and it saddens me. I wonder if I can find a better sideboard card in the next 16 hours to even the odds there a little...

Also, vengevine makes control decks cry like a little girl unless they have Karn. Even against burn my plan is often resolve a vengevine and then try to bring it back turn after turn as they kill it. 

Here's how I sideboarded in each match. Not sure if this makes sense or not, but it's what I did.

vs Goblins
+4 leatherback
+1 obstinant
-2 ranger
-2 ezuri
-1 corrupter

My thinking here is my opponent was big on burning out my dudes and swinging past them with goblin guides so I want to play more dudes that survive burn spells. Gaining life is good. In retrospect Ezuri is probably better than archdruid in this match since my opponent had arc trails which 2-for-1 archdruid and an elf but Ezuri can regen the elf.

I lost the match 1-2. One of the games involved my opponent playing turn 1 goblin guide, turn 2 goblin guide + goblin guide (beat me to 12), turn 3 attack + goblin grenade + goblin grenade. Yeah, a full house. And I was dead before getting a 3rd turn. Despite casting 3 creatures myself in those 2 turns. Bah.

vs Valakut
+4 leatherback
+1 obstinant
-2 ranger
-2 ezuri
-1 corrupter

This was the first time I ever saw Valakut in action and didn't know what to side in or out. I was worried about pyroclasm so I brought in the dudes that live through pyroclasm.

+2 ezuri
-2 leatherback

I didn't see any pyroclasm effects in game 2 (I won game 1) so I sided Ezuri back in. (He did cast primeval titan on turn 3 though!) He then proceeded to play turn 2 pyroclasm, turn 3 slagstorm (pyro for 3). I lost 1-2.

vs UW control
-2 sylvan ranger
+2 nature's claim

He had a pro-green sword. I didn't want him to hit me with the pro-green sword and I hate the ranger. I won this match 2-0.

vs Splinter Twin
+4 torpor orb
+4 nature's claim
-4 lead the stampede
-2 ranger
-1 ezuri
-1 warcaller

He comboed me out on turn 4 in game 1. I brought in the full package with enchantment removal for the twin and torpor orb to force him to try to deal with it. Going up to 31 non-creature spells with lead the stampede seemed wrong so I took those out. I took out the rangers again and then 1 each of Ezuri and warcaller. Not sure why.

+1 ezuri
-1 warcaller

I won game 2 and it featured a turn 2 torpor orb and then I topdecked my last warcaller. I decided his ability wasn't going to work with the orb in play (I ended up playing him for 1 to bring back a vengevine) and took him out for game 3. I have since realized he should still work since his ability isn't triggered. The corrupter, on the other hand, doesn't work with an orb in play. But I think I still want to leave him in to kill spellskite?
I won game 3 as well. 2-1.

vs Valakut
+4 torpor orb
-2 ranger
-1 corruptor
-1 ezuri

I decided to go for a different game plan against this valakut deck and tried to slow him down with torpor orb. I didn't draw one and it didn't matter. I exploded 0-2.

vs Mono green beats?
none

I honestly didn't know what this guy was trying to do. He cast a lot of midranged green creatures (including acidic slime to blow up a forest) but didn't seem to have any way to actually stop me from blowing him up with an army of elves. I didn't sideboard and blew him up with an army of elves. 2-0.

vs Puresteel
+2 creeping corrosion
-2 ranger

Puresteel plays with a lot of equipment and I want to be able to blow it all up. Not sure if I should also side in the claims here or not. It seems like with a decent draw I'm just faster than they are though they can get some sick combos going. At any rate he stalled on land in game 2 and I blew him up. 2-0.

vs UW control
-2 ranger
+2 claim

This is how I sided against the last UW control player despite this guy not playing a sword.

+2 ranger
-2 claim

I drew both claims and he didn't play an artifact in game 2. He did destroy me with Karn though. I was probably playing too passively in fear of wrath and I think it cost me. I undid my sideboarding for game 3. I also played this game too passively and frequently had 7 creatures in hand. (He tapped out and I lead a couple stampedes.) Eventually he played a wrath, I played a few dudes but not as many as I could. Then he played Karn and I realized I was just screwed if he had a wrath to go with Karn. So I played out an army of 1/1s. He didn't have wrath. I topdecked Ezuri and killed him. 2-1.


vs RDW
+5 baloths
-2 ranger
-1 llanowar
-1 arbor
-1 treespeaker

This match was a 2-player queue one. This guy wasn't playing goblins, he was playing full on burn with lavamancers and shrines. He had a lot of arc trails too. I decided my cheap stuff was just getting burned anyway so I sided a bit of it out and brought in large men. It worked, and I won 2-1.

vs GUW Pod
+4 orb
+4 claim
-4 stampede
-2 ranger
-1 ezuri
-1 warcaller

The last 2-player queue match. I got locked down behind Venser + stonehorn dignitary (skip your next combat phase every turn) so I sided in torpor orb to deal with him. And claims to kill off any pods. These are non-creatures again, so I pulled the stampedes along with my hated rangers and one of each of my finishers. I got locked again in game 2 and eventually got killed with about 120 power of dudes in play. I did get a torpor orb but by that point I had 2 extra combat phases skipped and he used Venser's ultimate to get rid of it. Pretty sure a turn 2 orb wins this game though, so I probably should have mulliganned into one.

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