TnT FNM 10/1/10 *3rd place 3-1*

Hello there. I am back to my usual time of writing these blog posts, where it is currently 1:18 AM. I look forward to doing nothing this weekend, so staying up late until the sun rises sounds like a nice treat.

What's a better way to kick off a chill weekend than with a whole lot of Scars of Mirroden? I picked up my pre-ordered box and fat pack and got some fairly nice results. I got no Mythics in the fat pack, but in my box I got four:

Elspeth Tirel
Liege of the Tangle
Lux Cannon
Wurmcoil Engine

I was pretty pumped when I opened each of these for various reasons. First, Elspeth is simply a money card to me (which I later traded 1-1 for Koth), but Liege is incredibly fun and wins games all by itself (as long as you don't get hit by Day of Judgement), Lux Cannon makes me really want to make a crazy proliferate deck, and Wurmcoil Engine is the 6th titan. I wouldn't have crack open my whole box right then and there, but I needed one more Genesis Wave for my mono-green Eldrazi deck, and I wound up getting it deep in the box. 30 seconds before the FNM started I had my sideboard thrown together and I was ready to play! Here's my list for the night:

Main Deck
4x Primeval Titan
4x Oracle of Mul Daya
3x Overgrown Battlement
3x Kozelik
1x Ulamog
3x Avenger of Zendikar

4x Khalni Heart Expedition
4x Harrow
3x Cultivate
4x Explore
2x Genesis Wave

20x Forest
4x Eldrai Temple
1x Eye of Ugin

Sideboard
1x Emrakul
1x Asceticism
3x Hornet Sting
2x All is Dust
1x Liege of the Tangle
3x Slice in Twain
2x Summoning Trap
2x Wurmcoil Engine

Round 1: GR Valakut Ramp
For the first round I was against a budget GR Valakut Ramp deck thata didn't run cards like Primeval Titan. In both the games we played I had a very strong draw and was able to ramp out the Eldrazi before he could stick his 3rd mountain. This round actually ended really quickly and I had a lot of extra time to mill around and watch people play their games. And when I say mill around I mean I had a great time watching a mill vs mill battle which ended in the UB version beating the mono-blue version. I felt really good about my deck and was looking forward to the next round

2-0
1-0

Round 2: Mirror Match
I wasn't the only one who picked up on how awesome this deck is and it turns out 3 (including myself) of the 9 people in the tournament were playing this deck. The other decks there included 2 mill decks, GR Valakut, UW Myr, and GW Stompy. I think the 9th deck was a UW control deck, but I am not entirely certain.

I knew I was in for trouble before the match began when I saw cards from my opponent's deck as he was shuffling. After playing out for a bit during game 1, I was able to stick an Avenger of Zendikar, dropping 8 tokens in play followed by a land making them all 1/2s. I passed the turn with 2 harrows in hand planning on going for the alpha strike next turn and making good use of the fact that Harrow was an instant and could suprise him for lethal. He made verbal note that I had a Harrow in hand (revealed by Oracle earlier on top of deck) and felt safe with his configuration before passing to me. I topdecked a Harrow and couldn't help but laugh. As expected I attacked and he blocked with everything, but a triple Harrow is just awesome! (keeping with the theme of 3s, a few minute later a mill player yelled about how he triple Archive Trapped someone for 0 mana!).

Games 2 and 3 didn't go over too hot for me. In one of the games he played 3 Everflowing Chalices in a row, using the mana from each of the previous ones to play the next and all of a sudden had 6 bonus colorless mana in play. I was pretty quickly crushed from there.

1-2
1-1

Round 3: UW Myr
Before the FNM started, I was talking with Jurras (I definitely spelt that wrong..) and I looked at his deck that he had all laid out which was very similar to the UW Myr deck that was in the back of my mind (which has since been edited and will show up in a post after I'm done with this one).

I was actually really happy I got to play against this deck because I got to see how it really played out. And what's the verdict? THIS IS SOOO SICK! The only trouble Jurras had with his deck was the lack of card advantage, something I touch upon in my updated version, aside from Jace TMS. Even despite that, I really had to play on my toes against this deck. Mana Myr don't seem very dangerous at first, but when all of a sudden Tempered Steel hits play and you get nailed for 12 damage, you start to play more carefully. I lost game 1 simply because I didn't take my time and really thoroughly evaluate all the numbers. I got confident that I could win with Kozelik, so I attacked, he sacrificed 4 lands and took the 12 damage. With my blockers down I got hit for 21 in one fell swoop.

That being said, games 2 and 3 I took my time a lot more and double checked everything before going forward and I only wound up winning game 3 by one point. On one hand I was amazed Jurras had the deck together on release day (although opening up 15 boxes does help...) but I was even more excited to see how it was actually very legit. On a side note, dropping Myr Battlesphere with Tempered Steel already in play is scary. 18 combined power for 7 mana? That costs 2 less than Terastadon and doesn't require you to lose lands or other permanents.

2-1
2-1

Round 4: UB Mill
I knew my opponent was playing Mill because I had watched him play previously and I felt like there was no way I could lose this matchup. First, I am still not a believer in milling, and secondly I am running 4 Legendary Eldrazi that make all of mill's hard work go to waste on a moment's notice.

Both games went by fairly uneventfully, although one funny event occurred when I played Primeval Titan, searched for my lands and then got hit with 3 Archive Trap for 0 mana (second time he has done that today!). Although nothing actually really happened because all of my Eldrazi got milled, making everything shuffle back, it was still really funny and very awesome.

2-0
3-1

Overall, I really enjoyed playing with this deck, but there are a few edits I want to make. First, Oracle of Mul Daya doesn't pull its weight in this build. I run 25 lands as opposed to 28, which makes her a lot more inconsistant, and ultimately led to giving my opponents information about every card I was drawing. So I would cut those for Jorage Treespeakers aka Sol Ring. There are no 1 drops in the deck, and this turn one is amazing because it doesn't break tempo at all while allowing a turn 3 Titan no problem:

t1 - forest, Joraga Treespeaker
t2 - forest, level Treespeaker, Overgrown Battlement
t3 - forest, Titan

And if you had the nut draw that means you get Avenger of Zendikar next turn for 5 or 6 tokens with many +1/+1 counters after attacking with the Titan which can mean a turn 5 win. Wow, that is speed never before possible without the Treespeaker!

Also, one other small tech with this deck is to bring in Tectonic Edge. I think 3 instead of Forests strait out should be good.

Anyways that is all for now, until next time I hope you have an awesome time cracking open Scars and packing some epic Mythics.