TNT Legacy *1-2*

Hello everyone! Last night I was hanging out at my house writing yesterday's post, when I got a txt from Joe saying there were 2 people at Toys for legacy including him. WOO! YEAH! 2 PEOPLE! I'm actually not being sarcastic either. Normally a group of 3-5 people would come down from Worcester every weekend to play legacy, and they pretty much made up the whole event as it was them + me + Benzo (the TO) if needed to create an even number of players. So if there were 2 players there already, then me + Benzo = 4 players so we could do a small event. I got there, and pretty soon a group of 4 more players from somewhere not Worcester came as well. Benzo hopped in, and we had an 8-man event kicking off! I decided to run my new Countertop-Humility deck:

4x Enlightened Tutor
4x Sensei's Divining Top
4x Counterbalance
4x Thopter Foundry
3x Sword of the Meek

3x Spell Pierce
4x Force of Will
3x Swords to Plowshares
2x Humility
2x Krosan Grip
4x Brainstorm
2x Jace, the Mind Sculptor

3x Island
2x Underground Sea
2x Tropical Island
2x Plains
4x Marsh Flats
4x Tundra
4x Misty Rainforest

Sideboard:
3x Engineered Plague
3x Mindbreak Trap
2x Pithing Needle
2x Krosan Grip
3x Submerge
2x Tormod's Crypt

The first thing I want to mention is that the mana base is incredibly tight, except the Marsh Flats needs to be changed out for Scalding Tarn, or one of the U/x Onslaught fetches. All the dual lands are U/x, so the Misty Rainforest can get me any color I need.

When the Worcester group was always coming down, the meta was very expected. One person always played Tooth & Nail, there was one guy who was either mill or Zoo, etc. However, with the only person of this 8-man that I have played with before being Benzo, it was a much more realistic event. The 8 decks were:

Countertop-Humility (me)
UW Countertop-Jace (won with Jace -12)
Charbelcher
Zoo
Mono-blue Mud (lots of counterspells, won with mana denial and Lodestone Golem)
Mono-black control
Mono-blue stall (tubo-fog style mill deck)
Goblins

Round 1: Zoo
I lose the Rock-Paper-Scissors (using the unglued cards), and he starts off with a Taiga into Wild Nacatl. Ok, I should do well here, as my Thopter-Sword combo should overwhelm him. Unforunately, the combo never really come together until it was too late, at which point you can see my life total going 4 - 5 - 3 - 1 - 2 - 0. I said afterwards if I had started at 25 life instead of 20 I would have come back completely. But hey, that's Magic. Game 2 went a lot better for me as I had Thopter Assembly and Enlightened Tutor in my opening hand, so I didn't even drop below 16 life all game before hitting him for 7, then 12. Game 3 started off really bad for me. My opening 7 was a really loose hand that had just 1 land, 2 brainstorms, and some decent stuff after that. I decided to mulligan, and had to go down to 4 to get lands in my hand. I had a land, 2 brainstorms, and a Thopter assembly. Sounds like that original 7.... despite my initial disadvantage, I top decked like a champ and got together the countertop combo, but the Thopter-Sword combo was eluding me. He had a turn 2 Sylvan Library, and it was good beats from there, as I was hit for 5 a turn from Wild Nacatl + Quasali Pridemage. At one point in the game, he tried to Krosan grip my Counterbalance, but I revealed an Engineered Plague off the top BOOM!

1-2
0-1

Round 2: Mono-blue Mud
I had been playtesting against this guy with a bunch of game 1s before the event started and I just couldn't win. This game started off in a similar manner when he got his Wastelands + Crucible of the Worlds combo together and running turn 2. However, his super-fast mana got the best of him. His Ancient Tombs dealt him 10 damage that game, so by the time I started bringing the beats, half my work was already done. For game 2 I brought in all my Krosan Grips and nothing else because I still didn't know what was going on with this deck. I still couldn't figure it out by the end of game 2 because I got a fast Topter-Sword combo off without dropping below 17 life. By the end of it all, I put him on having no counterspells because he didn't play any during the 6 or 7 games I had against him all day, and when I asked to peruse his deck he smiled and said no. Interesting....

I was wondering if he was running Grim Monoths. T1 Ancient Tomb/City of Traitors into Grim Monolith is 5 mana on turn 2, which could land you Lodestone Golem. I think I will come up with a cool deck utilizing that mana ramp in my spare time some day.

2-0
1-1

After this round, I started trading with my round 1 opponent, and pulled Copperline Gorge, foil Razorverge Thicket, Mind's Eye, and City of Brass out of his binder. He put the first 3 cards at 2 each and the City of Brass at 4. Now without looking it up, what do you think Mind's Eye is selling for online? Or in light of yesterday's post, what would YOU put it at?

I got a Mind's Eye off Defo last year as a crap rare throw-in for another trade last year. I moved to someone else as a crap rare throw-in over the summer. What's it selling for though?

$4.32

Really?!?! The main reason it sells so high is because of Commander, where you are supposed to have insane multi-player games. With Mind's Eye and a couple mana, you can seriously out-draw all of your opponents. I learned about its price 2 months ago, and the sole reason I asked for it was because I expected him to put it really low, like he did.

Anyways, I coughed up a Terastadon and a Krosan Grip for those 2 cards (Krosan Grip = Copperline Gorge, so I traded a 50 cent Terastadon for a $4 Mind's Eye. profit!)

Round 3: Charbelcher
I knew my opponent was playing Charbelcher, and very thankfully I won our game of Rock-Paper-Scissors, so there was a chance I could counter him mid-combo and cause the deck to fall apart. What's that I see in my opening hand? Spell Pierce! So I play and Island as pass, and very carefully moniter all of his resources to see when I can get optimal value out of this Pierce. I ultimately wait until I'm 4 spells in, and he is casting Rite of Flame while he has a Tinder Wall in play. He lets the spell get countered, then ships it back to me. I try to develop my board/find a counterspell as fast as I can, but he sticks a Charbelcher next turn, and then hits me for 56 damage. Life totals didn't even need to be written down. Game 2, I have Mindbreak in my opener, but it doesn't matter as he resolves the relevant spell first: Goblin Welder, then waits until next turn before playing a Lion's Eye Diamond, sacrificing it to discard a Belcher, then bringing the Belcher back from the grave with the Welder, and using the 3 floating mana to hit me for 100 damage.

It kinda sucks to lose to a non-interactive combo deck, but that's legacy. Decks like those can tear you apart, or can lose to themselves. Either way, if you want to get an adrenaline rush every time you sit down for a game, play Belcher, Dredge, or Tendrils Storm. Turn 1 insanity is always fun =D

0-2
1-2

I went out for food, and when I came back I learned that they had cut to top 4, and because Benzo was in the top 4 (he was playing for the store), there was a slot open that I could have taken. I had a nice Chicken Parm sub though....

Anyways, I wan't too sad about not prizing, there's always next week! As I mentioned above, the Marsh Flats have already been replaced for Scalding Tarns, but I am thinking I may also cut the Swords to Plowshares for Preordains. This deck relies on 2, potentially 3, 2-card combos between Counterbalance-Top, Thopter-Sword, and potentially Humiliate-Plague. While Enlightened Tutor can grab any of these, it's not enough by itself. Maybe cutting 3 Swords to Plowshares for 3 Preordains would be good. When you have both combos going side-by-side, the game feels unlosable!

Anyways, that's all for me today! Until next time, stay classy!