Previous Level Green
michaelj | November 19, 2008 | 7:03 pmWherein Mike discusses another 20 tournaments, and their relative Green-ness. This section includes most of his more recent success as a deck designer, including Kuroda-style Red, Critical Mass, Jushi Blue, and U/W Wafo-Tapa.
So this is a track of my previous 20 individual Constructed tournaments (in case you are new here this is a continuation from yesterday’s popular The Grinch That Stole Mike’s Rating) post.
So in my previous 20 tournaments I was Green only about 1/3 of the time (7/20). The Green component was +75 Rating Delta.
The overall in these 20 tournaments was +146… so I did much better overall to the tune of almost 18 points per tournament. For those of you who didn’t pass the second grade, that means the non-Green component was +71, so I did only mildly better on Rating Delta with Green.
But…
Green got the benefit of Critical Mass, which was +91 rating points in one tournament (that means the other six Green tournaments together were -16 Rating Delta. PTQ wins are of course very rich in Rating Delta, and Rating Delta is highly subjective based on relative rating… look at the very next tournament where I played to an identical record, but only +41.
The difference was that in Critical Mass I lost in the first round and with Jushi Blue I lost to Julian Levin in the last round, i.e. the worst possible round for Rating Delta.
In addition, Green got Ichorid and Astral Slide on basis of Dredge cards like Golgari Grave-Troll and Life from the Loam. Both of these were positive rating. So of the non-Critical Mass / non-Dredge Green decks (4) Rating Delta was -66, with only the brilliant Playing Fair in the black (and that deck was very Black… Green being primarily for Spiritmonger and Pernicious Deed).
Key caveats for non-Green…
The NAC Qualifier on 8/18/06… I went 2-1 but that doesn’t tell the story. I actually played against then-Number One Apprentice Julian Levin again in the 75-card Keiga mirror (see Jushi Blue, above). In this one Julian got the same sequence he beat me with at States, that is second turn Boomerang (maybe he beat me with second turn Jushi at States… I don’t remember). However this time I fought and fought and he “beat” me to resolve Debtors’ Knell.
However I knew how Debtors’ Knell worked. This just created an infinite loop of Julian getting back Keiga… and another Keiga… every turn. That is, he never got an attack due to the good old Legend Rule!
However after [functionally, strategically, sneakily] beating Julian in this wonderful fencing match where he had the “Boomerang draw” and multiple Compulsive Researches, I conceded the match to preserve his rating. That is, I really went 3-0 in that one!
Including the U/G Threshold tournament, I was 1-2 (but really 2-1) against Julian Levin in this 20 tournament stretch.
Enough excuses for Green / non-Green.
Green: +75
non-Green: +71
However non-Green has a very slight edge in per-match points (2.0111… v. 2.0).
Firestarter: Josh says it’s all about deck selection, not color. He says my most recent 20 matches could have had a high positive Delta even if I chose Green, had my Green been Kitchen Finks… but paired with Mulldrifter instead of more Green cards.
Discuss!
Tell all your friends!
LOVE
MIKE
This is fascinating stuff…i’m going to do the same thing for me (as i’ve been in somewhat of a slump myself) and link to you guys in my post. Thanks!
How many rating points did you get with The Rock when you got to bash Trix with it? How many tournament reports are in Deckade describing how awesome Yavimaya Ants and Ernham Djinn are? No offense Mike, but a lot of this might come down to the fact that you have a wife, a couple of children, and not as much time to focus on Magic these days. I would reccomend passing on T2 all together and playing one of those formats where Dark Ritual in still leagal.
Hi Dave,
Thanks for the comment.
Well it started when BDM recently accused me of being “the Greenest one of all” (as you probably heard). So I started off just seeing if this was true… and in my most recent 20 tournaments, I was green a gigantic 80% of the time.
So basically validating Brian’s opinion, I decided to see if there was any ratings / position correlation to my relative Green-ness… and it turned out there might have been (the sole Top 8 in the most recent 20 tournament stretch, with Clark, was with non-Green).
Now I didn’t have Clark in this 20 tournament stretch (he appeared right after my States win), but I did have Bella the entire time and was able to pull off States first and second and two returns to the Pro Tour (the other was not listed on account of not being individual, but I was Green in both PTQs and then not Green in the Pro Tour… My individual records were a little under even, 2-0 /4-0, and very good with Green, Green, not Green).
However the 91 point positive delta and PTQ win with Critical Mass might simply tell us that Green is good SOMETIMES and that in the -21 to -40 tournaments where I was Green only 1/3 of the time instead of 4/5 of the time that I simply had better deck selection instead of erring TOWARDS Green as it seems I did in the more recent 20 tournaments.
Even with the wife and kids I still practice maybe 10 hours a week of MTGO, which is nowhere near the top of my game (when I designed Critical Mass and Jushi Blue I practiced 20 hours a week of Apprentice, which might translate to more than 50 hours of MTGO in terms of deck data), and when I was a PT regular I practiced maybe 40-50 hours a week of Apprentice. So I definitely practice LESS… but 10 hours of MTGO isn’t nothing
My point is, I hesitate to blame the fam. It seems like I could be a little tighter on deck selection, Green or no.
Thanks again for the comment.
LOVE
MIKE
[...] of being the Greenest One of All in a recent Top 8 Magic Podcast. [In case you haven't been reading Top 8 Magic... which you should be] I have been some kind of Green in 80% of my last 20 individual Constructed [...]
[...] Previous Level Green, and… [...]