A little deeper look at that email Matt posted..

Around last Thursday, I exchanged a series of text messages with Asher Hecht, telling him, in the same way that you tell someone you’re going to show up for dinner, that I was going to win this PTQ.  I was confident in my deck, confident in my ability with it, and very focused.  I had worked on my toughest matchup during the week and figured out how to maximize my chance to win it, and it was the only relevant matchup that I was concerned about (Elves).

The deck I ran was Levitt Level Blue– kind alike Faeries but with good creatures like Tarmogoyf and Kitchen Finks instead of junk that says “Wizard” on it somewhere:

Everything went according to plan, as I beat elves round one.  Spencer Assif, it should be noted, had some pretty poor draws.  He also loaned me one of the cards I sideboarded in against him.  Thanks for being a sport, Spencer.

For the next 5 rounds, I played against one Death Cloud player who generously failed to pay for a Pact when he was way ahead in game 2 after I won game 1, and 4 Naya Zoo and Bant aggro decks, which don’t do anything so unfair that it makes me concerned about losing.  Christian Calcano, who I beat in round 6, shook his head after and called the matchup, “unwinnable”.  All those 3-drops that are supposed to get around Spellstutter Sprites and Spell Snares just give me time to cast finks and goyfs, resolve Visions, and start casting Cryptic Commands and powerful artifacts.

I drew twice into the top 8 and faced Desire, which I expected to be exiting the metagame by now, and had made my deck weaker against.  I drew enough Canonists to lock him out in games 2 and 3, despite seeing 0 counters game 3 and just having to pray that he couldn’t find a bounce spell (I had a Jitte protecting my canonist from burn).

In the quarters semis I beat local ptq-master Rob Seder and his interesting Disrupting Shoal, Visions, and Thirst for Knowledge-featuring faeries deck in 3 games.  If you play this deck, against faeries just cast your threats and force them to react.  They won’t catch up unless you have a very bad draw.

The finals was a W/R boat-brewish deck, with Figures, Fanatics, Ajanis, Spectral Processions, Seige-gang commanders, lightning helixes, Fulminator Mages, and such-like.  Hedge-mage came out of the board, of course.

Game 1 I had a decent hand with 4 lands in it.  Matt Ferrando was watching, and later said that he knew I’d be in trouble if I drew 2 more lands in the next 3 cards.  So it went.

Game 2 I had a better draw, and he was a little land-heavy, giving me plenty of time to deal with his threats and kill him with a Kitchen Finks.

Game 3 was much closer.  He stuck a turn-1 Figure, Helixed my turn-2 Goyf, and made his figure 4/4 on his 4th turn, while I sacced some lands. I had drawn none of my explosives or paths, and had only a sower in hand to deal with Figure and a lot of land again, so I dropped Finks on turns 4 and 5 and waited to hit 6 land so I could protect my Sower with a Mana Leak.

He played a Fulminator with one land up and beat me down to 10.  He did not sac fulminator.

On my turn I drew Umezawa’s Jitte, tapped all my non-basics to cast my Sower, stole his Figure, and left 2 basic lands up to facilitate Mana Leak.  I then traded half of a Finks and a tapped land for his Fulminator, not wanting the Fulminator around to fizzle my Jitte trigger.

On his turn, he dropped another land and cast Siege-Gang Commander.  I let it stick, since I had Jitte to deal with it.  Then, at the end of his turn, I don’t think to shrink his Figure, which I should have done.  On my turn I play a land, going up to 6 lands again, give the Jitte to my Sower, and swing with the team.  He takes 9 and trades a goblin for my shrunken Finks.  My hand is now Mana Leak & land.

Knowing his deck has a lot of token generators, and that he has been missing land drops (and thus has more gas in hand than I do), I know I’m going to need to ride my Jitte.  So when he plays Hedge-Mage with 2 mana up, I Mana Leak.  He then helixes my Sower, getting his 4/4 figure back.  I don’t have the spare mana to shrink it back to 2/2.

On my turn, I draw another land.  I equip my remaining Finks and swing, as his Figure is tapped.  I pass, and we both know he doesn’t have the 6th land since he already missed a drop.  He’s also playing Windbrisk Heights, which won’t help.  But the draw yields a Bloodstained Mire, and he swings for 8 in the air with his Figure, dropping me to 2.  He has 2 goblins in play, remember, so even 2 more Jitte counters from an attack won’t buy me another turn.  Draw phase?  Flooded Strand.

I had sided a land out on the draw, too.  I should have shrunk the stupid Figure.

Earlier this season, I went 14-3 in games at a PTQ in Philly and finished 9th by 0.1% on tiebreaks.  If you’re going to be at King’s Games in Brooklyn this Saturday, I’ll see you there.  I plan on winning this time.

-gcb