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Now onto the tournament itself.
Round 1 – Barbra, Red Goblins 2-0
I find my seat at table 2 and while waiting for
my opponent I think to myself
maybe this is what
I can expect all day; the top tables.
When my opponent came we were right into it. I
burnt a few creatures with
Shocks and Bolts.
Then I played a sulphuric vortex and one or two
Firecats
and won because of the vortex. Game two
was pretty much the same but I laid
two
vortexes. I took 4 from them putting me to 4 her
on 8 so I pulsed her, said
turn and the Vortexes
did their job again. Man, I didn’t know how fun
killing
your opponent by saying turn was.
Round 2 – Leighton Archer, R/W Slide 2-1
Game one was over quick. 3 Pulses and a Shock
later he’s on 6. I said turn
and show him 3
chains in hand and he scooped.
Game two saw Leighton caned me with a few Rifts
and a Dragon.
Game three, Vortex again drained us both. With
me 8 life him 4 life I played
Pulse, he played
Gilded Light. Well, now a lot of my burn targets
players.
Except for Flamebreak. I said turn and
won again. Yay! I’m glad I replaced
the missing Mox's with Flamebreak.
Round 3 – Mike Naisbitt, G/W 2-0
When I presented my deck he called over a judge
and asked if they could
be checked for marked
sleeves which is fair enough as they were pretty
rugged. So I found Leighton, got some more
sleeves off him and changed
after the round.
Nothing was wrong with them so no game loss for
me. Yay.
Game one I won quickly. All I saw him do was
cycle a Dragon and play lands.
Game two Another quick game saw but this time he
had Dragons beating me
down. I was on 10, he had
1 Dragon out dropped another Dragon then a
Rule
of Law. In response Pulse him and Chain him
dropping him to 2 leaving
me with no cards in my
hand. My turn drew a Flamebreak! Yay! Glad it
wasn’t
a chrome mox for the second time that
day.
I didn’t see much of his deck at all. I saw a
few Cloudposts, Talismans and
an Eternal Dragons
that was it.
Round 4 – Shawn Chang, Monored Burn 0-2
Game one I thought I had it in the bag with the
Vortex yet again. He was on 1,
I was on 8. I
said turn then he animated his Blinkmoth Nexus,
sacrificed it
and a Great Furnace to two
Shrapnel Blasts and killed me.
Game two was all about the Chain. I played one
and from that and the copies
he went to 8 I went
to 7. He then bolted a Firecat I attempted, he
then Pulsed
me at the end of turn. Then again
during his main phase so I lost.
Great new slips and I lose, so I start to think
the slips are cursed. I am really
superstitious
and I had my lucky hat and shirt. Soon, the
standings came up
and that restored my faith. I
was 6th.
Round 5 – Kim Shephered B/W control 2-0
Game one the Slith went hard he grew to be
either 4/4 or 5/5 before he was
Wrathed away.
All his discard fell to instant burn as they
were responded to.
Game two was pretty much the same as game one
except it went a bit
longer since he Persecuted
me. I was tapped out and couldn’t respond but
still
the burn won.
After the round I was talking with some people
outside about how people were
going when Kim
came out and said he couldn’t believe that 2
decks that were
just Mountain and burn could be
doing so well. We all got talking and
figured
out that 4-1-1 could make top eight.
Round 6 – John Reeves, G/R Beats ID
We played a few games and he slaughted me, 3-0
so I was glad he took the ID.
Nico, a team-mate of mine, got paired down so he
couldn’t ID and had to play.
I’m not sure if he
won 2-0 or 2-1 but he did indeed win. I came 7th
and Nico
came 3rd and we were the
only Hamilton players in the top eight. Both
from the
same team no less.
TOP 8
Quarter Finals – Shawn Chang (again), Monored
Burn 2-1
Game two He didn’t even touch me. He played 3
Scrabbling Claws and
sacked them for cards but
still couldn’t get out of mana screw.
Game two I can’t remember much but alas he won
Game three, it took us 7 minutes before we both
settled on our hands to
keep. I kept a 4 card
hand and him a 5 card hand. I found the mana
quicker
and beat him before he could find his
second usable mana source (his second
land was a
Temple of the False God). I’m through to the
semi finals!
Semi Finals – Nico Johnston, Ravager Affinity
2-1
Game one he smashed me with a classic Ravager
Affinity start. I kept a
hand with 4 lands at
the start and draw 3 more of the top.
Game two he played a turn 2 Ravager which I
bolted at his end of turn. He
sacked everything
to it so it’d live and I bolt it again so it
died. Then, it was
just finding the right burn
to win.
Game three after two Shatters he had only one
Great Furnace out.
Three Firecats later I won
and was on to the finals.
Finals – Glen (sorry I forgot your last name!), Goblin
Bidding 2-0
Game one I didn’t see a lot of goblins. In fact,
only a few came out so they
were easy to handle
and my Slith kept going through for the damage.
Game two was more or less the same as game one
but a Firecat or two
showed up on my side.
So that was the day that I, Scotty Couchman won
the Waikato Open.
If there’s anything I would change it would be
the deck list, to this one:
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