Oversoul
The Tentacled One
Some of the people at my LGS were involved in early testing for the Brawl format and they tried to rope everyone into it from the start. I built a Jhoira deck for format as soon as Dominaria was released, but I guess I didn't really talk about it much here. Well, I did. And I didn't play it very much. It had some explosive combos with Kaladesh Block cards. And of course, Kaladesh Block rotated out. But I was too lazy/busy to take the deck apart completely, although I did loot some key cards out of it for other decks.
Magic of Browns Point, the same group that organized the Two-Headed Giant Commander event I posted about last October, hosted a Brawl event for winter. A "Snowbrawl Fight I believe they called it. Alas, I was in the process of moving to my new house, so I couldn't make it. And then our area was hit by the largest snowstorm we've seen in my lifetime. Almost everyone around her missed work. I took the train and made sure to cover my office for the essentials, but most local businesses were shut down for a week or so. And that included the LGS hosting the event. So it was rescheduled and the period to submit decklists was opened back up. I didn't have a lot of time and didn't really know the format, so I threw something together using part of what I already had.
I like the card Jhoira, Weatherlight Captain. At this time, I don't feel like building a real EDH deck based around her. So it was cool to get to take her into Brawl one last time. Here's the deck...
Captain Lady
1x Artificer's Assistant
1x Azor's Gateway
1x Banefire
1x Blink of an Eye
1x Chromatic Lantern
1x Disdainful Stroke
1x Explosive Apparatus
1x Field of Ruin
1x Fight with Fire
1x Gilded Lotus
1x Helm of the Host
1x Icy Manipulator
1x Ionize
9x Island
1x Jaya's Immolating Inferno
1x Jhoira's Familiar
1x Jhoira, Weatherlight Captain (Commander)
1x Karn's Temporal Sundering
1x Karn, Scion of Urza
1x Lightning Strike
8x Mountain
1x Mox Amber
1x Negate
1x Niv-Mizzet, Parun
1x Opt
1x Orazca Relic
1x Reliquary Tower
1x River's Rebuke
1x Sai, Master Thopterist
1x Search for Azcanta
1x Silent Dart
1x Silent Gravestone
1x Skilled Animator
1x Sparring Construct
1x Squee, the Immortal
1x Steam Vents
1x Storm the Vault
1x Sulfur Falls
1x Tezzeret, Artifice Master
1x Thaumatic Compass
1x Traveler's Amulet
1x Traxos, Scourge of Kroog
1x Unwind
1x Verix Bladewing
1x Zahid, Djinn of the Lamp
I sleeved it up last night. I did not test it one bit before the event.And the performance of this list was, all things considered, pretty good. The problem was that Jhoira is a scary target for a lot of players, but this format doesn't have the tools to make her truly dangerous. I was disproportionately targeted sometimes potentially costing an overzealous opponent the game. When Kaladesh Block was legal in this format, Jhoira was much more potent. Still, I put something together that held its own. The even consisted of four rounds, each with three-player pods playing a single game.
Round 1: Captain Lady vs. Eddie (Teysa Karlov) and Mycol (Niv-Mizzet, Parun)
All three players built up boards and presented threats. We disrupted each other and the game became very drawn-out. A lot of back-and-forth, but no one could finish off an opponent without going "shields down" and perishing to the third player. Just as the 50-minute round time was coming up, I started to break the balance. Helm of the Host on Jhoira drew through my deck.We went to turns and I almost decked myself, but managed to kill both of my opponent in the same turn, just barely.
Round 2: Captain Lady vs. Matthew (Izoni, Thousand Eye) and Matt (Ajani, Adversary of Tyrants)
I didn't know it at the time, but one of these guys would go on to accumulate the most victory points in the whole event, taking first place in overall performance. And the other guy would go on to accumulate the most achievement points, a feat he accomplished deliberately (his deck was built to make tokens, put +1/+1 counters on them, and gain him lots of life, all things that the points system awarded). Both decks were faster and better than mine, so my opponents were mostly focused on each other. They took turns attacking me, mostly as an afterthought. I was generally outclassed here, and with 1 life left, I saw an opportunity to be a kingmaker in the game. If I cast Banefire on Tendershoot Dryad, then Matt could win the game. But if I cast Banefire on Ajani, then Matthew could probably take it instead. I chose to target Ajani, which gave Matthew the win and put him in the lead for total victory points. He thanked me.
Round 3: Captain Lady vs. Eric (Chromium, the Mutable) and David (Darigaaz Reignited)
Eric was my partner for the two-headed giant event back in October. For this event, he'd had some bad beats already. He seemed intent on stopping me from achieving any combo shenanigans, and he succeeded. He countered my key spells and David ran us both over with beefy creatures. I was a bit bummed out about being eliminated first in two rounds in a row, but they made the right choices in this one. David was right to eliminate me first and Eric was right to counter the spells that he did (or I might have won). Sometimes, that's just how it goes.
Round 4: Captain Lady vs. Mitchell (Slimefoot, the Stowaway) and Shaun (Muldrotha, the Gravetide)
Another long one, and for much of the midgame, it seemed like each player to take a turn also seemed to be taking control of the table. No one could pull completely ahead because one of the two opponents would always find a removal spell to deal with the biggest threat. Mitchell made a lot of tokens and Shaun tried to steal things and take extra turns. I kept finding enough disruption to survive and to build up a board presence. Like the first game, this one got drawn-out. We hit the 50-minute time limit on my turn, then stared at the table forever because I was too stupid to figure out that I'd won. Eventually, after I'd deliberated for far too much time, I blasted Mitchell with a 22-point Banefire (he was at 22). Then I attacked Shaun, who had 11 life and no flying blockers, with 12 power worth of flying attackers.
Being eliminated first in the middle two rounds somewhat offset my wins in the other two rounds. I lost out on Top 8 for victory points in the tiebreaker (for Magic of Browns Point events, the tiebreaker is deck budget, and my $121 list wasn't on the high end, but it was kind of middle-of-the-road for this event). But I did get some achievement points and won the tiebreaker on that one, getting a booster pack as a prize for taking 8th on achievement points.
Magic of Browns Point, the same group that organized the Two-Headed Giant Commander event I posted about last October, hosted a Brawl event for winter. A "Snowbrawl Fight I believe they called it. Alas, I was in the process of moving to my new house, so I couldn't make it. And then our area was hit by the largest snowstorm we've seen in my lifetime. Almost everyone around her missed work. I took the train and made sure to cover my office for the essentials, but most local businesses were shut down for a week or so. And that included the LGS hosting the event. So it was rescheduled and the period to submit decklists was opened back up. I didn't have a lot of time and didn't really know the format, so I threw something together using part of what I already had.
I like the card Jhoira, Weatherlight Captain. At this time, I don't feel like building a real EDH deck based around her. So it was cool to get to take her into Brawl one last time. Here's the deck...
Captain Lady
1x Artificer's Assistant
1x Azor's Gateway
1x Banefire
1x Blink of an Eye
1x Chromatic Lantern
1x Disdainful Stroke
1x Explosive Apparatus
1x Field of Ruin
1x Fight with Fire
1x Gilded Lotus
1x Helm of the Host
1x Icy Manipulator
1x Ionize
9x Island
1x Jaya's Immolating Inferno
1x Jhoira's Familiar
1x Jhoira, Weatherlight Captain (Commander)
1x Karn's Temporal Sundering
1x Karn, Scion of Urza
1x Lightning Strike
8x Mountain
1x Mox Amber
1x Negate
1x Niv-Mizzet, Parun
1x Opt
1x Orazca Relic
1x Reliquary Tower
1x River's Rebuke
1x Sai, Master Thopterist
1x Search for Azcanta
1x Silent Dart
1x Silent Gravestone
1x Skilled Animator
1x Sparring Construct
1x Squee, the Immortal
1x Steam Vents
1x Storm the Vault
1x Sulfur Falls
1x Tezzeret, Artifice Master
1x Thaumatic Compass
1x Traveler's Amulet
1x Traxos, Scourge of Kroog
1x Unwind
1x Verix Bladewing
1x Zahid, Djinn of the Lamp
I sleeved it up last night. I did not test it one bit before the event.And the performance of this list was, all things considered, pretty good. The problem was that Jhoira is a scary target for a lot of players, but this format doesn't have the tools to make her truly dangerous. I was disproportionately targeted sometimes potentially costing an overzealous opponent the game. When Kaladesh Block was legal in this format, Jhoira was much more potent. Still, I put something together that held its own. The even consisted of four rounds, each with three-player pods playing a single game.
Round 1: Captain Lady vs. Eddie (Teysa Karlov) and Mycol (Niv-Mizzet, Parun)
All three players built up boards and presented threats. We disrupted each other and the game became very drawn-out. A lot of back-and-forth, but no one could finish off an opponent without going "shields down" and perishing to the third player. Just as the 50-minute round time was coming up, I started to break the balance. Helm of the Host on Jhoira drew through my deck.We went to turns and I almost decked myself, but managed to kill both of my opponent in the same turn, just barely.
Round 2: Captain Lady vs. Matthew (Izoni, Thousand Eye) and Matt (Ajani, Adversary of Tyrants)
I didn't know it at the time, but one of these guys would go on to accumulate the most victory points in the whole event, taking first place in overall performance. And the other guy would go on to accumulate the most achievement points, a feat he accomplished deliberately (his deck was built to make tokens, put +1/+1 counters on them, and gain him lots of life, all things that the points system awarded). Both decks were faster and better than mine, so my opponents were mostly focused on each other. They took turns attacking me, mostly as an afterthought. I was generally outclassed here, and with 1 life left, I saw an opportunity to be a kingmaker in the game. If I cast Banefire on Tendershoot Dryad, then Matt could win the game. But if I cast Banefire on Ajani, then Matthew could probably take it instead. I chose to target Ajani, which gave Matthew the win and put him in the lead for total victory points. He thanked me.
Round 3: Captain Lady vs. Eric (Chromium, the Mutable) and David (Darigaaz Reignited)
Eric was my partner for the two-headed giant event back in October. For this event, he'd had some bad beats already. He seemed intent on stopping me from achieving any combo shenanigans, and he succeeded. He countered my key spells and David ran us both over with beefy creatures. I was a bit bummed out about being eliminated first in two rounds in a row, but they made the right choices in this one. David was right to eliminate me first and Eric was right to counter the spells that he did (or I might have won). Sometimes, that's just how it goes.
Round 4: Captain Lady vs. Mitchell (Slimefoot, the Stowaway) and Shaun (Muldrotha, the Gravetide)
Another long one, and for much of the midgame, it seemed like each player to take a turn also seemed to be taking control of the table. No one could pull completely ahead because one of the two opponents would always find a removal spell to deal with the biggest threat. Mitchell made a lot of tokens and Shaun tried to steal things and take extra turns. I kept finding enough disruption to survive and to build up a board presence. Like the first game, this one got drawn-out. We hit the 50-minute time limit on my turn, then stared at the table forever because I was too stupid to figure out that I'd won. Eventually, after I'd deliberated for far too much time, I blasted Mitchell with a 22-point Banefire (he was at 22). Then I attacked Shaun, who had 11 life and no flying blockers, with 12 power worth of flying attackers.
Being eliminated first in the middle two rounds somewhat offset my wins in the other two rounds. I lost out on Top 8 for victory points in the tiebreaker (for Magic of Browns Point events, the tiebreaker is deck budget, and my $121 list wasn't on the high end, but it was kind of middle-of-the-road for this event). But I did get some achievement points and won the tiebreaker on that one, getting a booster pack as a prize for taking 8th on achievement points.