David Zadok-Stroud on Starcity

[Crazy Pierre]

It was an interesting acrticle, but it seemed quite arrogant toward the end

Especially when talking about the Pirates and the Avatrar of Hope, etc.

If you truly want to become a better player, then you have to forget about the metagame. When I was testing Deck2K, which has yet to lose a Type II, we tested against EVERYHTING. We tested against Pirates, Dueling Grounds, Land D, Rebels, Nether-Go, Coutner, Blue-White, Blue Black, Green Red, etc
We never dismissed anything as being random.

People who classify decks into different categories are bound to lose more than they win.

You have to sit down with your deck and say
"Can my deck honestly handle ANYTHING?" What happens
if my opponent plays something unexpected?
"Can my deck defeat luck?" This is almost impossible to do, but if you can survive bad draws, or optimize your deck against them, then you will win.

If you look down on ANY deck, though, you are setting yourself up for failure.

 

[Zadok001]

Hmm... I just re-read that segment (I have it open in another window right now), and I really wasn't trying to be arrogent in the slightest. However, I don't think I made something entirely clear. The deck Kyle was playing was _not_ entirely random (his theoretical combo, which never hit, was Thrashing Wumpus/Armadillo Cloak), but it was a pile. I know my deck can't handle really flippin' huge Black creatures; that's a large part of why Void is in the deck, ignoring for the moment the fact that it is simply a wonderful card on general principles. Kyle got _extremely_ lucky in all three of our games, in that he repeatedly topdecked a nearly identical combination of cards that just beats my deck.

Ever played a red deck? Ever had someone topdeck a Circle of Protection the turn before you killed them? That's what it feels like- Three games in a row. That's pretty bad.

Kyle's deck was, and I make no assumptions here, a pile. It was a pile of good cards, but a pile nonetheless. He _literally_ built it while I was in the card shop with him, since he had just thought of the Wumpus/Cloak combo. He built it with the cards he had on him, and believe me, it was a pile. It may not have been that way if he'd built it with all his resources available, and I know I didn't make that clear in the article, but the deck was undeniably a pile. There's no two ways about it. By saying that, I don't mean to diss Kyle. But the deck was a PILE. Trust me on this.

Secondarily, allow me to defend my playtesting for a moment as well... I have a limited playgroup, and due to 'puter and Apprentice screwups, rarely get a chance to play online. Thus, I don't get a chance to play against Pirates or Rebels much at all. Therefore, I am limited to play theory, and testing against myself. (Remember Gizmo's two Type 2 decks, 3c Fish and U/W? I played against each of those more than 50 times, in various configurations.) I work with what I have available, and that often leaves me in the dark to a lot of deck archetypes and designs. Pirates was completely unexpected to me, as was Kyle's deck. Such is life.

I just don't get the opportunity to playtest to the extreme I'd like to, so I make do with what I have on hand- and that's often not a lot.

To answer your two questions:

"Can my deck handle ANYTHING?" No, absolutely not! No deck can. But it handles a majority of deck between sideboard and maindeck, and has at least a 50/50 matchup against everything I've gotten a chance to play against (again, not much), with the exception of G/W beatdown sans 'Geddon.

"Can my deck defeat luck?" Only with parallel luck. I know I sounded quite pissed off about the match with Kyle; believe me, I was. But look at what he drew, and tell me I don't have a right to be. Those were obviously broken topdecks, all of which happen to _really_ hurt my deck. Had I drawn a Void or Vampiric (parallel luck), I would have been fine. I did not. Luck, say I. Luck is everything, and I lost to it that round.

(Now, one final thing... There are decks that should be looked down on, at least for the time being. An example of such is the Prison deck I've been laboring to construct for weeks. It can't beat ANYTHING consistantly. It wins when it gets God Draws, and never at any other time. If I faced that deck in a tourney, I would laugh at it, and with good reason. Some decks really do suck. There is probably a good VARIATION of my Prison out there, but I sure haven't seen it...)

Anyways, to conclude:

I didn't mean to be offensive.
I believe all of my statements to be largely accurate.
I admit some of what I said sounded arrogent, believe me, I did not intend to come off as such. A lot of what I write should be taken as sarcasm, especially if it seems insulting. (For example, the last two games of my Pirate match seem pretty much in my favor, and I write them that way- That's all sarcasm. I was scared out of my friggin' wits the whole time, waiting for him to blow the rest of my land to hell and gone... )