Results of the NJ Pre-Release: CPA Victory

[Cateran Emperor]

Since this is otherwise buried deep in another thread that no one will likely see except a few folks who have already posted there,
After playing in 1st Flight, I went 5-0, 1st of 64, netting me a box of Odyssey. I greatly approve.

To everyone: Wild Mongrel just isn't fair. I got three of them. And a Nantuko Mentor. Can you say "combo?"

Taken from an actual life sheet of one game:

Me 20 Opponent 20 (Summon Druid Lyrist)
Me 18 Opponent 19 (Summon Mongrel)
Me 14 Opponent 20 (Cast Beast Attack)
Me 14 Opponent 18 (Summon Mentor, cast Deluge at EOOT)
Me 14 Opponent -4

The deck proper:

1 Nantuko Mentor
1 Beast Attack
3 Wild Mongrel
1 Nantuko Elder
1 Crypt Creeper
1 Childhood Horror
1 Coffin Purge
1 Diabolic Tutor
2 Sylvan Might
1 Dusk Imp
1 Refresh
1 Morgue Theft
1 Rites of Spring
1 Druid Lyrist
1 Afflict
1 Darkwater Egg
1 Chatter of the Squirrel
1 Rabid Elephant
1 Springing Tiger
1 Deluge

8 Forest
6 Swamp
3 Island

The only sideboard card was 1 Execute, nothing else ever came in so I won't even bother.

I'll put it simply, in every single round I would use my flashback cards (nuts in limited) to stall out the game until I had the combo of Deluge, Mentor, and Mongrel + various other creatures. The average game lasted about 8 turns, at which point the Mongrels would have taken care of him.

My games were 10-1, the one game I ended up losing was to an Escape Artist with Seton's Desire on it. Painful. A strange note, the same guy sideboarded in Aboshan's Desire and cast it on my Mongrel in the hopes that he couldn't be berserked by the Mentor. Unfortunately, he forgot that the untargetability kicks in at threshold and consequently did nothing but make the Mongrel flying.... which allowed him to soar over the Roar of the Wurm token that had been staring him down for some time. He killed himself several turns earlier than I could have thanks to that one.

 

[arhar]

Man, THIS SUCKS!!! I was also at the NJ!!! And played in the same flight as you!!! And we haven't met What's your real name? BTW, congratulations on going 5-0. Wow, I guess you're real confident about not drawing the last round. BTW, I went 4-1, getting 9 packs. So I guess CPA did own this tournament

 

[Killer Joe]

<Cheer>
"We-arrrrrre-the-C-P-A
Bet-your-*ss-we're-gonna-play!
Oo---oo--oo--oo-ah!"

Okay, that's it. We've got folks going to same tourney's and not knowing each other!?

It's gonna be real tough to get CPA shirts or hats or even buttons, so, what do we do to be recognized?

How about we all wear orange bandana's? <No?>

How about we mark all of our black card sleves with an orange marker with "CPA" written on them? <No?>

How about a visual signal: You flick the tip your nose twice with tip of your right index finger, then, with your left thumb you swipe your chin left to right, then, your right hand brushes your right hip: once backward, once forward, then once backward again, followed by a hip thrust forward and a loud cough!
Man, it'll be our own "Cool Signal"

<No?>

Oh well, we'll think of something .

 

[Cateran Emperor]

My real name's Kyle Brownlie. If you heard that huge commotion about the cheating just before the 5th round, I was at the table right next to the guy. I was keeping track of everything on the back of a copy of the spoiler. If that still doesn't help, I was the guy keeping track of the game count with the Stronghold Foul Imps.

That said, who are you?

 

[artifact]

AT the Olathe, Kansas Pre-release.
Both Quill and I made it into the prizes at our first flight.
It prolly wasn't as big as yours.
There was only 4 rounds
I went 3-1
Quill went 2-1-1 just barely making into the prizes and this was his very first tourny ever!
And i have to agree, the best card in limited was WILD MONGREL!
That card kicks butt big time.
My last match in the flight and he won me the game.
Last game I had only 2 lands and him out.
My opponent was using a lot of land destruction cards and was killing most of my lands. Right before I killed him, he tried to cast out a huge creature and tapped all his lands out to do it. Well, I cast Syncopate for 1 and removed it from the game. I attack with my Mongrel for 2. Next turn he drew another land. I knew he had a flashback fog in his graveyard. I attacked for 2 again with the Mongrel. He asked if i was going to ditch the 3 cards in my hand to pump him up since he had only 5 life left. I said no. So he didn't use the fog. After combat was over, I flame burst him for 3 (my pardic firecat was in the graveyard). He was stunned!
Definetly one for my record books.

 

[Gizmo]

I came 5th at mine, Neil won it. So count that as another one for the CPA

We both played good decks made from really bad cards, everybody else at the tournament seemed to open really good cards and proceed to make bad decks with them.
Oh well. If you ever thought sealed was luck, you`re wrong.

My deck:
CREATURES:
1cc
Diligent Farmhand
2cc
Wild Mongrel
Filthy Cur
Crypt Creeper
Werebear
Thought Eater
3cc
Dusk Imp
Puppeteer
Leaf Dancer
Spellbane Centaur
4cc
Dreamwinder
2x Nantuko Disciple (why I won)
Krosan Archer
5cc
Metamorphic Wurm
Aven Windreader

SPELLS
Aether Burst
Refresh
2x Repel
Elephant Ambush
Beast Attack
Morbid Hunger (never once cast it)

LAND
Timberland Ruins
6 Forest
5 Swamp
5 Island

I think you`ll agree thats a total pile of a deck. My only option was to play as many efficient creatures as possible, and turn them sideways as rapidly as I possibly could. When youve no better plan that actually works quite well in limited, .
I went 5-1-1 (the draw an ID) with a heroic Opponents Match Win ratio (even the guy I beat in the first round went unbeaten the rest of the day and beat me in the quarter final) so I was really pleased. Although I got badly screwed in the deciding match of the QF so I was a but annoyed.
Oh well.

I occasionally SBed the black out for red - I think I was the only person in the room not to get any red burn spells (i got the Tremor, woo!) and played 2 Ember Beasts and the Bomb Squad. Although whenever I did that I only ever drew the Halberdier .

 

[Apollo]

I would have taken the Akron prerelease for the CPA too, if my brother hadn't bailed on me...

Anyway, congrats everybody!

YJ: I was thinking we could all wear plaid pants...

 

[Cateran Emperor]

Ahhh, I did see you! I remember that shirt quite distinctly! I was wearing a shirt from my home store, The Only Game in Town (black with white letters) and had a flannel shirt over it.

 

[Spiderman]

YJ: Where on earth did you come up with that "Secret cool signal"? Are you resurrecting it from your childhood or something?

 

[arhar]

Spidey, you didn't know about the secret CPA hand signal?

 

[olwen]

The flights here are 32 strong, five rounds, no top 8, no land swap. I managed to get 2nd in Flight 2 and 1st in Flight 6, going 4-0-1 in both (intentional ID in the last game of the second Flight).
Didn't do so well the next day, so no info on that!

Deck lists are:

Flight 2
Testament of Faith
Minotaur Explorer
Thought Eater
Patchwork Gnomes
Hallowed Healer
Pilgrim of Justice
Pardic Firecat
Halberdier
Chainflinger
Mystic Zealot
Aven Cloudchaser
Resilient Wanderer
Aven Archer
Aven Windreader
Iridescent Angel
Firebolt
Blazing Salvo
Kirtar's Desire
Rites of Refusal (2)
Flame Burst
Embolden
Repel
Seafloor Debris
Ravaged Highlands (2)
Island (4)
Mountain (4)
Plains (6)

Flight 6
Druid Lyrist
Blazing Salvo (2)
Spark Mage
Ghastly Demise
Mossfire Egg
Sungrass Egg
Werebear
Wild Mongrel
Steamclaw
Leaf Dancer
Ember Beast
Infected Vermin
Afflict (2)
Elephant Ambush
Springing Tiger
Acceptable Losses
Partriarch's Desire
Famished Ghoul
Gorilla Titan
Metamorphic Wurm
Rapid Elephant
Thermal Blast
Zombie Assassin
Cabal Pit
Ravaged Highlands
Bog Wreckage
Mountain (3)
Swamp (4)
Forest (6)

Sideboarded in cards:
Bog Wreckage
Volcanic Spray
Leaf Dancer
Simplify
Chatter of the Squirrel

It has been great fun

 

[Spiderman]

arhar: Nobody tells me nuthin'

 

[mpgsheep]

I went 4-0-4 and finished in 41st place in the london pre-release, and had a generally good time. There was this one really cool game, where game 1 my opponent smashed my face in. Game 2 I returned the favour. Game 3, he dropped a forestwalk when i am down on 1 life(that dancer thing). So I have to topdeck my only removal spell. I flip over the card i draw and we both look. It is not a burn spell, but a way of surviving...
.
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LITHATOG!!!
I play this beast and then sac all my forests so i can't be killed!!!
This guy just burst out laughing to see me staying alive with just mountains and a timberland ruins as my only Green mana source. Anyway the game continued, and all he had to do was topdeck a burn spell, and i managed to sneak in some damage. He took his turn, untapped and drew, and burst out laughing. SO i said, "doh you got some burn then." He replied that it was something better, and drops a...
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.
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DWARVEN GRUNT!!
A 1/1 mountainwalker!!!We both burst out laughing as i scooped up my mountains and out them in my graveyard, giving me one huge atog(and threshhold!!!). The game continued and in the end he topdecked the burn to kill me, but this was one of the best competitive games of magic I have had ever, and I think this is what prereleases are all about. I will definetely be going to Torment!Hope everyone else enjoyed their pre-release!

 

[Elrond]

I went to the prerelease in Dallas and went 3-1 for 16th in the first flight and 1-1 drop in the second.

I don't remember all of the cards from my deck, but here's what I do remember:

Savage Firecat
Frentic Ogre
Call of the Herd
Chatter of the Squirrel
Khamal's Desire
Reckless Charge
the forestwalking centaur
2 Springing Tigers
and some other cheap creatures

The first round I lost in a very close match with me getting down to 10 before being able to drop him to 5 in one round with a Savage Firecat and Frentic Ogre, but he was able to do 9 damage with his creatures and burn me for the win. He went on to win that flight so it wasn't too bad.

The next round started off with Chatter, then built up to the Firecat and that was that.

The third round was won because of the Frentic Ogre. First game I got him down to 5 and attacked with the Ogre after discarding a card. The next game I got him down to 11 and he made the mistake of tapping out which allowed me to attack with the Ogre with 3 cards in hand and 3 mountains in play.

The fourth round went about the same as the last two, but I don't remember many details other than the fact that I was finally able to cast Call of the Herd, I only saw it once the entire flight.

So I went 3-1 and got 5 packs for my trouble with the highlight of them being a foil Mirari.

As I said I went 1-1 drop from the next flight, so I won't be talking about that.

 

[rkoelsch]

So did you get any Angels to trade?

 

[Cateran Emperor]

Not just that, but did anyone get Magni/Mortivores to trade?(arhar )

 

[arhar]

I think i'm gonna keep the Mortivore for sentimental reasons... After all, he won me 100% of the games, hehehehehe.

 

[Dead]

At the london pre-release (same one as MPGSheep went to) i won 4 rounds out of 5 then had to drop because i wanted to both draft and get home that night. Drafts were awful so i shouldha stayed in for a coupla more rounds... anyway i wrote a report which you can find Here .

 

[Chaos Turtle]

Gizmo sez:
We both played good decks made from really bad cards, everybody else at the tournament seemed to open really good cards and proceed to make bad decks with them.

That sounds familiar. I placed 19th and 17th in my first two 96-player flights, with no "bombs" at all. The in my 3rd flight (day 2, something like 32 players) I pull a Vampiric Dragon and get my oink handed to me all day long. I managed to get 2 matches out of that one and come in 23rd (I think, might have been 25th).

Anyhow it was terrible. My 2nd and 3rd round opponents had 3 Repentant Vampires between them, and Repentant Vampire OWNS Vampiric Dragon.

On a positive note, I had a heck of a lot of fun.