by Vincent Thibeault
After taking down 2nd place at Canadian Nationals, Vincent Thibeault shut himself from the world, methodically preparing for Pro Tour Amsterdam. In the end, despite not achieving his desired result (taking down the whole sha-bang), he still had one heck of an experience and is here to show you all why he is the favorite to win this year’s highly coveted French Canadian Tournament Report Writer of the Year award.
So I was finally back on the Pro Tour and getting prepared for Amsterdam. Already quite satisfied with the free trip to Europe, I still wanted to do well, having high hopes after my recent success at the Canadian Nationals. Robert Anderson was qualified as well and we decided to train together at his house, mobilizing some of the best up-and-coming young talents in Montreal to help us with the task of mastering the metagame of the new extended format.
Alexander Hayne and Joey Smith were the main troopers, taking part in the daily 10-hour practices, serving at time as punching bags, but more often than not refused to get pummelled by the two PTQs winners and fought back despite their statuses of unqualified commoners. During the playtesting sessions we built and tried quite a few decks found on Magic-League and on the Modo daily event lists, our main sources of information about the new format.
We quickly reached the conclusion that Pyromancer’s Ascension and the Ad Nauseum combo decks were the most powerful and that we needed to play something that could beat them. If we could not find something superior, then we would have to play tweaked versions of these decks. A common problem with combo decks, however, is that if they get too much hype before big events you may well end up playing in a field filled with hate cards, and your day may be quite a few rounds shorter than you thought. Anyway, a week before flying to Amsterdam, I was pretty set on playing one of these two decks, not realizing yet that they were now last week tech and that pro players, all over the world, would have reached the same conclusions as us and would be ready to deal effectively with these combo decks.
So I got to Amsterdam on the morning of August 26th, after a 6-hour flight on which I did not manage to sleep. I was going to meet a good friend of mine, Mark, a guy who used to teach ESL English in Taiwan at the same time as myself. My birthday was in a few days so we would be able to catch up and do plenty of sight-seeing.
Traveling is more than a hobby of mine, an intense passion would better describe it, and I spent in the past a long period of my young adult years backpacking around undeveloped countries, using local transport and sleeping in dirt-cheap guesthouses, trying to act a bit like the adventurers of the fantasy books that I used to read as a teenager, wandering around, picking up equipment and strange artefacts as I went along, meeting weird characters and getting involved in all sort of interesting misadventures.
Faithful to my traveling habits, I obviously did not get a pricey hotel room, but decided instead to sleep in the dormitory of a funky hostel in the downtown of Amsterdam. Most people staying there were young and slightly rebellious travellers (though trendy), and I could easily fit in, with my psychedelic shirt and my unkept beard. The decoration was brightly colored and the girl at the reception, with her dreads, her baggy, used clothes and her confused, inefficient but not totally displeasing attitude made me realize that I was, at last, in the notorious city of Amsterdam.
My dorm had 20 bunk beds in it, all full as it was still the high season, but I had been clever enough this time to reserve two places in advance. My friend Mark met me later during that rainy day and we decided to go around the city. He introduced me to a group of British lads in another guesthouse and we downed a few pints, celebrating our reunion and sharing stories about what had happened over the last years.
A night in a dorm as big as ours was bound to be interesting, or to put it mildly, eventful. Some couples were sharing the top of their bunk beds and Mark got waken up, more than once as he told me (but he tends to exaggerate regularly for the sake of story-telling), because some people got frisky in the middle of the night. Even if he wanted to sleep, he did not dare to speak out, and let them get along with their business. The following night was also out of the ordinary, as he woke me up around three, hearing mice having a feast in a bag of cereal that some young Italian girl left nearby, next to her bed. Not much I could do, so I went back to sleep, unfazed. Staying in a mixed dorm was quite an experience, and some people were I could say less shy than others, changing themselves and flashing their underwear around without trying too hard to hide. A general feeling of freedom and recklessness seemed to inhabit this place and being around less conservative and less career-oriented people than usual was like a breath of fresh air.
The second place I got to stay was in a hotel called the Christian shelter. Not that I adhere to their metaphysical beliefs or agree with their strict dogmas. I had more in mind the fact that people there would not be as festive and wild as in the other hotels, and that they would go to bed at a reasonable time, so I would not get waken up at weird hours during the night. The bed was quite cheap as well (20 euro) which was in my budget. People there in general were rather friendly, though uptight. You could see religious quotes on the wall and you could attend prayer sessions if you needed to get in touch with the Lord. To avoid trouble, which is a fundamental skill you need to develop when you travel, I resisted the urge to enter into discussion concerning theology or evolution.
What I did not realize at the time of my online reservation was that the Christian hostel was located in the center of the infamous red light district. Prostitution, like cannabis, is tolerated here and the red light district of Amsterdam is in fact very popular with all sorts of tourists, male and female, young and old, rich and poor. Some windows with red neon lights indicated where the women of the oldest profession worked and you could see streams of people walking by, beers in hands, and at time you can get a whiff of something other than cigarette. That first evening I saw a group of girls on a Hen night, dressed up in sexy outfits. Quite a few bachelor parties were going on as well, one in particular had an Asian man dressed up in an inflatable sumo costume walking around and having to ask some seemingly embarrassing questions to shopkeepers. The canals were pretty busy too, with huge flocks of swans and ducks congregating here and there, seemingly oblivious to the crowd of people chatting and laughing loudly around them. The neon lights were reflecting in the water and some upbeat pop music could be heard coming from the different bars. There was even a small embarkation full of freshmen passing by, blasting loud electronic music and getting unreasonably drunk. Probably the boat party I had read about in an advertisement, offering a night cruise in the district for 35 Euros a head, an hour and a half of pure fun and all you could drink alcohol.
An atmosphere of carnival, of total madness and at the same time of unfettered liberty was in the air. You could hear strange tongues from far away countries and if you had the audacity to look in some of the windows, you could be intimidated by the shamelessness and the straightforwardness of some exotic girls in panties, trying to make eye contact, winking, smiling lasciviously and using their body language in a way that meant that you were invited. The whole place was surreal and probably not the best environment to meditate and focus.
Luckily enough I had somewhere else to go in the evening, a bar where, a hobby shop owner told me, some players were going to play booster draft on Monday and Tuesday. I would hopefully meet some Dutch pros there and see what decks they were planning to play for the Extended portion of the Pro Tour. I thought: Playing Magic in a bar? Decidedly these Dutch people knew how to enjoy themselves! I got there and waited for the draft to start.
I looked around, hoping to see some pros like Frank Karsten, whom, if I played my cards right, would maybe share some of their insights on the constructed format. Karsten was not there, unfortunately, but I seemed to recognize a young man, barely in his twenties, playing with a proxy version of Faeries against a proxy version of Ad Nauseum. I was the only foreigner in the place and they seemed surprised that I was there. I was put on the draft table with other qualified PT players and we started drafting.
The Dutch players knew each other pretty well and they were joking around in their language, having a good time. I was introduced and did some small talk before we opened the first pack. I was sure, now, that I recognized the young man… he introduced himself only as Julien and I greeted him, without showing that I knew who he was, not wanting to appear like one of his thousand fan boys. Modest, friendly, unassuming, I was in front of the guy who won in 2004 the title of World Champion and Rookie of the year. Two years later he led the Dutch team to the title of World Team Champions.
Like some people who tend to idealise and give otherworldly characteristics to movie stars and sport heroes, I have an inclination to venerate people that managed to reach the highest summit of their art, especially Magic. To be able to play and discuss with him seemed at the time a privilege and he did not have the arrogance so common in some of the Magic elite. We got paired together for the second round of the draft and I managed to win, which did not mean much because Julien is not playing much these days.
Like quite a few pro players, he decided to put his efforts into poker and he has managed to accumulate quite a lot of wealth for a person of his age. He shared some of his strategies that he used when he played online and told me details about his everyday life, including how he was heartbroken after his separation from his sweetheart, probably his first serious love. I tried to give him some comfort, saying platitudes about the sea and its numerous fish, but all my wise counsels did not manage to reduce his pain. Only time would. Going back home that night, after winning the whole draft, I was thinking about the fact that, no matter how good you perform, or how famous you get, you remain, despite everything, human and so you are confronted with similar problems and situations that everybody else has. Julien got a special invite for the Pro Tour and he managed to finish 68th, with almost no preparation. I still had a lot to learn.
Two days before the tournament I went to the Movenpick Hotel to meet up with Andrew Noworaj. Robert Anderson had already arrived in town and was in a different hotel with his girlfriend, doing riveting couple activities like visiting the Tulip Museum and holding hands. So I met up with Andrew, a guy from Ottawa against whom I had played several times in local PTQs and was staying at last in a very nice hotel room, a bit out of my usual price range but totally peaceful and the kind of place you want to stay in before a pro tour. Andrew was already in the room with Jeremy Neeman and Alex McCormick, two Australians, and they were talking about extended. Neeman is a rising star of Australian Magic and had quite a good year, getting to the top 8 in PT San Juan and second at his Nationals this year. Hanging out with the best made me feel like I was a member of an elite. Maybe I could as well become a pro.
Playtesting my updated version of Ad Nauseum that I got from the Dutch (with an Esper manabase instead of a Vivid one), I quickly realized that the metagame had shifted and quite a few hate cards were now part of main decks and sideboards of the PT players. Playing against Rune Halo maindeck, or sideboard cards like Ethersworn Canonist, Meddling Mage, Leyline of the Void, Leyline of Sanctity or Thorn of Amethyst, helped me to understand that people would be prepared and that I would not know for sure what to bring in from the side as the deck was vulnerable from quite a few different angles.
I had to switch deck, again, but now time was running out. The morning after, Jay Elarar came in; sporting a deck he had been working on with Gabriel Nassif, a white weenie with a really low curve. I tested Kithkin in my playtest group, but not that deck, with Ethersworn Canonist maindeck and levellers. Elarar had mentioned it a few days ago in an email but it seemed rather unexciting and I did not take much notice of it. I could not have been more wrong, the deck ended up taking two spots in the top 8 and Rietzl won the whole thing with it.
After a few games with the White Weenie I came to the realization that this deck was the one I wanted to play, aggro and still under the radar. Jay graciously shared his list with me and Andrew Noworaj, way more organised than I was, agreed to lend me the cards without asking for anything in return. I now had a deck. I usually playtest a deck non-stop on MWS so I can get to play it on automatic pilot during big events, and that strategy worked pretty well until today. I now had to figure a deck out and how to play its different match-ups 24 hours before the biggest Pro Tour ever, with 457 people. I was up for the challenge, or so I thought.
We got to the site and Elarar asked me to follow him. The repeat national champion was playing his 20th Pro Tour and as a result knew quite a few people on the tour. His resume was impressive, having managed a top 8 a Pro Tour once, losing to Kai Budde, and a GP top 8. I did not know him that well before this event, not seeing him on the PTQ circuit as he managed to remain on the gravy train for all these years. I was going to realize that he was extremely well connected.
We went to a group of people and sat down with them. I instantly recognized Gabriel Nassif, future inductee to the Hall of Fame. At the same table I was introduced to Paul Rietzl, the only player I did not recognize in the lot. Antoine Ruel was there as well, Manuel Bucher, Rafael Levy, Matt Sperling, as was Eric Froehlich and Noah Boaken, two famous Magic players who went on to become poker superstars, having both won over 1 million U.S. dollars. Looking around I have to admit that I felt quite a bit out of my league; it was like being an extra in a big blockbuster summer movie, not really deserving to sit down with the big Hollywood celebrities. Jay, however, seemed totally at ease and was talking about sideboard tech and the white weenie different match-ups. I got so used to reading and getting to know these people though a computer screen that to be there, sitting with them, put me briefly off-balance, and I could hardly find anything intelligent to say. Ah well, this weekend would be an immense help me to get comfortable among what I wanted to believe was my own kind, the ruling elite of Magic!
The Pro Tour was tomorrow and we playtested with some of the pros at the lobby of our hotel, sharing gossips about other decks, especially about the rumour of new brutal dredge decks played by a contingent of Americans including Cedric Phillips, and a Doran deck played by team Channelfireball. Nassif and Rietzl built the Doran deck in proxy, speculating on the exact content of the deck following hearsay and deductive logic. As it was getting late we decided to part and went to bed early enough, getting ready for the big day.
On the morning of the tournament, we met Antoine Ruel on the way to the convention center, and he was playing the same WW list as us. We had two spots left in the sideboard and I suggested that we used Wrath of God as an unexpected card for the mirror and for some other matches like Living End and Doran. Antoine conceded that it was a possibility but he did not seem overenthusiastic about it. The night before Elarar had agreed with me on these slots and decided to put the Wraths in the sideboard. He ended up siding them in once, against Nuijten Goblin decks, in the only constructed match he lost. A running gag between us for the rest of the weekend was about my single contribution to his sideboard, which should have been something else, probably Celestial Purge.
Kar Yung Tom (KYT) is the Digital Content Manager for Face to Face Games. He oversees the F2FTour.com and Magic F2F websites. He is also the lead host of the First Strike podcast.