Barcelona…
HERE I COME!
I guess this all started on Tuesday when I left Andrew Oyen a message asking to bring cards for Storm so I could actually play in the event. With Oyen only being short a couple lands, I decided to risk the morning-of to find the rest and be happy with whatever I inevitably ended with. Lucky for me I found what I was missing and proceeded to play some fun games against Kyle Smith playing Melira Pod. After crushing him over and over, Steve Tomik mentions that we both had forgotten to register for the event… oops! We rush to the front, sign up and proceed to breathe comfortably.
Here’s what I registered:
[deck title=Storm by Noah Long]
[Lands]
4 Shivan Reef
4 Scalding Tarn
3 Island
3 Steam Vents
3 Misty Rainforest
1 Mountain
[/Lands]
[Spells]
4 Pyromancer Ascension
4 Faithless Looting
4 Thought Scour
4 Serum Visions
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Manamorphose
2 Grapeshot
4 Pyretic Ritual
4 Desperate Ritual
4 Seething Song
4 Past in Flames
[/Spells]
[Sideboard]
4 Empty the Warrens
1 Devil’s Play
2 Echoing Truth
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Spell Pierce
[/Sideboard]
[/deck]
This list is the MTGO PTQ winning deck of Zygonn card for card. Why change what isn’t broken, right? Combo in general has always been my favourite to play, especially at large events. Combo played well at the PTQ level can give you easy wins, including wins where you weren’t supposed to have due to opponents not knowing how to play against your deck properly.
People who know me from back in the day, especially the Vintage scene, know I’m a combo player at heart. I always look at a format to see if any of the combo decks that the format has to offer are well enough positioned before events. I see whether I can abuse the archetype due to metagame weaknesses. This deck was by far the best deck for me while testing on MTGO. So many wins out of nowhere and it was not any different this past weekend.
Here were my match ups and how I sideboarded:
R1: Kyle Duncan – Twin (2-1W)
IN: 3 [card]Empty the Warrens[/card], 4 [card]Spell Pierce[/card], 2 [card]Echoing Truth[/card]
OUT: 1 Pyromancer’s Ascension, 3 [card]Past in Flames[/card], 1 [card]Grapeshot[/card], 4 [card]Thought Scour[/card]
This match up comes down to going off asap or sticking a Pyromacer Ascension and playing the control game. Twin is a full turn slower but plays a bunch of disruption. Ascension is pretty important to fight through all of the hate, as well as Empty to fight the [card]Grafdigger’s Cage[/card]s Kyle had. Luckily for me, I won very quickly with fast [card]Empty the Warrens[/card] draws, as well as Kyle getting mana screwed after mulliganing game 3.
R2: Nassim Ketita – Gifts Storm (2-0W)
IN: 4 [card]Spell Pierce[/card]
OUT: 4 [card]Pyromancer Ascension[/card]
This match up seemed really easy for my list. His deck was a full turn slower and didn’t play Ascension, [card]Faithless Looting[/card] or [card]Thought Scour[/card]. His sideboard was a 15-card Twin board which was still a turn slower and allowed me the easy victory.
R3: Tony Cameron – BR Burn (2-0W)
IN: 4 [card]Empty the Warrens[/card]
OUT: 4 [card]Pyromancer Ascension[/card]
With Burn being Burn, it all came down to the race. With my deck being a full turn faster (notice a trend?), this became an easy win.
R4: Jon A Wdoxiasz – UWR Delver (2-0W)
IN: 4 [card]Empty the Warrens[/card], 2 [card]Echoing Truth[/card]
OUT: 2 [card]Past in Flames[/card], 1 [card]Grapeshot[/card], 1 [card]Pyromancer Ascension[/card], 2 [card]Thought Scour[/card]
The fight game 1 was getting through a couple [card]Remand[/card]s but I eventually went off. The SB game was something else though. He played a turn 2 Relic eliminating any [card]Past in Flames[/card] BS which forced me to go all in on my [card]Empty the Warrens[/card] for 8 guys. Luckily for me he had taken a good chunk of damage from his lands so with an additional 4 guys the following turn, I ended up racing his Geist to victory.
R5: Thomas P Traplin – Affinity (1-2L)
IN: 4 [card]Empty the Warrens[/card], 4 [card]Lightning Bolt[/card], 2 [card]Echoing Truth[/card]
OUT: 4 [card]Pyromancer Ascension[/card], 2 [card]Past in Flames[/card], 1 [card]Grapeshot[/card], 3 [card]Thought Scour[/card]
This was my only loss and it came at the hands of the only draws that were better then mine all day. He killed me turn 3 on the play game 1 with me holding a turn 3 in my hand for the following turn. Game 2 I make 38 dudes on turn 2 and then he gets me again super fast game 3. Nice format…
R6: Charlie Chan – RG Shamans (2-1W)
IN: 4 [card]Lightning Bolt[/card], 4 [card]Empty the Warrens[/card]
OUT: 4 [card]Pyromancer Ascension[/card], 1 [card]Past in Flames[/card], 1 [card]Grapeshot[/card], 2 [card]Thought Scour[/card]
This match up took me back to Lorwyn Block Constructed. Shamans were a legitimate beating then and with the added aid of [card]Hellrider[/card] and [card]Fauna Shaman[/card], there wasn’t anything different here. This was my closest win all day. Game 1 I win on turn 3 on the draw facing lethal then I fizzle game 2. Game 3 I mulligan to 5 on the play facing a turn 1 [card]Relic of Progenitus[/card]. Charlie tapped out turns 2 and 3 which gave me a short window to win on turn 4. At the end of Charlie’s turn 3 I cast a [card]Thought Scour[/card] in response he removes my [card]Serum Visions[/card] tapping his Relic. I hit very well off the Scour and proceed to win the game the next turn, making over 30 Goblins after [card]Past in Flames[/card] and rituals. Game 3 I decided to board out the [card]Lightning Bolt[/card]s for 1 [card]Past in Flames[/card], 1 [card]Grapeshot[/card] and 2 [card]Thought Scour[/card] because I was on the play and could just race his guys to victory.
R7: Chris C Ha – Big Domain Zoo (2-1W)
IN: 4 [card]Empty the Warrens[/card], 2 [card]Lightning Bolt[/card], 2 [card]Spell Pierce[/card], 2 [card]Echoing Truth[/card]
OUT: 4 [card]Pyromancer Ascension[/card], 3 [card]Thought Scour[/card], 2 [card]Past in Flames[/card], 1 [card]Grapeshot[/card]
This was also a very close affair. Game 1 was another clean victory. My SBing was a little all over the place for game 2 and 3 but I didn’t see any hate from him so I just did a little of everything since he had all 5 colours at his dispense. Game 2 I mulliganed to 6 on the draw. His draw was pretty quick and forced me to go off on turn 3 but I ended up 2 mana short and fizzle. Game 3 was interesting as well. Once again I was facing lethal after a lackluster draw on my part. I blindly went off at 8 with him having a Goyf on the board and 2 cards in hand (one of them being a Bolt). I dropped myself to 5 and then down to 2 from his Bolt. I eventually find an [card]Empty the Warrens[/card] on my last draw and make close to 40 Goblins. He draws and extends the hand which propels me into the top 8!
R8: Andrew Noworaj – Jund (0-0-1 ID)
7th after 8 Swiss Rounds 6-1-1
Top: 8 John Wasson – BR Burn (2-1W)
The same as my last Burn match up. Game 1 I win with no resistance on turn 3. Game 2 I make a small error in my line of play which gives him the win. Before going off I should have used my fetchland for a basic taking 1 instead of the [card]Steam Vents[/card] I took 2 from leaving me at 6 instead of 7. He untapped, drew, and then 2x Shard Volleyed my face. Game 3… I was on the play and kept a decent hand but nothing special. Lucky for me he didnt draw any creatures to keep attacking me and was just holding burn. Not good for me was his 2x [card]Volcanic Fallout[/card] in hand to trump my Warrens draw. After seeing his hand with Probe I saw I could be alive for a couple more turns if he didnt draw 6 damage in 2 turns. Then he drew a [card]Tormod’s Crypt[/card]… oh crap! Luckily for me, John used it immediately to remove my bin including 1 [card]Past in Flames[/card] and 3 [card]Faithless Looting[/card]. If he had only waited till I went off, he would have won. The Fallout and Crypt were enough to completely keep me from winning but he didn’t know how to play against this deck properly. This is what we call a squeaker!
Top: 4 Dane Broomfield – Jund (2-0W)
IN: 4 [card]Spell Pierce[/card]
OUT: 1 [card]Past in Flames[/card], 2 [card]Gitaxian Probe[/card], 1 [card]Thought Scour[/card]
In this match up the only card that matters is [card]Jund Charm[/card]. Game 1 he didn’t have it and won easily after he tapped out for a Goyf and 2 hand disruption spells. Game 2 I saw 2 [card]Jund Charm[/card] in his hand after a Probe. At the end of my 3rd turn, he used the first Charm to remove my graveyard, including 1 of the 2 [card]Grapeshot[/card]s left in my deck, then tapped out to cast a [card]Bloodbraid Elf[/card] which cascaded into a [card]Kitchen Finks[/card]. At the end of that turn, I cast 2 [card]Thought Scour[/card], refilled my graveyard and felt really dirty as I basically drew my whole deck with a Pyromancer Acension to find my last copy of [card]Grapeshot[/card].
Finals: Francisco Leon Valencia – Melira Pod (2-1W)
IN: 4 [card]Lightning Bolt[/card], 4 [card]Empty the Warrens[/card], 2 [card]Echoing Truth[/card]
OUT: 2 [card]Pyromancer Ascension[/card], 2 [card]Past in Flames[/card], 4 [card]Gitaxian Probe[/card], 2 [card]Thought Scour[/card]
Game 1 was another bye. He cast a Seer, then a Melira… then he died. Game 2 He keeps Birds, Pod and 4 land. He gets his Thalia in play on turn 3 and then a [card]Spellskite[/card] the following turn. If I had drawn a Bolt the turn before I died, I could have won, even through his [card]Nihil Spellbomb[/card]. Game 3 I just went for the turn 2, 10 Goblins and got there.
All my wins felt unfair. I don’t know if it was the fact that I didn’t play against anything else unfair or with lots of permission, but all my opponents were playing dead cards like Bolts and Paths and even creatures which didn’t interact with my side at all. [card]Empty the Warrens[/card] was by far my best card on the day. It came in almost every single SB game and won pretty much every SB game. It’s funny how this happened because most people would say “why not play some main deck?” Why? Because it’s unnecessary. Game 1s are so easy it’s almost a joke. Unless you mulligan to oblivion or your Affinity opponent kills u on turn 3 on the play. You shouldn’t lose a game 1 if you know what you’re doing.
Here are some stats from my day:
- Won only 3 die rolls
- Lost only 2 game 1s
- Mulliganed 3 times (5 and 6 both wins)
- Total record in games 19-7-1
- Stormed 4x on turn 2
- Stormed 10x on turn 3
- Stormed 4x on turn 4
- Legitimately lost 5x
- Fizzled 2x
As far as Modern goes I think [card]Seething Song[/card] should be considered for banning, unless something becomes unbanned. A bunch of guys asked why Seething Song? Why not [card]Pyromancer Ascension[/card] or [card]Past in Flames[/card]? As you can see, Ascension and [card]Past in Flames[/card] were SBed out the majority of the time. [card]Seething Song[/card] is the best card at catalysing all the blind “win out of nowhere” wins and is the card that all my opponents’ Inquisitions/[card]Thoughtseize[/card]s took on the day. It nets you 2 mana and is the best card in the deck by far.
As far as unbanning something, the control decks out there cannot keep up with the aggressive strategies running around at the moment, and could easily get either [card]Jace, the Mind Sculptor[/card] or [card]Ancestral Vision[/card]s off the banned list. It can keep up and be the part of the meta game which keeps the combo decks honest. A healthy format is usually balanced between 3 points: Aggro beating Control, Control beating Combo, Combo beating Aggro. With Aggro being played way too often for Control to survive comfortably, playing Combo will usually steal events or even dominate formats if no one dedicates enough SB slots for it.
Anyways, I did way too much thinking this weekend and will probably pass on combo for a while. I do not recommend playing this deck unless you are a seasoned player or one who only plays combo. Having played Storm in Legacy and Vintage as well as other combo decks in the past really helped towards being able to sculpt a game plan and also allowed me to be able to change that plan half-way through a game given the circumstances.
Last thing to say is thanks to all the guys who gave Tomik and I business on the day. As some of you may already know, Steve Tomik and I are backpack dealing now and will be holding events in the Ontario area soon with great buy and sell prices at our vendor table. We want to help stimulate Modern and eventually Legacy as both formats are hard to get into unless you’re Andrew Oyen and started collecting way back and never sold any of it. Add Tomik Long to Facebook to see updated buy lists and updated stock lists as well. We travel all over Ontario for collections so let us know!
I’m gonna take a break from playing until probably the PT in Spain so until Avacyn Restored,
Peace out players!
Noah
PS: We will be holding large cash tournaments throughout the summer in Ontario! Visit ‘Tomik Long’ on Facebook, follow MTGOntario.com and all my ManaDeprived.com articles for event dates and locations.
Noah Long has been one of the highest rated players in Canada. He top8ed Nationals the past two years, finishing 2nd in the last one.