SCG in the books

[John Galli]

So SCG Madison is now behind us, but hopefully everyone had a good time that attended. Was surprised not to see Travis there, but I did see plenty of locals and was happy that Ian Ellis took down the Legacy portion. He's one of the really nice "good guys" who plays magic and he's been getting better finishes in the last year or two. He also brews most of his own decks, a rarity these days.

Curious if others can share their experiences, would be glad to hear about it.

As for mine I sold all my red cards the morning of the event, bought the cards I needed for B/W Tokens, and played that to a 2-3-drop finish. I enjoyed playing and all but was disappointed after so much testing to bomb that bad. Part of the problem was deck choice, part of the problem was card choice, and then there was the whole losing 5 die rolls, taking 7 mulligans, and my opponents running hot. The shame in the matter was that I could have built Jasper's zombie list since I had it the morning of, and he started off 5-0.

Got a lot of drafts in over the weekend, but definitely the highlight was two-headed giant with Nick. We opened a sick pool with Avacyn, Wolfir Silverheart, Silverblade Paladin, Angel of Glory's Rise, etc, etc. We had some epic games, won some packs, and lost some ones that would have been turned the other way on the last turn. It was a lot of fun and definitely changed my opinion on the format.

Saw Brandon that you got a feature match in the legacy event, nice going dude! I watched a later round where your price of progress got countered and the red player in me died a little, but that's the life of a red mage .

Oh, and I rebuilt my Rafiq deck (and actually bought the General!)

P.S. Evan, I have your Wurmcoil Engine still, I'll bring it by sometime this week probably. Thanks again for lending

[Travis Lannoye]

Yeah, my whole weekend got taken over by the girlfriend and the friends that were staying with us from out of town. I managed to drive by the Alliant Energy Center three times, but wasn't able to actually stop in.

Evan, I still have your two Restoration Angels, and I'll bring those back as well. John, hopefully you still have my one Urabrask and Wurmcoil Engine that I loaned you on Thursday night. Glad to hear you rebuilt Rafiq.

[John Galli]

I actually have your wurmcoil Travis not Evans, and I think I accidently sold that urabrask so ill buy you a new one

[Travis Lannoye]

YOU SUNUVABEEHOLE! WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?!?! HOW COULD YOU BE SO RUDE?!? BAAAAAAAH! <explosion>

Nah, no worries. Just hit me back on Thursday and it's fine.

EDIT: Sounds like you've met this Ian Ellis guy before? Where/when did you meet him? I like the look of his Legacy deck, and I'd like to get some more insight on that part of the format.

[John Galli]

Yeah I've played against / talked to him at various tournaments over the years, he's a Minneapolis native. He's been at most of the SCG tourneys we were at and took one down last year with Jund. I'm sure he's on facebook somewhere or you can probably catch him at any major tourney in the area, his deck looked solid although nothing was crazy eye-opening about it.

I remember at the extended tourney where I met him he was playing a deck with cloudthreshers and battlegrace angel and started out 5-0

[mastrcontrol]

I certainly had a lot of fun too. Seeing everyone there was awesome, and the high point was definitely playing against adrain sullivan in legacy round 3. He also gave me some advice on the big red standard deck I had used day 1, though I'm still unsure if he was trolling me with the advice to use druidic satchel. Here's the list after reworking his mana base, card draw, and other maindeck inclusions:

noncreature spells:
4x desperate ravings
2x galvanic blast
2x devil's play
3x whipflare
2x slagstorm
2x tumble magnet
2x batterskull

creature spells:
4x kuldotha phoenix
4x inferno titan
2x solemn simulacrum
2x phyrexian metamorph

lands:
4x sulfur falls
4x inmoth nexus
2x desolate lighthouse
14x mountain

desperate ravings used to be ichorwell springs, nexus was phrexia's core, and satchel took the spot of some simulacrums and ancient grudge.

[John Galli]

I don't think he was trolling you, him and Jimmy both used Druidic Satchel in their lists on Saturday and it was in control decks a few months back. The card is pretty interesting, I don't know if it's the right choice as there's too much variance to it, but it can be very good in the late game.

Out of curiosity, what did you lose to?

[mastrcontrol]

I lost to myself. I should have slept and tested more. Looking back, the testing I was doing didn't accomplish much at netherworld as I didn't go against many stock r/g or delver lists. In the future, testing against what's popular will be a priority. Also, I should have brought snacks to keep my energy up. My list was determined minutes before deck submission and there were many minute plays I should have noticed throughout games that I simply didn't. Often times, I had xr burn spells in my hand aimed at creatures when I forgot I could just burn them out in 3 turns. I kept a lot of poor hands against r/w human decsk when I knew I needed a whipflare/slagstorm in the opening. I was also too eager to use these spells. Control decks hurt me the worst though, especially post side board w/b titan builds that removed my threats en masse and kept sun titans bringing the pain.