Manastack (Private)
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Round 1 vs. Kyle Lennox – Doomsday

I have Kyle on some kind of Tendrils deck. My opener is great, because I have a Bazaar and some other action, in the form of a Dragon and a Git Probe or so. I can bluff being on straight Dredge to possibly have him hold back going off, if he is on a Force deck. Kyle says “No” to fun by opening with a restricted card–Gitaxian Probe. The jig is up.

Game proceeds over a few turns with me looting and finding nothing, down to no cards ish, meanwhile Kyle keeps drawing lands, no action and slams Labman. I find and play JVP, and Labman proceeds to get aggro for a turn.

I flip JVP the next turn and am still jammed on mana producing lands. Choice is to neg Jace and flashback Collective Brutality or cast Imperial Seal. Choose to cast seal for the reanimation spell. Pass turn.

He rips Dark Petition, has spell mastery and wins via a determinant Yawg Will – Tendrils line thanks to his inordinate amount of mana sources in play.

Side Note: Kyle attempts to cheaty face me by cycling Street Wraith off Yawg Will. He does one, and then as he does the second, I say, “You are doing that, I assume you know that that works?” Pro Tip: It doesn’t work. He puts his card back, he wins anyway.

G2 was intense on my side but not really a game. The fun parts were: a. He casts Necropotence. I cast gifts for Force, Fluster and 2 other blue cards. He gives me the Force and let’s me counter the Necro. Next turn, he casts Dark Ritual, Doomsday and wins with a Gush/Labman pile. Pretty sure Kyle has my number, don’t think I have beaten him at a TSO yet. GG 0-1, 0-2

Round 2 – Steve McGrew – Jesaki Pryo

G1 Steve led by probing me and being no fun. I had a hot opener, with Mana Crypt and Bazaar and pretty sure a jet? Based on looking at my life pad, I thoughseizing something or looking w/ Probe, then a crypt hit, then take 2 from another thoughtseize, another crypt hit. Steve is digging furiously, me with a Dragon in the yard.

By turn 5 or so, he has made a board of 2-3 lands and some moxen. He makes Pyro and JTMS, tapping out. Zero’s him, made a land drop. After his flurry of action, he was left with just one card and one open mana, representing Flusterstorm. If we rip a reanimation spell, it would be Flacid-storm. Instead I rip and main phase Dig Through Time, which he Flusters, and I’m able to pay with my Mana Crypt mana. I take a look and find Lotus, Necromancy in my 7. DRAGON.

G2 Steve mulls I think. I’m on my transformational plan, minus Leyline/Helm. My opener is gasolina, with Tezz, Black Lotus, Thoughtseize. I have a look, see Force, Force, YP, mana–no other blue cards to pitch. Sad FoW. Slam Tezz and and minus to grab Key.

I couldn’t think of any outs he would have (he said he had 2x Needles but didn’t see them), and passed the turn. He passes it back, minus again for Vault. GG. 1-1, 2-2

Round 3 – Tyler Wilcox – Grixis Tinker?

These games were quick; too bad it was a pair down for me. Tinker into BS after A call.

G2, I transform, with one of each of the reanimation spells and one dragon for gifts. Thoughtseize, saw A call and Force. He draws a bunch of cards, counters two reanimation spells and then Vault/Key. GG 1-2, 2-4

Round 4 – Steve Sasala – White Eldrazi

G1: I open with with Probe; I have some amount of action, Tasigur, Dragon, Lim-Dul’s Vault, Dance to the Dead. I see Wasteland, Eldrazi Temple, Ancient Tomb, Thalia, Displacer, Smasher and TKS. So we just need some way to end the Dragon loop.

He leads with Wasteland and passes. I make a land drop and pass.

Turn 2, he plays Thalia off of the Cavern he rips naming Human, passes. At his EOT, I jam Lim-Dul’s Vault, planning to find the combo. Since I have Tasigur in hand I just need to ditch and animate Dragon at this point, but have to be able to stop the loop. I have a look at see Collective Brutality in the top 5, so I stack them, drawing CB first.

On my turn 3, I play Collective Brutality, negging Thalia, escalated to drain him, ditching Dragon. I pass with Underground Sea as my only black source. I have another Sea in hand, plus the animation spell. If he makes a land drop and then slams TKS, I’m SOL, bc he follows up with Smasher, and just runs me over. I pass and pray.

He puts me on not having any more black sources / not having the combo in hand, so he goes to his turn, wastes my Sea, passes with no other play. I animate Dragon, make infinite mana, end the loop by animating Thalia, play Tasigur and win.

G2: I transform to the Bad Grixis Tinker (BGT) board plan and say leggo. He opens super heavy GY hate, with Tormod’s Crypt followed by Cage, then Revoker then Containment Priest. They aggro me for two turns, while I have open a have natural Vault/Key (don’t recall) plus Tinker to win. GG. 2-2, 4-4

RD 5 – Ben – Inferno (Kelly) Oath

Swiss plus one means I get a wicked pair down. I didn’t realize it but I was out of prize even if won, since Kyle got the bye and he had beaten me, he was going to be a higher 3-2 seed. Meh. My opponent was 1-3 and graciously conceded to me to try to help me get into prize (T4 payout), since he was mathematically eliminated, unfortunately we didn’t get there. Thanks to him. A 3 game nail biter.

G1 Was him playing a bunch of lands, not finding Oath. I don’t recall the exact sequence but he countered some amount of my spells and but I end up Dragon’ing him after beating him with some spirit tokens. He had a board with Dack when I won.

G2 Kyle was watching our game and regaling us with jokes. “How many potatoes does it take to kill an Irishman? Zero.” Definitely too soon.

So he opens slowly, I end up casting Intution for A call, DT and Tinker. Tinker for BS. Get Dack’ed. Lose. “You were driving somewhere at 90 but I’m not sure you knew where.” -Kyle

G3 He has mono counter spells. I have actions 4 ways, with Imperial Seal, Tinker, Vault, Tezz. He just has it every time, counters for days. Grinds me and find an Oath plus Orchard, flips up Inferno Titan, shoots my spirit tokens, grudges the remnants of my mana, and passes. I have some outs off the top if I can find the Dragon. No such luck and I scoop it up. GG

2-3 (3-2), 5-6 (6-4) *Official Standings

Overall Thoughts: Lim-Dul’s Vault was excellent whenever I saw it, even if it got countered all except once. The threat represented is finding all your pieces in one shot, mathematically it is likely if you are in the MB configuration. With 4 Bazaar, 3 Dragon and 5 Animate spells, looking at cards in chunks of 5 could net you one stack with all 3, hopefully at least 2.

Hollow one plan was live in almost every game; never did I see one in my opener.

The transformational sideboard plan is probably not great, but everyone has GY hate. I don’t think playing anti-hate like Dredge does is right, because our combo is harder to assemble; sure I can blow up your Cage, but still need to find the Dragon, or the Animate.

I would like to find a way to have Dack in the MB as he is a looter on his own. Possibly cutting one JVP? He gets bolted a lot since those are generally blank otherwise

Fun day with a fun deck.