Tin Fins at Bazaar of Moxen

Bazaar of Moxen Legacy Main Event
Slightly over 700 players in the event, which puts it at about slightly larger than GP Denver from earlier this year. That means 9 rounds today with a 21 point cut off for Day 2 competition.
What is more surprising is that a second Bazaar of Moxen will occur this year in Paris, scheduled for Nov 1-3.

Thats pretty exciting in light of the loss of Vintage Champs from GenCon.
I’m playing this awful 61 card pile.

I wanted to play 14 lands but did not want to cut the 4th Probe. C’est la vie!

Round 1 – Jose Antonio with BURG Cascade

Tin Fins obliterates a non counter blue deck. Game 1 Turn 2 kill after Probing to facecheck. Game 2 Silence into the combo takes it home after Children gets sac’d. Yum yum!

Sb:
-4 Probe -2 LDV -1 Goryo’s Vengeance
+ 3 Silence +2 Pithing Needle +2 Chain of Vapor
2-0, 1-0

Round 2 – Christian with Goblins

On the play with double Entomb vs Goblins spells a turn 2 combo kill. Opponent remarks how luck I am. Paging @SaltyLosers.

Game 2 I peek at his hand and notice Surgical and Thalia, of which the latter is worse for me. Having double Ritual and double reanimation means I can beat Surgical, which promptly wins with Tendrils.

Sb:
-2 Probe -1 Silence -1 LDV
+2 Chain +2 Needle

To my right is another Tin Fins player from UK. To my left is a regular Reanimator. The graveyard is strong today!
4-0, 2-0

Round 3 – Matej with Reanimator

Game 1 I mull to 3 Rituals Proe and a Ponder no land. I Probe into a Lotus Petal and find a land for Ponder. We duke back and forth taking pieces from one another. He Reanimates Griselbrand and puts himself at 7, with a Force of Will as his only card. I brick on topdeck reanimation and instead draw Entomb, and pass back. He attacks me to 6 and passes. I draw reanimation, and try to go for an Emrakul, but my oponent draws 7 and Forces pitching Force, leaving him with no more Forces. I follow with Goryo’s my own Griselbrand to legend rule and puts us both at 6. I draw a reanimation before my opponent finds a live reanimation so I win.

Game 2 I ‘Seize my opponent to find two Surgicals and Force, which I take. I find Silence which will beat the Surgicals and Ponder finds me the mana and reanimation to go off. My opp blanks so I go to town which him twiddling his thumbs.

Sb:
-4 Probe -1 LDV
+3 Surgical +2 Silence
6-0, 3-0

Round 4 – Adrian with Shardless BUG

This is Enric Luzan’s roommate so I expect some sort of BuG shenanigans.

G1 Im on the draw and he doesn’t put up much resistance. I LdV into gas on the first five, and go Ritual seize to see what he’s hiding and its a bunch of blanks. That leaves me with exactly enough mana to entomb/reanimate and that’s game. This game was a mull to 5.

G2 I am on the wring end of DRS and a train of Seizes. Also another series of mulls that didnt find land.

G3 i adjust sb to account or lack of a Surgicals. I draw the one probe in my deck and see he kept it only on the strength of Nihil Spellbomb. I Ponder into the Ritual needed to get a turn 1 kill.

Skill game.
8-1, 4-0

Round 5 – Vincent with Maverick

G1 i probe to find a hand that has insane amounts of gas. My effort to win trough Thalia, Ooze, and Wasteland were fruitless.

G2 I win through Karakas via Chain of Vapor and Storm when my opponent does t make relevant hate bear plays after I blind therapy Thalia. Massacre kills Canonist to lead into the Griselbrand.

G3
I have a good hand but my opponent leads with Pithing needle on Griselbrand. That calls for a change of plans and instead I Emrakul to annihilate the needle with LDV as backup to find Griselbrand. I misplay however and fetch after stacking my tops. I am vindicated by topdecking it after my opponent taps out to try to play Gaddock Teeg. Dodged a fucking bullet mate.

#punt
10-2, 5-0

To be continued when I have more time.

Round 6 – Juan with Walking Dead
12-3, 6-0

Round 7 – Eugeni with MUD
12-5, 6-1

Round 8 – Frederico with RUG Delver
12-7, 6-2

Round 9 – Erik Hegelmann with Dredge
14-7, 7-2

Round 10 – Olle Rade with Infect
16-8, 8-2

Round 11 – Marc with Miracles
18-9, 9-2

Round 12 – Pierre with BUG Agent
18-11, 9-3

Round 13 & 14 – RUG Delver
19-15, 9-5

Round 15 – Simon with Esper Blade
20-17, 9-6

Result: a Revised Plateau. *shrug*

Road to Annecy, T-5 Days

Here I am, a few days from leaving the comforts of California and all its sunny splendor to travel halfway around the globe to play Eternal magic at one of its highest levels of competition: Bazaar of Moxen.

Last week I determined and finalized my Vintage deck of choice, as technology in Vintage tends to move even more slowly than it does in Legacy.

However, this week I’ve been racking myself with ideas on how best to prepare and address an unknown metagame of European Legacy. Past tournament results have pointed at a meta very similar to Southern California with a few odd twists. Primarily, Combo will be represented along with the usual assortment of three color Blue decks. Additionally, WG and BG creature strategies have been on the rise in recent weeks. Pretty balanced, but its more important to know your deck than what one might expect to face.

Over the last few weeks I attempted to get Tin Fins working. While a successful finish at SCG Las Vegas proved promising, there are some key vulnerabilities to the deck that I do not feel are a good idea to take into the Euro meta. Chief among these is Deathrite Shaman. I’ve encountered that alone, this card is easy to beat. However, most DRS decks today do not simply employ its namesake; but rather pair it with other disruption such as spot discard or cheap counters. These additional pieces are highly effective against Tin Fins as they address both the stack, hand, and graveyard. In short, the perfect trifecta of fairness.

Since I am still not giving up on my home boy Griselbrand, I am now reverting back to my old stand-in Sneak Show. The deck is fast, powerful, and ignores the graveyard completely. Its chief weakness is Karakas. Recently, Owen Turtenwald wrote an article on CFB about a move into Thoughtseize to provide both information as well as disruption. It opens up the option of Show and Tell and passing the turn. Its especially helpful against faster combo decks. While I won’t opt to run the full four that Owen proposed and Huey played to a T16 finish at SCG Milwaukee; the concept is sound and a number of Thoughtseize is desirable.

Thus, this is the deck I will be playing at Bazaar of Moxen 7 for the Legacy portion.

4 Griselbrand
4 Emrakul the Aeons Torn
4 Show and Tell
4 Sneak Attack
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
4 Force of Will
2 Intuition
1 Misdirection
2 Spell Pierce
3 Thoughtseize
1 Sensei’s Divining Top
4 Lotus Petal
2 Underground Sea
2 Volcanic Island
2 Island
1 Mountain
4 Scalding Tarn
3 blue fetch
3 Ancient Tomb
2 City of Traitors

sb
4 Leyine of Sanctity
2 Through the Breach
2 Echoing Truth
2 Pyroclasm
3 Grafdigger’s Cage
2 REB

Road to Annecy, T-13 Days

13 days and counting to Bazaar of Moxen, and I’m still undecided on my Legacy deck. So lets get the easy part out of the way first.

Bob the Builder Grixis Edition

Creatures (10)
4 Dark Confidant
3 Snapcaster Mage
2 Goblin Welder
1 Gorilla Shaman
1 Myr Battlesphere

Artifacts (12)
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Emerald
1 Black Lotus
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Crypt
1 Sensei’s Divining Top
1 Voltaic Key
1 Time Vault
1 Nihil Spellbomb

Planeswalkers (3)
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

Spells (19)
4 Force of Will
2 Mana Drain
2 Mental Misstep
1 Flusterstorm
1 Ponder
1 Brainstorm
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Thirst for Knowledge
1 Gifts Ungiven
1 Tinker
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Yawgmoth’s Will
1 Time Walk

Lands (15)
4 Scalding Tarn
2 Misty Rainforest
3 Underground Sea
2 Volcanic Island
2 Island
1 Tolarian Academy
1 Library of Alexandria

Sideboard
3 Grafdigger’s Cage
2 Yixlid Jailer
1 Lightning Bolt
1 Darkblast
1 Pyroclasm
2 Ingot Chewer
1 Viashino Heretic
1 Rack and Ruin
1 Mountain
1 Red Elemental Blast
1 Flusterstorm

The deck is built towards playing a board control and abusing Snapcaster Mage and Goblin Welder to interact with the graveyard. It plays a lot like traditional control. The red splash allows the deck to maintain a decent Workshop matchup and improves with SB options to remove lock pieces. In my recent testing, Phyrexian Revoker proved to be a challenge in overcoming, hence the inclusion of sideboard Darkblast.

Likewise, the Dredge matchup is improved with Yixlid Jailer and Cage. Snapcaster Mage interestingly still interacts positively with Jailer, but not Cage. Its enough of a deterrent against Bazaar that it gives the Grixis deck enough breathing room to develop its own game. Cages serve double duty against Oath decks.

Against other Combo decks this deck is slightly unfavored. However the expected metagame is closer to Workshop, Fish aggro, Dredge and Big Blue. The Storm decks typically need full power to operate without hood chances of beating Workshop on the draw reliably. Hence, I feel comfortable going against the combo decks.

Let’s hope it works out!