(A) World of Collections is a comic/game shop in a strip mall in Edmonds with a pretty easy to find location (the strip mall at least). I rolled in at about 8:45, had a seat, registered for the tournament, took my black decklist, and sat down to chat with Kyle Boddy and Joe Timidaiski, two noted local players (one of which even has a deck named after him, much to his chagrin!) Pauper cube drafts come up in the discussion as Joe talked about a deck he drafted the night before with Violent Eruption. That card was some good back in the day even if Jesse Hampton disagreed. I fill out the decklist, getting the last two Blood Crypts I needed from Gavin Verhey and survey the scene. There's 16 or so players, a few that I recognize as being good players (Jesse, Joe, Kyle, Gavin, as well as the John Carter Rules Explosion and fellow judges Keith Thompson and Eelco van Ruth), along with Gavin's brother Tanner, a couple players from Burien's Monster Gaming, and a few other players I don't recognize. The deck I was playing should be common knowledge by now, but here's a refresher in case you forgot:

Kitchen Finks are for Burn and Zoo as they slow the beats and interact quite well with Living End. Faerie Macabre is for Dredge, Thopter/Sword, and is potentially a better card than some in my deck in some aggro matchups as occasionally, Living End is just Wrath, and Faerie Macabre can eat the guys you kill with the first Living End before the second. It's also important if you ever run into a mirror match. Blood Moon is for Zoo, Scapeshift, and control matchups with exotic manabases. The interesting card is Hammerheim Deadeye. Decks that can put Iona, Shield of Emeria into play (Dredge and Hypergenesis) will name black with her to shut off Living End. Deadeye is an out against her.

We end up with 17 players (5 rounds!) and the pairings get announced...

Round 1 - Gavin Verhey - Elves

Rabon on Magic Online, Lesurgo everywhere else. You read his articles every week on StarCityGames.com, and I'm a big 2-0 against him in sanctioned matches. Completely meaningless, of course. We both know what the other is playing before we sit down (Gavin was asking for Glimpse of Natures the nighr before on Facebook. I win the die roll and I start off with a land while Gavin has a Misty Rainforest into a Forest and Elves of Deep Shadow. I cycle a dork in his endstep and evoke Shriekmaw. He plays Verdant Catacombs into Forest and drops another Elves of Deep Shadow and a Heritage Druid. All I can do on my turn is play another land and pass. He gets in for two with his elves and cracks another fetch for Forest. I'm getting a decent amount of time to develop my mana base, but I'm short on cyclers. I do have Violent Outburst in hand, so the situation isn't dire. It quickly gets that way though, as the following turn he has Elvish Archdruid and gets in for two again with an elf. The following turn he tries to Primal Command my graveyard away along with tutoring for an elf. I Violent Outburst in response to get my team in play. He goes to two on my swing in, and untaps, plays Glimpse, and after four elves enter the battlefield, he runs out of gas and concedes.

I board in the Ingot Chewers amd Faerie Macabres, taking out Fulminator Mages and two Valley Rannets, and shuffle up for game two. Gavin gets an incredible start, Glimpsing on turn 3 to put a ton of elves into play, including an Elvish Archdruid. He also SUmmoner's Pacts during this sequence to try and get lethal on the table for his next turn, and Primal Commands a land on top of my deck as part of the sequence too. I replay my second land and Shriekmaw his Archdruid, buying me a turn as it shrinks his army and makes him tap a bunch of elves to Heritage Druid to pay for the pact. The following turn, I have Demonic Dread to wipe his team and get three guys into play, and it's enough.

James defeats Gavin, 2-0

Between rounds, I head over to the store next door to get some granola bars and basically fuel up for the rest of the day. The big plus of the strip mall card shop is the proximity to shops and things between rounds you don't get at the big events.

Round 2 - John Carter - Punishing Zoo

Things start off auspiciously as the judges call both myself and John over to discuss things. For John, it was a broken sleeve on one of his cards he needed to replace. For me... it was a deck registration error. Seems that instead of writing down Violent Outburst, I wrote down Violent Eruption instead. That card's not even legal in Extended, it's so good.

At least I was having fun watching Eelco and his opponent play opposing mill decks.

I start out on the play and do my thing cycling guys. He starts out with a Wild Nacatl that meets a Shriekmaw on the way to the bin. If I'm gonna start a game down, this is the matchup to do it against. He has another Nacatl and a Noble Hierarch and the following turn Nacatl gets in for 4. He plays another guy and Lightning Helixes me, but I have a Demonic Dread on my turn to wrath and bring back Carabid and Shriekmaw. He doesn't have an answer in time as a third guy gets added to the table, and we pack up for game three. Awkward.

In comes one Ingot Chewer, four Kitchen Finks, and three Blood Moon for four Street Wraiths and four Igneous Pouncers. John starts out with a Grove of the Burnwillows and a Nacatl. Nacatl gets in for two before being Shriekmawed. He follows up with a Jotun Grunt and a Lightning Bolt to my face. I take four from Grunt and get down a Kitchen Finks to stabilize. Finks block Grunt to get me back to 14 before it gets Helixed. Eventually he can't pay for the Grunt's upkeep and he gets in with a Nacatl, but I'm able to refill my graveyard and Living End Finks and company back, and it's enough to get there.

James defeats John, 2-1

Round 3 - Joe Timidaiski - Hive Mind

I knew Joe was playing Hive Mind from his comments on Facebook as well. Hive Mind is impossible. Legitimately impossible. The way to beat the deck is to either put tons of pressure on them (Burn, One Drop Zoo), disrupt them with discard and counterspells (Faeries, UW control) or win faster than them (Dark Depths, Hypergenesis). Living End does none of those things. The only damage Joe took during two games was from his painlands - I tried disrupting his mana base with Fulminator Mage to no avail. Apparently you can go off with just one land if you have enough mana spells. In game one, he went off with two lands and two Pacts (Pact of Negation and Pact of the Titan) and in game two, with three lands and three pacts (Intervention Pact alongside the other two).

Joe defeats James, 2-0

I don't feel particularly down about losing - I'm more concerned with making sure I top 8 and then hope to avoid Joe in the elimination rounds.

Round 4 - Hai Nguyen - All-in Red

Joke not made on-site - "I think All-in Red has a Hai Nguyen percentage in this matchup."

Hai and the head jusge both inform me that Hai has a game loss for deck misregistration. I bet it was as stupid as Violent Eruption. Kids, take the extra minute to check your decklist before handing them in, otherwise this could happen to you. I do find it rather amusing that the last two times I've played Gavin round one in an event with decklists, I've misregistered. Hai and I both know what each other are playing as Hai watched my antics very closely at the PTQ and GTP at the Seattle Center, and Kyle Boddy tipped me off beforehand, talking about his last round opponent was playing All-in Red and was being talked to a lot by the judges post-match.

This matchup really comes down to the type of opening hand AiR gets. If they get a hand that leans on an early Blood Moon to slow things down, you'll have time (even more so if they don't know what you're playing and run the Blood Moon out there). If they have the quick Deus of Calamity or Demigod of Revenge, things get rougher. If they have the Empty the Warrens draw, it depends on how many Goblins they make and whether you're on the play or the draw. Hai has one of the slower draws and doesn't do much of anything until turn 3 (no Chalice of the Void for 0 or anything bad like that) and I'm ready to go off as soon as he plays a guy with Demonic Dread. At one point he discards a Demigod, then plays another to do ten to me. I have Demonic Dread the next turn and he doesn't draw another Demigod before I finish him off.

James defeats Hai, 2-0

At 3-1, the standings looked like this:

Tanner Verhey (3-0-1)
Joe Timidaiski (3-0-1)
James Dykes (3-1)
Gavin Verhey (3-1)
John Carter (3-1)
Kyle Boddy (2-1-1)
Jesse Hampton (2-1-1)

I can draw in if I get paired against Tanner, otherwise I would have to play to make sure of a top 8 (although with my tiebreakers even with a loss, I should be in 8th).

Round 5 - Tanner Verhey - Burn

To the om nom nom step, as Gavin would say. Onto the elimination rounds!

Intentional Draw

Quarterfinals - Keith Thompson - Zoo

I had watched Keith play at an extened tournament the night before (Living End 1-2, baybee!) so I knew this matchup was rather in my favor. Keith was not playing blue for Bant Charm and did not have the Tribal Flames mana base, so all I had to worry about were Lightning Bolts, Lightning Helixes, Jotun Grunts and the usual assortment of Zoo dorks. Neither game was particularly close, as Keith had to use Lighning Bolts on my Igneous Pouncers and Valley Rannets instead of my face while an army of 3/4s and 4/4s came for his head in both games. He didn't draw any of his hate cards against me in either game - there was a Jotun Grunt that hit his own graveyard because I only had one guy in my yard - and my deck did what it does in both games.

James defeats Keith, 2-0

Next door to me, Joe and his opponent from Canada (my apologies, but I didn't get his name) were facing each other down. I saw the Bant player's board of two Meddling Mages and figured Joe was toast until I found out what they were on. I told him that he should have asked me what Joe's deck was before the start of the quarterfinals, as I'd love to face a Bantwich in the semis instead of Hive Mind. Alas, it's not to be, as Joe cleans his clock in two games with a large number of Pacts.

Semifinals - Joe Timidaiski - Hive Mind

You can read about this match from Joe's tournament report here. Game one was a crusher - I had about as good a start as I could get and Joe had about as bad a start as he could get, and he blew me out of the water. If I have one more Street Wraith, I win that game, as I can Violent Outburst for exacties on my turn four to win.

Joe defeats James, 2-1

Overall, the deck performed well again, but there's a matchup that I just cannot win with the current configuration. I'm looking at options to try and shore this matchup up for next week, since Joe didn't win and will be slinging Pacts again at GameOn. I do think I've got way too many cards for Zoo in the board as that matchup is pretty much a blowout already. We'll get it figured out.