No More Merman – Tournament Report
Fishbowl is back and it’s more crowded than ever. A couple extra rows of tables have been crammed into the Al Bahr Shriners Convention Center and the whiffs of crusted sweat and crushed dreams of hygiene I may in fact have to tap out for olfactory reasons. It’s Fishbowl 6.
I play just enough CEDH to think I’ll win but consistently lose, so I’m playing Jund and, well, losing. I’m losing so bad that I was not only at the last table of the tournament, but the last table on the last day of the redemption tournament held for those who got dropped from the tournament the day before.
Beyond that, I had been losing so bad that we had to merge three different pods to get a four player match because at least four other players at the bottom tables had enough dignity to know when it was time to call it quits.
We were the irredeemable.
My hands are indicative of my competitive ability, which means I’ve mulled down to two cards. Yes, that’s extreme, but when your mull to three only has a Chrome Mox and one land, what options are you really left with?
I’ve already played against two of these guys from the day prior and neither had won a game all weekend. I’m bad enough to be sitting at the last table on the participation event, but even I’d at least won one.
Sure, I misplayed my way out of winning two more, but THAT’S THE FUN.
After shuffling my deck for ten games and choosing two cards, the game I am no longer apart of begins:
The Dahada guy tutors and ramps and looks ready to go.
The TnT guy gets a turn two Rhystic Study and likes that.
The Krark/Sakashima guy gets out a dice and now we’re all playing craps.
[Side note: Dice are fine for coin flips, but if I see another reroll from a Krark player because half the die is on the mat and half is on the card and it just happens to be the time when something’s getting bounced, I will leap across the table and flip enough coins until it tells me to strangle you.]
Krark guy Krarks and rolls/flips while I look at the one card in my hand that can do nothing to sway any aspect of this game at all. Flavor text isn’t bad though. By the time I’m done daydreaming about why I decided to spend my Sunday afternoon to stay for the Toilet Bowl round, there’s a stack of six cards.
Ah, so this is what Magic looks like.
Even through my Jund low intelligence, I’ve managed to parse a counter war happening over the Krark guy’s Jeska’s Will. That looks like a game-ender. There’s a Fierce Guardianship, Mindbreak Trap,Mental Misstep, Deflecting Swat, Flare of Duplication, Misdirection. It’s all there and serves as a reminder that my mind is too feeble to play blue.
The Krark player has been sitting around with(out) a thumb up his butt, growing his hand while a Storm-Kiln Artist powers up his board.
Then the Dahada player sacs to Culling the Weak to get enough mana to tutor and kill the Storm-Kiln Artist. Spicy.
Krark Flusterstorms of course, looking forward to all those treasures, but Merman makes the play of the day with Stunt Double to copy Storm-Kiln Artist, getting his 19 treasures first, then Mindbreak Trapping the other Fluster as well as everything else except a Gamble which he allows because he Opposition Agents the search and makes it the worst tutor ever.
Borne Upon a Wind, etc.
It’s pretty fun to watch as I flick my Elvish Spirit Guide in my hand, all the dice rolls, the intricate stack mechanics, the flash speed goodies, but its even more fun to watch a turn two Rhystic Study by a Thras player pull out all the stops to win the game at the last table of the redemption event.
That’s right. Turn two Rhystic is pretty good . . . if you’re with the worst players.
Mermaids and Mermen, Midrange Hell is over.
Death to Thrasios.
