Written by Quantumdemon on February 15, 2007
Extended PTQ Report: Affinity *7th*
by QuantumdemonIntroduction
Hello everybody, I'm Kenneth Ellis, a good old tournament spike for about two years from the great state of California. In the IRC rooms I'm known as QD- or Quantumdemon. Recently, my good friend Chris Davis a.k.a Shyft -level 2 judge extraordinaire- about the general magic tech talk when the discussion got to the his extended deck he planned on playing in the PTQ a week from then. I hadn't even realized there was one in Vegas at the time of the Planar Chaos release and immediately knew I HAD to go. After a consultation with the ol' girlfriend (yes I'm a slightly whipped), I determined that we would drive and that it would take about 8 hours; however, I made a promise to myself to go to every extended PTQ this season until I won one.
I talk to Chris a few days before the event and let him know I'm definitely going, I check up on his status concerning his deck of choice, he informs me he's going but doesn't have the deck together. I make the ubiquitous, "I'll get your deck together for you because
you're one of my best friends a few days before the tournament," promises I tend to make. I also ask one of my tournament buddies if they want to go, but only my friend Jay comes
along. That'll cut off my drive time giving me more time to sleep on the way. I get off work early Saturday and we're on our way to Vegas baby.My weapon of choice: Affinity
The still sexily fast and broken deck that raped tournaments all across the United States when Mirrodin was the next big thing is still as good as ever. Surprised? Well, I actually hesitated playing the deck when Karsten did his little article where he made a point to point out the obvious and proclaim, "Eureka! Affinity is still good!" which led me to believe people would sideboard more hate, expecting it. However, I determined that it wouldn't deter people from playing U/W tron, Boros without Kataki, trinket angel, Ichorid or tog, all good matches for affinity. Yes, boros is a GOOD matchup for affinity, they no longer run pillage or Kataki, meaning, affinity rolls over them their draws are reasonably (for Affinity) good. I decided to have some balls and just go with the deck I felt comfortable with.
| Ravager Affinity ala QD- | ||
|---|---|---|
| Main Deck | Sideboard | |
|
4 Ornithopter 4 Arcbound worker 4 Arcbound Ravager 4 Frogmite 4 Myr enforcer 4 Chromatic Star 4 Pithing Needle 4 Pyrite Spellbomb |
4 Cranial Plating 4 Thoughtcast 4 Vault of whispers 4 Great Furnace 4 Seat of Synod 4 Blinkmoth nexus 2 Darksteel citadel 2 Glimmervoid |
4 Cabal Therapy 4 Darkblast 4 Trickbind 3 Tormod's crypt |
Card Choices
I believe Pithing Needle is be one of the best artifacts in Extended because it stops a lot of key cards in a lot of decks, and almost every deck in Extended has some kind of activated ability that makes it work better. There are very few matches (Except vs. Ritual Desire) that I regret having them main deck; in fact, I’ve won several games because I have them main deck.
Secondly, Pyrite Spellbomb is one of the better artifacts in affinity because of versatility issues. I wanted there to be two slots where I can stick anything in depending on the matchup; that way, my deck would be versatile while having disruption. When I built the deck needle was my first choice, and I chose pyrite spellbomb because it is removal, a cantrip, or something to help me accelerate out a first turn Frogmite. In this deck it’s Llanowar Elves, shock, and Evermind. Typically I take it out against control for discard (i.e Therapy).
Against a lot of decks I try to sideboard expecting their sideboard strategies. For instance, against control, they might board a lot of different answers, so I run therapy, as I can hit a main deck card like a draw spell or a wrath, and if I see something alarming I can flash it back on a Arcbound worker and not really lose anything while considerably setting them back. Crypt and Trickbind are there to hose other straight forward strategies that may have draws that can outrace mine. Hosing other archetypes is always good. Finally, trickbind goes in for almost any other aggressive creature as it’s both a combat trick and reusable removal spell. It depends on the match up, but I usually take out Pithing needle.
The Tournament
Jay and I head down to the tournament at around 8 am, a couple of hours before the tournament because, well, I messed up bad. My friend Chia, who I usually borrow cards from before a tournament, went the Planar Chaos Prerelease, and I have about sixteen out of the 75 cards needed for Chris' deck between my friend Jay and I. So I had my work cut out for me unless I wanted to disappoint my friend who also traveled a great distance to get to the PTQ. I can happily say after a few stressful hours of frantic trading, buying, and borrowing, we got 73 out of the 75 cards before the tournament, except for the almighty 2 remands absolutely no one had for some reason. We add in some Mana leaks as replacement at the last second and Chris is ready to go. I'm ready to go (with a splitting headache).
Round 1
Opponent: Joe, Mongreen aggro??/UG static/opposition
I had yet to play against this deck, although I've seen the list from the Oklahoma PTQ. I didn't know if it was a good or a bad matchup, but looking at the list from Oklahoma, despite mana accelerators, it looked quite slow vs. Affinity, with no outs except an active jitte or early opposition.
Game 1:
So we shuffle up for game one, and I lose the die roll, per usual, and we're off to the races with his first turn Birds off of forest. My hand is pretty nutty, with a Vault, into Arcbound worker, double Ornithopter, frogmite, second turn, Seat of synod, Myr enforcer, Myr Enforcer. He has one Bird, an elf, and a wirewood symbiote. Needless to say the game took about three minutes, including shuffling.
Game 2:
I board out the spellbombs for darkblast. I never see a darkblast, but I get a couple of thopters, a couple of platings, and the lands to make it work, the game is over almost as fast as the first. I feel bad for my opponent, he seems like a nice guy, the deck is interesting, but affinity did what it does best. I wish him luck and I'm off to Starbucks for a hot chocolate and an eclair. I haven't eaten and still have a headache, luckily, eating helped a lot. Aggro is a good choice for a PTQ, I got a chance to scout while the control players were still in game two. I see a LOT of U/W tron, some boros, a couple of other affinity players, and a couple of weird decks, like a five color bringer deck.
Record: 1-0(2-0)
Round 2
Opponent: Steve, U/W tron?/U/W 8 post
Game 1:
Steve's a cool guy, I played him just a few weeks ago in the San Diego PTQ where I went 5-2 with the same deck, playing him in the fourth round and just rolling him over, 2-0 as he was playing U/W tron, a horrible matchup for him. I presume he's playing the same deck from a pregame banter where he implores "This time I'm ready for you" We get going when he wins the roll, per usual. Just like last time. He apparently
upgraded his deck in his own words, by taking out tron and putting in the posts. This becomes clear when he drops a turn one cloudpost, turn two cloudpost, signet, a vesuva, and then decree's for a boatload of soldiers, as he doesn't have access to double white, but I have flyers, with platings, the game goes quicklyGame 2:
I side out Spellbombs for Cabal Therapies. I think I know the kind of player Steve is from out last match and I doubt he would sideboard Kataki, which he called "too narrow" before. Second game goes very well; I get a plating, a nexus, a double therapy, I make some nifty plating tricks, and it's over quickly Apparently he sided in condemns, disenchants, all kinds of hate, but it wasn't enough, as condemn doesn't do well against therapy. He looks despondent, and I implore him to stay in the tournament, there was
only like eighty people at the tournament, he's a good player, the deck is good, there's aggro everywhere, and he boards his whole board vs. it. He says he might, I tell him if he does I'll see him in top 8, half joking.
Record: 2-0(4-0)
Round 3
Opponent: Lawrence, Karsten Boros
Game 1:
Lawrence to the table and flips out his playing mat studded with numerous top 8 pins, needless to say, it's intimidating. I lose the roll again. He makes his true colors known when he flips out a Bloodstained mire into a Sacred foundry into a Kird Ape. I figure, Zoo, possibly Gaea Zoo. However, his turn two Temple garden into Silver knight exposed him to be Karsten Boros. My life total drops to twelve, but the time I get out a few Myr enforcers, Ravagers and a whole lot of damage while still having guys much bigger than his blocking. Not much he can do, he looks visibly frustrated, but I like this: he's on tilt. He expected to win handily as most boros players do.
Game 2:
He elects to play once again, drops a couple of little guys who I spellbomb and darkblast, and I play out a couple of frogmites and Workers. The game quickly ends when I drop two ravagers. There wasn’t anything he can do other than to burn me out, he got me down to eight, before my army of Modularfied men smashed in for eleven unblocked. Although ancient grudge got the obvious 2 for 1 with a couple of my key cards, Ravager destroys traditional beatdown plans. He is now very visibly upset, and I feel bad so I try to encourage him by saying that it was a bad matchup for him, which he vehemently denies. I get kind of mad so I just mutter that I've played like 80 matches online vs. boros, and it's heavily in my favor unless they have kataki, which I have 8 answers to.
Record: 3-0(6-0)
Round 4
Opponent: Peter, U/W Trinket tron
Game 1:
Pete was a kid, maybe fifteen, although he had been playing magic in tournaments longer than I've been playing magic all together. We had playing next to each other the entire tournament, I knew the kid was pretty good, but I also knew he was playing a good matchup for me, another U/W tron deck at the top table, although his had the deviation
of playing trinket mage. Anyway, as it played out, I was forced with a difficult decision of sacrificing my ravager to my blinkmoth nexus because I sensed he had a wrath.
However, if he had a trinket mage, he could needle my nexus and it would be just as bad. So I thought for some time before sacrificing to the nexus, at which point the kid called the judge. Who ruled somehow that I hadn't activated the nexus too late, to be able to target it with the ravager ability, which was ridiculous to me. Especially at that point in the tournament and the rules level enforcement we were at. This caused my ravager to die and allow him to wrath away my guys leaving me nothing but a nexus and a couple of lands.
Game 2:
Okay, so I was a little on tilt because of the whole judge thing, and I sided out the Spellbombs for Cabal Therapy. I'm on the play of course. I keep a hand that had about five lands, a therapy and a plating, no nexus. On second thought, I should've mulled the creature light hand. Considering, I run twenty creatures, I figured I'd draw into at least one in the next few turns, even a nexus, and hoped the therapy would buy me time. With a crowd around us, I therapy away two Fact or fictions, leaving him with a Remand and a couple of signets. Obviously, at that point, if I draw a creature, I'm in a good shape; however, I proceed to draw twelve lands in total, making it a long frustrating game. As he
had the time to resolves both FoFs, giving him a hand full of answers if my deck ever decided to offer up a creature, or anything. Eventually he finds an exalted angel and the game ends equally. It was frustrating, but it happens, I knew I was very much still in the hunt, so I decided I needed to relax, focus, and keep on course for the top 8.
Record: 3-1(6-2)
Round 5
Opponent: Zach, Gruul deck wins
Game 1:
I knew if I won this game I could draw into the top 8, so this was very impor
tant for me. I needed to focus, and this kid Zac looked like he was anything but focused. This was a "bonus round", whoever won this round got a pack of Russian time spiral, and personally I was probably the only person in the room that couldn't care less. I wasn’t playing in this PTQ to win packs, I was playing to win period, as far as I was concerned the "bonus round" was nothing more than a distraction I didn't need. We rolled the die, I lost, again...and I proceed to watch my opponent throw his hands back in disgust, butproclaiming he had a good mulligan record all day, saying, "Every time I mulliganed today, I won," finally settling at five cards. I keep my initial seven, and he throws down a Kird ape fully pumped turned 1 off of stomping ground. Thoughts cross my mind: Zoo? Karsten boros again? R/G beats? I'm going to say it was gruul beats, as game one, all I saw was maindeck sudden shock, Lavamancers, Kird apes, and call of the herd; however, all of which chump blocked, and I played around Sudden shock by playing my Ravagers when he was tapped out and eating an arcbound worker or a chromatic star to bring them to 3/3. The deck seemed pretty underpowered, but he did mulligan. I swing in with an 8/8 Ravager and a 4/6 Ornithopter, he chumps his last blocker, draws a card and then shuffles up for game two.
Game 2:
I'm feeling REALLY good, I'm on the verge of top 8, I don't sideboard at all. I could bring in darkblasts, but I figure I'll need needles in case he brought in Jitte's. He's on the play and keeps his initial seven, leading off with a stomping ground into Kird Ape turn one again. I match him with a couple of first turn Frogmites followed next turn by a Thoughtcast, and a Worker. I draw into a Ravager, and he never plays more than a couple of creature, the game ends when I start freely swinging in with a plated thopter. He must not have removal, although strangely he has plenty of mana and four cards in hand. Curiously, he just scoops up his cards in disgust. I feel bad, so I just give him the booster pack and tell him to win out and try to win the amateur prize. I ask him what he sided in, he says four krosan grips, and I wonder what he had in his hand when he conceded, but he just walks off. I don't mind, because I just need to get a good pair, and I can draw into the top 8. Woohoo!
Record: 4-1(8-2) Best tie breakers in the room.
Round 6
Opponent: Kevin, 5 Color Bringers deck
-Intentional draw-
Record: 4-1-1(8-2-1)
TOP EIGHT
The top 8 decks are as follows
2 Ravager Affinity (guess who)
1 Boros Deck wins
1 URW Solution
1 U/W 8 Post (my round 2 opponent)
1 Karsten Boros (my round 3 opponent)
1 U/W Trinket Tron (my round 4 opponent)
1 Five color bringer deck (my Round 6 opponent)
I'm in fourth place after the swiss. I get randomly paired vs. the other Affinity deck, which sucks because I hate mirrors, and I have had bad experience with affinity mirrors which are true coin flips. I also have no sideboard for the mirror except maybe some surprises like darkblast or trickbind, which are at best marginal vs. affinity. The last time I played an affinity mirror match it was at a key junction at the last PTQ and I ended up losing because I played pithing needle on Cranial Plating, after my opponent played one, and I ended up hitting three on the next four draws, and never found a Ravager. That was game three.
Round 7
Opponent: James Gates, Ravager Affinity
Game 1:
This game is slaughter; I have the far superior draw and hit a chromatic star+Thoughcast= Ancestral recall draw to further exacerbate my already commanding board position. We then begin shuffling up for game 2 and I feel happy being up a game in a coin flip matchup.
Game 2:
This takes considerably longer, we both are explosive out of the gate, I actually sided out my pithing needles for two trickbind, two darkblast, in the hopes that those combat tricks cou
ld win me the game. The board position stalls early, we trade creatures and spells, he needles my cranial plating. I stall out on my draws and hit a thoughtcast and manage to throw out a couple of enforcers that look like they might win me the game. However, he finds a thoughtcast into Myr enforcer+Ravager, which beats my draw because I never saw a Ravager. I have a chance, I draw my trickbind, and I start chump blocking and I hatch a plan. I gang-block the ravager and leave the Enforcer open, meaning...if he gambled, and decided to sacrifice his Ravager to his enforcer, it would be lethal damage, and he would take the game, with only two lands open, none of which were Red sources, I figured he would take the chance and end the game before I could draw my Ravager. However, he simply sacrifices every permanent, which I anticipated; however, instead of dumping the modular counters and pretty much giving me the game, he simply allowed his ravager to grow bigger than my blockers. His board position is wrecked and in order to save face I pyrite spellbomb the ravager with damage on it, he responds by sacrificing a few more permanents, and I trickbind, killing the ravager and creating a huge Myr Enforcer. Unfortunately, he didn't take the bait, and it costs me the game. After the match was over, he explained to me in certain terms "I don't take risks", to which I respond, "Wish I knew that."Game 3:
So it comes to down to this game, win and I move on, lose and I'm out. Pressure's on, so I decided to take out the tricks as I knew he'd play around them, and I added my needles back in. I have a fast draw, and by turn three I have my whole hand on the table. However, he matches me with bigger guys. His enforcers stall out the game, and we both had no cards, so it was pretty much who drew better, I drew lands, he drew spells, and the game ends after a long mirror. In fact, out of all the matches, surprisingly, the affinity mirror took the longest, they even started the semifinals while we were on game two still. I congratulate James and wish him luck and told him whoever won our match would win the tournament, or they'd better as almost every deck in the top 8 is either a coin flip or a great matchup. The decks who made it to Semis were U/W 8 post (my round two opponent, congrats Steve!), UWR Solution, and Boros. I believe the boros and tron player got paired, and UWR has a lot of trouble against affinity.
Conclusion
The PTQ was a fun experience; I'm disappointed with not winning the whole thing but with two more PTQs to go, I'm very positive that I'll make another run at a top 8. Hopefully I'll be writing an article soon about a PTQ win, and represent Magic-League at Pro Tour Yokohama, if so, look out for me. I don't know if I'd recommend the deck, Affinity is NOT your father's aggro deck, the deck is very difficult to play correctly and even people who have tons of experience with it, like myself (thanks to magic-league) sometimes make mistakes. However, it's powerful, but if you're not a gambler, don't play this deck. You will always face hate, but your matchups are never unwinnable because like combo, you have some draws that no deck can beat. Well I hope you all enjoyed the article, I look forward to writing more in the future. One thing's for sure: someone from Magic-league WILL take down a PTQ and when they do, I hope they write a smoking article with a badass decklist. See you guys on IRC and in the minis, and once again, good luck in your upcoming PTQ's.
-QD
Jacois on 2007-02-15 08:32 MDT I've also noticed that the Affinity mirror is a grueling affair. Affinity is difficult to play. I am an avid fan of Affinity, and it is VERY skill testing to play. People who don't play Affinity think I mean it's hard to play because you have to add, but that's not it at all. Pick up the deck for the first time, and you'll be shocked at the many nuances of an affinity deck.
Anyways, good report. I'll be using Affinity this Saturday at the Montreal PTQ. Wish me luck!
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Jacois on 2007-02-15 08:32 MDT oh, and 1st!
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Rawrer on 2007-02-15 08:58 MDT 2nd!
What exactly happened in round 4 with the judge thing? It isn't very clear to me.
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|kaoz| on 2007-02-15 09:19 MDT btw, why not shrapnel blast?
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SOAD on 2007-02-15 09:30 MDT 4 spellbombs instead of 1 and 3 blast
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Spyx on 2007-02-15 09:37 MDT 1 Five color bringer deck (my Round 6 opponent)
loool that guy owns
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Pazzur on 2007-02-15 09:40 MDT bah im playing dirty kitty this sunday dont think i have much of a chance at my ptq
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Shooter on 2007-02-15 10:34 MDT Well, my list has 60 md cards = to yours o.0
sb I use 4 shrapnel,4 tormod's,4 stifle and 3 darkblast.
Affinity still is one of the best decks in ext, if not the best =[
gj
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Tranquil on 2007-02-15 10:44 MDT congrats for top8!
by the way..who won?
and plz explain better the judge thing.
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Shiva on 2007-02-15 11:02 MDT affinity w/o blast md = poor
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Equinox- on 2007-02-15 11:17 MDT Shiva = poor
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ringman on 2007-02-15 11:28 MDT i played affinity for 2 straight years no stopping and i still think im a noob player w/ affinity so guess what?
for me the most dificult deck to play in all mahgic but the more powerful of all(not considering broken decks).
Im still not playing it this weekend bcz im not feeling w/ luck enough to play aggro so ill play trinket post and hopefully win and go to pt:P
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Biorhythm on 2007-02-15 11:49 MDT hmm i guess the judge thing went like this:
A(ravager): i sac ravager, in resp to modular trigger i activate nexus
B(kid): JUDGE!!!!
J: yes no counters on nexus, because the target has to be set when the abbility triggers...
B: haahahahahhaahah
A: arggggg
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Ro on 2007-02-15 12:13 MDT You have some heavy emotions going on there :P.
You can feel sorry and hate the same person in a snap!
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Eldariel on 2007-02-15 13:34 MDT I think the "sometimes" in the "mistakes"-part should be "every game". Good job though, you must've played quite well to get that far (although I'm surprised you didn't appeal to the head judge in round 4). Also, why not just make lethal blocks on both, and Trickbind his Ravager's first activation? Or what was the board position like?
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sonicqaz on 2007-02-15 14:01 MDT How did your friend do?
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Nether on 2007-02-15 14:02 MDT Affinity is easy to play, it is hard to play good. Anyone who tells you otherwise, hasn't actually played the deck.
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CookieCutter on 2007-02-15 14:10 MDT 1337
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Eldar on 2007-02-15 14:33 MDT Heh I <3 affinity so much. Glad to see it doing well again. I'm gonna have to go and trade for my all foil version off my friend and play it again. And I will say it one more time for anyone who is dumb enough to contradict me. Affinity is easy to play but very difficult to play well.
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TD on 2007-02-15 17:11 MDT That was a pretty bad mistake on the ravager - nexus thing; yeah, its seemingly minor, but you shouldn't make mistakes like that at REL 3. You totally deserved the loss on G2 of the quarterfinals; you sided incorrectly for that game, and though I can't see your hands, it sounds like your draw G3 didn't have a lot of strength, just speed, which Raffinity can definitely shut down. As for BDW being a good matchup - if people playing BDW don't play Kataki (and at good PTQs, they do) then they deserve to lose.
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IanRobbins on 2007-02-15 17:43 MDT Yea, i believe what happened is he sacriiced his ravager, and then animatd his nexus. Forcorse you need a target for the couters, so the ravager ended up just dying, i have seen this called before, its hard, but its the rules.
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Quantumdemon on 2007-02-15 19:12 MDT Shrapnel Blast is very good, crazy good, however, I went with versatility in this build, not power. Sometimes Blast is the only card that can win you some games and sometimes it's just a dead card that you're looking for a color source for. My build uses pyrite to generate an early affinity count so I can more consistently get turn 3 or turn 2 enforcers and not really give up a lot of card advantage. If you wanted to cut needle for blast, I wouldnt be against it, but needle sometimes is an autowin vs. a lot of decks. Autowins are nice.
The mistake with the Ravager was awful, however, it wasnt really a mistake, I was deliberating on my play and the kid decided he was going to be an ass about what I was "implying" with my hand movements. When I decided on the final play, it was correct, however, the issue is if I activated the nexus before modular went on the stack, which I did. The judge somehow determined that I sacrificed my Ravager before I activated the nexus by me picking up the dice on it. Stupid situation, I'm still kind of steamed.
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jheezy on 2007-02-15 21:34 MDT congratz on the finish
affinity ftw
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Nantuko on 2007-02-15 22:03 MDT If it's not first place, whats the point in reporting. Nobody wants to play a failure deck. FAILURE!
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Quantumdemon on 2007-02-15 22:35 MDT ...
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Erebus- on 2007-02-15 22:49 MDT Which California PTQ did you attend? SoCal or Mountain View? Because you don't appear in either.
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C-Board on 2007-02-16 14:00 MDT its a las vegas ptq, they never reported it, i know he was there because i recognise some of the so-cal players in this report.
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Quantumdemon on 2007-02-16 17:07 MDT Yeah, it was Vegas, or um, Henderson or whatever, I was the dude with the black hat and black Misfits shirt.
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Linkman on 2007-02-17 12:48 MDT Óne word. PILE. The only reason you did so well was getting easy matchups. I doubt you'd survive an early kataki, and yes, boros still plays that main.
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fugii on 2007-02-17 18:07 MDT nice report!
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MTGFAN911 on 2007-02-17 21:58 MDT which judge gave you the ruling???
it wasn't Brian Page or Jack was it :/.
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sonicqaz on 2007-02-18 03:36 MDT How did your friend end up?
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Quantumdemon on 2007-02-19 03:23 MDT The day did not go well, which is strange because I'm used to always seeing him top 8 when I go to tournaments, not me.
