Game 1
Ryan: Torens | Keegan: Zur | vs. | Sean: Muldrotha | Alex: Korvold
First rolls of the night saw an on paper lopsided matchup. Torens is a great pairing for Zur due to his ability to setup pressure in the early to early mid game. Zur not doing much until 4 usually means that he has counters open to use defensively to make sure Torens creatures resolve or that key pieces do not hit from the opponents. A truly lethal pair on paper and theory. Korvold and Muldrotha are a pairing with synergy between them, but very similar play styles. Both want time to setup and do not impact the board in the early turns. A rough matchup for Sean and Alex, with the odds in my non-expert opinion leaning heavy towards Ryan and Keegan.
Keegan ended up taking his free and a mully down to six, but they went on the play regardless.
The early to early mid game was dominated by by Keegan and Ryan. Ryan was pushing creatures out, like Adeline, Resplendent Cathar and Saryth, the Viper’s Fang. Torens of course made an appearance, but off curve to get Adeline out. I want to note that this is an entirely rebuilt deck from the last week. Alex disliked the Heliod + Ballista combo win he had, so he rebuilt it to be human tribal first with a sub theme in +1/+1 counters. Zur was slinging counters left and right to protect the early game though. I beleive he countered a Exploration from Alex on T1 with a Swan Song, as well as aggressively countering a Paradise Druid with a Mana Drain I believe on T2. This let him get Zur out a turn early.
Alex and Sean got off to a slow start against the aggro beat down. With their accelerants countered they sputtered a bit harder. Korvold saw a Harrow to help advance his mana, but nothing compared to what could have been a T3 Korvold. It is noted that he was able to get Korvold down around T5 as well as glue on a pair of Lightning Greaves. Muldrotha on the other hand was having a very rough time in not drawing any mana or mana accelerants. He eventually got down a Bird, but it was around T4 or 5 and a bit late to party. If I recall correctly as well he was missing green for a while, and most of his hand was green.
From the jump this game was destined to end early, and around T6 Alex and Sean had no board while looking down a fat beatdown from Torens and a potential volltron hit from an already indestructible Zur. They were sitting at around 14 life while Keegan and Ryan were sitting around 60. It needs to be noted that Alex kept a “break glass incase of emergency” hand with Torment of Hailfire and a personal favorite of Rain of Filth. A turn or two before this though he had drawn a Food Chain, but was missing the only combo piece in Squee, the Immortal. He casts a Rain of Filth and taps his remaining 6 mana for Food Chain and Squee mana. He sacs through four lands and draws a Turntimber Sower which he stupidly casts into a Rest in Peace which was out from Zur. He sacs two more lands and does not see a Squee in sight. He has a single land left on a do or die situation, he sacs and draws. Off the top it is the hard to kill Squee. He resolves both Food Chain and Squee, makes infinite mana and proceeds to show he has a Bastion of Remembrance and an Ashnod’s Altar, as well as a Torment of Hailfire for a bajillion. With Zur almost tapped out and no counter in hand, Alex and Sean pull off a very very clutch Food Chain combo kill.
note: Big shout out to Ryan for pointing out that Food Chain exiles so Alex is not restricted in mana he can produce without fear of decking from Korvold
Game 2
Ryan: Obuun | Keegan: Muldrotha | vs. | Sean: Locust God | Alex: Uril
For the second bout of the night we saw some odd matchups. Obuun and Muldrotha are not bad pairings but not phenomenal either. Obuun can get online fast but does not care about what Muldrotha is doing, and vice versa. With their current builds there is no synergy between them good or bad making it a neutral pairing. Locust God and Uril are the same way. One is a voltron and one is card raw and go wide. No anti-synergy plays but also no true synergy.
Keegan took a free mully and Alex and Sean won the roll to go on the play.
Obuun and Muldrotha had a quality start, well Obuun did. Keegan was roasting his teammate for his deck as he sat on one mana for a long time, followed by an extended period where he was locked out of a color. Tough showing for Muldrotha, she may need a scratch and rebuild. But Obuun was hitting lands and land ramp very well.
Locust God saw an early Sol Ring countered, which left him struggle for mana for a while. Lands over rocks boys, rocks erode, lands are forever. Uril was sitting in the same boat though. He had a T1 Mirri’s Guile, and had all of his colors to get moving. Unfortunately he hit four lands and stalled very hard. He rolled an Armadillo Cloak on to an Azusa, Lost but Seeking. It was looking rough.
Eventually he hit his needed lands and glued an All that Glitters, a Ethereal Armour, Spirit Mantle and a Rancor onto Uril. But the situation was very sticky. Alex had Daybreak Coronet in hand, as well as a Fling. He had lethal the following turn, but needed to push damage in. The issue was that Spore Frog was out and negated the whole plan. Ryan had a known Mouraug, Fury of Akoum in hand. Sean had out a Magus of the Wheel, which Alex had thought that he was going to pop after he had glued his hand to Uril and beat in for damage. Unfortunately Alex did not communicate well and Sean burnt all his mana up and Alex swung in and popped the Spore Frog. The swing left Uril tapped, and the Moraug was able to get upto 10ish extra combats. Without Uril up to kill his lands, Alex and Sean were dead on the spot. Alex also learnt how the fuck Moraug worked with Obuun’s pull up trigger, and goddamn thats a mean Mr. Mustard.
Game 3
Ryan: Zur | Keegan: Zacama | vs. | Sean: Korvold | Alex: Emmara
Wanna talk about a weird ass combo? Zur and Zacama is that. On raw paper, Zacama is a 9 drop that borderline ends the game on etb. But a 9 drop lol. Zur is a portal master. But they both seem like they need a lot of attrition to get online. But then again, Keegan built Zacama, which is actually just hidden ramp tribal. So Zacama is normally arriving around T4-5. He could have arrived T3 during a recent casual game with all land mana. It is a weird ass pairing that is either going to look like me trying to learn to drive a standard transmission, or it will look like Keegan is the nutjob holding his finger over the nuclear warhead button without provocation.
Korvold and Emmara are a good pairing though. Korvold as stated before wants to get online and then get cooking, while Emmara wants to get out early and stick there. She clogs the board and lays the foundation for Korvold to get online and start eating all of the time on the game clock before he eventually wins.
It was truly a mully festival though, with everyone but Alex taking a mulligan, and Alex and Sean won to go first.
Remember the nuclear button analogy? Yeah it ended up being that. Keegan ramped his nuts off, at one point casting Boundless Realms (sick ass include btw) and snagging out 5 lands. Honestly this game did not have a lot to note. There was spot removal for Zur as well as Zacama, but Keegan was mapping out the plan of having a million mana when he cast Zacama. I am serious, he kept ramping even way past the needed time. I was watching him just thinking: insert. The only notable thing that happened I can remember was Alex casting a Cradle of Vitality naming Zur. Honestly this was a lesser of two evils at the moment. But it did not matter, cause Zacama came down shortly after and just face fucked our boards out. He locked out our decks, then ran over us with a Triumph of the Hordes. Oppression is Zacama with no answers, I went and hit the Pithing Needle and spoon after this game.
Game 4
Ryan: Locust God | Keegan: Shrines | vs. | Sean: Tuvasa (natural 20) | Alex: Jhoira
There is actually a new face in this pairing here, and she goes by the name Tuvasa. She was built by Alex but submitted by Keegan cause he owns the cards, and she is a full blown Bantress deck. Her constructed goal was to win through powerful enchantments and go wide, but she ends up more often becoming a voltron deck due to it being a sub plan and she is a natural Ethereal Armour and one time draw engine. Honestly, this commander is incredibly powerful and still needs tuning. Which I know Keegan will do since it is right in his wheelhouse.
Locust God and Shrines as a pairing have a decent amount of synergy due to them both being a late game snowball. They lack any board in the early game, but Locust God make up for it with a nice array of counter spells to distrupt tempo. Tuvasa and Jhoira do not have any synergy between them, but Tuvasa is sort of a battalion on her own, and she displayed that in the game.
Alex, Ryan and Keegan took their free mullys, and both Ryan and Keegan went to 6. Alex and Sean were on the play again.
Early game we had a bit of a slow start, outside of Tuvasa. Alex mullied a hand with only blue and kept a hand with only red with a colorless cantrip to hope to draw blue. Which didn’t happen so he was locked out with a hand of all blue spells for most of the game. Going to 6 for Ryan and Keegan made life a whole hell of a lot harder. Keegan was able to deploy both a Sanctum Weaver and a Sanctum of Stone Fangs. But Tuvasa was built to have blue be a steal color in it. So the Weaver was ripped away by a Treachery, and the Sanctum got snagged by a Steal Enchantment.
That is honestly how most of the game went. Tuvasa quickly became enchantment storm and once Bear Umbra was tutored out, she was essentially taking 2 turns per turn cycle. She is exceptionally greedy and the other side of the table having no answers outside of a Maze of Ith (which kept her at bay for a while) closed the game quick. Sean diversified his voltron pieces and beat into an empty board. It was a wide (for voltron) beat down, giving Sean and Alex a 2-2 record on the night.