Game 1
Ryan: Walls | Keegan: Jhoira | Sean: Emmara | Alex: Locust God
Alex and Sean took their free mulligans, and Sean rolled to go on the play.
The first game of the night was a long, messy, and grindy game. Honestly most of the game was super sloppy and out of pocket. The most notable moves from the table was Emmara. Sean was able to find both of the Soul Sisters, so he was gaining life off of everything and everyone. He also was able to find a couple of lifegain draw pieces like Well of Lost Dreams. He also found an early Ajani’s Welcome, so each token he made was giving him a whitning bolt.
Ryan had a tough showing from the walls. Alex was targeting him / had mass pieces, which lead to a lot of missed land drops from Ryan. Watching the missed land drops into 3 straight milled lands was giving me Zombies flashbacks. Ryan was the first to die thanks to a Craterhoof Behemoth from Sean which hit him for well over lethal.
Alex and the Locust God did not do much on his own board, but he had a couple of big plays that prevented others from closing before he had time to setup. Due to Elixir of Immortality, Keegan was able to pop off 2 Expropriates before Alex was knocked outta the game. Each time though Alex was waiting with a hard counter in order to shut down the probably game ending spell. The concept of countering two Expropriates from one player is bonkers. But we will talk more about this later on. Eventually the Locust God died to the Death Star that Keegan had found and had been powering up.
I need to note that Alex had a hard counter open for the Elixir, but opted to save it for a seemingly more impactful spell. This was probably the worst play in the game due to Keegan being able to shuffle that and his graveyard back into this library. He was starting to get slim on library, and preventing the potential self mill could have been game ending.
With Alex and Ryan out of the game, it was down to just Jhoira and Emmara to close. Sean had lost his library to a ton of draw and mill, but was able to stay afloat due to a friendly neighborhood Hall of Heliod’s Generosity. Unfortunately for him though he was only able to buyback enchantments, which means he was unable to setup the Heliod + Ballista combo win. He did get back an Aura Shards in order to begin to snipe some of Keegan’s key pieces, but forgot the trigger 3 turns in a row. The game was in a true stalemate once Keegan had out Sai, Master Thopterist and Saheeli, Sublime Artificer. Sean could attack and gain life, but Keegan had chump blockers for days and Sean had no trample. It got to a petty point where Keegan was burning life to steal +1/+1 counters from the Heliod trigger with a Spellskite.
Keegan popped off a 3rd Expropriate (l m a o) and realized he had a Millstone win. After Sean stuck the enchantment to the top of his deck, and prior to draw, Keegan activated millstone and clenched a Millstone victory. Magic like Richard Garfield intended.
Game 2
Ryan: Krenko | Keegan: Walls | Sean: Locust God | Alex: Tuvasa
First week in rotation and we get to see Ryan’s Krenko deck make an appearance. This is a goblins deck through and through. It wins through bunny like multiplication of goblins, and they either beat you down or burn you out through Impact Tremors. This is the long overdue mono red deck that I am thrilled to have in our meta.
Keegan and Sean both took a free mulligan, while Sean got himself a Shandy. Ryan won the die roll to go on the play.
Honestly I do not know what happened outside of what I did. Running with Tuvasa, it was a bloodbath. I stalled an Enchanting Evening, then threw down an Aura Thief. Followed that up with a Wrath of God and took everyone’s permanents. Two turns later I killed Sean with a Corrupted Conscious stuck on Tuvasa. The next turn I swung Tuvasa at Ryan and a Starfield Mystic with an Ethereal Armour at Keegan and mopped up the board. Quick, bloody, and efficient Tuvasa win for Alex.
Game 3
Ryan: Elenda | Keegan: Tuvasa | Sean: Atla (Nat 20) | A: Ur-Dragon
No new faces in the mix here, but Sean did scoop up Atla with his Nat 20. That man rolls nats like it is going out of style. The table did get to witness the famous Alex vs. Ur-Dragon showdown. It is an ongoing saga.
There again was not much to note from this game. A sick play was Ryan hitting a T1 Elenda thanks to a Jeweled Lotus. But it did not do much in terms of stopping the gameplan of Tuvasa. She just beat down everyone and everything that was in her way. Alex hit a combo win, while Keegan won through sheer voltron force. It was another quick sweep from Tuvasa. My notes simply say “Keegan big boy win”.
Oh, and Alex missed land drops and hit zero ramp and tilted into the moon. His usual.