Game 1
Sean: Krenko | Keegan: Walls (Nat 20) | vs. | Ryan: Torens | Alex: Elenda
Second to last normal league night brings us a hot set of two headed dragon play. The standings ended up shaking out as Sean and Keegan on a team, with Ryan and Alex on the other. This is the last true major shakeup to the top of the yearly leaderboards with Ryan and Keegan on separate sides of the table.
All repeat offenders in the command zone. Keegan went off kilter and chose Walls with his Nat 20. This deck has been struggling, but every time someone pulls it they are instantly in the tables crosshairs. Tough to fight through that, but having a teammate adds that buffer needed to get the ball rolling for the Walls.
Keegan and Sean both took their free mulligans, with Sean unfortunately needing to go to 6 with Krenko. Ryan and Alex won the roll to go on the play.
Honestly this game involved levels of luck that are almost impossible to reach. First and foremost, Sean had a terrible run with Krenko this game. He bricked on 3-4 lands for the entirety of the game. So he got a couple pieces out, but never truly had the mana to get the wheels running. This also meant that Walls was exceedingly open to being the sole focus without the goblin factory pumping out units.
Walls saw hate that it has never seen before. Torens has 3 pieces of creature spot removal, and Arcades saw both Swords to Plowshares and Path to Exile out of him. Elenda was able to produce a Swords as well, which means that by the end of the game, Arcades ate 3 1 mana spot removal spells. For that deck, it is a death sentence if he sees 1-2, the 3rd was the nail in the coffin.
The other side of the table was beginning to run away even early game. I cannot remember the actual pieces, but Torens was getting out some pieces necessary to begin to setup for the win. It was beginning to go wide by mid to end game. Elenda was honestly stalling out pretty early on. It was not able to hit the exact pieces it needed early game, and had a bunch of top end drops in hand.
After looking at cards played and Sean’s deck list, this game should not have ended at all lol. This is going to be a game with an asterisk next to it. Alex ended up playing out a Vito, Thorn of the Dusk Rose and a Sanguine Bond. Now this combo doubles Vito triggers which is super awesome, but unfortunately he thought it was Exquisite Blood. The cards were presented and no objections and the game ended. But yeah we were off on that.
Sketchy Alex and Ryan win to say the least.
Game 2
Sean: Obuun | Keegan: Animar | vs. | Ryan: Krenko (Nat 20) | Alex: Torens
For the second installment of our final 2HD game we saw another Nat 20 during the deck rolling process. This time it was from across the table with Ryan. Hearing Krenko hate he chose to run him with the natty. Animar also got another appearance in the command zone after his thousand year slumber.
A lot of mullys for this game though. Sean, Alex, and Ryan all took their free mulligan. Someone flipped a Shandy and Sean took that as well. Unfortunately this was not enough and Sean ended up having to go to 6. Alex and Ryan again won the die roll to go on the play.
This ended up being another very fast game for us. Obuun was able to hit some ramp and get himself out on curve, which is always a plus in a deck like that. Keegan was also able to find the bees knees with Animar. He got him out on curve, and quickly found a draw engine in Beast Whisperer. Additionally he found a Shrieking Drake which is cheap and efficient way to draw cards off the Beast Whisperer and put a counter on Animar. Honestly Sean and Keegan were a turn or two away from hitting a point where it was boardwipe or bust for Alex and Ryan.
Alex was starting to build as Torens does, but the power level scaling to Animar is not comparable. They are two different decks, but if Animar is left alone he will be able to draw and pump out a significantly nastier legion of creatures at a more efficient rate. Animar himself having protection from white meant that a lot of Alex’s board was a waste, including his tokens off Torens.
But Ryan had a whole different thought on the game. He was able to deploy Krenko who was not removed. He was then able to tutor out a Skirk Prospector. Additionally he had naturally drawn into an Umbra Mantle. He was able to deploy that with Skirk out and some fodder, leading to infinite goblins off of Krenko. I believe Goblin Chieftain was out and we had infinite 2/2 goblins with haste.
And with the first infinite Goblin combo the table has seen, Alex and Ryan took the second game of the night.
Game 3
Sean: Hapatra | Keegan: Tuvasa | vs. | Ryan: Walls | Alex: Atla
Yeah look at that lineup ^. This game was going to be a short, I’m-going-to-beat-your-face-in game from either side. It was up to the god of the draw.
Sean and Alex took their free mullys, and Sean and Keegan won the roll to go on the play.
Early on Alex realized that he kept a hand missing a color, but kept cause it had great pieces. So yeah he had all of the pieces out that are nasty in Atla, but was missing a color for 80% of the game. A recurring trend with his hands lmfao.
Walls was starting to get going, I believe deploying a wipe to clear Tuvasa at one point.
But this was a Yawgmoth, Thran Physician + Young Wolf + Zulaport Cutthroat win here. For those wondering, no this is not a modern league.
But a combo W for Sean and Keegan there.