Saturday, September 18th, 2010
So I know this is a bit late, as Grand Prix Portland was last weekend. I wanted to post a little recap of my experience there playing an enjoyable format, m11 limited. GP Portland was my first major magic event that I’ve played in as I mostly do my gaming on MTGO playing in drafts and testing out tech for standard. I will go over each round very roughly since I don’t remember a whole lot. The sealed pool deck below is what I put together for the main event. Destructive Force was a last minute inclusion as I wasn’t too sure how well it would work because of how creature heavy my deck was. I knew I had at least two creatures that could survive when I went off, and also that my ramping and Garruk could help me get there and recover post destruction.
Destructive Ramp Sealed
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Round 1 vs U/R Sky/burn
1-0
Game 1-
I came out fast with a cultivate and Garruk. While a gargoyle protected me I ramped up to the destructive force in hand and my opponent only had 5 lands when I cast it. With Garruk on the board and me picking up a few land draws he didn’t last long when he didn’t draw more than 1 land after the destruction.
Game 2-
I kept a 2 land hand with cultivate in it on the draw. I didn’t get a 3rd land until turn 4 or so. A few of his flying beaters and a fire servant made short work of me as he had two lightning bolts that popped for 6 a piece.
Game 3- I started loading the board with a gargoyle, garruk and his pack leader. He bolted the garruk after I made a beast, but I had sideboarded in a Natures Spiral and brought garruk back for another round. With him popping beasts and me drawing cards off the packleader I made short work of him.
Round 2 Vs B/G/R Titans
1-1
Game 1- I did what felt like nothing as he played turn 1 elves, turn 2 garruk’s companion, turn 3 garruk’s companion and ran over me. He bladed the creature I did get out and I died shortly after.
Game 2- Same story here as he played an elves then a companion turn 2 and beat me down a few turns while I goldfished and watched him play his grave titan. After he killed me, he showed me his hand of fireball and doomblade and told me he had a primeval titan in his deck as well as three garruk’s companions.
Round 3 Vs White / Blue
2-1
Game 1- I played some gargoyles and cudgel troll to hold off his guys and beat down. Then garruk and some beast tokens overwhelmed his couple of smallish flyers.
Game 2- We battled back and forth him dropping a vengeful archon and me dropping a duskdale wyrm. He had used most of his smaller flyers to chump my basilisk and spined wurm and even though I took some damage from his archon zapping me I was able to chump block it with my gargoyle and giant growth my guy to punch him out for lethal.
Round 4 Vs Red / White aggro
2-2
-This player had a faster red white build that had a couple of hellhounds and some flyers (including baneslayer angel) One game he got the angel out and I couldn’t outrace it even though I got my giant spider + giant growth set up to kill it before I died, his act of Treason foiled my plan both games taking my last blocker which was all that was standing between him and lethal.
Round 5 Vs White flyers / red removal
3-2
– This match my beasts and wurms did the dirty work being too much beef for him to handle. Game 2 he came out fast with a few flyers, my gargoyle and garrukk kept him occupied while I hit my destructive force and then drew lands while he had none to reload my board with some creatures.
Round 6 Vs White / blue weenie flyers
3-3
– My opponent in this round had 4 squadron hawks and 3 blinding mages, he also had 2 forsees and 2 aether adepts. Game 1 I got mana screwed by keeping a hand I should have sent back. Whatever I managed to stick on the board got sent back to my hand and/or tapped out by his mages. Game 2 I had made it up to destructive force mana while he had a crystal ball out and 3 weenie flyers. I cast it and couldn’t recover while he used crystal ball to find his land drops and send some more cheap flyers at me.
After this loss I dropped and proceded to play cube with the crew and some guys from Canada we met. Some things of note playing in an environment like this is that it was quite taxing physically and mentally. It took a long time for the rounds to finish and for the tourney to move on. I wasn’t quite on my game mentally and felt I could’ve been a bit better prepared for what I had predicted beforehand would be a long grinding process. Overall it was exciting to be a part of a magic event that was on a grand scale and I was glad to have experienced it.
Kevin