I nearly missed this weeks Standard Showdown.

The morning had started as usual for a Saturday (I won’t bore you again with my morning routine). I was bathed, dressed, caffeinated and fed. All in good time. In fact if I had left at that point I’d have been early and had time to play a few games before battle commenced.

Instead I decided to go down a rabbit hole and start digging out Standard legal pirate cards (which is basically the Ixalan block) for building a pirate deck. A deck that John the owners daughter could play with, or use the cards to strengthen her own deck. I liked the idea of her pirate deck, it just needed to be more consistent. Too many one of’ s.

When I finally popped my head out of the rabbit hole, what I thought had been five to ten minutes of sorting through cards. Had actually been nearly an hour, and I know had less than an hour to get to my FLGS.

I grabbed a play mat, my card quiver with my standard decks and dice. Rushed out of the door and hit the road.

Despite the time pressure my drive over was relaxed and uneventful. Helped by not being a lunatic behind the wheel, sticking to speed limits, and listening to the latest Dice Pool podcast looking at the recently released Android Shadow of the Beanstalk source book for the Genesys RPG.

As I was making my way into the store I bumped into Paul. He was just making his way back from the coffee shop, coffee in hand. In side Paul accepted my invite to play our decks.

There wasn’t much rememberable about the game. My deck fired. Paul’s didn’t. We just finished playing as the first round match ups were announced.

Casual game with Paul I won.

The days field consisted of 8 players.

Round 1 Andrew (knights)

This round went the way I suspected. It was also a match up I was looking forward to.

Andrew is one of the better players at the store, and on a budget builds great decks. So pitching my deck and skills against him is always a great opportunity to test them.

The actual sideboard card I needed for going against Andrew’s deck was in the sideboard of my mono blue mill deck. Selective Snare, Sleep or River’s Rebuke would have been handy cards to have to buy me time.

But sadly they weren’t an option.

I was happy to take one game, and force a decider. I’m sure my “in response” when able to be played was annoying.

Result: Loss 2-1

Round 2 Nathan (green aggro)

Nathan is the son of one of the stores “elite” players. His dad wasn’t playing today (luckily).

The overall story of this match up was me saying “in response…” The annoying blue counter side of my deck really kicked in.

Our first game I was able to stabilise around five life, after taking a pounding from a Carnage Tyrant. Luckily a Biogenic Ooze came to my rescue along with a Hydroid Krasis. If my fading memory isn’t failing me I managed to get two out in this game at the same time. Double +1/+1 triggers at the start of my end step. The writing on the wall forced Nathan to reach the conclusion that his position was futile and concede the game.

Game two was similar, but luckily with Andrew playing Dean next to me I had the Judge next to me to clarify rules questions with. Nathan did try pulling a fast one at one point. Having played a Nullhide Ferox, whilst I was clarifying the hexproof and if it stood whilst casting. He moved to end of turn. With the ruling I could counter it, I insisted he was unable to move to end of turn, and the Nullhide Ferox was countered.

To be fair the Nullhide Ferox out wouldn’t at that point have caused me much of an issue. But it was the principle at stake.

Result: Win 2-0

Round 3 Paul (White/blue something)

Paul and his decks are a conundrum. I’d love to look at the deck lists. Paul is a great, friendly guy that is fun to play against. But his decks seem to be not ready for prime time!

Both of our games he mulligans down to five cards. Which means l’m starting with card advantage. Both games he amplified the advantage by going first.

It’s hard to counter stuff when your opponent isn’t playing cards! Either Paul wasn’t hitting lands to play cards in hand, or he wasn’t hitting anything but lands.

So without pressure I’m able to set up my own board state and counter the odd card when played.

I’d like to say that may be it was just two games of bad luck on the card draw, But a comment at the start of the round by John would imply that their match up was a similar affair.

As you know by my deck lists I’m not a deck builder savant. But there is something about Paul’s decks that isn’t quite right.

Result: Win 2-0

Apart from Round 3, I swapped out Nexus of Fate for two copies of Root Snare and a Frilled Mystic.

Final position: 4th with a 2-1 record

Afterwards whilst waiting for the final results to be announced Paul and I played a casual game again, this time using different decks. I played my mono blue mill deck against I think his pirate deck.

A couple of early Duress’s played by Paul denied me of a mill card and a counter spell. But with a couple of Persistent Petitioners, a Wall of Lost Thoughts, a couple of Vodalian Arcanist and a Muse Drake out I actually won the game with damage and not milling. Although I did do some milling. A couple of times Paul did hit me with my own Muse Drake with an annoying Hijack.

Casual game with Paul – Win

I didn’t take any Commander decks with me so had to borrow a deck from Andrew. The one I played was an Omnath elemental deck. I fell behind on the land drops, so there wasn’t much I could do. But on the other hand I also wasn’t a threat.

I did come across a nice card that would nicely into my big green stompy deck. But although it wouldn’t be thematic it would be nice in one or two other decks like the Horrors from the Deep, or even the elf deck.

Despite a slow start I did manage to hang in to be first loser.

Another great afternoon of MtG. I’ll put up new deck list with the tweaks tomorrow. Need to keep the length of this long post down.