Report GenCon SoCal 2004

Hello all, I guess the task falls to me to write a tournament report for the GenCon tournament in Southern California. The tournament was sponsored by Cardshark.com and had 13 players. This is our worst number yet, but considering the low attendence of GenCon(CA) this and past years it is actually not that bad. They had a bunch of Unhinged release events that were sponsored by Wizards and they only had 2-3 times the number of people in our event.

First some rants. Once again we got listed in the ´´wrong´´ category and were under CCGs. They have 2 categories TCG and CCG and Wizards put all their events in TCG for Magic and ours was the only Magic event in CCG. I am not sure how much this effected the attendence as the book was pretty straight forward and listed by date and time. Another rant is about power. We requested power, and when we showed up got bounced around to different tournament headquarters and finally ended up getting our table from Wizards in the end. There was a power outlet on a pillar by us, but when plugging into it, found it was not active even. So we decided to run the tournament on paper. Thanks to Ted Beardsley for his help doing a paper swiss tournament. We had one of the tournament desk workers from the CCG area come over and threaten that we would get a $300 fine if caught using non-union approved power. This was half way through our tournament and we were using plain old pencil and paper, but he felt compelled to give us attitude... not sure why.

Anyways, all the negative stuff out the way, on to the good stuff. I feel we had a great and enthusiastic group of players. We had 13 in all and everyone played great games and had a good time. We did 4 rounds of swiss with a cut to top 8 single elimination. We did 50 minute rounds, but never reached time any of them. There was one rotating bye, but it worked out good since one player showed up late and was able to play as he had the bye and had time to finish his deck.

I am going to try to list the names and match results as good as I can. If anyone here actually played in the tournament and wants to submit a deck list that would be great.

The Players:

• Matthew Crofoot (cardshark.com, Peasant Council Member) (Elf-clamp)

• Johnny Lai (Peasant Council Member) (Red land destruction)

• Erik Wiessmann (former Master of Peasant Magic champion) (Elf-clamp)

• Adam Fischer (goblin sligh)

• Ted Beardsley (black ?)

• Jim Wozniak (black aggro control)

• John Hostetter (r/b/u affinity)

• Raf Erana (?)

• Shane Neville (r/g cloudpost/fireball)

• Wade Lindley (r/u isochron scepter)

• Roger Fondren (r/b/u affinity)

• Andrew Valkanas (mono Unhinged)

• Ryan Gan (blue/green mess)

Round 1:

Wozniak (2-0) vs. Valkanas (black aggro control beats unhinged 2-0)

Hostetter (2) vs. Lai (1) (Affinity beats land destruction 2-1)

Fondren (2) vs. Beardsley (1) (Affinity beats black ? 2-1)

Wiessmann (2) vs. Lindley (0) (Elf-clamp beats u/r scepter 2-0)

Crofoot (2) vs. Neville (0) (Elf-clamp beats r/g fireball 2-0)

[This was my first match and I beat r/g fireball mostly because of main deck blastoderms that he couldn't deal with using burn and his lack of creatures.]

Fischer (2) vs. Erana (0) (Goblin Sligh beats ? 2-0)

Gan vs. Bye

Round 2:

Wozniak (2) vs. Gan (0) (black aggro control beats u/g mess 2-0)

Fischer (2) vs. Hostetter (1) (Goblin sligh beats Affinity 2-1)

Crofoot (2) vs. Fondren (1) (Elf-clamp beats Affinity 2-1)

[These were some close matches... I basically got my drawing engine going before he could pound me with flying creatures. I sideboarded four naturalizes after first game. I lost second game due to letting my self get down to 5 life because I didn't block when he had an atog and Disciple of the Vault on the table... doh]

Erana (2) vs. Valkanas (1) (? beats Unhinged 2-1)

Lai (2) vs. Neville (1) (Land Destruction beats r/g Fireball)

Beardsley (2) vs. Lindley (1) (Black ? beats u/r scepter 2-1)

Wiessmann vs. bye

Round 3: Fight!

Wiessmann (2) vs. Wozniak (0) (Elf-clamp beats Black aggro control 2-0)

Fischer (2) vs. Crofoot (0) (Goblin Sligh beats Elf-clamp 2-0)

[These games were tough as Adam was playing Erik's Goblin Sligh deck which I have tuned against for about 4-5 years now). I can usually take the goblin deck at the height of my game, but Adam played it more like control and did not let me keep an elf on the table even though he brought his own life down to 3-5 using the Goblin Sparksmith many times). I feel if I had the mana elves, I could have got out some blastoderms faster for a win, but it didn't happen. Also the Goblin deck is famous for taking you from 13-16 to 0 in one turn with goblin grenades, which is always scary.]

Lai (2) vs. Beardsley (0) (Land destruction beats Black ? 2-0)

Hostetter (2) vs. Gan (0) (Affinity beats u/g mess 2-0)

Fondren (2) vs. Erana (0) (Affinity beats ? 2-0)

Neville (2) vs. Lindley (0) (r/g fireball beats u/r scepter)

Valkanas vs. Bye

Round 4:

Adam Fischer (2) vs. Erik Wiessmann (0) (Goblin Sligh beats Elf-clamp 2-0)

[Adam beats Erik with his own deck and racks up 2 wins for Goblin Sligh against elf-clamp this tournament. I still feel that Blastoderm is essential against red and Erik doesn't run them main deck. I know that elves can take goblins, but in the capable hands of Adam Fischer it just doesn't look possible in this tournament.]

Fondren (2) vs. Wozniak (1) (Affinity beats Black Aggro Control 2-1)

Crofoot (2) vs. Hostetter (0) (Elf-clamp beats affinity)

Lai (2) vs. Valkanas (0) (Land descruction beats Unhinged 2-0)

Neville (2) vs. Beardsley (0) (r/g Fireball beats Black ? 2-0)

Erana (2) vs. Gan (1) (? beats u/g mess 2-1)

Lindley vs. Bye

After 4 rounds of play we chose a top eight.

• Adam Fischer (4-0)

• Erik Wiessmann (3-1)

• Matthew Crofoot (3-1)

• Roger Fondren (3-1)

• Johnny Lai (3-1)

• Jim Wozniak (2-2)

• John Hostetter (2-2)

• Shane Neville (2-2)

One 2-2 did not make the top 8 due to number of games won being the lowest.

Top 8: round 1

Fischer (2) vs. Wozniak (0) (Goblin Sligh beats Black Aggro Control 2-0)

Hostetter (2) vs. Wiessmann (Affinity beats Elf-clamp)

Crofoot (2) vs. Lai (Elf-clamp beats Land Destruction)

[This seemed like an ok matchup for me due to having mana accelerators in the form of elves... it took a long time to build board advantage but once I got out a timberwatch for protection it was pretty easy to stall up to some blastoderms for a win.]

Neville (2) vs. Fondren (1) (r/g Fireball beats Affinity 2-1)

Semi-Finals:

Neville (2) vs. Fischer (r/g Fireball beats Goblin Sligh)

[I didn't expect this match to go this way, but I guess the fireballs took out all of the goblins]

Crofoot (2) vs. Hostetter (1) (Elf-clamp beats Affinity)

[Another match against Hostetter who proved a tenacious opponent throughout the day with his b/u/r Affinity build using Ornothopters. I get 3 well wishers active first game right away to save my butt until I can start going off with card advantage. Second game he Psychic Purges one of my well wishers and affectively took the gamebecause of it and his quick beats after that. Third game I top deck Overrun for the win before I die to ornothopter. These games were much closer than the earlier ones as he had time to get the Cranial Plated flyers out early.]

Finals (Feature Match):

Matthew Crofoot vs. Shane Neville (Elf Clamp beats r/g Fireball)

Once again I face off Shane who I feel was the friendliest player of the day :) I had a lot of fun playing against him. The games went pretty much the same as our first round together. He burned me once for a huge amount for a win I think. The other games were decided once again by blastoderm on the table and him having no creatures and no burn to deal with an untargetable creature. He had 4 Krosan Tuskers which he was able to use as chump blocks against the derms, but that wasn't enough to slow me down as I drew blastoderms quicker than he drew his tuskers. A fatal play error where he burned a creature with an active Timberwatch Elf on

the table helped guarantee my win.

Well, it's weird to win your own tournament, but I am happy for the bragging rights for a few months as Master of Peasant Magic. I think Elf-clamp is a great deck and I have been playing elf builds for many seasons now, but just always missing top 8 due to lack of that last little bit of synergy and card drawing needed. Skullclamp and Quirion Ranger add the extra power to this deck and all of the Onslaught block Elves really add utility and protection as well.

Here's my deck list:

Thanks and hope to see a renewed interest in the Peasant format! 

write by Matthew Crofoot