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Editor:Staff 8th February 2008
Murdoch Monthly
By Fox Murdoch Phew, what a day! Just home from the Morningtide prerelease and I've been in 3 flights and have squillions of new cards and cajillions of new deck ideas - damn near enough inspiration for any budding pro player. Now my day started by dressing in theme. Creature classes were the hot thing for Morningtide, so it was a Wizard, Rogue, Warrior, Soldier or Shaman I was dressing as. As cool as playing Magic in a bath robe sounds (going Wizard) around town, I felt I had to stay true to my heart, and went Rogue. So if you saw a smashing looking chap who stepped fresh outta the 1920s with a black and white suit and matching fedora, Hi! You've met Fox Murdoch, the Rogue. Dressed, I met up with my good friend Neil, who also dressed up (though certainly
not as stylish). I arrived in the middle of round 1, so had to build the
first of my decks instead of playing. It went something like this.
Taury and Friends (40) Black/Red with a blue splash, Ashling and Mauler to really hit through to the other side and act as a reset button and extra turns with Notorious Throng, man this deck was plenty of fun to play. I was happy with everything I'd put maindeck, and the Mauler was nuts, never died smaller then 5/5 and won 99% of the games it showed up in. Neil and I had also planned to go into Two Headed Giant (hense both dressing up, fun!) but Neil changed plans, so I rang up my No. 1 flunky, Prowler. He had just agreed to come and had hopped on a train into town when Neil changed his mind yet again and decided to stay... Three headed giant? Nah, I don't think the gaming world is ready for that just yet, however in theme it would have been. SO I win my first two rounds and am feeling very good about my deck. The midday flight was about to start however, and it had a different form of prize payout. Rather then 3 boosters no matter where you place, you got 2 boosters every time you won a match. Heck, I could do that, right? Neil and I drop from the first tournament and sit down for the midday flight. We get our jazz and build decks, just as Prowler shows up. My deck looked thus:
Rogues topdeck for the win (40) This deck also went quite well, but wasn't tested too much. I beat my first opponent rather easily, which I was happy of, getting two boosters. My second round opponent wasn't so accomodating however, Ash Cartright proceeded to out play and out wit me rather well. Not that my deck was horrid, I just played into one trick too many. Losing the round and seeing Prowler had shown up, I had a decision to make. Did I go in Two Headed Giant with Neil or Prowler? The other could still play in the casual flight if they wanted, or we could all go into the casual. We end up dropping (Neil hadn't won a match all day at this point, though he had won a game or two so good on him) and hop into the third casual flight of the day. Halfway through this round Chris Foggin makes an announcement. "Would everyone who's been in three different events please come up the front." We were getting a $10 discount for the next weekend Sneak Peek (I couldn't go, would be down the coast) and one of us would win a box of Magic. You know, a whole 36 boosters. Sadly I did not win this, but consoled myself by making the following deck: Rompa-stompa! (40) Oh boy this deck was fun to make. Nath of the Gilt Leaf and (squeel!) Wydwen? Yes! So you'd figure I would go u/b/g huh? Turns out nope, I go B/G with a blue splash for the legendary Faerie and the marvelous Mulldrifter and nothing else. Note that Mulldrifter shows up in all decks that had blue - good card. I beat my first round opponent with some skillfull cutting (the smallest technical cut you can make is one card) which gave him a bad hand for game 1, while he turned the tables and using the same trick gave me a horrid hand for game 2, me mulling down to 4. He had a great start with Oona's Prowler coming out turn 2, but I had an even better foil in Lignify. Prickly Boggart went in for 1 every turn after that. Then in came the power, Chameleon Collusus with pro black (Lignify doesn't change a creatures colour, so the Prowler still couldn't block) who went in for 4, then 8, then dead opponent. Good times. At this point Prowler had had his fill of the new cards and was tired from only having had four hours sleep, and Neil had a party to get to, so we agreed on one more round before we'd head off. Somewhere in the midst of all this booster cracking, opponent snapping, card collecting fun we also had Oportos for lunch. In fact I recall getting back to the Prerelease just in time to scoff my chips, have some water and then eat my burg--start building my deck. Tears. My second round opponent was Clarrie Brown (spelt right?) whom I knew was a very decent player in his own right, though I was determined to not let that undermine my own play skills or tilt myself. I let this sob do it:
I'd been hoping to avoid several cards all day, because as you may very well have seen Morningtide has a big injection of Stupid in it. One card was Giltleaf Archdruid (it isn't that hard to get 7 Druids, just drop 6 dorks then Shields of Velis Vel), Countryside Crusher (oh yeah he's fairly priced) and most importantly Lightning Crafter. 3 damage swinging around the place like a fire hydrant? With no cost greater then Tap? As you can guess the game went bad after that and quickly turned into a lose. Still I thanked Clarrie for his game, it was interesting to play up until the Goblin Shaman of Evil Doomy-Doom Doomness, and I went to find Prowler and Neil. Still feeling like a game Prowler came back to my place and we drafted our prize packs, while Neil vanished into the AEther. I figured a draft was the ideal spot to try out all those cards I'd seen and wanted to test, and thought Hey why not? chucking in random C- grade cards. Somehow Prowler also chose this draft to make the tightest Shaman deck ever, in any draft he's ever done and entirely mop the floor with me. His main plays were the Shaman Lord and surprisingly a pair of "Baby Goats of Death" Shinewend. I had Weed-Pruner Poplar but for some stupid reason didn't play him right away, instead casting my kill spells. His goats gently nibbled me to death. All in all a great day. I beat everyone I should have (casual gamers and such) and the only people I lost to were pro players or Prowler, who honestly deserved it after all the previous beatings I've given him. Not only that, but did you open a Maralen? No really, I saw 6 other people open her through out the day, where's mine? Bah, I'll get her at the sneak peek. Thanks for reading, Fox Murdoch. |
