Old men of the sea cup 2025

Small starting disclaimer, because of a lot of work and some pretty bad migraines, I can't remember all of this tournament in detail unfortunately, and I had this report only half finished when the extreme work kicked in. So somewhere in the middle the detail goes down a bit. Sorry!

I visited The old men of the sea cup last year, and it was a really nice experience at a great place run by volunteers in The Hague. There is something about places that are run also for the love of it. And when you get to play in a place like that, it is more special. So when I heard they were being closed down and there would be just one last chance to play there, I asked Tim and Ivo if I could join. Fortunately for me, there was still space for one more. 

A while back I thought of building a deck that was aiming for playing a quick bigger creature and then use sylvan library and Jalum tome to get to wheel of fortune or timetwister, fill my hand and go on. To make it not to much of a standard deck, I wanted to go for land, mox, fellwar stone and then play Su-Chu or Erhnam Djinn. I added 2 copy artifacts for land, mox, copy mox effect. I got to play first in the first game, and them kept a hand that could go for it. I got a turn 2 Su-Chi off that. 

My opponent started destroying my land in his turn by playing sinkhole on the city, then blight on my savannah. 

End then sinkhole, and drain life on my Su-Chi with drain life. So, 3 lands destroyed, plus my creature, in 5 turns. That was not good. But I had the Sylvan Library and the tome, which did not produce any land any time soon, but I could at least filter. 

Helpfully, I was also mind twisted for my entire hand after I had the chance of playing one land. 

But, since I had fellwar stone and a mox, I could play another fellwar stone. My opponent played a factory, I played a Su-Chi. He then played a skull of orm for the blight. Even though it felt like his deck was sub-standard, it was performing pretty well. 

He got back the blight and played it. 

Then, he drew into another drain life. Fortunately, I had seen shit like that coming since he was drawing basically everything he needed all the time, so I had tutored for balance, just waiting for him to drain life the Su-Chi, which was one turn after I had one chance to attack with it. So, I tapped my blighted land, which was gone, then played balance with no cards in my hand due to the mind twist, then stripped his last land. 

After a turn I played timetwister with the lotus to get going, figuring I would build up faster with the mana I had. Which worked. He was getting some land back pretty quickly but not quick enough before I could get in damage with Su-Chi. And a factory later on. So, 1-0, even against that onslaught. I was happy to have included balance in the deck, because after having all your land destroyed and your hand mind twisted, there really was not much I could have done otherwise. 

To prevent myself from dying from something like Juzam djinns or hypnotic specters, I had boarded in COP black and greater realm of preservation. Strangely enough, something else showed up. 

Never before in an OS game have I thought about using swords to plowshares on a wall of bone. However, since I had Su-Chi and wanted to break through, I did. And then another showed up. So I went for a copy of the Su-Chi and attacked with that. 

That was eventually enough to win the match. I was left with a really weird feeling about that first game. Had I almost lost to a deck with wall of bone in it? Really? Fortunately that did not happen, otherwise I would have really doubted my ability at playing this deck. The next game I was up against Tim, on mono green. Tim is of course THE mono green player in our country, with the best results playing a mono green deck. This was not going to be easy, unless I could have a big creature on the board quickly. 

Su-Chi was quickly removed but not before I could copy it, but I was taking damage quickly from factories and Argothian pixies. 

Eventually an entire swarm was building up, with a playset of factories. 

On my side I was able to balance things out a bit, and use Erhnam Djinn and Serra Angel to keep things from going really bad. Tim was ahead in life, but I could use the Serra to do some damage. 

Eventually Tim went for it to try and do the final points of damage. It was a really big creature battle in which I was using my factory and strip mine to the last of my ability to not be crushed. Fortunately, I was able to win this one with the Serra, even though I was really low on life. 

My Second game, I was quickly greeted by a forestwalker. I got a demonic tutor, for which I had to use my lotus to get Ancestral recall, and Su-Chi on the board quickly. The game was very fast paced from the start. 

I was able to use triskelion and Erhnam Djinn to keep away the onslaught from the other side, and was using Jalum tome to get rid of all my forest-lands. This was a really nice advantage. 

Eventually, the Serra Angel was the winning card again, which I would have gotten a lot later had I not had the Jalum tome. I am not sure I would have won without it. 

After we were finished, lunch was being prepared in the background, and the sandwiches have a MTG oldschool theme :)

Anyway, I was happy to be at this table after my matches so far :)

And, I was able to play my first turn fellwar stone as was my target while building this deck. My opponent could start, played a forest but not a creature. So, no mono green then? Not sure. 

I wanted to copy my sol ring for some more additional mana, but that was destroyed. And, all of a sudden there were more creatures turning up. 

An Erhnam Djinn showed up, together with some sprites on the next turn. So definitely mono green then. I played Serra to keep the onslaught away from me. Well, at least a bit. 

After taking a hit from the Djinn, I went for Sylvan Library and time walk, and then for regrowth and time walk, and then for Su-Chi and copy artifact. This was pretty crazy. Regrowth on time walk with Serra in play is phenomenal. 

When my opponent attacked with his Djinn, I wanted to get rid of it so blocked with both Su-Chi's, and was greeted by Djinn which was complete berserk. 

That killed off both my Su-Chi's, but not my Serra, so in the end I could keep attacking and win with her. So, on to game number 2. I played a first turn factory, and a second turn workshop, unfortunately, I could just use it for an orb, because there were 2 scavenger folk in play. 

I was not going that well, and 2 disenchants were not doing much, so after 2 more creatures turned up and I had nothing, I decided to balance it out. Not really happy with that, it felt more like a emergency break. 

After using psionic blast for another creature and the orb so I could keep being alive, I eventually got a Su-Chi in play with 2 factories. All I needed now was no pixies showing up. 

And there were not enough creatures on the other side to keep the factories and Su-Chi down, so I could just go all out on the attack and win game 2 as well. I then asked if my opponent felt like playing a game against my all-FBB deck which has been completely built from cards from binders. The challenge I set myself was to build an all-FBB deck without the use of the internet, so no MCM or ebay, or the likes of them. I'm pretty happy with the deck as it is. It could use some more spitting slugs, but when did you see those in italian anywhere? If someone has them, they're usually at home in a box somewhere. I also want to add more city of brass to be able to play some black cards. 

Eventually, the FBB deck was triumphant :) I was really happy with that, considering it cannot play Su-Chi or Ice storm. I have noticed it could use one or two Kudzu's to even that out, but when was the last time you saw those in FBB? I have been looking in binders for the last 2 years now, so far have not found them. Oh, remember how I said that there was a magic theme on the bar? You could call our awesome bar lady by summoning her with this magic bell :) 

on to the next match, my opponent was going really well from turn one. 

I had kept this, hoping to get out a quick Su-Chi, copy it and by then draw another land, to psionic blast any blockers away. 

My opponent just decided to draw an ungodly amount of cards after playing Su-Chi on his turn 2 and on turn 3 fill his hand with braingeyser with his lotus. 

The second game was not much better, starting off with lots of power. 

I am not sure how bad it was, but from the looks of it, I'm pretty sure I lost at least one of those matches, but to be honest, I am not sure which one it was. I don't think I lost both, because I managed to get into the top 8 later on. 

What I do remember, is the exceptionally, extraordinary awesome Faye, who prepared drinks and food for us gamers all day, in a place where she had been volunteering for years before this last tournament there. Many, many thanks, thanks, thanks! 

I also took some pictures of the other contenders for top 8, like Richard. 

When I did get into top 8, I was happy with my opening hand. 

My opponent however, was not doing that bad either. 

But hey, a few turns later, I could pull off the wheel and see what would happen from there. This was what my deck should do. 

The match was taking a really long time, with removal going up and down, after a time I got to play mind twist. Not for that many cards and they were not that interesting, but it made sure I could play a Su-Chi and a copy without risk of a disenchant or swords to plowshares. 

That was not entirely enough, though, since on of the 2 was blasted off the table and there was a Serra to follow up . Fortunately, I had another creature up my sleeve, which could work well against the Serra. 

Also, that was not really necessary, because Serra decided to come my way with the control magic I had been holding for a long time, and that decided that game in my favor. 

The second game I felt like my opponent was going too quick for me, so I decided to slow him down with a divine offering on his mox. 

But, that did not do much, because after a time walk, mana drain on my ancestral recall and disenchant on my sol ring, I was not getting back easily. 

Oh, and his ancestral recall did resolve, unfortunately. That was a pretty bad advantage. 

Also, not drawing more lands was a problem. So, 1-1 it was. 

I still felt I should have a pretty good chance in this matchup, but as soon as you reach top 8, draws are very important. The sol ring on turn one was not foreboding a lot of good.  

What was also bad, was not getting that fourth mana. Or a blue mana. Or a black one, for that matter. 

Just one mana more, and this could really work.. 

After a while, the fourth mana did show up, and I could play some of the cards in hand. A lot of them were removed or destroyed, but at least I was doing something. 

Eventually, I had the 3rd djinn and a su chi on the board, and could keep going. 

So, a pretty heavy match, but 2-1, on to the semi-final. 

The first game against Richard started up pretty good. 

Even though he had Ivory tower, I could play Su-Chi, then chaos orb and timetwister. 

The timetwister though, had also given Richard quite some good cards, to take care of the Su-Chi for instance. 

Actually, his draw was pretty awesome. swords, chaos orb, followed up by braingeyser. 

After removing some of my creatures and destroying one, I managed to get Trike and Serra out, and went for another refill. 

I followed that up with a mind twist. As noted before, draws sometimes matter more than playing in top 8's. And this was drawing really well. Even with this draw though, the game as a whole was not an easy win. Or at least it did not feel like it was. 

The second game I had some quick mana on my opening. 

That was met with a lot of removal though. My copy mox was destroyed, my tropical island stripped and the my mox destroyed. It was like I was playing a mana destruction deck. With a lot of time I managed to get Su-Chi out. 

But that was also met with more removal. This time, the balance of the draw was definitely on the other side. 

I was beaten by a djinn eventually. 1-1.

The third game was opened by Richard with a Library of Alexandria. After which he destroyed my fellwar stone and my mox. 

On turn 10, I still had only 3 mana and was stuck there. Richard however, was doing really well, with his 10 card card advantage and lots of land :) So no surprise that he won there, well deserved. Too bad I could not end this day with an exiting game that was exiting till the end. This definitely wasn't, but that also part of how it goes. 

3 lands against that active library... eh... nope! not working!

I took some pictures of the final and the beautiful sandwich signs before going for the drive home. 

In the end, after some missed orb flips from both sides and mind twists here and there, Richard won the tournament, congrats! I went home after an amazing day, in an amazing place, with amazing people. To bad it was the last tournament over there. An atmosphere like this is just not found somewhere easily somewhere else. Thanks to all, especially to Faye, who were there. It felt great, like OS should be. Till next time!