Camel Trophy VIII

For the 8th time, I organized the Camel Trophy in Arnhem. This tournament was born as a follow up to the Draconian Cylix (French rules OS) tournaments I organized in Eindhoven and the Ancient tournaments before that and is held in a gamestore. Like the Hill Giant tournament in Hilversum, the whole idea of the tournament is to relive tournaments held in a gamestore, which for many of us, including me, were our first tournament experiences. 

To live up to the experience of your first tournaments, I am trying to have people show up with less then 100% tuned spikey tier 1/2 decks. I find that I am much happier with people telling me about how they had an amazing play with their pirate ship or their dwarven warriors than watching extremely well-tuned tier 1 decks battling it out, because most of the time when both spike decks are piloted by capable players, it seems it is more about who has the better draw, than who is the better player, and though that might be interesting to watch, it does not spark the same happiness as when someone plays a deck like Rob's last year's spice prize winner in the Camel VII:

This makes me so much happier to be seen playing :) So like the last couple of years, I asked people to leave the spike decks at home if they could and play something more amusing. Asking this, I could not show up with a spike deck myself, so I did some brewing as a follow up to the article Johan and I wrote about Fallen Angel. 

I decided that hypnotic specter like I had in my version of the deck we wrote about would be a bit too spikey, so I went for something else, and decided to go for demon package with demonic hordes, lord of the pit, yawgmoth demon and of course, Fallen Angels. After I played a couple of games against some locals, I found out that somebody playing multiple copies of maze of ith pretty much killed the deck, so I did a bit of tuning, and since living plane complements the Fallen Angel pretty well, I added an extra copy of that, and triskelions to shoot annoying lands. I also added 2 prodigal sorcerers and 2 royal assassins in the sideboard for the same purpose, plus, I thought they would be good against weenie decks. I also took out one berserk (which are very much needed when you need to get rid of a demon when you can no longer maintain their needs) and replaced it with a sword of the ages, so I could work my way around icies and mazes and still do a lot of damage in one go. I ended up with this deck. 

Pretty simple, just do a couple of pings of damage with elves while you build up to enough mana, then play and angel or a demon, attack and play berserk. Not the best of strategies, but I thought it would be fun to play. 

When Wilco told me he would also be playing a Fallen Angel deck, I almost changed to another deck, but since his version is built around Khabal Ghoul, it is pretty different from mine, and my alternative Leviathan Deck was so completely awful when I tried a couple of hands with it, I decided to go with this instead. 

Unfortunately, the beta lord of the pit is not mine. It belongs to Fulco, who was kind enough to lend to to me so it would get out of the binder for day. 

When I got to our local gamestore the Spelkwartier, owned by our very friendly host Richard, I set up some stuff, had some major wifi issues that prevented me from accessing my prepared work for the tournament, fixed that finally by applying a cable to my laptop (thank God I still have laptops with ethernet ports) and we got started after my opening announcements. The first random pairing paired me against Marten, who is not only a great player, but also plays interesting decks he comes up with himself. He had not seen the message about spice decks, so he was playing his mono blue deck he has been playing in a couple of tournaments lately. It is a very original deck that turns creatures into artifacts, then steals them, and sometimes sacrifices them to diamond valley. If a deck does not have creatures, it just steals the artifacts. It is a very nice deck to see, and even though it is meant to be pretty serious, it is still very original as well. 

Since it is a pretty serious deck piloted by a great player, I gave Marten the better chance of winning this one. I started off with an Elf, but did not have a lot of chances to damage Marten with, since he had a quick mishra's factory. After I played another Elf of deep shadow and Sylvan Library, he played a Serendib Efreet. This was not looking great, since I did not have a fallen Angel yet, but with the library, that might show up quick enough. By now I could even play a lord of the pit if I got one. 

After luckily drawing into an Ancestral recall, I could a Fallen Angel. Marten took it with control magic, so I sacrificed it to itself. I then got another angel. 

After the Angel I played a Triskelion, which Marten tried to take with steal artifact. I killed it with its own counters and shot Marten. After attacking with my Angel, he blocked it and when I sacrificed an Elf, he sacrificed his Efreet to diamond valley. Another installment of control magic then got rid of my Angel, and I was attacked a couple of times with Mishra's factory. I was pretty low on life by then. I then decided that it was a good time to play my demonic hordes. I had a berserk in hand, and knew there was another one on top of my deck due to Sylvan Library. Control magic would not work on this horde of demons. 

Marten played another Serendib Efreet. I had to go for it, since the efreet would kill me pretty quickly due to the damage I had incurred from my own Elves and the damage Marten had done to me. I first tried to play instill energy, figuring Marten would counter that, because that would just be very annoying to his lands. He did counter it. I then attacked with the hordes, figuring he would either block or he would not. Marten was a comfortable 20, so decided not to block so he would kill me next turn. But thanks to the countering of instill energy, I was able to play this. 2 berserks, 20 damage in total. The first game was mine. 

The second game was not much of a game, unfortunately. Marten got a major mana screw, so even though my deck is pretty slow, it was still quick enough to win with first some damage from Elves, then from the Fallen Angel. 

Although it felt somewhat undeserved, I won 2-0 and was now up against some who also had won their first round. Depending on what I would be paired against, that meant the competition would only get stiffer from here. I was paired against Daryo, who was playing a very agressive mono green deck, which reminded me of the deck that won the Castle cup a bit. 

Since the deck was super aggressive and also had a great draw in which he strips my bayou, slowing me down, this meant the game was over in 5 minutes. 0-1. So, in came the prodigal sorcerers and the royal assassins, let's see if they could stop the onslaught. I had a prodigal sorcerer in my opening hand, with the instill energy, but no elves or birds, which meant I could play it on turn 3. I would have to see of that would be enough, I felt it was good enough and the instill energy meant I would probably get 2 creatures on turn 4, so that should be okay enough. If he would not produce an Erhnam Djinn very quickly. So, I went for it and played it. 

On his turn 3, he stripped one of my bayous, but I was still able to play the instill energy. Seeing the sorcerer, he decided not to play more creatures and wait. 

This game me some time to play a basalt monolith and ping him a couple of times. 

On his turn 5, he played Erhnam Djinn. On my turn 6, I played fallen Angel. He proceeded to play a maze of ith, with I strip mined after he had regrowth-ed his strip mine and stripped one extra land of mine. Oh, and he played another maze of ith. I used the basalt monolith to play an extra fallen Angel, and he played another maze of ith. *Sigh*

The upside was I would only have to wait for living plane to fix this problem, so it was only a matter of time, and if he did not play another Djinn, this would probably play out fine. The living plane turned up a turn later, after he played a whirling dervish. 

I was able to ping both mazes of the board, and then attack with both Angels, sacrifice my 4 lands, and hit for 14, which was enough because of the damage from the sorcerer he had incurred. 1-1. 

The third game was a repeat of the first, with sorcerers and assassins doing some of the slowing down, then I quickly went for it with a berserked Fallen Angel, which meant I won the match 2-1. 

Now 2-0 in matches, this meant I it would get worse from my opponents, and Roelf did not disappoint with a mono red Atog Burn deck with ball lightnings. He started off with a black vise, then ironclaw orcs, then atog. He also stripped one of my lands on turn 2 or 3. Fortunately, I had a birds and an Elf, which haped me, together with a mox, to play Fallen Angel. 

Somehow, I was able to keep up with the damage, and since my Angel can deliver a lot of damage in one final stroke, I this was enough to win the first game. 

The second game, he was a lot quicker, giving me a lot of damage with ball lightning on turn 3. 

This meant it was just to quick, even tough I had 2 basalt monoliths, I had nothing to play with them before I was dead. It aslo did not help that my birds of paradise was blown off the board. 

The third game, he started with quick sol ring and lotus. Damn, would I be looking at a first turn ball lightning?

"fortunately" it was only an Ironclaw orc and a copper tablet. The damage was going quickly. I had boarded in the assassins, figuring they would be okay against the Atogs and ball lightnings if he decided to kill my birds and Elves. Even though there were 2 copper tablets on the table, I played the assassin and time walk, to get rid of the Atog he had played. And then played fallen Angel. What also helped, was the Ancestral Recall, even though that did not deliver any immediately useful cards, at least I would be with the useful cards more quickly. 

After a bolt on my assassin and a detonate on my sol ring things were going quickly. But I was hitting back with the Angel as well, and he was taking damage from the copper tablets as well. So I attacked with the Angel, the assassin and the elf I had (I also played one on this turn), then sacked the summoning sick elf and the assassin that was blocked, giving the Angel a power of 7, and then played berserk, for 14 damage and one from my elf, 15 in total. In his upkeep, he died from the copper tablets. That was close, again. 

But the game was over quickly, which gave me some time for some impression shots:

Martijn flipping a Camel Orb, a card legal only for this day. 

Arno's elephant deck facing off against Thomas "Timmy" his enchantress leprechaun deck. 

Those are the decks that are really making me happy to look at. 

Being 3-0 now, I knew there was probably very little chance of winning any more matches, maybe if I was lucky. I played Tum, who dropped a first turn Sylvan Library with a mox, and I played an Elf. 

I played another Elf, and he played Tundra. I played Jalum tome, which was disenchanted, followed by balance on his turn, which cost me a land and 2 elves. 

He then played Erhnam Djinn, followed by Serra Angel, and won. The second game he started with 2 moxen and a strip mine. I had played birds on my turn when I started. 

He stripped my land, played sol ring and birds of paradise. 

He then followed up by playing swords to plowshares on my birds. I was able to get a bit back in the game when I played Ancestral recall, twice, by the use of demonic tutor and regrowth. 

I thought I had a chance there, when he played Erhnam Djinn, time walk, regrowth, time walk. 

I was able to get some play out of my Royal Assassin which got rid of his Djinn. When he attacked with his Serra Angel, I got rid of that by saccing 2 of my small critters, hoping for a win with the Fallen Angel. 

I was able to get a win out due to a berserk and living plane, just before he played another balance. 1-1. 

The third game opened with a land, 2 moxen and a sol ring, and sylvan library. Right... I would like to have moxen in my opening hand every game, but unfortunately, I am not that lucky, it seems :)

He played Erhnam Djinn, I tried to do something with prodigal sorcerer for his birds, but it did not do much, it just pinged him once, before an Armageddon hit on turn 4 or so, and I lost all of my lands. This meant there was no way I could stop this, and I lost without a hint of a chance. 1-2. 

Well, I suppose this was going to happen sooner or later. What was I expecting playing 2 lords of the pit? (which, incidentally, I had in hand when Armageddon was played in that last game). 

I was then paired against Eric, who was playing Robots, so another deck which I basically don't stand a chance against. But I tried. I played a birds on opening, after Eric played land, mox, sol ring, mana vault on his turn one. He played a second turn Sage. Well, that could have been worse. Accept for also being attacked by his factory. 

I played demonic tutor for ancestral recall, and than balanced the play of mana a bit by playing a mox and a sol ring. Now, if I would only draw that lord of the pit.. 

Eric attacked with his Factory and sage, and I played basalt monolith, tapped it and played Fallen Angel on my turn. He then played a Su-Chi on his turn. On my next turn, I was able to get out living plane, sacrifice my birds and 3 lands, for a 11 power Angel, which I could play berserk on for 22 damage. Wow. That was lucky. 1-0. 

The second game, Eric got more milage out of his deck by playing mishra's factory and copying it twice, then playing Su-Chi. I played the Energy Flux I had boarded in, and tried looking for Fallen Angel before I would be dead. 

That did not work. I was able to squeeze out a tranquility to be hurt less by the factories, but it was not enough. It was quickly 1-1. I had already boarded out the Lords of the pit here, seeing how slow they were against this quick deck. Although my Assassin did some work, I was still hit with a factory a couple of times. 

I played Energy Flux, which meant Eric would have to pay the upkeep for his Su-Chi and vault. The vault would be no problem but the Su-Chi might slow him down enough. Since I had the royal assassin, he let it go a couple of turns later, and played the Abyss. 

I did not get tranquility, so I just died when all my creatures were removed, and I was continuously attacked by factories. 3-2 in matches. I then played against Frenk which is always a pleasure. He was playing a interesting red/green/white deck with gauntlet of might, rukh egges and hazezon tamar. That is pretty cool. Unfortunately, he also played strip mine on my lands a couple times with regrowth, which is not something my deck likes because of the high mana curve. 

Thanks to the elves and birds, I was able to squeeze out an Angel, and then a demonic hordes. 

The hordes were quickly fireballed of the board though. And my Angel was also blown of the board. 

I was attacked by Rukh Eggs after a gauntlet of might turned up. This is definitely something that I did not see every day :)

I did a lot of digging with the Jalum tome, and eventually found a Fallen Angel, which, together with a berserk was able to finish the first game. 

The second game took me a lot of time also, but Frenk was also not that quick. I was able to do some damage with Elves, but there was a lot of removal in his deck to take care of both Elves and Angels. I eventually played sword of the ages for the first time this day, hoping to win with that. 

But against a red/white/green deck, that is impossible of course. It was gone before I knew it. 

I was lucky later on when Frenk his falling star did not do a complete rotation, which meant I could keep my fallen Angel. I offered him that he could flip it again (even though I think falling star is a pretty stupid card), but he was very strict about it and said that a miss was a miss. I had sacrificed the birds already, just in case he would hit, so it cost me a creature none the less. Fortunately for me, I was able to play 2 berserks for 12 damage 2 turns later, and that won me the game. 

That meant that, somehow, I managed to land in the top 8 with a 4-2 finish (we had 36 players). With a deck with 2 lords of the pit in it. Even though they never showed up at time where they could be played, that was still pretty cool. 

But before the top 8, it was time to hand out the spice prize, and fortunately, there were some very cool contenders, like Arno's Elephant deck: 

but also these beauties:

Remko's "Ping"

Wilco's Fallen Ghouls

David's Yawgmoth's Robots

Martin's all colorless mono brown

Johan's weakstone prison

Thomas "Timmy" his ward deck

In the end though, the commission of 3 spice experts were in agreement that this was the spiciest of all entries:

I mean, look at this cool deck. There is so much going on here that you never see normally. The Tawnos's wand, Floral Spuzzem, Shapeshifter, all working in combination. During the day, Juriaan had used the wand in multiple ways, including making his shapeshifter unblockable in his upkeep, then raising its power to 6 and attacking. How cool is that! This was such a cool deck to behold, it definitely made me smile, and a lot of other people with it. The playmat with art by renowned artist Buddy Jonkers was deservedly his. 

After this, we did a raffle where I handed out cards in all colors that you normally never would play, hoping that people will give them a chance. Stuff like Argothian Treefolk, Phyrexian Gremlins and word of binding do not see enough play :) I also raffled some cards that people would actually consider playing :)

Then it was time for top 8. In the top 8, I was 8th spot. Because Robbie dropped (he was 5th), Wouter Boendermaker took my place as 8th seat, and I played against Michiel, who was playing a ragingly fast mono green deck. His first turn was also pretty great. 

I played my basalt monolith, but that was quickly taken of the board by his scavenger folk, and I was crushed before I could do anything useful. 

The second game, I had boarded in Timmy again, and the Assassins. That gave me some time. Unfortunately, maze of ith had also shown up, giving Michel a lot of time. But at least I could do some pinging while I waited for other stuff to come around. The living plane would show up sooner or later, right?

Turns out it did not, but that was not needed. When Michiel played his Erhnam Djinn, I already had 2 Angels on the board, while he had only one maze. And that meant I could go for it. Together with the damage from the Timmy, I was able to first 3 damage from one attack with the 2 angels, and the turn after that, I did 14 damage with the Angel that was not stuck in the maze, and that was enough for the win. 1-1. 

The third game, I could play prodigal sorcerer out after Michiel had played his whirling dervish, which was protected from my assassins. Since it had a counter on it the next turn, I had to sacrifice my sorcerer and block and ping to get rid of that. It was too early to sacrifice my mana sources. 

He played regrowth, I played another Timmy. That kept the Dervish stuck in his hand, and the Assassins where ready to take care of his Erhnam Djinn. All I had to do is wait now. I got an Angel eventually, and started attacking for 3.. 

The turn after that, I got living plane, and Michiel scooped. I pointed out to him that I would have never gone for a immediate attack and sac everything, since he had 4 cards in hand. What if he had boarded in fog? Turns out he did not, and I would have just sacked one land every time when I attacked, and I would have won anyway. Glory to the Timmies and Assassins in these matchups. 

In the semi-final, I met Martijn, who was playing a black-white-red tax-tower-moon control deck. Swords to plowshares, Abyss, wrath of god, it was all there. I tried, but there was just no way to get through with enough damage. 

I had a glimpse of hope when I could play sword of the ages. If I got another creature next turn, I would attack with the angel, sack everything, do nine damage, then sac the sword for another nine and it would give me the win. 

But before I could manage that, wrath of god took everything off the board, and he also played another tower. The turn after that he played greed. I conceded, I know when there is no hope left. 2 towers and a greed means 2-3 cards a turn, while I need at least 4 more turns uninterrupted to at least have a chance. By then Martijn would have a full hand, more than 20 life, and gain 6 life per turn. No way I could win that. 

The second game I did my best with energy flux, but that was not enough. A quick blood moon slowed me down, and 2 of my birds were removed before they could produce mana. By the time I could play the flux with a Lotus, Martijn was already above 30 life, and it was basically hopeless. Oh well, at least I managed to get into the semi-finals with Fallen Angels :)

The finals where between Tum and Martijn, who were both playing well tuned decks. Although Martijn his deck has plenty of ways to deal with Erhnamgeddon, Tum just had the better draw against Martijn his artifacts and enchantments, and drew them all, together with quite some powercards, in the first couple turns, so Martijn did not stand a chance, and Tum won the tournament deservedly with a very tuned and very good deck. The Camel was his! 

The winner takes the Camel

Just before leaving, Peter told me of a play I can not resist to share here. He was playing a psychic venom deck we built for him the week before, and he had played control magic on a priest of Yawgmoth, which he used in his next turn to sacrifice his own Icy manipulator for black mana, which he then used in combination with pestilence to win the game :) cool! I love these plays. If there are any more pictures of spicy plays from the tournament, do not hesitate to send them to me, I will place them in this blog. 

After the top 8, I got some dinner with Fulco, who was not able to play but decided to  just come in the afternoon to watch and shake some hands, and we ate and talked till pretty late in the evening. Great finish to nice day. All in all a pretty great day playing old cardboard! 

Thanks to Richard for hosting the event, thanks to all the players that showed up for the tournament, especially all of the spice players! Until next time!