Time flew by in the meantime, and before I knew it, Weinfest was only a couple of weeks away, and I still had to work on the Friday before. Closely after that I figured out the drive there was actually 5 hours, so less easy to just squeeze in on an evening. I figured it probably would not work out, since I also had to pick up my new passport on that day before leaving. Just in case I would go however, I tried building a deck with the chains of Mephistopheles that Johan graciously loaned me some time ago. The weekend before I played some games, and the deck was very hit or miss. When it worked, it was absolutely awful for my opponents to play against. When it did not work, it pretty much had lots of dead cards. If you have 2 chains but no winds of change, nothing happens. If you have chains an a rack, but no winds, nothing happens, if you have 2 winds and a rack, but no chains... well, you get the idea.
On the Tuesday before Weinfest, I realized I really needed some time off work (the weeks before had been pretty hectic) and managed to take the Friday off. The Thursday before that, I built another version of the chains deck, and tried that against some of our local guys. The experience was the same. Sometimes it was spectacular, sometimes it did nothing. I decided that the deck was not good enough, but I did want to go to Weinfest, so I took to airbnb, found a place along the route which was about halfway there so I could drive friday evening, sleep there, get up early and drive on, and do the same in the evening after the tournament. Since there was no more time, I put together a version of my UWB deck I have been playing on and off since, I don't really know, but more than 15 years for sure. I had lunch with my wife in the cat cafe in Arnhem (since it had been our anniversary that week I wanted to do something fun together), picked up my passport, put the deck in a box and went on. I got there about 21:00 or so, and the appartment was small but nice, with everything I needed. It was a bit warm though, so I did not get a lot of sleep. When the alarm went off at 6:30, I was feeling a bit groggy. A shower and breakfast fixed that, and I was on my way.
The last part of the route to winefest was through some nice hills over narrow little roads. Since I am not only on cardboard crack but also a parttime petrolhead, I loved that. The surroundings were beautiful. When I got there, there were some familiar faces that I was happy to see, and also quite a lot of unfamiliar faces. It was great seeing so many people showing up for an event like this. The small village was hosting an Oldschool tournament with 79 people, from 5 or 6 different countries I think. A great gathering.
One of the bizar things that happens when you drive a long way, is getting paired against someone you also sometimes casually play against close to home. This is what happened over here, I was paired against Frank Sliphorst, whom I have played against in both kitchen table games and on tournaments. Frank is a great guy that tends to play competitive decks, so I was up for a tough start of the day. Although I had pretty good opening hand with sol ring and 2 Erhnams, Franks hand was very much up to the task.
So, 2 Erhnams gone due to mana drain and swords to plowshares. Fortunately, I had some of that coming franks way as well, I took care of his Su-Chi with my own swords, and then drew 3 cards with braingeyser, the turn after that I took care of his Sage of Lat-Nam, wich was great here while he was attacking with Mishra's factories. Every time I would have taken care of one, he would have drawn a card.
When I tried to copy my chaos orb, Frank countered that as well.
When I played my Su-Chi followed by pixies, there was a small window were I thought I might actually win this match.
That was before Frank copied his sol ring, then the turn after drew an immense amount of cards, and played time walk.
My Su-Chi was taken care of and Frank played Serra Angel. I took care of that with swords to plowshares again, and had to make the painful decision of attacking with the pixies and then play balance to even out the game again. Frank his hand full of cards was just too big a threat.
We then went into top decking mode, somewhat, and frank was getting ahead with destroying my factory, countering my Serra, all the while attacking with his mishra's factory.
To get rid of that, I had to play armageddon, but then Frank topdecked another Su-Chi.
I was fortunate enough to take care of that 2 turns later, but Frank then played another one. I played a pixies to keep that away from me, but Frank drew another swords to plowshares, and took his Su-Chi to the win. It had been a very long and grindy game.
The second game I kept a reasonable hand with a mox and an Erhnam, nothing special but if I could get it out by turn 3 and start hammering, it would be ok.
The expected swords to plowshares followed immediately.
I played Sylvan Library, which Frank disenchanted. When Frank played his Serra Angel, I was happy I had kept the hand, which also had my control magic in it. Frank played another disenchant, and I responded by playing swords to plowshares.
All the while, I was hit by a sage every now and then, so the game was not looking very promising. I had to play recall to get rid of a Su-Chi, and took the Sylvan Library also.
To just go for it, I played the Sylvan Library (figuring Frank had had 2 disenchants already) and a pixies, then the next turn went for it with armageddon to get rid of the 2 factories that were attacking me.
Although Frank was able to get rid of the pixies, I had plenty of lands lying on top to play a Su-Chi a couple of turns later.
So, 1-1 here. Well, against Frank, not a bad result.
Round 2 was against Thomas, who was playing a very aggressive UG build with flying men, Serendib Efreets, unstable mutations and berserks. Very much like the deck I played on Knights of Thorn III, one of my earliest tournaments with Swedish rules. He was off to a very aggressive start, 3 creatures and strip mining my Savannah. I swords to plowshared his pixies, tutored for balance, he then played unstable mutation on his flying men and hit me hard. Since I had a disenchant, I decided to wait with balance, and disenchant his unstable mutation.
That meant I could take some more time with only a Llanowar elf attacking me. He went for it playing two more creatures, I forgot which ones, and I then played balance.
From there on, my creatures were bigger than his, and I took game one. Meanwhile next to us, someone played main deck King Suleiman to great effect.
On to game 2, I was strip mined again early on.
But, I was able to play my secret weapon in time, after I had played swords to plowshares on one of his creatures and he crumbled my mox, I played preacher.
That slowed things down a bit, and I could build from there. He was able to crumble my Su-Chi's, which I immediately could use drawing extra cards with Sylvan Library. Since my creatures were just bigger, that meant I had the advantage.
The advantage in both cards and creature size gave me game 2 also. The game was over a lot quicker than the game against Frank, which gave me some time to walk around and have a chat with Brenda and Anson Maddocks again, which was just as nice as last time I met them. They're just great to talk to, funny, cool and nice people. I hope your flying experience leaving Germany was better than the stories you told me, Brenda ;)
I think it was time for lunch by then, and there was lots of homemade stuff like spreads to put on your bread, which was really, really tasty. Thanks to whoever made those!
Round 3 I played against Gabriel, who was playing an Atog burn build.
Although I should be able to win this matchup, he was drawing really, really well and I lost game one to multiple black vises combined with wheel of fortune, bolts, chain lightnings. Since the vise had come on turn one and I had a rather slow hand, it was just too fast, too much.
Although the second game looked a bit better with an early cop red while I was on 15, he managed to get out 2 vises again, played timetwister and out of that another vise, which meant I took 9 damage in my upkeep. Since I could play only 2 cards in my next turn, that meant 6 more on the next turn, so this insane play took the game before we got to turn 5.
My opponent asked if I wanted to play some more games, which I consequently all won. Unfortunately, these wins had come in the wrong order :) If only he had less awesome draws in the first 2 games, but hey, that is what happens playing magic.
Round 4 I played against Oliver, on UB agro. Another fast opponent against my midrange, but I figured it would be okay as a matchup, since my creatures are just bigger, so if I get them in play quick enough, it should work.
And it did, together with some removal, it was a pretty quick 2-0.
Round 5 I played against Christoph, who was playing control style deck with earthquakes, abyss and cop: Red. I was seriously surprised and happy to see Clockwork Avian in play here.
Unfortunately, I had to disenchant it to make sure I would not die to it. And even though there were earthquakes and bolts on the other side, it was not enough. I could just keep attacking with whatever I had left, and my Jalum tome was doing a great job at giving me a quality advantage in cards. I discarded 3 lands and a mox with it, which game me better cards to keep going.
That meant I drew more damage sources than my opponent played removal, and that worked out well. The second game I did not draw into my fourth land, and decided to just use the lotus I had to play my Erhnam Djinn and see what would happen. Last time there were 2 bolts needed to get rid of it, and that is not a bad trade.
The Djinn was not removed though, before my opponent could get to 6 lands to play earthquake 5, he was too low to play it, so another 2-0 win here. This left me with some more time chatting with Brenda, so I was not complaining. I also had some more autographs done and bought another artwork to frame, a Fallen angel, considering how much fun I had playing those in the last couple of months.
Weirdly enough, on round 6, I was paired against Frank Sliphorst again. When Frank noticed this, he asked the organizers about it, and they were like: "well, that is what the pairing says, let's not make this hard for anyone", and we agreed to play another match. We both thought it weird though, since we figured Tolaria uses the swiss pairing system, which would mean you could never be paired against the same opponent twice. Since Frank and his deck are a hard matchup for me, I was prepairing for another grindy, hard fought match.
There was a lot of glare from the sun, so taking pictures was a bit harder.
Although Frank did not have a bad draw, destroying some of my cards and playing a Su-Chi and a factory, I was ahead because of my pixies, which could pass by his blockers, and I wa able to get out Serra Angel. Frank drew a lot of cards with braingeyser, looking for a solution.
The solution in the form of swords to plowshares was not enough, and I took the first game. The second game Frank had a Serra out soon with some artifact mana, while I was looking for solution with my Sylvan Library.
Before I could play control magic though, he played wheel of fortune, which cost me my mana drain, control magic, regrowth and Su-Chi and mishra's factory. That was just insane.
I got a lot of mana instead of those cards, the wheel of fortune had not turned in my favor. Fortunately, I was able to get out a Su-Chi and a tome eventually.
It was hard to believe after that wheel, but I managed to win the second game also, just hitting with Su-Chi's over and over again.
Round 7 I played Flying Dennis, who was playing a mono green build. He was really quick, which made me work hard for the win, but eventually, my creatures are just bigger and together with some removal, that gave me the match.
Most of the other guys were still playing when we finished round 7. I was pretty satisfied with my 5-1-1 result, the deck did fine and even though it lost against the Atog burn deck, it had shown in the later casual games against it that it had a good chance of beating that too.
I had a look among the cards on sale, but unfortunately, there was no LG Fallen Angel I could get signed to have completely signed play set of them.
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| Need to be lost in a maze? Plenty of them around here :) |
After a raffle with lots of prizes and dinner, I managed to get into the top 8 at 6th place. Not bad. I played the quarterfinal against Elmar, and I was so taken into the game I completely forgot to take any pictures. Sorry! I was then in the semi-finals against Ben, who was playing a strong robots build. Not an easy matchup for my deck, but one I might be able to handle if does not go off and be really insane. There was a lot going on in the first game, with a lot of copies of artifacts in play that were both mana sources and Triskelions.
I eventually squeezed out a win, although I thought I would not be able to with an active sage on the table and lots of artifacts coming my way. The second game was also pretty hard fought, with an early gloom to slow me down. Fortunately, I also play artifacts and lots of green cards.
I decided to just go on the offensive with the pixies as soon as I could.
Even tough there were bigger creatures opposing me, I just kept attacking with the pixies, while compensating a bit for the other creatures with my Su-Chi and a maxe of ith. Unfortunately my Serra Angel was countered.
The pixies just went for it, and with one divine offering coming through on his Su-Chi copy, I managed a win in this tough match by just going on the offensive with the pixies.
Since Rob had won his semifinal as well, we would have an all-dutch final in this German tournament. Rob was on an very, very quick atog lions build. Although I can win that match-up, my only loss had been against something similar, so this was going to be hard. The matches were very hard fought, with Rob taking the first game, and I took the second.
The third game my deck stalled a bit, and this was one of 2 times today I had a Serra Angel in my hand, but not 2 white mana to cast her. And that is something that a quick deck like Robs' takes full advantage of, so he won fair and square in the end. It would have been nice to see if the Serra would have taken the match, I think it would have made a huge difference. But it did not, so Rob was the well deserved winner.
I took very little pictures, to keep my attention in the game. It was very late, very tense, we both missed a critical orb flip, and Rob took one of the games with a card I personally hate pretty much, city in a bottle. To fully appreciate this excellent play, I made this known to him (please note that Rob and I have known each other for a long time, he played Ancient mtg in the early 2010's, so we go way back. I know he can handle some antics in a tense game).
Johan helpfully turned this moment in the match into a classic oil painting, calling it a "classic oldschool moment"
By this time, it was around midnight, so I was not looking forward to an almost 3 hour drive back to the place where I would be sleeping. Brenda helpfully offered to let me stay with her and Anson and if I had known this would happen, I would not have left my bag at the airbnb I slept in. But I needed to get my things, clean up a bit there and check out before 10, so I had to decline her offer :( Very sad about that, but happy about the whole event. As always, the atmosphere was great. Oldschool here in Germany is as awesome as I hoped it would be. Thanks for all that came, thanks to the organisation, the bar guys and girls, and to Anson and Brenda. Hope to see you all again soon!
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| Even at midnight, still quite a lot of players :) |
I took home some nice reminders to remember this day by and went to the bnb. Fortunately since it was late and some stretches of German highway have no speed limits, I could make some time by driving a bit faster and I got at my bnb after 2,5 hours of driving. I was exhausted, and I fell asleep pretty quickly.
Did I mention Oldschool is awesome? The people, the cards, the atmosphere. Everything. I love it. See you all soon!
