The owner is a guy named Bill/William Waterrose, and the guy heading magic is named Kevin Swanson I think. The prices are competitive (very close to TCG market, will have to see how they adjust when prices fluctuate). They aren't a WPN store yet, so they don't have sanctioned events or FNM. They offer some comics, board games, and coffee. There's a comfy play area which is currently suited more for board games than Magic (very large, separate tables).
Talking to the owner, he said that he wants to attract a more casual crowd for Magic, less of the spiky type. So I decided to hit up some friends and attend their inaugural modern event with Waste Not Storm.
The decklist: https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/1440722#paper
The event: was announced on FB as $5 entry, Assassin's Trophy for first place. Right before I arrived, the TO made an announcement that because only 6 people showed up all the prizes (30 credit + AT) would go to the first undefeated player which is :/
Round 1 vs Nick on Storm (1-0)
He has no idea what I'm doing, but eventually I have two Waste Nots and make him discard a bunch using Wistful Thinking (it's like a worse Mind Rot!). I draw through almost my entire deck, and win with Snapcaster Mage on Torment of Hailfire for 5, with 3 cards left in my library.
Game 2 he has a bunch of rituals, Past in Flames, and Noxious Revival in the graveyard from Gifts Ungiven-ing in response to my discard spells (Wistful Thinking, Thoughtseize). He fizzles, but kills my Liliana of the Veil and flipped Jace VP. I Torment from hand for a bunch and get the win.
Round 2 vs Dan on Bant Spirits (1-1)
Didn't know about the undefeated thing, so we played it out. Dan is a local guy, nice enough when he's not losing. He's playing a version of Spirits with all 3 of their accelerants: Aether Vial, Noble Hierarch, and Collected Company, which seems a bit questionable.
I concede game 1 to his fast start to conceal information (all he knows is that I'm Grixis with Burning Inquiry and Faithless Looting).
Game 2 he gets a little land flooded and concedes to my Waste Not + Wistful Thinking.
Game 3 I have some bad openers and lose to Selfless Spirit negating my in-hand Damnation. Good sideboarding on his part, expecting sweepers from the Grixis deck.
Waste Not Storm retrospective:
- The SSGs can go - can probably cut them for Fatal Pushes in the main. It's not a fast combo deck - need to have the mana to have a good combo turn, but it doesn't need to be turn 3 or 4 wins. Maybe leave 1 in?
- Sideboard - can definitely use some work
- Mana base - I don't like it. I studied a couple lists online, and based it off those, but the Urborg feels super out of place and fetching+shocking hurts way more than I'm used to.
I decided to drag my friend Jason along with me, sticking him with a suboptimal mono red deck I threw together (including Hazorets, Ahn-Crop Crashers, Harsh Mentors, and Searing Bloods). Then I tossed him into the deep end. He played vs friend Matt on Hollow One (a crush), and then got a bye, playing against the nice Constant-ine who had a relatively casual but coherent werewolf deck. Props to both of them for being friendly and educational.
While driving Jason home, he mentioned that he felt most successful on the red deck when he just stopped thinking and planning for the long term. This is incredible - he managed to hit on a core element of Magic's game design / color pie philosophy. It's like, the most characteristic trait of red.
Bonus deck:
I threw together a quick draft for Bant Eternal Command deck, which was pretty suboptimal. The deck looked something like this? https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/1440739#paper (missing 2 from the main, most of the sideboard)
I played a couple quick games against Constant(ine) and lost both. Sequenced my removal poorly and I had a bunch of ramp with nothing to do. I realized that I have a bunch of cards to search for basics, but only about 5 basics, and can definitely use more removal/counterspells.
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