2024-08-01 BLBx6 RCQ/GenQ (5-1, 0-1)

GenCon Tournament Reports

• August 1 BLB Sealed RCQ/GenQ
  
• August 2 Modern for Original Art
• August 3 Legacy Secret Lair Showdown Qualifiers
• August 4 MH3 Sealed GenCon Championship

https://melee.gg/Tournament/View/122449 

Introduction

First time going to GenCon. I initially signed up for three BLB sealed events, but the later ones started much later in the day (and also I qualified for the Sunday championship via the first).

I played one Friday prerelease, two MTGA sealed pools, and did a few rounds of Draftsim. See also: Las Vegas prep. Glanced at 17Lands data, which is still early, just for the color winrates.

Bloomburrow sealed feels like you usually won't have a high synergy deck, but all the creature statlines are pushed so the format leans towards playing to the board heavily. Tricks are decent but not as insane or efficient as OTJ or ONE.

Sealed pool and deck

Playing 5 rares. Lifecreed Duo should have been cut for Whiskerquill Scribe, Mabel (Cragflame) is insane, blue splash was free af, Hearthborn Battler was an underperformer. Green was very shallow while black had a crazy amount of removal and no creatures.

Swiss rounds

• R1 Andrew Zinny GW WW (1-0)
• R2 Braden Yates RW WLW (2-0)
• R3 Justin Warden WB LWL (2-1)
• R4 Spencer Nelson GBx 4C ?? WW (3-1)
• R5 Jon Boyd RBu for Wick WW (4-1)
• R6 Nick Schreider GB WW (5-1)

Not a lot to say. Splash was great. Fliers were great, Cragflame was insane, Fountainport Bell feels great.

Draft deck

Passed a Vren P1P1 trying to signal my neighbor into UB, then waffled between RW and GW for basically the whole draft. Based on 17Lands IWD that's a total punt, but alas. I also went heavy on rabbits despite RW being mice, so my left neighbor ended up being in RW and I had low synergy.

• QF Phillip Li UW Skies LL
  Flooded out quite hard. Saw about 12 lands in G1, 10 lands in G2
  

Player Behavior & Healthy Habits

During one of my rounds, I had an opponent who was mm, aggressively unfriendly. Won't go into details, so instead I'll talk about something more positive.

When I play a match of Magic, there are many rituals and routines that I do to ensure clean and clear gameplay. By building these habits, I aim to cultivate a competitive but friendly match of Magic:

• Greet opponent by their name when we sit down. Record name in notebook.
  Ensures that I have the correct opponent, establishes baseline communications, good for my recordkeeping.
• Don't take out my deck until I have my opponent.
  Avoids possibility of someone sneaking a peek at my deck if I sit down first.
  
• Shuffle after we're both seated. Present deck, offer even/odd 2d6 roll.
  Even/odd requires rolling once, while high roll requires minimum of 2 rolls and the possibility of more. Refusing even/odd can suggest a fundamental weakness in statistics.
  Verbally confirm their choice, as well as the roll result.
  Verbally confirm the winner's choice of play/draw, write down in notebook as OTP (On The Play) or OTD (On the Draw).
  
• During mulligans, track mulligans as soon as they happen.
  Possibly make a note for self ex. 0L or 1L. If no mulligans were taken, fill this in as 7 vs 7 later.
  
• Track life totals on pen & paper as opposed to dice.
  Additionally track other public information ex. floating mana, poison counters, energy counters, etc. on paper as is proper practice at competitive REL.
• Note revealed cards, combat tricks in limited, SB cards, etc.
• Make conversation while I have no cards in hand, no available mana, etc.
  Reduces mental load, builds rapport, makes small human connections in this great big world.
  
• Announce untap upkeep draw (then do sagas)
  
• Announce triggered abilities. If my opponent misses a trigger, I usually choose not to point it out explicitly, but rather ask them to repeat their next announced action several times, sometimes quite pointedly.
• Double-check turn step changes and zone changes esp. in complex board states
  ex. beginning of combat triggers in limited, Dauthi Voidwalker in constructed.
• In Modern and other fetchland formats, shortcut fetch targets by announcing what I intend to grab and revealing what I intend to cast.
  This is a habit built to avoid going to time as Omnath.
  
• When the game ends, mark a W in the column of the triumphant player.
• While presenting decks for sideboarded games, verbally confirm that the [losing] player will be taking the play.
  
• Bring requisite tokens for limited where possible, dice for Wall of Roots, etc.
  
• Build the gut-instinct-action of calling for a judge immediately when realizing something is amiss
  See: Friday
  
• Pioneer Amalia: ability tokens to create stack clarity when they occur and explain the combo to Pioneer newbies
  Example scenario it's design for: I resolved Collected Company vs UR Phoenix who may be holding Spell Pierce, bounce removal, or damage removal for the right moment.
  
• Modern Nadu: green sleeves for insect tokens.
  The deck uses a couple other tokens, but insects are 95% of the tokens seen, so identifying them at a glance is helpful.