Grand Prix Lincoln

I was going to write a tournament report about this past weekend, but then it went incredibly poorly, so I figured I'd just blog. It was at that point I realized they are exactly the same thing, since I'd be focusing less on the game play and more on the whole experience and the mindsets and whatnot. So without further ado, here is my tournament report. Or, you know, just another blog entry.

I spent the week leading up to the grand prix thinking I liked my deck but not sure it was the right call because people would be prepared for it. Unfortunately this assessment was spot on. I seriously debated switching to a different deck the day before we left, but decided that without any games of practice, it would actually be worse than staying the course with a worse deck that I knew well. I expected a decent matchup against everything for the first game, and then varying degrees of preparedness to make the second and third games of each match more difficult.

We had planned to leave Ames around 5:00, so I went for a bike ride at 3:30, got back at 4:30, showered, and was ready to go. It turned out that a guy named Casey had his friends bail on him last-minute in Cedar Falls, so he drove to Ames to ride with us the rest of the way. This meant we left after 7:00, since we had to wait for him to show up, but it wasn't a big deal. The three and a half hours in the car were pretty easy considering that all magic players by default have enough in common to converse for days, and the drive was pretty short compared to many other car trips. All in all, the traveling experience was great. One of the guys in the group here in Ames has friends in Lincoln, so we crashed at their place for free. Plus, they knew good places to eat, how to get around town, and were pretty cool in general.

We spent much of the night before the tournament making last-minute changes to things. I only really wanted some advice for my sideboard, but some of the guys took that as an invitation to examine my whole deck. One of the many things I regret is listening to them as they criticized some of the choices I made. I wound up switching a couple of things because they made sense when people were explaining their thoughts to me, but I was the one with the most testing in, so I really should have stuck to my guns. We all went to bed late, but I figured since I had three fewer rounds to play than everyone else, it wouldn't matter as much. That was another mistake.

We go to the event site early the next morning to register and meet up with the rest of the Iowa contingent. I loaned out a bunch of stuff to complete some lists for friends, and then waited for the first rounds to start. Once they did, I looked on as almost every person I knew got off to a terrible start. One exception was Xavier, a guy I only met recently. He was playing a dedicated combo deck which had the sole purpose of taking the entire 50 minutes to win the first game, at which point the other two games are a draw and he wins the match by default. Needless to say, this frustrated many of his opponents. He wasn't breaking any rules, but it still isn't fun to sit down across for someone and watch them take 30 minutes on one of their turns while you sit there unable to do anything. After his third round his opponent was so frustrated he signed the results slip with such vigor that he ripped a huge gash in with the pen. And it turned out he had signed in Xavier's spot, so Xavier just scribbled something sort-of illegible in the guy's spot rather than let him know. It was pretty amusing.

Then it was time for my first round of play. I was paired against Gerry Thompson, a popular writer for a major magic website and fresh off a top 25 finish at the pro tour. I won the first game easily. I was riding high. I lost the second game. I changed a few cards because I was going to be going first in the third game and wanted a slightly different strategy. At the crucial turn he cast a spell his deck is known for, and I cast one that lets me search for a card in my deck and put it into play. I had switched it out because I was playing first. I lost. And I looked really stupid doing so. He probably won't remember it for long, and maybe he had a good laugh with some friends about it, but it was pretty terrible for me.

Had I won that match, I would have been playing other undefeated players, giving me a much higher likelihood of being paired against good decks. And because they are good, chances are I have a plan against them. As it was, my next round I played against someone piloting a really off the wall strategy that just happened to be really good against me. I made a minor mistake in one of the games now that I think about it, but I wasn't going to win that match.

My third round was against a deck I knew might be a possibility. It's pretty even, and it came right down to the wire, but I lost, ending my tournament as rapidly as was humanly possible. I watched my friends finish up. It turned out that nobody I knew made it past the first day of the tournament. We were all pretty worn out, so although there was still plenty going on, we left to get some food. Another great thing about knowing people in the area is that we get good restaurant recommendations. We didn't really want asian food, and the first place we walked into had over an hour wait, so we wound up at a place called Buzzard Billy's. The name was a little off-putting to be honest, but they served Cajun food, and that was on-putting enough for me to be looking forward to my meal. The five of us who went split two appetizers, one of which which was breaded alligator, while the other was bacon-wrapped chicken. Both were delicious, but the bacon-wrapped chicken things were definitely superior. For my main course I ordered a plate with blackened chicken, beans, rice, gumbo, and hushpuppies. The chicken was dry, the rice and beans were bland, and the hushpuppies didn't have much flavor beyond the taste of cornbread. The gumbo was good, but not enough to make up for the rest of the meal. Luckily, Xavier didn't want all of his steak, which was quite tasty.

We went back to the house, where we discussed a bit of magic, played some mental magic, and then went to sleep. Mental magic is where you take a random stack of cards and can play them as they are any card in the game as long as they have the same property for casting. There is limit in that you can't play a card that's already been played that game. It really rewards having an extensive knowledge of what cards have been made, and takes a lot of skill to play well. Luckily, none of us are very good, so it was still fun.

The next day I found out that I had managed to sleep through the somewhat triumphant return of a bunch of the lincoln natives from the bars. I say somewhat because while they had some pretty good times and stories, one of them did wind up falling down the stairs and throwing up on himself. I'm not sure if that's the order things happened in or not, but I am sure they both happened. I'm amazed I slept through it actually. The best story I heard about the events of the previous night was about a confrontation one of the guys had with another guy on the street. He was being his usual loud self, and somehow got himself into the situation where the second guy was quite annoyed and ready to do something. So he threatened our protagonist with a knife. Now, our protagonist, being quite intoxicated, did not take offense at this as one normally would. Rather, he just enthusiastically said, "wow! Cool knife! Can I see it?" and before the antagonist could construct a response, he grabbed it and started looking at it. The guy said something to the effect of "I have another one," and, indeed, pulled out a second knife. To which our protagonist responded, "no way! Really? Let me see!" and grabbed that one too. So here our protagonist is, with two knives in his hands, but still not quite realizing he might have been in danger, while the antagonist is a bit bewildered, less angry, and probably wondering if our protagonist is in a state where he should be having two knives. The situation concluded with the knives returned to their owner and our protagonist on his merry way.

We got a late start to our morning what with all the drunk people and figuring out transport and the locations of our bags and such. We ate a brunch-style meal at a Mexican place, and got to the tournament site at noon. That's when we heard the announcement that it was last call for a side tournament. Xavier and I scrambled to get registered and submit our decklists barely squeaking in. It was going to be a six-round tournament, with cash prizes to the people who finished with only one loss. I won my first round, and was called over by a judge right after. It turned out I had only written down 13 of the fifteen cards in my sideboard, so I had to start the next round with a game loss. I won the other two games, though, and was undefeated. The next round my opponent and I were picked to have our decks checked. This means they go through the whole thing and make sure you wrote down everything correctly. In my rush, I had switched a card. So I had another loss to start. This time I lost again, so I had to win the rest. I didn't, and wound up with nothing. It was nice to get some wins with my deck, though. I felt pretty bad that I got two losses for such similar things. I wish they had checked my deck the first time, because once I turn in the list, it's out of my hands, and it felt like I was being punished twice for the same thing.

It was a fun weekend, and between splitting gas and staying with people, it wasn't very expensive. Of course things could have gone better, but it's all on my shoulders that it didn't. I think I'll try again soon.