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Prince of Pauper – My PTQ Win

I’d like to start off by saying that this is not a detailed report of my matches or a strategy-based article, this is a recount of my experience wining the Ottawa PTQ held at Wizards Tower on October 13, 2012.

I remember back in the “good ol’ days,” when I was still wet behind the ears, I played Magic: the Gathering as a weekend getaway from my schoolwork or day-to-day hardships. It quickly became more than that. I soon met two vastly better players than me, Stephane Faure and Mathew Schmaltz. I tried to absorb as much as I could playing with them, testing day and night, getting better every game. At some point, the three of us were running the competitive Montreal Magic scene. Magic became a drug; the rush of doing well in tournaments or finding the latest tech and using it only to our team’s advantage was intoxicating. We had lots of success over the years but we fell apart and that was the end of that.

I was on a Magic hiatus for almost two years before I finally made my return to the proverbial ring. My first tournament was a Canadian Magic Tour (CMT) event in Ottawa where I got absolutely crushed. Had the game changed that much? Or had I been away so long that I forgot how to play at a competitive level? The average player was leagues above the skill level that I remembered. I’d fallen under the curve. This motivated me to work beyond any point I had reached prior. I spent the next two years attending every Pro Tour Qualifier (PTQ) or Grand Prix I could afford.

Until my recent victory, I had lost almost all hope of ever getting that prestigious prize. I’d been on a rollercoaster ride of ups and downs, having always performed well but never actually making the cut to top eight. What was the key? How would I get there? These questions swelled in my mind and I began to doubt my own ability until one day I just stopped caring so much. All I wanted to do was play the game, go back to my roots, and just have fun with it.

Let’s start from Friday night, it was about six when I sent my friend and traveling partner Steven Kroll, a.k.a. “Mr. Merfolk,” a text message looking to confirm that we were, in fact, still going to the PTQ. We had some people drop out, and it became more expensive to drive down. Neither of us was really keen on overspending, but I had not played magic much since the prerelease and was craving my next dose of the drug we all know and love.

That night, I tossed and turned; I couldn’t sleep a wink. All I could think about was the day to come and the fun that was inching closer as the hours rolled by. I believe I finally passed out at around five in the morning.

My alarm rang at six thirty and I was still comatose. This was one of those moments where I was so grateful to have a beautiful girlfriend who sleeps next to me. She, unlike me, is not a deep sleeper and kept poking me till I finally woke up and turned off my alarm. After a shower, cup of coffee, and quick bite to eat, I was off to meet Steven downstairs. I got in the car and was overtaken by joy: “We’re going to play some Magic today!” I said, like a kid about to have the time of his life. For the first time in years I was excited to just play the game. I wasn’t thinking about winning the tournament or whom I would have to beat. The only thought in my mind was to enjoy myself and play great.

The drive down was uneventful; we had a quick pit stop at “Timmies” where I got my usual XL coffee and a fruit explosion muffin (If you haven’t tried it, TRY IT! It’s amazing!). The following two-hour drive was filled with discussion about the video games we were playing and how great they are. I’ve been trying to stay away from overplaying Magic lately. I feel like, in the past, I would “burnout” from too much preparation, and it would affect my results negatively in the long run. Instead, I’ve been playing World of Warcraft, really enjoying the new expansion. So I was mentally fresh for the tournament.

We arrived at Wizards Tower and the place was packed like a sardine can. Considering the size of the last PTQ I played there and Return to Ravnica’s being an amazing set filled with chase cards, it wasn’t surprising to see the large number of players attending. I registered quickly and found Joshua Lemish doing the same. He had the ManaDeprived hoodies in his trunk, and I was excited to get mine as were the others who followed him to his car. After discussing how amazing they looked and a few minutes of small talk, the pairings were posted and we were ready to get the party started.

The most important thing for winning a tournament is mindset. Even before we sat down, I was in a great mood, and good news was followed by even greater news: Jason Wong was named as the head Judge for the tournament. He is by far my favorite judge. Jason is fair and also understands the many levels of competitive play in a tournament; he sees the big picture when it comes to the grey areas of the game. Needless to say, I saw this as a sign for good things to come.

I found my seat next to my usual seetings neighbor, Kyle Robillard, and we talked about how sketchy a character I’ve become. I’d like to take a moment and elaborate on the term “sketchy.” I’ve been called many things in my time playing this game, but I wasn’t happy with this name tag. I decided to try something different, seeing that I was in such a good mood. “How about we try not to scumbag people today? Would that be so hard for me? Let’s put some karma coins in the bank,” I said to myself before we opened our packs.

The pool I registered wasn’t the greatest. Other than the amazing bomb, Pack Rats, the pool was under par. I was happy it wasn’t the pool I would be playing the rest of the day. After a few passes and verifications, Kyle ended up with my pool and I ended up with his. Pretty sweet deal, his pool was way better than the one I opened.

I took my time and made sure there were no errors. Even though it had been verified twice, I wasn’t about to take a chance. Then I scrutinized the playables I had at my disposal.

The first deck I considered was a green-white deck with three [card]Centaur Healer[/card]s, [card]Collective Blessing[/card], and a splash for [card]Cyclonic Rift[/card]. This deck looked great but I wanted to make sure that I wasn’t just playing the easy deck to build because it was just, well, easy. I looked at my other colors and found a Rakdos deck touching blue for late-game card advantage and removal/tempo. Although I believe that the GW deck was stronger, I prefer to play decks with tricks and card advantage. I always do better playing decks that give me some room to outplay others and generate more two-for-ones.

It wasn’t till the end of round three that I asked Francis Cormier for his opinion on how he would build my pool. Francis is the go-to guy when it comes to Limited, a Jedi Master in the forty-card format. So when he told me that I should be playing the GW deck and not the monstrosity that I registered, I took it to heart and made sure that I would have it ready in case I needed it.

It just so happened that in the following round, I was paired against an aggressive Rakdos deck. After losing game one to a great curve backed up by removal and burn, I decided to pull out the GW deck and go for broke. Needless to say, the [card]Centaur Healer[/card]s were a huge part of the reason I won that match. I stopped to thank Corm afterwards.

In the following round, I found myself paired against the number one Planeswalker Points-getter in Canada at the time, William Van Veen. I did my usual chatting before we presented our decks and got some information about him. This is something I do all the time, and I find that not enough people do it against players they have never played before. How are you supposed to know if your opponent will block your 2/2 attacking into his 3/3 unless you know the kind of player he is? Knowing your opponent is one of the more important aspects to this game, an aspect that I hope will get some attention from readers.

This was the only match that I felt behind in; William’s deck was vastly superior to the one I had for game one. After playing a turn-six [card]Armada Wurm[/card] (which I dealt with and the token), he followed up with an [card]Angel of Serenity[/card] targeting one of my creatures in play and two of the creatures in his graveyard, one of them being the [card]Armada Wurm[/card]. I made a pretty sweet play, Cyclonic Rifting his Angel with the enters-the-battlefield trigger on the stack to make sure that Wurm never came back, but I was still in trouble. I had no answer to his Angel anymore, and that was all she wrote for game one.

As I sideboarded for game two, looking through my deck for an answer to the “Dynamic Duo,” I realised that I shouldn’t be looking for an answer but should instead be asking the questions. I quickly pulled out the GW deck and started shuffling. To my opponent’s surprise, I played [card]Centaur Healer[/card] after [card]Centaur Healer[/card] and quickly beat down for a game two win. William admitted to me that I had gotten him and that I was a “sneaky one,” and so we went back to the board.

Game 3 was a battle, William came out of the gates hard, but my army of [card]Centaur Healer[/card]s gave me enough time to draw my end-of-turn [card]Cyclonic Rift[/card] into a windmill slam [card]Collective Blessing[/card]s on my turn. After that, the fat lady was singing loud and clear.

My round-six opponent was none other than Kyle Robillard. He had just finished telling me that his Pack Rats had been doing quite a lot of work, and that he was winning most of his matches that way. I don’t know how I did it or even that it was possible to do so, but our first game I raced a turn-two Pack Rats with an onslaught of unleashed creatures and a well-positioned [card]Launch Party[/card] to seal the deal.

Our second game, Kyle once again played a turn-two Pack Rats, which I felt like may have manipulated him into keeping a hand with Pack Rats and nothing else. I quickly sent it to the graveyard with an [card]Izzet Charm[/card] while he was tapped out and proceeded to win the game. Unfortunately the details following the first few turns of this game escape me, but Kyle is a good player; he gave me a good fight.

This match put me at 6-0-0 and in a position to draw twice for a top-eight spot. My next two opponents were both friends and great players, so I gladly drew with them to comfortably position myself in second place for the overall standings.

The last two Swiss rounds took a long time to finish; it felt like an eternity. All that was going through my mind was how I planned to win the draft, the picks would I make, what kind of signals I would give, and so on. There was nothing that was going to stop me from winning and claiming my spot on the Pro Tour.

I’ve always been the class clown, but I never do things just to get a laugh, and this time wasn’t any different. I took a few cards and stuck them together with some tape and made myself blinders so there was no way I could peek at any of the cards people were picking. I was NOT going to be disqualified for something stupid. Although we all had a laugh at my expense, I’m sure the others were thinking, “I should have thought of that.”

Let’s get down to the draft now.

I hadn’t drafted the Return to Ravnica much, but I believed I had an understanding of the quality of the cards and the interactions they had. My first pack had a dream distribution. It looked something like a Selesnya deck with a [card]Cyclonic Rift[/card]. Daniel Grenier was to my left, and knowing him as a player, I knew he would take the hint and play the green-white guild if I passed him that pack. My first pick was obviously the [card]Cyclonic Rift[/card]. The rest of the pack made me feel like Cormier (to my right) was in blue, passing me all the red and black I could ever want. When he passed a sixth-pick [card]Pyroconvergence[/card], it was like I saw the light: at that moment I slammed it down and knew I would be the only Izzet drafter at the table.

I prioritized multicolored spells for the rest of the draft and got lucky opening another on-color bomb, [card]Mizzium Mortars[/card]. Even though Corm was in blue, I knew the red would flow on either side of me, and I didn’t mind losing some blue power to make up for it in red and multicolored Izzet spells. Playing the Izzet deck is risky; it’s not as safe as playing Selesnya for example, since you lack solid creatures and the spells are not the most aggressive. I would compare getting a good Izzet deck in Return to Ravnica to playing a mono-colored deck in a core set: it’s rare, but extremely strong.

After building my deck this is what it looked like:

Creatures: 12
3 [card]Frostburn Weird[/card]
2 [card]Goblin Electromancer[/card]
1 [card]Nivix Guildmage[/card]
1 [card]Cryptborn Horror[/card]
1 [card]Izzet Staticaster[/card]
1 [card]Splatter Thug[/card]
1 [card]Batterhorn[/card]
2 [card]Isperia’s Skywatch[/card]

Spells: 12
1 [card]Street Spasm[/card]s
1 [card]Chemister’s Trick[/card]
1 [card]Cyclonic Rift[/card]
1 [card]Inaction Injunction[/card]
1 [card]Izzet Charm[/card]
1 [card]Mizzium Mortars[/card]
1 [card]Annihilating Fire[/card]
1 [card]Auger Spree[/card]
1 [card]Izzet Keyrune[/card]
1 [card]Goblin Rally[/card]
1 [card]Pyroconvergence[/card]
1 [card]Essence Backlash[/card]

Lands: 17
8 [card]Island[/card]
7 [card]Mountain[/card]
1 [card]Rakdos Guildgate[/card]
1 [card]Swamp[/card]

To say the least, the deck looked really spicy. I felt like I had the best deck in the top eight by far. I got up from my seat and walked up to David Schnayer (also my Trios teammate) to ask if he had extra sleeves I could use. Cormier was there and they were discussing how great his deck was-no specifics just general statements. I asked Schnayer to take a look at my deck too; he simply said the finals would be a nice battle.

In my quarterfinals match, I was paired against Eric Gaudreault, a great player and a notable Limited master as well. I felt ahead on deck, but he has had a lot of success in the past few years so I had to play as tightly as I could to ensure I got to the late-game where my deck couldn’t lose.

Our first game was intense. Eric was a tricky bugger; he always had the pump spell and always had the combat trick. There was a point where I Auger Spreed a two-toughness creature when he was attacking, and he had the [card]Giant Growth[/card]. I almost scooped because the extra seven power was more than enough to kill me until I noticed the [card]Izzet Staticaster[/card] I had in play. If I had scooped there I never would have forgiven myself, and it would have been a downward spiral. Instead, this downward spiral was flipped on Eric as he began playing poorly, “tilted” from his misplay. Even without playing the rest of the match I knew I would win, and so I did.

I hoped to play Fransisco-Leon Valencia in the semis, but unfortunately Nicholas Meade had his way and beat “Mexi” in the quarters. Nicholas was on Rakdos, and I had heard he had a Pack Rats in his deck, so I made sure to keep a hand with removal for it just in case. I remember Nicholas asking me if I was alright early in our match; I had been so focused on playing well I forgot to be social. I was apparently in some sort of “Zen” state, and there was nothing that could phase me. Nicholas was overall unlucky with his draws, but I also played well, getting him to discard three cards to his Pack Rats while I was holding [card]Cyclonic Rift[/card] and a removal spell, which eventually won me the match.

The Finals: I still get goosebumps thinking about it.

Schnayer’s prediction of Corm and me meeting in the finals came true. I was nervous, but it wasn’t the usual nerves. It was more like awareness. Our first game took almost forty minutes. I could have gone for the win much earlier; however, Cormier being the master that he is, kept me at bay and made me cautious. Some spectators said I made mistakes playing the match, and I’m sure I did too. However, I was never trying to make plays that won me the game. Every play I made was to make sure that when we got to the late game, I would be the one with more cards in hand and the advantage on board. My deck was so well positioned for the late game it was my only thought: get there.

Our second game was nowhere near as exciting, Cormier unfortunately was stuck on lands for the longest time, and even though it wasn’t the battle I was hoping for, it was the win I felt I deserved.

Corm is one of the players I respect the most in this game, and if I could choose one other person to win that tournament it would have been him.

I’m going to sound like an emotional wreck but, I can’t help it. That’s who I am.

I was overjoyed; all the fruits of my labor were now picked, and I could enjoy the sweet taste of victory.

I was overwhelmed with emotions and couldn’t stop myself from screaming and yelling profanities, so I had to step outside and let it all out.

I want to thank everybody who was there to help me through this. I already made a Facebook post that was compared to making an acceptance speech for an Oscar, but I won’t do that again. I’ll just say, “thanks,” and leave it at that.

This whole experience has given me perspective on the game, my friends, and life in general. I don’t want to sound too philosophical, but I will take this win as a life lesson. I’ve committed so much time and effort to achieving this goal, it’s just a huge relief to me to have that win chalked up. It goes to show you that, when you put your mind to it, you can actually accomplish anything.
My new goal is to become a regular on the Pro Tour. I want to consistently do well to ensure my stay for a long time to come. If I’ve learned one thing on this journey, it’s that patience is the key. Good things will happen if you let them.

I’m looking forward to getting the chance to represent Montreal, Canada, my hometown, on the world scene at PT Gatecrash. Look for me to make a big splash: “Hometown Hero Wins PT Gatecrash!” A guy can dream right?

As I’m unable to play any PTQs for the next 4 months, I plan to play as many CMTs and ManaDeprived Open series tournaments as I possibly can. I’m really looking forward to playing with my “Jew Jew Beans” at the CMT Trios in Montreal. We placed second last time, and I’m hoping to do better this time around.

Hope to see you all soon,

Thanks for reading.

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