Wacky Worlds 2026 Results

Wacky Worlds 2026 ran on Saturday!  It was wicked fun for me and I hope the same was true for everyone who came.  There's a lot for me to write about here without talking about the seven different formats or point system that we'd worked out ahead of time, so if you are interested in that, you need to check out my prior post about all of the Wacky Worlds 2026 rules.  The four main things I relate here are:

• How I fared.
• How it went for the particpants in general.
• Some surprising stats.
• Takeaways for future consideration. 

Participants started arriving right at the 10am start time, though some people didn't arrive until the afternoon.  In all we had 11 participants and there was a stretch in the afternoon where all 11 people were here!  

I took photos of the packs people chose before they opened them.  The first player, P1, opened Wilds of Eldraine, Journey to Nyx, Theros Beyond Death, Kamigawa Neon Dynasty, Duskmourn, and War of the Spark:

I didn't have any OG Theros or Born of the Gods packs, so this is as Therosy as you can get.

Those are from six different sets, so they got the 6-point bonus.

P2 opened the most spectacular set of packs, Secrets of Strixhaven, Avatar, March of the Machines: Aftermath, Strixhaven, War of the Spark, Alara Reborn 6-card pack, Homelands, and Fallen Empires:

Eight different sets!  I wish I could have awarded points beyond 6.

There are so many fascinating aspects of these eight packs:

• There are packs from all four decades: Nineties, Aughts, Tens, and Twenty-Twenties.
• The time difference between the release of the first pack (Fallen Empires, November 1, 1994) and the last (Secrets of Strixhaven, April 24, 2026) is 31 years, five months, and 23 days.  That is easily the longest I've seen between packs at any kind of chaos event.
• There are four different kinds of half-sized packs.  No one else opened more than one.  
• We looked up what the rarity distribution of cards was for the Alara Reborn 6-card packs beforehand, and it was very unlikely there'd be a rare in the pack.   

I will be amazed by these choices for years to come.

UPDATE (June 15, 2026): P2 also had an amazing combo in their deck: Deep Spawn + Jace, Wielder of Mysteries.  A combo 25 years in the making!  

P3 opened Mystery Booster 2, Modern Horizons 2 and 3, Magic 2012, War of the Spark, and Double Masters:

I love how they arranged these on their playmat.

I don't think I've ever seen a Double Masters pack opened before!  Crazy!

Those first three players opened their packs, built their decks, and got down to challenging the horde decks and earning points pretty quickly.  I had a moment, so I got my packs ready.  I opened an Onslaught Tournament pack, Khans of Tarkir, Murders of Karlov Manor, and Duskmourn:

I forgot to line these all up nicely.

I picked boosters with other face-down creatures to complement Onslaught.  I opened my packs and definitely had the cards to fit that theme:

No fetchlands.  Sigh.

I did not build my deck right then because more people showed up!  

P5 arrived and brought blueberry scones they had made!  (I ate two.)  They opened Strixhaven, Modern Horizons 2, Lord of the Rings, Modern Horizons 3, Avatar, and Secrets of Strixhaven:

Lord of the Rings is kind of Modern Horizons 2.5.

They were very careful about building their deck!  

Meanwhile, P6 opened Mystery Booster 2, the full trio of Modern Horizons packs, a Duskmourn Collector booster, and a March of the Machines: Aftermath:

First collector booster!

Part of the reason I wanted to do a sealed event was so that people could open and use collector boosters "safely".  Draft doesn't work as well because then you have to pass a bunch of the cards. 

P6 named their deck "You better check yourself before you deck yourself" because they ran out of cards in all but one game!  They also were very nice as they brought two elder dragons to add to the prize pool!  Amazing and generous!

Now we had a prize for second place too!

P7 arrived with P6 and opened Secrets of Strixhaven Collector, Aetherdrift, Spider-Man, Turtles Collector, and Lorwyn Eclipsed:

Doubling down on collector boosters!

You'll notice that they didn't have six different packs, so just like me they didn't get the 6-point bonus.  They didn't like their pool and only played one game before they decided to open a second set of boosters with Spider-Man, Turtles, Lorwyn Eclipsed, Thunder Junction, March of the Machines: Aftermath, and Secrets of Strixhaven Collector:

Still getting that collector booster goodness!

P8 arrived and opened Duskmourn, Thunder Junction, Bloomburrow, Tarkir, and two Final Fantasy packs:

No 6-point bonus but our first Final Fantasy packs!

P9 arrived and opened Kamigawa Neon Dynasty, Kaladesh, Aetherdrift, Edge of Eternities, Brothers' War, and Duskmourn:

One of these is not like the others.

P9's plan was to build around vehicles.  Their deck, "Teferi Kart World" succeeded!  It was in Yore-Tiller colors (WUBR) with Teferi, Temporal Pilgrim and 6+ vehicles-matter cards!

I think it was around this time that I had my deck built.  Here's what I put together after many cuts:

A very normal mana curve.

I didn't have a lot of mana fixing, but I also had so many 3-generic face-down creatures to play that it was okay.

P10 arrived.  They had been talking about their pack choices for a while, so I was excited to see what they settled on.  They opened March of the Machine (normal and Aftermath), Secrets of Strixhaven, Modern Horizons 2 and 3, and Commander Masters: 

First Commander pack!

Commander packs might be broken in this format, if only because Sol Ring is such a powerhouse!  At least they counted as 1.5 packs, so you couldn't just swap out a single pack for one.

I got into some games.  Here's me playing Face the Hydra with P5 and P8:

It takes two Clay Spiders (morphs) to kill one Hydra Head.

Here's a game of Defeat a God I was with with P10:

One Clay Spider can trade with an Ecstatic Piper.

Here's a shot of the planar map from a Planechase Eternities Map game I was in with P3, P5, and P10:

Izzet Steam Maze doubled P5's Sign in Blood!

See how Lethe Lake and Sanctum of Serra are next to each other?  Their combined oppression caused many people to die by decking.  At the end of the game, I was at 3 and P3 hit me with Incinerate with their dying Lethe Lake trigger so that P5 won!  Amazing!

Here's how the Explorers of Ixalan setup looked in the middle of a game between P1, P5, and (I think) P2:

They dug straight for a 6-tile.

P11 arrived and opened Lord of the Rings, Match of the Machine: Aftermath, Commander Masters, Battlebond, Aether Revolt, and Thunder Junction:

First team-oriented pack!  Wait, are there team oriented packs aside from Battlebond?  ...First Battlebond!

P11's Aether Revolt pack was one they had purchased on a summer trip to a store I used to play at two decades ago in Salem, Massachusetts!  With their pool, they built a five-color deck named "WUBRG Speed Mill".  (I didn't get to play with them, sadly.)

I got into an Explorers of Ixalan game with P1 and P3 and achieved a new thing for me: I got a morph creature, a manifest creature, and a mysterous creature all in the same game!  

The week before, I told some people that I'd be really excited if we ever had three simultaneous games running at any time.  Well, that happened multiple times!  

No games were allowed to start after 8pm, so once 7:20 hit, I felt pretty confident that no new games were going to start.  I was in an Explorers of Ixalan game with P1 and P2 that finished at exactly 8pm.  I ended with 16 points and P1 and P2 both had 45, tied for first.  P5, P8, and P9 were locked in an epic game of Ravnica: Clue, however, and P5 also had 45 points.  Although P1 and P2 had played more games, P5 was on a winning tear, scoring 4 points in three non-co-op games!  They didn't win that final Clue game (they did score two points by guessing their opponent's correct accusation at the end) but any result was enough to put them on the top.  P5 won with a total of 47 points!

In order to determine second place, we had to go to the (poorly crafted by me) tie breaker: the product of the individual scores instead of the sum.  P1 got 3 x 3 x 6 x 6 x 3 x 3 x 4 x 1 x 1 x 4 x 2 x 6 x 3 = 1,679,616.  P2 got 3 x 3 x 6 x 6 x 3 x 3 x 4 x 1 x 4 x 3 x 6 x 3 =  2,519,424.  P2 won second place!  (I'm so glad we didn't have to resort to any hare-brained further tie-breaking measures!)

As for my own results, I earned 16 total points: 2 from a Battle the Horde win, 2 from a Face the Hydra win, 4 from a Defeat a God win, 2 from surviving five planar shifts in a Planechase game, 1 from each of two Explorers of Ixalan games, 1 from a Ravnica: Clue game, and 3 bonus points for playing in six different formats.  (I tried really hard to discover the Golden City in the Explorers games, but it didn't happen.)

I noticed one card constantly underperform during my games: Efreet Weaponmaster.  Because of the word "another" on it, you really only get the full value when:

• You have another creature, and
• You get into combat with both that creature and the face-down Weaponmaster, and
• The other creature happens to be fighting something it needs more power to kill, and
• The Weaponmaster is facing something with two or more power and four or less toughness, and
• You have the five mana available to pay for the morph cost.

That is really hard to make happen.  I even just had trouble getting another creature to stick on the board.  

Take that, Khans of Tarkir card!

 

Congratulations to P5, P2, and P1 for taking first, second, and third places!  I made a Google Sheet to track all the scores as games were finished.

 

Here are some fun stats:

• All seven different formats got played.  (Only one game of Kingdom was played.)
• Packs from 38 different sets were opened!  Three of those were collectors and play boosters from the same sets, so 41 different packs were opened!
• 26 different games were played, not counting co-op games where the players didn't win.  (I didn't record those!)  
• 9 people were able to claim the 3 bonus points for playing 6+ different formats.
• Only one brave soul played all six formats: P3.  
• Four people scored 40+ points!  P1, P2, P3, and P5.  I was very surprised the scores went up that high!  Four more people scored 30+ points: P6, P7, P8, and P9.  

 

Time for the takeaways!  First, here are things that went great:

• Each player opened many different boosters.  There was plenty of wackiness!  I'm not even sure I needed to include the 6-point incentive.
• Players were excited to pull off combos between cards from different sets.
• People seemed to have a good time! 
• The sheets worked out pretty well; people were able to keep track of their own scores pretty well. 
• No one made the mistake of opening their packs beforehand.  Whew!  I was nervous about that one. 
• Having the March of the Machine Aftermath Epilogue packs available was good to help fill in 1/2-pack gaps for people. 
• People needed assistance and had rules questions for many of the games.  Thankfully I was expecting I'd need to help facilitate, so my expectations were set correctly. 
• If people were out of one game early, it was easy to get them into a different game. 
• I'm glad each co-op format could only be scored twice.
• P1 and P2 were both really gung-ho about Wacky Worlds.  They knew all the different formats really well and helped out a ton by answering questions and encouraging the wackiness all around.  Props to both of them! 
• The Ravnica: Clue "add-on rule" for Wacky Worlds worked nicely.  (This was that before someone makes an accusation, all other players write down what they think the correct answer is.  If the accusation is correct, then those players reveal what they wrote down.  If any of them match the accusation, then those players score 2 points instead of 1.)   
• The standings were close!  There was a quick spike by P1, P2, and P3, but then lots of people caught up and they went back and forth a lot at the end.    

 Here are some "woulda-coulda-shouldas" (based on things that didn't go so great):

• I should have rearranged my furniture more to make more room so I could comfortably hold three tables of games.
• Events were not self-explanatory.  I don't know how I could have solved this except by making print outs of each different format to hand out.  Ooh!  I should have put a QR-code on the score sheet that linked back to the blog post!
• I left some typos and formatting errors in the sheets.  I need to proofread those better.  Oops!
• The max scores for the horde formats should have been harder to accomplish, so groups couldn't speed run those and might decide to come back around to them later instead.  I would have preferred people score points on the easier setting first instead of only going for the max points on each.
• There was some confusion about what "X" meant in the scoring table (a four-player option) for the Battle the Horde format.
• Planechase Eternities Map games took too long.  In the future I would set the starting life totals to 10.  I know that's extreme, but I think one of them took well over two hours!  It would also mean that it's less likely to claim the 2-point loss scenario by surviving five planeshifts.  Everyone got that.  
• It would have nice to have some sort of 1v1 format so if there were two players who had completed all the co-op events, they could start a game. 
• I bought seven take-and-bake pizzas from Aldi's to serve for dinner.  They are quite big and we only ate four.  Oops! 
• The learning curve for Kingdoms is really high and since it only supports exactly 5 people, it's hard to run.  (Ravnica: Clue also has a high learning curve, but it's not as bad.) 
• I wish I had tracked all of the horde losses instead of just the wins.  I'm not sure how feasible that'd've been, though.
• 10 hours was probably too long.  I can be a marathon-magicker, but some of my friends seemed like they were getting worn out towards the end.  

 

Congratulations again to P5 for being the Wacky Worlds 2026 champion!  Congratulations to P2 and P1 for coming in second and third.  Thanks to everyone who came and everyone who contributed ideas for the formats and rules.  Thanks to people who played formats they'd never done before!  I hope your bravery was rewarded!  I hope everyone had at least as much fun as I did.

If you want to do something like this yourself, go for it!  If you don't have the supplies, I made sites where you can play Face the Hydra, Battle the Horde, Defeat a God, Ravnica: Clue, and Kingdom.   

Happy Magicking, as Wacky as you can get!  

 

Trying on a Bracelet Amidst Chaos (WUBRG Drafting)

I got to do a little four-person draft on Wednesday.  The context for this is that it came shortly before Wacky Worlds, set to occur three days later.  It was, therefore, a bit of a calm before that storm.  I was coming off a tough record at a Modern RCQ, but not to worry!  I was back in the element that I thrive in!

I stuck to my plan of opening Ikoria, included Secrets of Strixhaven (spending my Gamestop money for the month), and threw in an Adventures in the Forgotten Realms to mix things up.  Here's what we all opened:

Lots of good chaotic packs here!

We decided to do the variant where the first pick of each pack is actually two picks instead.  I was very excited when I opened my Ikoria pack and found what I wanted: a triome!  During that first pack, I tracked my colors, being dedicated to getting all five sooner rather than later.  I got a bit stressed because I failed to draft any use for black mana.  I didn't solve that until halfway through pack two with Locust Spray, but I wound up drafting many black spells anyways.  Also of interest was my third pick in pack two, The Dominion Bracelet.  "Dominion" isn't "Domain", but it's close.  I really wanted to activate that during the games.  Here are all my picks:

Yay, Triome!

I really don't know whether I did a good job with this deck.  I agonized quite a bit over the construction.  Here's what I put together:

Bruenor turned out to be way better than I expected!

We decided to do a round robin of full matches.  I sat down against my first opponent, running a vicious Rakdos deck.  They started off by casting Umbral Collar Zealot on turn two.  I drew The Dominion Bracelet and cast it on turn three; they followed by casting Page, Loose Leaf.  I drew well again, grabbing Bruenor Battlehammer.  I cast him and used the free equip, making him an 8/4 creature right off the bat.  Sadly, my opponent Extracted a Confession from me, then played a Common Crook.  On the fifth turn, I played my Culvert Ambusher, face down.  My opponent then cast Mornsong Aria.  I'm very well acquainted with Maralen of the Mornsong, having played her in various of my Shuffleupagus decks for years.  There are, however, two very important differences: 

• Mornsong Aria is an Enchantment, not a creature, and
• Players can neither gain life nor draw cards.  This second part I wasn't aware of!

Look at that deck above.  See any enchantment removal?  See any in my draft pool?  Nope!  I was behind on life and without any mass removal cards, so all my opponent had to do was remove my creatures for a few turns before I died.

In game two, they played the Common Crook on turn two, then the Aria on turn three before I'd played anything.  I put up a fight, using each of my searches to find useful removal.  Orbital Plunge, Electro's Bolt, and Farideh's Fireball all hit their targets, but the last of those was Judith, Carnage Connoisseur, who also created a 2/2 with Duel Tactics.  I lost on what I think was turn seven.  0-1.  We played two more bonus games (since we were done so quickly) and I lost both of those as well.

I didn't last long enough in any game to see this sweet combo they had.

In round two I was up against "Temur Tam" a real strong Izzet value deck.  They played Tam, Mindful First-Year on turn two, the namesake of the deck.  I cycled my Topiary Panther on turn three and they played Tend the Sprigs.  With my mana sufficiently fixed, I got Bruenor out, but he was hit immediately by a Debris Field Crusher.  I hit Tam with Electro's Bolt on turn five, then they played a Rimeshield Frost Giant, which turned out to be a real problem.  I played The Dominion Bracelet and they attacked me, putting me at 12 with them undamaged.  I had nothing on my turn and they played Spider-Rex.  I died on turn eight.  

In game two, they got Virulent Emissary out right off the bat.  I played my Timid Shieldbearer then they traded in combat.  They cast Tam, which I hit with Electro's Bolt again on my third turn.  I cast Garrison Excavator on my next turn, but it got countered with Quandrix Charm.  On their fifth turn they played the Rimeshield Frost Giant again, and all I had to do was cast Lorehold Charm during their end step to get the Timid Shieldbearer back.  They played Elemental Mascot during their sixth turn, which they claimed was one of the best cards in their deck.  (They had two.)  I cast Ancestral Anger and realized that it was not the card I'd thought: Fists of Flame.  (I'm not sure how I mixed those two up!)  I took the card out of the deck for future games.  My opponent had Tend the Sprigs again, but this time got the bonus 3/4 Treefolk.  On their next turn they mutated Lore Drakkis onto that creature and grabbed Quandrix Charm back.  I took out the combination creature with Farideh's Fireball.  

Whose Fireball?  Farideh's Fireball!

On my ninth turn I played my Riftburst Hellion face down, but my opponent hit me with Homesickness at the end of my turn.  They played Slumbering Trudge and killed me on their tenth turn.  0-2.  We played a bonus game afterwards and I was very excited because I got to activate The Dominion Bracelet and win!  It doesn't count for anything, but it was still fun!

Dear Reader, at this point I was on a 7-round streak of losing matches 0-2, if you count my performance at the Modern RCQ just ten days prior.  It's time to turn this around!  My final opponent was running an aggressive Bant deck.  They started the first game with a turn one Studious First-Year.  I played the Dominion Bracelet on turn two and then they cast Elite Interceptor.  (Slightly better than Squire.)  I played a second equipment on turn, my Ranger's Longbow, only because I didn't have any creatures I could run out yet.  Thankfully, on turn four I drew a land and got to play Garrison Excavator.  My opponent played a Starbreach Whale, which I immediately hit with Orbital Plunge on my fifth turn.  (Five toughness?  Perfect.)  My opponent cast Daily Bugle Reporters and then we went back and forth hitting for six damage.  Sadly, they played a Badgermole Cub on turn seven.  With that extra power on the attack, I couldn't get in for the last bit of damage to win and I died when they swung back.  I died with 8 mana on the board and the Bracelet on a 6/6 creature.  One mana away!

In game two, I started off with Dungeon Descent and they played the Elite Interceptor again.  On their second turn they warped in the Starbreach Whale.  I cast Ranger's Longbow on turn three, then Bruenor on turn four, making him a 9/4.  My opponent cast Studious First-Year and then the Rejoinder to draw a card.  I attacked on turn five.  They cast a scary Badgermole (not the cub) but I had Electro's Bolt for it and continued my attack on my sixth turn.  They played Facet Reader and scared me away from attacking on turn seven with four power of creatures on the board.  I cast Topiary Panther, equipped the Longbow to it, and passed.  They cast Uthros Scanship.  The Panther was big enough to survive an attack into everything, so I had it press in and used the Dungeon Descent and Bruenor to go delving.  (Not that delving.)  My opponent scooped on the next turn.

In game three, my opponent played three creatures in the first three turns while I played only the Longbow: Curious Farm Animals, the Facet Reader, and an Infirmary Healer.  I played Garrison Excavator, but it got Essence Scattered!  My opponent cast Spider-Man India, web-slinging the Facet Reader.  I had an Electro's Bolt for it, but they followed that up with Daily Bugle Reporters.  All I could do was cast Sneering Shadewriter on my turn, but I was down to five life and couldn't block all the attackers.  

Beaten up by little critters.

0-3.  I ended the night on a streak of eight match losses, but at least I won a game in that last one!

Takeaways:

• Wacky drafting?  Do I even know how to do that?

I had so much fun with this deck, though!  My games were all really fun.  Happy Magicking: may you have as much fun as I do!

Shuffleupagus at RCQ (Mediocre Modern)

In the mid-Aughts, I had a long run of 2-X PTQ appearances.  It was after one of those, on a cold walk through the Allston/Brighton neighborhoods of Boston that my friend and I said the name "mediocre magic".  It fits the janky style perfectly.

I don't know if this is still a thing nowadays, but there was a bit of a counter-movement against "netdecking" in the nineties.  Mark Rosewater famously told Zak Dolan, the first world champion, not to tell anyone what was in his winning deck so people couldn't copy it.  That term doesn't mean anything anymore with ubiquitous Internet activity.  I like that there are metas and people scrutinize and optimize specific decks, but I want to create something of my own.  

I don't have illusions of grandeur.  I remember reading about top Extended decks after Mirrodin's release and the Scepter Chant deck (Isochron Scepter + Orim's Chant) had come out of nowhere and made a big top 8.  In a group interview, the creator rightfully got to say their deck was completely new while everyone else explained which version of the well-known deck they'd tweaked.  I'm not about to make something both that strong and unique, but maybe I can at least be known a little bit for getting some fun jank to work.

I have been working on versions of Shuffleupagus since 2003 when Psychogenic Probe was first spoiled before the Mirrodin prerelease.  I've been squirreling away cards that cause your opponent to shuffle their deck for years and have sporadically run it in different forms ever since.  (I was very excited when Modern was announced and the Probe just survived the cut.)

My FLGS, Intergalactic Plastic, ran a Modern RCQ on Sunday, May 31, less than two weeks ago.  I had gone 2-1 (kinda 0-2) on Friday with Spiteclasm, but it was a bit unfulfilling.  My friends knew I had a mono-black version of Shuffleupagus ready to go, but I had chickened out from playing it.  

I blamed it partly on a lack of Volatile Faults.  I had zero and kept hitting dead-ends finding them.  This is not just sour grapes--those faults are in some ways better than Ghost Quarter because that treasure token provides one more copy of Bitter Ordeal--but it's not like the deck is useless without them.

On Saturday the universe gave me a sign that I could not be so cowardly.  While at a yard sale in town, I saw a little bunch of magic cards for sale.  I flipped through and saw a Volatile Fault.  I overpaid for the cards, but was excited as I resolved to take Shuffleupagus to a real tournament. 

I did have some misgivings about running mono-black, but I tried to increase the chance I'd find Psychogenic Probe by including four Serum Powder.  This brought up an interesting rules interaction with London Mulligans: technically you are supposed to put cards on the bottom of your library at the end of each mulligan.  That means that if you don't like your hand with Serum Powder and you're a few tries into mulliganing, you can put cards you don't want exiled onto the bottom of your library and then exile the Serum Powder and the rest of your hand to get a redo.

Okay, here's the mono-black Shuffleupagus build I came up with:

• 4 Psychogenic Probe 
• 4 Serum Powder 
• 4 Lantern of Insight 
• 4 Bitter Ordeal 
• 4 Surgical Extraction 
• 4 Extirpate 
• 4 Deadly Cover-Up 
• 3 The End
• 1 Varragoth, Bloodsky Sire
• 1 Ob Nixilis, Unshackled
• 2 Doom Blade
• 4 Ghost Quarter
• 1 Volatile Fault
• 20 Swamp
  
  Sideboard:
• 2 Doom Blade
• 2 Cranial Extraction
• 3 Lost Legacy
• 1 The End
• 1 Maralen of the Mornsong
• 2 Canyon Crawler
• 4 Troll of Khazad-dûm 

I really struggled with the sideboard and making choices between Lost Legacy, Infinite Obliteration and similar cards. 

I believe 19 people showed up for the tournament, so we had five rounds.  In the first round, I was paired up against someone I knew but had never played before.  They were running Living End, the only deck I'd really prepared for!

I had been disappointed by presumably-good-matchups with Shuffleupagus before.  In the Aughts, when Tooth and Nail was hot in Extended, I thought I had a good plan against it with Cranial Extraction and Bribery.  I went to some big tournament, got matched up against Tooth and Nail right off the bat, couldn't pull off a win in that first round, then never faced it again as I floundered my way through the lower brackets.  This was my chance for redemption!  

Game one started slow.  On their turn three, they cycled Curator of Mysteries.  On my turn, I played Varragoth, but they evoked Subtlety and I put Varragoth on the top.  On turn four they cast Violent Outburst into the Living End, but I responded with Surgical Extraction to get rid of all the Curators.  Subltelty hit the field and I played Varragoth on my turn.  On my fifth turn, I played a Psychogenic Probe.  The game slowed down and I made a critical miscalculation.  Apparently the Living End deck only runs three of them, not four.  I had enough to Bitter Ordeal for two, which would have been enough, but was hoping to get three.  Instead my opponent played Shardless Agent a bit later and won the turn after.

In game two, I swampcycled a Troll on my first turn.  I played Probe on turn two, but my opponent was wise to the game and Force of Negation'ed it.  That left them without a counter for my Lost Legacy next turn.  They played a Curator of Mysteries on turn four, then countered the The End I hit it with next turn with a second Force of Negation.  They played another Curator one or two turns later and I didn't have any way to kill them both.  I got Varragoth out but died shortly thereafter.  0-1.

In round two I faced a remixed affinity deck that didn't actually use the Affinity mechanic at all.  On turn one, they dropped "flipwalker" Tamiyo, which was mostly there to generate clues.  They played Urza's Saga on their second turn and an Aether Spellbomb.  I got a Psychogenic Probe out, but I was clearly behind.  They played a Mox Opal on turn three and created a construct while I got out a second probe.  On turn four, they dropped their Urza's Saga to search for a Shadowspear as well as create a second construct.  I Extirpated the Urza's Saga at the end of their turn and then passed on mine.  I was only one life or one shuffle away from having enough to kill them with shuffles.  Instead, I had to hold for a The End for one of their constructs, but they even had Flame of Anor to destroy one of my probes before I searched on their turn.  I died to the construct soon after.  

In game two, they had a big turn two with Tamiyo, two Mishra's Baubles, and a Mox Opal.  I took out their Urza's Saga with my Ghost Quarter at the end of their turn.  On turn three I hit Tamiyo with a Doom Blade and then Surgical Extracted her on turn four.  Before I could do that, however, my opponent had played a second.  I drew a swamp and hit it with The End on my fifth turn.  My opponent had a better play: Cori-Steel Cutter.  I had Deadly Cover-Up on turn six and had enough to collect the evidence, which I used to get rid of Forces of Negation.  Unfortunately more monks emerged from the Cutter and I died to many of them.  0-2.

In round three I was up against a Charbelcher deck!  It was kind of neat, to have one Mirrodin artifact facing down another.  Their deck played no lands, instead relying on MDF Cards with lands on the back side.  I started off with a Lantern of Insight while they suspended a Lotus Bloom.  I cast a Psychogenic Probe on my second turn, but they had a Spell Snare for it, which was quite disheartening.  I had a second Probe in hand, but correctly guessed they were holding more counters and baited a Counterspell out with Varragoth.  I safely played the Probe and a Lantern on turn four.  They cast Tameshi, a new card to me!  

It combos real well with Lotus Bloom.

I was without a hand and they promptly got out Goblin Charbelcher and killed me with it.  

In game two they suspended the Lotus Bloom right away again.  I cast Lost Legacy on turn three, but they Force of Negation'ed it.  I played Maralen of the Mornsong on turn four and they resolved their Lotus Bloom.  I played Ghost Quarter on turn five and they surprised me with a Whir of Invention for four, bringing up a Charbelcher.  I Bitter Ordeal'ed the remaining three but it was too little, too late.  They activated the cannon on their next turn and killed me.  0-3.

In round four I was up against an Eldrazi deck.  In the first game all I really got down was a Lantern of Insight on turn one.  They used Kozilek's Command to set up for Through the Breach on turn four.  Emrakul came to my town and removed my entire board.  

In game two I had another first-turn Lantern of Insight.  They played Ugin's Labyrinth into a Talisman of Creativity.  I got a second turn Probe and they played Chalice of the Void for one.  On turn three I wanted to both Ghost Quarter and Bitter Ordeal but was one mana short.  Instead I decided to take out the Ugin's Labyrinth and hold on to the Bitter Ordeal.  There was a calm of a few turns and then I dropped the Ordeal on turn five.  Unfortunately they had Untimely Malfunction (sided in) to kill my Probe.  They played Eldrazi Command on their turn for nine.  Their next turn had Emrakul; Yggdrasil, Rebirth Engine; and Ulamog all on the same turn.  0-4.

Round five.  My last chance for a win... even a game win.  I was up against a mill deck.  My opponent and I were both in high spirits, clearly there for the fun of playing Magic.  They started the first game by Thoughtseizing one of my Probes.  They cast Fractured Sanity and hard cast Archive Trap.  I cast Deadly Cover-Up to remove a single Hedron Crab as my library withered and then again to take out a single Ruin Crab.  I still got decked.  

In game two they cast Thoughtseize on me again right away, followed up by Tasha's Hideous Laughter on turn three.  On my turn four, I used Ghost Quarter with Bitter Ordeal to remove three Fractured Sanities from their deck.  They had one in hand and used it against me right away, then an Archive Trap on the next turn.  (I was surprised they hadn't sided those out!)  I Extirpated the trap and then they played Ashiok, Dream Render.  My library kept disappearing until it was down to one card, a Swamp.  I drew it with my opponent at 12 life.  It was my sixth land and I cast Ob Nixilis for the first time all day.  I passed the turn and they did the same.  I entered my upkeep and Ghost Quartered one of their lands, with Extirpate in my hand.

They declined to search (obviously).  I cast the Extirpate for good measure and lost the closest game I'd had all day with my opponent at two life.  0-5.  0-10 in games.

Despite the tough record, I had a great time.  I was pretty nervous at the beginning since I hadn't been at such a high-level event in well over a decade, but all of my opponents were wicked friendly and I quickly settled into a great mood.  (The judge was also really good at promoting a chill atmosphere.)  

I honestly don't know what I should have done differently.  I would really like to see how the Orzhov, Dimir, and even Rakdos versions of the deck fare in a real tournament.  I also would like to have had more Volatile Faults!

It was fun to once again be a part of a higher-stakes event!  I think it's important for there to be a layer of jank at these things that sometimes shoots for the moon.  

Happy Magicking, no matter what level you're playing at! 

A modern night of Spiteclasm (Mediocre Modern)

"Hey, Kyle!  Your blog says 'Playing Magic: The Gathering... without the good cards.' but you don't really play constructed anymore.  I thought your whole thing was playing through the losing bracket at high-level events.  What gives, man?  I don't want to read about dumb Anaconda Chaos Clue drafts, I want to hear about how you killed someone with a terrible card!"

Good news for you: I got bitten by the bug to do this again.  I signed up for a Modern RCQ at Intergalactic Plastic on Sunday, May 31.  They added a little modern practice tournament for FNM two days before, which is what this post covers.  My last post from a constructed event was in 2017.  At some point I went 3-0 with Spiteclasm, and I think that was after 2017, so it hasn't been quite nine years.  It was definitely 2019 or earlier, though, so it's been a long time!  

For FNM, I had to make the tough choice between Spiteclasm and Shuffleupagus.

Spiteclasm pros: 

• I won that little modern tournament on the back of Blood Moon, which sometimes just wins games all on its own.  (I won the final round of that tournament by playing turn 3 moons in both games against Scapeshift Valakut.)  I had already acquired a playset of Winter Moons and had some other important parts of the deck ready.  
• It's still a janky deck.  It's not like I'm running some kind of main stream deck.  I don't even have Skred in there right now.  "Without the good cards" would still be a correct statement.
• The deck deals well with creatures and can close out games.
• I have the deck mostly ready to go. 

Shuffleupagus pros:

• This deck is hilarious.  I haven't ever played it in Florida.  I think it wasn't well-liked near the end of my times playing it in central New Hampshire, though.  When I presented the idea, people here were very gung-ho for it.
• Deadly Cover-Up can help take care of creatures in a mono-black version, so I might not have mana base problems.  
• This is much more janky than Spiteclasm. 
• I have been working on this deck since Psychogenic Probe was in the Mirrodin spoilers.  

I chose Spiteclasm for two main reasons:

• I have a ton of Shuffleupagus cards all saved together across all colors, but I don't know the best way to put them together.
• I think Spiteclasm is a better deck and more likely to win games.
• Spiteclasm is still plenty janky! 

Here's a quick deck list:

• 23 Mountain
• 4 Blood Moon
• 2 Winter Moon
• 4 Boros Reckoner
• 4 Screaming Nemesis
• 4 Humble Defector
• 1 Spitemare
• 4 Pyroclasm
• 2 Fire Magic
• 4 Cinderclasm
• 2 Shake the Foundations
• 3 Fiery Cannonade
• 1 Fuel the Flames
• 1 Earthquake
• 1 Ashling the Pilgrim
  
  Sideboard:
• 4 Oliphaunt
• 4 Mongoose Lizard
• 2 Winter Moon
• 2 Soul-Scar Mage
• 2 Pyrohemia
• 1 Earthquake 

There were clearly some missing pieces.  Fire Magic is better than Cinderclasm, Fuel the Flames is better than Fiery Cannonade, and that Spitemare should be replaced by an Ill-Tempered Loner but those are the cards I had ready to go.  The Oliphaunts and Mongoose Lizards were in preparation for facing down Living End, which was benefitting from some recent unbannings.  I had played this deck against a Living End deck before, but it was nearly a decade ago at this point.

In the first round, I was paired up against a cascade deck, but not Living End itself, Temur Rhinos, powered by Crashing Footfalls.  On turn two, they Iced my mountain on my upkeep, which did effectively slow me down.  They played Shardless Agent on turn three, which got the Crashing Footfalls out.  I played a Boros Reckoner down on the next turn.  They attacked with their team and I foolishly blocked the Agent, forgetting the bonus effect of Violent Outburst, which they used to trade with me and get another pair of Rhinos.  Thankfully I had two Pyroclasms that I played on my next turn to wipe the board.  On my next turn I played out a Screaming Nemesis and Humble Defector.  They cast another Violent Outburst at the end of my turn for yet another pair of Rhinos.  They untapped and cast Dead (of Dead and Gone) to take out my defector.  Then they suspended their final Crashing Footfalls and warped in Quantum Riddler.  I played out the Spitemare, but I was down on life 10 to 2.  I lost on their next turn.

In the second game, my opponent had to mulligan once.  I started off fast with a Soul-Scar Mage, but my opponent hit it with Dead.  I cast Humble Defector on my second turn and my opponent suspended Crashing Footfalls.  I played the Screaming Nemesis and thanks to shocks and fetches, I was up 20 to 12.  On turn four I played a Reckoner and on turn five attacked with both and cast two Pyroclasms to win.

In the third game they froze out one of my lands on turn two again and got the Shardless Agent into Crashing Footfalls on turn three.  I risked casting Blood Moon, but they had a Force of Negation for that.  On turn four they played another Shardless Agent, but I again had two Pyroclasms to save the day, though I was down 17 to 10.  They warped in a Riddler again and I played another Nemesis on turn five.  They cast the Riddler for real on turn six and I countered with a Winter Moon.  Sadly, they had enough non-basics that it wasn't a problem and cast yet another Shardless Agent on turn seven, then attacked to kill me on turn eight.  0-1

In the second round I got the bye, the bane of those who are playing in a tournament for fun.  I know that counts as a win for my record, but does it really?  Technically 1-1. 

In the third and final round I was matched up against an Affinity deck.  They started the first game off by playing an Ornithopter, then dropped a Refurbished Familiar on turn two and a Frogmite on turn three.  I played a Boros Reckoner after that.  They then dropped the key of their deck, a Simulacrum Synthesizer.  I cast a Cinderclasm on my turn to clear things out and got in for damage.  On the fifth turn, they cast another Synthesizer and I played a second Reckoner.  After I attacked I was slightly ahead in life, 16 to 12.  On their next turn, they played a Memory Guardian then two Frogmyr Enforcers for free.  Each of those created tokens from the Synthesizer, which had gotten a bit out of hand.

They are 17/17s right now.

I cast a Shake the Foundations but didn't draw into anything that would save me and I got crushed the next turn.  

In the second game, I had four moons in my opening hand, two of each.  They started off with an Ornithopter.  I dropped a Winter Moon on turn two and they played a Refurbished Familiar.  I then played Blood Moon, which did double-duty on their artifact lands, shutting them off from useful mana and removing their affinity power.  They played a Nettlecyst on their turn, which I took out with a Pyroclasm.  I played a Reckoner on turn five and they got enough lands to run out Frogmite.  On their sixth turn they played a Springleaf Drum, Thought Monitor, and another Frogmite, but I played Fiery Cannonade to clear their side of the board.  On turn seven I played a Humble Defector and they played a Springleaf Drum.  I didn't have another wiper, so I just attacked out for two more turns to win.

In game three I had another one-two moon punch on turns two and three, though they did have a big turn three first, playing the Familiar, two Frogmites, and a Memory Guard.  On turn four, they played the Nettlecyst and attacked to put me at 11.  I played a Reckoner, finally getting something on the board.  On turn five they equipped and attacked again with their fliers, putting me to 1 life.  They immediately remarked that they could have attacked with the two extra frogs to kill me.  I cast a Pyroclasm to clear all but one of their creatures and when they attacked on the next turn I cast Fuel the Flames to take out the other and leave my Reckoner alone.  I kept attacking each turn with the Reckoner.  At one point they cast a prototype form of the Frogmyr Enforcer (because they could use their mountains for that red) but I hit it with a Pyroclasm and my Reckoner ended up getting there.  Technically 2-1.  

Okay, so that 2-1 was a lot more like a 0-2, as I should have lost that last game.  

I have a lot of thoughts about this deck and how that went:

• I miss CardCodex.com, which used to be a site that you could use to find similar magic cards.  It is now something that is used to organize Pokemon card collections.
• Should I put a few copies of Brash Taunter back in? 
• Should I go back to the snow-covered version with Skreds?  
• I should get a copy of Sophim to put in there and probably also a copy of the new Hazoret.  

Coming soon: how did it go at the RCQ?

Happy Modern Magicking! 

One Straight-laced Multiplayer Game Still Accentuates the Chaos (WUBRG Drafting)

Last week I did a wacky draft with three other people.  We decided we wanted to play a big multiplayer game, but not play Ravnica: Clue.  I lobbied for some alternate formats to promote attacking people, but that got vetoed.  I was still happy to play in a bigger game.  Here's what we opened:

My second and third packs were calls out to the universe, asking for guidance for which Modern deck to run the following weekend.  Let me know if you think you know which cards I was looking for in each pack.

We used the first-pick-take-two rule so we got to make two picks from each pack but only as the first person.  I was very careful not to make sure I wasn't a fraud and had cards in all five colors by pick six.  Here are all the picks I made:

If you need to get an Ultimatum or Mythos from an Ikoria pack, let me open it.  I have some great (bad) luck with that.

I put together a fun deck with that:

A beautiful rainbow of five colors.

We rolled to see who would go first.  The order was:

• P1 was running "Take to the Skies" in Bant.
• I was second up.
• P3 was Temur, "Free Spells into Suicide"
• P4 was another WUBRG deck, "Class is Outside Today".  (At least they mused "I don't know how Kyle always plays five colors," partway through the game.)

In the second round of turns, P3 played Ominous Seas and P4 played Chrome Companion.  Both of those became important throughout the game!

On turn three, P1 played Glider Kids, I played Lumbering Laundry face down.  P3 dropped a Magnifying Glass, and P4 attacked P3 with the dog. 

P1 turned their attention to me on the fourth round of turns.  I did not take it personally and attacked P4.  P3 ramped with Zimone's Experiment and P4 cast Pensive Professor, another value generator described as the Instructor who would be teaching today's class.  

Player 1 played Bristling Boar to start off the fifth round of turns.  I played Deepcavern Imp but didn't attack with it.  P3 cast Rapturous Moment into Elemental Mascot and Spore Crawler.  P4 finished the round with Sanar, Unfinished Genius, one of the students.

In the sixth round of turns, P1 made another move for air superiority by casting Empyrean Eagle and attacked P4, recognizing the value engine that was spinning up.  I played Water Tribe Captain.  P3 hit P4 as well, then played Frilled Sparkshooter.  Player 4 reacted, but to me, taking out my imp with Blooming Blast, then playing Abigale, Poet Laureate (I just noticed the pun, ha!) and Hydro-Channeler.  

P1 cast Angelic Quartermaster to claim the dominion of the skies.  They attacked me, bringing the life totals to P1: 20, Me: 8, P3: 15, P4: 14.  I responded by attacking back for two damage, then cast Nebula Dragon to take out the Quartermaster.  P3 cast Improvisation Capstone and this was the first time I'd ever seen the Paradigm keyword.  (It's like Epic but better.)  With that they dropped Knowledge Seeker and Zaffai and the Tempests.  

Time for those free spells to shine!

P3 then also attacked P1 now that their defenses were down.  P4 out WUBRG'ed me and cast Prismatic Undercurrents for five.  They then played Lluwen, Exchange Student and announced that all three students were prepared for class!  Ha!

On turn 8, P1 passed.  I attacked P3 with the Nebula dragon, they blocked with the Frilled Sparkshooter, I activated the Water Tribe Captain, they cast Aquitect's Defenses on their lizard, and I cast Harsh Annotation on it in response.  I definitely overspent my resources on that battle!  P3 activated the Ominous Seas at the end of my turn.  They cast Tenured Concocter then attacked me with the 8/8, the Knowledge Seeker, and the Elemental Mascot.  I blocked the 8/8 and went to 3 life.  P4 cast prepared spells and re-prepared things and got Spirit Mascot out.  They then played Tester of the Tangential.

Congratulations, P4, on becoming the Archenemy!

At the end of P4's turn, P1 cast Ajani's Response on P3's 8/8 Kraken token.  The life totals were P1: 16, me: 3, P3: 15, P4: 14.  

P1 passed on their ninth turn, keeping all their mana and creatures open.  I finally played the Lifecreed Duo that had been in my hand all game, followed by my Iguana Parrot.  P3 cast Disruptor of Currents, bouncing P4's Pensive Professor.  They swung into P4, which went okay.

There was a lot of text on P4's board.

 

P3 continued by casting Icecave Crasher and Stock Up, but realized their deck was living up to its name: they only had ten cards left in their library.  They replayed the Pensive Professor and put Aetherize into their hand.  (I don't remember how that happened.)  They were also low on cards in their deck.  At this point I realized that everyone was out landing me.  Urf!

P1 passed to open the tenth round of turns.  I attacked P4 with my Iguana Parrot, which happily flew over, then I cast Crovax, Ascendant Hero.  That notably took out P4's Chrome Companion, which had been putting in a lot of work all game.  P3 cast Dreadlight Monstrosity and already had eight counters on Ominous Seas again.  They attacked me and I had to throw my now 1/1 parrot in the way.  P4 cast Fire Nation Warship, then Biblioplex Tomekeeper.  They attacked P3 with their 7/7 Spirit Mascot, but P3 cast Gone on it.  The life totals were now P1: 16, me: 5, P3: 15, and P4: 9.

P1 was sitting pretty and passed again on their eleventh turn.  I cast Tributary Vaulter, hoping I could stay alive.  P3 attacked me with Dreadlight Monstrosity, making it unblockable.  That would have been three damage, but P4 intervened.

Wait, not like that!

P4 really wanted Crovax off the board, and the Auspicious Arrival was enough of a boost to take me out.  On their turn, P4 cast Pinnacle Emissary and attacked P1 with their 4/6 Pensive Professor.  After combat they replayed their Spirit Mascot.  The life totals were: P1: 4, P3: 15, and P4: 9.

On turn 12, P1 cast Finch Formation, but didn't offspring it.  P3 declined to use the Capstone's Paradigm ability this turn, then attacked both opponents.  P1 used their untapped mana to cast Uncharted Voyage on the Dreadlight Monstrosity to stay alive.  Then P3 used Calamitous Tide to get some of P4's students off the board.  P4 cast Sanitation Automaton and attacked P3.  They cast Sanar's spell, Wild Idea, but failed to find a card in their small library.

P1 shocked the table on turn thirteen with Avatar's Wrath!  They kept Bristling Boar, cast Treeguard Duo, and swung into P3.  P3 cast their Dreadlight Monstrosity and P4 cast a Chaos Spewer.  The life totals were: P1: 4, P3: 8, P4: 9.

In the fourteenth round of turns, P1 recast the Finch Formation with the Offspring.  They went to attack, but P3 cast Frostveil Ambush, which P4's Chrome Companion had tucked many turns ago.  P3 attacked with their player-killing Dreadlight Monstrosity to take P1 out.  P4 recast Tester of the Tangential as well as many of their other creatures.

On the fifteenth turn, P3 recast more of their creatures, but P4 had more on the board and attacked.  P3 went to three life.  

On the sixteenth turn, P3 didn't have enough and P4 swung for the win. 

This game was great!  I do really enjoy the social aspect of playing in one large multiplayer game and it was fun to see everyone's decks fire off.  Although we didn't add any wacky formats, we didn't really need them.  We had lots of aggression and interaction and it was exciting to see all the different cards interact with each other across so many different sets.  

Happy Multiplayer Magicking, whether you add rules spices or not!