The cash tournament at Awesome CCG was a lot smaller than I expected with only 10 people I think. I’m not sure why. I know timing just didn’t work out well for some people, and there were others that might have been too focused on prepping for worlds, but it was still very light, considering past cash tournaments at this same store had 30-40 participants.

That said, of the 10 people playing, I think 5 were in worlds, so it was a rough field. I don’t recall the exact breakdown of heros, but what I do remember is we had at least

  • 2 Iyslander
  • 2 Fai (maybe a 3rd?)
  • 1 Oldhim (me)
  • 1 Boltyn
  • 1 Dromai

I felt pretty good about my decision to bring Oldhim. I ended up on this list, which was fairly aggressive but didn’t include the Zealous Belting/Rouse package.

Round 1 I played an Iyslander and lost. I boarded assuming they were running a Bull-lander type list, but they were running a pure arcane build which threw me off quite a bit at first. I got them to 1, but they were able to pull out the win in the end. I don’t know if they were banking on surprising people that were tech-ing for a more attack action heavy gameplan, but that’s what happened with me at least. I got stuck with things like Sink Below in hand at inopportune times, and was lighter on AB than I would have liked to have been. I think I played pretty tight otherwise, and was happy that I had played as much Iyslander as I had so I had a good understanding of what he was doing.

Round 2 I played a Fai and lost. We got to 1-1, and he managed to squeek out the win. I think I misplayed this matchup. I weirdly hadn’t had that many reps into Fai playing as Oldhim, so was playing a bit more on theory than anything else. I played too aggressively I think, taking quite a lot of damage on one or two turns so I could swing back with disruptive attacks. I probably should have turtled up a bit more and picked my spots to press the attack, maybe even holding off for late game. I felt like I wanted to be ice reacting more than I was able to, so probably would have liked a higher density of ice cards in the list.

Round 3 was against a Sabers Boltyn, where I pulled out my first win. I was able to play my game and disrupt effectively, keeping them from playing out their combo or threatening much more than some smaller attacks to charge soul.

Round 4 was against a Dromai, where I squeeked out a win. This was the best match of the day. I felt well prepared for it, having gotten quite a bit of practice into the matchup in the previous week on Talishar. I kept the board pretty clean, but not obsessively. I pressed the attack when I had good windows to do so and prioritized disruption with things like CLF. The match went quite long, ending with only a couple of minutes on the clock, but I felt pretty much in control the whole time.

Overall I had a great time playing and preparing for the event. Stakes were low, and the field wasn’t huge, but it was a nice opportunity to actually try to practice for a tournament, which is something I haven’t really done before. I felt ready for whatever I faced, I felt mostly good about my deck, and with a bit tighter play and some more practice into Fai, I was within reach of a decent performance.

I’ve really felt like I’m learning and improving quite a bit lately. Playing more on Talishar has definitely helped, but more than that it’s that I’m approaching games and playing more deliberately.

I’m going to work out a test plan for the upcoming ProQuest season and spend the intervening months to prepare. I’m planning to play in 2-3 PQs, and would love to top 8 one of them.