Title: Realm Championship - Teldrassil
Tags: Realm Championship - Teldrassil
Blog Entry: It's a week before the big trip down to Ohio for realm championships, and my group is playtesting for the tournament. I've all but decided on control, and have it narrowed down to three deck choices: Warrax control, Mazar control (the deck I had been playing with all set) and Horde Paladin. It was decided by my team that the control deck we would use would have to be able to a) beat Runetusk, b) stop Desecrator, and c) Remove Myriam Starcaller from the table. Needless to say, none of the decks tested could do all three, but some were close. The Warrax build was our favorite, so we tested it extensively. My friend and teammate Steve Lynn took the Warrax and I played our gauntlet against him. It beat most decks it played, but just had a terrible matchup against Desecrator (even with our early protector/armor curve). Thursday night rolls around, and we scrap the deck because of its huge weakness. I had no clue what deck I was going to be used until Friday night, some time after 1:00 am. Don't get me wrong, I was more than prepared for the tournament, I just couldn't decide which deck would get me the most wins. My lack of sleep over the last few days began to kick in and I had a strange epiphany; the Desecrator build we had been testing was destroying everything in testing (especially Warrax), so why not just take that to realms? This stunning revelation lead me to choose Desecrator Twig/Form Rush, modified, of course, to my liking. Without further ado, here's the deck I took to realms: Main Deck Hero: Desecrator Stormclaw 4 Dr. Boom 4 One Draenei’s Junk… 4 Finkle Einhorn , At Your Service! 3 Orders from Lady Vashj 4 Twig of the World Tree 4 Form of the Serpent 4 Cyclone 4 The Natural Order 4 Bloodsoul 4 Rak Skyfury 4 Retainer Zian 4 Snig Feralsnout 4 Magister Ashi 3 Innervate 4 Wrath 2 Earth Mother’s Blessing Side Deck: 3 Chew Toy 3 Tatulla the Reclaimer 2 Shred 2 Vexmaster Nar’jo (List courtesy of Professional Events Services. Thanks guys!) It's a pretty standard list, the first thing you may notice is the lack of Vexmaster (main deck). The deck is built to punish control decks with the stealth keyword, and Retainer Zian has great stats (most of the time). Ashi and Snig add to the stealth ally curve. Innervate seemed to come out in many matchups, but that may just be because of matchups. Dr. Boom! is one of the most amazing cards in the deck, and it let's you miss your one drop and keep a play, or play a one drop on turn two and use the extra resource. The 1-4 damage that you may take is usually negligible when compared to the card advantage. Shred and Chew Toy come out against control to kill any big protectors, and Shred can stop an Antikron or Parvink in its tracks. Props go to Nick Schian for providing me with his list that I tweaked and playtested over the last few weeks. My team and I arrive at the tournament with a half hour to spare, so I greeted everyone I recognized and filled out my decklist. I made a few minor tweaks to the list and sideboard on the spot, five minutes before testing (adding in Earth Mother's Blessing and Vexmaster Nar'jo, both of which ended up being overall beneficial). The actual report that follows will include only key plays that I can remember and opposing deck archetypes. Barring round one, which was an "epic" match, and the later matches, I will try to keep the other rounds fairly brief. Round One: Vince - Ressa Traitor Rogue Rush I sat across the table from Vince and knew I had a good matchup, but he won the dice roll so I would have to fight it out. Little did I know, I was shuffling my deck to prepare for my closest, toughest match of the entire day (and in the first round, no less). In game one, he began with Purloin and curved out with untargetable allies and daggers. I keep pace with him the entire game and get him 23 damage, with the win on the board. He's able to take me to 24 and has Gut Shot for exactly 4 to take game one. At this point, I begin to sweat, thinking I may have chosen the wrong deck for realms and my scrubbing out would be imminent. Game two was exactly the same, except I was on the play so I had the advantage. Cyclone on his hero in the last turn of the game stopped him from winning, but he had a play for me. I attacked him for 6 with Twig + Form when he was at 22 damage, and he responded with Gut Shot and struck back. The game was a draw. I laugh and shrug it off, suddenly feeling confident even though I would have to win two in a row. Game three goes heavily in my favor (no purloin), and I'm able to play Form on turn three. Getting Serpent Form onto the table is pretty much the end for him and I take the game. Game four, I'm going second and we have a battle very much like game one and two. I have a natural order for one of his daggers (my first one all match), but he has Prey on the Weak in response to my Earth Mother's Blessing. In the final turn, I have lethal minus one on the board before drawing, and needed one more damage to finish him off. I top deck Wrath, and am able to finish him off. 1-0 Just to point out, the wrath wasn't entirely a sack on my part. I've been over that draw in my head already, and there were a multitude of cards I could've drawn to beat him that turn (Wrath, ESB, Twig, Rak, and Snig - a quest to dig for one of these). I had outs, but did get lucky. Round Two: Andrew Pickett - Yanna Control I get matched up against one of my teammate and good friends in the second round. We don't play it out (knowing the matchup was in my favor) and he takes the scoop to me. He ended up going 5-2, only "losing" one match. 2-0 Between rounds, I meet up with my friend Brian Wilson. He hadn't been doing too well, but was still optimistic. He mentioned bringing out his lucky headband to win a few games (story behind the band: he's a teacher and one of his students gave it to him). He's never lost with the headband on. I was 2-0, and asked to borrow the head band to keep my streak going. He gave it to me and I tested its luck... Round Three: Kris - Ressa Aggro This match is against one of Vince's teammates and I'm able to take him down in game three, losing the dice roll. Like before, the deck simply couldn't deal with Form on turn three. My favorite play is using Wrath on turn two to take down is Zandar Shadesprocket and deal three to the hero. 3-0 Round Four: Andy - Ressa Aggro At this point, I'm a bit excited and a bit confused. I didn't think this deck would be nearly as popular as it turned out to be, but at the same time had just beaten it twice in a row. I lost the dice roll (again), and was able to beat him game one. Game two was just far too much for me to handle with his curve into Myriam on four, and I scooped with 23 damage, only dealing 7 to him. Game three (on the play), I curve into mass allies and take him down fairly easily without having to play a Form or Twig. 4-0 Round Five: David - Warrax I smile at this matchup, knowing he was using the deck I had playtested the most and knowing I had a great odds. I lose the dice roll, but take game one. He's able to beat me game two because of Xanata turn two, Xanata turn three, Puncture turn four and a few Weebles before ending with Myriam. I'm able to rush him out on game three (my first game on the play) with Form and Twig on the table. 5-0 Round Six: Dan- Pagatha Control I win the dice roll. If you've been keeping track, this is my first dice roll win all day. My hands were average during the game, but I really think Dan had terrible draws in both games. He missed several To Serve Kum'ishas, and was only able to grab Varimathras with others. He didn't play a single Sarmoth or Eye of Killrogg all match, which probably would've helped him out. I'll take what I can get though. 6-0 Round Seven: David - Yanna Control I liked David's deck. He seemed really well prepared to beat Runetusk and had a solid protector curve. Unfortunately for him, my deck tends to ignore protectors and was not a Runetusk deck. I took him down game one without much difficulty. Game two, he had my hero locked down with multiple cyclones and healing touches (3: Heal 10, I believe) and finished the game with an active Marnie I couldn't take out. In game three, I was able to rush him down with my Form/Twig, even after two Healing Touches. 7-0 I finish as 1st seed, the only undefeated. I feel pretty bad for knocking the last guy out of contention (he was 5-1), but I had to give my teammates a better chance to sneak in. The pink headband was working well, if I do say so myself. T8: Scott Au - Halvar Control This was one of my most difficult matches of the day. On the other hand, I won the dice roll for the second time all day and hadn't lost a single game all day going first, so I wasn't too worried. Like Warrax, this deck should have trouble with my desecrator, so I wasn't too worried. I took him pretty easily game one with Form of the Serpent. He was really frustrated with my Earth Mother's Blessing'd Masgister Ashi, and the Ashi put the game in my favor. He wrecked the Twig I played on turn four or five, but Form was enough. Game two was a different story. He had burn away for my Form, and multiple Smashes for each Twig I played. Eventually, he played Deafening Shout and Marnie Moonlight, so I had to take it to game three. My twig was able to hit this game, and he just couldn't slow me down like he had the game before. Great match. 8-0 T4: Jeff Peters - Runetusk I was genuinely worried about this matchup, because Runetusk can be really good against a deck like mine, depending on the build. I played very cautiously game one, trying to only play Form and Twig from hand and combo out that way. Unfortunately for me, Form/Twig can't beat Tatulla and 2x Greater Heal, so after the Bringer of Death I had lost game one. I was really discouraged at this point, very tired, yet restless. I walked around between games to stretch and then side boarded cards in. I figured out during game one that his deck was pretty much an exact copy of the DMF Stuttgart build, so I knew exactly what to expect for game two. I decided to forget playing cautiously, and just rushed him my best. Ally curve into form seemed pretty good, but he had a Shadala to end that dream. I was able to take him to 20 damage via Twig before he greater healed, but I wasn't out of it yet. Rak and multiple allies were able to overwhelm him and I "stole" game two. I remember game three quite vividly. Turn one began with an Ashi that got Mind Spiked. Turn two, I complete 2x Dr. Boom in response to his flip. Turn three, Snake Form and attack. Turn four, I have four cards in hand. I facedown one of the cards, and attack three times via double Rak Skyfury and attack with a ferocious Snig. He played Tatulla, but I really had done enough at that point. I play a twig later to finish him off, and see no Greater Heal that game. 9-0 Michael Jacob opts to take second place before we can begin playing, and I shrug and accept first place. In the end, I had a great day and it was a great tournament. Granted, what else would you expect me to conclude after finishing undefeated and winning a flight to worlds? I feel like I was lucky all day (several people can attest to this) and had pretty good matchups. Desecrator really was the correct call for me to make based on the decks brought to our realm, considering Runetusk wasn’t nearly as played as it was in other realms and bad matchups weren’t abundant. I didn’t see very many potential mirror matches, which is always a plus, and not many Horde Paladins (which I think is my worst matchup). Luck definitely played a huge factor in my overall performance, but I won’t count myself out entirely. My team had me well prepared for the varied metagame, and so I’d like to give a shout-out to them all. Sorry about the mishaps Mike, you should’ve put Wrath into your deck like I suggested beforehand =P. Thanks to Brandon Suchan for the trip and playtesting, as well as Brian, Nick, Steve and Andrew (all mentioned above). The pink headband has yet to lose a match! I’ll be at Nationals and Worlds to try my luck again, hope to see and meet you all. -Basem Alsalah. Sorry to any of my opponent's for getting names incorrect, I accidentally got my game logs mixed up and didn't write down round numbers. If you know it is wrong, just let me know! Team Bizarro: "I'm helping! I'm helping!"
VIEW FULL VERSION: Link