Standard:

The first PTQ for Philadelphia in Manila was concluded last weekend. It was the first major New Phyrexia legal Standard tourney in the local scene. Titan’s Jason Ascalon won the whole thing playing the most popular weapon of choice for the format; CAW-blade. 5 other CAW-blade players were also in the top 8, cementing the deck as the best deck (that got even better with NPH) in the format. The other 2 decks in the top 8 were RUG-twin and RUG. The full top 8 decklists can be viewed at Neutral Grounds’ facebook page.

Finishing just outside the top 8 (9th) was me, JT Porter, and my take on a mono-black midrange deck that was originally sketched by Patrick Chapin in 2 of his articles for StarCityGames. Chapin presented 2 different builds of a possible mono-black deck but did not really explain in detail how the deck and each of its components worked. Sure, individual black cards are pretty straightforward, but black decks should have all their cards working in unison and the pilot should know all the good combination plays. We were not too impressed by Chapin’s list as it seemed like it was only drawn on the table and has not been tested properly. We tried different other builds for the deck; splashing blue for JTMS and Creeping Tar Pit, splashing red for some artifact hate, and white for Stoneforge Mystic. The 2 color builds were very inconsistent and had a bad curve that we decided to revert back to mono-black, splashing green for sideboard Nature’s Claim. The big difference of our build and Chapin’s would be the disruption suite of choice. Chapin ran a combination of Inquisition of Kozilek, Duress, and Despise while we decided to drop Despise and put a 2/1 flying body in the form of Liliana’s Specter. Chapin also ran a set of Phyrexian Revokers which actually seems like a good idea given that majority of my build’s loses came at the back of a random creature with an equipped Sword of Feast and Famine.

PORTER, James
15 points

Lands:
20 Swamp
4 Verdant catacombs

Creature Spells:

4 Gatekeeper of Malakir
4 Liliana’s Specter
3 Vampire Nighthawk
1 Pilgrim’s Eye
4 Phyrexian Obliterator

Non-Creature Spells:
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
3 Duress
4 Geth’s Verdict
2 Go for the Throat
4 Sign in Blood
3 Lashwrithe

Sideboard:
1 Forest
3 Nature’s Claim
2 Go for the Throat
1 Ratchet Bomb
3 Hex Parasite
2 Surgical Extraction
1 Grave titan
1 Vampire Nighthawk
1 Duress

The deck finished 5-2, losing to 2 CAW-blade decks (both made the top 8). The loses were a bit sketchy though as we were not able to test enough sideboarded games, which meant that I was trying out different sideboard strategies during the tourney. It is a really fun deck to play specially if you or your wallet is not a big fan of JTMS, Lotus Cobra, or Stoneforge Mystic. As of this build, the deck has a total of 5 mythic rares, and has a total cash value of somewhere around “cheaper than a playset of JTMS”. With a bit more work, I think the deck could be a strong contender in the format.

Community News

Our beloved MTG distributor and the big dog of local gaming; Neutral Grounds, decided to bid farewell to their flagship branch in Robinsons Galleria. The GM; Mr. Freddie Tan (aka Mr. McMahon) discusses it in detail in their website. I am sure that everyone in the local community had their fair share of good memories in Galleria, be it spotting eye candy in the days when there were tournaments at the top floor, a lot of very large prerelease tournaments, memorable Nationals tournaments, and personally, a GP win that was scored in a once empty portion of the mall. There hasn’t been any MTG tournaments at Galleria lately but the team and friends still regularly visit that mall to pickup wholesale orders or eat at Yoshinoya (we had discounts here for a while) and DQ.