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We got there...


Today's going to be quick one, so forgive me for being brief. I'm writing this down in the half hour before heading to a friend's for an Unstable draft, so my time is limited.

I've been stuck in a bit of a rut for the past month and a half. Not much luck in my EDH games. In early December my mother passed away and since then it's felt like everything's just been off. This past week has been a long one. I had been planning to prepare for a second memorial for my mother up in New England. She lived up here for most of her life but spent the last five years in Pennsylvania. When she passed, the memorial was there, but I was enlisted to plan a memorial up here for her friends in AA and from her old church.

Last Saturday I attended a LARP event in my old live action roleplaying community, The Realms. It was great to see old friends and to watch some great folks get knighted, but I managed to take away the LARP event equivalent of the "con crud". I was sick in bed with a fever on Tuesday and Wednesday and was exhausted, but back to work on Thursday and Friday. As a result, the EDH games I was going to play on Tuesday night at our LGS and on Thursday at home with friends were both scuttled. Furthermore, the prep I had hoped to do for the memorial I had to pass off to others, which didn't hurt things any but which made me feel a little bad.

Things Get Better

Whenever you're going through a rough stretch, always know that it gets better eventually.

I was able to bake 6 dozen cookies on Thursday night for the memorial Saturday, and while I wasn't able to spend any time with my sister's family on Friday night, the memorial went well. I spoke and didn't cough too much, and Mom's New England friends were all deeply appreciative of having the chance to join together to remember and honor her life. She was an amazing person and I was truly blessed to have had her as my Mom.

After the memorial we pretty much went straight home and then straight to NexGen comics for EDH League.

As you know, I've been on a long run of bad games. I was secretly hoping that I would break out of that rut Saturday.

In game one I was playing Narset against a new player with a Rubina deck, a very strong player with a Bruna deck and another player with a good but midrange Kraj deck. I started slow, not getting much in the way of acceleration, and Bruna quickly got to the point of being scary and dangerous. I was able to cast Narset, and on the Bruna player's turn I think he had lethal or close to lethal on me. I told him if he didn't swing at me I wouldn't swing at him. The subtext was that we'd leave each other for last, though I didn't explicitly say that. I think he understood the sentiment. He's a great guy, we get along well, and there were no complaints later about how things turned out. At any rate - he agreed. I also told him that he still hadn't killed me with a Bruna equpped with his copy AND my copy of Eldrazi conscription yet, and someday I'm sure that will happen. If he let me swing at someone else, there was the chance he could live that dream...

The Rubina player had a Fog Bank out. I had Narset equipped with Prowler's Helm, so she wouldn't take any damage. I think the Kraj player was already out by that point. As I said, the Bruna deck is fantastic and he had a great early game.

I had Penance on the field, which lets me drop cards onto the top of my deck at any time. I swang at Rubina and dropped an extra combat step spell and two extra turn spells onto the top of the deck prior to the trigger, so I was off to the races. It took several swings before I was able to get any damage in on Rubina, but in the process of getting all those attack in, I was able to cast Past in Flames. That gave me access to even more combat steps and I think I might have wound up with Eldrazi Conscription and maybe Battle Mastery and Indestructibility on Narset, in addition to true unblockability with Aqueous Form.

Once the Rubina player was out, I was able to get one last lethal attack - this time on my last opponent, the Bruna player. When I made the initial deal, I genuinely did not believe I would "get there". I figured I'd run out of gas, maybe kill Rubina, but more than likely just flop into a bunch of lands. It had been that kind of month.

The win was a genuine thrust-my-arms-in-the-air exultant moment. I was still exhausted and under the weather, but something had finally gone right. The memorial had been a success. I had finally gotten a good game of EDH in, winning from out of nowhere against friends I really enjoy playing with, using my favorite deck that is both a glass cannon and a guilty pleasure. It felt great.

Final Thoughts

I didn't win any other games on Saturday but I didn't care. Narset did OK in round two but never got to blow up. I played two games with Rashmi, but never got to cheat any Eldrazi into play. I think that deck needs some tweaking...

That's all I've got for you today. As I've said before, this space is now my personal gamelog and I'll probably share things about my life and my thoughts that are more personal than anything I'll put on GatheringMagic.com.

Tomorrow you can look forward to what I think is a pretty good deck construction article about Azor, the Lawbringer on GatheringMagic.com. I started writing it when I was sick, but had the presence of mind to go back and adjust the tone of the piece. It started out as being pretty negative. I wasn't that excited about the project but I was also feeling terrible at the time, but I think the final piece is pretty good.

I'm off to draft Unstable. I'm as bad a drafter as can be, so I'm sure it'll be pretty sad, but at least I'll be among friends and afterwards we'll be rooting on the Patriots in the AFC Championship game. Hopefully Tom Brady's thumb won't fall off.

Thanks for reading & see you next week!

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