You Make the Play returns with a mirror match dilemma from this past weekend’s Star City Games $5,000 tournament in Philadelphia, PA.

The situation:
You are 4-1 or thereabouts in the Star City Games $5,000 tournament in Philadelphia last week. Your deck in this one is Blightning Beatdown… So is your opponent’s.

That opponent is Zack Hall, who has a Grand Prix Top 4 this year and is probably better than you.

That said, you got Game One at least in part because Zack shipped to Paris on the play; he had a lot of Flame Javelins to your Bitterblossom, but you got there with the card advantage.

So it’s game two. Having read Why Dave Price Goes Second, Zack opted to draw.

This strategy has served him pretty solidly this game and he is currently ahead. It’s Zack’s turn five and this is the situation:

He plays super duper deck namesake Blightning with three or four more cards in hand. Wow that is a lot of cards.

Zack’s board is a 2/2 Figure of Destiny and four lands (no Ghitu Encampment).

Your board is:

Ghitu Encampment,
Mountain,
Reflecting Pool, and
Auntie’s Hovel.

Your hand is (of which you will have to pitch two cards) is: Demigod of Revenge, Flame Javelin, Flame Javelin.

You missed your last land drop. You have sided out three Bitterblossoms for three Lash Outs this game.

Okay geniuses-in-training! Make the play. What do you pitch and why? More importantly (and it’s kind of the same question)… What do you keep?

LOVE
MIKE

This is the follow-up to “You Make the Play – How Do You Spend Your Thoughtseize?” … a discussion as to which card a first-turn Thoughtseize SHOULD take given these options…

I was very interested in what you guys had to say about this one.

For those of you who have not read the responses to You Make the Play – How Do You Spend Your Thoughtseize, the Five With Flores readership came out heavily in favor of nabbing Gift of the Gargantuan over taking Civic Wayfiner… and not a one [at the time of this writing] said he would take the Rampant Growth.

I really enjoyed reading how you guys puzzled through this problem. There were some very well thought out responses and if you haven’t read through them, I recommend all of them, but especially starwater, Gifts Ungiven, and Private_Dream.

…

So this is what happened in real life: My opponent and I were playing for 6-2 at best and despite the slight chance for Top 8 it was a very friendly match. I was frankly quite surprised at having pulled out Game Two given I had kept a slow, two land hand, especially as he stole my Rampant Growth on turn one.

When I showed him my hand, I secretly wanted to keep the Rampant Growth… But this is because of the curse of patterned behavior. One of the things that I am really going to work on — and I am going to encourage anyone reading this blog to work on — is to break this lazy and comfortable “autopilot” approach to the game. In those rare tournaments where I have done exceptionally well for myself, I can always pick out a couple of rounds that I won specifically because I did not do what my mana said to do… Just think of how many times you miss Top 8 by one game or so, and cross-reference with this statement.

So what if Rampant Growth is the only thing I can play on turn two? It doesn’t really get me anywhere unless I immediately rip Chameleon Colossus [remind me to bring this up when I do the response-to-the-responses for the first You Make the Play].

But I think consciously I knew Gift of the Gargantuan was the strongest card in my hand [for him to pilfer with Thoughtseize] and I actually suggested he take it. Did he think I was running the Jedi Mind Trick? Like I said the game was friendly, so I don’t know that he thought I was trying to fool him. He probably also fell into the same pattern as my “secret wish” and took my Rampant Growth in order to deny turn two action; no, I didn’t immediately pull the Chameleon Colossus, but I did get a little action over the next couple of turns just off the top of my deck.

In fact, after my Civic Wayfinder, I didn’t have time to play my Gift of the Gargantuan for three or four more turns, and when I did, I was already ahead just thanks to the top of my deck.

So what is the right choice?

I think that Rampant Growth — which is what I secretly wanted to keep and what he ended up taking — is the weakest candidate. It is only relevant if I get Chameleon Colossus right away.

From my deck’s perspective, I will generally play Civic Wayfinder before playing Gift of the Gargantuan for two reasons: 1) I want to get some board presence so I can start attacking as soon as I can, and 2) I like Thawing lands out of my deck before playing Gift so that I can increase the chances of a relevant two-for-one (even if you are generally favored to get a two-for-one, Thawing a Forest out of your deck increases the chances of scoring with a Treetop Village for instance). In that sense, it is not only faster at affecting the game, it might therefore be “better” in this game.

From the Fae deck’s perspective in the abstract, Civic Wayfinder is not really a relevant threat. It is a a Balduvian Bears stapled to a Lay of the Land… “card advantage” for Green, but not something the Fae need typically to worry their winged boots over, at least not by itself.

However, given how much the Jund Mana Ramp side favors the Civic Wayfinder over the Gift of the Gargantuan, I would seriously consider taking the 2/2. Remember that the humble Wayfinder is also a “two-for-one” and a more consistent [two-for-] one at that. At least half of “interactive” Magic: The Gathering is denying the opponent what he actually wants to do, not just doing what you want to do (and maybe more).

In fact, in writing this post, I actually reversed my opinion (which was originally Gift of the Gargantuan)! Imagine how slow the Jund Mana Ramp side will be with no turn two, and no board position on turn three (just a potential two-for-one, not even guaranteed). Fae should have some kind of response by turn four, right?

I am going to ask Blackman (Fae Champion of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania)… But believe it or not, I now think the right answer is Civic Wayfinder!

LOVE
MIKE

Discuss of course.

An all-new, all-different You Make the Play: What play would you make? What play do you think he made? What is the right play?

The situation:
Round Eight of the New York State Championships.

You are playing Fae, consensus best-or-second-best deck in the format.

Game One you won against a donkey with a Jund Mana Ramp deck utilizing some combination of Bitterblossom, Spellstutter Sprite, Mistbind Clique, &c. You know, how your deck rolls.

Game Two was highly improbable. Your opponent kept a hand full of expensive spells, but only two lands and a Rampant Growth. He could theoretically start playing his ponderous three mana spells (Civic Wayfinder, Kitchen Finks, stuff like that) if you let him play the Rampant Growth. Strategically, you took it with a first turn Thoughtseize.

Donk slumped back in his chair. No action.

Yep, he missed his third land drop, too. He had nothing going on.

Yet somehow he topdecked a land or two and managed to draw out of it.

The rest of the game went a long murder of Chameleons, Cloudthreshers, & Finks; from your side a succession of Puppeteer Cliques keeping you alive by slowing down the Chameleons. Your Mistbind Cliques took forever to show up… Not until after he resolved a Mind Shatter with Gutteral Response backup. The game was long and increasingly awkward from both sides — with your blocking way too many times with Bitterblossom tokens — but he eventually pulled it out by attacking over and over.

So onto Game Three…

You are on the play and open up on Thoughtseize.

This is what you see:

He has four assorted lands [note: I don't really remember what lands they were. -MichaelJ]; you can take one of…

Civic Wayfinder
Gift of the Gargantuan
Rampant Growth

Wow, a relatively slow hand. This is your opportunity to lock up 6-2 and potentially sneak into the coveted last spot in the Top 8.

Once again you have the opportunity to snag a first turn Rampant Growth, the only play he can make before turn three.

But… What card do you take?

LOVE
MIKE

So this is the follow up to Thursday’s post about what to do on turn three. If you haven’t read it, check this out first: You Make the Play

I was actually quite proud of myself that I broke patterned thought and “slowed down” with the “turn two” play of Rampant Growth on turn three… I went for Swamp like most of you said you would.

But what is our strategy here? By what tactics will we accomplish our goals?

In this matchup we want to minimize creature damage. We want to keep him contained so that even if he rips the combo, it won’t immediately kill us. Our resources are limited… but so are his, so the short term objective is to get a two-for-one on your Firespout or Jund Charm. How do we ensure a two-for-one? How do we preserve card advantage?

I feel there is no point in playing the Civic Wayfinder at all at this stage.

However, there might be an even better play hiding in our options… an no one suggested it.

Josh Ravitz says to say “Go.”

That’s right, do nothing. But sulk.

Play possum. I’m stuck on two Forests. Do your worst. Give him a bad beat story for later.

The plan is to play Firespout next turn regardless. We are likely to pull off the two-for-one. But what if we play dead? Will he over-commit? We have the maximum chance of a three-for-one if we sit. Think about it.

What do we get from a Rampant Growth? Very little. In this game we are not on a harsh time limit. We are not going to play Chameleon Colossus next turn (probably). We are going to play Firespout. We can play Firespout with the resources at hand, in hand, and already on the board. The difference is that we can put the ball in the opponent’s court for additional card advantage extraction.

Why commit Civic Wayfinder if we are just going to blow everyone up?

Don’t we want more opposition coming to the party?

I think Josh makes a very compelling suggestion, and not obvious at all.

I don’t know if there is a right answer, but if I had the same situation again, I think I would pretend to be manascrewed. This one is not a resource race. If you kill their guys, you are likely to succeed.

I’m sure most of you find that “solution” thought-provoking, at least.

Did you like this type of problem?

Thanks for reading,

LOVE
MIKE

This is an interesting play that I was presented with at the 2008 New York State Championship.

My opponent was a very good player playing R/W Kithkin Backlash (and I knew he was playing Kithkin Backlash).

I was on the play… This was my opening hand:

Firespout
Jund Charm
Chameleon Colossus
Civic Wayfinder
Fire-Lit Thicket
Forest
Forest

A fine hand against a non-Red-hating beatdown deck, I think you will agree; if not the speediest (but you don’t necessarily have to be the speediest to win this matchup in Game One).

I made Forest, Forest my first two turns; he played Knight of Meadowgrain on the draw.

So on turn three, I had an interesting pull: Rampant Growth (turn two pluck being Kitchen Finks).

My “scripted” play from my opening hand was obviously to start getting ahead with Civic Wayfinder.

So here are the questions:

What play would you make?
What play do you think I made?
What is the right play?

Follow-up tomorrow. See you then!

LOVE
MIKE