Deck theme: The Year Without a Santa Claus
Despite winning three of the past four months, Mark was still right on my heels for the season championship. I’d need another strong finish in Alpha to Alliances month to take it home. I wasn’t overthinking things – I had been successful in prior NEOS Alliances months running Counterburn, and I felt I had a good list together for it already. I am a believer in the black cards, I think there was no great premium on playing maindeck Blood Moon in a month likely to be featuring lots of Blue Red decks. As an experiment I tried subbing in two Guerilla Tactics for two Incinerates. This was brought on by the announcement that Necropotence would be unrestricted, leading me to believe I might encounter more Hymn to Tourachs. Tactics has some other upside, such as surprising a Mind Twist, Wheel, or Balance and maybe pulling you back into a game you would otherwise get blown out in by one of these restricted cards. But after playing for a month, I can say it isn’t worth it compared to running the full Incinerates. I never got off the surprise ding, and while I don’t think it cost me any games, hitting for 2 instead of 3 seemed unimpressive. I suppose another factor to think about is, while Tactics can kill an attacking Factory, it doesn’t automatically blow away a blocking one like Incinerate does. Relevant when you are attacking with 1/1 Gorilla Shamans instead of, say, Ironclaw Orcs where they would need to tap Factory to pump and you could just Tactics in response (but still you could just Incinerate and then have no blocker in the way). Tactics versus Chain Lightning is a much closer call, I would probably do Tactics there – but I didn’t have room for either. I also tested Brainstorm a little bit, hoping it would improve with the extra shuffle effects of Merchant Scroll and Lat Nam’s Legacy – but I always wanted just more Legacy instead, or more burn. The only other flex slot was for a Maze, which I played in hopes of gaining a small edge against competing Serendib Efreets.
I made 5-1 in the group stage, losing to Tim Moran in the mirror along the way. Nothing astonishing, just better draws on his side and I was cooked easily 2-0. He won our group with a perfect 6-0, and Noah Shanning also took down his group 6-0 on a Counterburn deck. So for sure, the Mox Monkeys were well-represented in the playoffs. For his part, Mark squeaked into the playoffs with his trademark Reanimator deck as a rare 4-2 group winner, but by this time I had secured the league victory for the season. It took every point! I did end up facing off against Mark in the Top 8, and my three Tormod’s Crypts came in handy there. Mark confessed to making a mistake Game 3 in Tutoring; he declined to get a Library of Alexandria that might have overwhelmed me, but got something else instead. My Shatters proved to be huge, hitting a Disk and a Mirror Universe.
In the Top 4 I lost to Noah Shanning – who hadn’t lost a game to that point. I stole Game 1 with a decent tempo hand involving two Monkeys and Ancestral, with a lot of burn. Game 2 he croaked me with a Library I couldn’t answer. When Counterburn starts chaining burn spells with Library, it is tough to beat. Game 3 was a whopper; I mulliganed into a turn 1 land/double-Mox/Timetwister, and was feeling decent. He responded with LoA again, but I had Strip. My issue was I had a Mox Monkey but not much else. I was whittling him down with some burn spells, getting close to the finish line. He started to recover though, killing my Monkey and burning some Factories I got online. It eventually descended into a topdeck war. At one stage it felt like Noah was on empty; I cast a Braingeyser, to which he hardcast Force of Will. He drew and passed, I drew and Merchant Scrolled up an Ancestral; he had Counter. I was holding a Tactics, he was at 4. A few turns passed, but then he found Zuran Orb. Infuriatingly, I drew Bolt the next turn. Had it been a moment sooner I would have had lethal. But now we settled into a long game, I eventually got an Orb of my own, but then he Geysered into some heavier threats like 2 Dibs and 2 Factories. I sac’d lands to stay afloat for a while, but without something miraculous like a Draw 7 I wasn’t coming back. He took it down.
CONCLUSION
So after winning three out of five months, and coming in Top 4 in another, I secured my fifth NEOS league title and fourth in a row. This time it took the unseemly shape of running The Deck and winning those events, which I won’t repeat again. I told myself this would be enough; “one for the thumb” and I’m done. In general I try not to play the same deck over and over, particularly THE Deck. It’s déclassé. I have shown much greater variety in X-Point, and I want to do the same in NEOS events, as well. To an extent it felt like I reached the center of the maze in 2024, and what’s written under the rock is: “The Deck is the best.” I’m ready to embrace the increased level of difficulty of not playing it, at least for a while. I’ll likely lean more into Black, Green, and Red in the coming year. More aggressive and midrange strategies. See what Atog has left in the tank. Cast some Hymns. Attack with Pixies. All that good stuff.
Another one of my goals for this year was to do more tournament organizing and content contributing, and I proudly accomplished that. I ran two online events over the summer (Summer of Sisterton and Original 6: Fire & Ice), and co-administered the Lobstercon X-Point side event with Tim Atwood. I learned about the rubber stamp game, planned a few future events, and got to know the ins and outs of Tolaria better. I also transitioned my content to this simple, throwback website! I previously was just using Google docs for my Dojo write-ups, as seen in some of my earlier articles. I will try to be back this summer with a new magazine feature, styled after old Duelist magazines. And keep your eyes open for some more pop-up sidequests I'll run on Tolaria. I'm thinking about Sisterton, Scryings, and potentially unveiling Ice-PointTM. Ice-Point was conceived in one of many late-night jam sessions with Rich Arevalo, as we chatted about possible formats. Somehow we arrived upon the idea of adding Ice Age to X-Point, which obviously would require some thinking about bans/restrictions and point assignments. My current thinking is to restrict Demonic Consultation (and give it one point), leave Necropotence unrestricted (and give it one point), and add one point to Time Vault (leaving it unrestricted). There are so many ways in Ice Age to abuse Time Vault, like Infuse and Lapis Lazuli Talisman. That said, I would like to see Time Vault have its day in X-Point. Heretofore attempts to make Time Vault work have had little success, and that within the context of Stasis decks. I tested a pure Twiddle-Vault deck before, and I think I lost eight straight games to Rich Shays' RUG Aggro deck. If someone can make the Time Vault combo work in this, then power to them (and we can deal with it through the point system later).
That about sums it up: a look back and a look ahead. See you on the battlefield. I wish you all great success in the New Year, 2025!
