If you frequent the website I’m sure you’ve seen logan’s recent post about his experience at the mid season invitational. I thought I’d bud in and post about my experience at the mid season invitational As well, and shed some light on a new deck that I’ve been working on inspired in part by the one and only logan Doan himself.
I live in Texas, specifically in Austin. So when I heard that the mid season invitational was happening so close to home I was ecstatic, I made plans to drive up with my buddy Joey and stay with our friend who’s place we visited on our last trip to Houston. I was especially excited about this mid season invitational because of a new deck I had sitting in my back pocket for a while.
Back right after the bans, freedom waffle took shorokai to Texas. The deck was clunky and untuned, and he ended up scrubbing out; but the concept was there. A Highly interactive deck focused on the new concept of rhystic clones introduced in Isaac’s list at cowtown and Evans spin on the archetype with the extra pitch interaction spells. The one issue I saw with the deck was it struggled to actually win the game, azorious lacked proper winconditions and sat around waiting for nothing often in the mid game. I moved the deck to the back of my mind, and for a while that’s where it stayed.
It was around the time when Evan first took nbc kinnan to a tournament that I played my friend Ryan’s Elsha deck in some casual games. The deck felt strong, as jeskai core is very reliable; but I was often stranded and behind in the games where I had and engine. I would stare at cards like fierce, swat, and mox amber in my hands and groan with disappointment. It was after I had arrived home that an idea for a deck was cooked up in the back of my mind. What if I just played Elsha, but instead of the side quest of a commander I played something that complimented the rhystic game plan the deck already wants to employ.
The first version of rog ishai was.. rough to say the least. The concept was definitely there, the conbination of the jeskai core and the nbc intertive rhystic clone package was strong but the execution was less than ideal. The deck struggled HARD to win the game and the list lacked direction. The deck was one thing however, very FUN. The list remained on my moxfield profile and occasionally put together in my deck box. I would take the deck to the occasional tournament, for fun mostly. It never performed poorly, but never stood up to the hulking standards that bluefarm held me to.
Months later i Eventually I began to play often in a private server with other cedh grinders, and to take a break from farm I’d occasionally play the deck on moxfield. Why not? Gifts ungiven was unbanned a few months before and flash photography had just been printed. It was in these games that I became astonished at the decks performance. Night after night I’d win game after game and think to myself, there’s no way this deck is actually good right?
I had to experiment, I slapped the deck together in paper and took it to a local tournament. I went 4-0-1 in Swiss and split finals. The deck was absolutely and fundamentally broken. I knew this was the deck I was going to take the the midseason invitional right then and there. (It is important to note, wrongsi as built by logan Doan heavily influenced the current build of the deck and guided alot of the principles that the deck follows. Huge props to him)
Eventually I played In a game with the one and only Zach Adler in that private server, and he was intrigued about the list. We exchanged dms and he promised to test the deck in person at his locals. From what I’ve heard the deck had struck fear into the heart of the California locals, so much so that when he handed the deck to Julian to play for a tournament he was threat accessed very heavily. (He still made top 16 because he’s the goat)
Zach had the same realization as me and continued to help innovate on the deck, As well as dexter and many of the other players in that private server. It got to the point where I’d put a rhystic on the stack in these private server games and someone would offer to fully SKIP their turn if someone else would counter it for them. I felt complete confidence that the deck would Excell at the invitational where other decks might flounder.
Zach agreed to take the deck As well, same 98, same submitted moxfield list. Day of the tournament, it was go time.
ROUND 1 DRAW- round one was against Carlos on Winota, Jason on farm, and Aaron on lumra. I mulled to 3 in 4th seat, commandeered Jason’s t2 rhystic, and drew because Winota assembled exodia boardstate. Overall not much more I could’ve done to salvage the game into a win, unfortunate but it’s what happens when everyone is playing so tight
ROUND 2 WIN- I sat down against logan Doan on farm, dev Patel on farm, and dallas on farm. It was hard to hide the smile on my face. This was the match-up I’d prepared for, spent hours yapping on the decklist for. I was locked in to say the least. I dropped the first rhystic study on turn two, and like America did to Japan the second one was soon to follow. The deck flowed like butter while the farm decks looked clunky and slower to assemble anything close to what I was presenting. It was my turn 4 that I cloned a 3rd and final rhystic study, then idyllic tutored for breach and ended the game. All of my anxiety about potentially chosing the wrong deck went away, and any worry that I’d be disappointed in my performance at the event evaporated. I ran over to Zach after my win to find he’d similarly destroyed a midrange pod on STREAM nonetheless. I was ecstatic.
ROUND 3 DRAW- I sat down against nick on vial thras, Grant on tnk, and dexter on rogsi. I was very confident going into the game, but the inevitable came when I kept a four that was esper sentinel mystical tutor infernal plunge fierce Guardianship. Grant went t1 necro and I offered draw. Not much I could’ve done to win, unfortunate but necessary.
ROUND 4 DRAW- This game left me kinda fatigued with the whole draw situation. I haven’t ever really been vocally against draws, and my experience at the last invitational had a severe lack of them due to me starting off 0-3 and recovering. All three opponents pregame offered draw, one of my opponents kept a hand that was all interaction. We drew pregame, played out the game anyway and I won. Whatever, it’s hard to win when someone isn’t trying to win. My frustration was that no one wanted to win, but hey that’s invitional cedh sometimes. Not wanting to win. Shrug.
ROUND 5 DRAW- This game simmilarly began with offers of pregame draw, but I’d managed to get the table to ACTUALLY play the game. It was another triple farm pod, Tyler linbad on farm, Sterling Stellards on farm, and Charles baek on farm. I kept a t2 copy Enchantment hand and everyone had a mystic remora in play by the end of t2. On Tyler’s turn 3 he hits a necro off a ragavn flip with 6 mana. He offers draw on the spot as we have cards and mana up. I manage to somehow yap my way into him going rhystic pass instead because I argued we all have a chance to win and for me and Sterling a loss means not much. I got to my turn, paid for fish, and tapped all my remaining mana for ranger paying rhystic. They all auto passed, value ranger right? Crack. They Rubberband off each others rhystics and find nothing. Ranger crack resolves. Wether or not it was me being tired, me being shaky at the prospect of having potentially getting 13 points in the invitational on rog ishai, or whatever; I miss sequenced my line post ranger Crack. I put a rite of flame on the stack after a chrome mox with infernal plunge in hand, the last card Tyler draws is bowman. He goes to bowman my rog and has to offer draw. If I had just cast the plunge first, I take a 1 in 7 on a gamble to win the game. I was very, very embarrassed by the result. It was only because I had great friends like Zach and dexter and basically everyone that I got the misplay out of my mind.
We lobby con’s at aarons place with pigeon waffle Sam black Vincent and some others, it was a blast and helped my get over my r5 disappointment. Had an amazing time, and slept through my over thinking.
TOP 16 LOSS- I woke up Sunday ready to rumble. I was stoked that me and Zach both made it to top 16 on the deck. I sat down against dallas, a different Aaron who was playing farm, and abhi in 4th seat. I keep land land mamber mirrormade Deflecting Swat. Both abhi and Aaron mull low, Dallas snap keeps first 7. He goes fish mopal pass, I go to my turn and draw fierce. I evaluate that since everyone mulled low I should hold my mamber and not feed dallas so much, so I go rog pass. Aaron goes mox diamond esper miss landdrop. Abhi goes dork pass. Dallas goes pay fish mana vault pass. I go mamber mirrormade… dallas casts FON. I show swat and ask if he wants to keep his FON, he declines. I swat and he mbt’s, at this point I’m signaling hard that he’s going to send it next turn. I fierce to protect my fish. If i hadn’t held my mamber t1 I wouldn’t be down fierce, so in hindsight it was a mistake. I didn’t think I’d need to protect my mystic remora from mindbreak trap haha. Aaron straight after me goes dark ritual necro. Plays city of Traitors. I ask him to send Necro deeper because dallas telegraphed a jam by aggressively interacting with my engine. He send 15 and passes. Abhi feeds fish twice and passes. Dallas goes let fish die tap vault ranger. Aaron shows pact and is ready to pass. I spend some time trying to get him to leverage his pact over dallas. Dallas stands firm that he wants him to cast pact. I say that dallas is making a play that is causing you (aaron) to lose intentionally. It is within your best interest to cast the pact or atleast threaten to because you can influence dallas to make a different play otherwise. (Dallas loses if he has to pass without a ranger, 100%) I show Aaron my intuition in hand which could tutor offer and as long as I can find anything to put on the stack he could force of negation then I could offer him so he didn’t die to pact. He says okay and baldie asks for a game action. He gets priority and passes. We die.
It’s frustrating to lose in a situation like that, especially when you’ve exhausted all your options. I had a long talk with Aaron post game and his reasoning for passing was that he thought dallas could not have the win. I was irritated but understood the play came from inexperience not anything else. I’ll take my licks and move on as a player. Overall I was very stoked by the performance of rog ishai at the midseason invitational. The deck is on a whole other level of broken and fits the way i play perfectly. It was disappointing for me and Zach to miss on top 4, but Zach mulled to 2 his game so there’s only so much you can expect.
We lobbycon’d at the hotel where the critical edh guys were staying, I had an absolute blast of a time. Joey intended on leaving back to Austin around 5pm, but after sitting down at lobby con he was ropped In and we didn’t leave houston till 1am.
It was a bittersweet moment for me, my family and I are moving this week to someplace east Texas. It will be very hard for me to continue attending local Texas events without anyone I know to drive me around. It felt like one last send off to cedh for the next while. I will still play cedh where I can, but not as often as I did before. I love this community, and even though I had a frustrating loss in top 16 I got more support from friends than I could ever imagine. This is the reason why cedh events hit 500 players, this is the reason why so many fly out every weekend to go play. The gathering in magic the gathering.
Sorry if this post rambles on or lacks direction, I have a lot to think about and a whole lot of nothing to do up here in East Texas. (Basically a barren wasteland) You should try out rog ishai if you are even remotely interested. I’ve seen so many people say that the deck makes them want to played more cedh and every time it warms my heart.
-Jase, coper signing off