Martin Jordö (MartinJordö) vs Patrick Thor (shipshoter)

Both players had the opportunity to draw in the last rounds of the Swiss.
Martin is running a three-color good stuff deck, featuring Dark Confidant, Dimir Cutpurse and is still undefeated in Standard with his 4 wins and 2 draws.

Patrick is running a classic Greater Good deck. He was 3-2-1 in standard entering the elimination portion of the tournament.

Game 1:
Martin won the die roll and kicked off with a turn two Dark Confidant. Except for Jitte, Patrick has no way to directly take care of it, except racing - which seems quite hard as Martin’s spells’ cost never exceed 3.

Patrick on his side built his mana in the form of Llanowar Elf and Sakura Tribe Elder. His second Tribe-Elder met Remand from Martin, and the elf saw his size reduced to –2/-2 due to a Last Gasp.

Meanwhile, Martin revealed a Jitte off the Confidant, which would mean that Patrick would have to bear Bob for a long time... if he (Patrick) was to survive a long time. Trygon Predator joined the Confidant on Martin side.

Patrick claimed some life back with a Loxodon Hierarch, but he already knew that the situation would become a lot worse on the next turn, as the Predator got to carry the deadly Jitte.

Both mages exchanged blows: Patrick hitting for 5, Martin for 2, but adding counters on his Jitte.

The situation looked quite grim for Patrick at that point. Martin revealed a Remand off Bob during his upkeep, and a Mana Leak off a Coiling Oracle on the same turn. At the end of Martin’s turn, he called to the rescue Arashi, the Sky Asunder, Kodama of the North Tree and Yosei, the Morning Star with a Congregation at Dawn. Jitte would have been the only card that would have helped him. So he basically condemned himself to certain death.

Martin finished the game at 5 life due to Bob and to the Loxodon’s attacks, but the life loss is far from being relevant – in that game- as he had many ways to take care of the Confidant in hand and that Patrick’s deck didn’t have a way to deal direct damage.

Martin 1 - 0 Patrick

Game 2:
Thanks to the time given before the finals to elaborate their sideboard plans, both Patrick and Martin were ready to battle again in no time.
Patrick:
+1 Viridian Shaman, +2 Paladin en-Vec, 3 Wrath of God for 2 Watchwolf, 1 Greater Good, 2 Selesnya Guildmage and 1 Indrik Stomphowler.
Martin:
+ 3 Execute, +1 Slay, +1 Viridian Shaman for 1 Ninja of the Deep Hours, 3 Mana Leaks, 2 Plaxmanta.

Patrick, on the play, built a fast army of 2 Llanowar Elves, Watchwolf and Loxodon Hierarch. Martin stabilized the board on 9 life with 2 Last Gasp killing a Watchwolf and an elf, and once again, played Jitte, sent one of his elf into the elephant, and killed Patrick’s remaining elf. Patrick added a second Loxodon to his team, and Yosei leaving Martin with a bird to carry the legendary equipment.

With 2 Loxodons and a dragon facing 2 birds, a Trygon Predator and a Dark Confidant, the game was soon to be over. Patrick sent his whole team into the red zone. One elephant traded for 2 counters from the Jitte. He sacrificed it with damage on the stack so the equipment couldn’t receive counters.

Jitte takes care of many situations usually, but can’t really stand alone against so much fat!

Martin 1-1 Patrick

From what we’ve seen so far, the matchup is looking very much one sided. As for a relevant sideboard change, Martin brought back the Mana Leaks on the play. As the aggressor, he wants his counter-magics to support his charge and not to defend himself against threats.

Let’s see if the die roll does make everything in this matchup!

Game 3:
Patrick mulliganed that game and stalled on one land, a Llanowar Elf helping him to cast a turn-2 Sakura Tribe Elder.

On Martin’s side side, things looked brighter. Dark Confidant hit the board on turn 2 and was hoping for a long life besides his master. BUT, Martin was only holding lands, he took some time to consider adding a Dimir Cutpurse to his team, as a Wrath of God would anihilate his whole team, and would jeopardize the game. But Patrick didn’t reach his fourth land and couldn’t play a possible Wrath of God, that he was holding. His fourth mana source being a Selesnya Sanctuary, it gave some more draws to Martin with the help of Cutpurse and Confidant, to recover from that Wrath.

Surprisingly enough, instead of playing the Wrath when he untapped, he choose to play a Loxodon Hierarch. It gave Martin another draw from the confident. It was indeed a great play as he also gave him the conviction that he was NOT holding a WoG. Martin then added another Dark Confidant to his team and THEN, Wrath of God took away his whole team, meeting no counter-magic.

Yosei backed up Patrick’s plan. Martin was then unprepared for that situation. His library gave him a Putrefy, but a second Yosei followed the turn after.

Martin 1-2 Patrick

The matchup after board seems to be significantly in favour of Patrick, as Martin does not have real hard counters to fizzle Wrath of God. Any tempo and card advantage he would get are just reduced to nothing when wrath is followed by a fat dragon. The only fact that Patrick has WoG in his deck, considerably hinders the plans of Martin who can’t really play around it, without losing lots of tempo.

Game 4:
Martin’s opening hand featured everything he could dream of: 2 lands, Jitte, Mana Leak, Elves of the Deep Shadow, Dimir Cutpurse and Putrefy. The only slight problem was that the only blue mana source he had was a Tendo Ice Bridge. His deck delivered him the blue source he was looking for right away, and his cutpurse would be sent with a Mana Leak backup.

Its first attack was blocked by a sakura tribe elder and a Dark Confidant joined Martin’s team. Just as planned, Patrick’s turn 3 WoG met Mana Leak. Martin on his turn, reloaded his hand, and played his Jitte. A wrathless Patrick played his own Jitte, but the bad was done. Martin was now drawing 3 cards a turn, and would be able to take of about anything.

The game was to be decided by whether or not Bob would spare his master. He was then on 3 life having taken 17 damage from pain lands and his harmful confidant. Martin held no answer to his own Confidant and even with his full grip while Patrick was handless, he was unable to deal much damage a turn due to Patrick’s paladin en-vec, so the Confidant would have a few more opportunities to deal some damage.

Dark Confidant revealed an Umezawa’s Jitte, putting Martin down to 1 life, the 1 life enough for Martin to survive that turn and attack for the win…

Spännande!

Martin 2-2 Patrick

Game 5:
Patrick will have the opportunity to play first in the deciding game. Will Wrath meet Mana Leak? Or take care of Martin’s team? Will Patrick overwhelm Martin with super-sized monsters?

At least I can answer of the questions above. Martin sideboarded out his Mana Leaks, so his only counters would only delay the inevitable fate of his guys. He basically relies on a better draw than his opponent’s.

Patrick’s third turn Paladin en-Vec sealed almost already the game. Martin’s only way to deal with the Paladin is Umezawa’s Jitte, or just overwhelm his opponent which seems quite hard on the third turn of the game. Taking into account that his guys will never be able to deal damage due to Paladin abilty to square off his beaters before regular damage step, it’s just a matter of turns before Martin loses. His only hope was that his opponent made a mistake, allowing him to add counters on the Jitte.

But soon enough, Yosei joined Patrick’s team. Unless Patrick made a HUGE play mistake, the game wouldn’t turn into Martin’s favour.

And mistakes he made not.

Martin 2-3 Patrick
Patrick Thor advanced to the Semifinals!