When I initially decided to go to GP: Columbus, I was fairly set on Reanimator as my deck of choice for the event. I felt that it had the tools to beat every other deck in the format, and it was even consistent in doing it. Unfortunately for me, WotC decided to ban Mystical Tutor before the event, and this forced me to look into other options.

The first post-Mystical deck I tested was CounterTop Thopters, with Enlightened Tutor. I copied the list that won the 5k, played some games, changed a couple cards, played some more games, and decided that I liked it. At this point, there was still a decent amount of time left before the GP. So, I put CounterTop Thopters on the shelf as my fallback plan, and began testing other decks.

My additional testing showed that Blue Lands was very strong against a lot of the decks that I expected to be represented at the GP. My main problem with the deck is that games took forever. I felt that if I did lose Game 1, it was relatively likely that my match would end in a loss or a draw. I wasn't sure if I was comfortable putting myself in that position, but even so, Blue Lands was my frontrunner until just a few days before the event.

With about two weeks left, I started to hear about an Aluren deck. I noticed that it was doing well on MTGO, and I heard rumblings about it from some very good players. I initially dismissed the deck, assuming that I wouldn't be able to find the 4 Imperial Recruiters necessary to build it. However, in a strange turn of events I ended up asking a friend, jokingly, if they had 4 Imperial Recruiters, and it turned out that they had a friend who owned 4 and was willing to lend them to me. After finding out about my good fortune, I immediately started testing Aluren as often as I could. I found that it was fast, consistent, and disruptive, which is everything you're looking for in a combo deck, and I decided to run it for the GP.

Fast forward to the Thursday before Columbus.

After work, I decide to go to the local card store, Jim Hanley's Universe, to test some Legacy. I make a point of letting everyone know that I'm only going to be around testing until 9 or so, because I haven't packed at all, and my flight leaves very early on Friday.

Obviously, I end up staying around until they closed, and then going out for Pho with the usual suspects. I get home ridiculously late and somehow decide that playing Starcraft 2 is a better idea than packing. That goes on for a while before I remember how early my flight is leaving, and, again, that I'm not even close to prepared for my trip. The responsible adult in me finally kicks in and I sort through a few large boxes of cards, pulling out all the Legacy staples I can find. My friend Yoni Skolnik is also attending the GP, and he's expecting me to bring enough cards for him to build any one of a few different decks.

With all the packing and very little sleeping out of the way, I head to the airport. The plane was tiny – 3 seats wide in total – and the ride was mostly uneventful. Despite taking sleeping pills, I was unhappily awake for the entire flight. I hate flying, and I was sure we were all going to die at least 50 times on this particular 1 hour long flight, but we somehow managed to survive.

Yoni picked me up at the airport and took me to his brother's house, where we were staying for the weekend. After a quick shower, and some less quick work, we made our way over to the site.

Yoni had decided not to play in any trials because his entire family was visiting Columbus for the weekend, so that they could see both sons in a single trip. Once we were on site, we chatted for a bit about Legacy and Yoni decided to play Zoo... no, Goblins... no, Zoo... no, Goblins, for sure. Yeah, Goblins.

Once the long process of deck selection was resolved, we went about getting the last few cards he was missing for Goblins. With that taken care of, he went to pick up his family at the airport, and then I met up with them for a nice 5 course Indian meal with his family, that made both of us sick by the end of it. After dinner we went back to the hotel his parents were staying in and crashed there for the night.

Saturday morning I woke up bright and early, and headed to the site to put the finishing touches on my Aluren list. I met up with Gerry Thompson, who was still trying to figure out which of about 4 decks he was going to register with. Eventually, he found 4 Imperial Recruiters, and decided that he could find the rest of the deck during his byes. We talked about the last few slots in the deck, adding a last minute Volrath's Stronghold to the main deck, and a Life from the Loam to the sideboard, to have a better long game against decks where we would need to be grinding.

The list I registered was 1 card different than his, -1 Lim-Dul's Vault (0) and +1 Coiling Oracle (4). I didn't hate the Vault, but I actively loved Coiling Oracle, and knew that I wanted 4 in my deck.

"Legacy - Aluren Combo"

• Creatures (18)
• 4 Birds of Paradise
• 4 Coiling Oracle
• 4 Imperieal Recruiter
• 2 Dream Stalker
• 1 Cavern Harpy
• 1 Parasitic Strix
• 1 Bone Shredder
• 1 Eternal Witness

• Spells (19)
• 4 Aluren
• 4 Intuition
• 4 Force of Will
• 4 Brainstorm
• 3 Cabal Therapy

• Lands (23)
• 4 Havenwood Battleground
• 4 Misty Rainforest
• 4 Verdant Catacombs
• 1 Wooded Foothills
• 2 Tropical Island
• 1 Bayou
• 1 Taiga
• 1 Underground Sea
• 2 City of Traitors
• 1 Island
• 1 Forest
• 1 Volrath's Stronghold

• Sideboard (15)
• 4 Natural Order
• 3 Krosan Grip
• 2 Thoughtseize
• 1 Harmonic Sliver
• 1 Faerie Macabre
• 1 Llawan, Cephalid Empress
• 1 Life from the Loam
• 1 Progenituss
• 1 Dryad Arbor

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As you can see, the deck has the ability to add the Natural Order combo after sideboarding. This was usually added in place of the Aluren combo, to fight Enchantment hate, Counterbalance (which, when set on 3 locks you out of Recruiters off Aluren), and other annoying sideboard hate.

Round 1 – Bye

Went back to the hotel room to grab some Aluren extras for Gerry.

Round 2 – Bye

Watched some matches, talked with a few people about sideboarding, and generally just hung around.

Round 3 – Bye

Watched some of my friends matches and wasted more time.

Round 4 – Belcher

Game 1:

I kept a hand with a turn 3 kill and Force of Will backup. I cast a first turn Birds of Paradise and passed. He tried to kill me on his turn, but I Forced his Burning Wish. On my turn I played a land and passed. On his turn he drew, made a comment about how much it sucked that he was paired against a control deck... and on my turn, much to his surprise, I killed him.

Game 2:

I mulled my 7 and 6, as neither of them had Force, Cabal Therapy, or Thoughtseize. I eventually kept a 3 land, Brainstorm, Intuition hand, figuring that if he didn't go off on turn 1, at least I would see 3 extra cards. On his first turn he made something like 10 Goblins and passed. I lost this one.

Game 3:

I keep a hand with 3 land, Cabal Therapy, Thoughtseize, Eternal Witness, and Imperial Recruiter. I rip apart his hand over the first few turns, using my Eternal Witness to bring back and flashback Cabal Therapy. A couple turns after I've reduced his hand to almost nothing, and I've not drawn anything relevant, he starts to go off. He removes a couple Spirit Guides, plays a Lion's Eye Diamond, and says "show me a Force and I'll scoop", to which I reply "play it out", although at this point I'm pretty nervous. He stares at his cards for a while and then passes. A couple turns later I draw some business and combo off on him. After he concedes he explains that if he'd waited one more turn to go off he would have had me, which is insane, considering I hit him with 4 or 5 discard spells.

4-0

Round 5 – Benjamin Lundquist playing Storm

Game 1:

I sculpt my hand with Brainstorm and Intuition while keeping him off balance with Cabal Therapy and Force. Eventually I whittle his hand down to almost nothing and I go off.

Game 2:

Mostly the same deal at game 1. At one point he uses Personal Tutor to find an Infernal Tutor. On the next turn he imprints that Tutor on a Chrome Mox and passes. A couple turns later I Cabal Therapy him and see 2 Infernal Tutors, so I guess he drew the 3rd one, which prevented him from being able to do much of anything, since he didn't have much mana either. Regardless, I was sitting on triple Force the entire game, and I eventually drew some combo pieces and won.

5-0

Round 6 – Burn

Game 1:

He casts some burn and a Vexing Shusher, slows me down by a turn with a Wasteland, and then I combo him out with about 8 life left. He makes me show him all the combo pieces and then scoops.

Game 2:

I smokescreen and board in nothing, start shuffling, and then opt to board in just the Harmonic Sliver.

He casts a turn 2 Pyrostatic Pillar, and throws some burn at me. On my 4th or 5th turn I play Aluren, then Recruiter for Sliver, and blow up his Pillar. This puts me at decently low life (8), with just an Intuition left in hand to his 1 card, he draws and passes. On my turn, I draw Cabal Therapy and cast it, in response, he Fireblasts me, and in response to that, I Intuition for 3 Imperial Recruiters and go off. While I'm going off he attempts to Fireblast my Parasitic Strix, but I show him the Eternal Witness still in my deck and he realizes what's going on and scoops.

6-0

Round 7 – Merfolk

Game 1:

I mull a couple times, keep a mediocre hand, and get rolled by a fast draw backed up by a Daze.

Game 2:

I keep a hand with the combo and a Cabal Therapy, but no way to accelerate. I cabal Therapy on my 2nd turn while he has an Island and an Aether Vial on 1 in play. His hand twitches a bit towards his permanents when I announce Cabal Therapy which gives a read on Daze. I name it, and he instead has Force of Will, some Lords, and Cursecatcher (which explains the hand twitch, which was apparently towards Aether Vial, not Island). I attempt to resolve my combo against his quickly growing army of Fish and just don't get there fast enough.

6-1

Round 8 – Hypergenesis

Game 1:

He casts turn 2 Show and Tell, I put Bone Shredder face down and he puts down... Progenitus. I lose exactly 1 turn before I'm able to cast my Aluren (with Recruiter in hand), which I inconveniently drew the turn after his Show and Tell.

Game 2:

I mull to 4, which is the first hand that has Aluren, Recruiter, Cabal Therapy, Thoughtseize, or Force of Will. My hand ends up being 3 land and Aluren. On his 2nd turn he casts Show and Tell to put Emrakul into play and I put my Aluren into play. On my turn I can draw Intuition or Recruiter to win on the spot, Brainstorm to dig, or Bone Shredder for his Emrakul. I draw a land and prompted get all my permanents eaten.

6-2

Round 9 – Dragon Stompy

Game 1:

I keep a hand with a turn 2 win: some green duals, City of Traitors, Havenwood Battleground, Birds of Paradise, Imperial Recruiter, and Aluren. On his first turn he casts Chalice of the Void on 1. I play Havenwood Battleground, preparing to win the next turn. On his turn, however, he casts Magus of the Moon. I manage to assemble a bunch of Imperial Recruiters to prevent his Magus of the Moon from attacking, until he draws a Jitte... and then a Flametounge Kavu.

Game 2:

I lead with a Misty Rainforest and pass. He plays a Blood Moon on his first turn and I crack my Misty Rainforest for an Island and Brainstorm. His Blood Moon resolves, and we play draw-go for a bit. Eventually he plays a Magus of the Moon, but at this point I am Brainstorming at the end of his turn and casting Intuition on my upkeep to filter away dead cards. I do this a few times before finding my basic Forest, Birds of Paradise, and Natural Order. In the meantime he plays a Trinisphere, and a Rakdos Pit Dragon. After he plays his Rakdos Pit Dragon, I turn my Birds of Paradise into a Progenitus. On his turn he attacks me down to almost nothing. On my turn, I attack him down to 8, play an Imperial Recruiter and use it to fetch a Birds to chump with. He frowns when he sees that I've fetched Birds. He draws his card, and calmly casts Flametongue Kavu to destroy my Birds of Paradise. With my Birds out of the way, he jumps his Dragon and finishes my tournament.

6-3

Not making Day 2 is obviously very disappointing. Started out 6-0 and not making Day 2 is even more disappointing. Making a bad call with Cabal Therapy is something that I'm still kicking myself for. Getting rolled by Flametongue Kavu is never fun, especially when you thought about it as a possibility, and came to the conclusion that your opponent couldn't possibly have thought it was a good idea to leave it in after sideboarding against a combo deck.

Despite all that, I'm not that disappointed. I feel like I played very good Magic, and it just wasn't my day. I'm confident in the plays I made and the deck I chose, and that's become more and more important to me lately. My disappointing finish in Columbus has got me back to thinking about how badly I want to do well at Nationals this year, and I'm really looking forward to that tournament.

I'm currently in the process of figuring out what to play for Nationals. I've already started testing Wafo-tapa's UW Control deck, and Jake Van Lunen's Pyromancer's Ascension deck, and they both seem very solid. I've also started working on Extended for Pro Tour Amsterdam and that format seems awesome.

It's important in competitive gaming to not focus on disappointing results, but rather to evaluate how well you think you played the event. Do I feel like I played perfectly? Of course not. But I feel like I played well, and I can only point to the Cabal Therapy play as a moment where I made a very bad call. What's important to me is that I'm consistently playing at a high level, learning, and improving, and I feel like I accomplished all of that this weekend.

M11 has released on Magic Online this week, so I'll be running lots of Standard tournaments in the near future. Next week, I'll be breaking down some of my Magic Online constructed matches from the tournament queues. I'll probably be looking at games with either UW Control or Pyromancer's, but I may showcase a couple of my own brews as well.

Until next week.

- Benjamin Hayes