Went 3-1 overall, and the one I lost was a close one. After we each one, we went to a final really close last match, but I lost eventually. I'm starting to feel like my matchups are at their best when I'm the much faster deck. When my opponent is comparable in speed, that's when I have the most difficult games. As such, the best route seems to be to take advantage of ending the game as quickly as possible. As back up, creature flood helps to overwhelm most enemies other than turbo-fog, but that's what a sideboard is for.
Game 1, My opponent was playing a RBU homebrew, and it basically never got a chance to go off. He had a Snapcaster Mage and a Notion Thief to chump, but they were basically useless. He was mostly mana screwed, and with Flinthoof Boar after boar coming down and bashing in, the games were quickly over.
Game 2, My opponent was playing Jund tokens, with Renegade Krasis Exava, Rakdos Blood Witch, the Gruul mythic-rare hydra among other hydras. Extremely aggressive and difficult for me to handle. Blocking was a total waste. But racing was almost impossible, as creatures with double strike or just piling on tokens were almost impossible for me to outpace. I lost game one, but barley. I almost won before I was overwhelmed. I staved him off for the most part with an indestructible Falkenrath Aristocrat looping a Gravecrawler with a Blood Scrivener. Next game I chose to be on the play, and I managed to have a swift victory. Gravecrawler into Flinthoof Boar into Falkenrath Aristocrat, Abrupt Decay the Renegade Krasis and the game was over. The last game I feel I severely misplayed. Instead of playing the Falkenrath Aristocrat and racing, I tried to build my defenses but was quickly overwhelmed.
Game 3, My opponent was playing Naya Humans, very fast and aggressive. Doublestriking 5/5 Champion of the Parish among many others quickly crushed me. I boarded out the Blood Scrivener and Domri Rade for other smaller removal like Abrupt Decay and Legion Loyalist and it actually worked. Two quick games of slamming aggro and I won. Domri Rade got an awesome reveal. After drawing a land, I +1'd Domri, revealed Falkenrath Aristocrat, played her and attacked for 4- exactly lethal.
Game 4, My opponent was playing classic Jund midrange with all that entails, except he was complaining about not having Farseek's in there for some reason. Game one, I was on the play and had an okay aggressive start. After getting him to 1 life, he killed my creature, and used Liliana of the Veil to make me sacrifice Falkenrath Aristocrat. After Thragtusk put him back up to 6 life, and I drew lands for turns, it was over. Game two, I was on the play but had a really excellent game of 5 3/3 haste creatures turn after turn. It was resisted well, but not enough. The last game was 30 seconds long. After I played a Gravecrawler turn one and Flinthoof Boar turn three, he scooped up. I was surprised, but he said something about lands and no creatures, just spells.
All in all it went okay. Still trying to figure out how to balance oliva voldaren and varolz, the sacr-striped. 2 main, 2 sideboard? 1 in each? Comments always welcome.
