Today my younger brother joined me (I borrowed him my Nether Void deck) for the FNM Type 1 tourney in Vienna (Europe). We both arrived early to organize a fourth Wasteland for him. In the metro we discussed that it would be quite boring if we had to face each other in the first round (since we tested a lot during this week because he was playing Nether Void for the first time).

Here is my deck for reference (almost the same as last time):

Keeper (non-Trinity, non-Paragon), 60 cards

Mana: 28
4 fetchland
3 Underground
3 Volcanic
3 Tundra
1 Island
1 COB
1 UP
1 LoA
1 Strip
1 Dust
2 Waste
6 SoLoMoxen (no Emerald)
1 Grim Monolith

Blue: 21
4 FoW
4 Mana Drain
2 Cunning Wish
1 Mis-D
1 Morphling
1 Power Artifact
1 Ancestral
1 Time Walk
1 Timetwister
1 Mystical
1 Merchant Scroll
1 FoF
1 Stroke
1 Geyser

Black: 5
1 Abyss
1 Demonic
1 Vampiric
1 YawgWin
1 Mindtwist

White: 4
1 Balance
1 D-Blow
2 StoP

Red: 1
1 Mox Monkey

Split: 1
1 Fire&Ice

SB: 15
Wishable: 12
4 REB
1 BEB
2 Disenchant
1 Enlightened Tutor
1 Ebony Charm
1 StoP
1 Diabolic Edict
1 Skeletal Scrying
Rest: 3
2 Powder Keg
1 free slot (Dwarven Miner)

As compared to last time I just swapped the random Impulse for a random D-Blow. Must have been my fear of TnT. But I really liked D-Blow on that particular day!

The field is again mixed with 3 Keeper decks, 1 TnT, 1 Gro-Atog, 1 NetherVoid, 1 WW, 1 SquirrelCraft, 1 Taiga.dec and a couple of Sui and Sligh decks (about 16 players total).

First round - guess what - NetherVoid against my brother (unpowered version with Factories).

First game:

He wins the die roll and starts Swamp Duress, taking my Vampiric. Fortunately I am mana flooded, which matches nicely with his flood of Wastelands and Sinkholes. I manage to Mystical in response to his Hymn for Timetwister, and this is already game, as usual. I mean, I still have to StoP his ensuing Negator and Fire his Hyppie, but I am in control, draw a couple of cards with Wish for Skeletal Scrying and combo him a few turns later.

I side in StoP and Enlightening for Mox Monkey and Mindtwist.

Second game:

I keep an average hand with Mana Drain, Balance, FoF, 4 lands. He starts Ritual Hymn, taking two lands. Two Wastelands and a Sinkhole follow, but I have Balance in my hand, so I don't give up yet. He Tutors for Necro, but I still don't give up since I still have Balance in my hand. He plays Hyppie and Negator, but I still don't give up because I still have Balance in my hand. Then he drops NetherVoid and I give up, although I still... ok, never mind.

Third game:

He has to mulligan twice, so he is already in bad shape. I manage to Mana Drain his first two Sinkholes and acquire some board advantage in the form of artifact mana. He randomly drops NetherVoid with 2 lands and Ritual, and I win quietly from there on (he told me afterwards he overlooked the Monolith on my side). We wish each other good luck for the rest of the tourney (he ends up 2-3, losing to Sui and SquirrelCraft).

Matches: 1-0, Games: 2-1

Second Round: Sui

He is a very good Sui player and I am a bit worried about his deck - he has all the good stuff and Null Rods. Fortunately, I start the first game.

First Game:

I play some artifact mana and some lands. His first move is to play Nantuko Shade with 2 Swamps (I have already Mox, Sol Ring, Monolith and 2 lands). EOT I Wish for StoP and Mystical for Timetwister, which I play on my turn after dropping a third land. I have quite some board advantage now, but I draw 5 lands, Mox Monkey and Mana Drain. He has drawn better cards and Duresses my Mana Drain. I topdeck another land and play Mox Monkey. Now he makes a mistake, although I am not sure if it was a crucial one - but it definitely was a bad move: EOT he consults for Null Rod, but I tap 5 mana when it is on the stack and before his attack phase I just eat it with Mox Monkey. I StoP his Zombie token and kill him with Mox Monkey and Sarco-damage (I draw some good stuff, but having drawn and fetched almost all my land my deck simply had no choice).

same SBing as against NetherVoid

Second Game:

I draw a decent hand and he has no first turn Duress. Fourth turn Abyss (with Enlightened Tutor for Abyss and Demonic for Black Lotus, since I had not much land after his initial Sinkhole assault) means game. Turn eight Morphling (now with some mana) does the dirty job of killing an actually dead player.

Matches: 2-0, Games: 4-1

Third round: Gro-Atog

Finally I have a chance to meet this hot deck - last time we escaped each other.

First Game:

We both have a LoA hand without Wasteland, but I believe in the long run this deal is better for Keeper. I have 2 Mana Drain and 1 Mis-D. After a couple of turns (both of us dropping Moxen and Sol Ring; he has an Atog which I tried to StoP but he FoWed) he tries to Gush, I Mana Drain, he Ancestrals in response, I Mis-D, he FoWs, I Mana Drain, draw three extra cards, Wish for StoP and proceed to win from there on. Mis-D on Ancestral usually means game anyway. He was complaining about my third counter, but such is life... Mind you, in the second game he really had reasons to complain, for I won solely by my incredible topdecking skills.

In: 2 Keg, 4 REB, 1 StoP
Out: 1 Mindtwist, 1 Vampiric, 1 Mystical, 1 Mox Monkey, 1 Stroke, 1 Cunning Wish, 1 Fire and Ice

He has a decent hand with second turn Dryad AND Atog (Black Lotus helped). I go for Abyss, but he FoWs and proceeds to beat me down. Fortunately, I topdeck a StoP for his Dryad (already 7/7) the turn before I would die. He is 1 card short of killing me with Atog, and I proceed to topdeck a second StoP. With Merchant Scroll I fetch Ancestral and try to StoP, but he counters. I Ancestral in response and the THIRD card is a REB! 2 turns later he draws another Atog (I am at 5 life now having fetched a few lands) which I cannot counter, but as a good T1 player I topdeck another REB He curses and proceeds to lose the game from there on (my Dustbowl and the fact that I could D-Blow his Fastbond were crucial ingredients to victory). I combo him with Braingeyser (twice protected, just in case - I counted our libraries, but he had 34 cards in his library and I only 33; otherwise I would not have cared if he Misdirects...).

Matches: 3-0, Games: 6-1

I had some time and watched another Keeper fellow. I witnessed a scene which Rakso would have loved: the Keeper player had only 1 blue mana source, but Jet and Pearl on the table. So he managed to counter with Dromar's-incredible-Charm a crucial spell of his SquirrelCraft opponent. He told me that he really liked Dromar's charm that day...

Fourth Round: Mirror match (well, not 100% - he plays only 2 fetchlands, Future Sight, 2 Brainstorms and 27 mana sources)

Last time KPfV managed to avoid my deck, but this time there is no escape I consider to draw and to play for fun, but he wants to play it out - probably he is right, it is better this way. After all, this is FNM and not a pro-tour...

First Game:

This is an amazing game - I cannot remember all the details, but let me draw you an approximate picture: in the beginning, he is slightly mana screwed (my Dustbowl and the fact that he has only 27 mana sources surely helped), and I am slightly mana flooded. There is a crucial intermediate turn after which he loses 2 FoWs (with 2 Mana Drain) and I lose 1 Mana Drain and 1 FoW, but I cannot remember the spell we were fighting about - must have been something relevant... I proceed to FoF and to Ancestral successfully (I had also an early Skeletal Scrying, removing Dustbowl and Time Walk) and now I think I am going to win. I play Morphling, he Mana Drains, I Mana Drain. He plays Balance, 1 FoW, but he Edicts with his last card. Damn! Now we are both in topdecking mode (I have 1 card, but it is a useless Abyss). I still have board advantage in terms of mana, but this is changed after he plays YawgWin for land and Ancestral. I topdeck nothing, he FoFs successfully (I split into Morphling and Mana Drain+3 mana sources. Of course, he takes the pile with 4 cards.). I draw a Stroke. He Mindtwists me for 2, but knowing his complete hand I Stroke for 8 cards. He is at 15 life and has to Mana Drain my Stroke (and after Mindtwist resolves I have to discard my useless Abyss), but he topdecks Mox Monkey next turn and eats all my SoLoMoxen instead of burning for 11! I topdeck a StoP and finally I begin to draw my non-mana cards. I YawgWin successfully a few turns later, ending up with a bunch of cards and Morphling on the table.

However, he casts Tutor (which I counter, since he had Wasteland and I had only 2 blue mana untapped) and then he flashes back the Edict (I totally forgot that it was a Chainer's and not a Diabolic!). Now I am left without victory condition in my deck, although I have established complete board control. I proceed to draw my library and the last card is the Grim Monolith. I cast Grim Monolith + Power Artifact, Wish for Ebony Charm to remove him 3 annoying cards (although I was stupid enough to take his victory conditions - I should have taken 2 FoWs and 1 Mana Drain instead!) and then I Timetwister into FoF, Stroke, Mystical and FoW. I FoF, but he FoWs and then I trance for a while (whether to wait for Mystical for FoW or Stroke him right now), but finally I Stroke him for his library and epsilon, protected with FoW and he does not have Mis-D or counter. So I win this incredible game.

Time is almost over after this great game with ups and downs on both sides.

Out: 1 Timetwister, 1 Mystical, 1 Vampiric, 2 StoP, 1 Abyss
In: 4 REB, 1 Skeletal Scrying, 1 Dwarven Miner

Second game:

It is not very interesting. He has to mulligan down to 5 (keeping a two land hand). I get rid of his lands and play Mox Monkey and have complete control over the game. When time is called I have Mox Monkey and Dwarven Miner on the table and he has 6 life. On my last turn I kill him. What a boring game...

Matches: 4-0, Games: 8-1

Last Round: WW (WTF? WW in the last round?!)

It was very funny for me, since this match was in fact the easiest of the whole tourney - no offence, the WW player managed to kill 1 Keeper fellow. But I was still very confident.

I win the die roll.

First Game:

He starts with Land Tax and Second turn Null Rod (I have Land, Mox, Sol Ring), but I Wish for Disenchant and get rid of the Null Rod. I play my topdecked Mox Monkey, but he plays (with 4 mana) 2 White Knights. I have Balance in my hand and Mystical and Time Walk and a Mox, so my plan is to get rid of Mox Monkey and Balance away his guys after playing Time Walk and Mystical for Ancestral (pretty easy plan). He attacks, I block and he plays three more creatures. He has 3 cards left which obviously have to be basic lands (he taxed for 6). So I proceed as planned and with Ancestral I draw into Morphling, which wins me the game in 4 rounds.

In: 1 Stop, 1 Enlightened, 1 Disenchant
Out: 1 Mindtwist, 1 Stroke, 1 Dustbowl

Second Game:

My starting hand features the three combo pieces (Braingeyser as kill card), 2 lands, a Mox and 1 Mana Drain. However, his second turn White Knight with his third turn Empyrial Armor put me on a fast clock. Fortunately, I have enough land to play a protected Monolith (that is, to protect the Monolith of Seal) and on 5 life I have UUUU for the kill.

Matches: 5-0, Games: 10-1

So my brother was the only one who took a game from me - not as good as KPfV last week, who went undefeated 10-0, but still quite decent. I get 30 Euro in store credit.