A Miscalculated Endgame

It has been week since I played the following game. I was a bit embarrassed. No, I didn't lose. However, that had been my goal and I failed to pull it off like I planned. Let me see if I can explain the how and why of it.

Jing-Jack offered to play me a game. They asked me to go easy on them as a new player. That was fine by me. I contemplated my Restricted Weave deck, but decided the Uwamar was too much of a problem. Last time I recall playing it against a newbie, I spent a good bit of the game trying to get rid of my own Uwamar just so they could get past my first Magi. I didn't want to repeat that for now. So, I chose my Storm of Fishes deck. Jing-Jack started off with Agram. Agram tossed down a Wudge, Zungg, and Corathan. A good opening, I think. Aula Mindseeker started off my side of things with Tradewinds and then used her windsight, discarding Cataclysm. With a Wudge in play, I chose to actually play her starting Typhoon. A roll of four eliminated the Wudge. For a single creature, Aula played out a Rayalon. Agram would answer with a Raveled Drush and Warrada's Ring. Rayalon would defeat the creature and fetch me the Tradewinds back. While a good move, it didn't make for overpowered play thus far. With a Hurricane Orish played, Aula would follow up with that Tradewinds and using her power again to draw cards. Agram would attack with the Corathan finally. Agram would play a Severos and then stole the Hurricane Orish. This defeated Aula Mindseeker. That was a good move. Voice of the Storm was in a good spot with all the card drawing I had been doing. However, it would be up to me to play the deck out a little incorrectly. Orothean Goggles and Tradewinds would make things a little better still. I actually tossed out big at this point to be sure Voice of the Storm got through Agram. Hurricane Orish, Wellisk, Pharan, Spray Narth, and Reef Hyren made for a strong creature showing. I debated using the power of the Spray Narth targeting one of my creatures, but figured that using it for my magi would still net me a solid energy gain to use without putting it into the field where it could be most devastating. So, with extra energy now on my Magi and two creatures down, I Sandswirled Agram to keep him from using his power to upset my efforts by stealing one of my creatures during his next turn. Voice of the Storm would use rebuke from Reef Hyren to destroy a Grim Pyder Agram played out. Abwyn's Gift on the Wellisk on my next turn would leave Agram wide open for defeat. Instead of playing back out the Wellisk, my Magi played out a Rayalon. Morag would stand in for Core next. Borgor, Core Grag, and an Rous would make a decent creature stand. I skipped rebuking any of them on purpose. Normally, I would've at least rebuked the Core Grag. After using all the powers, Morag used his 'Gift' to return the Rous to hand. Now, this next part is where I did some stuff that I am not sure how it really would've worked. I will have to check the Rules Digests some time. See, I played Hand of the Sky and used to play Corrupt. The problem I wonder is whether the Corrupt would've been shuffled back into the deck when the power of Hand of the Sky resolved or if it would when Corrupt would've discarded itself later when the next creature was played. In other words, did I totally was the energy to play the spell? Don't know. I chose to play things out as if I had. The only other spell in their hand was Vaporize, and they didn't have any relics in play. Morag then played an ROUS. Now, this made for a number of new questions. If the Corrupt was still in play, would it have triggered and saved the ROUS from discarding itself because I had creatures in play? Or, would the ROUS just discard itself first before I managed to gain control of it? Granted, I wasn't even sure the Corrupt would've been in play. So, we decided to play it out to Morag's advantage. ROUS gone. Corrupt used up and/or gone. I attacked with my one energy Rayalon, so I wasn't doing too great either. That is fine. Remember, my goal wasn't to overpower my opponent. Morag would answer by playing a Gorath Cub and Crushing Darkness would take away the Rayalon. I played out another Hand of the Sky, peeked at Jing-Jack's hand, then sacrificed Voice of the Storm by eating up a bunch of energy with Sandswirl and using Storm of Fishes for relics. Why? To deny Morag any benefits from Morag's Gift. Morag answered with a Tar Hyren while waiting for Niffer to appear. Niffer would toss down big. Probably too big. Phrup, Orathan Flyer, two Spray Narth, and two Pharan played in one turn, with an assist from the Orathan Flyer. I used the Spray Narth power to gain some energy and then used Abwyn's Gift to get rid of the Tar Hyren. Even still, this left me with an impressive bit of creatures and Morag would play no creatures. I began to fear that I had panicked the Jing-Jack with that power play. Though, Morag did attack some, getting rid of the Wellisk and Phrup. Niffer would play Tradewinds, Sandswirl, and then attacked. It wasn't enough to get Morag this turn. I dumped another Spray Narth and Pharan combo into the Hurricane Orish, plus I played out a Wellisk. On the next go around, she did get Morag. I also spent all the energy of the Orathan Flyer on a Rayalon and dumped the energy from my surviving Pharan into the Wellisk to make it more of an energy waste to actually use its effect. Lanyx Reaper would stand in for Core under what appeared to be desperate straights. I was thinking that I would just reset the mess I had by using Cataclysm. However, it wasn't to be. Morag's Gift was played first, a mistake really, but I let it slide at this point. Rayje's Belt would look down the Wellisk, so I couldn't waste energy that way. Borgor would do some damage to my massive creatures. Mind Blank would deny me of all my spells, so that Cataclysm idea was out the door. Chaos Sphere and Agram's Plaything would also appear. After using Lanyx's power, I would have to say that is a fair play considering the situation. However, I still heavily outweighed the opposition. So, it would be painfully obvious if I completely threw the game at this point. I would've had to stop playing.... Niffer had the Wellisk wipe out the two energy Borgor and Lanyx Reaper would be defeated by a one energy Rayalon.

I know this entry is rather long. I was surprised by the number of notes I had taken on the game. It has been suggested that I do a screen capture in the future and include it in this blog to make it more exciting. Hmmm, I guess I will have to write shorter descriptions of the game. They've been getting long enough as it is.