Initially I had planned to crush GP Cleveland this past weekend, along with the rest of the Day 2 Crew—Carrie O’Hara, Gabe “The Doc” R., and Zach “Drawing Live” Barash—even though I had played virtually zero Fate Reforged sealed. Despite having a great pool, that didn’t happen, and I scrubbed out with a shameful 3-3 record, with two byes. Pretty much my worst GP result since like GP Worcester a few years ago.
I was going to post my pool here, and analyze what went wrong, but given that Fate Reforged is now a lame-duck format, I can’t really stomach revisiting that train wreck. Suffice it to say, I just never felt like I was able to get any traction with my deck in the four rounds that I played. I died once to Torrent Elemental and Anafenza, the Foremost; once to a shit-ton of fliers I didn’t draw removal for; and once to a brutal combo of Palace Siege, Shaman of the Great Hunt, and (yet again) Torrent Elemental. I was pretty tilted.
But, as I told my wife when I got home on Sunday, I still had a great time, mostly because of the excellent crew I was able to hang with: the aforementioned Day 2 competitors, With Whom I Am Greatly Pleased, as well as fellow Hipster Gabe Carleton-Barnes, Chris “Meddling Mage” Pikula, Jaime Parke, former L4 judge and new friend Seamus Campbell, and The Unbreakable Phil. We got up to some bidness Saturday night after Day 1, let me tell you.
Perhaps I had a premonition of my inevitable defeat, though, because I decided to document my trip, Matt Jones–style, and focus on posting that. I miss having lots of GP pictures on our site. So here it is, my GP Cleveland photo essay. Dig it!
Obligatory (airport) bathroom selfie.
I love these water bottle filling stations they have at airports.
Anchor Steam at LaGuardia.
Cleveland had a pretty sweet transfer from the airport to downtown. When I told my Ohio-native co-worker I took the train, he thought I was nuts.
On the RTA.
The tastiest train station. (I love Triscuits.)
Me and Zach “Drawing Live” Barash at A Bar and Kitchen in Downtown Cleveland.
My Ohio co-worker told me to try Great Lakes Brewing Co.’s Great Dortmunder beer—it was pretty sweet.
Day One of the GP. A fine day to sit inside all day and play Magic.
Obligatory hotel-room selfie.
Carrie and I saw this pretty sweet statue on the way to breakfast at Urban Farmer, at the Westin.
Just one more in my continuing series of “guys with their heads flat on the table at Grand Prix.”
My sealed build. It looks sweet. It did way less.
After scrubbing out of the GP at a very disappointing 3-3, thus pretty much ending my goal of attaining two byes for next year, I went back to Urban Farmer and had a Manhattan. Chris Pikula and a buddy of his happened to be there, too, so we hung out.
The next morning I decided I’d had it with Magic for the weekend, and just wanted to be home. So I changed my flight and split from the hotel, going back to Tower City (pictured here) and the train back to the airport.
This was my breakfast/lunch at the airport. It was OK.
My co-worker told me I had to try Panini’s while I was in Cleve, but unfortunately I ran out of time!
Peace out Cleveland. I actually had a good time in you.
Hello again NYC—thankfully about eight hours earlier than I was originally scheduled to arrive.
23/17 is a Hipsters of the Coast column focused on Limited play—primarily draft and sealed, but also cubing, 2HG, and anything else we can come up with. The name refers to the “Golden Ratio” of a Limited deck: 23 spells and 17 lands. Follow Hunter at @hrslaton.