Wizards of the West Coast

So here it is, my very first tournament report that is not written on Facebook or sent as an email. As to why you're reading this here and not on Zuckerberg's godforsaken hellscape of enshittification, take a look at my previous writing effort.

As is tradition, I'm writing this two days before I pack my decks and travel to Mummiland for my next tournament adventure. Look forward to seeing the tournament report from that in a couple of months, probably a day or two before the Uthden Troll Cup in November.

The warmup to Slaughter Island III consisted of hours of vibe coding with my new best artificial friend, Claude, to build this website, because I wanted to move tournament organisation and stuff away from Facebook and its accomplice, Messenger. Due to the time spent vibe coding, I managed to uphold another tradition and didn't decide on a deck until the morning of departure. More on the deck itself later.

The morning of departure started as most of my mornings; with kids waking me up way too early, which for once was a good thing, as I still needed to put together a pile of cards that could feasibly turn into something playable. Juggling cards, diapers, lunches for the kids, and most of what I needed for two nights out of the house, I finally managed to pack all of the above plus the kids into the socioeconomic overstep that is our car. I dropped the kids off and headed towards the city hall to spend a couple of hours in service of the city of Bergen. Around 13:36, according to my timeline on Google Maps, I packed my municipal work stuff and headed over to the parking garage with a shopping centre attached, as that was where I had parked my car and also where I was supposed to meet, this year's guest from abroad; Sindre from Voss. Due to short notice, we couldn't get anyone outside of Norway to join, but Sindre is a sailor and has sailed a schooner round the Horn of Mexico or something like that, so I decided that he qualified. Head on over and pay your respects to the Dunce Crew to read his musings about the tournament.

After some messaging back and forth about where to meet, we agreed to meet outside Normal, as I needed salt water spray for my glorious hair. Which was ironic given this weekend's destination. Anyway, salt water spray and toothpaste was acquired and Sindre was waiting for me outside Normal. Greetings were exchanged and we went on our way to the Mecca of Magic the Gathering in Western Norway; Bømlo. I don't recall much of the car trip, but knowing myself, I probably pointed out all the spots on Bømlo where I played Magic as a young lad.

Two and something hours after our departure, Sindre and I were the first to arrive at Brandasund, but were very quickly joined by the rest of the gang and headed over to Skjeret Landhandel, where we met up with Jostein, our water chauffeur for the weekend. After greetings and hugs were exchanged, we stepped into our survival/flotation suits before boarding the Thunder in Paradise of Bømlo.

A five minute boat ride later, we arrived at the beautiful island and lighthouse of Slåtterøy.

Since we knew we would arrive somewhat late, the plan was to play whatever we wanted. After bribing us with a delicious pot of chili, most of us agreed to draft Erik's extended Premodern cube. As is tradition, I ended up with a handful of green big bois and plenty of ways to get them onto the board well ahead of the curve. I can't remember how my deck fared, but I would have remembered if it went very well, so it probably didn't go very well. Beers were drunk, shits were shot and since I am a father of two living alarm clocks, the prospect of uninterrupted sleep became too tempting and I hit the sack well before midnight.

Somehow I must've managed to sire two telepathic alarms, because sometime around 6:30 I woke up as the first one, but no more than five minutes had passed before the familiar sounds of tall old men stretching their limbs out reached my ears and I was joined by the other dads with telepathic offspring.

After some coffee and the compulsory bacon and eggs (note to self: pack tabasco and worcestershire sauce next year), it was time to look over my deck for today's event. I had theory crafted for a while and had four slots that were locked in; 4x Vodalian Mage. Other than that, I was open to suggestions. After some hits and misses, I decided that I wanted to flip Orbs, like a lot of Orbs, so I ended up with putting together a blue black control thing with Chaos Orb's frozen little brother, Winter Orb and other stuff to make sure that any fun in the game belonged to me and only me.

The format of choice for Slaughter Island is, and always will be, the best format in Old School, X-point OS.

Round 1

Since we were an odd number of players, each round had a bye that in addition to three points also got to help with preparing the dinner. The lucky winner in round 1 was Thor. I was paired up against Kay's Dead Guy Ale which splashed for blue cheaty cards. He played Hyppies and Juzzies that beat me to a pulp. 0-1

Round 2

I was paired against Robert's black red Abyss burn thing. Somehow I managed stick The Hive and even though my drones got intercepted by Chain Lightning Bolts they didn't die to the Abyss and in the end I believe Robert succumbed to the death of a thousand/twenty cuts. 1-1

Round 3

In the third round I was paired with Arnfinn who, to the surprise of no one (except maybe Sindre, since he hasn't played any of us before) brought a counter burn thing. However I had more counter things and managed end up winning 2-1. 2-1

Round 4

Next up was my nemesis, Ole-Gunnar, playing Erik's monowhite creation. My repeated Chaos Orbs were no use, as he kept drawing creatures. Each Orb miss pushed him one step closer to victory and after enough misses he had amassed a large enough army that his little critters, that after a Crusade or Two weren't that little anymore, handed my behind to me two games in a row. 2-2

Round 5

I needed to win this match, but I feared Erik's little green men as I knew they had many answers up their little sleeves. However, my deck finally managed to do what I wanted. An early Guardian Beast paired with a Chaos Orb meant that I finally got to have all the fun. I ended up going 2-1 and secured a spot in the top4. 3-2

Top 4

...against none other than my nemesis, Ole-Gunnar. My deck hadn't gotten any better since our last match and his little dudes ran over me two games in a row.

Final

No final for me, but Erik and Ole-Gunnar duked it out with Erik emerging as the winner of Slaughter Island III.

Congratulations to Erik!

After the tournament, it was time for the main course, pinnekjøtt (literal translation: stick meat), better known as rack of lamb, followed by our new tradition; The Wine Walk, where those who want to, bring a glass wine and go for a scenic walk on Slåtterøy.

Thanks for a great weekend, guys! Already looking forward to next year's edition!

All the tournament results plus deck lists can be found here.

I hate Facebook. Making a list of the reasons for my blood curdling hatred of this behemoth of enshittification and rage bait, that Mark Zuckerberg may or may not have stolen, would result in a document the size of the Magic: the Gathering Comprehensive Rules.

So while it's safe to say that I'm not a fan, I'm also mature enough to acknowledge what Facebook does (or rather did) well; events. You create an event, invite people, add some broth, a potato, and baby, you got a stew/event going! Which is the way I and other local TO's have arranged tournaments for years. However as more and more people log off Facebook, keeping tabs on attendance on Facebook and taking people not on Facebook into account, becomes tiresome.

Despite this, when the date for Slaughter Island III was settled, I immediately logged on to Zuckerberg's Portal of Friendship and Agreeability, and eagerly created the event. Before inviting my carefully curated list of lucky prospective attendees, I challenged the largest LLM's (Large Language Model, or AI as some people call it) to create a banner image for me, to get the hype going.

Armed with a photo of Slåtterøy that I fed into the LLM and a prompt calling for a retro styled science fiction B-movie poster with some kind of monster as a nemesis, drawing inspiration from the photo of the lighthouse, with elements of old school magic the gathering from 93/94, I excitedly pressed enter.

Of the three, ChatGPT definitely was closest to what I wanted, but something wasn't right. It felt too distanced from the real horrors that inhibit Slaughter Island. And then it struck me; Bæælzebub.

You see, the sheep that are evil and don't get along with the other sheep, are sent to this ovine Alcatraz. And last year, one particularly demonic specimen tried to stop us from slinging our beautiful ancient cardboard:

Adding the image above to the prompt, along with a scientifically accurate and unbiased description of the animal in question, yielded the results I needed for my banner for the event I was creating on Facebook:

Equipped with my artificially generated masterpiece, I was ready to add people to my event. I opened the list of people Facebook suggested I add to the event, which, due to my job, mostly consisted of members of the city council of Bergen, the mayor and several other members of Bergen's political and bureaucratic elite. I quickly found both Sindre and Johannes and promptly added a checkmark in the empty box next to their names. Seeing none of the other names on my shortlist, I turned my attention to the search bar and entered the name of Arnfinn, but Facebook returned an error; "Can't find the page" or something like that.

I tried again, this time another name; "Can't find the page"

I tried again, this time on a laptop; "Can't find the page"

I tried scrolling through the plethora of Bergen's political and bureaucratic elite; "Can't find the page"

I waited a few hours and did all of the above once more; "Can't. Find. The. Mother. Fucking. Page."

So now I had an event with two invitees and couldn't invite anyone else on my list. Facebook had finally shed its last functional feature and reached its final form by ascending to level 10 in the Church of Enshittification.

After the Black Death, the Renaissance was born, through the cracks of the Dark Ages, shone the light of the Age of Enlightenment, from the ashes of the Second World War, we put a man on the Moon and from the shit stains of the steaming turd that is Facebook, the website you are reading these ramblings on, has come to life.

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