Player’s Championship Qualifier/Round 10 RCQ Recap
This past weekend we had 26 players battling it out for both an invitation to the HFXGames Player’s Championship at the end of the year and 4 invites to the Regional Championship in Calgary! With all the focus lately being on Standard for the past couple of RCQ seasons, as well as the latest Regional Championships being Standard, it’s nice to breath some fresh Modern air! The format is almost always unpredictable locally with 8 entirely different decks making up our top cut. Aggro, Midrange, Control, and lots of Combo; whatever style of deck you want to play, clearly the Modern format will have something for you. Our last Player’s Championship Qualifier was our Tarkir Standard Store Champs won by local legend Phil Samms who managed to (despite having a deep and undying hatred for the format that transcends time and space) find himself in the finals of yet another tournament. However, this time he would be bested by Player’s Championship 2024 attendee Mike Giles, who would take down the event with his signature deck Mono-Blue Tron! Let’s see how Mike built his winning deck list, as well as the rest of our Top 8!
Mike Giles – Mono-Blue Tron (1st)
Phil Samms – Esper Blink (2nd)
Doug Maguire – Mono-Red Belcher (3rd-4th)
Adam Joyce – Gruul Eldrazi (3rd-4th)
Travis Benedict – Neoform Combo (5th-8th)
Jordan Fisher – Izzet Prowess (5th-8th)
Matt Bailey – Gruul Through the Breach Eldrazi
Scott Bell – Domain (5th-8th)
Mike continues to prove that it isn’t all about picking the shiny new toy when it comes to winning games of Magic! If you know Mike Giles, you know you’re likely to be facing down some powerful colourless threats backed up by a myriad of answers in blue. Mike was kind of enough to once again give me some of his time to answer a few questions about his Magic career and the deck that he’s played so faithfully!
T: Hey pal! Congrats on qualifying for yet another Player’s Championship! The first thing I’d love to find out from you is how long you’ve been playing Blue Tron for!
M: Ah, great question! It’s been about 8 years now. Back in 2017, I qualified for an RPTQ that happened to be Modern. At the time, a string of my favourite decks—Birthing Pod, Splinter Twin, etc—had all been banned, and I found myself without a Modern deck I really enjoyed. I had just moved cities and knew I’d be playing mostly online since I didn’t have a local play group. That’s when I decided to start streaming and document my journey to find a new deck for the RPTQ. I tried all sorts of decks that just didn’t click for me—UW Control, Storm, Titan. Then someone suggested I try U-Tron. It was a very different deck back then, but I really enjoyed it. I started gaining a following and ended up going 6-2 in the RPTQ with a meta-targeted version of the deck. I lost my win-and-in match—not going to say I punted, but I definitely misclicked my way out of it when it counted. After that, I kept streaming and eventually built the deck in paper for local events. It’s had its highs (The One Ring—my precious) and its lows (hello MH1 and MH2). These days, U-Tron can still hold its own thanks to its ability to adapt to the meta.
T: That’s awesome! Do you still stream at all? If so, where could the people find you?
M: I’ll be honest—I ended up burning out from streaming. It’s a serious commitment, and while the community and friendships were great, I’ve always been pretty hard on myself. I tend to get hyper-focused on playing well, and trying to juggle that with entertaining an audience is tough. These days, I mostly just hang out in the Blue Tron Discord—whispers of days gone by, really. That said, the community here in Halifax is absolutely incredible. Everyone at the events is so friendly, and it’s been amazing to see. You really can’t say enough about the people who lend out cards just so others can play the version of their deck they want—huge shout out to Adam for that. And thank you to you and HFXGames for kicking off this event series last year. It’s made a big difference.
T: Yeah, having to have a consistent schedule when streaming, it can start to feel like a job instead of a hobby. With a deck like Blue Tron that you can customize to attack specific metagames, what kind of field were you expecting? Did the decks line up with what you thought you’d see, or did you have to fight through anything unexpected?
M: I’d been facing a lot of Energy online, and it seems like a deck that people are gravitating toward for paper events and challenges right now. I’ve had some success against it online, though that could just be variance over a small sample size. When building my list, I made choices with Energy, Titan, and Eldrazi in mind—though I knew I might be making the wrong calls. Funny enough, I ended up only using about half of my sideboard throughout the matches I played that day. I definitely got lucky in a few spots—drawing the right Tron land when I needed it or spinning Portent of Calamity for four and actually hitting four different card types. And to everyone who has to read Portent of Calamity… I’m sorry. “What does it do?” Everything—and yet it might also be my downfall. As for unexpected decks, I played against a sweet Valakut deck in the quarterfinals. I didn’t know what was going on in their deck, but it was really cool. That and my Affinity opponent Evan. Very well-designed deck built around Mox Opal.
T: Portent is such a sweet card. And ripping the Tron piece you need may just be the greatest feeling possible while playing Tron! So, this also comes with an invite to the Regional Championship in Calgary in November, do you think you’ll bring Blue Tron out West?
M: I feel like I might be at a bit of a crossroads in my Magic journey. I spent years grinding events across Ontario and Quebec and came painfully close to making it to the big stage more than once—even with U-Tron, nearly a decade ago. But now, the cost of flying out to Calgary for a shot, combined with the fact that I just don’t enjoy the grind like I used to, probably means it’s time to hang up the holster. The door isn’t fully closed, but let’s just say things aren’t looking too great for U-Tron representation.
T: Well, it looks like it’s still getting the job done for you for the time being! I got just one more fun one for you: They ban Urza’s Mine tomorrow. What does Mike Giles register for his next Modern tournament?
M: Oh ouch, wouldn’t be the first time my deck gets banned. Hmmm, they ban Urza’s Mine yet Kozilek’s Command is still legal, the fools! Green Eldrazi with Consigns in the side is where you would see this sicko.
It pays to know your deck! Congrats Michael Giles, we’ll be seeing you at the Player’s Championship in December! Congrats to the rest of our Top 8 as well for a great finish and thank you to everyone who came out to play! Our next Player’s Championship Qualifier will also be Modern on June 21st! Will the release of Final Fantasy shake things up? Come find out!
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Written By: Travis Benedict Pro Tour Competitor, Cat Lover |
