EDH Feature Match - Hunter Garrett vs. Skye Kutner

Full results will be up soon, but for now it's time for another feature match I did during my bye.

Round 4 of 5 in the EDH tournament pitted Skye's deck, which was led by Intet, the Dreamer and sitting at 3-0, against Hunter's enchantment deck, which was 2-1 and captained by Uril, the Miststalker. After a debate trying to solve the age old question of "What is the brainless animals?", we eventually admitted a distinct inability to understand the question at hand and proceeded with the Magic game. Hunter won the roll, chose to play first, and kept his opening seven. Skye shipped back his starting hand, but was satisfied following his free mulligan and avoid going below seven cards.

Hunter started off the game by playing a forest and casting an Alpha Birds of Paradise. Skye looked over the table in awe for a few seconds before realizing it was a proxy. Hunter used his second turn casting a Sterling Grove, while Skye's first action was a Thought Courier on the same turn. Hunter sacrificed his enchantment at the end of the turn to tutor up a Runes of the Deus onto the top of his library. Both players spent their third turns padding their mana bases, with Skye fetching a Breeding Pool with Farseek and Hunter planning some future shenanigans with his general thanks to Contested Cliffs.

Thanks to his Bird, Hunter was able to cast Uril, the Miststalker on turn four. Skye used his Thought Courier to discard Anger, giving his future creatures haste. This was immediately relevant, as he cast a Merfolk Looter. Hunter played his Shinka, the Bloodsoaked Keep to legend-rule Skye's copy of the Kamigawa land, and then had to settle for giving his Uril double strike with Battle Mastery, as he lacked the necessary mana to cast Runes of the Deus and give it trample as well. Skye chumped with his Courier and got a free Basking Rootwalla after activating it. He also disposed of the Birds with a Firespout aimed only at flying creatures.

Skye's cycling found him Nevinyrral's Disk, but the delay forced him to give Hunter a turn to draw a land and possibly blow him out. However, Hunter couldn't find the land to give his general trample, and the Rootwalla chumped Uril. Hunter did cast a Rampant Growth, threatening his Runes next turn. Skye had no plays the following turn, and chumped Uril with his last remaining creature, the Merfolk Looter, dropping Genesis into his graveyard. Skye used Genesis to recur the Merfolk Looter, and it chumped Uril again the following turn. However, Hunter generated a second combat phase with Seize the Day, finally forcing Skye to pop Nevinyrral's Disk. Hunter was then content to pass the turn back to Skye with no further plays.

Skye cast Spellbound Dragon on his next turn, while Hunter hit his seventh land and re-cast Uril. Skye attacked with the dragon and discarded Ancestral Vision to the loot effect, finally dealing the first damage of the game (37-40). He also cast a Vexing Sphinx. However, Hunter finally got to cast his Runes of the Deus, and even with the Sphinx blocking, it put through 14 points of general damage (37-26). Spellbound Dragon got in for 6 next turn, as Kodama's Reach was discarded (31-26).

Hunter enchanted Uril with a Boar Umbra and attempted to attack for lethal, but Skye bought some time with Moment's Peace. He then attacked again with the Dragon, discarding Jilt (26-26). Skye survived another turn by using Flashback on Moment's Peace, but he was approaching the end of the line. He cast Survival of the Fittest and discarded the Genesis he had returned to his hand to fetch a Trygon Predator. While this seemed like a good idea, Hunter used Contested Cliffs to destroy the Spellbound Dragon. At this point, Skye realized that he had no outs, as even if he attacked with the Predator and destroyed Runes of the Deus, he would be unable to block Uril's lethal swing. Thus, he conceded the match and prepared for Round 5, where both players would still have the chance to win the event if they could win their last match and post 4-1 records.