I expect most people will see this and be pretty unexcited. Sure, it's a nice aggressive card for blue in drafts but what's so special about it? Well, it is a functionally equivalent reprint of the card Rishadan Airship from the Mercadian Masques set, which was the limited format for the first Pro Tour I qualified for.
It was December 5th, 1999. Pro Tour: Chicago was taking place and there was a storm in Toronto so the turnout was very low. Jer had won a PTQ in Waterloo earlier in the season but still let a couple of us crash at his parent's house in Toronto and chauffeured us around. I think it was just myself and Tom playing in the tournament. There were 5 rounds and I was 3-1 going into the 5th round. The judge then pulled out a rule I'd never seen before and hadn't seen since. There were enough people at 3-1 that if we all drew some of us wouldn't make top 8, but if just one table drew they'd both advance. He didn't want games dragging on as we waited to see if other people were drawing or not so he said we had to decide _right now_ if we were drawing. We were all choosing secretly if we wanted to draw without even knowing who our opponents were. If two people wanted to draw and happened to get matched up they could draw. Otherwise we had to play. No one ended up drawing.
My opponent ended up being incredibly slow, and we actually ended up naturally drawing. I'm not sure if he did it on purpose or not, I certainly played fast as always. At any rate we both ended up making top 8. We had a draft archetype we liked in Team Comf which involved focusing heavily on blue for aggressive flyers (3/1 and 2/3 for 3) coupled with great control cards like waterfront bouncer, stinging barrier, counterspell, and gush. I ended up drafting mono blue with I think 4 bouncers and a ton of flyers. I won the first two rounds easily and ended up in finals against a young Richard Hoaen. I believe we split the first two games and were on to game three for all the marbles.
We ended up doing a lot of early damage to each other and then the board clogged up with a lot of junk on both sides. On the critical turn I declared an attack and Hoaen cast shoving match. This was a blue instant which gave all creatures in play on both sides the ability to tap to tap another target creature. In a game with a lot of creatures and low life totals it might as well read 'target player wins the game'.
Typically what will happen is the caster will tap a creature to tap something else. The something else has the same ability so it taps back. Eventually everything is tapped. And when everything is tapped, I lose. So I put on my best dejected face and didn't tap anything back. After all, doing so would guarantee I lose. Hoaen tapped my flyers and then said he was done. It was at this point that my heart started racing and I got really excited. I turned to the judge and said 'I get to attack now, right?' and the judge nodded. So I attacked with my Saprazzan Outrigger, used my balloon peddler to give it flying, and then used the shoving match and my remaining creatures to tap the rest of Hoaen's flyers. Outrigger punched him in the face and killed him off. 'Target player wins the game' indeed, but for some reason he targeted me with it instead of himself.
I often get asked by people why I never concede games when it's 'obvious' I'm dead. This game is the primary reason why. Even when I know I'm guaranteed dead just the act of staying calm and making my opponent keep making plays can result in them making a brutal mistake and throwing the game away. Also, sometimes I actually have an answer in hand. If I'd always concede when I didn't then good players could play around my answer when I don't. By always making the game play out to conclusion I remove that tell from play. (An exception is if I think time is a concern and it's just game 1 and not the match. Conceding early to save time can make sense.) Interestingly, the first time I qualified for Nationals I won a slot in a grinder. My opponent in the last round of that grinder had the game guaranteed won several times but managed to throw the game away at every turn.
Never give up! Never surrender!
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