Day 1 of GP Melbourne

8.30am
The phone goes off and I get dressed and meet Gibs downstairs, where I write this and where there is a BEVVY of young girls. Don't get excited, they're all too young for you, but it's obvious there's some girls school event being run here. I keep the door open for three girls who're meeting up with everyone down stairs, and one of them realises that they left their key with the teacher, so how're they going to get back in?

Gibs is finding something to eat while I write this. We're going to walk to the tram, catch that down to Flinders street then walk the rest of the way. I have a feeling I may miss the first grinder, but I'm OK with that.

On the topic of grinders I may only do one or two. It's $40 a pop, plus I gotta pay $40 to even enter tomorrow, so I don't wanna do myself in before the main event's even begun. We'll arrive, figure out when they're doing the sealed, and then maybe float around until then.


11.55am
Finally found a chance to sit and do nothing. This is after:

Finding the MCE and realising that it's the wrong place. We DID venture there, Amy and I, for the Dr Who in january but it's not the same place. So after an hour of walking to the wrong place, we had another half hour of walking the correct way.

After the finding the real place, finding which section of the place was the real actual location for all the Magic fun.

After finding the event, finding a cash machine (still unfound as I write this)

Giving up and sitting down after consuming my second bottle of coke for the day and a jam filled chocolate doughnut.

SO let's just say it's very tiring walking around with your bag for far longer than you imagined, but we'll be better planned for tomorrow. I'm signed into the third grinder of the day (Sealed) and after I've had a break I'll look for the ATM again. Maybe. I hates it.

Anyway, the help here was non-existant. There is ZERO signs to an atm. I asked one fella where the atm was, and he pointed kind of THERE. I asked a second, who pointed there as well, but said don't go that way and they mentioned a players lounge. That was closed, for sure. Then I asked another person who said "Melbourne Cricket Ground" and that was a first, some solid location, before 3 more people joined in and tried to give us further directions.

Apparently you need to go back around the front and INSIDE as if you were buying a ticket from ticketek, and there's an ATM in there. You also need to want to walk around there for the third time. At the moment, I lack this desire.

2.41pm
Sealed number 3

Well I sat down, opened my card pool and it had both Brimstone Volley, Fires of Undeath, Skirsdag Flayer and Thraben Doomsayer. But that's OK because I got passed a pool with foil Liliana of the Veil, so I was set and sold that to my mate to pay for my next sealed.

My pool was great, but didn't win. Game 1 I get an early Vorapede out, but my opponent Matt makes a Fortress crab who can block all day. I formulated a plan to sack it to my Falkenrath Torturer, as this would make him big enough to bash in, but I didn't want to kill it the first time for my opponent. In the end, bad choice. He takes game 1, game 2 I take real quick and game 3 goes to time as beat down early, Lili and such to kill his blockers but he assembles the Invisible Stalker and Butcher's Cleaver.

The race was very exciting, players all waiting on us (last match) and I bash, lose a creature so he gtes morbid'd for 5 to Brimstone Volley, then Fires of Undeath, but he bashed next turn, then Brimstone and Snapcaster'd it back. Bad beats, so close oh wells.

Now for sealed 2!


7.14
I'm writing this a BIT after it happened.

Sealed grinder number 2 gets off to a far more humble start, and there's less buzz seeing I've already done the open, register, pass and build that occurs. My pool isn't anything amazing and I build a red/green/white/black thing, which isn't super bad but is really rather inconsistent. I play a few too many red splashes, like Mondronen Shaman and Rage Thrower, and lose the first round.

It was close-ish though. Game 1 I win convincingly, game 2 he gets Fengraf Monstrosity while I get nothing, and game 3 I mull down to four. Nobody likes that, it's a boring fight, there's minor hopes that the underdog can pull it out, and some times they will, but most often it's just the simple thrashing everyone expects, as this was.

After this I got myself and Gibbers, or he got me, and we left to find a pub. Alone with his came Shane, a mate of his. We spent AGES finding a pub, also trying to follow people directions which were about as useful as those given earlier about the ATM.

I did also find the ATM btw. Thanks to the heavenly saints I know up in Lismore, they walked me very much right up to it, where it charged me $2 to check my account, then another $2.50 (why increase?) to actually take some monies out.

Aside aside, we find a pub called insignia, where I'm so starved and done in from the day (Gibbs eventually traded my bag off me, considering how damn heavy it was) that I ordered a beer without considering the shout's rights. So Craig started the shouts and I have yet to return them, though I have just noticed that his glass is empty.

So the day has been a joy and success. I played Magic, met players, cheered my mates on and found no real success myself, though only paying for one event (my openings from the previous paid for the second) was good.

I imagine tonight will devolve into unrecordable events, so I'll maybe remember them, but most likely not.

10.42
So day 1 has ended. I didn't win any grinders, but Ammy did (proud of her) and Tim did (a lismorian, must be proud of him) and I've gotten two more loads of cards for only the one payment (Lilli paid for the second go).

We had a few drinks (too many?) before trekking home. I find the way pretty easy enough, while we pass a few suggestive places with names like "The main course" and well, ya know. We found the Melbourne equivalent of Kings Cross, lessay.

So, tomorrow we awake for an early trip in to the city, we know the way there a lot better but have to be there by 8.45, we think. I need to drink a lot of water, before retiring for the night and changing into the GP shirt that we all got when we registered today.