Alter Ante 2023

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So you want to know: “What is Alter Ante?” Well then I want to know how is that rock you have been under? Check out the following content where we have been beating the drum:
Cabin 2022 Report
All Tings Considered 215
As Garfield Intended 13
All Tings Considered 219

I love playing Ante40k. Check out the site shufflecutante.com for details. Unfortunately there are few people near me who have the Swedish reprints and a stomach to risk actual cards. The format has more to offer than just risk. Swedish reprints are very sexy, there is a reduced deck power level which feels more like the kitchen table magic from our childhood, and you get to cast Contract from Below.

Last year I hatched an idea to get more people to play Ante40k even if it wasn’t for keeps. You can read the process of FakeAnte40k in the Cabin 2022 Report It was a lot of fun and we learned some things from that test run: Round robin is good, Jeweled Bird is zero fun when there are no stakes, and lastly $8,000 was too much.

When the cabin FakeAnte40k was a success, my immediate focus became how do we make this an open invite one day event. Where did we officially land?

Deck Construction

Build a Swedish Ante40k legal deck. Use any American OS legal reprint you want (non-foil, original art & frame permitted including CE/IE, FBB & FWB, & 30th). No proxies except those sweet Glorycon cards. Your deck needs to be worth between $4,000 and $7,000 USD using the list below no matter what version you actually sleeve up. No sideboards. *Black Lotus, Ring of Ma’rûf & Jeweled Bird are banned*

At the cabin we just used “Don’t be a dick” honor system on deck values. But for an actual event we needed to set the values in stone so players could brew ahead of time. The above list was hand typed from Card Kingdom good values on 11-15-2022. In order to make it one sheet we dropped a bunch of cards and just made them $1.00.

The Pod System

At the cabin we played round robin against every player one game each for our final records. It was a lot of fun finding your own games but we had all weekend. At an in person event where we would have more people and less time, this was not going to work. We all have probably played in a NEOS online monthly or something similar to understand pod play. 6 people in a pod and best record within the pod goes to the playoffs. I wanted to have some of that structure but still be able to go play whoever I wanted in the room. I’ll skip all the iterations of the pods as players signed up to come very close to the event and show you where we finally landed.

We had 4 pods of 7 people (6 opponents) and 5 wild card (opponents you choose) for a total of 11 opponents to play in 5 hours. Those 11 games became your record. You could play additional games to add cards but they didn’t add to your record. Having a good way for everyone to keep score was very important for this so:

As soon as you walked in you were given a bag with your name on it with the following swag: Pen, 11 custom made blanks, event stamped Ghost Ship, name tag, custom patch, custom pin, and a score card.

This score card was the most important piece of this pod play puzzle. With the big picture on the front you could flash the card around the room to find players in your pod. It had all the pod players listed out and room for write ins. it also folded up to fit inside your deck box.

As a TO I was quite giddy over this whole pod idea. Once the tournament began, I literally didn’t have to do anything except play. I was just a player: no match slips no software, no printer, no stress. It was the most enjoyment I had as a TO during an event ever.

Start of the Event

Once everyone had their score cards, we made a few announcements and cut the room loose for 5 hours of pick up games for Alter Ante. At the start of the game each player will shuffle, cut, and ante 1 card facedown. Then deal your hand and mulligan as normal. At the end of the game all cards changing ownership (including cards in the ante zone) are done so by proxies that the original player doodles for the exchange. Some of you are very talented.

Between games, since you don’t lose any cards and you are giving away proxies, your deck can remain the same all day. Cards you win can be added to your deck even if it violates the restricted list. You may remove cards from your deck as long as it does not go below 60 cards. Cards you win and cards you take out can live in your “side deck” to change out before matches.

Special Guest

On site you could also visit our special guest Mitch Grosofsky (aka MG Alters) He has quickly become one of the best and most available alterist in our community. He loves old school and it shows. Scans of Mitch’s full art alters were used for the fronts of the score cards. Since the score cards were designed to fit in a deck box, you can cut the front off and use for a sweet proxy after this event. Mitch also painted the full art Shivan Dragon which he donated to the Chinese Auction for the charity. Mitch wasn’t done there. During the event he altered all the prize cards. I may have erased the borders off them all but Mitch painted all kinds of Easter Eggs on these cards. Thank you for all your hard work Mitch.

Winners for some of these special prizes: Most games played: Ty Thomason, Best alterist: Mark Evaldi, Highest value card won (on the third tiebreaker): Michael Perrien, Spicy: Andy Blaufarb, Most cards won: Levi Baumgardner, Best deck photo: Nate Shue

Food

Included in your ticket price was a simple meal. Admittedly we were shooting blind with the food having never eaten there, but Tim from Mezzogiorno knocked it out of the park. The baked mac and cheese was stellar and the chips stole the show. Since these were pick up games, the food was kept warm for over an hour so everyone could eat when they had time.

Charity

Our charity for the event was The Alzheimer’s Association which leads the way to end Alzheimer’s and all other dementia. Find out more at alz.org To support this charity I asked for donations from the old school discords for the Chinese auction and they did not disappoint. Thank you: Cam Wall (Frezzybear), Carson Morell (trademade), Jared Miller (Sarevok), Mario Murr (merhans), Nicholas Ziesmer (Slum), Jason Koresko (koresko), and Mitch Grosofsky (mgalters).

We also offered adding a Mox to your deck for a $10 donation (after losing 3 games). For this we made some simple World Championship gold bordered proxies.

For the 28 people in the room we raised $550 (I covered the $26 processing fee) and someone privately added another $35 so the total donated was $585. Thank you everyone.

Top 4

This leads us to the end of the 5 hours of games. Time to do TO stuff… or not. A simple “Get together with your pod mates and shout out who won the pod for the top 4”. Tie breakers within pods were head-to-head so that was easy. We did have 2 pod winners who had the same record. They flipped a coin for the higher seed. If this gets ran back I’ll have to add another breaker or two rather that go to Chaos Orb or coin flips.

Top 4:
Ian(2) vs Bryan(3)
Levi(1) vs Ty(4)

Real Ante40k while top 4 is happening

Finals Ian vs Levi

A big THANK YOU to everyone that help with this event. A special thank you to the wonderful staff and ownership of Mudhook Brewing Company for all the hospitality Friday, Saturday, and every first Wednesday.

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