On October 6, 2026, forty-one wizards descended upon WestFax Brewing Company in Lakewood, CO with a Premodern deck in hand for Day 1 of YetiCon 5. In addition to the Premodern event, the Yeti’s also hosted a Sorcery tournament and a Cube event for the other attendees. As one of the organizers of the event, I volunteered to design the event logo, make the prize cards, and work through tournament logistics throughout the year with Jared, YetiCon’s primary event organizer. For purposes of this report, I am leaving the Old School event details and final charity contribution information to Jared which will be coming soon. Before getting into the tournament details, a few words about the charity I selected and the pre-event logistics:
Why I chose the Native American Rights Fund
YetiCon supported three charities this year and as the organizer for the Premodern event I selected the Native American Rights Fund (NARF) as one of them. As an attorney who represents Tribal governments and tribally owned entities, NARF is near and dear to my heart. I believe in its mission as a non-profit to defend Native American rights and help people and communities in need. Getting to support that work through a weekend of 90s and early 2000s Magic meant a lot to me, and I’m grateful to everyone who donated items for the raffle and bought raffle tickets. In addition to NARF, Jared selected the Sheep Dog Impact Assistance fund and the Denver Tool Library. Along with the charity raffle, all proceeds from the event, after expenses, will be donated to these organizations. More details to come soon.
The Logo and the Prize Cards
Given that YetiCon has been held at a death metal themed brewery the last three years and the Yetis have no shortage of metalheads, this year I chose to implement a pentagram into the logo to resemble the five years of incredible events, with a roman numeral V at the bottom of the lower point. Of course, a few of the original Magic cards have pentagram references which felt fitting for the Old School event. I also wanted the logo to feel like something you could only get by being part of YetiCon 5.
Once Jared gave the thumbs up on the logo, I ordered a stamp and a couple batches of stickers to hand out at the event. When I think about my favorite cards in my collection, I always return to the unique event cards I’ve won or that have been given out. After stamping 300+ cards for Premodern, Old School, Sorcery, and the for the cards in the claw machine we had on site, I was ready to roll. For the Premodern participation card this year, I chose Naturalize.
“My fingers hurt”
“Oh yeah? Well now your back is going to hurt because you just pulled landscaping duty.”
The Event
The night before YetiCon, I ventured to Casa Bonita with the Yetis and a several others who flew in for the event including Ken F., Joe S., Flint E., Stoomie, and many more. We smashed some reasonable Mexican food, raised our table flag for some fresh sopapillas, walked through Black Bart’s Cave with a margarita in hand, watched cliff divers, and had our first Magic experience of the weekend featuring “The Insanely Mysterious Sorsoro” a person in a blue body suit doing magic tricks. I also picked up a Shivan Dragon in the Casa Bonita parking lot from Will P. (Yagmoth Demon) and talked alters and poscas for a while (see pic at the end) before getting some sleep ahead of the event in the morning.
Casa Bonita with the Boys
Black Bart’s Cave
As I approached the WestFax door on Friday, two friends from my hometown were already there. DJ and Bones traveled in for the tournament from Tulsa, OK, and seeing them as soon as I walked in helped settle my anxiety a bit. Up until that point I’d been thinking through everything that still needed to happen before Round 1 including helping Jared and Sara with the larger event details and setup.
DJ and Bones jumped in to help set up the event space, along with several other people from near and far. I’m incredibly grateful to everyone who pitched in. Jared and I were also greeted by Andrew C. who runs the Denver Dreadnoughts. He gifted us each an event card which was signed by everyone at the tournament which was incredibly generous (see pic at the end). There’s a stretch before check-in when you’re trying to get the room ready while keeping track of all the little things you’ll need once people start arriving. Having friends there to work through it with me made that part of the morning a lot easier. It meant a lot that people who’d already made the trip to play were willing to spend part of their morning helping us get the tournament off the ground. Seeing the room fill up was the moment all that prep turned into an actual tournament.
Truitt Parrish revealing new art for the upcoming Sorcery set
For the tournament itself, we played five rounds then cut to a single-elimination Top 8. We used regular tournament rules and I ran the event through Melee.gg. Although I didn’t play the event, I was able to squeeze in a couple of AAA games against Peter S. featuring a white weenie mirror. The highlight was Peter playing and activating an Ashnod’s Coupon the turn before I played multiple Crusades to close out the game with a Serra. In the end, Peter won a beer and I won a revised Plains. In addition to AAA, I got some signatures and alters from legendary artists Drew Tucker (see alter pics at the end) and signatures from Dan Frazier. I also scarfed down a cheeseburger from the food truck we had on-site which was much needed.
Premodern Top 8
At the end of the fifth round, the Top 16 each got a custom-stamped prize card. The players who finished ninth through sixteenth got to pick their cards in standings order while the Top 8 moved on to the quarterfinals. In addition, we gave our Spice prize to Flint E. who was on a unique Doomsday deck featuring Buried Alive and Sutured Ghoul.
Prize cards for Premodern, Cube, and Sorcery
Across 96 matches, YetiCon showcased a diverse metagame spanning 21 distinct archetypes among the 41 players. Proactive combo-synergy decks largely set the pace at the top tables, culminating in an undefeated Full English Breakfast (6-0-2 match record, 12-2 game record) over UW Replenish in the finals. When the dust settled after top 8, we had our final standings:
- Alex B. – Hermit FEB
- Ben L. – UW Replenish
- Max G. – UW Landstill
- James P – Reanimator
- Joel A. – Oath Spec
- Nick R. – Elves
- Tyler T. – UB Psychatog
- Tommy W. – UW Replenish
Deck lists from the Top 8 are available here.
Congratulations to Alex B. for taking down the event and to Ben L. for making it to the finals!
Metagame Breakdown and Win Rates by Archetype
All-in-all, it was a very smooth event from the TO standpoint, and I received a lot of additional support from our local Premodern crew, the Denver Mulldrifters, which includes Mike and Hans (and Ben):
Thanks to everyone who played in the event and helped throughout the day, to WestFax for giving us a place to play, to Jared and Sara and the rest of the Yetis for their incredible efforts in organizing YetiCon, to everyone who donated to and supported the charity raffle, to Drew Tucker, Dan Frazier, and Truitt Parrish as our event artists, and to Jeff from Enchanted Grounds as the event vendor. My favorite moment from the day was taking a breath after the event kicked off and recognizing how insanely rad our community is and getting to be a part of it. That’s what I’ll be thinking about when I sit down to make the next batch of prize cards.
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