For those of you just joining the Vs. System world, Doug Tice is the man of the hour as far as Sealed Pack play is concerned. Last week, he became the only person to win multiple Sealed Pack $10K events, both of which had rather impressive fields to wade through. His draft was a little less than stellar, and it will be interesting to see if he's able to pull out a win with his deck. His opponent this round is a member of the strong German contingent that has been putting up impressive numbers since the dawn of the Pro Circuit. Doug won the die roll and chose to go first.

Doug had no turn 1 play, which Alex used to his advantage by playing Insectoid Troopers. After some quick beats, Alex began his turn 2 recruit with an in-theme Zazzala ◊ Queen Bee. Doug recruited a Captain Boomerang, "Digger" to match it and passed the turn back to Alex. Alex immediately declared a team attack into Captain Boomerang with his men and Doug fell to 47. Since Zazzala wasn't stunned, Alex began to swarm out and added an Infernal Minions to the table.

Turn 3 brought a Floronic Man, Jason Woodrue for Doug and a Shadow-Thief via a Secret Files for Alex. The Shadow-Thief also brought Illusionary Warriors for Alex. Doug began his turn by sending Digger at the Troopers, and then his Floronic Man straight at Alex. Alex passed the turn and the players got set for turn 4. Alex continued to build up his impressive army by adding General Fabrikant to his side of the table, visible to all. Doug dropped his Dinah Laurel Lance ◊ Black Canary, "Pretty Bird" into play on his side. Alex's Shadow-Thief bashed in and made short work of the Floronic Man. Thanks to the General, Doug wasn't able to stun his hidden character back. Alex then sent all of his characters except the General into Black Canary. Thanks to a timely Infestation, the pretty bird went down. A final attack by the General himself knocked Captain Boomerang out of the way, and things were starting to look grim for Doug. He flipped up his UN Building to team-up JLI, Gotham Knights, and Secret Society before his team was slimmed down to just a Black Canary. Alex took advantage of the recovery step to throw an Infernal Minions on his side thanks to Zazzala's ability. The swarm was continuing to grow.

Turn 5 brought a small glimmer of hope to Doug in the form of Martian Manhunter, J'onn J'onzz and a Quadromobile for the Canary to ride in. Alex opted not to play a resource on his turn, and simply recruited Batman, Hidden Crusader. Doug began the attacks by using his Black Canary to stun Alex's Batman. Martian Manhunter finished off the General of the growing concealed swarm and ended Doug's attacks. Doug was left with no visible characters, and Alex was left with free reign to bash Doug's face. The reason for Alex's refusal to play another resource also became clear as he flipped his JLI Embassy up before recovery. That prevented him from having to KO a character this turn. He now had seven characters to Doug's lonely two. Alex certainly had Doug on the ropes, and it was going to be his attack next turn. What to do . . .

When Alex used Secret Files to search his deck for Kimiyo Hoshi ◊ Dr. Light, I could tell the game was more or less over. Doug played a Charaxes, Killer Moth as he continued up the curve, but it wasn't likely to be good enough. Kimiyo is one of the best cards in the off-curve strategy, as it makes all of your characters enormous. It, combined with the General, would make most of Alex's army unstoppable. He did have some difficult things to tally up before he attacked though, as is commonplace with the off-curve decks. Ultimately, Alex decided to begin by sending his Insectoid Troopers (which were still around from turn 1) and Infernal Minions into Doug's Charaxes. Thanks to Batman giving the Troopers a bonus, and the ridiculous Dr. Light bonus, those two lone characters were able to add up to 11 ATK. When Doug tried to power-up out of range, Alex responded with a Plasma Blast, bringing the big moth back down to size. Doug had The Plunder Plan ready, though, and Alex was left with no answers. All of that work, and all Doug got to do was stun a measly 1-drop. Alex's next attack was to guarantee that Charaxes would fall. He sent an Infernal Minions, Zazzala, and Illusionary Warriors all in at the big bug. Doug tried to search for something, anything really, with a Roll Call!, but when his draws turned up nothing, Charaxes stunned. Next, the General rode in after Black Canary. Doug was all out of gas and had to stun his character. When they did the math on the next attack and realized that Doug was dead on the board, he conceded.

Alexander Jersch wins!