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Two men enter and one man leaves—that’s the way these things go. |
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Julius is playing the same deck that Antonino DeRosa was playing before he got eliminated in the first round of the Top 8. It’s the same deck, card for card, that Team TOGIT was playing in PC: LA. |
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Jacob won the roll and chose the odd initiative. Both players kept their opening hands, Jacob choosing to stay with Boliver Trask, Sentinel Mark V, Magneto, Master of Magnetism, and Cover Fire. |
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One last step remains for the last eight players traveling the road to the final four. In a Top 8 featuring six home-state players and just as many archetypes, few knew what to expect. Here’s how the matches played out. |
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Find out about the players who made the Top 8! |
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Check out the Top 8 decklists here! |
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We’re past the midpoint here in Orlando, where it was expected that the pros would dominate, but at present, two unknown names sit atop the standings. |
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Table 1 saw two 8-1 players play an inconsequential match. At table 2, Milton Figueroa quickly conceded to longtime friend Antonino DeRosa. That left six men, each with a 7-2 record, playing for their Top 8 futures at tables 3 through 6. Winners play tomorrow. Losers go home. |
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Despite both players hugging the curve and hitting their ideal drops pretty tightly, Figueroa managed to build up a veritable hoard of characters on his side of the field. |
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Kenneth Choi shocked me in round 7. I was watching what I thought was a Curve Sentinels mirror matchup, when Choi dropped Daredevil, The Man Without Fear to try and cover his missed 6-drop. That seemed odd. |
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Jacob Hershberger came into round 8 as the last man standing, the only player who managed to circumvent losses in the first seven rounds. With only eight other players sporting less than two losses, the matches on tables 1 through 5 started shaping our impressions of what the Top 8 might look like. |
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At Table 1, what first appeared to be a Curve Sentinels mirror match turned into something far more complicated. |
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My favorite part of every event I get to cover is the single-card tech. Whether it’s pure genius or pure jank, I love seeing what the often short-lived and under-recognized trends are in restricted metagames. Orlando did not disappoint my penchant for the extraordinary in the slightest. |
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Just nine undefeated players remained heading into round 5, meaning that all eyes were focused on tables 1 through 4. Here’s what happened. |
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Everyone was excited about Spider-Friends when Web of Spider-Man first hit store shelves. Packing huge quantities of evasion, strong synergistic effects, control, and one of the best 2-drops in the game, Spider-Friends Evasion and Spider-Friends Team Attack decks looked to be the next big thing. |
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Round 4 saw three competitors at the top four tables competing with The Brave and The Bold decks. Here were the matchups. |
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With two rounds down and eight to go, the field is taking shots at itself, and only the strong survive. While some of our headhunter targets have already cost T.O. Jeff Williams a few boosters, Rob Leander and Ryan Jones are off and running. |
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The metagame of $10K Orlando showed continued growth in the trends demonstrated at $10K Columbus. Here is the breakdown of the 137 decks that were played. |
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Do you know how many times I’ve typed Rob Leander’s name in the last three weeks? It’s disgusting—this kid’s everywhere. With two $10K victories and a plethora of other strong finishes, Rob’s been all over our coverage and the competitive map. This time, though, he’s caught the headlines without building a deck, winning a match or even playing a resource. |
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You can feel it, can’t you? The air’s filled with excitement. Sunday’s the Oscars, we’re in Disney-infested Orlando, and the Pro Circuit’s finest are trying to create Hollywood endings of their own. The red carpet’s out, the band is playing, and there’s only one thing left to do—let’s play some cards. |
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