Steven Levesque and Scot Anderson are both playing in their first $10K Top 8s, and have made it through to the semifinals here in San Diego. In a Top 8 that was evenly split between Sentinels and Titans, we now have a Top 4 that’s still evenly split, with two each of Sentinels and Titans left.

Next to them, Adam Prosak and Jason Nelson are playing the Titans mirror, and here, Steven and Scot sit down to play the Bastion . . .er, Sentinels Mirror.

Both players disliked the idea of goldfishing to turn 6 and conceding if they didn’t have Bastion, so they shuffled up and drew their cards for game one.

Game One

The first character of the game was Hounds of Ahab on Steven’s side, and on turn three he added a Sentinel Mark II to his board. Scot didn’t have anything until a turn 4 Sentinel Mark V, but he was already holding Nimrod for turn 5 and the all-important Bastion for turn 6.

Steven didn’t have a 4-drop, and had to play off-curve with another Mark II and Boliver Trask on turn four. Hounds of Ahab still sat in the hidden area, though, ready to pounce and laugh at the lone Mark V that Scot had played. A Hounds lock appeared to be imminent, based on the sheer number of character that Steven had in play.

“Mark V at Mark II,” Scot announced. Steven lost 7 endurance, but then sent his second Mark II and Boliver Trask back across the table at the Mark V. He was holding back his Hounds to try and get the lock started. He added a Savage Beatdown to his attack, but Scot had both an Acrobatic Dodge and a power-up for his Mark V. The Mark V survived the attack and the Hounds lock was avoided.

“That was nice,” Steven conceded to Scott.

Both players had Nimrod for turn 5, and both players had a second copy of him to pump up with when Steven attacked into Scot’s Nimrod. Both Nimrods lost repair counters, and the two players moved on to turn 6. Scot was quite content with a hand that already included both his 6- and 7-drops.

Steven didn’t have Bastion, and it looked like he was in trouble.

“This is so screwed up,” Steven said. He played a Mark II and passed the turn back to Scot. Scot had Bastion and the turn 6 initiative. Steven looked at the board and could do nothing but frown.

“Mark V at Mark II,” Scot announced. Steven chose not to reinforce and took seven points of damage from the attack. He still had Nimrod in his back row, and a second Mark II and Boliver Trask out front.

Scot looked at a board where he still had two attacks to declare, with Bastion and Nimrod primed to decimate Steven further. “Nimrod attacks Nimrod,” Scot said. Steven confirmed it was legal, and when Scot powered up his Nimrod, Steven muttered something at his deck.

“My deck is stupid,” he said. He followed it up quickly with, “Stupid Bastion.”

They could have saved some time and just drawn to turn 6. When a player misses Bastion in this mirror match, things get ugly.

Game Two

The two players didn’t have a great deal to say as they shuffled up for game two, and a deathly silence descended on the table.

Scot’s opening hand for the second game included two copies of Mark V, Bastion and Magneto, Master of Magnetism. The late game looked good for him, and playing a turn one Boliver Trask to get a Mark II meant the early game would be good.

Steven had a Boliver Trask of his own to play and went to get Hounds of Ahab with him. No 2-drop for Scot meant that Steven would be able to KO Boliver with the Hounds, and the table favored Steven, though it was early in the game. Scot had his Sentinel Mark II for turn 3, but he was left with the challenge of making sure it survived so that he could avoid losing it to the Hounds.

Scot declared an attack with his Mark II into Steven’s Mark II, showing a knowledge that he was going to lose it to the Hounds but wanting to force in some breakthrough endurance loss, but Steven played Search and Destroy in response. He found two more copies of Mark II in Scot’s hand and they went flitting off to the discard pile. The Hounds attacked and another Mark II went into the discard pile. The Search and Destroy did show bad news for Steven though, as he looked at Scot’s hand and muttered something about “darn Bastion.”

It didn’t look like Bastion could help Scot with the state of the board on turn 4. Hounds of Ahab kept the lock on turn 3, and it looked like they would keep it on during turn 4. Scot had the Flame Trap for Hounds, trying desperately to keep his Mark V around, but Steven had a Finishing Move to get Mark V off the table. It all ended with Scot still not having a character on board.

During recovery, Steven elected to let his Mark V go and keep the Hounds around, knowing that Scot would only have one character on the table. Neither player had Nimrod, which made the lock easier to reapply without that pesky repair counter. Both players played a boosted Sentinel Mark V. Steven swung with his Mark V into Scot’s, stunning them both, and then passed the attack. After making sure to save the Hounds of Ahab last turn, he inexplicably forgot to attack with them this turn and stun the Mark V!

On turn 6, Scot had Bastion and Steven didn’t. Scot put Bastion behind his Mark V, and Steven played Nimrod behind his Mark V, with the Hounds still hiding out in the hidden area, apparently hidden even from their controller.

“Team attack Bastion,” Steven announced. Scot stared at the board, and then tossed two cards to use Bastion’s ability to pump his Sentinel Mark V up to 11 ATK/11 DEF. Steven flipped up a Nasty Surprise and the Mark V went down anyway. Steven had the first attacks that turn and there hadn’t been any way to get his Hounds in to deal with the Bastion menace, so despite missing Bastion on turn six he was able to force a turn seven.

Steven was ahead of Scot with 24 endurance to Scot’s 22 going into turn 7, and both players had Magneto, Master of Magnetism to play. Scot had a Genosha he popped off the table as well, stocking his hand full of Bastion fodder for what would probably be the final turn of game two.

Steven had six cards in hand as he surveyed the board, trying to decide the best use of his attacks, and two copies of Savage Beatdown, would be. He finally decided on Magneto, Master of Magnetism attacking Magneto. Once it was declared legal he pushed all his chips into the middle, flipping over Savage Beatdown in his resource row, then dropping two copies of Savage Beatdown from his hand onto the table, and then discarding three characters from his hand.

“That’s 34,” he said.

“I know,” Steven responded. “I’m thinking.”

His thought process didn’t last much longer, as he extended his hand and congratulated Scot on his victory. Scot Anderson moves into the finals, where he will face the far more experienced Adam Prosak.