Matteo Paolucci is a pro player from Italy. He qualified for PC So Cal through his rating, but also won the Vienna $10K event. He’s playing an F4 Beat deck with a few equips. His opponent is Richard Vaughan, a pro player from Denver. He qualified through his Limited rating, and is well-known in certain online circles. He's playing a Gotham Knights deck with a couple splashes.

Paolucci won the coin flip and opted to take initiative on odd turns. He decided to mulligan, and Vaughan followed suit. They stared at each other for two turns without recruiting a character. Finally Paolucci broke the silence on turn 3 and recruited She-Hulk, Jennifer Walters. Vaughan answered with Huntress. She-Hulk attacked into Huntress and Vaughan powered her up, but Paolucci flipped Unmasked to force the double-stun.

Vaughan had nothing to recruit on turn 4 and braced himself for some trouble. Paolucci paid to flip down Unmasked and recruited Wolverine, New Fantastic Four to his front row. She-Hulk attacked Huntress, and Wolverine sunk his claws into Vaughan directly.

Paolucci continued to hit his drops, recruiting Mr. Fantastic, Stretch on turn 5. He exhausted She-Hulk to pay for Tech Upgrade, searching for Fantasticar and attaching it to Stretch. Vaughan recruited Batman, Caped Crusader to protect Huntress, then passed the initiative back to Paolucci. Wolverine sailed over Batman thanks to the flying bath tub and nailed Huntress, pushing through eight damage total. Mr. Fantastic took a crack at Batman. He was 1 ATK short, but a Savage Beatdown looked to fix that problem. That is, until Vaughan showed a Fizzle. At that point though, Paolucci was fully committed and invested It’s Clobberin’ Time! into the attack. Vaughan played Acrobatic Dodge, but a second It’s Clobberin’ Time made sure the attack succeeded.

Vaughan recruited Dick Grayson ◊ Nightwing, Defender of Bludhaven on turn 6. Paolucci thought briefly, then recruited Hulk with a Personal Force Field. He formed up with everything in the front except for Stretch: he clearly planned to take Vaughan down with anything that was left standing after his combat. Vaughan sent Nightwing after She-Hulk, and Paolucci chose not to reinforce with Stretch. Vaughan then pulled a surprising move and attacked Stretch with Batman, adding a Savage Beatdown to the mix. There was nothing Paolucci could do. He took the stun and a crippling 13 endurance loss. He still got a chance to fight back though, and sent Hulk after Batman. Vaughan gave Batman a Nasty Surprise and attempted to power up, but had forgotten about Paolucci’s face-down Unmasked from earlier in the game. Hulk narrowly avoided being stunned back. With the score 21 to 10 in his favor, Paolucci was looking to end the game on the next turn. Vaughan needed to pull something big to save himself.

Paolucci opened the turn by recruiting Thing, The Ever-Lovin’ Blue-Eyed Thing. Vaughan shook his head. “Amazing . . . ” he said, clearly bemused. He brought down his own turn 7 hammer though, in the form of Magneto, Master of Magnetism.

Thing attacked Nightwing looking for game, but Vaughan used Nightwing’s ability to reinforce him. Hulk attacked Batman. Vaughan pondered his next move, checking his resources and hand. He eventually exhausted Batman for Bat-Signal, pulled a copy of Dick Grayson ◊ Nightwing, Defender of Bludhaven and took 14 endurance loss total, putting him at -10. With Hulk and Thing not potentially reinforced, but with Stretch ready and waiting behind Wolverine, Paolucci passed initiative for combat. Vaughan attacked Mr. Fantastic with Magneto. The attack went through, but Paolucci used Stretch’s ability to move the Personal Force Field to him. That was game.

Game Win: Matteo Paolucci