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In a sea of Sentinels, Jason Scudder is a light of hope at the end of a long, purple tunnel. He has piloted his very original Spider Friends/Gotham Knights through a sea of curve Sentinels to make the Top 8 here today. His opponent is Anthony Pino, a local player piloting the ever-present Sentinels themselves to his own Top 8 berth.

Jason won the die roll and opted to take the even initiatives. He threw back his original hand and the game got under way. Where would a Curve Sentinel deck be if it didn’t get Turn 1 Boliver Trask? We may never find outm as that’s exactly how Anthony started this game. “I get an extra shuffle, great. Holy cow! Thank you Boliver,” Anthony remarked as he fingered through his deck. Jason’s next turn passed pretty uneventfully as his freshly mulliganed hand refused to cough up any 2 drops. Anthony’s deck continued in perfect form with a Sentinel Mark II on turn 3, while Jason’s deck finally caved and gave him Barbara Gordon ◊ Oracle. She managed to draw him a card before being stunned by the Mark II and left for the Hounds. Next turn, Jason used his Avalon Space Station to snag Barbie out of his KO’d pile so he could play her and Bat-Signal for an Alfred Pennyworth. “Oh, so that’s why I didn’t draw a 2-drop,” Jason lamented as he searched through his deck. When Anthony managed the almost required turn 4 Sentinel Mark V, Jason sarcastically asked, “Do you have Total Anarchy, too?” When Anthony could muster no response other than a smile, Jason’s eyes got wide and he shot Anthony an incredulous, “Are you serious?” In fact, he did have the Anarchy, but it wasn’t in his row and he was content to let the Hounds munch on Alfred.

Turn 5 brought Jason a glimmer of hope in the form of a Batman, Caped Crusader. However, any celebration he might have started was quickly cut short when Anthony continued his perfect draw with a Nimrod. Mark II then crushed the already wheelchair-bound Barbara Gordon, and then Nimrod and Mark V decided on a little team play as they ran into Batman. This left Jason in a bit of a bind as the Hounds lock he had been in since the beginning of the game threatened to take him completely out of the game. However, he did still have something up his sleeve as he played Flame Trap in response to the Hounds attack to stun both the doggies and the man at the end of their leash, Boliver Trask.

Turn 6 brought Dick Grayson ◊ Nightwing for Jason and Bastion for Anthony. Taking advantage of the initiative, Jason brought both Batman and the grown-up Robin into Bastion. Bastion went down, but not before seriously pumping up Anthony’s Nimrod. This let the big, bad robot bring the pain on the caped crusader’s head. His situation clear, Jason smiled and said, “I can’t win this game,” and they moved on to game 2.

“Are you going to take evens game 3?” Jason asked. “Hopefully we won’t have to go that far,” Anthony replied.

Once again taking the even initiatives, Jason kept his opening draw and let Anthony start things off. And start things off he did, as his string of perfect draws continued with a turn 1 Boliver Trask. Jason’s deck allowed him a bit of a quick start as well as Alfred Pennyworth finally made an early game appearance.

Turn 2 brought the usual Hounds of Ahab, go figure, for Anthony, while Jason got a Spoiler ◊ Robin. Spoiler immediately took out Boliver, and then the Hounds took care of her. Turn 3 showed the first falter for Anthony’s deck as he was forced to settle for using a new Boliver to go fetch some more Hounds from his deck. Jason used his decks excellent search capabilities to make sure he didn’t fall into the same hole that Anthony was in. He used Alfred to search his deck for a Bat-Signal and then sent the signal up for Barbara Gordon ◊ Oracle to answer. Boliver then took his dogs and attacked into Spoiler, thus creating Total Anarchy. Oracle went straight to the KO’d pile, but not without taking a Hounds of Ahab with her.

Turn 4 brought the first Spider-Friends card out of Jason’s deck with a Will O’ the Wisp. Anthony recovered from his slight stumble with a Sentinel Mark V to bolster his forces. Will O’ the Wisp went straight for Boliver. Anthony chose not to reinforce with his Mark V, apparently planning on getting to attack back. And attack back he did. Mark V flew right over Will O’ the Wisp to hit Barbie. Jason was ready, though, with a Have a Blast for Anthony’s Total Anarchy. This left the players going to turn 5 with Jason eking out a small advantage.

On turn 5, Anthony was forced to play Reconstruction Program to try to get Boliver Trask out of his KO’d pile. Jason immediately Fizzled it, though, and if it wasn’t for a second Reconstruction Program, Anthony might be lost. However, he still did have to settle for a Boliver to fetch an unboosted Mark V from his deck. This is the second time this game he’s stumbled after a stellar first game. Jason had no 5-drop, though, and had to replay Barbara Gordon ◊ Oracle and pass the remainder of his build. Anthony’s two Mark Vs were unfortunately too much for Jason’s sub-par board and, despite the early troubles, he seemed to be regaining the advantage. Jason did have a bit of a trick up his sleeve, though, as he used Nasty Surprise to make sure that both of Anthony’s Mark Vs stunned. The Hounds were then free to go munch on Mr. O’ the Wisp.

Turn 6 started optimally for both players as they both hit their 6-drops of choice, with Jason finding Dick Grayson ◊ Nightwing and Anthony finding Bastion. Jason chose to send Nightwing in alone against Anthony’s Sentinel Mark V Then, doing his best Sherlock Holmes impression, Jason managed to use twoDetective Works to stop both of Anthony’s attempts to Nasty Surprise his Mark V. “I didn’t think you’d have two of them,” Anthony said sheepishly. Bastion went back into Barbie and Anthony ended his turn.

After pooling his resources on turn 7, Anthony popped a ridiculous three Genoshas in an attempt to find that oh-so-elusive Magneto, Master of Magnetism. All he found, though, was a Nimrod. Better late than never, I suppose. Unfortunately for him, though, Jason had a Spiderman, The Amazing Spiderman to take control of the initiative by exhausting Anthony’s entire team. He also showed signs of the impending apocalypse when he Bat-Signaled for Spiderman, Cosmic Spiderman. Everyone’s favorite duo of Spidey and Nightwing—I just call them like I see them, guys—went straight into Bastion.

Turn 8, the final frontier. Spiderman with cosmic powers just seems unfair to me. Regardless of how fair he is, he came down to play on Jason’s side. Faced with more than he could really handle, Anthony packed it in and they were off to game 3.

“I’ll keep this hand,” Jason announced after drawing his first four.

“I will not,” Anthony chuckled. He laughed a little more after drawing his replacement. “Yikes.” That didn’t sound promising. Anthony’s first three turns passed with no play, and it quickly became apparent what “yikes” meant. He had no plays to match the turn 2 Tim Drake ◊ Robin, The Boy Wonder and turn 3 Barbara Gordon ◊ Oracle from Jason.

On turn 4, Jason continued to stockpile guys as he played out a Cassandra Cain ◊ Batgirl. Anthony finally got on the board with a Sentinel Mark V. They exchanged phone numbers as well as fists and both ended up stunning. By the beginning of turn 5, Jason’s position was starting to get ridiculous. He had a full board of characters, as well as a ten card grip thanks to Barbie. Anthony was going to need some real help if he was going to get back into this game. His deck answered his prayers in the form of the nigh-unstoppable Nimrod. Jason’s deck did what it had been doing all game, and curved out perfectly with a Daredevil, The Man Without Fear. Nimrod made it personal as he smashed into Jason’s Ben Affleck . . . I mean, Daredevil. One power-up later and Nimrod became the first person to make Daredevil scared. At then end of the turn, Jason played out an impressive third Bat-Signal to snag a Spiderman, The Amazing Spiderman. This was a sign of things to come. Anthony merely sighed when he saw the big guy hit Jason’s hand. He then flipped what would be his second Micro-Sentinels. The other had been around for only a turn, but with the addition of a second, things looked like they might get dicey for Jason.

At the beginning of the next turn, both Micro-Sentinels triggered and Spoiler ◊ Robin bit the dust, disassembled by the little Sentinels. Dick Grayson ◊ Nightwing dropped onto Jason’s side, which Anthony soon trumped with Bastion. Nightwing went straight into Anthony’s Sentinel Mark V. Batgirl then ran into Nimrod. She might be the perfect card to try to run at a Bastion-backed Nimrod, as she can pump once for every time Bastion pumps. Jason had so many cards in his hand, thanks to Barbie, that it seemed like an unfair fight. Ultimately, Cassandra Cain was victorious, and Nimrod’s counter was removed. Daredevil then got over his fear of Nimrod and decided to try and take him out. Anthony tried to get some reinforcements through a Reconstruction Program, but Jason had the Fizzle to stop it. Not one to be deterred, Anthony tried again. Luckily, Jason was up to a little Detective Work and had an answer.

Turn 7 saw the emergence of the big guy himself, Spiderman, The Amazing Spiderman. After his performance last game, it isn’t hard to see how he got his nickname. Anthony’s third Reconstruction Program was met with another Fizzle from Jason. Apparently sick of being shot down, Anthony went for his fourth and final Recon. This one slipped through, and he was able to find a Sentinel Mark V and a Sentinel Mark II in his KO’d pile that he could play. Things didn’t look good for Anthony, although the duel that Cassandra Cain ◊ Batgirl had with Nimrod depleted most of Jason’s hand. However, thanks to an Avalon Space Station, Jason was able to shut down Anthony’s biggest guys and take control of the initiative. Smashing soon followed.

Turn 8 was more of a formality than anything as the previous turn had left Anthony with virtually no team and only 3 endurance. Apocalypse hit the board for Jason and Anthony finally found the Magneto, Master of Magnetism he’d been looking for the last two games. A few attacks later, Jason had won the match.