Alex Shvartsman and Antonino De Rosa are no strangers to the sheen of final day lights. Today, these two accomplished TCG veterans did battle for the chance to win a $40,000 first prize and vault their respective names into the Vs. System stratosphere.

 

Shvartsman quipped, “My parents came over to watch this. So you can beat me, but don't embarrass me too much.”

 

Shvartsman won the coin flip and decided to start. Both players agreed that they prefer to start with Sentinels, though Antonino offered the opinion that if he had a chance to play Ryan Jones, he would want to go second because of Finishing Move.

 

“Don't want him Finishing Moving Bastion.”

 

So, who had the matchup advantage? Shvartsman pegged his advantage at thee to five percent. “You have Micro-Sentinels, but I have Dodges. Then again, you have four Magneto and I have three. If you draw him and I don't . . . ”

 

The rest was left unsaid but understood. Such a situation would be a disaster.

 

Shvartsman looked at his opening four. “That's a tough one. That's a really tough one.” It was two Genoshas, a Hounds, and Overload—a powerhouse turn 7 hand, if Alex could make it that far (and draw a couple of men along the way). Antonino and Alex both had Hounds on turn 2, but Antonino had Mojoverse to take the endurance lead.

 

Shvartsman's turn 3 brought only a second hounds—he hadn't drawn a Mark II. Antonino hit his Sentinel Mark II, but Shvartsman was on the initiative, which meant that he had the opportunity to run a Nasty Overload.

 

“I know you don't have a Dodge.”

 

Antonino didn't (of course, there are none in his deck), and Shvartsman got the KO via Hounds—not bad for an under-drop turn. Antonino bounced back and hit his 4-drop with Sentinel Mark V, and Alex checked his resources before laying a fourth. He debated his play.

 

Antonino gently prodded him. “Another two Hounds? I assume if you're thinking that hard, you don't have a Sentinel Mark V?”

 

Alex flipped one of his cards in hand around—a Mark V. Alex was holding two Magnetos and the Mark V as his only characters and didn't want to lose his Mark V to Antonino's Hounds on the turn, a situation he couldn't avoid because of Antonino's Mojoverse. He made an unconventional play and decided to pass the entire turn. Antonino bashed for 10, leaving himself at a 43-34 endurance advantage going into Shvartsman's turn 5 initiative.

 

Alex eventually had to recruit his Mark V, boosted.

 

“No Nimrod, eh?” Antonino was obviously pleased.

 

Alex shook his head. “My draw is not . . . ‘the best'.”

 

“Sad thing is, I don't have Nimrod either,” lamented De Rosa. He then recruited Boliver Trask and picked up a second Mark V, which he also played to use up his remaining resource points. The boards stood at boosted Mark V and two Hounds for Alex, and two unboosted Mark Vs, a Hounds, and a Trask for Antonino.

 

Alex sent his Mark V to bash an unboosted counterpart on Antonino's side, and the defending player had a Nasty Surprise for a double stun. Then, one of Alex's Hounds bashed into Trask for a deuce.

 

Next, Alex ran a gambit.

 

“This might be the worst play ever, but . . . I don't have a chance in this game if I don't do it.” Alex sent his Hounds into Antonino's Mark V and played Savage Beatdown. “Got an Overload?”

 

“Yes.”

 

Alex was ready to flip his Hounds over, but Antonino seemed to hesitate. “I just have to decide if it's worth using.”

 

Alex was incredulous. “Oh, it's worth using.”

 

In the end, Antonino did it, and Shvartsman's board was clear except for his exhausted Hounds. Antonino beat down for 7 more and KO'd Shvartsman's Mark V, leaving the Brooklyn native's board in a state of complete “bomb scare.”

 

On turn 6, both players played Bastion, but Shvartsman was on the defensive and his copy went down to Antonino's big team-attack. Antonino was content to lean on Alex for the rest of the game, using Hounds to wipe the board again and again. Sure enough, a Hounds ran cleanup on Shvartsman's copy of Bastion. Alex was in deep trouble, down 31-12 in endurance with no board and facing down a Bastion and two Mark Vs.

 

Alex played Magneto and got a chance to use the Genoshas he had saved up (now up to three copies!), but Antonino was unimpressed.

 

“You drawing all those cards would be a lot more scary if you had Bastion,” he remarked.

 

As it turned out, Antonino had Magneto and two Genoshas of his own. From there, it was academic. Antonino finished off the match in style, using double Savage Beatdown and two Bastion pumps to Overload Shvartsman's Magneto. Alex was smiling, scooping and shuffling before the chain had even half resolved.

 

Antonino De Rosa takes a 1-0 lead.

 

 

Antonino mulliganed his starting hand and both players passed. On turn 2, both players played Hounds (Alex: “We don't even bother with Trasks around here”), and Antonino again had Mojoverse to get an endurance edge.

 

Both players had Mark IIs on turn 3, and Alex bashed in and flipped over Total Anarchy, KO'ing both 3-drop robots. Antonino then used Micro-Sentinels to start the slow death of Alex's Hounds, showing the superiority of that card over the relatively useless Total Anarchy.

 

On turn 4, both players had Mark Vs. Antonino had his Mojoverse going, and Shvartsman tried a Dodge. Antonino played Beatdown. Shvartsman had another Dodge and a power-up, but Antonino had a power-up as well and managed the stun. Then, his Hounds KO'd Shvartsman's 4-drop. To cap the turn, Micro-Sentinels finished eating Alex's Hounds, leaving him with an empty board. The game had gone completely into the gutter for Shvartsman.

 

Antonino was way ahead and he didn't stop there. Alex had to Reconstruction Program on turn 5 and replay a Mark V. Antonino came over the top with Nimrod. Shvartsman tried to attack into Nimrod and power up, but Antonino had a Nasty Surprise.

 

Shvartsman knew he was cooked. “I had to hope you missed something . . . because I certainly have missed a lot of stuff.”

 

Antonino counterattacked to take a 41-25 endurance lead and cleared Shvartsman's board again for about the eighth or ninth time in the match. For his turn 6, he didn't have Bastion, so he Reconstruction Programmed and played out a boosted Mark V. Alex was resigned.

 

“You don't have to worry; I don't have Bastion, either.”

 

His turn was Trask and Nimrod. With Antonino on the initiative, things looked downright ugly for the number one seed. Nimrod attacked Nimrod and Antonino had the ever-present Mojoverse to force action from Shvartsman—the card had really been showing its worth in this contest. Alex had no action, and the repair counter was lost. Then, Antonino sent a boosted Mark V into Nimrod for a mutual stun, beat Shvartsman for 7 more by hammering on Boliver Trask (who was KO'd by Alex's own Total Anarchy), and then kept the Hounds lock up, leaving Shvartsman with nothing and the scores at 7-13.

 

On turn 7, Alex had initiative and Magneto. Antonino had two Mark IIs but didn't seem concerned, and there was a good reason for that—Shvartsman had almost no chance. Alex took a shot with Magneto (on Nimrod), but then Antonino sent in his entire team to stun the Master of Magnetism on the counterattack. The Hounds dined on Lehnsherr-burgers, and it went to turn 8.

 

Any guesses about what's coming?

 

Antonino had Apocalypse.

 

Shvartsman just gave a thumbs-up and started mentally putting on his jacket. Then, Antonino deliberated for a few seconds and flipped up Micro-Sentinels to put one counter on Alex's second Magneto of the game, a gesture so fruitless and irrelevant that it drew plenty of laughs from Antonino, Alex, and the gathered crowd.

 

Shvartsman's attempts at any semblance of defense were likewise fruitless and irrelevant. It was Antonino's match to take, and he did. A Beatdown and a handshake later, Antonino De Rosa was on to the semifinals and Alex Shvartsman was on his way home with a smile, a story, and quarterfinalist money.

 

Antonino De Rosa wins 2-0.