Some would have you believe that time is a house of cards, and that if you remove one card, the house collapses. The physics of time, however, allow for another possibility: remove that same card, and the house rebuilds itself—but never to its original form.
-Walker Gabriel, Chronos #9
I would like to try a little experiment today. It may not be very scientific, but it will be loads of fun. We are going to travel back in time to find out what will happen in the future. You are firmly planted in the here and now while you are reading, but who knows where we will end up when it is over?
Throughout the years, DC Comics has created myths that span expansive reaches of time. Our newest Vs. System booster set features the Legion of Superheroes and it is about to burst into the present moments of our lives with the Sneak Preview tournaments on December 2nd and 3rd. The heroes and villains that battle in these tales are glimpses of the future. Most of their adventures occur in the 30th century, but some of them fast-forward all the way into the year 85,400 AD.
A little closer to home, Pro Circuit Los Angeles 2006 is directly ahead of us. The history that it etches into the game will be complete in less than one week. The Golden Age environment on the immediate horizon promises to be an enchanting mix of old and new strategies. We will set our experimental devices toward discovering the Top 8 for the upcoming PC by the end of this article. First let me tell you how this works.
When Grant Morrison and Mark Waid were at their creative peak as writers for DC Comics, they collaborated on a unified theory of time construction that would allow every story ever told about a character or location to become equally valid in the official mythos of their existence. All the changing costumes and cracking continuity could combine and be redeemed. Instead of certain events remaining splintered away from official canon, Mark Waid decided to simply say: “It’s all true.”
This theoretical structure for the temporality of their tales was dubbed “hypertime”. It was a fascinating concept that created quite a stir in the comic fanboy community. It reminds me of the fourth dimension as taught quite concisely by Carl Sagan, and yet it does not allow all timelines to exist simultaneously for the characters themselves. Warren Ellis recounts an evening of party-turned-philosophy with Grant Morrison in which he described DC Comics’ hypertime like this:
Hypertime is a tool for the consideration of fictional reality.
Take a glass sphere studded all over with holes, and then drive a long stick right through the middle of it, passing exactly through the center of the volume. That's the base DC Comics timeline. Jab another stick through right next to it, but at a different angle, so that they're touching at one point. That's an Elseworlds story. Another stick, this one rippled, placed close in so that it touches the first stick at two or three points. That's the base Marvel Comics timeline. Perhaps other stories follow the line of the DC stick for a while before diverging, a slow diagonal collision along it before peeling off. This sphere contains the timeline of all comic-book realities, and they theoretically all have access to each other. In high time, at the top of the sphere, is our reality and we can look down on the totality of hypertime, the entire volume.
In Chronos #9, history deletes itself and Walker Gabriel becomes "The Man Who Chose Not to Exist." Using his time traveling abilities as Chronos, Walker worked his way through hypertime for family reasons. He went back a few decades and saved his mother from death. There was only one problem; he also threw human events into a collision course with World War III. The only solution was for Chronos to wipe himself from existence completely.
Of course I am not suggesting anything close to that for our little hypertime experiment today. We are simply going to examine each of the first 64 Pro Circuit Day 3 finalists and try to determine which of them will make the Top 8 again this time. (I realize that this will exclude any potential underdog surprises from our predictions.) In the spirit of convoluted chronology and potential Goliath-killers, I found a very interesting quote to help with the visualization of victory for any outsider looking to shock the world. This is from an extremely serious essay entitled “Hypertime” by Alan G. Carter.
If a developed mind can manipulate itself so as to put itself into a state that can only be the decay product of certain specific future states, those future states will inevitably happen. You have to really become that which you want to become, and then the accessories will drop into place.
Since I will not be able to attend Pro Circuit Los Angeles 2006, I am instead attempting to become a soothsayer. Let’s see what accessories I need to have fall into place. Since I do not own a glass sphere studded all over with holes for this experiment, I am simply throwing the names of the first 64 Day 3 finalists into my magic hat and closing my eyes. This is what I see for the future, along with one card from each player’s past Top 8 performance that may come into play again this time.
8. Nick Little used Flame Trap to burn away the weenie hordes on his way to the quarterfinals in the very first Pro Circuit event. It’s about time for him to heat up again. He is the most entertaining member of The Donkey Club, always ladling a bit of levity into the game. I have never failed to share a laugh whenever our timelines meet and I see another Day 3 full of frivolity and fun for the furry one.
7. Ryan Jones is due. History often repeats itself, and if we finally get a two-time Pro Circuit championship when the calendar hits November 20, my money is on Jonesy. I also got an imaginary gander at Garth ◊ Tempest recurring some plot twists that are too fuzzy to be deciphered. Teen Titans took Ryan to the mountaintop once upon a time; they might just do it again.
6. Adam Prosak rolls into the next phase of PC history as a force to be reckoned with. He proved his mettle once again at the Columbus $10K by busting loose with a Heralds / Inhumans stall deck that may set the tone for all future Silver Age events. He suffered through a cold spell for a time, but he is as warm as a muffin in the oven for this. Adam might even dig up the Mephisto, Soulstealer that took him to Day 3 at Pro Circuit Amsterdam to negate opposing KO’d piles. It happened before and it can happen again.
5. Jason Hager is a genius in any era. His hidden Faces deck is further proof. Every day that he sets his designs on Vs. System is another day that the world of trading card games is a better place. All compliments aside, he might make Day 3 again but I do not see a Pro Circuit championship yet for The Donkey Club. Boris, Personal Servant of Dr. Doom will probably be pulling his weight in whatever brilliant bounty Jason brings back to the quarterfinal tables, but history will repeat and leave him just a bit short of the ring.
4. Dr. Light, Master of Holograms returns Michael Dalton to the Pro Circuit Top 8. At least that’s where the signs point. It’s been a while, but it seems like the right time for a Dalton on Day 3 again. He has something to prove, which may be just the motivation he needs.
3. Dean Sohnle showed me a Multiple Man ◊ Jamie Madrox deck at the last Pro Circuit Indianapolis that knocked my socks off, and my feet have been itching ever since. I really don’t remember if it contained any Cosmic Radiation or not, but I bet the globetrotter returns to past glory and unveils something that the rest of us would never dream of. He will be pinching himself again at the Top 8 tables.
2. We are down to the finals, and the future is starting to blind me. It is almost as bright as Niles Rowland wearing an orange Aquaman shirt. My eyes are having problems focusing; let me take some deep breaths to prevent System Failure. Okay, I’m back and I saw the Promised Land. Niles is indeed returning to Day 3. He will win his first two matches and produce 76 loud belly laughs among the audience along the way. This Top 8 is going to be the most fun of all time—especially when we see who the winner is.
1. Yes, I see Tim Batow becoming the next Pro Circuit champion. I needed to adjust my picture a bit and lower my view, but he will be taking out opponents like Mikado and Mosha in a time warp. He is as dedicated as anyone in the game, truly enjoyable to play against, and a brilliant strategist. He will finally lift Team Alternate Win Condition onto his back and dunk them all in a pool of championship champagne. History will be changed and a new Napoleon will be born. Vs. System will be much richer for it and we will all enter a new Golden Age together.
Unless, of course, you can prove me wrong. Time is a slippery and subtle thing. It may not exist at all. By the time my predictions are proven one way or another, we will all be so shaken by the magnificence of the new metagame that it may not matter. And there will always be next time.
Rian Fike is also known as stubarnes and he is as curious as you are to see if his predictions actually come true. If you have an experimental time machine and you need a guinea pig, send full blueprints to: rianfike@hattch.com