After traveling all the way from the opposite end of the country, these two Florida natives are facing off against each other with nice, shiny, 2-0 records. While Patrick is hoping to make his breakout performance today, Joey Carey already has one $10K Top 8 and countless high money finishes to his name and is hungry for another strong finish today.
Patrick won the die roll and decided to let Joey go first, but neither player had any plays until Joey played Franklin Richards, Creator of Counter-Earth unopposed on the second turn. Turn 3 saw Captain America, Skrull Impostor sit across from Jolen, The Treacherous One. A few attacks later, and little Frankie hid the Captain before all the cosmic—surge characters received their counters.
Turn 4 saw a strong play from Patrick in the form of Ronan the Accuser, Starforce, while Joey could do nothing but sit back and play a Crystal, Elementelle. Even after hiding Crystal, Joey still went down to 36 as Patrick powered through the turn with the help of Elemental Battle and Pressed into Service. Elemental Battle was the most back-breaking of the two, shooting down a critical team attack that Joey needed to take down Patrick’s menacing Ronan. Ronan’s cosmic ability was clearly frustrating Joey, who had Extended Family and countless other blue cards in his resource row just waiting to be of service.
Turn 5 looked a little better for Joey as he played Black Bolt, King of the Inhumans. Patrick didn’t let off any pressure, though, as he set Red Shift, Rift Walker next to the lonely Jolen in his concealed area. Even though Joey was able to stun Ronan, Terragenesis made it all for naught when Patrick simply gave him back his cosmic counter in the recovery phase.
With the score pretty even at 33-30 in Joey’s favor going into turn 6, Firelord, Harbinger of Havoc looked like the perfect play for Patrick. Taskmaster looked like an equally strong play from Joey, giving him the potential to have two 7-drops the next turn. Hoping not to make it that far, Patrick discarded Tyrant to Firelord’s cosmic ability, making him a 19 ATK / 13 DEF in an attack against Taskmaster. Joey noted that if Patrick had pitched a 7-drop or less, he would probably pull it out, but the 8-drop would be the straw that would break the Floridian’s back. Joey sat and considered his options, unable to do anything but look at his useless plot twists sitting in the resource row. Joey mentioned that Ronan was probably the most powerful card in the set, and even though he had a good draw, he just couldn’t deal with the Kree 4-drop.
Patrick moved on to a 3-0 record, guaranteeing him a strong finish in the first pod, even if he loses his next round. With a deck as strong as his, though, it doesn’t look likely that he will have to worry about a loss. Joey was still in good contention with a solid deck that would most definitely get him a 3-1 record before players press the reset button with new decks after round 4.