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The Sentry™
Card# MTU-017

While his stats aren’t much bigger than those of the average 7-drop, Sentry’s “Pay ATK” power can drastically hinder an opponent’s attacking options in the late game.
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Round 11 Roundup

Justin Gary

July 16, 2005

This is it: the final round before the break to Sunday. With players scrambling for that last win to secure themselves a spot in the Top 8, the field looked . . . monotonous. I searched the top tables for some matchup that wasn’t just Teen Titans vs. Curve Sentinels. Just as I was about to give up hope, I found the match between Ruben Recinos and Kevyn Lee.

I have been periodically watching Kevyn play all day. He is 13 years old, but he plays like a pro. Kevyn has played in multiple $10Ks and a Pro Circuit, and he piloted his Teen Titans deck far better than many players in this field.

Kevyn, however, was not why I watched this match. Ruben Recinos, in his very first $10K, has put himself in a position to fight for Top 8 with one of the more unlikely team-ups I have ever seen. Ruben’s League of Assassins/Spider-Friends deck utilized a lot of really cool synergies between the teams to create a stall strategy that caps off the game with Ra’s Al Ghul, The Demon’s Head. In order to get to turn 8, Ruben uses the Spider-Friends’ powerhouse defensive cards like Spider Senses and Nice Try. Also, Ruben used the evasion characters of Spider-Friends to enable Pit of Madness and Bronze Tiger, Benjamin Turner.

I came into the match during turn 4, and things looked bad for Ruben. He missed his 4-drop and had to play a Spider-Man, Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man to join the Ricochet he already had in play. Facing off against him was a full board of Titans characters—Terra, Roy Harper ◊ Speedy, Hank Hall ◊ Hawk, and Dawn Granger, Dove. Ruben had the initiative and was able to stun both Hawk and Dove, but he took a lot of damage on the counterswing and was forced to lose Spider-Man.

Turn 5 saw Kevyn recruit Garth ◊ Tempest and Ruben recruit Bane. Bane allowed Ruben to use The Demon’s Head to get Metropolis and team-up in response to a large team attack from Kevyn. Then, the newly initiated Ricochet exhausted to fetch Pit of Madness. Ricochet evaded, and the Pit attempted to save Bane. Kevyn used Garth to get enough power-ups to get through the attack.

Turn 6 Ruben recruited Iceman, Cool Customer against Kevyn’s Cassie Sandsmark ◊ Wonder Girl. The increased size of Ruben’s characters allowed him to stun three of Kevyn’s characters while only getting one of his stunned.

Turn 7 was the crucial turn of the game. Kevyn had no drops for the turn, but was able to U.S.S. Argus into Roy Harper. Garth brought Dove back from the dead, and things looked bad for Ruben . . . that is, until he played Spider-Man, The Amazing Spider-Man! In response, Kevyn exhausted his team and attempted to stun Ice Man with Roy, only to have his plans foiled by a Nice Try. A Press the Attack allowed Kevyn to stun Ice Man, but Spider-Man, Bane, and Ricochet where able to apply the beats to Kevyn’s exhausted team. Kevyn was unable to use the Heroic Sacrifice in his KO’d pile because of his returning of Dove earlier in the turn.

The critical Nice Try brought the game to turn 8, where Ruben was able to drop the dominating Ra’s Al Ghul, The Demon’s Head and cause Kevyn to succeed.

We all waited in anticipation to see if Ruben made Top 8, allowing us to highlight this exciting new decktype tomorrow. Alas, as the names were read off, Ruben’s didn’t make the cut. He finished thirteenth, which is an impressive feat for his first $10K. I expect that we will see more of him. In the meantime, here is his fascinating decklist:

Characters