Alex Shvartsman is a 29-year-old professional tournament organizer and game store owner from Brooklyn, New York. Known worldwide for his well-traveled tournament shoes and legendary mastery of the profiteering side of the industry, Alex is a tremendous player in his own right. He proved that time and again this weekend en route to first place in the Swiss standings. He attributes his success to complete immersion in Vs. System and a genuine love for the product.

 

“People play in my store, I run events,” says Alex. “Even if I don’t have time to check bulletin boards to see what the community is up to, I’m around the game enough and I love it enough that it translates to success.”

 

Alex’s main interests outside of the realm of gaming include travel and sci-fi (books, he assures me—not movies) and he will be running Curve Sentinels tomorrow. When asked if there is anything special about his particular build of the deck, Alex laughed. “No. The name of the deck is ‘KNG YMG Super Secret Tech’ because everyone was joking that we’d have some super secret tech for this event.”

 

 

Adam Bernstein is a 20-year-old poker player and TCG enthusiast from Dallas, Texas who made the trip to New York mainly in order to see his beloved Yankees play the Boston Red Sox.

 

“And if we were going to be here anyway,” he said, “we figured I might as well get qualified!”

 

Bernstein, whose other interests include baseball and, formerly, the New York Rangers, professes that his accomplishments in high level TCG play amount to “the stone nothing”. He chalks up his success in the event to “slightly above average play and getting unbelievably lucky.” Like many of his contemporaries, he is piloting Curve Sentinels in the Top 8. His version of the tried and true robot deck features Apocalypse and no defensive plot twists.

 

 

Michael “Big Spooky” Barnes is a 33-year-old student from Tulsa, Oklahoma. After playing Xavier’s Dream to a sterling record on Day 1, Michael managed to struggle through the draft portion to get a chance to play for all the marbles on Sunday, and put his deck to the test against the best players in the world with thousands of dollars at stake.

 

Michael attributes his success to clever metagaming and finding a design that had a high win percentage against the defining deck of the format. After he graduates, he plans to get a job in numerical forensics (like “CSI,” he says, “but with numbers!”) and of his interests outside of gaming, reading is the most prevalent. He counts Robert Jordan and Dan Brown among his favorite authors.

Ryan Jones is a 25-year-old software programmer from Los Angeles, California. Prior to this weekend, his Vs. System resume included a Top 8 at $10K LA in addition to his win at PC SoCal. He piloted Curve Sentinels to a 9-2 record on Friday and this Teen Titans master said that he picked the robots simply because they beat Titans. The secret to his success this weekend was hitting his one-drop in nearly every match on Day 1, while he had very little success on Day 2. The Green Lantern Corps draft portion went according to plan, but the wheels came off in Marvel Knights and left Ryan in desperate need of a win in the final round to secure a spot in the Top 8. He did just that and can now add at least another PC Top 8 to his growing reputation as one of the best players in the world. When asked about his interests outside the Vs. System, he said, “I just play cards. If I had anything else to occupy my time, my girlfriend would probably dump me.”

This 23-year-old professional gamer from Port St. Lucie, Florida just managed to squeak into the Top 8 after losing to Jason Hager in round 21. When asked about his occupation, Antonino (Ant or Antonio to his friends) said that he also takes care of his parents in Florida. He took Curve Sentinels to a 9-3 record on Day 1 and said the secret to his success this weekend was simply making fewer mistakes than his opponents. Previous accomplishments for the Italian Stallion include a third-place finish at PC So Cal and a Top 8 at $10K Orlando. When not playing Vs. System, Antonino can be found playing Magic and chasing girls at the beach.

 

Ah, ze Germans. Hans hails from Bochum, Germany and is widely considered to be one of the best Curve Sentinels players in the world. He proved that this weekend by directing the evil robot army to a 9-3 record on Friday before notching another eight wins on draft day. The 27-year-old philosophy student informed us that the secret to his success this weekend came from hard work and a lot of help from his excellent German teammates. He has two $10K titles to his name to go along with three other $10K Top 8 appearances. His interests outside of the Vs. world include girls, reading, and almost every kind of gaming.

 

Vidi is a 21-year-old Los Angeles resident who moved to the United States three years ago from Indonesia and who works part-time as a courier. He has absolutely no idea what the secret to his success has been this weekend, but he still managed to rack up nine wins on Day 1 with his Curve Sentinels deck. Interests for this amusing player include girls, money, and bodybuilding, and this weekend he added a second PC Top 8 appearance to go along with his four $10K Top 8s and his Top 4 at Pro Circuit So Cal.

 

Jason is a 23-year-old student at Marshall University in Huntington, West Virginia. When not at school, he also works two jobs, including weather director at a local TV station and freelancing as a graphic artist. The Constructed deck he played this weekend was one of the pleasant surprises of the Constructed portion of the event, the latest edition of Evil Medical School (which Jason also designed) that the West Virginians are calling New School. Jason stated that the secret to his success this weekend came largely from surprise factor. When building new decks, Hager says the key is to try and prepare a deck for the complete metagame while still staying rogue, and it worked quite well for he and his team. When not bashing with heroes, Jason mostly works and enjoys reading and creating comics.