This matchup of 2-0 players features two men with some 30 hours of airplane time between them. Kieren Otton, an Australian national, is perhaps most famous for being the Arkham Inmates’ biggest fan, and—true to form—he’s here today with a tricked-out Arkham curve deck. His opponent, John James Watkinsfield, is here from the other “other side of the world”: Truro, England. John booked his own thirteen-hour flight over the Atlantic to represent the X-Men.
The two sat down at the table and bantered about recent Australia-England sporting events in football and rugby. As much as I’d like to give you a transcript of recent action in international sports rivalries, the talk of penalty kicks and slide tackles and scrums and such had me lost in under a minute.
Kieren pulled out an ornate and really cool-looking gold coin to flip for the initiative. John won the flip and selected evens. Both players pulled their opening hands off their decks and got down to business. They promptly both passed turn 1 with a resource and no characters.
John led off turn 2 with a Puppet Master, eliciting a delighted (or horrified—it was hard to tell) cackle from Kieren. He quickly matched the Puppet Master. They mastered each other’s Puppets before moving on to turn 3.
Kieren exhausted Puppet Master to exhaust the Master on the other side of the table, then played Charaxes, Drury Walker. John followed with a Cardiac. Kieren attacked and KO’d John’s Puppet Master, and John attacked Kieren’s Master with Cardiac.
On turn 4, John played Dr. Light, Master of Holograms and retrieved his lost Puppet Master. Kieren came back with Fatality, Flawless Victory. John chose to stun Kieren’s Master with Cardiac, Kieren responded with the Master, and John responded with his own Master. This KO’d Kieren’s Master due to Fatality and left the lethal lady as the only ready character. Kieren brought her into John’s Dr. Light, dealing 6 endurance loss and KO’ing Dr. Light. At the end of the turn, John was left with Puppet Master and Cardiac, while Kieren still had Charaxes and Fatality.
On turn 5, Kieren went off-curve. He played Mad Hatter and Poison Ivy, Deadly Rose, then used his last resource point in an attempt to steal John’s Puppet Master. John exhausted Puppet Master in response, and John responded with a Cardiac activation on Poison Ivy. The chain resolved, leaving Kieren with Fatality and Charaxes ready and Mad Hatter and John’s stolen Puppet Master exhausted.
John underdropped his turn 5 recruit as well, electing to play Rogue, Power Absorption, who copied Cardiac at the start of combat. Kieren attacked Fatality with Cardiac for the stun/KO but had no other attacks. John returned fire with Rogue into Charaxes. John’s Puppet Master came back to him at the end of the turn, leaving John with Puppet Master and Rogue and Kieren with Fatality and Mad Hatter.
John had the initiative on turn 6 and played Mimic. Kieren decided to try the on-curve strategy here as well and played Mr. Freeze, Dr. Victor Fries. John’s characters both became Puppet Masters. Rogue attacked into Mad Hatter, and Kieren reinforced with Freeze. John then sent Mimic into Fatality with no responses from Kieren. Kieren had no attacks, but there was still dissension in the ranks, and John’s Betrayal caused Kieren to stun Mr. Freeze as well. Kieren elected to keep Mr. Freeze, and John still had his Puppet Master/Rogue/Mimic board. Endurance totals were 35 to 17 in John’s favor.
On turn 7, Kieren brought out Arkham’s big turn 7 gun, Two-Face, Split Personality, and formed him behind Mr. Freeze.
John didn’t have anything nearly so simple. He played a Poison Ivy of his own and then flipped Enemy of My Enemy for Dr. Light, discarding Mikado and Mosha. He played the Master of Holograms, brought back M&M from the KO’d pile, then KO’d M&M to Poison Ivy to search out X-Corp: Amsterdam. He then activated Puppet Master, played another Puppet Master from hand, and activated the new one, leaving Kieren’s board exhausted. Kieren’s Two-Face triggered at the beginning of combat, and Kieren chose evens, exhausting the rest of John’s board. Life totals held steady at 35-17.
John led off on turn 8 with a Puppet Master activation, then KO’d the Puppet Master to Poison Ivy to search up Avalon Space Station. John then played Straight to the Grave for Jean Grey, Phoenix Force to satisfy the loyalty requirement of the Jean Grey in his hand before dropping the game-ending 8-drop into play. Finally, he activated Dr. Light for the much-abused Puppet Master, then activated it to exhaust Kieren’s other character.
Kieren’s situation looked grim, but he soldiered on. He flipped up his own Enemy, to which John responded with Latverian Embassy. Kieren was unconcerned. He searched out Mad Hatter, played him, and activated him to steal John’s Poison Ivy. He played a War of Attrition on John’s Space Station and then flipped up a Slaughter Swamp, which he used to retrieve and replay his own Poison Ivy (KO’ing John’s stolen one). Kieren then flipped up a Space Station of his own, retrieved his Charaxes, and played him as well. He formed up with Poison Ivy in front of Charaxes, the exhausted Mr. Freeze in front of Mad Hatter, and the exhausted Two-Face hanging out in the back row.
John attacked Mimic into Mad Hatter — which Kieren reinforced — and then attacked Jean Grey into Charaxes. That was enough to put Kieren into the negatives, and he conceded.
John James Watkinsfield wins!