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It’s time for the final installment of the “Spooky Goes Out To Eat” trilogy. When we last saw our fearless culinary adventurer, he was being restrained by his coworkers from cutting off his own head to put out the eternal fire burning in his nostrils—a fire largely due to a generous dose of wasabi. This time around, our hero is on his way to sample some steaks at a local eatery.

Okay . . . I’ll cut out the spaghetti western narrative now.

After my experience at Nobu, I was eagerly anticipating a meal that contained foods I was familiar with. The dinner was taking place as part of a “partner community event.” In essence, a partner at my company (i.e., a person who makes a lot more money than I do) was assigned a group of individuals within the organization to mentor. As part of this mentoring process, the partner sponsors events for the individuals. In this case, my partner was sponsoring a swank dinner.

Now, while I love steak as much as the next guy, I was a bit concerned about the duration of the dinner. You see, I was already riding the tail end of a 60-hour workweek, and my boss had informed me that we would be putting in some time over the weekend, as well. As someone who really enjoys his free time (maybe even more so than steak), this was very bitter news for me. Accordingly, while I was looking forward to a fantastic dinner, I was not looking forward to spending three hours dining with a group of people that I barely knew.

Yeah . . . I know what you’re thinking. “Three hours for dinner? Is the meal served in bite-sized courses?” Those were my thoughts as well. The dinner was scheduled from 6:00 to 9:00 that evening, but I honestly did not anticipate that it would take that long. I mean, come on! Who spends three whole hours eating a single meal?

I was in for a very rude awakening!

Dining: A Timeline

6:00 P.M. I arrived at Bob’s Steakhouse in uptown Dallas. The restaurant was somewhat deceptive from the outside, as it looked like a ramshackle storefront. I could tell from the aroma wafting from inside, though, that I had found the right place. I met up with my group at the bar (which was a challenge in itself, as I am not good at mingling with people I don’t know). Everyone tried to make polite conversation (what colleges they attended, what kind of cars they drove, whether they thought Tim Batow should wear an Aqualad costume at the next PC, etc.). Unfortunately, auditing was about the only thing that everyone had in common, so the conversation inevitably drifted back to that.

6:30 P.M. After half an hour of uncomfortable mingling and an encounter with a not-so-subtle bartender over my beverage of choice, one of the hostesses led our party to our table.* We had twelve people in our party, so I assumed that we would be seated at a large rectangular table with the partner at the head. Imagine my surprise when they sat all of us at a giant round table. It appeared as if the restaurant was well-suited to serve large parties, as there were several of these tables scattered across the dining room.

7:00 P.M. I quickly tired of counting the giant round tables in the restaurant. I was still waiting for the Diet Coke that I had ordered about half an hour earlier. I attempted to engage some of my coworkers in small talk. However, as I am an accountant and a trading card gamer, I am quite horrid at small talk. Moreover, many of the guests at the dinner were wholeheartedly engaged in a discussion of various reality television shows. As I fully believe reality TV to be one of the signs of the Apocalypse, I do not spend a great deal of time following them. As such, I was left almost completely out of any table discussion.

7:30 P.M. My beverage did eventually arrive. However, I was a bit wary about consuming too much of it, as it would probably take another full hour to refill it. The server also brought appetizers for the table. The buffalo wings were quite tasty, but the sauteed mushrooms left something to be desired. Perhaps it was because the mushrooms were sauteed whole rather than sliced—but I digress. When the server came to take our entree orders, I was a bit unsure about what I should have. I decided upon the most logical course of action: I simply ordered the same thing as the guy next to me. In this case, it was the twelve-ounce filet mignon.

8:00 P.M. We were still waiting on the main course. The polite conversation had actually shifted to me, since I was a Forensics oddity in this group of auditors. Many of the auditors were curious about what exactly I did in the Forensics group. Of course, the partner followed this up with, "Don't worry . . . before we're done, we'll convince Michael that audit is the way to go!" Thinking this was a joke, I started laughing out loud. It struck me a few seconds later that no one else at the table found the comment to be a source of humor.

8:30 P.M. After having already spent in excess of two hours in the restaurant, our food finally arrived. I remember thinking that for this dinner to be even somewhat worthwhile, the steak would have to be the best I'd ever eaten . . . and it was! After taking my first bite of the delicious, juicy, and tender beef, I forgot all about everything else that had troubled me earlier in the evening. I was so focused on the steak that I almost missed the scalloped potatoes (which were excellent) and asparagus (which was not as good as the steak, but good nonetheless). The one thing that I distinctly remember about the meal is that once I had finished my steak, I wished that I had ordered the sixteen-ounce filet mignon!

9:00 P.M. After a fully satisfying meal, I was ready to bid my farewells and head home to get some sleep before my busy working weekend. But wait—no one at the table seemed to be making any overt movements toward the exit. In fact, everyone (except me, of course) seemed to be firmly planted in their seats, enjoying an exciting Friday evening of . . . um . . . sitting.** Our server came around with the dessert menu, but all I could think about was whether or not I would be getting out of the restaurant at a reasonable hour.

9:30 P.M. Everyone else seemed to be having a grand time enjoying their desserts and laughing as if they didn’t have a care in the world. I, on the other hand, remained sulking in my chair as I frequently checked my watch to see just how much longer I had been stranded at Bob’s. My conversation was limited to a barely audible series of grunts, which earned me a few questioning looks when people at the table tried to speak with me. This did not, however, prevent the partner from ordering another bottle of wine!

10:00 P.M. As the fifth hour of my visit to Bob’s Steakhouse began, I started frantically thinking of ways to escape this prolonged agony. Whenever I caught the eye of one of the guests at the table, I pointed to my watch and screamed, “It’s ten o’clock! Ten o’clock!! You’re going to miss your Seinfeld reruns!!!” Unfortunately, my mad expostulations were drowned out by the hearty guffaws of one of the other guests at the table who, by this time, had surely consumed enough wine to poison a mastodon. Despite my frantic efforts, everyone else at the table roared into the late night with no other thought than to eat, drink, and deprive Michael of sleep.

10:30 P.M. By this time, I had lost all sense of feeling in my backside. I was sure that my body was settling into a state of rigor mortis and that the wait staff would be preparing me for embalming any moment now. I cursed the fact that I hadn’t drafted a last will and testament, for now my Tim Batow–autographed copy of Aqualad would undoubtedly be lost forever. As my motionless body dragged nearer and nearer to demise, I prayed to God that my internal organs (at least, the ones that still worked) would be donated to somebody in true need.

11:00 P.M. A fate worse than death. The aforementioned fellow, who had been imbibing at an alarming pace, began attempting to sing “Louie, Louie.” Having decided to proverbially gnaw off my leg to escape the trap, I stood up and thanked the partner for a wonderful meal. Everyone at the table looked at me quizzically, undoubtedly thinking, “He surely can’t be leaving this early!” I attempted to clarify, stating that I had to go into work early the next morning. This, of course, was met by more vacant stares. Flummoxed, I shook my head and departed the restaurant. As I walked out of the door, I was positive that I heard someone drunkenly singing “Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.”

Okay . . . so maybe the evening wasn’t quite that arduous. But it was close.

The Chains That Bind

The feeling of being trapped by “invisible chains,” so to speak, is difficult to describe in accurate detail. I know that everyone has had that feeling at one time or another, whether it’s shopping with a girlfriend, being trapped in a movie or a play that you don’t like, or even being stuck at work for hours on end. You can see, hear, feel, and taste freedom. Inevitably, though, it is just beyond your grasp.

Perhaps this notion of being trapped is what led me to find this week’s deck so appealing. During my Christmas break (a gloriously audit-free vacation back in Oklahoma), I was introduced to the new pet deck of my good friend Johnson Bailey. Johnson has about everything an aspiring Vs. System pro could want—a keen love and talent for the game, an attractive wife (who also has a keen love and talent for the game), and (most importantly) me for a teammate!

Johnson told me about his project deck that abused the card Mystic Chain. I had always been fascinated by the card, but I was never able to find the right deck to utilize it. Johnson, however, had a great deal of success with it in a very aggressive swarm build. Recalling the intangible chains that held me to that brutally long meal, I decided that this would be too good of an analogy to pass up!

As I did before when featuring another individual’s decklist, I’ll provide the build, then go into detail about it afterward.

The Chain Gang (60 cards)
by Johnson Bailey

Characters (32)
4 Ape X, Xina
4 Bart Allen ◊ Impulse, Hyper-Accelerated
2 Dawn Granger ◊ Dove, Agent Of Order
1 Doctor Decibel, Anton Decibel
2 Joystick, Janice Yanizesh
1 Nathan Garrett ◊ Black Knight, Corrupt Crusader
1 Pantha, Subject X-24
1 Paul Ebersol ◊ Fixer, Problem Solver
1 Phantazia, Eileen Harshaw
1 Roy Harper ◊ Speedy, Mercurial Marksman
2 Soldiers Of New Genesis, Army
2 Sue Dibny, Charismatic Coordinator
1 Ted Kord ◊ Blue Beetle, Heir Of The Scarab
1 The Shark, T. S. Smith
2 Thermite, Sam Yurimoto
2 Yellowjacket, Rita DeMara
1 Booster Gold, Michael Jon Carter
1 Hank Hall ◊ Hawk, Agent Of Chaos
1 Speed Demon, Second Chance Speedster
1 Vic Stone ◊ Cyborg, Human Machine

Plot Twists (20)
4 Savage Beatdown
4 Flying Kick
4 Forced Allegiance
4 Mega-Blast
4 No Fear

Locations (4)
4 Birthing Chamber

Equipment (4)
4 Mystic Chain

The Build

The inspired brilliance of this deck is difficult to describe. I am not a big fan of swarm decks in general, but this build has the potential for enormous successes where others have failed. One major downfall of swarm decks is that they drain the hand too quickly. Mystic Chain, however, solves this dilemma by turning the swarm strategy into a source of massive card advantage. Not only can we start drawing extra cards as early as the second turn, but we can also make our opponent’s life very difficult by forcing him or her to discard cards from hand in the early turns.

Of course, the card-drawing engine of the swarm build is further supplemented by the presence of Birthing Chamber. Since we will usually have four characters on the board by turn 3, Birthing Chamber will further enable us to maintain a sufficient hand size. This is very important when we are recruiting multiple characters every turn.

Of course, every swarm deck needs enough attack pumps to take down larger characters. This deck has plenty of pump, toting sixteen attack pump plot twists. Flying Kick and Mega-Blast are potent all-purpose attack pumps that can give attackers turn-based bonuses as early as the first turn. No Fear is great because it can be used as either an offensive or defensive weapon (especially since we will usually be attacking and defending up the curve). Finally, Savage Beatdown is . . . well . . . it’s Savage Beatdown!

As far as teaming-up goes, you might have noticed that the deck plays a very wide variety of teams. To deal with this issue, we could play a card like Mosaic World to enable these characters to interact with one another. However, there are a few characters that have potent benefits conferred upon them from having other characters of the same team on the board with them (Bart Allen ◊ Impulse, for example). As such, we will rely on Forced Allegiance to team-up our weenies. Forced Allegiance will effectively meld all of our characters on the board without disrupting characters’ hand and deck effects (like Yellowjacket and Sue Dibny).

Let’s now take a quick look at character selection.

Ape X: Squadron Rush players know all about Xina's equipment-fetching goodness. In the case of this deck (which leans pretty heavily on Mystic Chain), having a character on the board and a card that fetches your win condition all in one is a definite benefit. As such, Ape X is one of the two most important characters in the deck, and a definite four-of.

Bart Allen ◊ Impulse: The second of the two most important characters, Impulse is dramatically different from Ape X in that it's never been effectively utilized in a competitive deck. However, Impulse can be a major player in this deck with the proper setup. According to Bailey, an optimal series of drops on the first two turns would be Ape X, Impulse, and any other 1-drop (we'll say Thermite for argument's sake). Assuming that the opposing player has only one visible character, Thermite attacks up the curve to stun the 2-drop (with the help of an attack pump if necessary). Then Impulse (equipped with a Mystic Chain) attacks directly to score a card. Finally, Forced Allegiance is flipped up to make every character Teen Titans. Ape X is exhausted for Impulse's effect, and Impulse attacks again directly to score another card. Granted, there are several cards that have to come together to make that combo work, but when it does go off, it is a thing of beauty!

Yellowjacket, Rita DeMara, Sue Dibny, Dawn Granger ◊ Dove, Hank Hall ◊ Hawk: While not as critical as our lynchpin characters, these cards fill a major role in that they serve as character searchers for our deck. While having the ability to search out characters is important, these cards have an added benefit in that they actually net us card advantage when they are played. Sue Dibny allows for an immediate search of Booster Gold when she is played. Yellowjacket requires a boost of one resource point, but you can search out any Masters of Evil 1- or 2-drop—and you get the resource point back! Finally, Hawk and Dove are well-known for their escapades in standard Teen Titans builds. They are no less formidable here, giving you what are essentially a free character search effect and both a 2- and 3-drop, all for the price of three resource points.

Joystick, Pantha, Soldiers Of New Genesis, The Shark, T. S. Smith: Since we will be doing a lot of attacking up the curve (as most of our characters are 1-drops), it would probably be wise for us to have some strong attackers in the 1-drop position. Of course, they don't get much bigger than Joystick, who is effectively a 3-drop when you have few cards in hand. While she can be a liability in later turns (assuming our deck's strategy comes to fruition and we fill our hand), she can be very potent in early turns when we are dropping several cards each turn. Pantha is an offensive monster that can easily attack up into 2- and 3-drops. Soldiers Of New Genesis are just plain big. Finally, The Shark keeps getting bigger as we flip up resources (which we will hopefully be doing often).

Doctor Decibel, Phantazia, Nathan Garrett ◊ Black Knight, Roy Harper ◊ Speedy: Of course, size isn't everything, so Bailey included a few "finesse" 1-drops to balance out the deck. Doctor Decibel and Phantazia are great at keeping opposing defenders at manageable DEF levels. Black Knight has a nice Blind Sided–type effect that can enable a character equipped with Mystic Chain to force through breakthrough endurance loss. Finally, Speedy is quite simply the best there is at eliminating problematic 1-drops. Child-lock players will have a tough time making A Child Named Valeria effective when Speedy keeps Invisible Woman, The Invisible Girl out of play.

Paul Ebersol ◊ Fixer, Thermite: Of course, any good deck always has a couple of good tech choices. Having a deck chock-full of 1- and 2-drops can be problematic if our opponent is playing Flame Trap. Thus, Fixer is a natural choice, as it forces our opponent to deal with him before he can torch our board. In addition, we can easily search out Fixer with Yellowjacket. Thermite, on the other hand, is not quite so obvious a choice. However, any 1-drop with a decent ATK that can force hand control on our opponent is worth consideration. As such, Thermite should be a card that we utilize (if sparingly) to keep our opponent's hand in check.

Ted Kord ◊ Blue Beetle, Booster Gold: Blue Beetle and Booster Gold are recent imports from the JLA set. Blue Beetle has quite a bit of utility in the deck in that he can search out either Mystic Chain or Booster Gold with his effect. While his effect is not as helpful from a hand advantage perspective since it requires a discard, it does have the advantage of being reusable. Thus, we can feasibly cycle "dead" cards out of hand for extra copies of cards that we can effectively utilize. Booster Gold, in later turns, is simply a 1-drop disguised as a 2-drop. Since we will get two of the three resource points that we pay to recruit Booster Gold (assuming that we boost him), we'll get a 3 ATK/2 DEF with flight and range for the low, low price of one resource point!

Speed Demon, Second Chance Speedster: We have a couple of key choices for characters outside of 1- and 2-drops. Of course, we should naturally give consideration to the awesome Speed Demon. As my good friend John Hall once stated, "Speed Demon is the best 5-drop in the game!" Of course, he was referring to the fact that, barring interference from Terra, Gambit, and the like, Speed Demon is an extremely effective under-drop in later turns. For the cost of a single endurance point, you will almost always net two attacks with Speed Demon. With a Flying Kick or Mega-Blast thrown in the mix, you can easily take down a 4-drop and 5-drop with a single 3-drop. To say that Speed Demon is awesome is a massive understatement.

Vic Stone ◊ Cyborg: Finally, we have a much-maligned Teen Titans character. Cyborg gets a lot of flak for being significantly weaker than other Teen Titans characters. However, he does fill a useful role in our deck with his ability to search out Mystic Chain for free. While his stats are a bit less impressive than the average 4-drop, the prevalence of attack pumps should be more than enough to make up for this disparity.

Potential Considerations

While Bailey stands behind the potency and effectiveness of the build, he admits that there is probably room for improvement on the design. One character that he mentioned wanting to find room for is Punisher, Jury. Additionally, there are several low-cost characters that might assist in the deck’s swarm utility, such as Dr. Light, Master Of Holograms, Beetle, Armorsmith, and Poison Ivy, Deadly Rose. Having a wider array of search and recruiting effects in the deck could add to the board and hand advantage that the deck emphasizes.

One card I would like to find a space for is Justice League Of Arkham. This card breaks the mold of most prior discard effects in that it is effective outside of the combat phase. In essence, if you can draw into a couple of copies, it is possible to force your opponent to completely miss playing a resource and/or a character on later turns. However, this strategy would require playing Arkham Inmates characters (which might be an additional incentive for playing Poison Ivy).

That wraps up this week’s Breaking Ground. You are always more than welcome to shoot any thoughts or ideas my way at BigSpooky1@hotmail.com. If I fail to get back to you, please don’t take it personally. I am probably just trapped at a partner dinner with no hope of immediate escape.

*I don’t drink alcohol much anymore, but this guy was bound and determined to get me sauced. Every time I said “Diet Coke,” he repeated back “Rum and Coke?” I am hoping that it was just a matter of him trying to get me to pay more for my drink so that he’d get a bigger tip. However, I still find myself occasionally looking over my shoulder in fear.

**It occurs to me, though, that this is a bit of a hypocritical criticism, as I am prone to spend my Friday evenings sitting around playing Vs. System. I guess it all depends on your point of view, eh?