Welcome to a special edition of Draft Knights. Today we’ll be covering the Top 8 Booster Draft from the first Sealed Pack $10K held recently in Auckland, New Zealand.

At the risk of ruining the ending, the day was won by Alex “Uly” Brown from Sydney, Australia. Alex was the Draft Knight from my second column and will again be the focus of the following coverage. It’s worth mentioning that all three players featured over the three episodes of this column made it into the Top 8 playoffs, so there’s no doubt you’ve been receiving some top notch advice!

Before we get into the draft itself, I’d firstly like to thank the onlookers who graciously volunteered to cover the draft picks of as many players as possible to maximize the chances of recording the selections of the eventual champion. They were Luke Bartter, Ryan Dare, Rob Davis, Randall Hughes, David Redfern, and Jarrod Scriven.

First Pack

1. Hypnotic Charms, Midnight Sons, Face the Master

This was nothing less than a dream pack for Alex to kick things off with. Hypnotic Charms is actually his preferred team-up, putting him in the minority of Sydney drafters. Compared to Midnight Sons, he claims it has equal if not superior versatility, plus there’s a lot less competition for Underworld than Marvel Knights cards. As an added bonus, he got to send two incredibly strong signals downstream.

2. Crime and Punishment, Deathwatch

No real competition here—Alex snapped up the Savage Beatdown of the format.

3. Gravesite, Day of the Dead

Day of the Dead is well worth picking high, but Gravesite is such an indispensable part of the Underworld plan that this was essentially another no-brainer.

4. Orphan, Good Guy

5. Blackout, Morbius

An unexciting pack got Alex’s first 7-drop out of the way, but the next was far more interesting. Even with a Hypnotic Charms already in front of him, Alex demonstrated the importance of Underworld characters that can get cards into your KO’d pile. Plus, as he told me later, “There will always be another Morbius.”

6. Strength of the Grave, Morbius

Unfortunately, the next Morbius was sharing a pack with an even bigger bomb that has the potential to be better than Crime and Punishment in the right deck. Alex was planning to draft the right deck.

7. Vengeance

8. Venus Dee Milo, Dee Milo

9. Mysterious Fan Boy

10. The Spike

11. Corkscrew

After an uninspiring seventh pick, Alex read between the lines and leapt with gusto into his second affiliation, reaping some solid rewards. Note that all four X-Statix characters had passed through all eight pairs of hands before finding their way into Alex’s pile.

12. Coach

13. Micro-Chip

14. Monument to a Madman

Coach could possibly make the cut if Alex’s bottom end turned out disastrously, but his playable curve after the first pack looked something like this: 2, 4, 4, 6, 6, 7.

Second Pack

1. Psychoville, Nightmare

It’s not always a first pick, but Alex likes this location a lot more than most. He was confident this would not be his last chance to pick up a second on-color 7-drop . . .

2. Varnae, Zarathos

. . . Which turned out to be quite an understatement. It was a little annoying to miss out on Zarathos, but the team’s best 5-drop was never going to compete with the set’s best 7-drop. Alex had obviously done an excellent job of cutting off Underworld to his left.

3. Luke Cage, Power Man, Strength of the Grave, Dracula’s Castle

Here he went from the set’s best 7-drop to the set’s best 6-drop, and in a pack still chock full of Underworld goodness! Alex’s playable curve was now: 2, 4, 4, 6, 6, 6, 7, 7.

4. Black Magic, Day of the Dead

Alex continued to be spoiled for choice between Underworld-stamped cards. Here he grabbed the It’s Clobberin’ Time! of a new generation.

5. Anarchist, Tike Alicar

6. Luke Cage, Street Enforcer, Asmodeus

7. Plazm

With his upper curve already complete, Alex set about improving the quality of his middle order. The fact that Plazm was his first 3-drop was probably setting off a few alarm bells in his head.

8. Dead Girl, Venus Dee Milo, Telegenic Teleporter

This was a “lesser of two evils” pick. Alex took the view that there would be more 3-drop bodies in his future than 5-drops. He told me later that he didn’t want to miss out on good blue in the third pack because he was still filling his 5-drop ranks.

9. Mind Over Matter, Nightmare

Alex picked up a high quality plot twist on the wheel. The fact that Nightmare had also done a lap around the table indicated that neither of Alex’s affiliations were being conspicuously over-drafted.

10. Club Dead, Rough House

The plot twist was a stronger card to hate, but Alex didn’t want to risk sending any misleading signals in either direction.

11. Orphan, Guy Smith

12. Lacuna

Orphan was a much-needed addition to the ranks of Alex’s 3-drops, and Lacuna is always a late pick worth considering while the Marvel Team-Up dream is still alive.

13. The Hand

14. History does not relate. (That’s not a card, by the way.)

So, with only 14 picks remaining, it was perhaps time to relax some restrictions on what constituted a playable character and look at the curve in its entirety: 1, 2, 2, 3, 3, 4, 4, 4, 5, 5, 5, 6, 6, 6, 7, 7.

The major weak points were the 3- and 5-slots, and an additional 4-drop would not be wasted. Two more 2-drops would also be optimal, but their acquisition was less likely to be problematic.

Third Pack

1. Anton Hellgate, Zodiak

Alex immediately put his 4-drop concerns to rest with the only good card in this mediocre pack.

2. Blown to Pieces

Blue this good needs to be snapped up immediately when offered.

3. Zarathos, Skinner

Alex didn’t let the insane 5-drop slip through his fingers a second time. Skinner would have been a spectacular addition to his pile, but again, Alex prioritized his 5-drop quality over that of his 3-drops.

4. Hypnotic Charms

His second copy of the plot twist went a long way towards atoning for missing both copies of the tutor in the first pack.

5. Bloke, Brother Voodoo

Alex was sorely tempted to take the off-color 3-drop to bolster the vital slot, but ultimately stuck with his chosen teams to flesh out his 2-drops.

6. Sluk, Missed Drop

Despite his very high regard for this plot twist, an on-color 3-drop of this quality was impossible to pass at this stage.

7. Gin Genie, Go In Swinging, La Nuit

So satisfied was Alex with the quality of his blue already that he continued to prioritize curve filling above all else.

8. Dead Weight

9. Nekra, Nerve Strike

10. Grandstanding

Here he picked up a couple more playable plot twists and, at last, an Underworld 2-drop. Alex was well aware that Underworld characters were far more important to his deck than their X-Statix counterparts were, particularly in the early game . . .

11. Skinner

. . . Which meant that he all but cried tears of joy when this guy did a lap around the table.

12. Training Theater

13. The Darkhold

14. Armed Escort

The Deck

2: Bloke, Corkscrew, Lacuna, Nekra

3: Orphan, Guy Smith, Plazm, Skinner, Sluk

4: Anton Hellgate, Blackout, Luke Cage, Street Enforcer, The Spike

5. Anarchist, Tike Alicar, Vengeance, Zarathos

6: Luke Cage, Power Man, Mysterious Fan Boy, Venus Dee Milo, Dee Milo

7: Orphan, Good Guy, Varnae

L: Psychoville

P: Black Magic, Blown to Pieces, Crime and Punishment, Grandstanding, Gravesite, 2 Hypnotic Charms, Mind Over Matter, Strength of the Grave

Despite the deck being insane overall, Alex still had a number of interesting thirty-first card decisions to make. It’s worth repeating that the Underworld affiliation was significantly more useful to his plans than X-Statix, so Vengeance won over Dead Girl. Similarly, Lacuna trumped Gin Genie (since the former could at least potentially acquire the Underworld affiliation). Nevertheless, his X-Statix characters still outnumbered his Underworld ones, prompting the final call of Grandstanding over Club Dead.

Quarterfinals Opponent: Scott Hunstad

Scott had just come off a red-hot fourth place finish at PC Amsterdam. He was also the very first Draft Knight to be featured in one of these columns, which I have no doubt is an accomplishment of which he is even more proud. Scott won the toss (for the first time in his Draft Knights history) and chose the odd initiative.

Scott had a big think before choosing to keep. “I can now see the problems in my deck,” he announced prophetically. Alex mulliganed.

Both players hit curve on turns 2 and 3. Scott’s Hounds of Ahab and Suicide faced off against Alex’s Corkscrew and Skinner, the black borders on Alex’s characters protecting them from the nightmare of the Hounds lock. Scott flipped Gravesite after combat.

Alex led off with The Spike on turn 4 after pitching Bloke to Gravesite. Scott countered with Centurious, having pitched the far more impressive Anton Hellgate. The Spike swung down the curve into Suicide without incident.

As a prelude to his next attack, Alex flipped Hypnotic Charms to enable his two remaining characters to propose a team attack on Centurious. Scott prompted a rethink by flipping Club Dead and recovering Suicide to protect his 4-drop. Alex changed tacks, activating Psychoville to expose the Hounds, swinging Skinner into them, and discarding Nekra to keep his attacker face up.

Scott evened up the endurance totals a little by swinging back at The Spike with Centurious and playing Mist Form. He now trailed Alex 35-38. Make that 35-39 after Alex pitched Lacuna to Gravesite.

Scott dropped Mephisto, Soulstealer, and Alex looked concerned, despite replying with a Zarathos that only cost him a 2-drop to get into play. He hid The Spike behind the new arrival.

Centurious and Suicide teamed up on Zarathos, and Alex had no response other than to stun the 4-drop. Next, Scott stole all three souls from Alex’s KO’d pile and swung Mephisto at The Spike, trying to survive the attack with No Rest for the Wicked. Alex had the mirror plot twist Blown to Pieces, enabling his 4-drop to trade up. However, The Spike’s Hypnotic Charms life-support system no longer functioned with an empty KO’d pile, so into the KO’d pile he went.

Scott optimistically proposed Hounds to the face, but Alex predictably used the Psychoville technology to move Skinner into the line of fire. Scott sent his Hounds after their new quarry, flipping a Hell’s Fury in response to Alex’s first attempt to “Skinner-up” his defender, then played a second Hell’s Fury from hand after Alex discarded two more cards to save his 3-drop. With only two cards left in hand, Alex decided it was time to cut his losses. He now led Scott by only a single point of endurance, 24-25.

Luke Cage, Power Man came crashing down in front of Alex next turn and was soon facing off against the similarly large Blackheart. Scott chose to position him behind Suicide.

Zarathos swung way down the curve into Suicide, and Scott reinforced. Before his second and final attack, Alex dragged Mephisto into the visible area with Psychoville and then launched Power Man at him. Scott raided Alex’s KO’d pile again, removing all six character cards. He added one more from his own (leaving three) to bring about the trade. After recovering Suicide with Club Dead a second time, he was able to make a full recovery and enter turn 7 trailing by just 9 endurance points, 10-19 (11-20 after Gravesite).

A wrench was thrown into Scott’s works, however, when he could only enlist Battering Ram and Werewolf by Night on the critical seventh turn. Alex continued to hit curve like a madman, adding Orphan, Good Guy on his side.

After pondering for a time and mumbling that he wished he had 1 more endurance, Scott got the ball rolling by cracking Battering Ram to shut down Alex’s board. Then everybody except Blackheart ganged up on Orphan. Mephisto removed the single character card from Alex’s KO’d pile and two more from Scott’s to enable the trade before going down. Scott’s final attack was to swing Blackheart at Zarathos, but not even a Tryks to make the exchange one-sided was good enough.

Alex began the eighth turn with the initiative and an opponent on 6 endurance. After he recruited Varnae and pushed all his characters into the front row, Scott turned his thoughts to . . .

Quarterfinals – Game 2

“Varnae! I’ve got to go evens.” – Scott

“I think you do.” – Alex

Both players kept their hands and busted out a mostly new roster of characters on turns 2 and 3, with Alex’s Corkscrew and Orphan, Guy Smith trading blows with Scott’s Hannibal King and Elektra, Elektra Natchios. Gravesite was again flipped face up before the fourth turn.

“Why does it have to be you!” demanded Scott of his 4-drop, the obviously uninspiring Cloak, Child of Darkness.

“Don’t worry, I’m not hitting 4,” replied Alex as he under-dropped for the first time in the match with Plazm. Scott immediately capitalized on his good fortune by swinging Hannibal King up the curve into the new arrival. Then he swung Cloak down into Orphan and attempted to dodge the stun by playing a Tryks. Alex responded with a power-up, putting Orphan, Good Guy into his KO’d pile, but Scott had another Tryks up his sleeve. That left Elektra free to swing at Alex’s face and Corkscrew free to respond in kind. Scott led 34-32.

Alex returned to curve with Anarchist, Tike Alicar on turn 5. Punisher, Executioner finally came into play on Scott’s side, having been revealed to play both Elektra and Cloak. Cloak exhausted Orphan before he could cause any mischief, so Alex made the combolicious play of team attacking Punisher with Anarchist and Corkscrew, then stunning his 2-drop to play Grandstanding. Punisher went straight into the KO’d pile, and Alex was content to pass. Elektra exacted some revenge with a counterattack on Orphan. The score was now in Alex’s favor at 28-26.

Scott under-dropped with Mephisto, Soulstealer on turn 6, but Gravesite meant that the KO’d piles were sufficiently laden to ensure that Mephisto could swing with the big boys. On the subject of big boys, Luke Cage, Power Man was next to arrive on the table, and he immediately set about protecting Anarchist.

“I’m such a bad player. I’ll tell you why later. Actually, I probably won’t. It’s too embarrassing,” said Scott.

Despite his embarrassment, Scott managed to launch a series of furious attacks. First, Hannibal King and Cloak swung way up the curve into Luke, aided by a full-strength Hell’s Fury replaced from the resource row. The upswings continued as Elektra took down Anarchist with another full-strength Hell’s Fury. Finally, Mephisto used a third Hell’s Fury from the hand to swing down into Orphan without needing to steal a single soul.

After Gravesite formalities, Alex entered the build phase trailing 15-20. He hit curve emphatically with Varnae, while Scott could only under-drop again with Blackheart.

Alex proposed a clash between the two new arrivals, and Scott allowed the attack after draining all nine character cards out of Alex’s KO’d pile. In a baffling passage of play, Scott removed the four precious Underworld character cards from his own KO’d pile to play Strength of the Grave, but erroneously chose to boost ATK rather than DEF. He lost a total of 11 endurance when the attack concluded, compared to Alex’s 7.

Never one to stop kicking a man when he’s down, Alex activated Psychoville to de-cloak Cloak and then slammed Power Man into his soft underbelly. Crime and Punishment created a 19-point swing and an 18-point deficit. Scott could steal three more souls and swing back with a Mist Form, but it would not be enough.

Finals Opponent: Matthew Woodhall

Matthew was the great local hope after dispatching Australian James “Kongy” Kong (the third Draft Knights alumnus to make the Top 8) in a closely fought semifinal. Interestingly, Matthew was seated directly to Alex’s right during the draft. He kept his opening hand after Alex won the toss and chose evens. Alex also declined to mulligan.

Matthew had Caretaker in reply to Bloke on turn 2 but missed his 3-drop completely. When Alex’s Plazm hit the table, Matthew soon found himself on the receiving end of a 50-39 score line.

Alex maintained the rage with The Spike, and Matthew finally landed an impressive body in the shape of Moon Knight, who was immediately assigned protection duties. Plazm flew straight over the top to deal another 6 points of endurance loss through the 2-drop, then The Spike traded with his opposite number, leaving Bloke to again score a bonus hit to the face. Despite having missed only a single drop, Matthew was now reeling at 23-46.

Neither player could find a tier 1 5-drop, but both managed to hit curve—Matthew with Dead Girl and Alex with Vengeance. Matthew tried to drag Vengeance Out of the Darkness, but Alex had the Psychoville technology to negate the plot twist. Plan B was more successful—flipping Midnight Sons to enable Dead Girl to hit Vengeance with a Head Shot.

Moon Knight sought out a rematch with The Spike now that the lunar cycle was more favorable, and it was looking like a turn was finally going to go Matthew’s way. However, Alex returned fire with Plazm and Bloke on Dead Girl, then stunned his 2-drop to play Grandstanding. Matthew was left with two stunned characters and a 14-28 deficit heading into Alex’s initiative.

Alex signaled his intention to end the game this turn with Luke Cage, Power Man. Matthew replied with the identically sized Ghost Rider, Johnny Blaze. Alex launched The Spike up the curve at Dead Girl and conjured up some Black Magic. Matthew could only reinforce.

When the 6-drops clashed, Matthew gave himself a fighting chance with Dead Weight. However, when Alex had the Mind Over Matter, Matthew pulled the plug on a brutal game.

Finals – Game 2

Alex kept his opening hand after Matthew opted for the even initiative. Matthew took a mulligan and then missed his 2-drop. Alex had Corkscrew, then Orphan, Guy Smith. Matthew triumphantly found a 3-drop in the shape of Mr. Code.

The big guns started hitting the table on turn 4, with Matthew’s Moon Knight facing off against Luke Cage, Street Enforcer. Moon Knight swung down the curve into Orphan, and Alex reinforced. Matthew tried to drag another of Alex’s characters Out of the Darkness, this time Luke Cage, but Alex was again able to negate the effect by flipping and activating Psychoville. Mr. Code reset his sights on Corkscrew, and then fell to Luke’s counterattack.

The impressive bodies continued on turn 5, with Alex dropping Anarchist, Tike Alicar and Matthew opting for Vivisector, Lunatic Lycanthrope. Anarchist collected Orphan en route to a team attack on Vivisector, and Matthew chose to KO Orphan.

“Orphan?!” – Alex (and pretty much everybody else watching the game).

Matthew confirmed his decision. To his credit, having played a commendably tight playoff series up to this point, he simply acknowledged his fault and got on with the game.

Alex proposed Luke Cage, Street Enforcer on Moon Knight, then activated Psychoville’s second power to keep his attacker face up. He entered the recovery phase 14 points ahead, 40-26.

Matthew again found Ghost Rider, Johnny Blaze on his sixth turn, and Alex replied with Venus Dee Milo, Dee Milo. Matthew optimistically targeted Luke Cage with Out of the Darkness, prompting Alex’s well-worn Psychoville maneuver. However, the fact that the plot twist was played from hand increased Ghost Rider’s ATK from 12 to 14, and the 6-drop could now launch into his opposite number. Alex, of course, had Blown to Pieces to force the trade. The combat phase concluded with Moon Knight swinging up the curve into Anarchist and Luke Cage swinging down into Mr. Code.

Endurance totals of 27-10 meant that we were probably entering the last turn of the entire tournament, and both players rose to the occasion. Varnae led off proceedings, and Dr. Strange soon joined her. Matthew put the new arrival behind his 6-drop and declined to hide any of his characters.

Alex took no chances, swinging Venus and Luke into Ghost Rider to ensure the stun. His final play was to propose Varnae on Dr. Strange, then flip a Crime and Punishment for style points.

Conclusion

Mad Propz™ to Alex for finally winning a $10K after three consecutive Top 4 appearances. This column is going to take a break while the locals acclimatize themselves to Green Lantern. If and when they have some wisdom to impart, you’ll be the first to know! Please send any and all pleas for the next episode to vsrules@gmail.com.