The undefeated New Zealand machine (playing Curve Sentinels, the machine deck), Shaun Heyward, took on Brisbane’s own Peter Allen in a mirror match. Shaun was nothing short of methodical, ripping all four of his Overloads and gaining good board advantage.

Peter missed the all-important Bastion, adding to his woes. Shaun extended his winning run.

There were six other players at 5-1 (other than Allen) and they faced off against each other. Alex Brown took on Melbourne’s Anthony Macali in a Titans mirror match, while Sydney’s Paul Van der Werk and Brisbane’s Early Nguyen featured another clash of the Sentinel machines. The only non-mirror match was Sydney’s Randall Hughes’ Rigged Elections deck against Adrian Capilitan’s Common Enemy. Macali built up a better board than the Auckland $10K champion.

Alex lamented choosing the “wrong initiative” and that he missed elements of the crucial Terra, Roy Harper ◊ Arsenal and Garth ◊ Tempest board development plan. Van der Werk had the much better early board, as Early suffered a bad draw and missed “infi” drops. It was a quick, brutal victory for Paul.

Meanwhile, Adrian’s Doom components had too many control elements to permit Randall’s Rigged Elections combo to come off in a long, dour game. Adrian reportedly never misses a chance to drop Boris. “I love old man Boris,” he said.

“No, old man Boris loves you,” judge Ryan Dare said.