Robin Pailer is a 30-year-old worker in a German print shop. The Curve Sentinel deck he played, which runs Juggernaut instead of Magneto, Master of Magnetism, was the main reason for covering this matchup. Though it was a high-ranking match, of course, my main interest was in seeing if Juggernaut could pay off in a documented case.

Tomas Kosicka, from the Czech Republic, is a 37-year-old professional analyst. He was running a very focused Big Brotherhood deck that had carried him to a 6-2 record thus far.

Kosicka won the roll and opted to take the odd initiative. Pailer had Juggernaut in his opening hand and he kept it. Huzzah! Neither player had a 1-drop.

Pailer had nothing on turn 2 and was smacked lightly about by a Toad. Kosicka followed him up with a Quicksilver, Pietro Maximoff, forcing Pailer to place his turn-drop, Sentinel Mark II, in his back row. Quicksilver attacked the Mark II and got a power-up with Lost City, and Pailer wasn’t looking too happy. Combat resolved, stunning the Mark II, and Toad again smacked for 3.

It was Pailer’s turn for some retribution. Controlling the initiative, he recruited Sentinel Mark V. He formed up with the Mark II protecting the Mark V and lucked out—Kosicka had nothing to recruit! However, he made the mistake of sending his Mark II into Toad. “Arg, that was a mistake.” He opted to power up to save himself from the stun, but shook his head, waiting for a response. Kosicka didn’t have any sort of retort, though, and lost 5. Mark V then swung into Quicksilver and Kosicka activated him in response, burning for 5. Quicksilver got another power-up, and Avalon Space Station brought back both Quicksilvers. Another was discarded for a power-up—the Mark V ate it. The score was 45 to 29 in favor of Kosicka.

Magneto swooped onto the field on Kosicka’s side, and Pailer couldn’t find a Nimrod. He opted for a boosted Mark V, instead. Mags exhausted one Mark V and Kosicka activated Avalon Space Station, swinging with Magneto into the ready Mark V and giving it a power-up. Showing stunning flexibility for a robot, the accosted Sentinel was powered up and then given an Acrobatic Dodge, narrowly taking him out of stun range. Quicksilver then attacked into the Mark II. Kosicka had spent some time deliberating an attack against the Mark V, but he didn’t like Pailer’s superior hand presence. Pailer used a Cover Fire, Kosicka powered up, and the Mark Vs shot off yet another round of Cover Fire. Toad gave one last try, attempting to take out the Mark II. Both characters would have been stunned, but Toad scampered back to Kosicka’s hand. The 9 ATK/9 DEF Mark V slammed into Quicksilver, and the score was 37 to 26. Pailer was still down, but he was gaining ground.

With the initiative behind him, Pailer recruited Bastion. He formed up with Bastion protecting the Mark II and the boosted Mark V protecting the other one. Kosicka chose an L formation, with Magneto in back and Sabretooth, Victor Creed in front of Quicksilver—a very effective choice.

“Mark V on Quicksilver,” announced Pailer after long consideration. In response, Kosicka activated Avalon Space Station, ditched Toad for two Quicksilvers, and discarded them both to try and save him. It seemed like a poor choice to overextend for such a small factor. A Savage Beatdown laid Quicksilver low anyway, and Pailer, who at one point was at a hideous disadvantage, seemed to be gaining a lot of speed.

He looked at his resource row and then at me. “Can I bribe you to not report my stupidities?” He flashed an Overload from his resource row—he could have used it on the Quicksilver to stun him and reset the attack. He took it in stride though, and it was a mistake he’d later cherish.

The boosted Mark V attacked Magneto, and Bastion gave it +1 with a discarded Boliver Trask. One of Kosicka’s two remaining cards was Magneto, though, and he discarded it to take out the Mark V. Bastion then attacked into Magneto and stunned him, dishing out 8 endurance. The score was 24 to 18, a narrow lead for Kosicka, and he contemplated attacking with Sabretooth. He opted not to and recovered Magneto, seeming to telegraph the lack of a Master of Magnetism for next turn.

It was turn 7, and Kosicka controlled the initiative. Whatever happened, it seemed likely that we’d at least see the Juggernaut that Pailer had been tearing up the field with. With no turn-drop, Kosicka Avalon’d for Toad and Quicksilver, Speed Demon. He recruited both.

“Now, the moment we have all been waiting for is about to come!” Pailer dropped Juggernaut.

Kosicka was formed up with everything in front, so Juggernaut’s main effect was kind of moot. But he was still a wall, and backed by Bastion, he made an imposing presence on the field. Kosicka carefully considered his attack. If he made one false step he’d be a goner, and unless he had a second Avalon Space Station in his row, he would only have one card in hand. He had a total of 33 ATK on the table, but he’d need to commit virtually all of it to Juggernaut if he wanted to take him out. If he didn’t, then Toad was going to earn a one way ticket to the world’s largest Juggernaut beating.

Sure enough, Kosicka’s first move was to slam Toad into Juggernaut, just to get him out of the way. Quicksilver attacked Bastion, a second Avalon Space Station flipped, and two Quicksilvers powered him up. He was a 14 ATK/14 DEF. Cover Fire put Bastion at 16 DEF, and another power-up put Quicksilver one point above his needed threshold. But here came that Overload, the one Pailer berated himself for not flipping on the smaller Quicksilver turns ago! Kosicka grasped his head in both hands for a minute straight, trying to think of a way out, but he had nothing. Quicksilver exploded.

Kosicka gave up on Juggernaut and sent Victor Creed after Bastion. Pailer took some time to do some math, and then bumped Bastion up by 2 points with the last two cards in his hand. Kosicka looked at Juggernaut, smiled, and offered the handshake to Pailer. He flipped over a set Not So Fast—he had the disruption, but not the card to pay for it with! Juggernaut could not be stopped, and with a little luck, Robin Pailer claimed another victory!

Match Win: Robin Pailer

After the match, Robin Pailer mentioned that he and Maik Stich discovered Juggernaut from reading my article about it two weeks ago on Metagame.com. I proceeded to experience warm fuzzy feelings of professional validation.