Hey all! Welcome back to another week of Breaking Ground. I realize that it has been well over a week since Pro Circuit San Francisco ended, but from my perspective, it’s just been a couple of days. In fact, even though I slept for nearly fourteen hours Monday night following the PC, I am still worn out! Working on about ten hours of sleep over four days can certainly take a lot out of a person.

My article this week will be part tournament report and part deckbuilding exercise. I wanted to include a decklist, as that is what everyone comes here to read, but I also thought that a tournament report would be fun, as I have some great stories to tell. So, here’s the tournament report:

Thursday, June 1

I can honestly say that I had never been quite as excited for a PC as I was for this one. I really felt good about the team’s chances and was sure that someone (probably Tim Batow) would grace the team with another Top 8 finish.

My plane landed at the San Francisco airport around 10 AM. I met up with the Tulsa guys¾Tim, Shane Wiggans, and John Hall¾and we headed over to pick up the minivan we had rented for the weekend. Afterward, we headed over to the Delta terminal to pick up John Tatta and Justin Hostutler, who had landed from their flight at around 11 AM. We headed to the hotel to unpack and clean up so that we could head over to the PC site.

We went over to the tournament site to check out the festivities and get registered for the PC. I played in a quick four-man draft where I pounded on Tim and John Hall. By the time the beatings had ceased, everyone was pretty worn out, so we went back to the hotel to relax.

After I went to the airport to pick up Jayson Cody (a friend of mine and a local player from Dallas), we ate over at the hotel restaurant. Much like the hotel, it was quite upscale. Fortunately, Shane used his PC winnings from Atlanta to cover the bill. Everyone enjoyed living the high life for at least one night.

Around midnight, I made the trek to pick up Jeremy Blair and his buddy John Viola. Their flight had been rerouted to Dallas and they had arrived three hours late. Still, they had made it to San Francisco, so everyone was happy.

Friday, June 2

Our trip to the tournament site was an event, as the minivan was designed to seat seven people, and we had nine . . . and most of us are quite large! We actually made the trek by sticking Batow in the trunk (no joke!) and Tatta on the coffee holder. Quite an unpleasant trip for both, I would imagine.

The first two rounds of the PC went well, as I managed to beat Ian Kasoff’s Anti-Green Lantern deck and Michael Jacob’s Killing Joke deck without too much of a problem. However, I scored my first loss against Chris Jilot’s Squadron Fate deck when I forgot to activate Slaughter Swamp to counter his Panacea Potion.

I got back to winning ways in rounds 4 and 5, taking down Chris Turnage and Jonas Skali, both of whom were wielding Good Guys decks. While Good Guys is possibly the strongest deck in the format, it tends to wilt when Kang, Kang Cobra is in play. Unfortunately, Kang decided not to make an appearance during my sixth round loss to Eric Hunter’s Good Guys deck. Where is Enemy of My Enemy when you need it?

My results were far more favorable in my round 7 feature match against Chuck Bell. Chuck had me on the ropes early with FTN’s Mexican Hardware Store. However, my draw of four copies of Knightmare Scenario turned my board into a defensive barrier through which none of Chuck’s attacks could pass. I wish I could say the same for my eighth round match against Dean Sohnle’s Deep Green deck. Unfortunately, my deck didn’t cough up a character for the first three turns. Still, I somehow managed to make it a nail biter, losing by a final score of 2 to -1.

In round 9, I faced my fourth $10K winner of the day in Quang Nguyen. Unfortunately for Quang, his JSA / Checkmate deck coughed up a hairball (much like mine did in round 8) as he missed his 4- and 5-drops. So I strolled into round 10 at 6-3 and proceeded to lose to Paolo Fisicaro’s G’Lock deck. While I was able to dominate most of the game, two copies of Revitalize on turn 6 kept Paolo’s board intact. He then proceeded to gain 15 endurance on turn 8 for the alternate win with Captain Marvel, Champion of Magic.

After the tournament, the entire team (along with Jayson, John Viola, and Martin Weis) headed out to see X-Men III. We followed that escapade up with, fittingly enough, a draft of The X-Men. In two words, my draft was really bad. I knew that I would have to step it up to have a shot at money on Day 2.

Saturday, June 3

My preferred Draft strategy for The X-Men is usually Morlocks. However, I knew that it would probably be over-drafted, so I decided to try my hand at X-Men Energy for the first draft. The result was an absolutely amazing concoction that probably should have led me to a 3-0 performance. However, I ran afoul of Neil Reeves in the first round. Despite the fact that I managed to Drain Essence on his 3- and 4-drops, Neil was able to stay in the game with four copies of Army of One. He ended up taking the game on turn 8 by 1 point of endurance.*

After a bye in round 12, I managed to draw the nuts against Justin Desai en route to a 33-0 win on turn 6. Justin is a great player and a great guy, but a full curve supported by multiple copies of Drain Essence and The Evil Eye was too much for him to handle.

My second draft nearly went south in a hurry, as I first-picked a Shrapnel Blast and then got little else to support it. After the first pack, I had two copies of Image Inducer, two copies of Kill or Be Killed, and an assortment of little characters from every team except the X-Men. So, I decided to try to make a non-Blackbird Blue off-curve deck work. The result was actually pretty decent, as nine of my eleven non-character cards were pumps of some type (including two copies of Planet X). It put up winning performances against Shaun Hayward and Robert Swarowski but faltered against Michael Dalton’s Neutralized and Drain Essence on turns 3 and 4, respectively.

My final draft was (at least initially in my mind) my worst draft of the day. While I had a few great Morlocks cards, I had to patch the holes with Physical characters from other teams. However, I managed to pull off an insane X-Corp: Paris / District X / Beef combo in my first match against Arnaud Vilain that scored me the win. And while I didn’t get the combo in my next match against Adam Fears, Beef and multiple copies of Kill or Be Killed still scored me a huge win. But my final round opponent, Adam Prosak, trumped my combo in the final round by KO’ing my entire board on turn 3. While Beef can be a monster, he does work better with the support of a team.

Sunday, June 4

The final day of the PC did not start out optimally for me, as I went 0-2 drop in the Sealed PCQ with a truly horrendous set of packs. I then managed to lose my first round match to Mike French in an eight-man booster draft, and then followed that up with a loss to Ryan Jones in a side game. After that, Mike Rosenberg laid a whoopin’ on me with his Qward deck. I figured that I had used up all of my luck during the PC. Of course, my losing streak was relatively minor compared to the loss that Tim was handed in the PC quarterfinals by eventual winner Ian Vincent. While I am happy for Ian and his victory (as Ian is a great player and all-around nice guy), I was understandably sad that my little buddy Tim didn’t make it farther.

My high note of the day was an invitation by Anand Khare and Ben Seck to take part in an Infinite Crisis draft for fun. The participants were a truly dazzling array of players, including Anand, Ben, Eugene Harvey, Gabby Izsac, Luke Bartter, Stephen Silverman, and Tommy Ashton. With that powerhouse group, I expected to get crushed badly. Imagine my surprise when I drafted what was, without a doubt, my strongest Infinite Crisis Draft deck ever. With the exception of a single copy of Kilowog, Drill Sergeant, my deck was a pure Checkmate powerhouse. I was able to beat Anand handily by over 30 points on turn 5. Of course, it was his first Infinite Crisis draft, and he did pay 20 endurance to put Nightmaster, Demon Slayer into play on turn 5. But in my mind, it was a gratifying victory nonetheless.

After taking my Florida teammates to the airport and heading back to the PC site to watch my buddy John Hall finish the Constructed PCQ with an undefeated record, I headed over to the Hard Rock Cafe to have dinner with John, Tim, Shane, and our new barn Josh Wiitanen. At the restaurant, we met up with Joe Corbett, Keebler Powell, and some of their buddies.** Afterward, we headed back to the hotel to get some rest before the flight out on Monday.

PC Aftermath – What’s the Best Deck in the Format?

The Pro Circuit in San Francisco brought us some truly phenomenal decks. Foremost in many people’s minds is the amazing Killing Joke deck that was sported by The Donkey Club and sent fifteen of its eighteen members to Day 2. Of course, FTN’s Mexican Hardware Store boasted similarly impressive results, with ten of eleven players making the cut to Saturday. There were also a few other decks that had impressive showings on Day 1, such as Checkmate Toolbox, Fate Artifacts variants, and Good Guys. And stalwart powerhouses like G’Lock and Squadron Supreme remained moderately successful even amidst all the new deck tech.

So, with all of these great decks, and Justice League of Arkham banned, which one will dominate Silver Age? The answer, my friends, is quite simple: it’s Revenge Squad.

Quote the entire Vs. System public, “Revenge Squad?!”

Okay . . . before you close your browser and toss your monitor out the window in disgust, let me explain. The simple truth is that Revenge Squad¾or, perhaps more appropriately, Revenge Squad with some help from the Injustice Gang¾is the deck that can deal with all of these new powerhouses. If you looked around the PC, you no doubt saw several decks sporting Revenge Squad tech. Hope and Phantom Zone were key components to TDC’s Killing Joke deck. Metallo made an appearance in Ian Vincent’s winning Deep Green build. Heck, my team had Bizarro, ME AM BIZARRO #1 in our build to allow for access to his namesake Bizarro World. Revenge Squad is so hot in the Silver Age!

With all of this great tech, it serves to reason that a deck that could successfully incorporate all of it would control the Silver Age metagame. So we’re going to do just that. Maybe the Revenge Squad has gotten the shaft in the past, but with the help of their pals from the Injustice Gang, they are about to lay a hurting on every other deck in Silver Age!

The Build

You will notice that this deck bears a striking resemblance to several of my other Silver Age builds. So, instead of doing a card-by-card analysis of the deck, I’m going to give you the decklist and then discuss the key cards in each matchup for the deck.

The Kings of the Silver Age (60 cards)

Characters (30)

2 Mikado and Mosha, Angels of Destruction

1 Mr. Mxyzptlk, Troublesome Trickster

4 Infernal Minions, Army

1 Deadshot, Dead Aim

1 Mr. Mxyzptlk, Fifth Dimension Imp

4 Poison Ivy, Deadly Rose

1 Lex Luthor, Champion of the Common Man

4 Lex Luthor, Nefarious Philanthropist

4 Metallo, John Corben

1 The Joker, Headline Stealer

1 Abra Kadabra, Citizen Abra

2 Scarecrow, Psycho Psychologist

1 Eradicator, Doctor David Connor

1 Ocean Master, Son of Atlan

1 The Joker, Permanent Vacation

1 The Joker, Emperor Joker

Plot Twists (25)

3 All Too Easy

4 Criminal Mastermind

4 Gang-Up, Team-Up

2 Hostage Situation

4 Power Siphon

4 Secret Files

1 State of the Union

2 Straight to the Grave

1 Unmasked

Locations (5)

1 Bizarro World

1 Fifth Dimension

1 Injustice Gang Satellite

1 Phantom Zone

1 Slaughter Swamp 

Key cards: Mikado and Mosha; Lex Luthor, Nefarious Philanthropist; Metallo; Criminal Mastermind; Gang-Up; Power Siphon; Slaughter Swamp

Okay, so this deck isn’t really a Squadron Supreme no-hand deck, per se. However, it does boast several characters that benefit from having few to no cards in hand (Joystick, Shape, and Golden Archer, for example). As such, the Injustice Gang strategy of many, many cards in hand can effectively turn these characters into dead cards. In addition, the multitude of equipment cards in the deck makes Metallo a monster.

Key cards: Metallo; Abra Kadabra; Eradicator, Doctor David Connor; All Too Easy; Fifth Dimension; Injustice Gang Satellite; Phantom Zone

The key to beating this deck is to provide enough disruption to disable it. The characters are naturally large and have very potent effects. More importantly, the deck allows a player to dump cards from hand rather easily (hence the need for Abra Kadabra). However, the deck is certainly not fast, so it is relatively easy to get to turns 6 and 7. If you can launch a single successful attack with Eradicator, then the Checkmate deck will probably be crippled beyond repair. Metallo also provides some effective offense against Knight Armor, which can be an effective damage deterrent for the Checkmate deck.

Key cards: Metallo, Power Siphon

Characters equipped with the Fate Artifacts can get really big! But the problem with this strategy is that Metallo just destroys them. If you get off one successful attack with Metallo against a character equipped with the Fate Artifacts, then you can pretty much call it game, because the Fate Artifacts deck usually can’t handle losing three equipment cards and +4 ATK / +4 DEF worth of pump. In a format full of power equipment, Metallo is an MVP!

Key cards: Mikado and Mosha, Metallo, Abra Kadabra, Hostage Situation, Unmasked, Injustice Gang Satellite, Phantom Zone

I was surprised that so many of the Good Guys decks in San Francisco had cards to deal with Kang, Kang Cobra but didn’t really have anything to deal with Unmasked. To be fair, there really are only a few teams with cards that can search out Unmasked. Thankfully, Revenge Squad is one of them. With a couple of copies of Hostage Situation in the deck, there are effectively three copies of Unmasked at a player’s disposal, but the deck only plays a single copy. Metallo is great in this matchup as well, since Nth Metals can scrap just as easily as Fate Artifacts from Metallo’s golden touch.

Key cards: Poison Ivy, Deadly Rose; Lex Luthor, Nefarious Philanthropist; The Joker, Headline Stealer; Scarecrow, Psycho Psychologist; The Joker, Permanent Vacation; The Joker, Emperor Joker; Hostage Situation; State of the Union; Bizarro World; Phantom Zone

While it may no longer rule the roost, G’Lock is still a force to be reckoned with. The power recursion of Dr. Light, Master of Holograms combined with the defensive power and endurance gain of Malvolio and Katma Tui make for a tough match for most any deck. Add in that the G’Lock deck has a new win condition with Captain Marvel, Champion of Magic, and the deck can hold its own in even the toughest of fields. Fortunately for us, the Revenge Squad has some neat tools to stymie the G’Lock efforts. While the steady burn of Scarecrow won’t normally be an issue for G’Lock thanks to its ability to gain back endurance, Bizarro World makes G’Lock’s task much more difficult. And if the G’Lock player tries to get feisty with a Breaking Ground on your Bizarro World, you can show them what for with State of the Union. Unless there’s a “Major Disaster,” you should be safe and sound.***

Key cards: Mikado and Mosha; Lex Luthor, Nefarious Philanthropist; Metallo; Criminal Mastermind; Gang-Up; Power Siphon; Slaughter Swamp

Not much to say here. Squadron’s “no hand” strategy loses pretty badly to Lex Luthor and crew.

There are a few other cards that require some explanation. Infernal Minions is really only in the deck to facilitate having a drop on the first turn. It can be nice for activating early copies of Criminal Mastermind and Secret Files but will usually be sacrificed for Poison Ivy’s effect.

Deadshot, Dead Aim and Mr. Mxyzptlk, Fifth Dimension Imp are perfect enablers for Poison Ivy. Deadshot turns any 3-drop or higher into a pseudo Dr. Light, Master of Holograms, and Mr. Mxyzptlk will usually come out for free every turn after you have an active team-up. Once they are in play, you can KO either one to fetch a location and then repeat again on the next turn.

Lex Luthor, Champion of the Common Man and Ocean Master are primarily in the deck for the mirror. The newest 3-drop Lex is the biggest of the 3-drop versions that we’ve seen so far. With the accelerated draw created by Injustice Gang decks, he also has a relevant effect, turning any plot twist into an ATK pump. And Ocean Master is just plain amazing with an effect that rivals Bastion in terms of sheer power.

The preferred initiative is probably evens. Your plan is to get Poison Ivy and Lex Luthor into play on turns 2 and 3, respectively. Obviously, you’d like to have a copy of Infernal Minions in play on turn 1, as well. But don’t hesitate to play Mikado and Mosha or Mr. Mxyzptlk, Troublesome Trickster so that Ivy will have some kind of fuel for her effect. Even if you miss one, you can bring Deadshot or Mr. Mxyzptlk, Fifth Dimension Imp into play for free in later turns as fodder for her effect.

With a decent draw, the deck certainly has enough power to win on turn 5 or 6. However, against more defensive or stall-oriented decks, you might be better off going for the turn 8 win with The Joker, Emperor Joker. Not only is it quite viable in this build, but it’s also a lot of fun to see your opponent’s face when you beat him or her with Emperor Joker!

Well, that wraps up this week’s discussion. I’m off for some much-needed rest. If you have any questions, comments, suggestions, or the like to share with me, send me an email at BigSpooky1@hotmail.com. I admit to being very bad about returning emails, but I am very good about reading them. Whether I get back to you or not, please know that I would love to hear what you have to say.

Take care, and we’ll see you back here next week. Same Spooky-time, same Spooky-channel.

* You can read all about Neil’s victory with Piper in Ben Seck’s PC Day 2 blog at Metagame.com. Even though I lost, I still think it’s pretty funny stuff!

** While I was at the Hard Rock Cafe, I came up with a game that I am positive will become the most popular side event at future Pro Circuits and $10Ks: “Rub the Head of the Keeb.” The object is simply to rub Keebler Powell’s head for an extended duration of time. While there are no prizes for accomplishing this feat, it will give you a great deal of personal satisfaction. And for you Vs. System players in the Ohio area, you are more than welcome to play in this side event whenever “The Keeb” is around.

*** Hee hee! I made a pun!