This round 6 feature match pits Darwin Kastle of YMG, a New England team that’s been dominating TCGs since the dawn of cardboard, against Steve Horowitz. After a little deliberation about who would get the honor of using the scorekeeper, the players shuffled up for their match.
Darwin Kastle started turn 1 with an Ape X that got a rather fetching set of Dual Sidearms. Steve followed by recruiting a Destiny, Irene Adler. He activated his Destiny and predicted that Ape X would stun. When Darwin attacked in, Steve flipped up The New Brotherhood for a mutual stun.
Steve managed to jump ahead on the next turn by playing a Lorelei and a Mastermind. When Darwin had no recruit for his turn 2, it appeared that he would be in for some beats. Mastermind took down Ape X, as Destiny predicted, and the rest of the team sent Darwin crashing down to 35.
Turn 3 saw Darwin get back on track with a Lady Lark, but his increased hand size from his missed turn 2 was going to be a problem. Steve continued to curve out nicely by adding a Mammomax to his squad. He then chose Ape X again with Destiny, and then let Darwin begin combat. Darwin sent Ape X into Mammomax, and thanks to a Mega-Blast, the ape stunned the elephant. Darwin then discarded two Airskimmers to fly over Destiny and hit the lovely Lorelei hiding behind her. Before the attack finished, though, Darwin had a few tricks. He played Answer the Call and responded to it by playing the last card in his hand, a Panacea Potion. This allowed him to recover his Ape X and get a power-up for his Lady Lark. It also allowed him to have a zero hand size so that he could flip up a TNB of his own in Rocket Central. At the end of the turn, Darwin was ahead in endurance 30–29.
On turn 4, Steve had only a Toad as his recruit. It appeared that his deck had finally caught up with its initial rush. Darwin had his ideal Golden Archer and was apparently back on top after his early falter. Steve chose Ape X with Destiny and began his swing. He sent his Toad in after Darwin’s Lady Lark and then returned it to his hand when it was to be stunned. Next, his Mastermind got some help from a Flying Kick and flew over to hit the “destined to die” Ape X. Steve’s final attack of the turn was to send his Mammomax into Darwin’s Golden Archer. Steve used a couple of power-ups to force through a bit of extra endurance loss and went to the next turn with Darwin behind 8–19.
Turn 5 was set to be the last turn of the game one way or another. Darwin had the initiative and recruited an Albert Gaines ◊ Nuke. With a zero hand size, Nuke was prepped and ready for a monster endurance swing. Steve thought for a very long time about the proper course of action for his build. Darwin called a judge over to make sure the game didn’t take longer than it needed to and to keep Steve on pace. After some prodding from the judge, Steve decided to play a Magneto, Eric Lehnsherr. This was a tough debate for him because this meant he would have to exhaust his Mammomax. Darwin began by attacking Magneto with his Nuke. After using not one but two Answer the Calls to get power-ups, Nuke was a whopping 17 ATK / 13 DEF. Steve flipped up his second The New Brotherhood and KO’d a Genosha to make sure they could stun back. He also popped another Genosha in an attempt to find a power-up to absorb some damage. After finding none, the attack succeeded, and Steve was left with no ready characters and only 6 endurance. Golden Archer was able to finish off the rest.
Darwin Kastle wins!