Sohnle’s deck is a fully dedicated Fantastic Four Equipment build that’s capable of 
insanity. Weinberger is packing a standard Mutant Nation deck that is almost certainly 
the only one in the tournament. 
 
In the first game, Dean started with a turn 1 Ant Man and immediately revealed 
Thinking Outside the Box. He followed with a turn 2 Invisible Woman, The Invisible Girl 
before Weinberger finally made a move. When the German did move, Wolverine, Logan 
arrived.
 
On turn 3, Mr. Fantastic, Reed Richards showed up and 
immediately coughed up Flamethrower for Dean. On the 
next turn, Dean’s combo started working, with Mr. 
Fantastic setting cards up for Thinking Outside the Box, 
and Antarctic Research Base refilling his hand.
 
Andre could do little more than stare at Dean’s growing 
setup. Pretty soon, the Englishman had four equipped 
characters to Weinberger’s lone Wolverine. Andre played 
the expected turn 4 Sabretooth, Feral Rage, but 
somehow that seemed pedestrian compared to Sohnle’s 
army.
 
Riding the wings of A Child Named Valeria, Dean had the 
nerve to bring down Sabretooth without losing a 
character. He finished the turn with a 20-endurance 
                                        lead!
 
Weinberger unloaded Quicksilver, Speed Demon on turn 5, but Dean was enjoying his 
deck a bit too much. He revealed Pier 4, dropped a few more pieces of equipment, 
and then used Cosmic Radiation for some extra sickness. He used Flamethrower and 
Advanced Hardware while playing Cosmic Radiation to burn Andre, and soon had the
German picking up his cards.
 
Weinberger needed a faster start in game 2 if he were to play in the semifinals. He 
certainly needed to get in some damage before Sohnle’s toys kicked in.
 
Strangely enough, they both had no plays for the first 3 turns. The first to blink was 
Dean with a turn 4 Human Torch, Hotshot, quickly followed by Unstable Molecules. 
Again, Weinberger had nothing to play.
 
Finally, Andre found a character. On turn 5, he played Quicksilver, Speed Demon. 
Dean answered with Mr. Fantastic, Reed Richards, and then he Signal Flared for 
Invisible Woman, The Invisible Girl.
 
When Dean revealed Antarctic Research Base, Andre sank in his chair. The game was 
quickly getting out of hand for him. Weinberger tried to strike back with Quicksilver, 
but the Englishman was at full speed. 
 
Dean was moving so quickly that he added a second equipment card to several 
characters before revealing the Pier 4 in his resource row. He quickly noticed the 
error and tried to correct it, but it didn’t help that he’d already drawn cards with 
Antarctic Research Base from the extra equipment recruits. The situation led to a 
judges’ conference.
 
Since Dean had already made a similar mistake earlier on, the head judge was forced 
to give him a game loss. Weinberger got a free win, and Sohnle was somewhat rattled 
while shuffling for the deciding game. He’d had the quarterfinals wrapped up, but had 
failed to lock them up.
 
This time, Dean had a turn 1 play—Ant Man. He followed that with 
Mr. Fantastic, Reed Richards on turn 2. Then he revealed Antarctic Research Base, 
while Andre revealed Cerebro so he could find and pump out 
Nightcrawler, Kurt Wagner.
 
They were both off to a great start. Cerebro failed on turn 3, however, sending away 
Sabretooth, Feral Rage and leaving Weinberger with no play. Across the table, Dean 
was speeding up again. He used Signal Flare to find and play 
Invisible Woman, The Invisible Girl, and then he started unloading equipment cards to 
cycle through his deck with Antarctic Research Base.
 
The Pogo Plane gave Dean his Pier 4 on the next turn.
 
Dean: “I’m not forgetting this time.”
 
With a single Nightcrawler, Kurt Wagner on the table, 
Andre could do little more than stare and hope for a 
second miracle as Dean went into overdrive with his 
gadgets.
 
Weinberger played a turn 4 Sabretooth, Feral Rage. 
Dean’s fully armed Invisible Woman attacked 
Nightcrawler, but Lost City saved the fuzzy elf. Dean’s 
Ant Man grabbed his gear and struck down the mighty 
Sabretooth in the same turn.
 
The German’s Nightcrawler had no chance to strike back, 
and Andre was forced to end the fourth turn with his 
opponent at a healthy 47 endurance. Cerebro dug up some extra trouble for Andre,
and out came Magneto, Eric Lehnsherr.
 
Unimpressed, Dean dropped Thing, Ben Grimm and a boatload of equipment cards. 
Weinberger’s crew came, but Sohnle put a stop to any ideas about stunning his 
characters with A Child Named Valeria. Still, the breakthrough damage brought Dean 
crashing down to 31 endurance.
 
Dean’s Fantastic Four crew took a deep breath and struck back with a vengeance, 
getting a little help from Cosmic Radiation. Weinberger fell to 18 endurance.
 
With two extra copies of Cosmic Radiation in hand, Dean tried very, very hard not to 
screw up the last step. He nervously unloaded his equipment cards and let Weinberger 
have a go at recruiting. Out came Colossus.
 
Dean attacked and brought Weinberger down to 0, and when he showed the German 
the next Cosmic Radiation, Andre smiled and scooped.
 
Dean Sohnle advances to the semifinals, where he’ll play against the winner of the Iain 
Reid vs. Jonathan Challis quarterfinal match.