John Rich is the spiritual leader of Bam Bam Bigelow’s Gigolos (or 3BG for short), a new Vs. team that includes Rich, Josh Wiitanen, and Matthew Meyer. The name for the team comes from Rich’s uncanny resemblance to the famous wrestling figure.
Rich could not make up his mind this morning between three different deck lists, and finally left it up to a judge to decide for him. When he signed up for the tournament, he presented three face-down deck lists and asked the judge taking signups to pick one at random.
He ended up playing Curve Sentinels, and he couldn’t have been happier about it. If you have ever met Rich, you know that he’s not going to play an off-the-rack version of Sentinels. Instead, he’s running a version that has been dubbed “Pimp My Bot,” because it features the purple-caped and funny hatted Magneto at the 7-slot along with Genosha for additional card drawing.
David Brent is a well-known judge who handles upper level events for Upper Deck that range from the Yu-Gi-Oh! World Championships to local Pro Circuit Qualifiers. He is playing what is, at first glance, an off the rack deck—Common Enemy. Because of his judging responsibilities, Brent rarely gets to play, and he could not resist a little custom tailoring for this weekend’s gala.
His deck has an added New Gods burn component, with Mark Moonrider and Lightray backed up by Cosmic Radiation. It also requires an additional team-up with Royal Decree to take that route. The deck is still capable of playing like straight-up Common Enemy build, though, and I was quite pleased to feature two such interesting decks in the first round.
The game got off to a slow start for Rich, while Brent played Boris on the first turn and beat for 1.
Rich thought he knew what he was up against and announced, “Common Enemy.”
“Yucky yuck!” declared Brent as neither player made a 2-drop. Boris continued to bring the beats. John tipped his deck off with a Sentinel Mark II on the third turn.
“It is too early to be playing against that deck,” protested Brent as he recruited She-Thing. She hung back after the Sentinel took down Boris out of respect for the ubiquitous power-ups in Rich’s deck.
Rich laughed as he drew his two cards for the turn. “There’s Boliver Trask . . . ”
Brent appraised his own draws and had a chuckle, as well. “Tell me about it. I am set for drops 1 to 3, now.”
Brent had Doom on turn 4, and Rich played a Mark V up front. The Mark II was bounced with Reign of Terror, and both players continued to gripe about their draws.
“Where is my Common Enemy?”
I’m not sure what Rich had lurking in his resource row, but he didn‘t seem concerned about Brent finding what he was looking for. “Please play Common Enemy,” he teased.
Doom came after the Mark V, and Rich flipped up a Tag Team after Brent passed. Brent attempted to Tag Team with She-Thing, but forgot that he did not have his guys teamed up, and the effect negated. Brent’s Boris jumped back in the deck at the prospect of being attacked and fetched a Mystical Paralysis for his master. The Mark V readied and served for 7.
Rich assembled a Nimrod while Brent constructed a Robot Destroyer. The Destroyer did his thing on the Mark V and the Paralysis took care of the Nimrod. Turn 5 came and went without any actual combat.
Brent searched up a Hulk with Signal Flare and put him up front with the Destroyer.
“I’ll bet you don’t want to see this guy,” smiled Rich as he played Bastion. The turn was very similar to the previous, with the Destroyer taking down the Mark V and Doom paralyzing the Bastion. Hulk came over and swiped a repair counter off of Nimrod.
The Big Pimp from Rich’s deck showed up in Magneto, Master of Magnetism, while Submariner hit play for Brent.
Rich sent Nimrod after Doom, and Brent exhausted Magneto with a third Mystical Paralysis. He flipped up Doomstadt, but a discarded Boliver Trask stunned the Doom. Robot Destroyer smoked the Mark V rather than face combat, and Brent dipped to 15 endurance. Bastion came after Submariner, and Rich pitched his hand to pump it to 18 ATK/18 DEF. Rich then flipped Genosha and drew four cards. He continued to pump, and finally passed and when Subby stunned. Brent dropped to 5.
Brent considered cracking back, and finally sent the 14 ATK/12 DEF Hulk over to Nimrod. Rich flipped up two Cover Fires, and then used a Reconstruction Program to finish off the Hulk and David Brent.
John Rich goes to 1-0, while David Brent faces an uphill climb and unpredictable matchups in the 0-1 bracket.
Bonus Coverage: Matthew Meyer vs. Robert Leander
John Rich and Robert Leander have a playfully antagonistic relationship. Actually, Leander has a similar relationship with all the 3BG team members. He and Josh Wiitanen almost made a bet for this tournament where whoever finished higher would get to shave the other person’s head at PC Amsterdam.
Leander had been struggling with which deck he would play, and had two deck lists prepared for the event. Rich challenged him to let a judge choose randomly, the same as he had. Leander took it one step beyond and did not look at which deck he ended up piloting. Rather, he put the list he was not going to playing in his pocket, and when the first round began, he looked at it to find out which deck he was not playing. Leander must have been relieved to find out he was playing Teen Titans. It is his trademark deck, and almost the same listing as the one he used to win the Texas $10K a couple of months ago. He also piloted Titans to a money finish at PC So Cal.
His opponent for this round ended up being 3BG member Matthew Meyer. This was a matchup that Meyer was actively wishing for prior to round 1. Meyer is playing an intriguing Superman deck that features Phantom Zone, a card he feels will devastate a Titans deck.
By the time I got to their match, it was already turn 7. Matthew had a sparse board, with only Superman, False Son and Cir-El Supergirl. Leander had assembled a full meeting of the Teen Titans, and if he simply survived Matthew’s initiative, he’d likely be able to do all the fun stuff that Titans decks do to take the match.
Meyer sent his Superman in after Garth, but Leander was able to shoot down Cir-El with Arsenal, reinforce his Garth, and return one of his deck’s combo pieces to hand—no Phantom Zones for Meyer—for turn 8. When the dust settled, the endurance totals were 8 to 3 in Leander’s favor. He was able to assemble all the pieces he needed on the next turn. When he announced a team attack with all of his characters going after Superman, it was clear that the match was over.
“You are so lucky he didn’t have a Phantom Zone!” someone shouted from the throng of players that had crowded around the match.
Robert Leander advanced to the 1-0 bracket, while Meyer would have to fight for truth, justice, and the American Way from the 0-1 half of the room.