Table One: Elton Cho vs. John Umali

Arguably the single best player in the building, John Umali, ran into the one person apparently invulnerable to his head games—thirteen-year-old Elton Cho. A game that began with Graceful, Pot and Delinquent Duo on Umali’s side nearly turned sour as it became a long standoff due to some clever plays by Cho. But, Umali managed to maintain his advantage throughout, and though Cho took him down to 300 life points, he still managed the win.

Game two would go much differently, as Ring of Destruction, Bottomless Trap Hole, and a flurry of other monster destruction paid off in spades. Cho took Umali out in just three turns, preventing his opponent from ever keeping a monster on the field and placing the match at an even 1-1.

Game three wasn’t nearly as much of a crush. In fact, it was a long back and forth game in which both players over-extended to little effect. Cho was the first to recover, and due to a key mistake from Umali (forgetting to activate a Bottomless Trap Hole) he managed to take the match!

“And I’m just a little kid!” grinned Cho.

Match Win: Elton Cho


Table Two: Jacob Burdette vs. Emon Ghaneian

Jacob was playing an aggressive and dedicated Chaos Warrior, while Ghaneian was running a Lockdown Burn deck. Game one was very back and forth, and each player activated Delinquent Duo on turn one. “It was pretty close, we both went down to topdecking several times,” explained Burdette. “I managed to get and maintain field advantage, and that won me the game.”

“He took me out with strong attacks,” Ghaneian agreed. “I had cards that were just dead against him, like Nobleman of Crossout. He’d never play anything face down! I side decked for game two though, bringing in two Kinetic Soldier and a Blowback Dragon. I used the Dragon to take out D. D. Warrior Ladies and stuff.” The Kinetic Soldiers made the difference, as Burdette, who was used to crashing his D. D. Warrior Ladies into face-down monsters to remove them, suddenly found himself taking huge quantities of damage as a result. “He had hand advantage early on and just steadily took me down,” remarked Burdette.

Both players agreed that the third game was very close. “Kinetic Soldier killed me again. I attacked with a D. D. into another facedown Kinetic Soldier, and that just ruined me.” He used Lightning Vortex to take out the Kinetic Soldier, but Call of the Haunted brought it back. Though he had an answer in the form of Ring of Destruction, he brough himself dangerously low in life points. Try as he might, Ghaneian could not bring out Black Luster Soldier for quite a while. He sat with it in his hand, waiting for his chance, and eventually that chance came. Drawing into Metamorphosis he brought out Thousand-Eyes Restrict with a Scapegoat token. He used it to suck up one of Burdette’s monsters, tributed the Thousand-Eyes Restrict away for Airknight Parshath, and finally managed to bring out Black Luster Soldier. Airknight pierced through a Goat token on Burdette’s side, and Black Luster Soldier ended the game!


Table Three: Mario Begay vs. Joshua Nino

Both players were running what they described as “Cookie Cutter Chaos” decks. Well, we’ll give them points for honesty!

Nino lost game one due to a deck error, which was caught in a random deck check that round. On game two his luck changed though, and after maintaining commanding hand advantage for the entire duel he easily claimed the win.

Game three was extremely back and forth. “It was really a tight game,” said Begay. Thousand-Eyes Restrict managed to tie up the game for round after round, and as Nino sat behind his big thousand-eyed wall he felt relatively secure. Unfortunately for him, that illusion was eventually shattered as the grindingly slow game came to a crescendo. Begay managed to summon Dark Magician of Chaos, use its effect, and then attack to win the game.

Match Win: Mario Begay


Table Four: John Navarro vs. Eli Hsih

Navarro was playing a disgustingly good Mill deck against Hsih’s Chaos variant. Game one went to Hsih, as Navarro drew nothing, and with his deck being very synergy-dependent, that was a death sentence. Hsih saw his opening, and pressed his advantage on Navarro. It would win him the game.

Game two went very differently though, as Navarro got off his combo on turn one! Cyber Jar after Cyber Jar after Cyber Jar flipped thanks to Shallow Grave, Serial Spell, and Book of Taiyou. Card Destruction ended the game.

Game three went exactly the same. Navarro used a plethora of tricks to get to the cards he needed and then rolled the combo over and over to mill both player’s decks before using Card Destruction to win the game!

Match Win: John Navarro