Marc Glass is back after making Top 8 last month at Shonen Jump Championship Orlando! There, he did it with an aggressive Creature Swap deck. Today, he’s playing Diamond Dude Turbo, a deck that was surprisingly popular yesterday given the difficulty of building it. He’s 24, and a win here would mean an SJC champ in Severn, Maryland.
His opponent, 14 year-old Tommy Nguyen of Minnesota, is playing a Monarch variant powered by D.D. Survivor, Dimension Fusion, and Macro Cosmos. On one hand, his remove-from-play cards can render some of Glass’ cards useless: Destiny Hero — Dasher, Magical Stone Excavation, and several other cards might be less than ideal for Glass. At the same time though, Nguyen might load his opponent’s removed from play area with monsters and hand him the Dimension Fusion win.
This one’s going to be tricky.
Glass won the roll, and both duelists shook hands before getting started. Glass summoned Elemental Hero Stratos, searched his deck for another, and activated Destiny Draw. He discarded Destiny Hero — Malicious, drew two, removed Malicious from his graveyard and special summoned another. Glass was starting things off big! He continued, activating Reasoning, and Nguyen called level 6. The Reasoning hit Destiny Hero — Diamond Dude and special summoned it. Monster Gate tributed away Malicious, and brought out another Diamond Dude at the cost of seven non-monster cards. Glass lost both of his Magical Stone Excavations, which might slow him down a bit in the long run, but he didn’t seem concerned. One of the Diamond Dudes whiffed, while the other hit Reinforcement of the Army, setting Glass up to use it on the following turn. He set one spell or trap to finish.
It was a monumental turn, and Glass couldn’t have asked for a better one. Nguyen would have his work cut out for him.
He special summoned Cyber Dragon and activated Dimensional Fissure. He then used Reinforcement of the Army to search his deck for D.D. Survivor. He summoned it, and attacked with Cyber Dragon, but ran into Waboku. Nguyen activated Confiscation in main phase 2, revealing Glass’ hand of Mirror Force, Premature Burial, and Stratos. After some careful thought and some time spent examining his opponent’s graveyard Nguyen opted to force the discard of Mirror Force. Nguyen ended.
Play was back to Glass, who used the Reinforcement of the Army sent to the graveyard Last Turn to search out Stratos. He removed his Malicious from his graveyard to special summon his last to the field, and activated Diamond Dude — Jinzo. He activated the second Diamond Dude — Destiny Hero — Dasher. No help on either, but it wasn’t like Glass needed any. He summoned Stratos, used his effect to destroy Dimensional Fissure, and turned everything to attack except for the freshly-summoned Malicious. A Divine Sword — Phoenix Blade let one Stratos trade off with Cyber Dragon, while the other traded with D.D. Survivor and both Diamond Dudes hit directly. In main phase 2, Glass brought back Stratos with Premature Burial and searched his deck for Destiny Hero — Dasher with its effect. “I end my turn.”
Nguyen was now solidly on the defensive, and set a card to each zone. Glass activated Diamond Dude, hit Dasher again, and activated the second: the second Diamond Dude flipped Graceful Charity! He then tributed Malicious for Jinzo, removed Stratos and Malicious from his graveyard to get back Phoenix Blade, and gave the Blade to Stratos. Jinzo attacked Nguyen’s set monster.
Nguyen took a moment to search his opponent’s graveyard, and activated Book of Moon to turn Jinzo down and stop the attack. Stratos, with the Phoenix Blade, attacked into Nguyen’s set Gravekeeper’s Spy to destroy it, and Nguyen pulled another in defense position. Glass turned both of the Diamond Dudes to defense position in his second main phase.
It was 7200 to 4200 with Glass leading. Glass had seven live cards on the field to Nguyen’s two, and a Graceful Charity waiting in the wings. Victory seemed academic, and Glass ended his turn.
Gravekeeper’s Spy was tributed for Zaborg the Thunder Monarch, and Zaborg’s effect took out the set Jinzo. Zaborg then attacked the Blade-wielding Stratos, and Nguyen set his last card to his back row.
Glass used his Graceful Charity effect to start his turn, and discarded Stratos and Phoenix Blade. He activated Destiny Draw, discarded Dasher, and drew two more cards. He activated Heavy Storm, Nguyen lost his set Enemy Controller, and Glass removed two monsters, Stratos and Dasher, to bump Divine Sword back to his hand. He tributed his two Diamond Dudes for Dark Magician of Chaos, returned Premature Burial to his hand, and then used it to return Jinzo. Things were going to end this turn.
He activated Dimension Fusion and brought back Dasher and the two Stratos. Nguyen had no way to stop the onslaught.
Marc Glass takes a devastating first duel, dominating Tommy Nguyen on all fronts!
Both duelists did some quick shuffling and smokescreening between the first and second duel.
Nguyen caught some luck as he opened the second duel, and activated Confiscation to reveal Glass’s hand: Jinzo, two Waboku, Stratos, and Diamond Dude. Stratos was the obvious pick, and was discarded once Nguyen got a good look at his opponent’s hand. He activated Dimensional Fissure, set a monster, and ended.
Diamond Dude came down for Glass, used its effect, and hit Stratos. Ouch. It attacked, ran into Gravekeeper’s Spy, Nguyen pulled another in defense position, and Glass set a back row card. If Nguyen could press hard and fast, and work through those Wabokus, he just might press this match to a third game.
He played aggressively, tributing for Zaborg the Thunder Monarch to destroy Diamond Dude and then attacking into Waboku. Glass heaved a sigh, drew, set a back row card and ended. Nguyen attacked again, and Glass flipped another Waboku, leaving Nguyen to set a monster. Glass topdecked into Diamond Dude, summoned him, and used the effect: Diamond Dude flipped nothing but Destiny Hero — Dasher. Diamond Dude attacked into Spirit Reaper and Glass set a back row card to end his turn.
Spirit Reaper went to attack position, Zaborg attacked Diamond Dude, and Reaper hit directly! Glass was forced to discard Jinzo! Nguyen passed, and things looked bade for Glass . . . until he flipped his set Dimension Fusion! He brought back two Dudes and Jinzo, whiffed on his first Diamond Dude’s effect, but hit Monster Gate with the other. He piled both Diamond Dudes into Spirit Reaper to dish out 2200 damage total, and then sent Jinzo to dish out another 2100. He set a spell or trap, and the life points stood at 2700 to 4100.
Nguyen tributed his other Spy for a second Zaborg and turned Reaper to defense. Dimension Fusion had clearly changed the face of the duel, and when he attacked he was met by yet another Waboku. He set two back row cards to end. Glass activated his Monster Gate’s effect, special summoned Malicious, and then used Malicious for another Monster Gate. He lost five non-monster cards before special summoning Destiny Hero — Dasher in attack position. He activated both Dudes, hit Lightning Vortex and Dimension Fusion, and turned them both to defense. He tributed one to Dasher, ran Dasher over one of the two Zaborg, and announced that he was ending his turn. Dasher turned to defense position.
Nguyen was in trouble. Lightning Vortex hung over his head like the sword of Damocles, and if either of the two set cards in his spell and trap zone were of defensive use he likely would have played them on the turn prior. Even if they were helpful traps, Jinzo was coming back next turn and would negate them. A game that had started off so well was now collapsing around Tommy Nguyen, and, after taking his draw for the turn, he spent some time considering his options. Next turn, he was going to be blasted by Lightning Vortex and Glass would recover his Diamond Dude, Malicious, and Jinzo that had been removed from play. Time wore on.
Glass wanted to urge the duel along. “I don’t mean to be a jerk, but I’ve got game next turn if you can’t deal 4100 this turn.”
Nguyen set a monster and then attacked with Zaborg, destroying Diamond Dude and removing him from play. His own Dimensional Fissure was working against him at this point. Glass drew for his turn and used his Dimension Fusion’s effect to special summon two Diamond Dude, Jinzo, Dasher, and Malicious. He then blew away everything but Nguyen’s set monster. He tributed Malicious to beef up Dasher and attacked with it into Gravekeeper’s Spy. There was nothing Nguyen could do: Jinzo, Diamond Dude, and all the rest attacked directly, and it was over.
Marc Glass recovers from a difficult early game, and moves on to the semifinals with a 2-0 finish!