I thought with the future of our game as ambiguous as ever now would be the ideal time to do a match report. And that’s what this will literally be a 1 game match report, but I’m going to try to inject as much detail into this 40 minutes as possible. To initiate said match I drove 5 minutes over to my friend Bob’s house and we each took 5 packs and got ready for a MEV sealed deathmatch; winner gets first pick of rares! (Feel the drama…)

Prior to this match I’ve done rather well in limited play with this set. My strategy has been to look for X-Force (because of all the support that’s not rare/uncommon) or Marauders/Weapon X (let them pick odd initiatives, because I’ll kill on 6). Sure I’ll include a 5 drop Rogue, but otherwise I’ve been shying from Exiles for good ol’ fashion curve/pump/kill. After I cracked my packs I was disappointed to see little in the way of X-Force, but oodles of Marauders. Here’s what I went with:

1 drop- Mystique x1, Timebreakers x1

2 drop- Malice x1, Prism x1, Senyaka x1

3 drop- Lady Mastermind x1, Blink x1, Mr. Sinister x1, Riptide x1

4 drop- Quicksilver x1, Illyana Rasputin x1, Gambit x1, Random x1

5 drop- Cannonball x2, Shatterstar x1

6 drop- Malice x1, Hulk x1

7 drop- Ultimaton x1

PT: Boiling Point x1, Captive Audience x2, Acolyte Protection x1, Sinister Disciples x1, Sewer Rats x1

Loc: Panoptichron x1, Arctic Base x1

Equip: The Tallus x2, Kick x1

My curve was 2-3-4-4-3-2-1 with a character/pt, loc, equip split of 19/11. My reasoning behind some of the cards were thus:

Mystique (1): love her. I’m not a fan of 1 drops in sealed but she functions as a plot twist or a back up Blink to utilize Tallus

Prism, Quicksilver, Random, Hulk: My plan was to pick odds and off initiative stall with beats on odds. If it turns out I got evens I have enough aggro tricks to easily kill on 6.

Captive Audience(s), Kick, Arctic Base: I haven’t lucked into this type of aggro support in many a set. This set is known for not having a lot in the way of non-team stamp pumps.

The only thing of not that I tossed was a Doopworld. I had already included the Acolyte Protection and pretty much was only playing with two teams (with a few cards thrown in fill my curve.)

When we were both built we flipped for initiative and I won. As mentioned earlier I chose odds.

Bob shipped his opening hand. My usual condition for an opening hand is a semblance of a middle curve. I lucked out with this opening hand: Prism, Panoptichron, Mystique, and Gambit. This was pretty close to amazing and it was an easy keep. I drew my additional 2: Shatterstar and Lady Mastermind. Do the math; I had a curve 1-5 with a great resource to place. I already felt great about this game.

I placed down the Panoptichron and made my first mistake-I mean move. I recruited Mystique. The temptation of fully curving out overpowered what I knew was proven in sealed; pumps win games and a powerup is not to scoffed at. Bob layed his resource down and put a shift counter on Archangel-5 drop, recruiting nobody. I swung into Bob direct for 1. (50-49)

After I drew my next two cards (Malice 6 drop, Boiling Point-the ridonkulous curve out continues), Bob laid down a resource and shifted out Cable with a counter (I’m guessing he just drew into him), and used his remaining resource point to recruit Multiple Man (1 drop). I layed down Boiling Point and recruited Prism. Prism did as intended and forced Bob to pass initiative. Knowing that Bob would use MM’s activation power to give him a 4 atk, I swung with Mystique for a mutual stun. Prism went in direct for another point of endurance. (49-47)

On turn 3 I drew my next two cards (Kick, Random). I lucked out with Random because I would have had to put a character in row, but since Random has reservist, no harm-no foul, I placed Random down and recruited Lady Mastermind, placing her in front of Prism. Bob laid down his resource and gave all 3 points over to Cable. At this point of the game I would have bet money that I had the game. I went with Mystique into Multiple Man once again. The reason I didn’t go in with Lady Mastermind was in case Bob had a pump waiting. Mutual stuns for 1 each. I then went in direct once again with Lady Mastermind and Prism for 6. I also made sure to utilize LM’s free power and make it so Multiple Man couldn’t ready. . At the end of 3 I had 3 ready characters to Bob’s 1 exhausted character, the rest of my curve in hand, and a lead of 48 to 40.

Turn 4 is where everything changed...


If you actually believe me the rest of the match report can be found precisely...........................here:
http://vscompelsyou.wordpress.com/

Shameless, yes. Blog hits, possible. Shameless attempt at getting blog
hits because I love VS., absolutely.

Very very cool. Can't wait to read the rest!

How does Mystique serve as a back up Blink for Tallus? Mystique only has all names while in hand, deck or KO pile. Am I missing something?

He didn't RTFC, and cheated haha.

I think we can all agree after reading this that the 5 drop Shatterstar sucks.

Shhh...that's how I win all my games! No, I knew that it doesn't apply when Mystique is in play; I just forgot during my write up.

Shatterstar---great art and great card for Xforce---shablam!

ciao
wade

I love this stuff and would love to see more. Post every darn game you play in graphic detail, and It'll be like I'm there, with friends, playing cards, instead of all alone in this cold cold space.