Match 1N - Doomriders VS Sunburst Special

  Doom Riders
  Pilot- Steph
    VS
  Sunburst Special (Favored to win)
  Pilot- Mark


Mark wins the flip and elects to take Odd initiatives

Both players keep

        TURN 1:(Mark initiative)

    DRAW PHASE
(Both Players draw 2 cards)

    BUILD PHASE

Mark sets a resource and passes

Steph sets a resource and passes

    RECOVERY PHASE

    Doom Riders -> 50   Sunburst Special -> 50



        TURN 2 (Steph Initiative)

    DRAW PHASE
(Both Players draw 2 cards)

    BUILD PHASE

Steph sets a resource and recruits The Chief in the front row visible area.

Mark sets a resource, and recruits Owen Mercer.

    COMBAT PHASE

Steph passes combat

Mark passes combat

    RECOVERY PHASE

    Doom Riders -> 50   Sunburst Special -> 50



        TURN 3 (Mark Initiative)

    DRAW PHASE
(Both Players draw 2 cards)

    BUILD PHASE

Mark sets a resource and recruits Dick Grayson, renegade before passing his build.

Steph sets a resource and recruits Sugar Man, flipping up forbidden Loyalties, (Discarding The Chief) to team-up Doom Patrol and Horsemen and placing a +1/+1 counter on Chief.

    COMBAT PHASE

mark attacks the Chief with Dick Grayson for a stun and passes.

Steph passes combat.

    RECOVERY PHASE

Steph recovers Chief.

    Doom Riders -> 47   Sunburst Special -> 50



        TURN 4 (Steph Initiative)

    DRAW PHASE
(Both Players draw 2 cards)

    BUILD PHASE

Steph sets and flips Dayton Manor and recruits Dark Beast protecting Sugar Man, keeping The Chief in the front row.

mark sets and flips Xavier's School for Giften Youngsters and recruits Kimyo Hoshi in the support row before recruiting Thunder, anissa pierce protecting Kimyo.

    COMBAT PHASE

Steph attacks Thunder with Chief for a stun, and tehn sends Sugar Man into Kimyo Hoshi stunning her as well. Finally she sends Dark Beast into Dick Grayson, activating Dayton Manor to place a +1/+1 counter on it. mark activates recruiting drive from the row to return Dick Grayson to his hand to search for Grace and Halo. With no defender, Dark beast readies and then declares into Owen for the stun.

mark Passes Combat, his entire board stunned.

    RECOVERY PHASE

Mark recovers Kimyo Hoshi, KOing thunder and Owen.

    Doom Riders -> 47   Sunburst Special -> 36



        TURN 5 (Mark Initiative)

    DRAW PHASE
(Both Players draw 2 cards)

    BUILD PHASE

Mark sets a resource and recruits Gambit. flipping X-Men United from his row to team-up X-Men and Outsiders and then recruits Dick grayson, forming them al in the front row.

Steph sets a resource, flipping up Misfits from her row to remove a counter from the Chief to search for her Apoc 5 recruiting him behind the Chief.

    COMBAT PHASE

Mark declares a team attack with Kimyo, Dick and Gambit into Dark Beast. Kimyo's effect activates targetting The Chief while Dick's effect triggers, the chain resolves, readying Gambit and stunning the Chief.
Mark then activates Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters to ready Dick before playing a fastball special exhausting Dick and Gambit to stun apocalypse. Dark Beast discards Cyclops for a +1/+1 counter and stuns back Kimyo in the mutual stun.

Steph retalliates with Sugar Man attacking Gambit. mark decides it is not legal, and plays Recruiting Drive, returning Gambit to his hand to search for Wild Child and Sabretooth. Steph instead sends sugarman into Dick Grayson and activates Dayton Manor and uses Suger Man's effect (removing Cyclops and The Chief)  for two +1/+1 counters to avoid the stunback.

Afterwards she flips up Marvel ZOmbies targetting Apocalypse.

    RECOVERY
At the start of teh recovery phase, Steph KO's The Chief from Marvel ZOmbies effect to recover Apoc.

Steph recovers Dark Beast.
Mark recovers Kimyo.

    Doom Riders -> 36   Sunburst Special -> 27



        TURN 6 (Steph Initiative)

    DRAW PHASE
(Both Players draw 2 cards)

    BUILD PHASE

Steph sets a resource and spends all 6 of her resource points to Apoc's effect, granting him six +1/+1 counters and passes her build.

Mark sets a resource and recruits Gambit behind Kimyo, Dazzler in the support row, and Grace, protecting Dazzler.

    COMBAT PHASE

Steph sends Sugar Man into Grace, reinforcing with Dazzler. Dark Beast discards a Beast Boy placing a third +1/+1 counter on him and attacks Kimyo. Mark reinforces with Gambit and Kimyo stuns. Steph tehn removes beast boy and The Chief from her KO pile to Suger Man's effect placing a third +1/+1 counter on him.
Finally she attacks Gambit with her supersized Apoc. mark flips up a second X-Men United, replacing it to reinforce Gambit.

    RECOVERY PHASE

Steph activates Dayton Manor to place a +1/+1 counter on Apoc.

mark recovers Kimyo, KOing Grace and Gambit.

    Doom Riders -> 36   Sunburst Special -> 20



        TURN 7 (Mark Initiative)

    DRAW PHASE
(Both Players draw 2 cards)

    BUILD PHASE

Mark sets a resource and recruits Sabretooth, wild child, Looker, Ice man and Halo. (Forming up Halo, Kimyo, Sabretooth and wild child inthe front row with Looker, dazzler and Iceman formed behind.)

Steph sets a resource and spends all 7 resource points to Apocalypse's effect. placing 7 +1/+1 counters on him. and activates Dayton Manor for a 15th counter.

    COMBAT PHASE

Mark declares Halo, Kimyo, Sabretooth, Looker, Dazzler, and Iceman into Dark Beast with 18 total attack. Kimyo triggers stunning apocalypse, and Dazzler triggers, burning Steph for 6 endurance loss. Steph activates Dark Beast's effect, (Discarding Mento) to place a +1/+1 counter on him and he stuns back Kimyo. The stun triggers sabretooth's effect, readying him and sabretooth and Wild Child then attack Sugar Man, the team attack triggers Dazzler's effect to burn Steph for 2 more endurance loss. Suger Man stuns back Sabretooth in the mutual stun.

    RECOVERY PHASE

Steph chains to the start of recovery, playing Misfits, removing a counter from Sugar Man to search for apocalypse 8. Before KOing Sugar Man to Marvel Zombie's effect. recovering Apocalypse

Steph recovers Dark Beast.
mark recovers Kimyo, KOing Sabretooth.

    Doom Riders -> 16   Sunburst Special -> 15



        TURN 8 (Steph Initiative)

    DRAW PHASE
(Both Players draw 2 cards)

    BUILD PHASE

Steph sets a resource, and plays Freak out from the row, moving all 15 +1/+1 counters from apoc onto Dark Beast. She then recruits Apocalypse 8, KOing her 5 to uniqueness. She activates Dark Beast to remove 2 counters to draw two cards before playing a second freak out moving the 17 remaining counters back onto the 8 drop.(Dark beast started the turn with 4)

Mark sets a resource and exhausts Looker for time breach putting Beast, Bookworm into his hand.

Steph activates Dayton Manor placing a +1/+1 counter on Apoc.

    COMBAT PHASE

Apocalypse's effect triggers.
Steph KO's Dark Beast
Mark Ko's everything but Looker.

Apoc attacks and stuns the reinforced 2 drop.

    RECOVERY PHASE

Mark recovers Looker.

    Doom Riders -> 16   Sunburst Special -> 13



        TURN 9

    DRAW PHASE
(Both Players draw 2 cards)

    BUILD PHASE

Mark sets a resource and flips cerebra activating it. Making a comment wondering why it is in a build that only runs a single 4 drop. revealing time breach, placing it on the bottom of his deck.

He then recruits Beast, drawing 9 cards and placing Jubilee, alias investigations, batman and the outsiders and Xavier Institute for Higher Learning on the bottom of his deck.
He forms bothe of them into his front row and passes his build.

Steph thinks for a while, sets a resource and passes.

    COMBAT PHASE

Apoc triggers.

Mark chains to the trigger playing a fastball Special from his hand, exhausting Looker and Beast.

*******RULES BREAK!*******
Steph asks if the timing is incorrect since  fastball Special specifies "Only during your attack step" while Apoc's effect triggers at the start of the combat phase. So we look it up!


We found the correct resolution here:
400.7 A
Any time all players in the game pass priority in succession WHILE THE CHAIN IS EMPTY, the game progresses to the next phase, step, or substep.

406.1 The combat phase contains an attack step for each player. Each attack step contains optional attack substeps. Steps and substeps are performed as outlined in rule 400.

This means that Mark cannot chain Fastball Special to Apocalypse's triggered effect since the combat phase will not move to his attack phase substep until the chain is empty.

**************************

Since the fastball special is now off the menu, Mark plays recruiting drive, returning Beast to his hand to fetch Kimyo Hoshi.

Apocs effect resolves koing nothing as both players only have 1 character in play.

Mark passes combat

Steph attacks Looker with Apoc activating Dayton manor to place his 20th counter on him.

Realizing all he can do is draw out the game a few more turns through reinforcement, before finally taking a huge breakthrough swing, Mark allows the attack to resolve.

    RECOVERY PHASE

    Doom Riders -> 16   Sunburst Special -> -26

        Doom Riders advance to the next round!


        POSTGAME THOUGHTS:

Mark Thoughts:
"That ruling really shut down what I was hoping to be a really fun way to end the game. But it's pretty hard to argue as it seems pretty clear.
Still stunning Apoc with Fastball specials twice to get Steph exactly at zero endurance was a nice thought and would have been cool if it had worked."

Steph Thoughts:
"The recovery tricks of this deck were really surprising. If that ruling hadn't gone my way i would have lost for sure."