Justin Childs vs Kevin Hillock	Defending champ Aaron Fuegi vs Sean McCulloch

Michael Pustilnik has become a first-time champion, and interrupted the chain of wins by either David desJardins or Aaron Fuegi. His course was far from easy. He had to best former champions in four out of five matches, perhaps the toughest tournament ever in terms of opponent rank. In early action, 2002 champ Dan Strock won the roll-off after a mutual in Round 1, but lost to David in Round 3. Aaron won over 2007 champion Sean McCulloch after a mutual in Round 2.

'99 champ Jason Ley made it to the Final with warlock power, but did not recruit any warlocks by an opening roll of six. In his first game, he rolled a 4, took his titan next to the adjoining tower, and then rolled a 1. In the second game, it was a 5 to the nearby brush followed by a 1. In the third game, against Aaron, 1 followed by 1. His warlock strength had a strong effect on all games, in either the final battle or in threats that limited opponent movement.

Here's a problem. You have a nine-high titan with one unicorn, two dragons and three colossus. Do you move to the plains underneath the mountains when you know the other titan, also nine high, sits in the mountains with five hydras and an angel, with an angel to call? It appears as if the colossus legion has more overall strength, so '98 champ Ed Rothenheber made the move. Michael was in the mountains, and attacked to have the summon instead of waiting to be attacked. The range strike also proved important as he had two colossus in the front row wounded to 8 and 5 with the angel plus range strikes. Two hydras were killed during the next move, but strikebacks killed both wounded colossus. A summoned angel helped kill the last colossus and a dragon on the next attacker move, and poor rolling results left two hydras alive but wounded. When the unicorn and the summoned angel died fighting each other, the wounded hydras put four hits on Ed's titan and expired at the same time. Now it was unwounded titan on four-hit titan, and Michael managed the five hits needed on the first blow. Ed was not able to get nine hits on nine dice.

The next game Michael played against second rated David desJardins and it turned into a question of which original stack held the titan and which the angel. Michael started with a 6, but declined to teleport and reveal his titan. David used a ranger kill stack to clear the upper circle and move his titan 3 troll stack in position to get a warbear. But this stack was immediately threatened and had to move on a non-parity roll to the mountains. A rather weak stack with a minotaur then moved to just below the upper circle, and David had to move again to avoid being weakened. Michael's titan then had an opportunity to attack the other titan in the hills, but Michael was still unsure which stack contained the opponent titan, and an attack into the hills, if it turned out to be the angel, would be subject to counterattack by the other stack. So the first opportunity passed without an attack, but on the next turn, after David had no good options to move out of the hills, the attack came 7 on 5 and the outcome was pretty much determined by numbers.

The critical battle of the Final came at the hour and a half mark with only Michael adding a pip to his titan up to this point. Jason's titan, for the first time in the tournament unable to recruit a warlock, with two rangers and three lions, was attacked by a split off stack of two gargs and three cyclops with an angel to summon. At the most opportune moment, the cyclops rolled just enough sixes to kill the two rangers and expose the titan. The next two swings by an angel put the six-high titan, well, six feet under, and crowned the new champion.

Jason Ley plays Dan Strock as Justin Childs observes	David des Jardins and Aaron Fuegi in one of their frequent duels.