In this series, I highlight cards that I am currently enjoying. These are by no means the most powerful cards. They aren't even necessarily my all-time favorite cards. They are simply cards that I am really enjoying right now. At the end of the article you'll find a decklist that I've enjoyed using them in and a gallery that displays all the cards highlighted.
Web of Life and Destiny
This card is the crux of Web-Warrior builds, so I'm tackling it first. Web of Life and Destiny is amazing if you're a Web-Warrior, because it's a free resource generator. However, it is definitely worth the cost for non-Web-Warriors. This card rewards you for letting allies do what they do best... getting knocked out. Not only does it generate card draw, it lets you choose which player gets the draw. That's super important for the deck below, but it's also incredibly flexible and helpful for the team. Something else I really like about this card is that it only cares if the ally leaves play. Meaning that if an effect would force you to discard an ally or you're at your ally limit and need more space, you can still benefit from the ally being lost.
Additionally, Web of Life and Destiny helps unlock Web-Warrior builds for heroes that are not Web-Warriors. Like many characters in the game, some of the Web-Warrior allies are trait-locked, meaning you must have a specific trait to play the ally. However, the Web-Warrior trait-locking is what I would call a "soft-lock." They don't require that your hero has the trait, only that you control a card with the trait. Enter Web of Life and Destiny. Not only does it give you the fantastic boon of giving any player a card draw when a Web-Warrior leaves play, it can facilitate playing all of the allies that have the soft-lock. If you're running any Web-Warrior build, this card is a must.
Across the Spider-Verse
Another auto-include for any Web-Warrior build, Across the Spider-Verse lets you ensure you can bring back your multiverse friends. Not only that, it can be triggered multiple times off a single play. You can choose to have yourself or another player repeat the ability, and then that person can choose themselves or someone else, and on and on and on until you run out of the things you need to pay the costs. As a bonus, this is also a nice way to get around Peter's Requirement ability, and it's a small discount compared to playing the 3+ cost allies from hand.
Ghost-Spider
This is likely one of the most powerful allies in the game, even if you're not running Web-Warrior. Not only will Ghost-Spider give you a card draw from Web of Life and Destiny, she will also hand-pick the hero event you most want from your deck. And since hero cards are usually the best cards (cough Legal Practice cough), you can snag something incredibly important. This is the one Web-Warrior ally that is worth running even if you run no other Web-Warrior cards. Just make sure you can get her into play with the likes of Make the Call.
SP//dr
SP//dr has some similarities with one of my other favorite allies: Starhawk. Both can be recurred into hand with their own ability, meaning that they become incredibly reliable and consistent cheap allies. Personally, I love cheap allies that incentivize you not to block with them, so SP//dr gains some brownie points from that. Here, SP//dr is essentially becoming a 1 cost source for 1 damage and 2 threat removal each turn (1 cost due to her drawing you a card from Web of Life and Destiny and not starting in your hand).
Spider-Man: Peter Parker
Spider-Man is incredibly flexible, and he can really accelerate your tempo. For Web-Warrior heroes, he's great for helping you be more flexible or really lean into a boosted stat. For non-Web-Warriors he is great for amping up allies like SP//dr.
Honorable Mentions: Spider-Man (Spider-Men?)
Hobie Brown and Otto Octavius are strong allies as is, and they can be powerhouses in the right deck. They can be deck dependent though, and they don't have quite the same overall impact. For example, Otto is naturally insane with the SP//dr hero, but essentially does nothing in the deck below. Hobie has some strong thwart, and he can crank out some unpredictable non-attack damage on the villain.
Try It Out
It's a little late for Christmas, but the gift giving continues with Captain Marvel. This is a deck that I took to Con of Heroes last year, and I had a blast handing out cards left and right. Shout-out to MrSelfDestruct from discord for reminding me of this deck, inspiring me to make some updates to it, and suggesting the new Mission Leader upgrade!
The whole point of this deck is to be as generous as possible. You can play it solo perfectly fine, but if you love playing support roles while still getting stuff done, then this is for you.
Things you can give away:
Carol Danvers' Commander card draw ability
Avengers Mansion card draw
Helicarrier discount
Web of Life and Destiny card draw
Mission Leader card draw
Maria Hill card draw
Players their own allies with Regroup
An ally with Call for Backup
A support with Build Support
Basically you will be everyone's best friend. If you don't mind having a thick deck, feel free to toss in some reinforced suits or other ally upgrades for your friends. Some other notes:
Agent 13 can ready Alpha Flight Station, which means in alter-ego you're getting bonus cards!
Build Support can grab whatever you need most, but its primary target should be Web of Life and Destiny.
Mission Leader only triggers if you are in hero form, so watch the timing. You'll be in alter-ego a decent bit with this deck.
If you give the deck a spin, let me know how it goes!
