TL;DR: I'm playing through every hero using decks suggested to me from other players. If you want to skip straight to the decks and my brief thoughts, use these links!
Once upon an early December, I had a simple and brilliant idea. I would play through all of the heroes before the end of the year! Unfortunately, I found myself with a case of the lazies when it came to building decks. I decided to outsource it and have other people suggest decks for each hero! (Feel free to picture the Genius card of your choice.)
The premise was simple. Whatever suggestion was made for a hero and aspect combination, I would play. To make things simple, I had a randomizer spit out an encounter to tackle, and I planned to use the recommended modular sets with Standard III and Expert I for the difficulty.
It got off to a great start! I had a bunch of suggestions from many helpful people on Discord, and I managed to gather a deck for each hero. I got straight into my games, sure to waste no time.
So here we are a week into the new year, and I can confidently announce… I didn’t make it through them all. The holidays ate up more time than expected (not a bad thing), and my family fell ill to a terrible case of the flu (a bad thing). Additionally, I ended up with a lot more than the 55 plays I was expecting.
I initially thought that I would just play each deck once, have a grand old time, and call it a day. Once I got into the games though, I found one game per deck was simply not enough. I ran into a number of decks where I wanted another game with them. Either I felt like I didn’t understand the deck on the first play, or I felt I bypassed their core concept by exclusively playing hero cards or leaning into my own play-style too much.
Then, tragedy hit. I had a rash of games that I didn’t enjoy. I came out the other side of each game feeling more negative about the hero. I like to think of myself as an overly optimistic player, and I can find the fun in anything. So I took a step back, took a little break, and realized something important. I was playing a lot of play-styles and deck types that I don’t naturally fall into. By not choosing the decks myself, I was actually forcing myself to really push the limits of my comfort zone. It was going to take some finagling to make each of these games sing for me.
I learned two things from this. First, I really can find the fun in anything. Sometimes it takes some work, but I can do it. Changing scenario, difficulty, player count, modular sets... There are many ways to dial in the fun. Second, all things in moderation. Pushing out of my comfort zone is fun! But pushing out of it repeatedly and successively can make it hard to enjoy the plays. After a brief break and scheduling in some time for "normal" games of Champions, I got back into it.
Despite it being a lot larger of a task than I initially thought it would be, it has been a really fun experience. I’m going to share some of the decks I’ve been through so far, as well as do a brief write-up on my games with them. As I get through more heroes, I’ll write them up and post them in batches. With luck, I’ll get through them all before next year.
Nightcrawler Protection
Suggested By: Caldias
Created By: Caldias
Encounter: Juggernaut
Difficulty: Standard III + Expert I
I had a lot of fun with this deck, and I think it would have shone even brighter in multiplayer. This deck functions on defending a lot, so having more opportunities to defend would have really opened up the deck’s identity and let me cycle my BAMFs a bit more. As it was, I largely stuck a BAMF on Juggernaut, then left it for an emergency. I used my basic defense for the first attack each round (just in case I got exhausted), and saved my BAMF for any bonus attack. It was amazing getting to deal small packets of damage and removing small bits of threat throughout the villain turn. Ignoring the fact that I was stunned and avoiding absurd amounts of retaliate damage while dealing damage to Juggernaut was particularly satisfying. I love all styles of Protection, so this one was right in my wheelhouse.
Cyclops Leadership
Suggested By: MrSelfDestruct
Created By: MrSelfDestruct
Encounter: Master Mold
Difficulty: Standard III + Expert I
Deck: Blue is Yellow
This was another deck that I think I would enjoy even more in multiplayer where I can really lean into its core concept. I had a hard time prioritizing the Uncanny X-Force stuff, because I needed to answer the board state all on my own. That said, it performed really well, and I have been enjoying Cyclops a lot lately. There is a massive amount of thwarting potential here that I really want to tap into. I plan to pair this with Caldias's Nightcrawler deck for another go soon!
Thor Leadership
Suggested By: royal7
Created By: Boomguy
Encounter: Zola
Difficulty: Standard III + Expert I
Deck: Blue Christmas
This deck really lets you tap into Thor's health pool while giving him some much needed boosts. The economy felt fantastic, and the gameplay was really smooth. This was easily some of the most fun I’ve had with Thor. The new cards have breathed a whole new life into him. I was incredibly lucky on my randomizer here, because Zola really feeds into Thor's abilities.
Nova Aggression
Suggested By: astrodar
Created By: astrodar
Encounter: Mutagen Formula
Difficulty: Standard III + Expert I
This is cheating a bit, because I used my own deck! I was having an interesting conversation on discord about Test the Defense, so I revised one of my old decks and took it for a spin. Nova really is a blast, and Unleash the Nova Force turns are so much fun. The premise of this deck is to show there is a home for Test the Defense, and I think this deck does that. Nova can charge it up quickly, and it’s great for keeping an Unleash the Nova Force turn going! I had a lot of fun with this deck, so props to the deck builder. They must be quite dashing and intelligent.
Deadpool Protection
Suggested By: tjjj
Created By: tjjj
Encounter: Loki, Venom
Difficulty: Standard III + Expert I
Deck: Marvel Jesus
I ran this up against Loki and lost three times. I decided I didn’t understand the deck well enough to run it solo against Loki, so I re-rolled my randomizer and took it against Venom. It was a lot of fun once I had the room to flip and more easily manage threat. The Serve and Protect combo for keeping threat off the board was really solid. The threat did slowly keep climbing up, but that was largely because I didn’t focus any energy on managing it beyond Serve and Protect. I was reminded that Deadpool has some absurdly powerful cards, and that Protection works really well to help him protect that final HP. My favorite moment in the game was leaning into the fact that I was going to smacked for absurd amounts, and letting Deadpool take a hit consisting of 7 boost cards, only to flip and live on at 1 HP.
This was a clever use of a “multiplayer” card in solo games, and I really want to take it into a multiplayer match! (Sorry to whoever ends up with me poorly piloting such a deck!)
Conclusion
That's it for this first installment! More plays are done and on the way, so keep an eye out! Let me know if you take any of these decks for a spin and how it all fared!
תגובות