In the past, I have done complete set reviews, analyzing each team card by card. I try to make the write-ups as interesting as possible, but with so many cards to cover, and so many other, similar articles out there, I wouldn’t blame a reader for becoming jaded.
This time around, though, I’m going to try something a little different. I’m going to do something that should be fun and educational for even me. I’m going to see if I can find each team’s ten most noteworthy cards, and then I’m going to put each of those cards under the microscope for analysis. Then, sometime around the end of the Heralds of Galactus Sealed Pack era, I will go back over these selections to see if my initial impressions of these cards are anywhere close to my final understanding of their play-value.
I think where I stand to gain the most is in the long run. If, after months of playing with the Heralds of Galactus set, we can sit back down and agree that most of the cards I felt were top-notch still rise above the rest, then you and I can both feel more confident that the advice I share in these articles is meaningful. If it turns out that after months of playing, I realize that I was completely off-base, I will then revisit the methods I used to initially evaluate the cards; if I was horribly wrong starting out, I can learn from my mistakes and revise my card-evaluation methods. You, of course, would gain in the long run from this as well.
In the short-term, I hope to provide useful insight into the major strengths of each team and the cards that make their themes possible. This look at the teams should provide a quick launch-point that will help us all build better Sealed Pack decks.
The first team to be dissected will be the set’s namesake, the Heralds of Galactus.
The Heralds team seems to have two recurring themes: “4 or greater” and “fun with cosmic / cosmic—surge”. The Heralds of Galactus team isn’t the only team utilizing cosmic and cosmic—surge, but it looks like their cards have a higher concentration of these keywords.
The “4 or greater” theme of this team is beautiful in design. I truly feel that the set’s designers wanted to create a team that could be played for the long game in Sealed Pack. They wanted to challenge players to figure out some clever ways to play a top-heavy curve that could compete with other, more aggressive strategies. It took me a little while to figure it out, but the plan with this theme is to gain endurance and then patch up the holes as you go along. With so many of the Heralds team’s cards interacting with cosmic, you will notice that the “fun with cosmic” and the “4 or greater” themes often supplement each other quite nicely.
Human Torch, The Invisible Man’s text says, “Heralds of Galactus defenders you control have reinforcement”, but the character also has a cosmic power. When I first saw this character I passed over him, thinking he was a fairly vanilla 7 ATK / 7 DEF character with flight and range. Of course, I didn’t realize at the time that his reinforcement text worked all of the time.
I also underestimated the rest of his textbox. While the power, “If a character you control would cause breakthrough, instead, you gain that much endurance” is limited to when the Human Torch has a cosmic counter, the early endurance gain can add up. As you may already know, the Heralds of Galactus team is capable of replenishing lost cosmic counters as well. The Human Torch could be thrown into the “fun with cosmic” category, but I think he is more fittingly the cornerstone of a “stall until turn 8” strategy that should work in Sealed Pack. As the format develops a little more, we may learn that stalling for the late game means only surviving until turn 7, so I reserve the right to amend my “stall until turn 8” statement to read “stall until turn 7” if the format proves to be a little faster than I think it is right now.
Worldeater Apparatus is missing one word that would make it way better, and one line of text that would make it much worse. If this card had terraform I would have a hard time controlling my delight. If this card also read, “Use this only once per turn,” as I assumed it did, it would be far less desirable. As it stands though, the Heralds of Galactus team gets a location that resembles Katma Tui, a card that is no stranger to stall decks. Since the “4 or greater” theme doesn’t plan to have many of its early drops around for very long, and since Human Torch, The Invisible Man gives all of your characters reinforcement anyway, I think you could still come out on top if you sometimes opted out of hurting your opponent in favor of gaining endurance. After all, your mission is just to reach turn 8 (maybe turn 7).
Taa II; Air-Walker, Gabriel Lan; and I Must Obey are the rare cards that you want to play with the rest of your Heralds of Galactus team. The more cards I read, the more I realize how many stall elements this team possesses. I had Taa II in my Sealed Pack card pool at the Heralds of Galactus Sneak Preview event. Having the terraform keyword to use as a tool now is such a treat. The effect generated by Taa II can target your attacker or defender, making it a premium location for Sealed Pack.
Kindred Spirits is probably the best solution to building this top-heavy curve that I keep referencing, without sacrificing numerous slots that would normally be taken by locations and plot twists. It is still very important to recruit some valuable characters in the first few turns of the game, and with a threshold cost of 0, Kindred Spirits could set up your drops as early as turn 1. Having a copy or two of Kindred Spirits should let you skimp on your earlier drops a bit, but I would still suggest that you try not to go overboard.
Silver Surfer, Skyrider of the Spaceways gives you an excellent way to set up your later turns without completely overcommitting to the top-heavy curve. With one or two activations of the Surfer, you should be set to play out the rest of the game. I’m still inclined to think that most builds should consist of a top-heavy curve, but with a copy or two of this Silver Surfer, I would consider shaving off a little from my higher drops.
Morg, Corrupt Destroyer does not fit into the “4 or greater” stall theme, other than removing opposing threats when he has a cosmic counter. (He does cost 4, so I guess it has some connection to the “4 or greater” theme.) Moreover, Morg is the Heralds of Galactus team’s premium aggressor. The threat of adding a timely mid-combat cosmic counter to him will cause your opponent to proceed with caution.
The Fallen One, The Forgotten is the best option that this team has for adding cosmic counters to its characters. With his cosmic counter, The Fallen One can remove your opponent’s best character. Combine him with Morg, Corrupt Destroyer, discard a card of cost 4 or greater, and watch your opponent’s forces crumble. If The Fallen One survives into turn 8, look out for this next guy . . .
Tyrant, The Original Herald. Have you ever heard of an 8-drop that wasn’t rare? When the set designers put these 8-drops in the rare slots, they do it so that you will have lower cost common and uncommon options to play with. Almost anyone would agree that conventional Sealed Pack and Draft logic says that turn 8 isn’t reached very often. When I noticed that Tyrant, The Original Herald was uncommon, I thought to myself, “This is a clue.” With all of the stall elements that the Heralds of Galactus team offers, I think you are supposed to plan to finish the game with this guy in play. Trust me, when he comes into play and uses a cosmic counter or two, you will definitely see how this card wins the game.
Honorable Mentions:
Terrax, the Tamer is a powerful rare and yet another top-notch 4-drop. His Terra-like power helps facilitate stalling through later turns. Notice that this is yet another cosmic power.
I’ll be back next week with another look at the top ten most noteworthy cards of the next team in this series. Between the release of this article and my next, I will have played in $10K New York. Hopefully, I will have a good success story to tell as I return from the event. Wish me luck!