Preview time is upon us once again, faithful readers. It’s interesting to see all the different reactions to the multitude of cards and new mechanics that pop up in these few weeks before the Sneak Preview events. Personally, I love preview weeks, because when I get a preview article I get to share my enthusiasm and love for the game with you. I’m lucky enough to share a new card with you today, so I won’t waste any more time waxing philosophical about why previews are so great. Without further ado:

I’ll be honest here: when I first got my card, my reaction was, “Who is this?” I had never heard of Chemo before, so I did some research. I have learned from my time here as a Metagame.com writer that Wikipedia is my friend. I quickly searched for Chemo, not certain I would really find anything of interest. Lo and behold, I found just what I was looking for.

During Infinite Crisis, The Society had a grand plan for using Chemo as a chemical weapon against the city of Blüdhaven, which Nightwing protects. Chemo is, essentially, a huge vat of chemical compounds and mixtures that eventually gained consciousness. In the simplest terms, it is a walking, talking (its ability to speak goes as far as “Gg” and “Oop”), chemical weapon of mass destruction. The Society (represented in Vs. System as the Villains United team) saw Chemo’s potential and threw it out of a plane to explode upon the city of Bludhaven, creating even more chaos for the heroes that were dealing with the Infinite Crisis. This scenario is presented very well in the card art; you can see the large cargo plane dropping Chemo onto the unsuspecting innocents below.

The city was devastated, but Chemo began to regenerate, pulling all the chemicals that made it up back into its plastic shell and easing some of the suffering in Blüdhaven. Thankfully, Superman saved the day (what a surprise, right?) and threw Chemo into space. Whether this is the end of our favorite pile of goop is yet to be seen, but I wouldn’t count it out yet.

What Can It Do?

I’ll be honest; I was very underwhelmed when I first received this card. Its stats are horrendous. With only 3 DEF for a 3-drop character, Chemo is the epitome of mediocre. If it was a plain vanilla character with no card text, I would immediately discard it. Thankfully, we get much more than that here.

With this character, we are more interested in its vengeance than in its ATK/DEF. In order for vengeance to trigger, Chemo has to stun, and that 3 DEF all but assures that will happen. With a 4 ATK Chemo won’t be winning a lot of fights, but it can usually take down an opposing 3-drop given that so many have 4 DEF.

So what kind of impact can Chemo’s vengeance have on the game?  Obviously Chemo does nothing of real significance on its own, which I love. It’s very flavorful that in order for Chemo to have an impact on the game, there must be others around who are willing to “throw it out of a plane.” In the comics Chemo was used for a larger agenda, and in our wonderful game we get to do the same thing.

The first thought that popped into my balding head was to immediately do a search of all the applicable characters with vengeance. Unfortunately vengeance is a relatively new keyword, and characters that work well with Chemo’s vengeance are few and far between. There were a few diamonds in the rough, however, that could provide some interesting interactions.

• Dr. Psycho, Mental Giant – This was the first character that crossed my mind when I thought about abusing Chemo. Unfortunately, his ability is rather narrow in scope. If your opponent is not playing an off-curve strategy, you won’t gain much of a benefit.

• Dr. Light, Furious Flashpoint – This interaction was not so obvious to me; Dr. Light, Master of Holograms is, by all accounts, a much better Dr. Light. After more consideration, though, this is a very interesting combo. You could potentially pump out two characters a turn with the Chemo/Dr. Light interaction. Granted, those cards must be unique (you can’t have a card with the same name in play when you use Dr. Light’s vengeance) but a skilled deckbuilder should have no problem with that.

As strange as this may sound, those were the only vengeance characters that were really applicable to Chemo. As I said before, we don’t have that many vengeance characters to look through because the mechanic is so new. I was at a loss for other characters that would work well with Chemo, and then it hit me: what other teams or mechanics have powers that involve stuns? Morlocks with evasion, of course!  Once again, the creative juices started flowing. Here are a few thoughts to get your own ideas trickling:

•  Electric Eve – This card is a High Voltage mainstay but has some interesting synergy with Chemo. One of the biggest problems in utilizing Chemo’s ability is having a character that is already stunned on your side of the board. On your opponent’s initiative, he or she might just swing into Chemo first to make sure you don’t get off any chemical-related shenanigans. That’s where evasion comes into play. Hitting the opponent for an extra 2 endurance a turn is pretty sweet, especially when we have cards such as Surprise Attack that are dedicated to this type of direct damage. Given that, we should not underrate this interaction either.

• Tar Baby – Removing a card from the opponent’s KO’d pile is always a good thing, and removing several can be downright devastating. Many players make use of The Phantom Stranger, Wandering Hero and Mr. Mxyzptlk, Troublesome Trickster as a means to build hand advantage. Just playing Tar Baby and getting him stunned allows you to remove one of those little cards from the game. When you add Chemo to the mix, your opponent will never again be able to reliably use Straight to the Grave or Slaughter Swamp because you may have tricks up your sleeve.

• Healer – Would you like to gain some extra endurance each turn? I know I would, and Healer is just the man for the job. With Chemo, he throws in that little extra oomph that your deck might need to make it over the hump.

• Leech – This guy has been teched in decks since he was first legal. With his ability to neutralize any character’s payment power, using this guy twice a turn can be a real thorn in many players’ sides.

Sealed Impact?

It’s hard to comment on Chemo’s impact in a Sealed environment. As I mentioned before, its stats are sub-par for its cost; therefore, for Chemo to have any real application in a Sealed environment it will have to be played in conjunction with other characters that either have the vengeance keyword or gain some sort of benefit when another character stuns or recovers.

In the End

While Chemo himself may not be formidable, if you surround him with the right support group he could be a wrecking ball that creates all kinds of disruption your opponents may not be ready for. I can’t wait to see what the rest of the set has in store for us, because I would love to be in a situation where my team can throw Chemo at my opponents and wreak some truly chemical havoc!