Welcome to the Doom stop on my tour of the top ten most noteworthy cards each team has to offer in Heralds of Galactus. If you’re just coming into this series, you can get caught up by checking out the first, second, and third installments preceding this article. At the end of the Sealed Heralds of Galactus season, I plan to revisit these articles to see how close I was to getting it all right.
Jumping right in, first I’d like to take a look at five plot twists that I will follow up with five of the Doom team’s best characters.
There is a high concentration of rare Doom-stamped plot twists in the Heralds of Galactus set. While this typically means more fuel for the Constructed gurus, I think a number of these rares can really give your Sealed deck a big shot in the arm.
The first of these rare plot twists I’d like to touch upon is Doomed Earth. I was able to play this card both times I had it in my Sealed Pack card pool. I haven’t been able to flip Doomed Earth as early or as often as I would like, but I usually find an opportunity to flip the card during the course of the game without KO’ing ready characters. There was always at least one turn somewhere in the middle of the game when I would end up with my entire board of three characters stunned. This would obviously be the optimal time to flip Doomed Earth. Because the Doom team has the most ways to put extra characters into play—even if for only a turn—I find Doomed Earth to be easy enough to flip consistently. The question then becomes, “Is Doomed Earth worth flipping if its drawback is going to mean losing one extra character?” Different situations will dictate whether it is, but I’m willing to bet that early enough in the game, the answer is, “Yes, go ahead and flip it quickly, and reap the rewards throughout the rest of the game.”
Next up in the series of rare Doom plot twists is Unthinkable. Unthinkable probably doesn’t need much explanation. It is an incredibly versatile combat modifier that carries a slight drawback—KO’ing the target character as you reach the recovery phase. The Doom team’s characters just can’t seem to stick around anyway, so it makes good sense to capitalize on an opportunity to play a big pump on an attacker or defender that you don’t expect to have around for the next turn. I’m not sure how relevant the +2 DEF part of this card will ever be, but it will probably come in handy many times for many different players.
Time Thief rounds out this sub-segment of rare Doom plot twists. Remember that we’re talking Sealed Pack here; a lot of players’ character curves top out at 7 with only one 7-drop in their decks. I, for one, have not yet had the chance to play with Time Thief in Sealed Pack, but I’ve heard numerous stories at my local game store where a player crippled an opponent by removing the opponent’s only 7-drop from his or her deck as early as turn 3. In Sealed Pack, there could easily be one critical non-character card that defines your opponent’s deck, which when removed causes your opponent to misfire for the rest of the game. Maybe he or she has only one Team-Up; let’s see how the opponent likes playing without that option. Time Thief doesn’t race up to the top of these ten most noteworthy Doom cards because it is more a “risk vs. reward” type of card. The risk is that your opponent will not be handicapped if you choose incorrectly, or that he or she has already drawn everything needed to finish the game. The reward is that if you get the right card at the right time, you may cut your opponent’s hopes of salvaging a tough situation from slim to none.
As mentioned already a time or two in this article, the Doom team has no qualms about KO’ing excess characters. Doom Needs Only Doom and For the Glory of Doom! are two great ways to get the most out of your expendables. Almost all of the Team-Ups in Heralds of Galactus make the top ten list for their respective teams. The added burn from For the Glory of Doom! will, over time, make its mark on your opponent’s endurance total. Doom Needs Only Doom gives its target -4 DEF for the turn, meaning this card can be used to cause extra stuns when you are defending as well as attacking. The Doom team in Heralds of Galactus was designed to cycle extra characters into and out of play via powerful plot twist effects such as these.
Moving along to the characters, here are five of the Doom team’s top players:
Dr. Doom, Richards’s Rival begins with a sturdy frame and then pours on layers of strength. I love having the option to search my deck for my best plot twist, and it doesn’t bother me one bit to KO a stunned character that I would lose anyway to replace a resource. I’m sure the Doom theme is pretty apparent by now: KO all of your extra characters for some positive effect. The fact that Doom’s search effect is optional is actually a big bonus. If you probably won’t be losing a character on the turn that Dr. Doom, Richards’s Rival comes into play, and you are still hoping to dig deeper to find that missing drop, you can always opt out of putting a card on top of your deck that is guaranteed to not be the character you need.
Dr. Doom, Sorcerous Savant is an even more powerful version of the super 3-drop. 13 ATK and flight already make this guy worth a look. Because Dr. Doom, Sorcerous Savant probably won’t be coming into play until one of the last turns of the game, it isn’t a big stretch to say that you may only get to use his power once a game. Often getting one use from Doom is all it will take, though. If you’re lucky enough to open a bomb of a combat pump like Armageddon or Live Kree . . . or Die!, Doom gives you a way to make a second copy of the plot twist (assuming you have drawn your one copy and placed it in your resource row). I haven’t personally seen Armageddon flipped back down with Dr. Doom, but I hope that when I do finally see that play, I will be the one attacking.
Did you know that the Doom team has a recurring theme of KO’ing excess characters for positive effects? (That’s a rhetorical question, in case you missed the sarcasm.) It seems like every Doom card has something to do with KO’ing your own guys. Magneto, Acts of Vengeance is a great finisher. I have been forced to underdrop on the final turn of the game with Magneto, and as it turned out, playing him was better than playing my missed 7-drop would have been. Magneto helps break up solid defensive formations. He can also prevent those sneaky concealed lurkers from coming back to haunt you after you battle with the visible characters. The one thing that truly makes Magneto, Acts of Vengeance a gem is that his power, while limited to your attack step, is not limited to only once per turn. Many people don’t realize this, but it is an understandable oversight since so many other strong effects are limited that way.
I’ve described effects requiring you to KO Doom characters as a cost many times throughout this article, but I haven’t given many examples to back up statements that the Doom team can easily put extra “free” characters into play. Technarx, Cyborg General is the all-star of the free characters that the Doom team has to offer. Technarx doesn’t get tired of playing after coming out for one free visit; he keeps coming back for more. And yes, Technarx gives you something to do with extra stunned characters other than choosing to not recover them.
Finally, we close out this segment with Ultron ◊ Ultron 11, Army. Be sure to fill that KO’d pile with a bunch of excess—Ultron can stay out past all of the other Doom characters’ bedtimes. With enough fuel in the KO’d pile, I find that it is even possible to use Ultron as one of the characters KO’d to meet the additional cost requirements of cards like Doomed Earth before returning him to play pre-combat. Then during the combat phase, with still enough fuel to resolve Ultron’s effect yet again, Ultron can go full-speed into battle knowing that he will live to fight another day.
The end of this series is drawing near, with one final segment to go. Skrulls, Infinity Watch, other legacy teams, and generic plot twists, locations, and equipment cards will all fall into the grand finale. Since there are so many great cards that are unrestricted by team-stamps, I will be highlighting more than just a top ten next time. I’m not sure if I’ll just give a number of honorable mentions, or how else I might handle the situation. Maybe I’ll go with a top twenty. The good news for me is that I have about a week to figure that out; the good news for you is that you will be getting a break from me for a week after the conclusion of this series.
For now, go enjoy playing some Sealed Pack. Vs. System is a wonderful game. Heralds of Galactus is a spectacular set. Mutant Supremacy is still the coolest card that I have never actually played. I bet you didn’t know that.
Doug Tice’s accomplishments: Sealed Pack $10K NY 2005 – Winner, Constructed $10K Charlotte 2005 – Finalist, Sealed Pack $10K LA 2006 – Winner, Constructed $10K Austin 2006 – Winner, Pro Circuit San Francisco 2006 – Quarterfinalist, Sealed Pack $10K NY 2006 – Semifinalist.