I’ve attended a couple of $10K events and several PCQs this summer and wherever I go, people tell me that my latest article exposed their top-secret killer deck idea. I’m sure that someone, somewhere, will scold me for giving away “the sauce” with today’s deck.

This League of Assassins/X-Men team-up deck tries to knock your opponent’s hand down to no cards ASAP, then it takes out his or her locations with extreme prejudice by way of Josef Witschi.

League of X-Men
4 Josef Witschi, Talia's Assistant
3 Nightcrawler, Kurt Wagner   
4 Hassim, Loyal Retainer 
3 Wolverine, Logan              
4 Psylocke, Betsy Braddock
4 Rogue, Power Absorption
2 Gambit, Remy LeBeau
3 Professor X, Charles Xavier
1 Whisper D'Aire, Cold-Blooded Manipulator
1 Colossus, Peter Rasputin
1 Ra's al Ghul, Master Swordsman

4 Cerebro
4 Professor Xavier's Mansion
2 Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters
1 Mountain Stronghold

2 Blind Sided
4 Children of the Atom
3 Dual Nature
3 Marvel Team-Up
4 Museum Heist
3 World's Finest

Even if your opponent isn’t playing with locations (or doesn’t dare flip them), the deck can quickly run an opponent out of cards, which ain’t half bad in its own right. Costing him or her a resource (or two) is just the final nail in the coffin.

Although Josef is the only 1-drop in the deck, it’s not a good to actually recruit him on the first turn of the first game. If you got the combo going in game 1, however, feel free to telegraph your diabolical plan by recruiting him on turn 1 of games 2 and 3. It’s preferable to use Dual Nature to get him into play, as your opponent won’t see him coming, and you can maintain your curve on the turn you want to see him out.

If your opponent is playing a fast deck, Josef could be very useful before turn 4. However, if your opponent has a sizable hand, you might as well wait to bring him out him until after Xavier's Mansion has done its work.

Hassim is the recruit of choice on turn 2, as you’ll probably be recruiting X-Men the next two or three turns. If on turn 4 you have two stunned characters, it might be a good time to Dual Nature Josef into play by getting rid of Hassim. It’s the crucial turn of the game, as you need to keep characters alive to trigger the Xavier's Mansion. Flip the team up if you haven’t already. Bust out with the Children of the Atom as well to make sure you have at least three characters face up when you head into the recovery phase. Sadly, you can’t wait and use Josef after the Mansion has done some housecleaning of your opponent’s hand. If your opponent has a location in play, go ahead and use the newly Natured Josef on it, as it will further deplete your opponent’s hand. Making him or her lose a resource is great, but if he or she has no cards, it doesn’t even matter how many resources he or she has . . .

When your opponent ends the turn with no cards in hand, he or she will soon find that the following turn won’t be any easier. With just two cards in hand, chances are good that your opponent won’t have the curve character for the turn. If he or she does, then he or she will have to play one card as a resource to recruit the character. Your opponent will be lucky if he or she recruits a character without needing to play a resource, as Josef will be on the hunt for a location to take down.

Resource destruction so far has been a very fair process, meaning no one has been able to KO an opponent’s resource without losing one of his or her own. Finding an opponent with no cards in hand is what Josef really wants to see. When that happens and Josef KO’s a location, that opponent actually goes down one resource. Ouch! If the opponent is playing a heavy location deck, things can go from bad to worse when you ready Josef with Xavier's School. And don’t forget about Rogue, Power Absorption. If you see a lot of juicy location targets, just copy Josef’s power and go to town.

The deck needs to draw some cards in order to get all of this going. Once your opponent sees some of the discard elements of the deck, he or she will be very stingy with cards to avoid dropping down to zero. No problem. Put your opponent between a rock and a hard place with Museum Heist. It’s very easy for this deck to have a ready character during the recovery phase with Dual Nature, Children of the Atom, and the School. Chances are good that your opponent will let you draw two cards instead of discarding a precious card from his or her hand. That will give your hand the fuel for Gambit, Children, Dual Nature, and Josef.

The deck really needs to get as many locations into the resource row as possible, plus you need to get one team-up card there, too. So don’t be afraid of playing plot twists from your hand. Each slot in the resource row is crucial. When you do have the full boat of locations, there is lots of fun stuff you can do. Cerebro is crucial, as you need characters in your hand all the time to use all the cool powers of this team-up. Plus, Cerebro lets you get rid of the duplicate locations and extra team-ups you don’t need.

If the plan hasn’t been working, you can still deliver some big beats on turn 6 with Colossus (who will easily be at +5 ATK due to Cerebro, Children of the Atom, Gambit, and Dual Nature). And if you just didn’t draw the locations the deck needs, but you have a lot of face-up plot twists in your resource row, try playing the 6-drop Ra’s. You can refill your resource row with a whole new crop of cards that should help you win on turn 6 or 7. If your opponent’s endurance is very low, you can let one of your characters get stunned (shouldn’t be hard to do, as the deck is light on defense), then Dual Nature in Nightcrawler or Professor X to make an attack from the support row. While Blind Sided is in there for Psylocke and Whisper, it can certainly be used to go for the win with Colossus or Ra’s.

Questions or comments may be sent to mhyra@metagame.com.