Wild Who? The Army Card, Right?
After reading our preview card, you probably thought immediately of the Wild Pack, Army card that was in the Web of Spider-Man expansion. If you didn’t, you need to start brushing up on your Vs. System trivia. Silver Sable was a frequent guest star when I first started reading The Amazing Spider-Man, but there was not much discussion of her or her “Wild Pack.” Anyone who is associated with Silver Sable is bound to have his or her hand in some nefarious stuff, and essentially, the Wild Pack is a group of mercenaries assembled by Sable whose mission is to search and destroy as her personal bounty hunters. R&D, as usual, did a great job conveying this purpose in our preview card.
Every time a character your opponent controls leaves play, a counter is put on Bounty Hunt. Thematically, this reflects the concept that whenever a high level bad guy breaks out or “leaves play,” the Wild Pack is keeping watch. One little baddie may not be enough to attract your top-of-the-line mercenaries like the Wild Pack, but add a couple more escapees and the rewards start piling up—and suddenly, you have their attention.
The reward for this card can be substantial if used correctly. The fact that Bounty Hunt gains a counter whenever a character leaves play—not merely when a character is KO’d— makes the card much more attractive. Right now, many decks abuse characters that enter and leave play repeatedly to gain multiple effects, such as the recently banned Frankie Raye ◊ Nova, Optimistic Youth, or any of the multiple Kree press characters. Add in the number of cards that actually allow you to return your opponents’ characters to their hands, and you have a card that has a lot of potential. Now, thanks to Bounty Hunt, you can actually gain some utility from your opponents’ characters when they bounce back and forth from play.
Drawing Cards is Good, Right?
When trying to evaluate the utility that Bounty Hunt gives, it is important to remember the average number of cards one might see in a given game. If a player does not draw any additional cards beyond the two normally drawn each turn, an average game that lasts seven turns will net a player eighteen cards. At the bare minimum, if Bounty Hunt’s effect is used only once, a player will see 11% more of his or her deck. I would hazard to say that percentage could be the difference between hitting or missing a drop or key plot twist. All in all, I would find it hard to squabble with the benefit that our preview card could give, especially considering the low cost involved. I will admit that the accumulation of counters could be slow, especially if an opponent doesn’t lose any characters or if you don’t pull Bounty Hunt until late in the game. Thankfully, there are ways to help speed up the counter collecting, which I will detail momentarily.
Sealed and Constructed Impact
Drawing cards is always a good thing. This is because card drawing increases your potential to find more of your curve, or more answers for your opponents’ plays. This is true of both formats, but more so for Sealed because your deck contains fewer cards. Thankfully, UDE realized that this card could have the potential to be overpowered in Sealed and made it an uncommon. Not knowing the rest of the Marvel Team-Up set makes it hard to evaluate how useful Bounty Hunt can be, but it is safe to assume that this card could be a diamond in the rough in the right deck.
This card is much easier to evaluate in the Constructed format, because we know what works well with the card and what doesn’t. It’s not hard to find this card’s weakness, which is that it is dependent on what your opponent plays. However, your opponent cannot afford to withhold characters out of fear of your potential card drawing, since you would simply be able to attack directly for the win. So how can you speed up the card drawing process given what your opponent plays? I have a few different ideas for you:
- Total Anarchy and Absolute Dominance – These two cards have a devastating ability, which is only abused further when you throw Bounty Hunt in the mix. Being able to kill off multiple characters in those first few turns is huge if you have our preview card flipped up in your row. The main problem with this interaction is that it requires your row to be pretty close to perfect, since Bounty Hunt and both of these cards are ongoing plot twists.
- Morg, Slayer – This is another character who facilitates the early use of Bounty Hunt. His interaction with our preview card is far more limited in scope, however, because it requires your opponent to play a 1-drop. But where Morg, Slayer is limited in scope, he is easier to play than Total Anarchy or Absolute Dominance. You don’t have to set up your resource row, and he can even be underdropped later if your opponent tries to rush you.
- Morg, Corrupt Destroyer – Another Morg that has synergy with our preview. This one is just a bigger, more efficient variation of his previous version, but only if you can turn him on. His power is cosmic—surge, so in order to get Morg to start “bouncing” characters, and thus getting you bounty counters, you would need a plan to put a cosmic counter on him.
- Silver Surfer, Righteous Protector – This guy has some great synergy with Bounty Hunt. His ability is cosmic-themed, but he comes into play fully powered. Add the fact that his power can return multiple characters, and you could potentially draw four cards off of his effect alone.
- Flame Trap – This card actually becomes a lot better when paired with Bounty Hunt. One of the most prohibitive drawbacks of Flame Trap was the required two-card discard. But when a player plays Flame Trap, he or she generally stuns several characters; Bounty Hunt can essentially eliminate the discard cost by allowing you to draw two more cards to replace the ones that were just ditched.
There are many more cards that work well in conjunction with Bounty Hunt, but I would hate to deprive you of all the fun and excitement that can be had trying to break this interesting new card.
In the End
I think this card could find a place in a variety of decks, both casual and competitive. We will have to wait and see exactly how much of an impact Bounty Hunt will have on the Sealed formats, but I have a feeling it could be a sleeper hit. Enjoy the rest of the previews we have here on Metagame.com, and I will see you soon!
Shane Wiggans, one of the nicest guys with a tattoo sleeve, is also a member of Team Alternate Win Condition and can’t wait to see what else Marvel Team-Up has in store. If you have any questions or comments for him, feel free to say hey at any event, or email him at piercedlawyer@yahoo.com.
*Check out the Spider-Man movie soundtrack for a very cool rendition by Aerosmith!