Since March of 2004, one month before I had real Vs. System cards in my hands, I was building decks that could finish opponents in three or four turns. A deck that wins fast is dangerous . . . both for your opponent and for yourself.

There are many card combinations that can inflict 50 endurance damage and end a game before turn 5. All of them are very risky. The designers of this game made sure that quick-kill cards like The New Brotherhood couldn’t be searched for without teaming up. That makes luck such a critical factor in drawing the right twelve cards at the beginning of the game that a fourth turn win is extremely inconsistent.

When I was making my decision about what deck I wanted to play at PC LA, my teammate Ryan Jones was winning a PCQ with pure speed. Two of his matches ended on the fourth turn. He had built a deck similar to Matt Boccio’s TNB burn deck from the first $10K in Philadelphia, but made two outstanding improvements. Ryan added 4 copies of A Death in the Family, and his character list was a collection of small, assorted nuts. With less multiples, The New Brotherhood and The Mutant Menace could empower a reasonably sized swarm of beat sticks, either for an early win or for a shocking, late game comeback. Jonesy wanted to call the deck “Surprise, You Lose!” With this deck, your opponent will often think the game has swung in his or her favor by turn 5 or 6, only to get burned to death by Surprise Attack and The Mutant Menace. I decided to eschew my beloved Sentinels for a chance to win on the fourth turn, especially with the presence of Unus in the deck.

Poor Unus. He doesn’t get any respect. Not only is he a pro wrestler, but his death story is also the most pathetic thing you’ll ever hear. This is what happened: Unus was using his mutant powers of repulsion one day when his forcefield went haywire. He repelled himself away from the ground and floated in mid-air as his best buddy Blob watched in horror. Unus screamed in agony as his forcefield became so powerful that it pushed all the air out of his lungs. The helpless Blob began to cry. When Unus finally suffocated, his power turned off and he fell, lifeless, into Blob’s arms.

In case you feel the way I do, and you actually want to beat people with a character like that, here is the deck:

Surprise, You Lose!

Ryan Jones

First Place

Gamer Con Los Angeles PCQ

November 20, 2004

3 Lorelei

2 Phantazia

2 Destiny

2 Mastermind

1 Thornn
4 Pyro

2 Toad

1 Avalanche

1 Unus
2 Quicksilver, Pietro Maximoff

1 Rogue, Anna Raven

1 Mystique, Raven Darkholme
4 Sabretooth, Feral Rage

1 Sauron

1 Blob
4 Magneto, Eric Lehnsherr

4 Savage Land
4 Genosha

4 The New Brotherhood
4 Savage Beatdown
4 Surprise Attack
4 The Mutant Menace
4 A Death in the Family

The deck is so fast that it can win on the third turn with the perfect draw. It can beat Titans. In fact, Vidianto Wijaya almost knocked Ryan out of the PC LA Top 8 with a similar build that added Foiled and Ka-boom! instead of the burn cards. A Death in the Family is just that good. In the first game of their Top 4 match, Vidi drew The New Brotherhood, Savage Land, a character for every resource point, and two copies of A Death in the Family. Speed like that kills every time.

Now that the Superman, Man of Steel expansion is tournament legal, I’m looking to get fast with Deep Six. They are small and nasty. They live underwater and are really, really ugly. They serve Darkseid’s appetite for destruction from deep beneath the sea. Vs. System gives Deep Six so much burn potential that our metagame waters might soon be boiling, especially with Jaffar’s ability.

In the myths, Jaffar is, by far, the most evil member of Deep Six. He is not satisfied with merely destroying his enemies. He often uses his powers to transform humans (and other weak-minded life forms) into Deep Six styled sea-creatures. In the game, when Jaffar allows a player to use extra resource points to recruit Deep Six characters, he is actually grabbing a spectator and morphing that unfortunate bystander into a dripping fish-monster. Not pretty.

Deep Six characters are small enough to start the beatings early in the game, and they have been blessed with many aggressive support cards. Darkseid’s Elite has perhaps the best piece of equipment in the game—Beta Club. This terrible toy gives any character that holds it the power of Batman, Caped Crusader. When an opponent is suffering twice the normal endurance loss every time a defender stuns, games don’t last very long. Tech Upgrade allows the Club to be tutored for, and Salvage is a little-used recursion card that has finally become viable. The Deep Six underwater weenies, armed with their Beta Clubs, will bring new meaning to the term “beat stick.”

This is my rough concept deck:

The Quickest Club

4 Gole

4 Kurin

4 Jaffar

4 Shaligo

3 Trok

3 Bernadeth

3 Granny Goodness

2 Spider-Man, Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man

2 Nightcrawler, Kurt Wagner

4 Beta Club

3 Salvage

4 Tech Upgrade

4 Press the Attack

4 Hordes of Apokolips

4 Mega-Blast

4 Flying Kick

4 Heat Vision

What is the deck trying to do? What else . . . win fast. With a lucky draw and Jaffar, you can recruit an extra character on turn 2, and then recruit Trok on turn 3. Tech Upgrade some Beta Clubs onto the group, and your opponent will shake with fear. Team attacks will now do double, triple, or even quadruple endurance loss. Add in Granny Goodness and the Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man, and you have an outrageously risky trick that will keep your friends buzzing for days. Deep Six should be able to Press the Attack, maybe on a Darkseid’s Elite–flavored Nightcrawler, Kurt Wagner with a Mega-Blast or two.

Big, beautiful beats come in small, ugly packages. Try some today, before the fifth turn.