Part 1

In this type of deck, there should be more character cards that non-character cards, but it’s currently lopsided. We’ll need to make several cuts here.

Plot Twists

4 Spider Senses

These are to be used efficiently on turns 4 through 6. Hoard these. One is nice, but two will fail attacks. This is especially true when someone decides to attack up the curve with a Savage Beatdown and you have the Senses ready. Then the opponent either has to blow another Beatdown, or the attack fails and costs the opponent a stun, a character, and a Beatdown. You should avoid using Senses when a Beatdown or a No Man will simply counter it, but sometimes that is precisely what you will want to do so that the opponent doesn’t get to use that same Beatdown on a follow-up attack. You will have to use your discretion—listen to your gut. Try to feel out how many offensive pumps your opponent has. Lastly, use this card to save endurance. You are trying to get to turn 7, and after that point, your plan is not to need more DEF pumps.

4 Wild Ride

Obv. Be careful of the endurance loss, though. This card is very versatile, but it stings in the late game. Having this card as your go-to search strategy is one of the major reasons you need to play so conservatively in the early game.

You need to deny people plot twists. You need to stop No Man when you boost Dr. Strange, and you need to stop Titans Go any time your opponent has the initiative. Also, it’s a good way to start a turn 7+ against Titans. You have two great options to name, supposing your opponent just lets it resolve, which he or she will often be forced to do: Press the Attack or Heroic Sacrifice. Be aware of the current metagame and look for signals. If your opponent is playing A Child Named Valeria and Alfred Pennyworth, you may want to call Cosmic Radiation. If he or she is playing Thunderbolts, you may want to name Team Tactics or Blind Sided. And if your opponent is playing Gotham Knights and you have a few search cards you have to force through, you may want to name Fizzle. Lastly, I’m a fan of naming offensive and defensive pumps. Naming Savage Beatdown on the same turn where you have two Spider Senses in your row can equal very bad times for your opponent. If he or she is playing all characters with range and a Cover Fire would wreck you, look out for that. And if you sit down in front of me anytime, you may want to name Reign of Terror on turn 4 before I recruit, supposing of course that you have a non-Ricochet 3-drop worth Reigning. Practice this card—it’s one of the bigger finesse cards you will ever find in a card game. Remember that you can Micro-Chip this, so play it from your resource row when you can. In a pinch, you can even name Kang Council with a Midnight Sons and replace a couple copies of Null Time Zone. I mean, I’d do it.

2 Nice Try!

I love the effect, but I’m only playing two of them. I like being able to counter a Roy Harper activation, especially if a Null Time Zone naming Press the Attack has already gone off, but I am scared of choking on these. Choking on a card, for those of you not familiar with the term, is when you draw too many copies of the same card and are constantly in a situation where you can’t play any of them. Nice Try! is the type of card that you can choke on, but it’s also the type of card that wins you the game when you least expect it. Remember that Nice Try! can negate No Man Escapes the Manhunters (3 endurance is 3 endurance).

2 Spider-Tracer

I haven’t used Spider-Tracer very much myself, but I figure Rosario can’t be too far off base with this card. It is good for many of the same reasons that Null Time Zone and Nice Try! are good, just in a different way. Remember that you can Micro-Chip this. This is an especially good reason to get into a Roy Harper exhaustion war during the build phase. I fear that this card can also choke you, which is why I’m only including two. I think it’s a little too situational for any more copies.

4 Midnight Sons

Here are the Team-Ups in the (most likely) correct order: The first one will name Spider-Friends, the second one will name Brotherhood, the third one will name Titans, and the fourth one will name Kang Council. But don’t use these like they are going out of style. Only flip the Titans and Kang team-up if necessary, because you may have to fight against Have a Blast! or War of Attrition and you will need backup Spider-Friends team-ups.

4 Savage Beatdown

How predictable. We need offense, huh? How about Beatdown? This deck does occasionally need to enter the Red Zone and fight, and the best bang for our buck is the good ol’ Hulk Smashing Abomination card. I feel dirty playing a deck that actively promotes declaring attacks, but I’ll swallow my inhibitions for this article.

4 Costume Change

This gets you the Spider-Man you need when you need him. It can also get Scarlet Spider now and then, but don’t rely on that. Remember, if you already have your drops planned out, you can use this card to get more Spider-Men into your Avalon Space Station rotation. This is especially handy for power-ups. I like playing eight search cards. It makes me warm inside.

Some Thoughts on the Plot Twists

I’m excited. This looks like a pretty good selection we have going. The absence of Reconstruction Program may be apparent, but unlike Rosario’s list, we have access to the Brotherhood team-up with Avalon to net cards.

Locations

4 Avalon Space Station

Use this card constantly. You want to use this card proactively to fight a lot of fights. Remember, this card makes every card you draw a potential character exhaustion from turn 7 on, or a power-up during the turns prior. Before you go crazy fighting power-up wars against Curve Sentinels, remember that. Most of the cards you draw are just generic slots waiting for Avalon to give them a purpose. Also, you should team-up with Brotherhood early and use Avalon to get all your Midnight Sons out of your deck pronto. Sometimes it will even be correct to discard a Midnight Sons to get back a Dagger, mostly in cases where you don’t expect to need all the possible team-ups this deck can provide. Don’t be scared on a later turn to flip up a second Avalon, KO’ing the first one. Sometimes it’s your best play, but be aware of whether or not it will give you a major advantage. This is especially true when Brotherhood is teamed up. Avalon is also like the 7-drop Spider-Man—you aren’t penalized for playing four copies of it. You can avoid choking on the extra copies simply by discarding extra copies to itself.

Okay, now that we know what we are trying to do, let’s make the cuts! It’s everyone’s favorite part of the show, where I take cards that I have just said are great and tell you that they aren’t really worth it.

The Cuts

We need to remove thirteen cards, most of which will be characters.

-1 Micro-Chip

We want to have the chance to draw him naturally, but he’s not mandatory. He’s more of a breath-mint for when we go into battle—it’s nice to have, but not crucial.

-1 Scarlet Spider

This way, we are playing five copies of Scarlet Spider, whereas the original list ran seven—not too big of a difference. I think we can concede the second turn play most of the time, as it will not get us enough traction to get out of whatever mud-hole our opponent pushes us into.

-2 Ricochet

I like variety here, and I think it’s a very important drop to hit. This is where your legitimate curve should start. We were playing seven 3-drops, and the original list had a few less that mostly required natural drawing. There should be around five or six.

-1 Scarlet Witch

She is a pipe dream, and her ability doesn’t do quite enough against the problems that may arise, especially from Dr. Light, Arthur Light–based decks that will just choose to stun her before moving forward. In those situations, I’d rather have the Alien Symbiote and Ricochet protecting him. Besides, she deserves to be cut for what she did in House of M—totally her fault.

-1 Ezekiel

I’m cutting Ezekiel for pacing purposes. The film was just moving too slowly with him in it. He will be featured on the bonus-filled DVD that will be released just in time for the holiday season. You should try him and see how you feel about him, but he is often just a “win more” type of card, in my opinion.

-1 Ghost Rider

He is being cut for the same reason as Ezekiel. I think he’s a novel idea, but there isn’t room to support every pipe dream. You either need to have faith in Dr. Strange or faith in Ghost Rider. I chose the one that isn’t just a skeletal biker with fire for hair. Dr. Strange is mystical, and that tickles me.

-1 Null Time Zone

While this card is incredible, you’ll be able to reuse it with Micro-Chip at least once in a game if you are willing to under-drop. Also, Null Time Zone can whiff if you aren’t careful. This card takes a lot of practice, and unless you are willing to focus on every possible outcome of every possible turn, limiting yourself to just three of them for the really crucial turns may be okay. You don’t want to be in a situation where you are choking on them and just play one and name whatever because it might do something. Those are the worst Null Time Zones. They are mostly for later turns anyway, so we can safely cut one here.

-4 Savage Beatdown

Let’s be honest . . . can we do that? I really don’t think this deck is clamoring for Beatdowns to begin with. Not every deck that plans on turning characters sideways should put in four Beatdowns, so we should be fine without them. The point of the deck isn’t to run over your opponent. Without Beatdown, you just have to watch for potential Acrobatic Dodges and make safe team-attacks. Just get yourself to turn 7 and let the web-slinger work his magic from there on.

-1 Avalon Space Station

Something has to go, and the frequency of drawing it while playing three as compared to the necessity of drawing one isn’t too big of a tradeoff for us. You can win games when you don’t draw any Avalons. That is acceptable.

So, what did we end up with? I kept Koriand’r in the list . . . I can’t believe she survived the cuts! Playing her on an unsuspecting opponent has always been a dream of mine, and this is the type of deck where it may actually work. We are playing a deck that lacks flight, so your opponent hiding big characters in the back row makes sense, and turn 6 is the most pivotal turn that we have. Stunning Bastion, removing a Nimrod counter, or stunning Garth or Red Star is not out of the question with her. Let’s see how you like a taste of your own medicine, Titans!

Here’s our final decklist:

Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends

by Jason Hager

60 Cards

2 Micro-Chip

1 Scarlet Spider ◊ Spider-Man

2 Ricochet

1 Cardiac

1 Spider-Man, Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man

1 Brother Voodoo
4 Spider-Man, Peter Parker

1 Cloak

4 White Tiger

1 Spider-Man, Alien Symbiote

4 Scarlet Spider, Ben Reilly

1 Koriand’r ◊ Starfire

1 Spider-Man, The Spectacular Spider-Man

4 Spider-Man, The Amazing Spider-Man

1 Dr. Strange, Stephen Strange

1 Spider-Man, Cosmic Spider-Man

Plot Twists (23)
4 Spider Senses
4 Wild Ride
3 Null Time Zone
2 Nice Try!
2 Spider-Tracer
4 Midnight Sons
4 Costume Change

Here are some matchup situations to look out for.

Avengers Reservist

Your attacks are not safe! This is the type of matchup where you need to hit 3-drop Spider-Man and go very carefully. The good news is that once you reach turn 7, you win the game. Your opponent can do very little to resist your punishing late game. Just be careful—this deck has so many Nasty Surprise–like cards that you will be happy to get Peter Parker’s DEF bonus while attacking. That being said, don’t stop attacking down, especially when it will require your opponent to flip a hidden Avenger’s Mansion and have a Heroes in Reserve. But remember that this deck can’t fight in combat in terms of defense, so you can make even-drop attacks all day long and they will all succeed. Get your opponent’s heavy hitters off the board and turtle up and reinforce when you don’t have the initiative.

Curve Sentinels

This is the matchup you built the deck for. It is far from a gimme, but it’s just about as good as you are going to get. Curve’s real magic usually takes place on turn 7 when Genosha goes large, and by that time, you should be able to start turning your opponent’s side of the table sideways. Don’t make any risky attack on turns 4 through 6. Team attack where necessary and don’t get ruined just because your opponent drew five copies of Sentinel Mark V and a Reconstruction Program. You aren’t trying to win the race early—just try to remove a few robots from the board while eliminating attacks back.

Teen Titans

You are going to get your 7-drop Roy Harper’d. It will happen. Be careful. You will have to fight tooth and nail to make sure he doesn’t get those ATK bonuses by exhausting the team in a very deliberate order. Start off by exhausting a non-Roy character. Your opponent will put a Roy pump on the chain, you will add to the chain with another character exhaust, your opponent will pump Roy, and you will exhaust another. Keep going, and finally, with all the pumps still on the chain, you will exhaust Roy. He will often pump himself, and then your opponent will Press the Attack him.

There are a few options for you in these situations. You can sometimes just exhaust Roy. See who your opponent is willing to exhaust in response to give him ATK bonuses. This is especially true when your hand isn’t huge to begin with and you need your opponent to exhaust his or her own guys (remember always to act as though you can exhaust every character your opponent ever plays, even if in reality you cannot). Against Titans, you need to attack during the mid-game and attack well. You desperately need to remove characters from the board. You can’t allow Titans to have out six or more characters on turn 7 for very long. Nice Try! will be ridiculous in this matchup, and if you are really scared of Titans, I would add more of them. Null Time Zoning at the beginning of the turn in the late game will be very good for you, especially if you have a Nice Try! to back it up. You may want to Spider-Tracer Red Star once and a while, and remember that it’s made for Roy. Naming Teen Titans Go! in the mid-game with Null Time Zone is the correct call.

Well, there you have it. I took out Iceman, Cool Customer and put in Koriand’r ◊ Starfire. Playing with Starfire is pretty close to playing with Firestar, and it reminds me of the old Firestar, Iceman, and Spider-Man cartoon from the ’80’s. (I saw it recently—it sucks. All your favorite cartoons from when you were a kid suck. It’s depressing.) Anyway, I hope maybe I said something you hadn’t thought about, and I hope I read all the cards correctly.

Keep sending me your decklists for review, please. Over the next few weeks, I’m going to mull over the JLA set and eventually clinic some decks that contain JLA cards.

Jason “I Can’t Believe I Lost to Koriand’r in LA after Writing This Article” Hager,

Hager47@marshall.edu 

Jaxxin on vsrealms.com