Poor children of the world, rejoice. We’ve found you a hero in the form of Tim Batow.

With the popularity of decks like Curve Sentinels and Teen Titans continually skyrocketing, the prices of the cards in those decks are doing the same. Savage Beatdowns are reaching $30 online, and cards like Bastion, Genosha, and Garth ◊ Tempest each cost a month’s allowance. For the working adult hobbyist, this is a mere divot on the road to deck-based respectability. For the financially burdened gamer, however, it’s a ditch.

The reason for this popularity is the obvious strength of the decks in which those cards are played. A hundred articles written by a hundred writers have sung a thousand praises to the dominant decks, and with the gamer being a notoriously lazy breed, it’s simply easier to copy than create. That’s where Batow comes in.

Today, Tim is playing a four-team variant of Rigged Elections. Based on the deck Craig Edwards played at PC Indy last summer, the deck needed a facelift in light of recent expansions. Presently 3-0, Batow is in the process of proving that you don’t need to duplicate to dominate.

“I didn’t want to play one of the core decks,” explained the seventeen-year-old Batow as we chatted about his choice. “I mean, if you play Curve Sentinels or Teen Titans, sure, you can win mirror matches by adding skill to the equation, but if they get the good draw, you can always lose regardless of being the better player. I’d rather play something that challenges me as a player and deckbuilder and surprises people a little.” This isn’t exactly a new sentiment for Batow, who won $10K Las Vegas playing the less-than-popular My Beloved.

His newest creation really only has one way to win—Rigged Elections. Playing 27 1-cost characters, the deck is more than capable of a fourth turn kill. The big fear is that his opponent is playing Have a Blast! or Foiled, but Micro-Chip can protect his Elections from both cards.

“One thing a lot of people don’t know is that Rigged Elections keeps its counters when its flipped over, like Xavier’s Dream, so Have a Blast! isn’t that bad.” Part of Tim’s decision to play the deck was based on his belief that Doom is becoming less popular in the wake of the Sentinel/Titan ascendance. “With no Doom, Alfred Pennyworth doesn’t need to search for team-ups, so you can use him to get Bat-Signal instead.”

One truly beautiful aspect of the deck is the cost. Made mostly of commons and uncommons, the only expensive cards in the deck are Alfred, who is dollar for dollar one of the best characters in the game, and Wild Ride, one of the chase cards from Marvel Knights. The Ride is especially effective in this deck, with none of its potential targets costing more than 2 endurance points.

In the end, this is a pretty amazing deck to see in action, especially when you consider how it looks at first glance. If you’re tired of reading the same old articles by the same old writers about the same old decks, keep an eye on Batow’s progress. He’s a poor student, too . . . you could do worse for a role model.

Rigged Elections by Tim Batow

Characters:
4 Invisible Woman, The Invisible Girl
4 Mr. Fantastic, Reed Richards
4 Mikado and Mosha
4 Dagger, Child of Light
4 Alfred Pennyworth
2 Micro-Chip
1 Query and Echo
1 Ratcatcher
1 Harley Quinn
1 Ventriloquist ◊ Scarface
5 GCPD Officers

Plot Twists:
4 A Child Named Valeria
4 Cosmic Radiation
4 Rigged Elections
4 Wild Ride
4 Midnight Sons
4 Bat-Signal
3 World’s Finest
2 Marvel Team-Up