Today’s Marvel Knights preview card is Diplomatic Immunity. An ongoing plot twist for Dr. Doom’s arsenal, it is basically a “Save Dr. Doom Panic Button” with some

neat tricks.

Essentially, the main purpose of this card is to keep Dr. Doom out of harm’s way. Many competitive decks now pack KO effects, most notably Titans and Curve Sentinel builds with Finishing Move. You also see such effects in League, and in a variety of decks that make use of A Death in the Family or Fight to the Finish. Being able to protect Dr. Doom from the combat that makes him susceptible to one of these effects is valuable, as once you lose your Doom, you could also lose the ability to play Boris, Mystical Paralysis, and several other tricks to their utmost potential.

When considering the real value of Diplomatic Immunity’s ability, it’s important to note that Doom is pretty hard to wipe off the field anyway. The only Doom whose DEF falls behind the curve is the 4-drop version, so if he’s ever attacked from down the curve, the opponent will have to use some sort of pump to have even a chance of taking him out. Similarly, with Doomstadt on the field, Doom’s DEF goes from securely average to darn well frustrating, regardless of what version he is. Playing Doomstadt either forces your opponent to play the game your way and attack into Doom with some sort of ATK modifier, or it deters them from attacking Doom altogether. If Doomstadt alone isn’t enough to make your opponent think twice about attacking Doom, Diplomatic Immunity will make such an attack impossible.

Remember that once you declare an attack legal and your opponent exhausts, you can’t whisk Doom away to the hidden area to interrupt that attack. Attacks only check for legality once, and moving a character from the visible area to the hidden area during a legal attack falls under the same ruling as moving a character from point to point within the visible area.

Because you can keep 4-drop Doom in the hidden area and use him for all of your Doomy little tricks, you’re freer to explore extra options in the late game. Any deck running Doom wants to drop Diabolic Genius on turn 4—that’s pretty much a given. However, since you can now keep Doom alive a lot longer, there’s less pressure to play Victor Von Doom on turn 6. In a dedicated Doom deck, you could make Mimic your 6-drop and copy Puppet Master’s effect if he’s still on the field (which would obviously allow you to maintain a bigger field presence, because you wouldn’t be KO’ing your own 4-drop). In team-up decks, this could free up turn 6 entirely. In matchups where a turn 6 Reign of Terror or double Mystical Paralysis is more valuable, that won’t really matter, but it’s an option and options are good.

Diplomatic Immunity’s ability to move Dr. Doom back in from the hidden area is important, too. If, via effects or tactics, an opponent forces one or more of your characters into the hidden area, you might find yourself set up for a big direct attack. The ability to send Dr. Doom instantaneously back into the line of fire (where he can protect your endurance) could be important, especially in the late game if it’s Dr. Doom, Lord of Latveria that you’re moving. We’ll just have to wait and see, however, if any Marvel Knights cards happen to use offensive concealment.

Preel, preel.*

Also of note is Diplomatic Immunity’s status as an ongoing plot twist. Now, that Revenge Squad/Doom team-up deck that I speculated about a couple of weeks ago is one step closer to becoming a reality.

Check back next week as I look at a card that not only makes me happy because it’s quite good, but also because it almost, sorta, kinda, barely shares qualities with one of my favorite Arkham Inmates cards.

Preeling,

-Jason Grabher-Meyer

* “Preel” is the onomatopoeic sound of pranking and mischief. It indicates plotting and general chicanery. This is the end of today’s Canadian slang lesson.