Agony and Alchemy form an amazing dichotomy of mythic meaning. By the time we get done telling their stories, we might even get an idea for a Vs. System deck out of them. Especially since the shiny new Marvel Team-Up set has so many parallels we can use to expand their legends.
Agony is primarily purple. She is one of the crew of symbiotes spawned by Venom when he got a serious case of separation anxiety. Carnage is her brother, and Toxin is her nephew. She only got to spit poisonous chemicals for a few issues before getting stabbed to death. Then Agony was reborn in 16 bits. Hundreds of thousands of old-school button-mashers may remember her fondly from the Super Nintendo glory days of 1995. Video games tend to allow even the most marginal myths to take on a life of their own.
The legend of Agony is very short in the comic books. Her image is still powerful enough to have attained a certain level of celebrity, even without her personality ever being fully formed. The Venom alien that she sprung from is also fairly under-developed in historical comic book stature—but he is one of the most popular characters in the world.
Venom touches something inside of us. He is like a primal scream, the embodiment of all our base urges. He has become an icon. In my past decade of teaching high school, nearly every one of my students already knew this character. Whether from comic books, trading cards, television cartoons, or video games, most pop-cultured young people can describe him from memory. Venom is inevitably seen as “cool”.
Thanks to the Marvel Team-Up expansion, Vs. System has five different versions of this visceral villain. We had already been flipping the two cardboard incarnations contained inside Web of Spider-Man booster packs, and now we’ve been given three more. You know what that means, don’t you? Longshot, Rebel Freedom Fighter will be saying his name now. It’s time to get sick with a black suit and a very long tongue.
Venom’s transformation from inanimate Vs. System cardstock to kitchen table gold is not quite ready to begin. Longshot needs another target for his luck powers, and Alchemy is waiting patiently for his entrance. Settle back into your chair and let me tell you a story.
Like Nyssa Raatko, Daughter of the Demon, Alchemy came from the community. In the late eighties, Marvel Comics put out the call in a contest for fan-created characters. Alchemy happened. The upcoming Vs. System City Championships will also grab someone from the audience for transubstantiation. One of our faces will soon be turned into immortal cardboard gold.
Going back to his birth in 1989 within the pages of X-Factor #41, Alchemy already looked a lot like one of us. He was excessively intelligent, unmistakably nerdy, and somewhat sheltered. He fought his most difficult battles against trolls. In the end, Alchemy harnessed his natural talents and saved the world. Deep down inside, each of us dreams of that.
Tom Jones had a gift. He was an ordinary teenager, but his hands were special. A mysterious mutant ability allowed him to transmute the chemical composition of anything he touched. He could turn random stuff into real gold. Trolls can smell that. Angry about being unceremoniously eradicated from the British Isles, the Troll Associates caught a whiff of the money. They tracked down the young mutant and cooked up a plan.
Phee, Phy, Phough, Phumm, Phit, Phlopp, Phlegm, and Phopp kidnapped Tom’s mom. They wanted him to turn most of the citizens of England into gold, starting with the Queen. This would give the remaining Brits a glut of wealth that would collapse the entire economy of the world. Knowing that the result would be a mass exodus to a better climate, the magic folk of the woodland realm could finally return to their homeland.
Tom was not having it. He took on the super hero name of Alchemy and froze the villains into yellow metal statues. He tussled with the trolls for a few issues of X-Factor, and remains vigilant to this day. In fact, he is one of the few mutants who were allowed to retain their powers after Scarlet Witch rebooted reality in the House of M.
Neither Agony nor Alchemy have been represented on Vs. System cards yet, but just as Agony led us to Venom, Alchemy leads me to an idea. X-Factor later received a complete line-up overhaul, and who was one of the main members? Yes, you got it: Multiple Man ◊ Jamie Madrox. The most dangerous man in the game is back in business. Longshot, we are looking at you.
Longshot, Rebel Freedom Fighter’s luck skills improve greatly when a large number of copies of a single character are included in his deck; Mulletman needs multiples to fill the hand. Jamie Madrox is an Army character, so this comes naturally. Venom needs versions, and now he has them. While I am no relation to Michael Barnes, even when they call me Stu, I know how freaky the game can get if we start with this basic skeleton:
4 Longshot, Rebel Freedom Fighter
20 Multiple Man ◊ Jamie Madrox
4 Venom, Mac Gargan
4 Venom, Alien Symbiote
4 Venom, Lethal Protector
4 Venom, Eddie Brock
4 Venom, The Hunger
You can always use Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters for an even more insane setting if you are so inclined. Even without the overkill, you will be looking at a swollen hand unlike anything Vs. System has ever seen. What are we going to do with so many extra cards per turn? I’ll throw up a few ideas and you can see which ones stick for you.
I have always wanted to Get Him My Petsss. Venomous Madrox magic might just be able to make that desire real. Another Sinister Syndicate character might help, or else Jamie will be stuck in the X-men team affiliation too long to pull it off. Aside from tossing in a Fastball Special or two, that might not be such a good idea.
Let’s look at Lizard, Voracious Predator for help. If he gets a taste of Multiple Man at the beginning of each combat phase, he won’t be able to burn us back too badly. This reptile screams “card advantage” in any language, and our Mulletman likes the sound of that.
Slyde would allow our swarm to slip into the opponent’s hidden area. With quite a few viable strategies relying on black-bordered character cards, that will come in very handy. Any early Sinister Syndicate characters are a bonus since Madrox needs birds of a feather to fly freely into a team attack. Jalome Beacher is surely a valuable feature.
How about the other Sinister Syndicate plot twists? What tricks will give us the most kicks with a swarm of tiny dupes in the mix? Hold on, I’ve got your fix. The Legacy of Evil looks tasty, and Multiple Man may be one of the best ways of meeting its requirement. By the time this deck gets in gear we may have our entire deck in our hand.
Giving attack pumps across the board to our entire squad will be important, since Jamie Madrox tends to be a little skinny on his own. Luckily for us, the Sinister Syndicate absolutely loves that sort of thing. We can get the Spider Hunt started if we are in position to finish the game with a single flip. Spider Slayers can easily allow a field full of 1-drop Army characters to take down the biggest of butts. When the Multiple Men are fresh, they love to become Hired Goons. That even works when attacking directly to the face.
Our flight of fancy could really get off the ground with a Goblin Glider. Imagine a turn 4 Venom, Mac Gargan. He follows and consumes a Madrox, grabs the Glider, and sits pretty at 14 ATK with a handful of natural power-ups. Wow.
This line of thinking is as risky as it gets in Vs. System. It will take some serious skill to take such an insane strategy and build it into a rewarding deck. There will the Agony of defeat, over and over again. Eventually, however, it may be possible to bring some Alchemy to the table and make it work. The fun we will have in the process is the true gold. I can’t wait to bite into it and see if it’s real.
Rian Fike is also known as stubarnes and he is in ecstasy telling you about Agony. If you have any success in the laboratory with this or any other risky strategy, send your notes to: rianfike@hattch.com