This week, I’m going to take a look at the Justice League of America set’s namesake. The JLA has a lot to offer in terms of power. They are built to abuse ally, one of the main mechanics of the set. Everyone wants to be on their side. They are the Magnificent Seven—seven of the most iconic, recognizable characters ever created. Everyone knows what they can do and what they stand for. Who other than a villain wouldn’t want to stand by their side in their time of need?
The JLA is blessed with numerous good characters and a mechanic that’s just waiting to be abused. Much of a JLA deck’s power will be derived from its plot twists and its ability to draft multiple copies of characters to trigger the ally ability. Especially if your deck contains characters with good ally abilities, such as Batman, Avatar of Justice and Katar Hol ◊ Hawkman, you should highly value additional copies of your characters.
Enough talk about what makes them good. Let’s get to the characters.
Aquaman, Arthur Curry - Though constantly the butt of jokes in the superhero world, Aquaman converted to the TCG world with surprising ability. He is an average sized character with a highly relevant ally ability. Against a Secret Society deck, just use him to eat the most useful cards out of your opponent’s KO’d pile to hamper his or her strategy. Against any other deck, it becomes highly feasible to make him a 6 ATK / 6 DEF. Be careful while attacking with him, though; if you don’t have a way to power him up and your opponent can play a defensive plot twist, he’ll immediately shrink. Keep multiples handy.
Aquaman, King of the Seven Seas - Wow. This guy is a really good 7-drop. He is an average sized character with a monstrous ability. All you have to do is line your characters up to take advantage of his leader ability and fill up your mitt with all sorts of goodies from your KO’d pile. His only real drawback is that he doesn’t have flight or range.
Barry Allen ◊ Flash, Scarlet Speedster - It’s really too bad that he’s a rare. His ability only works when you power him up, which, thanks to his rarity, hardly ever happens. You’ll have to rely on plot twists, other abilities, or being the luckiest person in the entire world to pull off a power-up consistently. If you do get an opportunity to use his ability, he becomes a high-speed wrecking ball. He’s a bit on the small side for a 6-drop, but you usually aim him at one of your opponent’s smaller characters before firing off a Magnificent Seven to have him go in after another target. Make no mistake—he may be undersized, but he certainly isn’t underpowered. This guy is quite deserving of a high pick.
Batman, Avatar of Justice - Vanilla stats, ridiculous ability. That seems to be the general flavor with the JLA characters we’ve seen so far. Batman prevents your opponent from using any of those meddlesome plot twists during combat. Counterstrike? No. UN Recognition? I said no. It even works when you’re on defense. All it takes is one power-up for each plot twist you want to stop. This guy is one of the main reasons to draft extra copies of your characters.
Connor Hawke ◊ Green Arrow, Son of the Archer - Another very solid guy from the recruits of the JLA. Connor has good stats for a 2-drop, range, and a decent ally ability. His ally ability isn’t as game-changing as the Bat’s, but in all fairness, Batman’s been in the crime fighting biz a bit longer. All that aside, every bit of ATK helps, and Connor’s +1 ATK to characters that get powered-up will add up fast.
Dinah Laurel Lance ◊ Black Canary, “Pretty Bird” - She’s not bad; she’s just drawn that way. Following in the long line of disproportionate but incredibly attractive superheroines, Black Canary is a bright spark in the otherwise drab visage of a Vs. System game. But don’t go thinking that she’s all beauty and no substance; this girl packs a wallop. She’s an average 7-drop with range, which is really nothing to write home about, but her ally ability can be very useful when forcing through endurance loss on later turns. All you do is bash in with someone, power the attacker up, and exhaust the character that could reinforce your next attack target. Voila, damage served.
Elongated Man, Ralph Dibny - I really like this guy. First off, I’m a huge fan of the Sherlock Holmes hat. Secondly, he’s a rather solid character. His stats are pretty good for a 2-drop and he packs a strong ability. As stretchy as this guy is, I’d expect him to be able to clear space. There are some incredible locations in this set. (Gorilla City, Slaughter Swamp, and The Watchtower are just a few examples.) Ralphie here gets rid of them. Hooray Ralphie!
Faith, “The Fat Lady” - Quite the misnomer, if the card art is to be believed. She is in many ways the counterpart to Connor Hawke ◊ Green Arrow, Son of the Archer. Her stats are similar to his, and her ally ability has many similarities also. Both are relatively innocuous abilities that are more “nice to have” than essential.
Firestorm, The Nuclear Man - The first thing I said when I saw this card was, “Yay! Card drawing!” Drawing cards is one of my all-time favorite things in any format. However, I’m not sure it’s as good as it could be here. First of all, 3 endurance is a hefty cost. Secondly, with Injustice Gang in the format (I’ll get to them next week), I don’t know if it’s actually worth the 3 endurance to get the extra card in a lot of games. In my opinion, there are better 5-drops in the format than this guy.
Gypsy, Cynthia Reynolds - She is one of the few 1-drops I would actively search out in this format. Her ability is amazing in the ally theme. Since she has concealed, she’ll probably get to hang around until you find a good target to power-up.
Hal Jordan, Hard-Traveling Hero - Oooh. This guy is a bit bigger than your average 6-drop. He flies. He ranges (whatever that means). And best of all, he wrecks formation. Nothing allows you to get absurd amounts of damage through quite like forcing your opponent’s reinforcement lynchpin to move. This guy gets two thumbs up from me at the 6 slot.
John Henry Irons ◊ Steel, Steel-Drivin’ Man - Nth Metal was printed. Steel is therefore good. As if an 8 ATK / 11 DEF with flight and range wouldn’t get the nod from me on stats alone, Steel decided that he needed to be a bit better. So, he included a couple of abilities that allow you to abuse one of the best pieces of equipment in the set and his team’s main mechanic. What a swell guy.
John Stewart, Emerald Architect - Man. I hate having to say this about cards, but this guy doesn’t quite make the cut. His ability could be very powerful if you had cards in your deck to abuse willpower, but they’re so rare and generally underpowered that it isn’t really worth playing a character who’s merely average. Find another 4-drop if you can.
Katar Hol ◊ Hawkman, Thanagarian Enforcer - I get goose bumps every time I read this card. Give him an Nth Metal and he becomes a 5-drop. Power-up any of your characters while he’s around and you’ll have no trouble attacking up the curve into your opponent’s team. He also allows you to stun your opponent’s characters back on defense. With enough power-ups, he allows you to take control of the game. He classifies as a bomb.
Martian Manhunter, Manhunter from Mars - I covered this guy last week, and in case you missed it there, he costs 8. That’s all I thought you needed to know.
Martian Manhunter, J’onn J’onnz - This is the best 5-drop in the set. Period. Pick this guy first. End of story. If you really want to know why, read last week’s article. If not, trust me.
Oliver Queen ◊ Green Arrow, Hard-Traveling Hero - This guy can do some really sick things on defense. Power-up a defender and watch the sparks fly as Ollie picks off one of your opponent’s characters. His ally ability is only marginally useful on offense, but the potential to stun an additional character, even only on your opponent’s initiative, is far too good to ignore.
Plastic Man, Eel O’Brian - This guy is really, really cool. Kudos to whomever at UDE is responsible for this card’s design—you’ve really outdone yourself in sheer coolness factor. I’d also like to applaud the person who decided on the alternate foil version of this card. But alas, coolness doesn’t always mean playability. Unless you want one for your collection, leave this guy in the pack.
Ray Palmer ◊ The Atom, World’s Smallest Hero - Big things come in little packages. Depending on what your opponent has in store for your characters, his ability can range from annoying to very good. The ability works on a card in play, so your opponent can play around it, but how much can he or she honestly do? He’s concealed, so your opponent would first have to get to him to stun him. But he has 2 ATK attached to his 1-drop frame, so he may have to get down and dirty and attack some 2-drops. Regardless, you’ll always find that his ability is a benefit to you.
Red Tornado, John Smith - What a shield! You get the luxury of sending in two larger characters to attack, and you don’t have to worry about either of them stunning. Brilliant! You even get to return him to your hand so that you can replay him if something happens later. The downside is that unless you are able to get him into an attack that won’t stun him, you lose out on an attack. Still, for the board advantage, it’s a price I’m willing to pay.
Shayera Thal ◊ Hawkwoman, Thanagarian Enforcer - So, let me get this straight. She gets me my Katar Hol ◊ Hawkman, Thanagarian Enforcer. She gets me my Nth Metal. She’s even a decent body with flight and range. Say no more. I’m sold.
Snapper Carr, Cool Daddy-O - Ayyyy! The Fonz would be so proud. Assuming you’re lucky enough to get some decent equipment, this guy is pretty good in a JLA deck. Anything that has the potential to power-up your characters is a huge asset to your deck. Snapper can do some wonderful things if he survives. However, your opponent knows this and will probably be gunning for him.
Superman, Avatar of Peace - Superman’s JLA incarnation is stupid good. First off, he’s huge. Secondly, his ally ability is just ridiculous. If you manage to get a few power-ups on your attack, you can save around 15 endurance; being able to save a third of your starting total is just amazing. Add to that the fact that he can give all characters surrounding him flight and you create a veritable army of kamikazes. This guy warrants a first pick.
Wonder Woman, Princess Diana - Not too shabby. She’s an average 7-drop with flight. She also comes equipped with a built in power-up for the first attacker or defender in a turn. While she isn’t a phenom, she’s solid enough that I’d play her if I needed to.
Wonder Woman, Avatar of Truth - Wonder Woman's ability can prove to be beneficial, as it restricts your opponent's plot twist options. Other than that, she’s a slightly above average 4-drop. She’s not a particularly high pick, but don’t write her off if you think you can abuse her ability.
Zatanna, Zatanna Zatara - This card’s really good. She triggers ally mechanics every turn. This means that she generates a cool ability or two every turn. Like I said before, cards that regularly trigger ally abilities are phenomenal in the JLA deck. She’s not a bomb, but she is a very solid 5-drop who will definitely make her presence felt.
Zauriel, Guardian Angel - He’s a slightly above average 5 ATK / 5 DEF until he gets stunned. After that, he becomes a bit more expendable. I’ve seen his ability become extraordinarily relevant and powerful, especially in conjunction with a timely ally or leader ability. The only flaw he has is that your opponent will usually stun him near the start of his or her attacks to minimize the damage that he can do.
That does it for the JLA, everybody. When I get to the section on plot twists (coming soon, I promise), I’ll try to pinpoint some cards that are especially good with this team. In fact, that’s one of the main reasons I wanted to do the characters first. The value of many plot twists changes depending on the teams you have.
The JLA will obviously want any plot twists that allow them to power-up their characters. This will best allow them to abuse the ally mechanic to its fullest. Also, when drafting JLA, draft multiples of the characters in your deck. It may be worthwhile to forgo taking a marginally better character over another copy of a character you already have simply to maximize your ability to power-up. Keep that in mind and you should do fine.
Anyway, that’ll do it for this week, kiddos. I’ll be back next week with the final team from Justice League of America, the Injustice Gang. Questions and comments can be sent to the_priceis_right@yahoo.com.