Despite having been in players’ hands for months, the Man of Steel set is only now beginning to take root in most metagames. With decks like Phantom Phone Booth starting to make an impact on the tournament scene, many players are finally finding DSM-based decks that work for them. Always curious, I asked twenty people to name their favorite deck that uses cards from Man of Steel, and to explain their choices. The catch? Each player had only twenty seconds.

Oddly enough, all of the responses fell into clear cut categories, the first category being players who had some definite insight into the Man of Steel set . . .

“Team Superman. They have raw power, and I think they’re the best thing from the set right now. You can play it like Curve Sentinels, and it seems to do well. It has some nice gimmicks and I think it will make a push soon.”

—Alexander Doring, $10K competitor

“Team Superman. It has good matchups with Curve Sentinels.”

—Jorge Cerda, $10K competitor

“Team Superman, because I like Superman! Well, plus it’s great against Curve Sentinels. [Gangbuster] is very good.”

—Giuseppe Iacono, $10K competitor

“Team Superman, I think. It also can win against Teen Titans and Cosmic Cops. Therefore, it should make an impact in the future.”

—Daniel “Stone” Steinsdoerfer, $10K competitor

"I personally still think Revenge Squad is going to do stuff, and I think Phantom Phone Booth is sort of like a poor Curve Sentinels. I like [Phantom Zone], but the deck basically seems to be tier two trying to be tier one. [Doomsday] is an utter beast—if you get in the clear with him, it’s over. I think Revenge Squad just has a lot of very interesting pieces to it.” 

—Duncan Tang, $10K competitor from the UK

“I would think, uh, New Gods. Because they have the best characters from the set, and [The Source] is very good.”

—Marcus Roahm

“League of Assassins is really the one deck that has profited the most from Man of Steel. Before, it was not possible to build a pure League Deck!”

—Jelger Wiegersma, $10K competitor

“Brotherhood/League—it’s very good. Teen Titans . . . I hate them, but they are so good. X-Stall is my third, for sure. It hurts a lot of the decks out there right now.”

—Alexander Doring, $10K competitor                   

“League of Assassins is good, but I think it just got a few cards, so I’m going to go with Superman Robot Army deck. I like Superman Clone decks, too. I like Revenge Squad with President Luthor, too.”

—Sascha Wagner, Judge

“New Gods—a Prophecy Fulfilled build. Because you have the possibility to not care about your own endurance as much as usual. [Big Barda] is great, and bringing [Infinity Man] out on turn 5 is nice. Hey, you need a perfect draw, but if you get it, you’re going to do well.”

—Matthias Nagy, TO for the Hannover $10K

“Doom/New Gods. Why? On every drop, you have one of the best cards in the environment, and you can search for it. For every drop, you have a searcher.”

—Klaus Springer, $10K competitor from the UK

“I like New Gods. I haven’t seen them played yet, so I don’t know what I’d team them up with. But their effects are good and they have a searcher.”

—Dirk Blohmann, Judge/ UDE official for the Hannover $10K

Then we come upon some players who think that the set still hasn’t been explored enough to realize its true potential . . . 

“Superman decks seem to be the only thing viable right now. Maybe some sort of New Gods team up, but I haven’t really seen anything yet.”

—Andreas Kruschel 

“I don’t think anyone has found the set’s main strengths yet, but I personally like Revenge Squad and Gotham Knights. I think that could do well. I like League/Brotherhood a great deal, too.”

—Phylipp Rautenbach, $10K competitor

“I’m not really sure. No one around here has given the set a lot of play yet.”

—Dagmar Bergem, $10K competitor

“I haven’t really seen anything yet. I have some ideas in mind, but I’m a bit tentative to have an opinion at the moment.”

—Paul Jonas Prengel, Judge

“Nothing really. I haven’t seen much yet. I don’t think much is strong, although Revenge Squad is a beast. It’s not like other decks in my eyes—it really differs from everything else.”

—Oliver Gehrmann, Live coverage Vs. reporter for Germany

Finally, we have some of the more negative responses of the group . . .

“Nothing really, I guess. I haven’t seen anything from it being used.”

—Achim Guenzel, $10K competitor and Product Manager/Editor of Card Master Magazine

“Man of Steel isn’t my favorite, to be honest, so I can’t say much about it yet. But I’m hopeful someone will figure something out soon.”

—Moritz Hohmann, $10K competitor

“I don’t think I’ve seen much that uses Man of Steel successfully, but I don’t play much, really.” 

—Jelger Wiegersma, $10K competitor

Special thanks to Duncan Tang for his help finding people to interview!