Legends: The Options

 It’s Sunday afternoon. Tuesday night is the DCL Build A Legend event at the Hobby Kingdom. Which Legend deck will I be playing?

I’m still undecided.

You may recall my posting last Sunday about being torn between playing Darkseid or Ghost Rider? Well, it hasn’t gotten any better.

For the MVL Build A Legend event I played Family of Four, so my only restriction (self-imposed, I admit) is that I don’t want to play the same deck this time around.

Unfortunately, while sorting out decks, there are now five options on the block. Thus, it’s time for a nice rambling post, five decklists, and a general mutter about my being an indecisive twit.

Though personally, I’m amused that three of the five Legend characters have flames in their concept.

Tonight I’ll be joined by CaptainSpud and Gamerette for some our usual Sunday night shenanigans. While this may have otherwise provided an opportunity for some last minute playtesting, we pretty much always play three player games. As such, other than seeing how the decks are drawing, I can’t really draw a bead on how well any of them are performing since I’m dealing with two opponents, and only having initiative one turn in three.

Three player is great fun, and allows for wonderful politics - we actually had a situation once where one player bribed another with a DOR Garth - but it’s not conducive for playtesting and analysis of deck performance.

I’ve confessed to primarilly being a Marvel fan several times before, so it should come as no surprise that there’s only one DC deck among the five. A further contributor to that is I generally only collect teams I’m interested in, so from DCL I’ve only been collecting SecSoc stuff. As such, I don’t have any Legends cards from any of the other teams, and since Grodd stuff’s a pain to get ahold of, Darkseid’s it.

The fact that the Darkseid deck is almost completely from DLS is a coincidence, I assure you

Anywhen, in no particular order other than that which they came out of the box I was carrying the decktins in, the decks….

NB: Since I don’t own a dozen Mobilizes, it’s not feasible to include a playset in each deck. I have all five assembled right now, after all.

 Jean Grey: Phoenix Rising

• 4x Jean Grey: Teen Telepath
• 4x Jean Grey: Telekinetic Fighter
• 4x Wolverine: Logan
• 2x Jean Grey: Age of Apocalypse
• 4x Professor X: Headmaster
• 2x Rogue: Power Absorption
• 4x Jean Grey: Phoenix Rising
• 2x Rogue: Total Transformation
• 1x Professor X: World’s Most Powerful Telepath
• 1x Wolverine: Bloodlust
• 2x Jean Grey: Phoenix Force
• 4x Worthington Industries: X-Corp
• 4x Snikt!
• 4x Assorted Aliases
• 4x Turnabout
• 3x Phoenix Rising
• 3x Children of the Atom
• 4x New and Improved
• 4x Splintering Consciousness

The appeal of this deck is simple - it’s beat-tastic. I like a good beat-to-the-face deck, especially if it can provide massive walls on defense too - hence my love of the Family of Four deck.

The lack of To Me My X-Men’s and X-Men Assemble’s in my collection hampers the potential here a little, but I still like the deck. It’s *almost* idiot proof.

Recruit charactes, beat people up with an assortment of pumps. Discard Jeans to fuel the five-drop, New and Improved lets you get some value out of the characters your replacing. Since there’s only actually four different characters in the entire deck, you should get some use out of it.  

Ah, if only Avengers Disassembled was legal in this format… the current equivalent, Anguish of the Innocent, is Ghost Rider stamped, else it’d be in the mix too.

  Punisher: MKKO

• 4x Daredevil: Fearless Survivor
• 3x Punisher: Suicide Run
• 4x Morbius: Biochemical Bloodsucker
• 3x Ghost Rider: The Devil’s Rider
• 4x Punisher: Guns Blazing
• 1x Wolverine: Covert Predator
• 2x Vengeance: Spirit of Vengeance
• 1x Moon Knight: Knight of Khonshu
• 1x Captain America: Loyal Patriot
• 2x Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance
• 1x Punisher: Angel of Death
• 4x Wild Ride
• 2x Heroes of Two Worlds
• 1x Call in a Favor
• 4x Finishing Move
• 2x Crushing Blow
• 4x Savage Beatdown
• 2x The Uni-Power
• 2x Nasty Surprise
• 2x Flying Kick
• 4x M60’s
• 4x Desert Eagle
• 3x Katana

This is pretty much Steve Garrett’s (Kamiza) MKKO build, with a couple of minor differences steered by card availability and whimsy. Much like the Jean Grey build, the appeal of this deck is its beaty nature. Constantly KO’ing your opponent’s board is pretty sweet too, I gotta admit.

It may be possible to tweak this out one day to be a dual Punisher/Ghost Rider legend deck, but frankly, I’m running out of time to be wildly experimenting… (a statement which seems almost farcicle since I haven’t actually tested three of the five builds yet…)

 Ghost Rider: The Devil’s Rejects

• 4x Tommy: Runaway
• 4x Electric Eve: Livewire
• 4x Tar Baby: Adhesive Ally
• 1x Leech: Inhibitor
• 1x Postman: Memory Thief
• 4x Ghost Rider: The Devil’s Rider
• 2x Healer: Life Giver
• 4x Storm: Leader of the Morlocks
• 1x Hump: Servant of Masque
• 4x Marrow: Gene Nation
• 2x Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance
• 1x Dr Strange: Master of the Mystic Arts
• 2x Wheels of Vengeance
• 4x Chain of Vengeance
• 4x The Alley
• 2x Sewer System
• 2x The Hill
• 4x The Forsaken
• 4x Shrapnel Blast
• 4x Bloodhound
• 2x Mutant Massacre

This is the deck I have the least confidence in at this stage. A shame, since it’s the Ghost Rider option.

Normally I love my Morlock Evasion deck, and I’m wary this deck’s having to lose a good chunk of the Morlock’s combat tricks (Retribution, Bum’s Rush, Backs Against the Wall) to make room for the Ghost Rider stamped stuff and the team-up (required if we’re going to make use of 6-drop GR and Dr Strange, since they specify MK characters only in their text boxes).

This would also be the first time I’ve run The Hill. I’ve normally favoured Sewer System as my primary location, but with Total Anarchy back on the books, I’m rather concerned about losing my enabling little peeps when they evade.

 Darkseid: Darkseidstitution

• 3x Parademon Elite: Army
• 4x Dark Lantern: Mockery
• 2x Dark Thanagarian: Mockery
• 4x Dark Firestorm: Mockery
• 3x Dark Martian: Mockery
• 3x Darkseid: Apokoliption Oppressor
• 3x Darkseid: 8th Century
• 1x Dark Superboy: Mockery
• 2x Darkseid: Evil Reborn
• 2x Dark Kryptonian @ Dark Superboy: Mockery
• 1x Darkseid: Apokolips Now
• 1x Darkseid: Dark God
• 4x Dark Matter Drain
• 2x Furnace of Apokolips
• 3x Ancient Throne
• 2x Ancient Evils
• 4x Mobilize
• 4x Titans of Tomorrow
• 3x Big Leagues
• 3x Against All Odds
• 2x Servants of Darkness
• 2x Pathetic Attempt
• 1x Omega Effect
• 1x Endgame

This is probably the current frontrunner of the lot. I’ve played it the most out of the five contenders, and I’m comfortable with the way it works. There’s a temptation to up the counts of Servants of Darkness and to fit in some more Omega Effects, probably at the cost of the Pathetic Attempts, but damn if that Pathetic Attempt hasn’t earned its slot in the deck.

The substitute factor in the deck is spiffy keen, and this deck has potential to beat out a heavy stall deck thanks to Dark God and Endgame. In your FACE Galactus! Dark Kryptonian can even help to force the issue, if I sub him in on 7 and force the curve turning turn 8 into turn 9 for Endgame.

 Human Torch: Nova Blast

• 4x Jaime Reyes @ Blue Beetle: High-Tech Hero
• 2x Aunt May: Golden Oldie
• 2x Frank Drake: Nightstalker
• 1x Speedball: Robbie Baldwin
• 4x Black Cat: Nine Lives
• 2x Namorita: Atlantean Warrior Princess
• 1x Dr Doom: Richards’ Rival
• 2x Random: Marshall Evan Stone III
• 4x Punisher: Frank Castle
• 4x Human Torch: Nova Blast
• 1x Rogue: Power Abosrption
• 1x Sub-Mariner: Uncertain Ally
• 1x Dr Strange: Ally of the Four
• 1x Spider-Man: Stark’s Protege
• 4x Empire State University
• 2x Soul World
• 4x Heatwave
• 4x Firewall
• 2x Skreeeeeee!
• 2x What Are Friends For?
• 4x Enemy of my Enemy
• 2x Signal Flare
• 4x Frag Grenade
• 2x M60’s

Yes, this is pretty much Savage Tofu’s decklist… but when he’s put together something that works smoothly, it’s hard to ignore it… though I’m still bemused by the presence of Speedball.

The most complicated deck of the lot, it still reeks of fun. I’m wary that, without having put much (read: any) playtesting time into it, I’ll be making play errors left right and centre. With our playgroup, since we’re so heavilly focussed on casual play as opposed to competitive play, it may well not mean the end of the world…

… especially since I want a playset of There Is No Escape (the 2-4th prize card) about, oh, say, 300% more than I want a playset of Parallax (Manhunters FTW!). As long as I finish in the top 4, I’ll be a happy lad. With our regular turnout of about 6-12 folks, so long as I don’t make complete goiter of myself I should be fine.

So yeah…. Jean, Frank, Johnny, Darkseid and the other Johnny. 

… and the frontrunner’s the guy who doesn’t even have a normal alias to go by. Heh.