Playing Vs. System Backwards

[raybomb]

This thread is for the discussion of the article "Playing Vs. System Backwards" by Chris Fletcher. You can find it here - http://www.vsuniverse.com/db/article.asp?id=1178

Discuss!

[WAXER]

With All This
"only Do (insert Effect) If You Have No Cards In Hand" It's Time To Bring Out The Most Crappest Rare Of Any Set That Never Ever Made No Sense To Me.

Goth Corps.
Draw 1 Discard 2. THATS A QUICK WAY TO CUT DOWN YOUR HAND AND CYCLE THREW A BIT.

[StormWind]

I want to thank the VsUniverse staff for hiring me on, and giving me a weekly chance to share my insights, and my many years of CCG experience. I began playing Magic back during the Revised Edition and stayed on up until 6th edition, before moving on to other things.

I played a year of Heroclix and was a lvl 1 Judge for both Heroclix and Pirates of the Caribbean before giving up both positions and focusing my time and energies on Vs. I've been playing since just before the release of the Man of Steel set, and while I don't have a lot of tourney experience under my belt, I'm working on that.

Until then I'll share my special brand of deckbuilding, cobbled together from my own skills, and the wisdom of those better than me. I'm always open to criticism and suggestions about my deck builds. I by no means claim to be the best, or anywhere close. But I will playtest anything I build, and I'll share with you the results, where I think improvements can be made, what works, why it works, and what doesn't work, and why it doesn't.

My current GL/EE deck is still an ongoing project of 3 months, I've got a EE deck in the wings, and now the Squadron Supreme to work on and test. I've also been hammering out a new rebuild of the Hidden deck that won a 10K not long ago, they were close to my original idea, I made the few changes, and now I'm reworking, to see what the Avengers has brought us can do for it. I'm suspecting Wasp will be simply deadly in the concealed build, replacing Hannibal King, whether or not there's room for Lady Punisher, Dr. U'Bx, or Fiero stands to be seen.

And that's just some of the stuff I'm working on. Until my next article, get out there and have fun. And feel free to share thoughts and experiences with my first draft deck build of Squadron Supreme.

StormWind
Chris Fletcher

[StormWind]

With All This
"only Do (insert Effect) If You Have No Cards In Hand" It's Time To Bring Out The Most Crappest Rare Of Any Set That Never Ever Made No Sense To Me.

Goth Corps.
Draw 1 Discard 2. THATS A QUICK WAY TO CUT DOWN YOUR HAND AND CYCLE THREW A BIT.

Yes it could help if you're going Golden. For now I'm looking into mostly Modern builds. I mean realistically if you want to go Golden replacing Might Makes Right with Savage Beatdown makes perfect sense. For now I'm going to stick with Hibernaculum, but it's certainly something to look at in a GA build.

StormWind
Chris Fletcher

[Dynamyte]

Why is Eldrich Power only a maybe? +3 Atk on Atk or Def seems pretty good, and the BEL problem wouldnt be a problem on chars like Amphibian.

[Paul Smith]

Chris> Your numbers are a little off. That final build actually has 36 characters, 24 plot twists, and 2 equipment for a total of 62 cards. Interesting article, my friend has been playtesting a similar squadron supreme deck with proxy cards, and it seems quite easy to empty your hand, and even recruit the 8 drop Hyperion.

[devonator]

I actually don't think that this deck will be so terrible. I also don't think that you need to play so many Discard effects to make Squadron Supreme work with the No Cards in Hand strategy.

Play a TON of reservists! Play a TON of Attack boosters! Hit your opponent hard on turn 3-5 unloading your offensive pumps and doing massive Breakthrough...Squadron Supreme likes Breakthrough. Either Turn 4 or 5, you should have rid your hand of cards and gotten an effect for them. Also, you should have Reservists for the late turns (and a search for the ones your missing) in your resource row.

I mean think about multiples of Mega Blast, Flying Kick, and Combat Reflexes (all ATK pumps that last the turn) on Whizzer on turn 5. You could easily make a TNB style deck that has the possibility to curve. This thought should also help explain why Other-Earth is really good for this deck (after you've unloaded your hand of PTs).

Of course, you might have to change some of those PTs for MMA. But if you're going Golden, here are 2 great cards to consider for the deck.

In Evil Star's Evil Clutches--Your going to be using your Resource Row as your hand. IESEC makes that easier.

Avalon Space Station--Your going to be using your KO'd pile as your hand. Avalon makes that easier. Also, getting creative with Avalon and the chain, you could actually have a card in hand for some of these "No Cards In Hand" effects.

And here are 2 great MK additions to the deck...

Mystic Chain--One of Squadron's Supreme's greatest strengths is going to be your opponent's discard. Both you and your opponent will play with no hands. The difference is that you're equipped to handle it. Your opponent isn't. Mystic Chain compliments the Breakthrough and Discard Strategies.

Graveyard--This deck is going to be a lot about filtering the cards you need versus the cards that you don't. Graveyard will make good use of this. In fact, I see one of the strongest potential decks for the MMA format being an Underworld/Squadron Supreme team-up. Hypnotic Charms, Hibernaculum, Strength of the Grave, Evil Awakens, etc.

Good Article, though. I think this is going to be one of the strongest Constructed teams from this set.

[Twanbon]

Eldritch Power is an absoulte must for SS decks. The fact that it doubles as a Nasty Surprise is too good to pass up. You could probably cut the Peace In Our Time, or maybe a few characters for them. I would think that you actually want to be playing a somewhat low character count in this deck, as one thing this deck could not handle is having a hand full of Red.

[StormWind]

Thanks for all the insight.

It's entirely possible my numbers are off. I'm a writer.. basic math.. yeah.. without the cards in my hands to count off, I tend to slip up.

As far as the characters go, as I said I've yet to playtest this. So I honestly don't know how the synergies will work except on paper. In real testing, it could do better it could do worse.

Eldritch - I wanted to squeeze it in. Believe me I did. 3 end is piddling compared to the BEL powers of these guys.

Hyperion 8 Drop - I'm not saying he's not possible to get out. It's just really hard. The circumstances required to pull this off are rough. But then it's also why I shy away from decks like Xavier's School, Rigged Elections and what have you. I don't trust combo decks. Again it's not something I've put into practice and I'm writing off what looks good on paper. Without the real world experience of "How often can I have a search in my resource row on 8?" And "How often will I actually GET to 8." SqS is NOT a stall deck by any means.

Combat Pumps and SqS - I didn't include hordes of them for a reason. 1) I'm sticking with a Modern deck for now. This eliminates Beatdown, Flying Kick, Mega-Blast, and pretty much everything but C&P (which is not so good in this deck), Eldritch Might - Which very well may end up in this deck, Might Makes Right - Which is a staple for this deck, and Rocket Central - Which I want to find room for.

There are several questionable plot twists. AIDA is one of them. Other-Earth is one I worry about, but yet it's so essential to what SqS wants to do that it's not funny.

Peace In Our Time may also see the axe because it's function is more useful in the early game.

Mystic Chain is certainly a good idea, as is In Evil Star's Evil Clutches.
The former is Modern legal the latter is not. But when I go to a GA version of the deck it's one to consider, since I'll want the ability to replace my resource row at will.

For the GA version the possiblities are endless and I appreciate the feedback. However I want to stress for now I'm working on the Modern Version.

StormWind
Chris Fletcher

[devonator]

I don't understand. You're talking about including Eldritch Power and taking Other-Earth out.

Other-Earth is this team's Tower of Babel. It's an invaluable card that you really can't do without. Once you've emptied your hand, you really don't have PTs to play, so the "You may not play PTs" is not that big of a deal. Beyond that, it's a one-turn -2 DEF to EVERY defender an opponent controls (read: your attackers get +2 ATK). Additionally, your opponent CANNOT reinforce. So, the only possibilities for defense are DEF boosters...of which there aren't any in MMA. Your other option is that you play Eldritch Power. You get 1 more point of ATK but your opponent can still reinforce...and when you do Breakthrough, your opponent gets an END boost to counteract it.

These cards achieve the same function. One of them achieves that function far more effectively than the other...and it's not Eldritch Power.

Other-Earth is at probably a 3-of. You'll want to play it once! Now, I think it could be a 4-of. Especially when you consider Peace In Our Time!

Somebody made the point that you really can't afford to play lots of characters. Yes, it's true that lots of characters that you can't use to power-up and you can't play does not help you. However, you really can't afford NOT to play lots of characters. The reason that we have the typical 27 to 33 characters in a deck is because we need to draw the cards so that we can make our curve. If you get away from that, you're toying with consistency. This is where Peace In Our Time comes in. Attack! Do your Breakthrough! Your opponent drops 1 card for each copy you have in the Row. This card hurts your opponent and helps you. You go ahead and take the Breakthrough so that you get to discard your unwanted characters. The end result is that by turn 5, neither you nor your opponent have any cards in hand. What this does is it place an emphasis on your opponent being able to top-deck the correct drop or a character search late in the game. Peace In Our Time is going to be an engine for this deck. It's going to simultaneously punish your opponent and help your strategy. I think this is a Squadron Supreme must also.