The End of All Things

The thing I’m digging about MUN is that a lot of the cards are inspiring to me as a deckbuilder. Last week was excellent, this week I’ve loved what I’ve seen. The thing is, they were all missing a certain je ne se quois. As I said a few days ago, I’ve got ideas. None of them compare, though, to the rampant abuse I’m seeing via JLA/Thunderbolts, and SHIELD/TT.

JLA Thunderbolts reminds me of isreali bandages and claymore mines. On the bandages, on the side of the bandage opposite the pad, it states in large, red letters even a blind man could see ‘Place Opposite Side on Wound’. LIke some jackass is going to put that on the outside… seriously. Same with a claymore. It seriously, not joking at all, says ‘This side toward enemy’ on the side you don’t want to be on. I love the faith our leaders have in us. *sigh*

The reason I say this is because of the discussion held on VSR about the implications of a Judgment Day on turn 4 or 5. The whole idea is ignoring the ‘This Side Toward the Enemy’ and facing it at both people. Take that obnoxiously obvious warnings! I IGNORE YOU!

The idea? Using Poseidonis/Construction Site and Modern Era you utilize Thunderbolts Mountain 5 times. This leaves 9 resources in your resource row. That’s enough for (shock) a Judgment day to come in and slaughter everyone’s resources. Nailing a Radioactive man on 3 means that he’ll have 1 counter on 4, and 1 on 5. That means they can only Bat Got Your Tongue?, or Jean Grey the bomb. That also means that once the resource reset goes down they can no longer play plot twists. This tends to be a good thing, as it will fill their hand, and on turn three: The quest for more money you drop Venom, “Mac” Gargan and he’s looking a very statuesque 10+ ATK.

The other thing it allows you is to use multiple copies of identical locations without fear of rebuttal. How, you may ask? By chaining their effects to Judgment Day you’ve already set to KO each resource you control. You simply KO them a step early. Example: You want to cycle your deck for another 1 drop to start next turn off well? Watchtower, then flip another one and watchtower on the chain. They’re going to die anyway. You want to make sure you get those heroic efforts you dropped to pump Radioactive man back? Poseidonis, Poseidonis and you have your next draw already squared away. The brief chained moment of playing Judgment day allows a bit more resource recklessness than one normally sees. Hooray freedom.

The kill condition is, of course, Venom and Aquaman. By running KO Tek you can take down your opponent’s 4 drop, finish him off, and be king of the scene for a while. With the afforementioned Heroic Efforts your Radioactive man should be able to withstand their 3 drop, and he dies on the next turn. It’s artificial board superiority that’s maintained until on turn 4 redux you’ve nickel and dimed your opponent’s life to the other side of the number line.

A difficult build, yes. But a powerful build. What good is a rush deck that can’t rush? What use is a curve deck if the mainstay of their curve is just a dead card for the whole game? The power is worth the price of tuning such a deck so finely. Once it’s where it needs to be its strategy is so left field that there really is no way to counter it without sacrificing your ability to play normal decks. Jank FTW.