Agents of SHIELD-Hulk

Agents of SHIELD-Hulk

Woah! A themed deck list, that's pretty new for me (in the sea of Marvel REWIND lists at least). Regardless, introducing my SHIELD-Hulk deck with the cards from the latest expansion: Agents of SHIELD!

She-Hulk has been a long-time favorite of mine, so I thought who better to challenge this new box on Expert mode than an old favorite with some new tricks.

Let's talk gameplay and deck choices:

We all know and love Jen's gameplay, but for those who need a quick primer: she likes to flip... A LOT. However, flipping in solo mode can be scary, especially against some of those lower threat thresholds. This is why Justice is a natural fit as she will be able to lower the threat after taking advantage of her numerous flips throughout a game. Consistent choices such as For Justice for the main / side schemes along with Surveillance Team's round up our non ally based thwarting. Though with an ally lineup of nine, we will be relying on them to fill in those gaps.

Our justice ally lineup consists of three classics, Agent Coulson, Quake, and a personal favorite: Monica Chang. Monica Chang is a deceptively good card, providing essentially 5 THW and a block (though not all at one) for the low cost of three. All of the allies in this deck can be discounted through Government Liaison minus Jen's signature ally and Professor X (Grant too I guess for being 0 cost).

Running such a large ally lineup allows Jen to make efficient tempo plays early while building out any of the NUMEROUS resource generators included. Helicarrier, Quincarrier, and Avengers Mansion along with her two identity-specific Focused Rage cards may seem like overkill and, for the most part, I'd agree after testing. The idea is not to get all of them out in a singular game, but to have options to play when available. Some games access to a wild from Quincarrier will be more important than getting a 3rd draw for turn off of Avengers Mansion.

Once you have a good amount of build-out and the board in check, you can do what Jen does best and start slamming the villains. Three copies of Limitless Stamina along with the rules errata on Superhuman Strength can really help Jen make those final pushes for the game. And let's not forget probably one of the most satisfying feelings, a max damage Gamma Slam to close out after a hard-fought battle.

Other concerns / card considerations:

Even though we are in the justice aspect, you may notice a grand total of ONE confuse in the deck, courtesy of Professor X. For a hero that likes to flip as much as Jen, I can understand this being a confusing choice. My first goal for this deck was to thematically tie her to SHIELD as much as possibly, so I wanted to play the max number of cards I could get away with. This does not mean the deck is bad by any means, but building solely for power was not the main focus for the deck. Some of the more consistent Justice cards to help flipping (namely Upside the Head, Dazzler, Under Surveillance and more) will be absent from this deck list. If you feel the need to include them, go for it! I find that Jen gets much more use out of tempo plays and can often flip down fairly safely without the reliance on confuses as long as we keep the main as low as possible. Additionally, it would dilute for the overall theme I was going for in the deck.

For a SHIELD-themed deck, I can also understand confusion around not including choices like Homeland Intervention and Global Logistics among other choices. I'm sure there's definitely a version of this deck build running the Agent 13 package along with Field Agent and the two cards mentioned previously, it is just not the direction I chose to go with the build. Global Logistics specifically can really guarantee safe flips for her, but in this version of the deck list I try to make the most of my allies and do not want the slight tempo hit of not using an activation for the turn. This is admittedly a greedy choice as there are few truly protected flips in this deck list, but I wanted to keep the tempo high for some fast-paced games.

Lastly, let's speak on some cards that have become "She-Hulk staples" in a way. The three cards are namely Down Time, Endurance, and Unshakable. Most She-Hulk builds will include one, if not all three, of these cards which I chose to omit. This is not because they're bad, I think all three of them are a net positive to the deck. It is a similar reasoning to the previous section that they do not actively assist me in the overall high tempo game plan. All three of these cards are extremely cheap, but they are also resources that could be spent playing upgrades/supports to build, playing allies to give me tempo, or fueling one of the 6 readies the deck features.

Deck results:

This deck has be tried and tested this past week extensively through the villains on Expert in Solo, and a few 2P games, to great results. It takes a familiar archetype of SHIELD Justice and complements her by giving her early tempo to manage the board state and build so she can take advantage of her stats while mitigating her lower than average hand size.

Black Widow: 3W-0L
Batroc: 3W-2L
MODOK: 3W-0L
Thunderbolts: 3W-1L
Baron Zemo: 2W-1L

If you try it out, let me know what you think, who you fought, and any changes you made!

Get out there and Gamma Slam some goons :)