Cyclops: Leader of the X-Men

Leader of the X-Men

This deck aims to take full advantage of Cyclops' ability to play X-Men allies from any aspect. Since some of the best X-Men allies are on the pricey side (you get what you pay for!), the rest of the deck is focused on his economy to be able to afford all of these cards.

For economy, the deck leans on Meditation to be able to play several cards early then rely on Uncanny X-Men, Team-Building Exercise, and The X-Jet to provide continuous resources. Most of his Identity-specific cards will be used as resources and Constant Training provides an extra resource most of the time.

The allies are the star of the deck and here are why they were specifically chosen over the others:

• Armor: 2-cost ally that blocks 2 attacks. Chosen over Colossus because of the cost and also to enable playing with another player with a Colossus deck or ally.
• Beast: virtually a 2-cost ally with the rebate. Bringing Beast back with Rapid Response (which incidentally is a Tactic upgrade you can get with Constant Training!) lets you keep tempo by allowing you to play more cards the following turn (or the current turn if defeated by consequential). There's 1 copy of Band Together to get even more resources.
• Blindfold: encounter manipulation is a very powerful effect and being able to re-use them is extra powerful. Bonus points for being a Psionic for Cerebro.
• Forge: finds Cerebro/The X-Jet/Utopia or can be treated as a a 1-cost ally meaning it's "free" with UXM as long as not all 3 X-Supports are in play.
• Nightcrawler: emergency damage prevention and guarantees a Utopia trigger when needed. The main restriction is the cost which the deck doesn't have a lot and will mainly rely on The X-Jet.
• Pixie: allows a re-use on any of the X-Men, has 2ATK, and still block one hit with UXM/TT in play.
• Polaris: giving tough to your identity allows you to delay blocking with an ally and lets them activate an additional time to use up the extra HP from UXM/TT.
• Professor X: IMO one of the best ally available and have it in all of my decks. He's even better in this deck due to UXM, TBE, and being a Psionic for Cerebro. 3 THW makes him a good target to Ready with Utopia.
• Psylocke: provides 2 confuse effects which lets you safely go to AE to use Cerebro and Constant Training. Another excellent target for RR.
• Wolverine: piercing is a powerful effect and he's is much easier to use compared to Ruby Quartz Visor since Optic Blast requires an upgrade attached to the target and this deck prefers to allocate resources for allies instead. He'll also stick around for a while to be able to do damage and remove tough consistently.

Gameplan

• Mulligan: look for Meditation, Uncanny X-Men, Team-Building Exercise, The X-Jet.
• Early Game: setup your supports and find allies to help deal with the early encounters. Professor X is one of the best early game option since he provides a confuse to help flipping back to AE on T2, 3THW can clear a lot of side schemes, and provides an easy block for T1.
• Midgame: leverage UXM to create a board of allies to deal with everything the encounter throws at you. Having a board of 4 allies at all time isn't very hard to do at this point and it will most likely be Wolverine + Nightcrawler + 2 others.

Notes

• Meditation is a very powerful but restrictive card. It's mainly used to accelerate on T1 and don't expect to play it more than once/game. T1 is often the most critical turn as you start with nothing and depending on the encounters there are multiple things you have to deal with so you want access to the most resources possible on T1. Additionally, your hero activation is often not necessary on T1 so this converts 2THW/1ATK to 1 resource which is worth a card.
• Conversely Band Together isn't good on T1 and in fact is often worse than any other card since it does nothing without an ally. That's why this deck only runs 1 to be fetched by Beast. If playing with a partner that can afford taking constant damage, swap this with Clarity of Purpose.
• If you're interested in a deck specifically designed to play with this deck, check out this Storm partner deck!