Player Schemes and SHIELD dreams

After playing the first two scenarios of the NeXt Evolution set with both the Cable and Domino precon decks (something we rarely ever do with Heroes), we decided it was a good enough starting point from which to build our own. I must stress, this deck was built as a Co-Op deck to work with the https://marvelcdb.com/decklist/view/31131/wild-assessment-1.0 (Domino) deck I have also posted. After toying with a Cable Leadership build (w/ all the new X force toys) and a Domino Aggression build (w/ Cosmo focus), these are what we've come to.

I imagine as a Justice build it could work very well with just about any other Hero (especially a rush deck), but for now I've only been able to play it in a few games with Domino, with tweaks along the way. So far we've defeated the following scenarios:

-Expert Taskmaster (played when the deck was Leadership; changed to something resembling this build for the rest of the scenarios)

-Expert Red Skull (One Way or Another x2 swapped for Deadpool and Frenemies)

-Expert Sabretooth - (This is about the point where the Domino deck shifted away from Aggression to more basic)

-Expert Klaw

Both decks performed quite well in each scenario. I won't go into details about every card change along the way, but I will attempt to go over how they ideally want to play with each other, since I believe they complement each other well.

This is a deck, designed for 2P, that usually wants to go 2nd. Specifically, with the Wild Assessment deck, to grab the Call for Backup PSS first turn. This is the play pretty much every opening hand where you have a Mind Scan and some other card to thwart the scheme completely (maybe a Surveillance Team). Ideally, once defeating that scheme, you grab Monica Chang to do her thing so your Homeland Intervention is online. The Wild Assessment deck, since it usually wants to be alter-ego first turn, grabs Professor X to confuse the villain and have a block for the Cable player.

If this doesn't work out, it is also typically most beneficial to grab the Lock and Load scheme to grab the Sonic Rifle right away for some confuses, since you're pretty much guaranteed to be able to clear 4 threat 1st turn, and Domino's pistols are priority cards for her to deal with the minions that you are trying not to concern yourself with.

From then on it plays as you would expect. Control the threat with the SHIELD things, play and defeat the PSS whenever you can (and whenever it's most advantageous) to buff all Cable's cool events, and watch things fall into place. It's very satisfying to get that Telekinetic Blast and Mind Scan into the double digits. There are plenty of cards that would be great in this (as seems to be the problem with Justice), but the list feels so tight (and much space is dedicated to the Surveillance Team package) that I can't imagine cutting much without completely re-working what the deck does.

After the 6 games we've played with the two, Cable absolutely seems like a Hero best used in lower player counts, when you can reliably thwart the schemes yourself without having to rely on anyone else's support. It's a shame, but such is the balancing nature of the PSS. For now, as someone who plays almost exclusively 2p (occasionally 3-4), this feels pretty good to me- you can rarely go wrong with the SHIELD good stuff.

Cable is fun to play, comes with lots of choices and can be a bit slow to set up, but once you're off, you fear no scheme. Just thwart, thwart, thwart to your heart's content, and leave the rest to luck.