Vanilla

Iceman is a very cool hero and the fact that Frostbite stacks provides us with a ton of control.

At its core, that's what this deck is, a control deck.

You're going to need quite a bit of setup before things start getting real frosty.

You'll navigate through the early game trying to get your supports and upgrades out and feel the heat the villain is trying is lay on you, but if you keep your cool and deal with the problems as they come by, you'll be chilling in the end game and laughing at the villain as they have 6 stacks of Frostbite on them while also having a Frozen Solid almost permanently on them.

Ice Ice Baby

I can hear some of you already saying "16 Nights, Iceman in Justice? What the hell are you smoking? Doesn't he want to either attack or defend?"

Yes, he does and that's what we'll be doing too.

You see, Frostbite has a pretty cool interaction. If the villain doesn't activate, it doesn't go away.

Frozen Solid is our icing on the cake being able to make even Steady or Stalwart villains unable to act.

Most decks I've seen for Iceman so far seem to be ignoring 2 things. Yes, Mirage's interaction is awesome and stunning works, however everyone seems to be forgetting that confuse achieves the same results as long as you flip down.

And Upside the Head is absolutely perfect for Iceman. It pulls double duty of giving us a confuse on our basic attack and a stun if we confuse the villain through something like Professor X or Dazzler. Or even another Upside the Head.

The other thing is that whenever you flip down to Alter-Ego, you get to Cool Off and shuffle 1 ICE card from your discard for each copy of Frostbite in play.

Once we're down to the last cards in the deck, flipping down to Alter-Ego with 6 copies of Frostbite in play makes it so that you're basically able to shape your next turn and with a bit of luck able to keep slapping Frozen Solid on the villain.

And at the end of the day, that's what we want to do. Keep recycling Frozen Solid and preventing the villain from activating for several turns in a row as we melt away their HP.

If there is a problem, yo I'll solve it

We're running 12 allies, 11 of which are X-Men. Allies are amazing, that's no secret, but Iceman enjoys the benefits of triggering Utopia a lot.

Cypher is the odd one out, but he helps cycle through the deck a bit faster while providing a cheap blocker if needed.

Every one of the X-Men pulls their weight in managing the board. To highlight a few.

Legion is an amazing ally and most of the time in this deck he'll be triggering his ability to remove 2 threat from a scheme in play. If possible slap that Mission Training on him and he'll stick around all game and is a thwarting machine.

Triage has come in clutch to keep the 3 HP allies alive and get extra uses out of them and control threat longer. I haven't used her on Iceman himself so far, but the HP might make a difference at times.

Forge's primary target is Utopia. The X-Jet is nice and all, but less crucial. Utopia is so good for Iceman, especially with 7 of our allies costing only 2 before bringing in something like Team-Building Exercise.

The allies in this deck are also the primary source of thwarting power, so that's what most of them will be doing. However, they also help tremendously with dealing with minions when you don't happen to have a Ice Blast on hand.

Just remember that the main goal is to resolve problems as they arise and survive to the endgame.

Too Cold

Let's talk Ice Slide for a moment.

With our goal to confuse the villain and all that, we won't see much use for Ice Slide until we're ready to go to town on the villain. It's still a Heroic Intuition/Combat Training/Armored Vest in one and that's awesome, but shuffling it back into deck is something you don't want in the early game.

However, once you got that sweet stack of Frostbite and a confuse or Frozen Solid on the villain, having Ice Slide shuffled back into the deck with other ice cards is not that bad.

Why? Well, Cryokinetic Perception wants us to draw cards with the ice trait. Once we're in a position like that, shuffling 7 instead of 6 ice cards back into the deck just increases our chances of being able to ready with Cryokinetic Perception.

Ideally, you just don't play Ice Slide until the mid-game and you've got your economy going through Team-Building Exercise, Power Belt and the like.

As for the Alter-Ego ability Cool Off, the primary targets from your discard are the following:

1. Arctic Attack when you're going to be closing out the game
2. Frozen Solid
3. Chill Out! or Arctic Attack depending on threat/minion situation
4. Snow Clone because they're effective and able to trigger Utopia
5. Ice Slide if you feel like you'll be in Hero mode for a while
6. Ice Wall when you know your remaining cards include at least a Energy, Genius or Strength

Yo man, let's get out of here

Some cards didn't make the cut.

Most of you will notice the lack of Deft Focus and X-Gene. While they might find some use, I've felt that every time I had either, I'd much rather have something else.

Deft Focus and X-Gene just don't pull their weight in my tests given we've got only 7 repeatable targets. Cryokinetic Perception we'll always play over every other card if given the chance, as it's just too good and Ice Slide is situational at best in this deck because of our goal to confuse and flip to Alter-Ego.

I considered running Sonic Rifle for an extra source of damage or confuse, but found that Iceman already has enough stuff to set up as it is and doesn't need another. The 3 damage definitely also wasn't what I felt like I needed in any of my games so far.

Build Support and Superpower Training are both handy player side schemes for Iceman and if you're looking to replace Cypher, I'd probably pick one of those two, mostly leaning towards Superpower Training because Cryokinetic Perception is such a strong card and at worst you'll get a Frozen Solid or your Power Belt.

Lay the Trap is another consideration if you want to have an option for burst damage, especially with the thwarting power of the allies being higher than their attack. But honestly, this deck is able to control the field well enough that you don't need it.

Word to your mother

Steady and Stalwart villains make Upside the Head and Float Like a Butterfly less than optimal.

Honestly, you don't need to have 6 stacks of Frostbite to have a solid time flipping down and only adding one or two threat on the main. Basically, you want at least a couple copies of Frostbite in play every time you flip to Alter-Ego in order to shuffle any (if not all) copies of Frozen Solid back into the deck.

I haven't been able to test the deck in 2+ hero games yet, where it will be tricky to maintain a high amount of Frostbite stacks, but the upside of that is that you probably don't need to and will still make life easier for yourself and the other heroes at the table.

Just keep them Frozen Solid and then just ice ice baby.