Firstly, I'd like to introduce myself to the Marvel Champions community. I've been playing this game since late 2022, and I've been _really _enjoying it (I'm about to crest 900 games played). This marks my first ever published decklist on marvelcdb.

Over the last few months, I've been uploading Marvel Champions gameplay videos and regularly live streaming on my YouTube channel, The Crash Space. I've just uploaded a video that thoroughly deconstructs this decklist, alongside some gameplay against Expert Unus. I hope you enjoy it!

I had two main goals in mind when building this deck:

• Do something cool with Flight Squadron.
• Pop off with Strength in Diversity.

I think we landed both of those goals, and so far, this deck has been a lot of fun.

Flight Squadron

Alert All Aerial Allies

This shiny new team card readies our exhausted allies after we play an aerial card. While Command Team is a totally cromulent card, that readying effect seemed a bit lacking in context of the aerial ally pool - a lot of low attack and thwart numbers, and low health numbers to boot (particularly on our bird friends).

However, the aerial trait contains two important allies which can generate infinite value when exhausting - Cloud 9, and the new ally, Aero.

The plan is to get Cloud 9 and/or Aero on the table, alongside Flight Squadron, and a healthy cadre of aerial allies (with Flight Squadron and The Triskelion, we can have five allies in the sky). We exhaust either Cloud 9 or Aero based off what the board demands, and then play an aerial card to fire Flight Squadron (it's very common that we bounce Redwing every turn, ensuring consistent access to an aerial play). We use Flight Squadron to ready the exhausted Cloud 9 or Aero, and then simply re-exhaust them for a massive +2 boost to all of our allies alongside our aerial Falcon hero.

While a relatively simple combo, with a stacked board, Cloud 9 or Aero can generate an additional 10 damage or thwart every round.

This engine makes the smaller hitting aerial allies like Redwing, Hugin & Munin, Vivian, and Adam Warlock punch (or thwart) way above their weight class, which has felt great.

When playing this deck, I don't often block with my allies, but rather defend with Falcon. We scale really well with a full aerial army, so try and preserve your flying friends. Luckily, Falcon is no slouch when it comes to defense. Starting with a base two defense stat, further bolstered by Vibranium Microweave and Captain America's Shield, we're functionally blocking for five even before considering Battlefield Awareness. I'm mostly a Protection player, so this sits well with me.

You can also use Aerial Evacuation to get a damage-less block from an ally, and then start your next turn in alter-ego for the recovery or bird search.

Strength in Diversity

Gotta Catch 'em All

This card is so damn cool - I'm a huge fan of creative build arounds that encourage you to dig deep into your boxes or binders.

As we saw with Maria Hill's All-Points Bulletin before, a non-attack, non-thwart typed flexible damage and threat removal card is equally flexible as it is valuable:

• It is not affected by Stun or Confuse
• It ignores Guard and Patrol
• It perfectly pings off Toughness
• You never waste any value

As someone who plays mostly solo, having a card that can address any given board state is just so exceedingly important. Do you have a three health minion and a side-scheme? No problem.

It also has a wild icon, which is cute. We like that with Spectrum.

It turns out that the aerial ally pool is naturally trait diverse. Every ally in this deck produces at least one unique trait (barring Spectrum), and when we're fully built out, Strength in Diversity becomes a whopping 2 for 9!

To be clear, you don't need to be waiting for the late game 2 for 9's. Paying 2 for 5 mixed damage/thwart is more than acceptable, and you can get there by playing as few as two allies.

Also, feel free to swap out Cannonball for Sunspot. Cannonball is a great inclusion with the Cloud 9/Aero engine, but if you're playing against a minion dense scenario, Sunspot works great with Falcon's Flock.

Basic Gameplan

No surprise, we want to assemble our allies alongside Flight Squadron. I'll often use Sam Wilson's Birds of a Feather to grab Falcon's Flock on turn one, as it allows us to set up quickly and consistently (we have 19 aerial cards in the deck - nearly half). I'll prioritize Cloud 9 and Aero when they show up, which gives us consistent incremental value with our cheaper allies. I'll try and block almost exclusively with Falcon, or just take an unblocked attack from the villain if we spy a low boost value.

Redwing is a total star in this deck - both for managing the impending boost card, but also as consistent access to an aerial play for both Falcon's Eagle-Eyed ability and Flight Squadron. Even with only two Avenger allies, I'm still playing Avengers Tower because we play and replay Redwing that often. Feel free to replay Redwing multiple times per turn if the top card of the encounter deck is generous with its icons. Otherwise, on a regular turn I'll bounce Redwing, replay him, and then attack or thwart for whatever boosted number Cloud 9 or Aero can produce. Rinse and repeat.

I've barely mentioned Falcon's hero text - while not being the star of the show in this deck, it's still great. I've exclusively played this deck in solo, and seeing the impending boost card allows you the safety to jump down to alter-ego for some soup or fresh birds. If you see a big boost or an annoying star, just toss it at the villain with Redwing or swoop it into the bin with Falcon. It's not uncommon in solo to end up in the "if we get a three boost on the thwart, we're pretty cooked", and you simply don't have that problem. Also, if you see a low boost icon on top, feel free to take an unblocked attack from the villain so Falcon remains ready next round to send back some Cloud 9 and Aero buffed stats.

Clarity of Purpose + Vibranium Microweave

I just wanted to shout out the interaction between Clarity of Purpose and Vibranium Microweave - you can totally prevent the Clarity damage with the Microweave. I found that Falcon usually blocks well enough that the Microweave remained unexhausted into the player phase, so this is a great way to get some extra value. Dealing a damage by generating a resource is an absolute treat.

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That's the deck, and hopefully you enjoy it. I'm not the biggest fan of Leadership, but I found this to be a satisfying enough puzzle with some interesting moving pieces. If you have any questions or suggestions, please, leave a comment. And once again, if you want to check out some gameplay and a full deck breakdown, this video has you covered. Cheers!