Spider-Woman — Ketchup & Mustard

Getting Lie in Wait with Coulson... good idea, never thought about it. Does it make the card a little more reliable?

I think I'd find a way to include Skilled Strike in here, for SW it means +3 ATK if it's the first aggression card you play.

@neothechosen Thanks! I agree that Skilled Strike is very good for Spider-Woman, and I’ve run that in her decks in the past. With this iteration, it seems like I usually have an Aggression card to play every turn as it is. I had never used any of the “Power of” cards in any of her decks, but with all the Aggression allies and two-cost cards, it made sense here. So, that kind of steered me away from Skilled Strike, too. I built this deck for Kang, which is why Piercing Strike is in here, but in other scenarios, I could definitely see swapping three copies of Skilled Strike in for that and maybe one of the Power of Aggressions or one of the Aggression allies. It would probably depend on the scenario for which one to drop.

Also, I didn’t mention in the write up, but I realized while playing with this deck that Jessica Drew’s Apartment can be used to search for the Power of Aggression as an aspect card. That kind of blew my mind when I noticed that because that can really help play the allies if you find it.

@neothechosen I forgot to answer your first question! I think it does make it a little more reliable. At the very least, it essentially reduces Agent Coulson into a pseudo-two-cost ally, or it guarantees you a cheap Aggression card for the round in case you didn’t have enough resources to pay for one of the others. I like Coulson for the two-thwart also because it can pair nicely with Inconspicuous or Clear the Area. But, I actually have also used Coulson to knock the Tough off or to clear Kang’s Temporal Shield and then used him to block.

The other thing with Lie in Wait is that it gives you an option for when a minion engages you to consider how the math would work out the best. For example, you might have Valkyrie in your hard and don’t need to trigger Lie in Wait, but maybe you have another ally in play who could defeat the minion if you do trigger Lie in Wait, which saves your attack for the villain. It’s just a nice extra option.

@Mathetes Is Quake better than Wiccan? I'd probably swap them. Also, Skilled Strike is amazing for Spider-Woman. Otherwise, seems pretty good

@Mathetes Thanks for the response! I started earlier today with a like, switched it to a favorite. I really like the audacity it shows, using cards too often overlooked (Lie in Wait, Multitasking)... I like trying to find a use for these cards too.

One idea occured to me: on scenarios where Piercing Strike isn't as useful, maybe Press the Advantage to combo with Pheromones could be good?

Thx for the share!

@DoctorWhomst You’re right. Quake had become an auto-include for me with Justice, and I overlooked Wiccan for that simple reason. Wiccan definitely pairs well with Jessica Drew’s action.

Also, Skilled Strike is definitely a great card for her. The only reason I didn’t include it in this build was because of Toughness with Kang (The Conqueror), which led me down a path of including Piercing Strike and The Power of Aggression to help pay for it and allies.

On that note, I had a crazy idea earlier today of trying a build with none of Genius, Energy, and Strength, but instead opting for two copies of two “Power of” cards in their place. I'll have to look through the card pool more to decide which aspects and if it will have to be a 41-card or include one basic (grey) card to make it an even split. It might not be a good idea and might not work at all, but it could be fun to try!

@neothechosen Thanks! I really truly appreciate the feedback and the responses!

I almost included Press the Advantage in a previous iteration, but for some reason, I keep shying away from it. It’s tricky for me because I feel like the one-cost for two-damage isn’t good enough if you don’t get the card draw. But, even with the card draw, it always feels just okay to me. You’re definitely right though that it pairs nicely with Pheromones, which is always a high priority to play, and it also can pair with Spider-Girl against minions.

I like Clear the Area quite a bit though, which is basically a mirror image of Press the Advantage, but I do think that one-cost for two-threat is pretty good and then is very good if you get the card draw. Threat removal usually seems to be costed slightly higher than damage, or slightly less efficient. Although these examples are not great cards, To the Rescue! and Haymaker are good examples of identically priced two-cost basic cards with the two-threat being less than the three-damage. So, I’ve always been slightly unimpressed with Press the Advantage because of Clear the Area, but I do think that I need to give it a fair try.

Also, I’m glad that you mentioned Multitasking. I love that art on that card! But, I feel like the one for two-threat is not terrible when it can also boost your stats if it’s the only Justice card you play that round. But, really, if there’s a side scheme, the one-cost for four-threat removal total is fantastic. I also like how it pairs mathematically in this deck with Inconspicuous, the allies, your own THW stat, and Clear the Area. There are some turns where it can give you multiple options to help make sure that Clear the Area can remove the last threat to draw you a card. Between that and the occasional Captain Marvel ally activation, it helps having several one-cost cards around to draw into, which, of course, gets back to why Press the Advantage probably deserves a more fair chance by me.

Me again - you tell me when I get annoying lol! I had no time to test any of this, but have you tried Turn the Tide? I was also thinking it might be fun to have Martial Prowess as a mirror to Sense of Justice (altought it would have fewer targets).

@neothechosen It’s not a problem! I appreciate it.

I do like Turn the Tide quite a bit. It’s a very cost efficient card. However, in this build, I wanted to focus mainly on having some cheap thwarting options for the Justice cards (and then the Agent Coulson/Lie in Wait combo). Basically, I ran out of room for Turn the Tide because Spider-Woman is limited to a smaller amount of cards from each aspect, since she has to have an equal number of cards from each of the two chosen aspects. I kind of have a thing about trying to stick to 40-cards for consistency, too. You certainly can go over, but I don’t recommend it for Spider-Woman in particular because I want to see Pheromones and even Contaminant Immunity as often as possible. If I can play one card from each of the four aspects in a turn, it’s great for the stat boost. Turn the Tide seems great to me with a hero that can only use one aspect because it gives a solid damage dealing card to Justice to pair with Followed (which is fantastic in scenarios that start with a side scheme in play and/or have regularly occurring side schemes). But, in this deck, because of Spider-Woman’s stat boost for each aspect card played, I wanted to let the Justice cards clear the threat (especially with Clear the Area if I can) and then play an Aggression ally or a situation Aggression card like Lie in Wait with Coulson or Piercing Strike when someone like Kang has Toughness. And, then, it’s almost always after playing as many different aspects cards (if I can) that I want to activate Spider-Woman with the maximum stat boost for the turn. In other words, Turn the Tide in this deck feels like it would almost always be a second (or third) Justice card for the turn, which doesn’t help her stats. Or, it would be played after thwarting with her THW stat, in which case the stat boost wouldn’t help anymore. Long story short, I think Turn the Tide is fantastic for other heroes, but maybe not quite as good here.

I really thought about Martial Prowess at one point, but you’re right that it wouldn’t have enough targets. I opted for more Aggression allies and for The Power of Aggression to help pay for all of it. The only Aggression card in this deck that The Power of Aggression can’t pay for is the one copy of Lie in Wait, which is basically solely intended to pair with Agent Coulson. This is also part of why I shied away from Press the Advantage. But, you could make a neat deck with Martial Prowess and more attack events, like Press the Advantage. As it is though, I couldn’t justify it in this deck. You do still have Spider-Woman's Finesse, which can help pay for any aspect card. Finesse is definitely a higher priority than Sense of Justice, which is basically a luxury in this deck.

Once you’re fully set up, you can have a really big turn if you can use Sense of Justice to play one of the thwart events, The Power of Aggression (or Genius, Energy, or Strength) to play an Aggression ally, and Finesse to play Pheromones or Contaminant Immunity. I think that this sort of turn is what this deck is trying to build towards doing most of the time. And, then, you’ll have those turns where you do the Coulson/Lie in Wait combo, but that’s just an occasional little trick you can do if you have Coulson in hand. Otherwise, the former example is a more typical type of turn.

Thanks again for the feedback and questions! Let me know if you build a version with Martial Prowess and Sense of Justice both. It could be fun. I’ve also thought about building a “spy” deck with Team Training and a bunch of allies with the Avenger or the Spy trait. But, in the end, I think that might work better for Black Widow, since I don’t want too many basic (grey) cards in my Spider-Woman decks (mainly to get max use out of Finesse and the stat boosts each round). It’s too bad because I really like the pun “Spy-der-Woman” from the flavor text of Inconspicuous. lol It still might be fun just to be able to use the pun for it!

Thanks for the replies!

I was curious to try a few things for myself, I just posted a list inspired by yours with a few changes (Turn the Tide, Martial Prowess, Press the Advantage...) if you want to check it out:

marvelcdb.com

It actually performed well, not sure about Kang or minion heavy scenarios, but so far so good. It struggles in the resource department when it comes to allies though, so, it might turn out too weak to mention it.

Still, your deck got me craving to build for red/yellow Spider-Woman again, thanks a lot!

I’m glad that this led you to try a variation of your own! Very cool.

If the allies are a bit expensive without The Power of Aggression, I wondered if there would be a couple of cheaper Attack events to swap in, so that Martial Prowess had a couple more targets. I’m struggling to think what would be best besides a situational card like Piercing Strike. Maybe Browbeat wouldn’t be too bad. Surprise Attack is great with Ant-Man, and maybe it would be alright here if you want to flip back and forth fairly often. I always hesitate to include too many cards that could lead to potential dead hands, though. But, perhaps two copies could be okay, if you wanted to try another cheap one-cost Attack.