Introduction
When your first Mystery Card of Pool 3 is Patriot you gain access to a very unique archetype which breathes new life into your starter cards.
Game plan
The deck strategy is straightforward, play a bunch of cards with no abilities/token generators and then buff them with Patriot and Onslaught.
Card suggestions
Other cards you can consider:
- Hulk instead of Abomination if you want a chunky finisher.
- Blue Marvel for White Tiger to really lean into those buffs.
- Ant-Man instead of Angela to smoothen your curve.
Down the line you'll want to upgrade the deck by swapping in Wasp, Mysterio or Brood, with Doctor Doom as your finisher.
Another way to go is Debrii and Ultron. In this case you may want to also swap Ka-Zar into the deck for all those 1 cost tokens.
However, the most important addition will surely be Mystique who's insane in these types of combo decks.
Decklist
More about the deck:
- Squirrel Girl, our first token generator which can potentially provide 9 power across the board. Good for spreading tokens into locations you normally don't want to or can't play cards into such as Death's Domain, Sanctum Sanctorum, Luke's Bar or a Flooded location. Not meant to be played on the first turn as she can unnecessarily clog up locations such as The Space Throne or Bar with No Name. Also always be aware of Killmonger. If you want Angela to receive her buff then play her on that same location.
- Misty Knight, one of our many starter cards which find new life in the deck thanks to Patriot.
- Angela, a staple in almost every deck as she scales well.
- Mister Sinister, another token generator, once again good for locations where you can't usually play or retain cards.
- Shocker, Cyclops, The Thing, Abomination have great synergy with Patriot.
- Patriot, the MVP of the deck. Greatly benefits from Onslaught's Citadel.
- Cosmo, his most obvious use is to protect Patriot with Onslaught. The other is to disrupt your opponents, for example by playing him into the same location as Bucky Barnes to deny their power swing.
- White Tiger, the final token generator of the deck is a good alternative turn 5 (or 6 if Onslaught is a no-show) with the same advantages as Squirrel Girl and none of the downsides besides the cost. Excellent in Kamar-Taj.
- Onslaught, the big finisher who'll double the power boost from Patriot.
Final thoughts
When to snap: I recommend doing so once your playline for the final 3 turns becomes clear based on what you're holding (e.g. it's turn 4, you've got The Thing, Patriot, Shocker and Onslaught, check the board state, calculate the rough power increase, see whether you'll be ahead from the buffs based on the opponent's deck and make a choice), depending on the match-up.
Should things go awry, or you've been unlucky with your draws, there's always the option to retreat on the final turn.
The tech cards to watch out for are:
- Killmonger, try to play around him by playing your 1-drops later.
- Enchantress or Rogue who can delete your Ongoing effects, try to protect them with Cosmo.
- to some degree Shang-Chi as Patriot can push a lot of your No Ability cards above 9 power.
Have fun!