This week's Spotlight card joins a long line of energy accelerators. Wiccan gives you a big boost of two extra energy, but you need to have spent all of your energy by the time his On Reveal goes off. Will Wiccan have the same impact as other energy boosters, or will his condition be too high of a hurdle?
Like his mother, the Scarlet Witch, Billy Kaplan manipulates magical energy to warp reality. Ok, so in true Marvel fashion, Billy (along with his brother, Speed) is technically the reincarnation of the son of Wanda and Vision, which the boy only discovers later in life. The best place to follow his exploits with teammates Kate Bishop, Marvel Boy, America Chavez, his brother Speed, and boyfriend (and later husband) Hulkling is in Kieron Gillen’s 2013 Young Avengers series.
[Art by Jamie MacKelvie and Mike Norton from Young Avengers #1 (2013)]
The Big Question
The first question about Wiccan that came to mind for many was, “Is he going to make Quicksilver and Domino relevant finally?” I want every card to have a niche, and it would be great if these two training cards could show some level of play beyond the initial learning period. After running the numbers and theory-crafting, I'd be surprised if Wiccan could fully pull Quicksilver into relevance. But Domino, on the other hand? It's possible.
The odds of having any individual card in hand for turn 1 (three cards + first draw) is 33.3%. Adding Domino to your deck increases this to 36.3%.
Domino can increase the chance of having a 1-Cost card on the first turn. If you have two 1-cost cards in the deck, you have a 57.6% chance of having at least one for the first turn. If you have two 1-Cost cards in the deck and Domino, she raises that to 61.8%. Of course, Quicksilver gives you a 100% chance of having a 1 drop for the first turn, but Domino allows us to play a card that accomplishes more than Quicksilver.
Odds of having at least one 1-cost card for turn 1
However, Domino reduces the chances of drawing any individual card later. That could prove very important in the case of Wiccan.
Odds of drawing Wiccan by turn 4:
- Without Domino - 58.3
- With Domino - 54.5%
- With Quicksilver and Domino - 50%
The above information leads to the following conclusions:
- Domino may be an acceptable compromise for building with several 1-cost cards and Wiccan.
- Playing both Domino and Quicksilver may reduce your chances of drawing Wiccan too dramatically to be consistent, but it can lead to big spikes like Mr. Negative.
- Domino or Quicksilver with Wiccan will make your deck worse at pulling off multi-card combos.
- Wiccan will be better in decks where you have a variety of paths to victory and generically good cards on later turns rather than relying on specific combos.
- Wiccan decks will need ways to win games where they don't draw Wiccan.
There are quite a few ways to nudge these numbers in our favor. Jubilee and Iron Lad can give us one last chance to pull Wiccan if he's not in hand on turn 4. Crystal can give us an extra draw to increase our odds of seeing Wiccan.
Kate Bishop, Snowguard, Maria Hill, and the Hood can increase our chances of spending all of our energy before turn 4.
As with Mr. Negative, Psylocke and Zabu can help you play Wiccan out a turn early if you draw him (or Jubilee or Iron Lad) in time.
More energy… for what?
The other primary question with Wiccan is what exactly we're using all this extra energy for. Traditional ramp options, like Electro, allow us to play a powerful 5-Cost card early, followed by two consecutive 6-Cost cards. Wiccan comes down too late to achieve a similar path. In my opinion, this has led many to underrate Wiccan incorrectly. I believe he will be best at allowing you to play out large numbers of cards later rather than ramping into the highest-cost cards.
Ramp into a flood
The logical way to construct a Wiccan deck will be to include several 1-Cost cards, a few 2-Cost cards (or Domino), and a small amount of 3-Cost cards. This means the low-cost cards will have to be powerful or be able to generate cards that are. The ideal 3-Cost cards will be generically good on turn 3, including in games that you don't draw Wiccan, or will give you more options to use Wiccan's energy when you do. I think the best choices for 3-Cost cards for this role are Loki, Nocturne, Copycat, Cassandra Nova, Agent Coulson, or Magik.
Ramp into 6s
The other way to construct a Wiccan deck is to ramp into multiple 6-cost cards. While I don't think this is Wiccan's ideal use, there will be powerful combos that result in moderate win rates but solid cube rates.
By playing Wiccan on turn 4, followed by Wave (plus something else, ideally) on turn 5, you can play two 6-cost cards on turn 6!
Playing a combo of a strong finisher, like Ultron, with a control card like Alioth is game-winning.
With Wiccan’s extra energy, you could potentially play Knull and Arnim Zola on the Same turn.
Knull Zola
Doom and any other 6-cost card would be powerful, but with Odin you can just play two Dooms.
Strong combos to use your extra energy
Here are a few turn-specific combos to get your creative juices flowing!
Turn 5, 7 energy combos:
Nocturne + Captain Marvel or Gwenpool
Marvel Boy + Nightcrawler + Grapple Arrow + Kraven
Wong + Ironheart or Sage
Turn 6, 8 energy combos:
Iron Man + Mystique
Blue Marvel + Patriot
Shang Chi + Enchantress or Absorbing Man
Turn 7, 9 energy combos:
Wong + Namora
3 Surfer Cards
Scosco's Day One Wiccan Decks
Wiccan Flood
Wiccan Bird
Wiccan's Familiars
The above three decks are all takes on Wiccan with lower-curve packages that aim to leverage Wiccan's extra energy for explosive late-game plays.
Wiccan Tribunal Combo
American Wiccan
These two decks are essentially the same concept, each attempting a combo that can only be beaten if your opponent has specific tech cards that answer your deck.
Wiccan Ramp
Wiccan Wong
Conclusion
[Art by Jim Cheung]
I'm confident I'll manage to get some use out of Wiccan. If you have the resources, I think he's worth taking a risk on 6000 tokens. His ceiling is high, and he's a fun deck-building puzzle. However, even if you're not sold on Wiccan’s potential, this week is still an excellent opportunity to acquire new cards. Loki seems quite powerful in his new form so far, both in Arishem decks and as an enabler for Mockingbird. Pixie is seeing less play, but she's no less powerful than she used to be, and no other card does what she can. If you're missing either of these, I'd recommend opening caches.
Update
