Gamora the Healer

Gamora the Healer

Healing

Gamora wants to eat the villain attack each turn with this deck because of the healing options she has available:

• Momentum Shift: Healing is a cost to deal damage with this card, so you need to take damage to use this!
• Precision Strike: Only heals when it defeats an enemy, but it's not too difficult to make that happen a lot of the time (but I didn't mind just dealing two damage with it either, because of Gamora's "ping" synergies)
• What Doesn't Kill Me: Healing is a cost to ready with this card, so you need to take damage to use this!
• Conditioning Room: Alter-Ego Action, but I like flipping down to take advantage of the first part of this card and her Alter-Ego action (flipping up with 7 or 8 cards is nice)
• Med Team: Also heals allies...
• Endurance: Not true healing, but she does "heal" 3 when you put it into play

Allies

I didn't chump-block with this deck unless it was absolutely necessary because I needed to take damage to use some of the cards. Sometimes I'd chump the Villain and take a little Minion damage to "turn on" her healing events. Med Team healing let me use my allies many times before needing to chump with them.

You have to keep an eye on the damage you're taking though. If a BIG attack is coming and/or you have no healing in hand for the next turn, a chump block is usually the best course.

Early versions of this deck used Groot instead of Daredevil and Drax instead of Starhawk.

• Groot with Hangar Bay is AWESOME but I'd often toss him because he was too expensive for the turn. Daredevil is just easier to get into play and can ping off low-ATK minions.
• Drax with Med Team healing is a villain slayer, but he can't attack minions! Starhawk is easier to play and is more versatile and strategic.

Skilled Tactician

Gamora's ability to splash Attack and Thwart events from outside her aspect is a fun deckbuilding option. This is why Gamora and Spider-Woman are two of my favorite heroes.

• Clear the Area: This did a lot of work and is "free" with a single Keen Instincts because it (nearly always) replaces itself. In scenarios with several schemes Multitasking would be a good replacement.
• Precision Strike: It doesn't always heal, but it's a cheap 2 damage (+1 to any enemy with Gamora's Sword in play) event, made cheaper with Keen Instincts. I tested Clobber in this slot, but I'll take inconsistent healing over no healing.

Record:

Core

• Rhino (Standard): Many wins, 0 losses
• Rhino (Expert): Many wins, 2 losses
• Klaw (Standard): Many plays, roughly 60/40 win ratio. I really like this fight because it's challenging
• Ultron (Standard): 1-4. I thought this deck would beat Ultron pretty easily, but once it got behind in Drones it was tough to recover. Made Stage II in all five games.

The Galaxy's Most Wanted Campaign (Standard)

• Drang: 1-0 but it was a long game
• Collector I: 1-0 with no player cards in the collection at the end
• Collector II: 1-0 but I didn't get any Galactic Artifacts (which actually made Nebula easier)
• Nebula: 1-2 and I got really lucky with the encounter deck in my win
• Ronan: 0-5 and I never got him to Stage II (down to 3 health in Stage I once though)

Standalone Ronan: 0-2

Standalone Ronan is far easier than Campaign Ronan, but I still couldn't win. I got him to Stage II both times and down to 8 health once. The only change I made was trading one each of Momentum Shift, Precision Strike, and What Doesn't Kill Me for three Tackle which helped quite a bit (but obviously not enough). You have to get rid of Universal Weapon before you can stun him, at the cost of health and ANOTHER encounter card!