Ms. Marvel Aggression

Ms. Marvel is an interesting hero with some unique strengths and weaknesses. In particular, she has a base stat line of 1/1/1 (currently the worst in the game) and her personas can only be activated in alter-ego. However, Morphogenetics allows us to replay some event cards. So how can we take advantage of this, and when would you play Ms. Marvel over another hero?

So first, Aggression is simply the best Aspect (currently) to pair with her. Leadership has no synergy because it doesn't have events to use with Morphogenetics. Justice currently only has For Justice! and Concussive Blow which are both good cards, but leave her relying entirely on Big Hands and Followed for damage, which simply aren't enough to reliably handle minions. Protection has Tackle and Expert Defense which are solid events, but she simply lacks the synergy with Protection that Peter Parker does with Black Widow or Enhanced Spider-Sense.

So what does Aggression offer her?

She's got more synergy with Melee than any other hero, as the developers have ruled that Embiggen! makes it into a 5/5. Similarly, a single Chase Them Down in hand can do 6 thwart for 0 when you play it with Shrink and then use Morphogenetics to recall it and play it again. With Biokinetic Polymer Suit you can guarantee that Relentless Assault will do overkill damage, and with Embiggen! there's very few minions that it won't remove from the board. Tigra solves some of Ms. Marvel's issues with clearing minions by being fairly sticky, provided you can take advantage of her Response.

This deck isn't running any copies of Combat Training because bringing Ms. Marvel from 1 ATK to 2 ATK is fairly useless, given that you're mostly exhausting to use Morphogenetics instead of your basic ATK. If you're playing with She-Hulk or Captain America, you may want to put a copy or two in your deck, but otherwise it's not worthwhile.

Similarly, we run Uppercut over Tac Team because it's an event with a resource that can be used with Hulk or Relentless Assault. However, you'll almost never be playing Uppercut - 9 times out of 10, it's simply a resource to power your other cards. Once we get more Aggression cards, this will be first up on the chopping block.

Endurance and Down Time are personal preference. I feel Endurance is necessary due to her low base health (she's in a tough spot when the villain attacks her and she doesn't have an ally or Wiggle Room to help defend). The Down Time is to put her in a similar position to Peter Parker with Aunt May - at 13 HP with REC 7, then even when she's at 1 HP she can flip to Kamala Khan and recover, then the next turn she can recover and flip back to Ms. Marvel.

The most controversial card choice here is Lockjaw over Mockingbird. Mockingbird is becoming less valuable as the game progresses, as other players are much more likely to stun the villain with Heroic Strike and Tackle now that those options are available. Without the stun, she's simply a 1/1/3, which is a fairly bad stat line, and she has the same cost as Lockjaw.

"Wait a minute", you say, "Mockingbird costs 3 and Lockjaw costs 4." Well yes, but also no. Mockingbird costs a card from your hand (Mockingbird herself), so it's effectively 4 cards from hand to play Mockingbird. Lockjaw can be played from your graveyard (which is the only time you should be playing him, for the most part), so he's also 4 cards from your hand to play. They both generate , so there's no change in resources.

In most cases, you won't want to play either card, as you'll simply have much better options on your turn. However, if you start in Hero form with a bad hand (maybe Relentless Assault and Chase Them Down with no minions in play), then you can still flip to Alter-Ego, put one of them underneath Bruno Carrelli, and then play Lockjaw from the graveyard to still accomplish something for the turn. With Mockingbird, you're relying on her being in hand, which is much less likely, especially since Teen Spirit discards any non-Ms. Marvel cards.

Similarly, you can't rely on getting Nick Fury on the shuffle due to Teen Spirit, but what you can do is put Strength, Energy and Genius on the bottom of your deck along with Nick Fury using Aamir Khan and guarantee yourself a good Nick Fury draw when you reach the end of your deck.

The most important cards to get on the table are Embiggen! and Shrink, you should be willing to mulligan most cards on your opening draw to look for these.

The primary use for Bruno Carrelli is to stash away situational cards that you can't use this turn (Chase Them Down or Relentless Assault with no minions, Sneak By with no/low threat) or to save bigger cards that you can't afford to pay for this turn but that you still want in play (Avengers Mansion and Helicarrier).

As soon as we see the Aggression cards with Thor this deck will get some changes - Jarnbjorn and Hall of Heroes will likely replace Avengers Mansion and either Down Time or a copy of Uppercut.