This week, time for a slight change of pace. There’s a card I always had an eye on but never figured out where I wanted to use her: R Jubilee from DPS. And after playing rincevent in the 20×20 TTTD (who won the tournament using her), I thought it was time to revisit the idea. Time for some…
Chilly Fireworks
Format: 2021 Modern Age
The Team: This team is dealing X-treme damage.
So while I do take some inspiration from Rincevent’s team, this team has a bit of a twist: Iceman.
The core idea is a bit convoluted, but bear with me. I will use Jubilee (and/or Hope Summers copying Jubilee), spending X-men dice as energy to pay for globals, in order to deal damage to Iceman. He, in turn, will deal 2 damage to my opponent for each damage dealt to him. And all of that damage must be dealt during the attack step for Iceman’s ability to trigger. You’ll notice I’m not mentioning fielding dice to deal Jubilee’s damage – that’s because fielding dice from the Reserve Pool only happens during the Main Step, which doesn’t work with Iceman. Globals are really the way to go here.
So the first three cards in the team are obvious: Jubilee, Hope Summers and Iceman.
For this strategy to work, however, I need cheap X-men dice to use as energy, and global abilities to spend that energy on. Kitty Pryde was there strictly to use as energy. To use said energy, time to bring in Clayface, and Static Field. The idea is to attack with my characters, use Static Field to bring them back, and the energy from Static Field triggers Jubilee/Hope’s ability and triggers Iceman’s damage.
I put in two other cards for their globals: Villainous Pact and Dark Phoenix. Pact’s ramp is useful, and it’s not unreasonable to use this global during the attack step to trigger Jubilee (assuming my Prep Area is empty). Dark Phoenix is a funny choice at first glance, until you realize that Jubilee and Iceman are X-men dice too. So if necessary, I can Clayface either in, and use that energy to trigger that global twice and trigger Hope/Jubilee’s ability. Plus, Dark Phoenix’s discount is always handy, and being able to KO Hope Summers to change my target is a must.
Now, I have a win condition, ramp (Clayface, Pact and Dark Phoenix) and I am slightly lacking in removal. So that’s what I added with my remaining two cards. Mimic is self-explanatory. Great removal, X-men die, also gives me masks for globals. And Cyclops, wouldn’t you know it, also great removal, also an X-men die, and gives me bolts, also great for globals. Yep, a recurring theme in this team, but it makes it very focused and fairly reliable. Looks like I’m all set to go.
And with all of that said, on to the games!
Game 1:
My first game was against SR Mary Shazam fueled by Parasites. Intriguing matchup, because he put in a force attack global (Slingers), which I could easily use to trigger shenanigans on his turn. My early turns didn’t exactly go my way. I had the energy to load up on Kitty Pryde dice, and I got Hope Summers early, but it took me a while to get to Iceman as I didn’t roll bolts when I needed, and I couldn’t get to Jubilee for the same reason. Thankfully, even with just Hope doing the damage, I was wearing my opponent down a bit. And then Iceman showed up. I didn’t even need Jubilee then, because being able to trigger my shenanigans on my turn with Static Field and on his turn with Slingers (so I’d Static Field what I forced to attack, triggering Hope/Jubilee and allowing me to damage Iceman)…it was just more effective than it had any right to be. Mary showed up and did some damage, but since I blocked with Iceman, Mary’s damage was substantially slower. I wore my opponent down and won.
1-0
Game 2:
Next match, I was up against C Anti-Monitor/Deathbird. This matchup was advantageous to me because my opponent brought me R Mister Sinister to play with. Clayface + Sinister is an amazing combo, and Hope/Jubilee get to trigger damage if I use my X-men dice with Clayface (which I did). And so I did. In this match, between Hope and Jubilee, I did a big chunk of my damage before Iceman even showed up. When he did, my opponent was at 8 life. After fielding Iceman, in my Reserve Pool I had a Kitty Pryde die and one mask energy. I purposefully didn’t field Kitty, sending her instantly to the Used Pile at the beginning of my attack step (where I attacked with two characters). Clayface’d Kitty in, used both masks for Static Field, giving me a total of four damage triggers (2 for Hope, 2 for Jubilee). 4 damage to Iceman later, my opponent took 8 damage and I won.
2-0
Game 3:
For the last game of the evening, time for some Deadly/Doom Lance/Deathbird shenanigans. This game started odd, with most characters not rolling on both sides. But this gave me the time to purchase some characters. He also had the same issue, and bought himself a R Dr Strange to spin my stuff to energy. This hit me pretty rough, but he wasn’t dealing me the damage he needed to win either. So eventually, after he missed an attempt to roll Strange on Energize, I got my combo on the board and used his Dr Strange global to force something to attack, then Static Field to send it back (using Kitty Pryde dice to trigger the Hope/Jubilee/Iceman damage). I had my opponent down to 8 life on my turn, with two bolts in Reserve (from a Jubilee die), and Hope/Jubilee/Iceman active, alongside two sidekicks. I attacked with a sidekick, used the two bolts to Dark Phoenix global out my two sidekicks, and used the resulting Hope/Jubilee triggers to deal 4 total damage to Iceman, meaning 8 damage to my opponent. I won.
3-0
Post-Mortem:
-This team worked a little TOO well for the setting. I guess I should’ve seen that coming, but using Jubilee to damage Iceman is just dirty, especially when you copy Jubilee with Hope. And using a Kitty Pryde’s energy to Clayface in another, then using Static Field to do more Kitty Pryde triggers…it just snowballed real quick.
-I didn’t build the team to deal damage with Iceman on my opponent’s turn, but I guess that’s probably the optimal play here if you want to make this better. Force attack globals certainly came in handy when my opponents brought them.
-Yes, Dani Moonstar is a better 2-cost than Kitty in 2021 Modern. But then I would’ve put in Booker T’s global, and it would’ve become a Dani team, not an Iceman team. I wanted something different in this team.
-Some might think, “For targeting Iceman, isn’t R Jubilee just SR Turk Barrett but harder to use?” Well…somewhat? Jubilee has the advantage of triggering off any energy type (and being able to hit the opponent in a pinch), but the disadvantage that she only triggers off X-men dice. And in 2021 Modern, Jubilee has a major advantage: being copied by Hope Summers, doubling your damage. But yeah, if an Iceman-style effect returns to the current (2022) Modern, Turk Barrett will probably be preferred over Jubilee since Turk triggers off sidekicks spent as masks.
So there you have it. Very effective team, fun for me, maybe not as much for my opponents. Do you have any funky ideas on using R Jubilee in the current Modern format?
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