Falcon Punch!

Some weeks you don’t want to build something quirky. Some weeks you don’t want to have to explain your team using arcane rules interactions and timing conflicts. Some teams you just want to set up a big attack and yell…

Falcon Punch!

The Team:  Or should that rather be a Falcon (Side)Kick?

Format: Legacy League (all winning cards banned, including BACs)

For this one, I’m breaking out an old-school favourite and an underdog that never made it to the spotlight. Venom (whose ability, per this ruling, can be used multiple times per turn) makes my sidekicks huge, and Falcon makes them unblockable. Pretty straightforward.

I decided to throw in Phil Coulson and Green Goblin as other ways to buff my sidekicks (if ever Venom gets Blob’d or something). I also put in Elektra, for two reasons: first, for cheap masks. Second, to counter globals such as Blink-Transmutation.

For ramp, I strongly debated between two cards: Atlas and S.T.A.R. Labs. Because I couldn’t decide, I ended up putting both in. Atlas helps me get Venom more easily (by using his global on T1 and rolling 5 dice on T2, where I buy Venom), whereas S.T.A.R. Labs is helpful to get me more sidekicks and keep my bag thin throughout the game.

For control, I went for Captain Cold’s Cold Gun and Smash. Smash is there to deal with Overcrush (seeing as most of my characters have rather weak stats), while the gun can serve to stall an Iceman or even blank a Blob to neutralize its effect for a turn. Versatile and well worth including. And for the last card, I put in Rally, having some vain hope that I could get it to fire off somehow.

And with all of that said, on to the games!

Game 1:

My first opponent used a team of Overcrushing Immortals. I resisted using his Heimdall and stuck to my guns: T1 Coulson + Atlas, T2 Venom, etc. I got 4 points of damage in early, and before he could deal any serious damage, I managed to set up Venom, 4 sidekicks, and a Falcon, with enough energy to give each sidekick 4A (for 16 total damage, which was his exact remaining life. And thus, I won a quick game.

1-0

Game 2:

Next up, it’s sidekicks against sidekicks. My opponent ran a sidekick rush team based around Wong + Insect Plague, with plenty of ramp courtesy of SR Darkseid. She had little means to stop my unblockable rush, except for her R Blob. Problem is, he never rolled. I fielded Venom quickly, and decided to attack with him and get some early damage in, while I set up a larger sidekick rush. She eventually got a decent number of characters, but by then I had enough sidekicks, with Venom and Falcon ready to charge. A big attack later, I won.

2-0

Game 3:

My next opponent? That Deadly team from last week. FYI: Bloat-Drone is a giant pain in the neck if you’re trying to set up a sidekick rush. So I was getting my damage in when I could. No huge rush this time around, just a bit of buzzing and a bit of damage at a time. Thankfully, my team was quick, and his beefy blockers can’t stop a Falcon rush. Bit by bit, I managed to outpace him and won.

3-0

Game 4:

I finished the evening against an Attune team that was having a rough time with most of the best cheap actions already banned in our league. This made it hard for him to set up quickly. And to be fair, I was helped in this game by an insane roll where I got 4 sidekicks in one turn. That was crazy. And from there, I just needed a turn with a few masks to deal 20 damage in one turn. I won.

4-0

Post-Mortem:

-That Venom is just…busted when used with Falcon, especially with the ruling. If he’d come out at a different time, he could’ve been a competitive staple.

-I’m not sure I needed to put both Atlas and S.T.A.R. Labs in the team. However, I’m not sure what I should be doing here; the Labs are insanely useful to field sidekicks and ramp, and a T1 Atlas is generally how this team gets Venom reliably.

-I’m disappointed in Rally though; getting my bag set up properly for it was a constant headache, and I didn’t get it to work once all evening. S.T.A.R. Labs probably didn’t help.

-The matchups this evening were a bit uneven, in my favour; this was an abnormally fast team considering the state of the meta in our league. With how much stuff is banned, most teams are mid-range or slower now, so people didn’t expect a quick rush team like this one.

Overall, this team was cool, and I had a good time running it. That Venom is definitely a bit underrated. He’s in that niche of “too slow for Golden, but not legal in Modern” that plagues so many fun win conditions. If you have him, try him out sometime in a casual setting; you may be surprised.

EDIT: fixed an error I noticed recently.