Burn Before Reading

In the ashes of a dying world, Red finds a letter which simply reads
-Burn Before Reading

This is the first of many letters, sent across all of space and time between the two protagonists in my all time favorite book: "This is how you lose the time war". Red and Blue are time travelling assassins from opposing factions waging this eternal conflict. They are the best that each side has to offer. What starts as mere curiosity grows in passion with each letter sent.

"Your letters — your last letter. Be certain that I won't drop it where any of your fellows can read it. It's mine. I am careful with what belongs to me."

I saw a parallel here with Natasha and Bucky. Two highly trained assassins, programmed for great power conflict, forbidden romance. Winter Soldier is Red; a cold cyborg built for destruction. Black Widow is Blue; a perfected biological weapon, carefully sowing seeds for the future.

Blue was the first to take initiative. Black Widow will do the same here with an opening letter of her own: Dynamic Duo. If you have at least 4 preparations in play, Winter Soldier will be free to play. Even with a 5 card hand and no double or resource generator, you have just enough resources to play Dynamic Duo, Bucky, and the team up Winter, Widow, Soldier, Spy in one turn. Quincarrier and Martial Prowess will free up a card or 2 in your hand, letting you play another preparation or a cheap ally.

You always want at least 4 preparations out, but with Practiced Plan, Safe House #29, and Winter, Widow, Soldier, Spy, you can still use them pretty liberally. I like using the team-up to replay Grappling Hook, since its a 2 cost upgrade but you can get it back for free.

"I'll be all the poets, I'll kill them all and take each one's place in turn, and every time love's written in all the strands it will be to you."

This is a classic Black Widow minion slaying deck at its core. This strategy revolves around triggering Lie in Wait and Widow's Bite when a minion engages to take them out right away. The ping damage from widowmaker can also be used to finish them off.

We have the all star cast of Angela, Spider-Girl, and Throg. I don't think much needs to be said here, this is the crew you want when you are messing around with minions. Target Spotter prevents Quickstrike, and lets us engage minions from other players in multiplayer. Hall of Heroes and Shakedown reward us for slaying minions.

"This is how we win."

Speaking of Shakedown, exactly defeating minions is a simple task for this deck. Not only can widowmaker be used to ping 1 or 2 extra damage whenever needed, we also have a number of attack events that deal different amounts of damage. Case in point, Dance of Death can deal 1, 2, or 3 damage in any order, and you can combine them onto the same minion if you want. This means it can deal any number between 1 to 6 to the minion of your choice.

Despite there only being a single copy, Aggressive Stance is a key card here. This can grab Dance of Death, Winter, Widow, Soldier, Spy or one of the 2 one of's: One by One and Piercing Strike. Having one copy of these 2 cards that can be tutored with our preparation adds extra versatility to the deck.

Keep Up the Pressure is used for a game ending finisher by grabbing Dance of Death. Each of the 3 attacks on this card gets +1 damage from the side scheme, which bumps it up to 2 + 3 + 4 = 9 damage total. This can further be increased with Aggressive Energy: 12 damage or 15 damage if combining both resources. These cards also work well when combined with One by One for the same reason.

"Flowers grow far away on a planet they'll call Cephalus, and these flowers bloom once a century, when the living star and its black-hole binary enter conjunction. I want to fix you a bouquet of them, gathered across eight hundred thousand years, so you can draw our whole engagement in a single breath, all the ages we've shaped together"

I was never a big fan of Aggression Black Widow, but you can now call me a believer. She's clearly well suited for Dynamic Duo, and I think aggression is where she can really make best use of that team-up. Plus she loves using Shakedown.

In solo, you can drop Target Spotter, and you can go up to 2 Aggressive Stances (but I didn't find it necessary).