Spider-Woman - where the ocean kisses Ireland (EXPERT)

I've now taken this deck through a bunch of villains on expert and it has beaten them all first time. Zola was close, and I needed to make a few tweaks to the original deck to get through Mutagen Formula, which I started with, but then this deck has succeeded against everything I've put it against:

• Expert Mutagen Formula with Goblin Gimmicks
• Expert Klaw with Masters of Evil
• Expert Crossbones (finished during Scheme 2b)
• Expert Absorbing Man (finished with 6 delay tokens)
• Expert Zola

Please note that this has been built for use on OCTGN, which at the time does not have the Scarlet Witch or Galaxy's Most Wanted.

The original idea behind this deck was to get the most out of Spider-Woman's ability to power herself up with multiple aspect cards, then defend, thwart and attack multiple times with Self Propelled Glide. However, in playing I find that it's more that the red cards allow you to add that extra layer of damage to a protection active defending deck.

Yes, Self-Propelled Glide is awesome when you can trigger it and get to attack or thwart again, but the real advantage I've found with her is building yourself up to a 4 or 5 defence (2-3 aspect cards played plus armoured vest) and defending against an attack, readying with Indomitable and drawing a card with Unflappable.

The Desperate Defenses are good early game, but by late game you tend to have enough set up not to need them. Further, if it's the only green card you're playing, you only get the bonus to your stats for the villain phase. In contrast, Indomitable is really good in this deck as it's a cheap green card you can play with an economy card, like Finesse and get yourself set up nicely for the villain phase whilst giving you an aspect-card-played bonus to use.

The cost curve for most of the cards is very low, ideally allowing a typical hand to play out at least 2 aspect cards and a Self-Propelled Glide to ready. Her defensive kit is based around defending then readying. If she's got a two 1-cost cards for different aspects and a self propelled glide in hand she only needs one additional resource to be able to perform 2 basic actions in the turn. With more resource generation out in play (like Finesse, Martial Prowess and Unflappable she can do even more.

You need a quantity of low-cost replayable cards of various colours to get the most out of her Superhuman Agility ability. Normally I might prefer to play a deck with a higher number of permanent upgrades and supports, but I don't think her aspect events, outside of Pheromones, are strong enough that you want to focus on them alone (and even that you tend not to want 2 turns in a row). Press the Advantage synergises really will with Pheromones, further driving the deck's draw engine. Relentless Assault provides some much needed minion control, often providing better value than Venom Blast, which is itself better saved for later in the game when you're going after the villain directly.

The deck has a high proportion of resources, which are designed to get the most out of Wasp and allow Hulk to be used for minion swarm control, such as against Ultron. Clea has proved underwhelming in this deck - you tend to want to actively block yourself, so chump ally blockers aren't as necessary - she'd be the first card I'd cut. I also think that Bug replaces Spider-Girl when OCTGN gets updated, or when I can be bothered to get my physical cards out of the box.

The deck's biggest weakness is managing the scheme. It's for this reason I've not been brave enough to try it against Red Skull yet. I think Hard to Ignore is the card the deck misses most, but Bait and Switch has to be in contention, too. Hard to ignore really synergises nicely with the deck's desire to defend and not take any damage from the attack. My plan is to include try 2 of each (cutting Clea, as mentioned above, and the desperate defences) then see which work and whether 2 is enough, and try to find the balance point between the three cards. Inconspicuous is an amazing card when it comes up, but even when you've honed your deck down, there's just too many events in this style of deck for a 2-of to come up reliably.

Finally, A note on the deck name: it is a lyric from The Red and Green of Mayo by the Saw Doctors. The red and green reference is hopefully obvious. Mayo is the county in Ireland where my dad was born.