Paging Dr. Danvers (Captain Marvel Leadership, Med Lab)

"Nick! Sharon's in a coma in the ICU. Who are you paging??"

On the occasion of Rogue's release, I thought it would be fun to revisit Captain Marvel given the two characters' complicated history. I was also looking for a platform to play with Med Lab. Lucky for me, if you want to make an aspect card look good, just play it in a Captain Marvel deck. But let me sell you on why this deck works and why this is an especially fun platform for Med Lab.

tl;dr: Abuse AE for card draw; frequency of AE makes Med Lab easy to use; Med Lab keeps high value allies (White Tiger, Spider-Woman) in rotation at a discount to Make the Call and without needing to be in hero mode like Rapid Response.

To get there, we need to lift up the hood and take a close look at the engine.

Go, go, go: Agent 13, Command Teams, and Alpha Flight Station

Fun fact: Alpha Flight Station is SHIELD traited. (This is known, but maybe not as widely as it should be!) So every time Agent 13 thwarts (or attacks, if you MUST), she readies Alpha Flight Station. In AE, this is about as fast as deck acceleration gets, especially when you Command Team to ready her a few times. So spending time in AE is even more valuable than the free card draw from Carol Danvers' Commander ability might suggest. This is important because spending time in AE is how we'll get value from Med Lab.

Stay alive: Spider-Woman

Jessica Drew helps us spend more time in AE greedily drawing through our decks like power hungry card goblins. She lands her confuse and suddenly with Med Lab, her 2 health is an asset, not a liability. She's two quick activations away from some restorative intravenous fluids. (If you want get really greedy, you can add Professor X but I haven't found any more confuse that necessary.) Your high thwart allies and the occasional confuse from Spider-Woman are plenty to keep you building your board state from the safety of AE.

Bling for days: Beast, White Tiger, Nick Fury, and economy Supports

This deck has pricy allies in all directions. Carol's inherent draw is supplemented by her Energy Absorption triple resource, Beast fetching it, and draw allies, to make it all work. Quincarrier, Helicarrier, and Avengers Mansion are all relatively easy plays to continue to build your board state. Med Lab itself is an economy card. We have Make the Call to recur allies from discard, but what Med Lab makes those allies cheaper to play as we don't need them in hand. Even if you don't need the "from your hand" effects, Med Lab creates value. But White Tiger makes full use of Med Lab and keeps you drawing. And spamming Beast is especially helpful to get a couple allies down to power up your Band Together.

Why 3x Band Together and not the other doubles you might ask?

Seal the deal: Energy Channel, Vision, Dum Dum Dugan

As you gobble cards cookie monster-style (nom nom nom) with Alpha Flight Station, you might be asking, but why? How do I win?

Three ways: 1. Energy Channel, 2. Big allies, 3. Photonic Blast as icing. Every time you find yourself with Energy odds and ends, dump them into Energy Channel for later. It's your savings account. Find yourself with a full Energy Channel and another in hand? Pop up to dump your savings in the form of 10 damage and play your second. Vision, Dum Dum Dugan dropping late game with 2-3 Command Teams is also extremely valuable to help close games. I've done 35 damage in a round. And this is why we're using Band Together instead of the doubles - when you want to drop two Energy Channel bombs in a round, you want the energy resources, and Carol's card draw and filtered draw with Alpha Flight Station makes up for Band Together whiffs in the first couple turns.

Until next time ...

The deck's 41 cards - you cut one. :)