Peter Peter Villain Defeater (4-Pack Challenge)

Peter Peter Villain Defeater (4-Pack Challenge): In today's episode, Peter Porker and Peter Parker team up to take on Klaw, Rhino (with M.O.D.O.K.!), and Magneto!! They'll battle each one until they've defeated every villain in standard and expert!

Note on 4-Pack Challenge: This series of decks was inspired by The Masked Hero's video series of New Player Guides for the various allies, which can be found here: New Hero Guides

Results: Only one loss against expert Magneto, which was then followed by a victory, so that's 1 loss and 6 victories altogether against their foes.

Example Turn 1 against Magneto: Admittedly, the stars aligned on this turn: Played Nick Fury, drawing 3 cards, one of which was Spider-Ham's Petulant Pig, which I then played, taking some damage and drawing 3 more cards, one of which was the other Petulant Pig and played that one as well. That was 9 cards altogether on turn one, two of which included Peter Parker Spider-Man and Captain Americat. Between each of these allies and other cards, Magneto already had Physical Strain on him (on turn 1!). We then played Swinging Web Pig, so we also dealt him 6 damage and had him Confused.

Replacement note if one does not have the Next Evolution expansion (having only the Core Set plus each of the 3 Web Warrior expansions): The purpose in using Next Evolution is to access the very powerful Player Side Schemes; however, if one does not have this expansion, that would only remove the 3 Player Side Schemes from the deck. These might be replaced by Mockingbird (to Stun an enemy), another copy of Get Ready, and either Hawkeye or Plan B, and the deck should still be quite effective.

NOTABLE ELEMENTS OF PLAY:

Clarity of Purpose is the ultimate resource generator for Spider-Ham: Because Spider-Ham's hero ability, Spider-Nonsense gives him a Toon counter every time he takes damage, every use of Clarity of Purpose gives him a Toon counter to use as a wild resource to play a future card.

Primary targets for Make the Call: Nick Fury (for the card draw), Spider-Man Peter Parker (for the readying of other Web Warriors), and then Ghost-Spider to grab one of Spider-Ham's events, often (Swinging Web Pig to deal damage and confuse the villain, but "I Don't Think So!", and Petulant Pig can be viable strategic choices as well.

Primary targets for First Aid: Spider-Man Peter Parker is a great target for First Aid to give him two additional activations to ready other Web Warriors. In a pinch, First Aid can heal Spider-Ham, hopefully using Clarity of Purpose to do so, which causes a net gain of one hit point while simultaneously adding another a toon counter to Spider-Ham.

Important Note regarding the "faux" resource generators: Team-Building Exercise and Helicarrier act similarly to actual resource generators; however, since they, in fact, do not generator a resource, one cannot use them to put allies into play when using Make the Call. Spider-Ham's hero ability Spider-Nonsense as well as Clarity of Purpose serve that, well, purpose. They are effective, though, in reducing the cost of cards in hand and are still very helpful improving the economy of the deck and make great targets for Build Support. They can also help Spider-Ham preserve some of his toon counters for when needed with specific cards or to play additional cards on the turns when he has drawn a large number of cards.

Notes on Strategy:

When playing against your "average" villain, Spider-Ham can utilize Swinging Web Pig throughout the game to damage and confuse the villain, allowing one to set up his kit throughout the game while maintaining control of the board and dealing regular damage to the villain with the allies, Swinging Web Kick, and, eventually, Spider-Ham once he has Huge Wooden Hammer in play.

When facing a challenging villain such as Magneto, the focus is solely on maintaining control of the board while building out Spider-Ham's supports and upgrades. Once that's done, he can take advantage of the card draw from Nick Fury as well as the Web Warrior allies leaving the board (due to Web of Life and Destiny). He'll be re-readying Spider-Ham with the Peter Parker Spider-Man ally and Organic Webbing to help with board control and villain damage and continually bombard the villain with Swinging Web Pig. Meanwhile, the card draw also gives regular access to Cartoon Physics to limit damage and consistently generator more Toon counters, allowing his allies to have more activations.

Conclusion: Despite the restriction to 4 packs, this is a very strong deck due to the plentiful card draw from his own Ham It Up cards, Nick Fury, and the Web of Life and Destiny (along with a plentitude of Web Warrior allies). His "big" attack may only deal 6 damage, but it helps one to flip regularly to Alter-Ego, and he can more than make up for it with damage from allies and his own 4-damage attacks once he has Huge Wooden Hammer in play, especially since he rarely lacks for resources due to his Toon Counters, especially once Clarity of Purpose is in play. He has a lot of fun interactions between cards and is powerful pig to boot. :-)