Adam Warlock Leading His Mystical Guardians

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Derived from
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Direksone · 1

Welcome to my first deck guide! Ever since I played The Mad Titan's Shadow campaign years ago when it came out I fell in love with Adam Warlock. I love the deckbuilding options (and challenges) he brings and his kit is very versatile to handle many things. The range of options you have and how to order your actions each turn once you are setup are very fun! He also is quite excellent as a true solo hero, which is where I have been honing this deck! Thus far he has beaten The Mad Titan's Shadow campaign on Expert, Mutagen Goblin and Expert Kang with relative ease. I expect this deck should have no problem (well no more than any other Hero) with villains like Rhonin and Venom Goblin. Welcome to the Mystical Guardians!

Mulligan Priorities:

Now for a deep dive into the decisions that I made for this deck. The name probably already caught your eye. I wanted to go for a thematic deck where I bring Mystic and Guardian allies together as those are Adam Warlock's traits. Now to get another obvious thing out of the way: 43 cards. Once you are setup your deck is quite small and because of your base kit with Cosmic Awareness & Karmic Blast you will cycle like crazy anyway. You can totally afford a bigger deck with Adam Warlock due to this and with the deck building restriction your deck isn't very consistent anyways, but you always have tools to deal with the things at hand. I just landed on 43 because of Knowhere (increase my Ally limit), Superpower Training (to get Mystic Senses asap) and Gamora (I wanted another ally).

Basic Cards

  • Superpower Training is an insane card as we all know and it's not different for Adam Warlock. Mystic Senses we want out ASAP, but otherwise you still have Soul World, Karmic Staff and Warlock's Cape. These are all cards we want out quickly (especially the staff out of these 3).

  • Team-Building Exercise is the crux of the deck and why I brought the Mystical Guardians (trademark pending) together. Our deck is also full of expensive allies and we don't have a lot of resources or resource generators outside of our staff to get them out easily outside of Summoning Spell. A lot of Adam Warlock decks kinda go all-in on Summoning Spell, which I think is a bit of a trap. Adam does not have amazing resource generation (non-existent outside of his staff) and has to spend his cards to get cards out. I thought we could combat this weakness with Team-Building Exercise, which led me towards both Mystic and Guardian allies. The card is not super crucial, though, and your base kit is more important to setup, but it's nice nonetheless.

  • Knowhere is mostly here to increase our Ally limit. We can keep them alive with our Battle Mage ability and are blocking a lot of the damage ourselves, so the extra slot is very useful. I noticed I often did not have room for another ally to play and discarding one that was in play felt like bad value. The draw is also nice (though we do have plenty without). Is The Triskelion better? Probably, but it is a S.H.I.E.L.D. card and we're not about that with this deck. We are the Mystical Guardians (trademark pending)!

Honorable mention:

  • Spiritual Meditation is not currently in the deck, but I will give it a try again. I had it in my original Adam Warlock way back. It's a decent card that can help us get our crucial cards out more quickly. Adding more basic cards does of course make your Cosmic Awareness and Karmic Blast slightly less consistent.

Allies

Let's be honest: Summoning Spell is one of the main reasons you play Adam Warlock. It's an incredibly powerful spell that lets you get out expensive allies for just 2 resources. Because of this you will want to play 3-4 cost allies to get the most bang for your buck. Why did I take these allies?

Well, to be honest: we don't have that much choice. A lot of solid Guardian allies are Basic, like Rocket Raccoon and Groot and we don't want too many Basic cards in deck as I mentioned above. You can always add them of course! It will make Knowhere more consistent at least. There are also not very many Mystic choices either. Regardless, I also think it is very fun to play with some allies you might not normally choose for your deck as they are not S-tier allies per se! That has been one of the enjoyments for me in this deck: to discover allies like Martyr and Jack Flag!

  • Brother Voodoo is a Mystic and draws you an event. The deck is stacked with Events and almost never misses.
  • Gamora functions similarly as Brother Voodoo. She draws you a card while cycling through your deck. There's so many events that is rarely happens you discard a lot, but if it does it's not the end of the world as we can fuel Soul World faster or grab things from the discard pile using Quantum Magic. I wanted another Guardian Ally to make Knowhere just a little bit more consistent and her ability is nice. She can definitely be cut if you want to trim the deck.
  • Jack Flag is here mostly because he one of few 4 cost Justice Guardian/Mystic allies. His 2 thwart is quite nice since Adam isn't the best at keeping threat under control outside of Cosmic Awareness and his other ability can come in handy from time to time. He isn't amazing, so you can definitely swap him out for someone like Wraith (who can be solid depending on the scenario). Venom is also an option and someone I haven't tried myself as the main scheme does typically have threat on it due to Adam Warlock not having amazing thwart capabilities. His 3 attack is very nice regardless and he should definitely be considered! I am going to try him out!
  • Kaluu. Yes I know he is a 2 cost. "What about Summoning Spell?". Play around it, there are only 2 2-cost allies in the deck. He's a Mystic and draws you a card (just like Brother Voodoo). It's always good to have a cheap ally to play when you need one. With Team-Building Exercise he is essentially free. If you really don't want him in the deck check out some options I laid out below where I discuss the Leadership package of this deck.
  • Magik: Mystic and has a response. She's solid.
  • Martyr has been proving fun. You can tee up kills for her using Battle Mage, Basic Attacks or one of your spells and she can then block for you using the Tough status. Charlie-27 can be an option as well instead if you want or need a meaty blocker.
  • Quasar is a solid Guardian ally. In certain scenarios his value is amazing. Just like Jack Flag you could replace him with Wraith if you think you need it for a certain scenario or Venom.
  • Yondu is the secret MVP of this deck. Load him up with the Energy Spear and watch him deal amazing amounts of damage throughout a game. He also fulfills the important role of a fatherfigure, which is not to be underestimated.

Honorable mentions:

  • Bug I tried him out, since he is also a solid choice for the Energy Spear, however I found myself barely using my Basic Attacks, thus he ended up just being a cheap blocker. Which is fine, but I did want to make Summoning Spell a bit more consistent as well (in terms of value), so I cut him.
  • Eros was in the early build, but I too cut him to make Summoning Spell more consistent and I had way too many allies (11 or so) and just didn't have the room to play them all. His ability is fine, the thwart was nice, but ultimately he was just a chump.
  • Clea another cheap ally and Mystic. Was also cut for the same reasons described above. I thought I needed cheap blockers, but as it turned out: not really.
  • Starhawk is an incredible card, but just like the above allies I did not feel he had a place.
  • Moondragon I have not played with myself but I could see specific scenarios or Villains where she is solid.

Aggression Package

  • Clobber I have come to love in this deck. You can use it first on your turn and then Battle Mage for 5 damage, which when you are setup also draws you 2 cards and you only had to spend 1 other card to use it as it came back to your hand.
  • Magic Attack is a great damage Event that works well in Adam's kit.
  • Aggressive Energy is something I have been trying out and might get cut over time. I could not find an Event that I really liked myself that fulfilled a certain niche: a specific tool for in my toolbox (as is the nature of an Adam Warlock deck). Having a or something to fuel your Battle Mage ability is decent enough. It also increases the damage of your Karmic Blast, Magic Attack and Clobber, which on occassion can make a difference.
  • Energy Spear is amazing and thematic. Throw this on Yondu for the best value. It's quite nice on Martyr as well! On any Guardian ally it will find decent value since we can Battle Mage our Protection cards to keep our allies around.

Justice Package

  • Under Surveillance is a great card. Adam does not have any ways to confuse the villain, so this gives us some breathing room so we can flip down and use Soul World when we need to.
  • "Think Fast!". As I said: we don't have any ways to confuse, this gives us the option to when we need to so we can flip down without having to worry. Especially if we have Cosmic Ward out.
  • One Way or Another. Insane card, generates a lot of tempo. Almost every Villain has at least a Side Scheme that is no issue to reveal, but even problematic ones you can deal with quickly if you have an Ally out or with your Battle Mage ability. Worst case scenario: it fuels Battle Mage.

Honorable mentions:

  • Zone of Silence is a solid card that can help with threat removal. If you think you need it you can slot it in, but I would find it hard to take any of the other cards out. Against a Stalwart or Steady villain you could take out "Think Fast!".
  • Clear the Area was in here intially for some draw, but that proved inconsistent and I rather had something else personally.

Leadership Package

  • Summoning Spell because duh. What a card!
  • "Welcome Aboard" is a fantastic way to get our expensive allies as well!
  • Band Together is something I have been trying out. I do not find that 'The Power Of' resource cards have much of a place in this deck. They are too inconsistent and just end up being used for Battle Mage or a . However, we often will have 2 allies out (making it basically as good as a double/power of resource card) and 3 or 4 allies are not rare either, which is great value! This helps with playing other allies.

Honorable mentions: You can try some other cards instead of Band Together or Kaluu (the other cards are a given in my opinion):

  • The Triskelion is probably a great choice (and then you can cut Knowhere as well).
  • I also had Make the Call in the deck for a while, but with this amount of allies and Quantum Magic we will have them out most of the time or can fish for one anyway.
  • I had also been looking at Comms Implant and Laser Blaster for thematic upgrades to throw on our Guardians. I felt the latter would prove lackluster compared to Energy Spear. Most allies don't have amazing attack to have the Overkill be meaningful and the former not super neccesary due to Battle Mage (rendering the extra hp moot) I don't see the 1 extra thwart making a difference either.

Protection Package

Thanks for reading all this! I hope the explanations for my choices make sense to you. If you have any cards you feel are must includes in an Adam Warlock deck, please let me know!

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