Falcon's Champions Flight School

At a Glance

Player Counts: 1-4

Play style: Quickly Scaling Control Game.

Strengths: Good Economy, lots of options once developed, potent combo plays paired with lots of flexibility.

Weaknesses: Low Burst damage options in the extremely early game.

Taking Under the Wing

Sam and Bucky are here now, bringing Cycle 9 to a close. Lots of interesting ideas this wave, but in terms of hero kits, Falcon's is the one I've been most excited for. Props to the designers for once again making a character who just flies feel interesting! This deck is only a few clicks different from the Falcon precon, but I think it shows off at least a couple cool interactions that haven't been mentioned that much online.

Something my normal group had said a lot during reveal season about Falcon is "every one of his cards is a hook". And now that we've seen everything he has to offer, I'm still confident that's true. To emphasize this, we're focusing on his resource generator.

Usually a very straightforward part of a heroes kit, with notable exceptions like Nova and Quicksilver, there's usually not a lot to get excited about with these cards. Falcons Flock is very different though.

One it is searchable with his AE ability, meaning it can be a guaranteed part of your strategy from turn 1. It also doesn't exhaust to spend a resource, and since it shares the aerial trait with Falcon, it turns on Organizational Support from turn 1. This means that after EGS and PoF as well, Falcon is super wealthy with 9 copies of very generic double resources.

Flock also gives us the Champions hook in this equation, in that it also generates an energy resource for Falcon's mantle ally Joaquin. This will let us compound readies on Joaquin onto Cloud 9, really pumping up the THW stats across our entire board. Between that, and the newly printed Wingman keeping Joaquin healthy, it's a very potent setup to consistently burst threat.

Forming the Flock

Into the card by card, we'll start with our obvious allies. It's still really cool Falcon has some direct synergy with his sometimes sidekick outside of just the aerial trait. We want to keep Joaquin healthy by playing wingman on other allies. Readying him with the new Flight Squadron or Falcon's Talon will let us ready him, and then double dip those readies with just a charge of Falcon's Flock. His main targets are Cloud 9 for the blanket THW buff to our board, and Aerial Form Snowgaurd who starts with the superb 3-THW headstart to really drive home our big clears. She'll be our second target for Wing Man lifts.

At the edges of our echelon formation, we have Vivian as well as Hugin & Munin. Both are really potent allies in their own right with lots of flexibility and are good cheap Wing Man holders. Vivian can also be valuable as an ally that can clear itself the turn it's played, your board can get surprisingly gummy, so having something that can still bring the value in her effect+Squadron+potentially buffed Thwart is really valuable. Cannon Ball is also here for a good ready when the Wingman's just aren't sticking or lining up, can fill a similar niche to Vivian like we mentioned earlier if really necessary.

Beyond that, everything should be straightforward. Wingman has already been mentioned, don't be afraid to play this on any of your allies. The above is definitely the ideal scenario, but the deck is flexible enough to operate in a different order, and we're keeping it at 3x for good consistency. Even Cloud 9 getting one to lift consequential of Falcon just for her to ready after the activation is solid.

Flight Squadron is always online once it's in play(even in AE!) and we have several great targets for it. Triskelion is also appearing as this deck really goes wide, we might want the space before we draw Squadron, and even after both are down we can still setup to a huge self sustaining board of Wingman.

Both of these are valuable targets for build support, especially with our lofty thwart capabilities. It's gonna take Quinn and Helicarrier with it. Probably the biggest flex spots in the deck weirdly, but our economy is already outstanding. But Heli will always feel good for late BS pulls and Quinn is valuable for specific resources we want.

Speaking of, we are playing the new Captain America card. While we are scaling to crazy thwart values we'd actually appreciate a consistent damage outlet we can tap into, especially with how rich we get. Quinncarrier also can get us the needed fist since it's not the most common resource for us. Also, just doubling down on Falcons already great defensive abilities is nice, and can really help him do impressive defensive work for himself or a team.

Soaring Acrobatics, great efficiency fixing and good long term value, nuff said.

Already spoke on Org Support, but it is nice to still give us outlets for allies we want to preserve until they get a Wingman, and flexible resources are really nice to pivot between value and Tempo plays depending on what's needed.

Power of Flight might not seem too interesting, but I did want to talk about how I feel Falcon can use it compared to his obvious Hero comparison, Angel. For one I think Falcon has way more things he's happy to spend them on. Considering how greedy Angel is to run through Aerial events, he doesn't have as much motivation to play heavier aerial allies in the turn by turn like Falcon is really comfortable with. Flock also just makes it more efficient in other ways, often preventing resources from being floated that sometimes a PoF could leave you with when you start your turn dumping it. It also is a great resource filter for lower cost cards. PoF into Flock means the resources for PoF can be converted into resources for one 1-cost aerial cards or abilities like Joaquin, without losing value. Which is a very subtle, but in my opinion, meaningful distinction on how Falcon can pull utility from it. Angel can't spend PoF on two different aerial cards, but a PoF paying for flock lets you spread the love.

Graduating with Highest Honors

And that's the deck. It's honestly pretty simple to see the game plan, while still giving you room for creativity in your actual game. The deck, and honestly just Falcon in general, is very competent and resilient. I had a game in testing where both Joaquin and Snowgaurd were Beguiled and the bounce back was very seamless.

My favorite thing is this deck hardly touches all of the unique things Falcon can do. We aren't doing anything with scrying/encounter reads, Practiced Plan, Shield, Avenger, broad defending, or all the other hooks he just comes with. I hope you try this deck, but really do try out any deck that comes up that has a new strategy that excites you. The amount of strategies you can try with him is only going up. Happy gaming!