PITCHBACK ASSAULT COUNTER

Guys, I think I've finally done it. I've broken Nick Fury.

I have been stress testing Fury against Venom Goblin for a good long while now, trying to find a way to win consistently. But no matter what I tried, my win rate was at a devastating 20-25% or so. I agonised. I despaired. I screamed at the sky. Why can't I make this work? I feel as if Fury should be able to win consistently, but I just can't figure it out!

So I gave up. Started exploring other heroes. But my mind would always return to Fury and I would try and make the comparison to my Black Widow Repurpose Deck and would wonder why I was able to make a ready spam deck work for Black Widow, but not Nick Fury.

It's because I was focussed on the wrong thing.

Yes, for Black Widow, spamming Repurpose is powerful. But for Nick Fury in Aggression, spamming Spoiling for a Fight, is not always the best. They share the readying up, but are ultimately otherwise very different cards, and trying to use them to achieve the same result with different heroes, is not necessarily going to generate the same level of power or success.

So then I asked myself, what else made the Black Widow deck powerful, that might be possible to try and emulate with Nick Fury . My conclusion was Widowmaker. Dealing an extra 2-3 damage a round racks up big time over the course of a game, especially in multiplayer or against longer scenarios.

I then began to really realise and appreciate just how absurdly powerful Secret Agent could be. It is a better hero ability on a card. Remember, a point of threat removal > a point of damage, generally speaking. Not even taking into consideration that the removed threat is added to the suit form upgrade which can then generate even moar value.

Put it another way. If you can trigger 2 PREPARATION cards in a round - very much achievable especially with Practiced Plan - it is basically the same as generating a 'free' thwart activation with Maria Hill. Except even better because you can split the 2 points of threat removal on 2 schemes.

What makes Secret Agent even better is that you don't need to hard mulligan for it - Fury has other higher priority cards to get into play like Fury's Flying Car and Fury's Watch. In fact, drawing Secret Agent in your opening hand might not be the best. The ideal playstyle is to set-up a bunch of PREPARATION cards and have them sit there until you play Secret Agent, and then you start firing off each of your PREPARATION cards for immense value.

So I ditched the minion collecting strategies I used to implement, threw in some more PREPARATION cards and have not lost to Expert Venom Goblin since. This list is so strong at threat removal, that I think in 5 games, I maybe played Covert Surveillance once. I pretty much never needed to use it, because between Fury's basic activations, Eyepatch Camera, and Secret Agent, I was able to maintain overall control throughout the game - although yes, there were a couple of close calls, but that's just the nature of the beast.

I think the long story short is that events can be unreliable, whereas supports and upgrades achieve greater consistency.

Because this deck runs 3 copies of Espionage, we want to resolve a Surge Encounter Card to get that sweet sweet draw power, while also taking some threat off schemes with Secret Agent.

Face the Past puts a (nasty) body on the board. However, in exchange it gives Shadow of the Past surge, if Fury resolves it, while also serving to trigger Aggressive Stance on our turn, and so is worth the inclusion for this list. Orion is much easier to deal with if you can search out an appropriate ATTACK event to dispatch him with, via Aggressive Stance.

Symbiote Suit serves a multitude of purposes here. It boosts Fury's stat line for his multiple per turn activations. It gives a health buffer to help fire back with Counterattack, which tends to see use on the second deck pass, after you have your kit set-up, and you are ending your turns in Assault. It finally increases the odds of seeing a Surge Encounter Card.

Captain America provides an extra ready, especially a ready that can be utilised in Alter-Ego form for mega healing if need be. Once set-up, you want to be in Assault so you are positioned to fire off a powerful Counterattack, and if you have EM Shield in play also, you can assess the damage you will be taking and decide whether to throw it back or negate.

Do I want to play with a third hero ability? Sign up Winter Soldier then! He also helps with threat removal and if the cards allow it, I like to equip him with Bambino to help take down bigger minions, as Fury ideally wants to use his basic activations for thwarting.

I opted for Pitchback as an additional search target for Aggressive Stance. It works very well here and now I have cards in this deck that synergise with all of the traits Fury can access in his hero kit. Because Fury's Flying Car grants the AERIAL trait until the end of the round, if you draw into Pitchback at the end of the player phase, and you have Counterattack primed, you can pull off a PITCHBACK ASSAULT COUNTER. A great way to burst down a villain as you can spend 6 threat from your suit form upgrade to boost both attacks.

All in all, there are many ways to play Fury. But to me, leaning into his hero kit, specifically Secret Agent feels like the overall best way to play him.