Psylocke Ninja

Whenever we get new skill cards, I always want to test them out with Psylocke. In FNE, they graced us with 3 of them, and they are all pretty interesting! Time to put Betsy's training as a Hand ninja to the test in the streets of Hell's Kitchen!

This is a skill focused deck, with 9 cards that can be pulled with Training Regimen. I recommend trying to flip down to alter ego often to make use of this card without having to discard a card after. There's 3 reasons to want to focus on skill cards with Training Regimen:

1. It lets you find those cards, when you want them, consistently.

2. Drawing into it essentially reduces their effective resource cost by 1

3. it can act as a pseudo resource generator, if you choose to discard the card that you draw.

Ninja Stealth

The core of this deck revolves around Stealth Training. This adds stuns to our repertoire. Along with all of the confuse found naturally in her kit, Psylocke can now keep the villain completely locked down. This card needs 2 things to work: flexible thwarting, and a steady supply of schemes to clear.

Ninja Dexterity:

Stealth Training requires exactly clearing schemes, meaning you need to get it down to 0 threat without going over. This precision is where Psylocke excels! She has some of the most flexible threat removal in the whole game. Her basic thwart can be adjusted by flipping her Psi-Weapons (1 THW, 2 THW, or 3 THW), or with Heroic Intuition (2 THW, 3 THW, or 4 THW). And her thwart event, Mental Detection is also flexible - removing 1, 3, or 5 threat.

The second new skill card, Move in Shadow also helps here, by removing 1 threat every time you play a card. Exactly clearing schemes couldn't be easier! It's just too bad she doesn't get the discount. I mean, ninjas are both martial artists and spies, but she doesn't get either trait??? Make it make sense! But with all of the cheap 0 and 1 cost upgrades, and card cycling from Mental Detection, you can get up to 6 or so threat removal off of this card fairly easily, which ain't too shabby!

Ninja Planning

All this precise thwarting is great and all, but we need some schemes to make it work. Build Support and Lay the Trap are classics, you know em, you love em. All 3 of the supports in this deck are really helpful to get in play so that you can start making big plays. Going Undercover is one that I think is pretty underrated, I really like it. First off, it fits our stealth ninja theme perfectly, but it also does a great job at controlling the villain for a whole turn, even in multiplayer. Looking at the top 5 encounter cards and essentially putting them wherever you want has a huge impact. And the fact that it doesn't scale in threat based on the number of players makes it perfect for a deck like this in higher player counts. Since you'll stun the villain off of Stealth Training, (and you'll probably have them confused too) you'll be able to determine not only the boost cards but also dealt encounter cards even at 4 players. Choosing who gets what encounter card is the most powerful part of this effect. Deal out side schemes that you will want to clear later. Deal minions to the player who is looking to defeat them. Deal treacheries to players who are the least harmed by them.

There are 3 other cards here to get more side schemes. First is the classic One Way or Another. I've only included one, but you can scale it up or down based on player count (remove at 3-4) or number of schemes in the villain deck. Sentry is one of my favorite newer allies, he can either bring out a scheme, or add 6 threat to the main scheme. Neither of those effects really bother us much, and then he can just sit there dealing big damage every turn. Manifold is probably best used late game to go find Lay the Trap for the finisher.

With all these side schemes in play, we can take advantage of upgrades cards that attach to them. I've included 2 copies each of Chance Encounter, Followed, and Overwatch. These cards are reliable with the amount of schemes in play, cheap (which helps fuel Move in Shadow) and work with the final new skill card, Contingency Planning.

Truthfully, this card isn't crucial to this deck. You'll probably end up tucking a single card to it, and MAYBE play that card by the end of the game. Despite that, its worth keeping in the deck. It's low impact, but also low investment. At the very least, you can draw it with Training Regimen and it can block Caught Off Guard. At most, it can help enable a big turn.

Of these tuckable cards, Overwatch is generally the best one. It's a really cheap way to throw out an additional 4 or 5 threat removal with either her basic or Mental Detection. Any of the allies could be worth grabbing with Chance Encounter, but Angel is usually the best choice. That extra ready is just so strong.

With the 3 supports and X-Gene in play, you can really cycle through and play a lot of cards with this deck. I almost always play Mental Detection with 2 Katanas out for the extra draw. You can fund this with X-Gene and one of the Psi Weapons. The best use of this card is to convert resource generators into card draw, which is usually preferable. With Move in Shadow in play, this now removes 2 threat instead of 1. With 3 copies in the deck, chaining Mental Detection card draws is how you can end up removing over 6 threat from Move in Shadow.

In higher player counts, swap out One Way or Another and Under Surveillance for more copies of Skilled Investigator.

I had so much fun taking this deck through FNE and beyond, it fits that street level stealthy ninja vibe perfectly. It's not groundbreaking, but this is my new favorite Psylocke deck...I can't put it down!