[{"text":"After a solid performance at the Ohio tournament (https:\/\/www.dcdeckbuilding.com\/article.php?id=10885) last month, Darkseid saw a surge in his rankings on the Main Character leaderboard (https:\/\/www.dcdeckbuilding.com\/chars\/).&nbsp; This led many players to give the combination of Darkseid + Deathstroke a try, and more often than not left them fighting for third place, and chalking up the excellent tournament results to random luck with a bad team. Although we discussed Darkseid one year ago(https:\/\/www.dcdeckbuilding.com\/article.php?id=10827) we wanted to give a refresher on him, as well as touch on some things that have changed between then and now that might help turn those losses into wins."},{"header":"darkseid (tier 4) + Deathstroke (tier 2)"},{"double":[{"src":"dar510569darkseid.jpg"},{"src":"dea698591deathstr.jpg"}]},{"text":"First things first, let's discuss what this team composition is trying to do. With this team composition, you want to buy cheap cards, then use Darkseid's ability to trade them for more expensive cards so that you can end the game quickly. Let's go over some character specifics. Darkseid has an amazing ability of &#34;once during each of your turns, you may destroy a card with cost 1 or greater in your hand or discard pile. If you do +2 power and draw a card.&#34;&nbsp; Then along comes Deathstroke who is all to happy to offer you another +1 power for destroying that card.&nbsp; Together, this combination can lead to some surprising early power, often as early as turn two. Suppose your opening hand consists of 4 Punches and a Vuln, and the starting lineup is all 5+ cost cards (bummer!!!), so you spend your first turn buying a Kick (as does the rest of the table most likely).&nbsp; During your next turn you'll have a hand of 3 Punches and 2 Vulns, and can perform the following set of actions:"},{"list":[{"listType":"bullet"},{"caption":"Play 3 Punches for 3 Power"},{"caption":"Use Darkseid's ability, destroying the Kick you bought last turn, and netting +2 Power and drawing a card"},{"caption":"Darkseid's destruction triggers Deathstroke, scoring us another +1 Power"}]},{"text":"Before considering the card we drew with Darkseid, we're currently sitting at 6 power (3 from Punches, 2 from Darkseid and 1 from Deathstroke).&nbsp; We then have an 80% chance of drawing another Punch, which would yield 7 power. Given that the lineup was all 5+ cost cards, there's most likely an expensive card we can buy that will help setup our game plan moving forward.&nbsp; Note that since its only turn two, we most likely have the first shot at an expensive card in the lineup; probably only Killer Frost or a teamwork comps has equal chances of hitting 6 power reliably on turn 2. For clarity, the range of power you can achieve on turn two falls into a few categories, depending on your turn one opening hand.&nbsp; Here's how much power you end up with on turn two based on the following turn one starting hands:"},{"list":[{"listType":"bullet"},{"caption":"A.) T1: 2 Punch, 3 Vulns => Pass. T2 = 5 Punch = 5 Power"},{"caption":"B.) T1: 5 Punch => Buy Kick. T2 = 2 Punch + Destroy Kick + Draw = 6 Power"},{"caption":"C.) T1: 4 Punch, 1 Vulns => Buy Kick. T2 = 3 Punch + Destroy Kick + Draw = 6 or 7 Power"},{"caption":"D.) T1: 3 Punch, 2 Vulns => Buy Kick. T2 = 4 Punch + Destroy Kick + Draw = 7 or 8 Power"}]},{"text":"So, worst case scenario, we always have at least five power on turn 2, we'll most likely have six power, and then occasionally have seven or eight.&nbsp; With this in mind, we should be keen to watch for opportunities to pick up high impact expensive cards early so that we compensate for having destroyed a valuable card in our deck."},{"header":"Two cost cards"},{"text":"Two-cost cards are your best friends with this build. When you buy them, you can immediately destroy them for +3 power and draw a card. Two power was spent on the card so you\u2019ve actually gained 1 power in buying a card from the lineup!&nbsp; We call this 'ramping' because you spend two power to buy a card, then destroy it for 3 power and draw a card; it 'ramped' you into something more expensive that you maybe couldn't otherwise buy! "},{"double":[{"src":"bat2827batarang.jpg"},{"src":"vib126635vibe.jpg"}]},{"header":"USING DARKSEID EFFECTIVELY"},{"text":"The most important thing I can stress when playing this composition is that you probably should not be using Darkseid's ability every turn. It is perfectly acceptable to &#34;bank&#34; cheap cards for later use. The most common mistake I see is of people using Darkseid\u2019s ability only on the turn they buy a card and never think about saving the cards to destroy on a later turn.&nbsp; This costs them a VP which they never end up recouping.&nbsp; This both hurts their future draws as well as reduces their chance of winning just a bit.&nbsp; When repeated enough times this drops you into the third and fourth place positions. Keeping that in mind, we know that Darkseid will happily destroy a card for us and convert it into 2 power and a card. This is easy enough to understand, but in practice maybe its not well understood. The team really needs fuel to keep moving, and because you are often destroying cards your deck tends to be quite thin.&nbsp; This is not immediately alarming, but note that Darkseid is at his best when you destroy a card in your discard pile.&nbsp; That means we need a discard pile to destroy from, but because we are often destroying cards our decks tend to be quite thin, and hence require constant shuffling.&nbsp; This really nerfs your game plan and can really cripple your game plan. To help prevent this, don't fall for the 'best card trap'.&nbsp; Darkseid teams don't have the luxury of always buying the best card in the lineup.&nbsp; Some players feel like &#34;That's the best card, I have to buy it&#34;, which by itself is probably a correct assessment of the card, but it's a trap because while yes that card is good, it's really not very good for Darkseid.&nbsp; Perhaps the better play is to buy two Kicks instead of a Hugo Strange for instance.&nbsp; This is because there is a high chance we'll want to destroy both of those Kicks over the course of the game.&nbsp; I see players fall into this trap time and time again, and often it comes back to bite them later in the game."},{"header":"best cards for the team"},{"double":[{"src":"rec757960reconstr.jpg"},{"src":"the757187the-owls.jpg"}]},{"text":"These cards all give +3 power with the ability to destroy all of the cards in the lineup. If you can yolo and blow them all up that's an extra +5 power (thanks to Deathstroke)! +8 power is halfway to any Super Villain from just one card.&nbsp; This whole cycle of lineup destroyers from Crossover 4 are all auto-buys and are enough to win the game buy themselves.&nbsp; Destroy a SV if you need to with Darkseid in order to get that last bit of power needed to buy these if necessary."},{"double":[{"src":"glo56364globe-of.jpg"},{"src":"for953689forager-.jpg"}]},{"text":"Globe will destroy two of the three cards revealed which will give you +2 power from Deathstroke. It gains you the card with the lowest cost and places it in your hand which can either be played for its effect or immediately destroyed with Darkseid for an additional +3 power (2 for him, 1 for deathstroke) and a card. This is potentially +5 power from a single card plus a redraw. Card is crazy good! Same with Forager, except he lets you start recycling all those cards you've been destroying all game.&nbsp; Getting 9+ power with this team is the whole goal (we want to be taking out SVs left and right) so that minor disclaimer is almost never a factor. "},{"double":[{"src":"new931226new-york.jpg"},{"src":"sig485235signatur.jpg"}]},{"text":"These two let you buy\/gain most of the cards you have previously destroyed this game (those friendly 2 cost cards) while adding more cards to the destroyed pile. Note that buying from the destroyed pile will give you an additional power because you have to destroy the top card of the main deck to use New York City."},{"double":[{"src":"air313516air-walk.jpg"},{"src":"tar346622tar-pit-.jpg"}]},{"text":"Almost any card from The Rogues set is worth picking up, because they have the added bonus of not costing you a VP when you destroy them.&nbsp; This is because they give you a VP token and themselves are worth zero VP.&nbsp; These have huge combo potential with the cards just mentioned that can retrieve these from the destroyed pile and let you free roll these cards for more VP tokens.&nbsp; Rinse and repeat for a quick ggez."},{"double":[{"src":"ama406362amanda-w.jpg"},{"src":"sup14755super-in.jpg"}]},{"text":"This cycle of destruction cards from Forever Evil do everything we want to do and then some.&nbsp; While not as powerful as destroying the entire lineup for value, these do let us rid ourselves of some pesky starters for profit (+1 power from Deathstroke) and then become late game bombs when we use them to destroy non-Starters, netting us some much needed power boosts to defeat high cost SVs.&nbsp; These are worth picking up almost every time."},{"double":[{"src":"ato845701atomica-.jpg"},{"src":"ste843928steel.jpg"}]},{"text":"This cycle is way less exciting, but should still be pointed out. Destroying a Starter for +1 power is fine, and you can always destroy this card later with Darkseid once you've destroyed your Starters to get them out of your deck."},{"double":[{"src":"hun485984huntress.jpg"},{"src":"son192113sonic-si.jpg"}]},{"text":"These cards get special attention because they provide 2 power and get to destroy a card which turns into +3 power. That\u2019s very powerful for a card that only costs 4 to buy."},{"header":"cards to skip"},{"double":[{"src":"mot580914mother-b.jpg"},{"src":"r02268929r02-nax.jpg"}]},{"double":[{"src":"pha205710phantom-.jpg"},{"src":"r02709225r02-ranx.jpg"}]},{"text":"I've seen this error more than once as well.&nbsp; Players know they have Deathstroke, so they feel obliged to buy any card they can that destroys cards.&nbsp; Unfortunately that's not always the case, for many of the reasons we've previously discussed. Consider Mother Box: we can only activate half the card, which means it's not going to be drawing us any cards.&nbsp; This means the turn we play it, it's either a Blank, or its +1 power.&nbsp; Eventually it'll just be destroying Punches for a net gain of zero power.&nbsp; While its good to destroy your starters, we have to remember that we're a team beating SVs, and 7 cost cards that provide +1 power aren't what we're looking for.&nbsp; Buy two Kicks instead. Nax has similar issues; while always being a cantrip to replace itself, its most likely just drawing us into another Starter when what we really wanted was 2 power so we could buy another card or to help beat the SV.&nbsp; The cute text about destroying stuff if we are attacking might only come up once or twice in a normal game since we aren't prioritizing attack cards because they are often lower power for the cost due to having an attack tacked onto them. Projector is better off in a Green Lantern deck where playing it has more impact.&nbsp; Here we're probably just generating 1 power via Deathstroke, and buying Punches isn't where we want to be.&nbsp; Stick with the Kick every time. Ranx goes back to what was mentioned earlier about buying every card that has the word destroy on it.&nbsp; We're not usually attacking anyone, so we're better off buying a Kick and wasting the two power.&nbsp; Don't second guess yourself, just take the Kick and move on."},{"header":"the 5-cost traps"},{"double":[{"src":"che71915cheetah-.jpg"},{"src":"cry609735crystal-.jpg"}]},{"double":[{"src":"eme33797emerald-.jpg"},{"src":"joh94167john-con.jpg"}]},{"text":"We'll refer to this as the 5-cost trap, here's what it looks like:&nbsp; a Darkseid player blows up a card in order to buy a five-cost card worth one VP and then passes the turn. By doing this, you\u2019re not gaining any VP that turn. If you\u2019re going to use Darkseid\u2019s ability to only buy one of these cards, be very confident that that card is going be very good for you the rest of the game, or I\u2019d advise just buying another Kick and ending your turn that way. Buying a Kick here means you gained a VP for the turn, and added another card you can destroy with Darkseid to your deck. Inevitably you will find yourself in a situation where the only card you can profitably destroy is one of these 5-costers you bought, and you'll be kicking yourself that you're effectively losing 2 vp in doing so.&nbsp; I have seen this happen time after time."},{"header":"alternatives to deathstroke"},{"text":"For those who aren't keen on Deathstroke, there are alternatives that players have found success with, so feel free to experiment.&nbsp; Another we'll take a look at is Darkseid + Orion."},{"header":"darkseid (tier 4) + Orion (tier 2)"},{"double":[{"src":"dar135208darkseid.jpg"},{"src":"ori893654orion-ng.jpg"}]},{"text":"Darkseid makes it very easy to consistently trigger Orion. With every use of Darkseid\u2019s ability, you\u2019re playing with a pseudo seven card hand."},{"list":[{"listType":"bullet"},{"caption":"You typically start with a 5 card hand"},{"caption":"The +2 power from Darkseid is the equivalent of a Kick for the 'sixth' card"},{"caption":"The draw from Darkseid\u2019s ability is the 'seventh' card."}]},{"text":"It\u2019s very easy to hit 9 power with a 'seven' card hand. Meanwhile, with Orion in the fold, it becomes much easier to gain 3 or more VP a turn after losing a VP to Darkseid\u2019s ability. When you trigger Orion, if you get an average of a punch off of each of the two cards you draw, you\u2019ll have 11 power. 11 power is a very good number. With 11 power you can start to buy those powerful 6+ cost cards and still buy extra cards to fuel Darkseid\u2019s ability."},{"header":"What to look for when playing this team"},{"double":[{"src":"bat984171batmobil.jpg"},{"src":"bet613795beta-clu.jpg"}]},{"double":[{"src":"dr-714638dr-mid-n.jpg"},{"src":"tel910737telepath.jpg"}]},{"text":"When playing this Darkseid variant your going to want cards that let you get cards into your discard pile. This is to help get you through the turns when you've just shuffled and have no discard pile.&nbsp; These 'enablers' allow you to put a card into your discard pile so that you can destroy it with Darkseid\u2019s ability.&nbsp; Because we want to be at 9+ power every turn, we can't risk having to destroy cards from our hand with Darkseid to get us there, we really need him to be able to use our discard pile plus a full 5-card hand to make sure we have enough power to trigger Orion."},{"header":"conclusion"},{"text":"Because of the inherent downside to destroying your own cards, Darkseid teams are often teams trying to beat SV after SV and end the game quickly.&nbsp; Eventually the Kick stack will run out, and you might find yourself without fodder for Darkseid, and you will rapidly lose ground to other teams. Either of the two teams mentioned here are capable of beating all five Super Villains in a row, so keep that in mind when playing this team.&nbsp; It's probably correct to that the card that gives +2 power over the potentially better, but more situational, card.&nbsp; With Darkseid destroying VP from your deck every time you use his ability, you will often find yourself ahead in the early game, and typically the way you'll throw the game away is via the multitude of errors mentioned in this article.&nbsp; Play smart, don't fall into any traps the main deck throws at you, and you'll soon find yourself in contention for first or second nearly every game. So, until next time, hopefully we'll see more people winning with the Darkseid of the Cube. "}]