I really like the whole King Mechanic, I wonder if some of the other kings will be more Powerful like Max Lord.

Checkmate seems interesting.

No competitive constructed player worth his salt will dare play this. Silver age you have to put up with No Man Escapes for a long, long time before it rotates out. Ditto with Golden Age. It can be a good card to draft or play in sealed provided there's not a lot of Concealed hate in this set alone. Other than that, if losing one "king" loses the game for you, I'm staying away from Checkmate.

league of assasins team up and use his ability to search for lazarus pits and you just got around his major downfall

No, I don't think that guy was a member of Checkmate.

Ahmed Samsarra, as far as anyone seems to be able to find out, was just one of the throw-away Checkmate leaders that Maxwell Lord had gunned down in OMAC Project #2.

However, let's examine some facts:

1. The card's art depicts Samsarra giving Batman information on Cain, which is pretty much the only thing David Said is known for aside from making Huntress a Checkmate agent for a short time.

2. David Said is introduced as a Checkmate King is Detective Comics. Then, in OMAC Project, a similar looking man named Ahmed Samsarra is introduced as Checkmate's White King.

Speculative Conclusion: David Said is just an alias used by Ahmed Samsarra, who wouldn't want people knowing his real name being a bigshot secret agent and all. Upper Deck is supposed to be have access to all kinds of super secret (or in this case, trivial and near useless) information for this set.

Or maybe I was just wrong. :laugh:

saphfron - Great, devote cards in your deck to protecting your game-ending liability while I just play a normal Squadron or Titans deck.

It's thinking like that, sir, that clogs our tourneys with 20 odd copies of the same 3 decks.

No offense, but you're not looking at things from the same perspective as Mr. Saphfron:

League of Assassins was probably already running Lazarus Pits, especially if they were going for a Location Theme. The non-uniqueness clause makes them perfect for filling the resource row. Along with Metropolis (if you're running a team up deck), they make the deck run, as well as it ever really has. :ermm:

Now, there's a chance to play Blue from your row and blast it out to tutor for toolbox locations AND fill your row with the locations that make Merlin so KO-licious. It may make the deck that much more streamlined from previous versions, even with the added cards for a team up.

This card has alot of potential, and the League has ways of keeping him from being a liability. I guess I just fail to see what the problem is. :confused:

He has to worry about Titans because of Terra and Roy of course.

But why would he care about Squad outside of No Man Escapes?

Either way ... his ability IS pretty nice, regardless of the drawback.

Some would say that KO'ing a resource and exhausting a ton of characters ... or that having no hand ... would be a horrific drawback and 'no competitive player' would ever consider playing jank like that ;)

Regardless, the guy is INTERESTING ... when we see what Checkmate can do to protect itself 'naturally' we'll get a clearer picture of what's going on.

Heck, they mention a card that is going to be spoiled today which helps it out ...

I don't see him very good in Golden Age with all of the out of combat stuns by Titans, X-Stall, etc.

However, if you can protect him from No Man Escapes the Manhunters in Silver Age (Medallion of Power or something similar), he's definately worth it.

He's a 6/6 for 3 that allows for a Location Toolbox, which can be very good in say, Hellfire Club, who actually wouldn't mind the Medallions, or you could use Deadly Game/The Hellfire Club to negate attempts to move him.

Biz98- Thanks for the link.

Just Beware Of Deathstroke, as you dont want to loose the game, but then again thats how Deathstroke Rolls.

I think that with several Kings on the team, UDE will implant enough 'anti-ko' tech into the team to keep it away from being a simple death to Terra.

Come on people, have alittle more faith then that

Batshido, first off, love your sig, Drawn Together rules. I do try to look at cards objectively, but any card that can result in an auto-loss for me better have an insane effect. Location tutoring is hardly going to win the game especially when you:

1. Have to play him Concealed, thereby making his stats a moot point, except when you do attack with him or he gets pulled out by No Man Escapes.

2. You'll still be scared of a stunback if you do attack with him.

3. Have to make sure you have cards to protect your Kings from being KO'd. The team-up with League of Assassins and Lazarus Pit is good synergy, but then you have to have a team-up to use, so you're required to draw that card. Even with this Threat Neutralized card that's coming out that's supposed to protect your Kings, you're devoting more deck space just to keep yourself from losing, and not winning.

Celtichunter- getting your team-up and Laz Pit is as easy as just hitting an LoA guy turn 2. With 4 TDH and 4 Team-up, along with Mr. 6/6 Himself, you should have it by turn 3.

wow, celtic hunter, you are arguing about the league in every forum:p:p:p:p

Celtic:

I appreciate your points, and it is a harsh drawback to deal with. Let's look at the upside to the card:

1) He's got great stats for a 3 drop. He can't swing as high as Lady Lark or Black Panther, but he's a heck of alot more suited to long term survival.

2) He basically has The Demon's Head stapled to his back. With that ability, I can see the League and other location centric teams moving towards the realm of combo, since he can find your pieces in alot less painful way than the other options available right now.

3) After He's outlived his usefulness, you can use some Lazarus Pit type effect to keep him around. You can also bounce him with Swift Escape or Boom Tube after he's outlived his usefulness. He can also just stick around stunned for abilities that count stunned characters, as long as you have some type of "cannot be KO'd" tech.

Honestly, I don't know how good he is within the concept of his own team. That is primarily because we've seen only one of thier cards at this point. I just see him as the missing piece that a Location centric League deck can use to finally fix it's Resource issues. He's also great for Reservist Strategies that can KO characters to get locations, then retrieve those characters with the location. That's creating Card advantage in the long term.

He's a fun card. I see alot of possibilities, and the risk of maybe losing on turn 4 or 5. That happens anyway right now. I like him.

True Batshido, he does have upsides to him, and criticism of any card when it's previewed can be considered premature. My big hang up is you're paying far too much for a constant tutor ability. Just like paying 15 endurance for Conjuration is. They're trying to expand the game to make it vastly different, but it seems that in order to break from the norm, you have to pay just a little too much to do so.

A good analogy is winning a new luxury car. After the initial ooohs and aaahs you realize you have to pay for a lot of insurance, make sure it doesn't get stolen by getting car alarms, etc. when you can easily use your car you have now to get where you need to. The new car may get you there faster (Ahmed) but in the end, it's just seems too pricey.

Again, maybe Checkmate has an Ongoing Plot Twist (possibly Threat Neutralized) that keeps your Kings from KOing. If they do, Ahmed improves slightly, but you're still depending on something bailing you out just so you can have a tutor ability and not pay the price for it.