Kergy's Korner #4: Fantastic Four VS DOOM, pt. 2 - It's All About DOOM!!

(note: the deck in this article was built by me a couple of weeks ago. It is not thoroughly tested. If it bears any resemblance to YOUR deck, it is merely coincidence.)

A couple of weeks back, I highlighted the Fantastic Four, and showed an example of a basic FF-equipment deck. This week, it’s all about DOOM!

Deep in the forests and hills of a tiny Balkan country named Latveria, resides a quiet and philosophical iron-fisted totalitarian ruler named Doom. Drawn by an obsession with killing Reed Richards (when not embroiled in a vicious Heroclix battle with Boris), Doom has a vast army of goons with guns, robots with guns, robots with bigger guns, and a variety of super-villains, despots and Dystopian autocrats at the tip of his plated gauntlets to command.

Remember one important tidbit when building a Doom deck, however – it really IS all about DOOM. In order for any solid Doom deck to work, you have to stock up on Dr. Doom cards – many of the better Doom characters, locations and plot twists need a Dr. Doom in play. This is where a little lad names Kristoff comes in handy, as he COUNTS as Dr. Doom for all intents and purposes, and you can play Doom cards as if Dr. Doom was in play when the little boy who would be DOOM is in play.

Doom is also about plot twists. There are SO MANY great Doom cards that allow you to play plot twists, stop your opponent from playing plot twists, search for plot twists, and recover KO’d plot twists. A typical Doom deck will be about 85-90% characters and plot twists, with a handful of location and equipment cards to boost up those cards.

This is an example of a BASIC 60-card Doom plot twist deck:

2x Boris
2x Darkoth
4x Dr. Doom: Diabolic Genius
2x Dr. Doom: Victor Von Doom
1x Dr. Doom: Lord of Latveria
2x Kristoff Von Doom
2x Rama-Tut
2x Robot Destroyer
2x Robot Seeker
1x Sub-Mariner
2x Victor Von Doom II
2x Volcana

3x Faces of Doom
2x Mystical Paralysis
1x The Power Cosmic
2x Acrobatic Dodge
4x Finishing Move
2x Flying Kick
2x Greater of Two Evils
2x Medical Attention
4x Savage Beatdown
2x Surprise Attack
2x Swift Escape

2x Doom’s Throne Room
2x Latveria

2x Power Compressor
2x Dual Sidearms
2x Personal Forcefield


This deck uses guile and strategy to win. If played well, you can hold until the 4th turn where your more powerful characters start to appear - such as Diabolic Genius. While limiting your opponent’s plot twist use, you’re cycling, recycling and searching for those you need. And if you can hold your opponent off with power boosting Savage Beatdowns and Dual Sidearms, your later turns will successively bring your opponent much pain with cards like Victor Von Doom, Robot Enforcer and Sub-Mariner. You can cross your fingers and hope for a Lord of Latveria, or gamble and use The Power Cosmic to gain initiative and rip into your opponent’s endurance with everything you have.

Other possibilities include adding two Doomstadts to increase your ‘Doom’ control, and removing the Dual Sidearms or a couple of plot twists to make room, as well as trying a Doom-Negative Zone team, with a few Negative Zones, an Annihilus and 2 Blastaars, while removing a few plot twists, the Volcanas and/or the Robot Seekers.

Why are there so many cards there that the deck only runs 2 or 3 copies of? I thought it was common CCG knowledge by this point that you try and play as many copies of the best cards that you can to increase consistency. Are you worried you'll draw multiples of the unique characters or something?

I would definitely run 4 of Boris in any doom/plot twist deck. Is ability is too crucial to risk him not coming out in the early rounds.

Between Boris, the Throne Room, and Faces of Doom you have a lot of searching. My Doom deck is subpar but I've managed to play Diabolic Genius in every one, I think. The plot twist Tech Upgrade allows searching for the equipment you need.My problem now is finding the right mix of characters to support the good Doctor.

LOL! You do know that I was joking when I asked for royalties last time, right? :)

Anyways, good article. That said, I agree with Braden about the 4 Boris' and I myself might've put in 11 or 2 more Victor Von Dooms. Don't know who I'd want to take out though, everyone's got their purpose.

Darkoth seems like an easy cut. KOing resources when you're trying to get up to eight for the biggest Doom variant seems like a bad idea. Kristoff Von Doom also seems less than amazing in a deck with only four Army Doom guys, so you could cut those.

1) Since there are only 6 equipment cards, and I said that 2 are replaceable, why would I bother with Tech Upgrade?

2) In the first version of this deck, I did have 4 copies of Boris. You guys are right that 4 times Boris is a good thing, but I felt that I had enough PT searching that I didn't need more than 2. Again, since I haven't playtested this deck much, I can't really be sure.

3) While Darkoth's power is a nice bonus, he's not there for his power. He is a Ranged Combat 4/5 for 3. This deck isn't a beatdown deck, and it's not that Aggro. I'd much rather have 2 Darkoths than 2 extra VV Dooms with a 6 cost - they're more likely to be of use to me.

4) Kristoff, again, isn't there for his Army boost. He's there because he's a super cheap Doom 'control' card. If you sub in Doomstadts, then he might be expendable, but it's always good to have a cheap card that counts as Doom to be able to recruit other 'Doom' cards.

Remember that a solid character shouldn't be overlooked just because one or more of his/her powers aren't that useful. If their base stats or alternate powes are very useful, does it matter if the rest won't be so soild?

5) The reason there are 2 and 3 copies of many cards is to cover all bases. For one, I don't need more than 1 or 2 Sub-Mariners or Lords of Latveria. Since they're least likely to come out early, I can't afford to have them taking up space in early draws. some decks will want only a handful of characters, with 4-12 versions os said characters. This deck needs variety.

For Plot Twists, since they're recyclable and searchable, it's better to have a variety of useful PTs then to put all of my hope on 3 or 4 cards.

Well, sure. I'm not saying the cards have no use; I'm just saying that that the use they provide is not equal to the alternatives. A vanilla 4/5 for 3 is great or whatever, but I do not believe that alone justifies the card's use. In a vacuum, I think that something like the three caster Doom Army guy would just be better than Darkoth. It is slightly smaller but has an ability that you may actually use from time to time.

(EDIT: Upon further inspection I have found that there are two Doom Army guys who cost three. Oops. I was referring to Doom-Bot, although now I'm thinking like the Seeker might be better. I have no idea.)

Basically, I'm just worried this deck is trying to spreading its resources too thinly. Generally speaking, a deck that does one thing great is usually better than a deck that does everything okay. There are several different directions you could go with a Doom deck - you could focus on the Army guys, you could try all sorts of neat things with plot twists, you could make a "toolbox" type deck that can search for single copies of narrow but powerful PTs - but trying to cram every Doom-related strategy into the same deck is not likely to work. Darkoth and Kristoff don't really seem to be pulling in the same direction as the rest of the deck, so I do not really believe they deserve to be there. There are Doom decks that would find those cards invaluble, sure, but this deck isn't it.

Again, I feel this is a problem of spreading the deck too thin. I agree that too many high casting cards is not good for this deck, but I don't believe the solution is to play 1 or 2 copies of everything you'd like to fit in. I think the solution is to decide on which cards that perform a specific function are the best at that function and run four copies of that card.

For example, I notice you're running 2 Darkoth and 2 Volcana. Now, not having tested the deck, I don't really know which of these cards is better for the deck (although as we know by now, I am not a fan of Darkoth in this deck). But they're both three casters, right? One of them is better at costing three than the other. The difference is that one of them is bigger and the other can deal direct damage. One of those two things has to be better for the deck than the other. There are a few other examples where you're running 2 each of two cards with a similar function instead of four of the better card. Consistency wins more games than variety.

Of course, you can make an exception for the plot twists, since you have ways to draw/search for them. You could probably make an exception for Doom as well, since you can Faces of Doom for him.

I agree with you in principle - but this isn't meant as an example of a competitive tournament deck. It's merely a basic frame for a Doom PT deck. So indeed, if you think a couple of cards don't work, sub in what you think WILL work =)

Cheers!
-Ben =)

Fair enough. The concept behind the deck seems strong, anyways.

Thanks =)

And you ARE right - especially in re: the Darkoth/Volcana comment. I think that 4 Volcanas might better serve this deck than 2 and 2.

Thanks for your input!

Cheers!
-Ben =)

I'm not sure about this one. Off the bat the stats on Darkoth are better (4/5 v 3/3) and they're both ranged. Volcana can't be recruited turn three unless you can consistently drop Doom turn two. Her shooting ability, though nice, seems more aggressive than a control-ish deck should be. On the other hand Darkoth isn't entirely useless late game, growing by +7 ATK each time you sac a resource. If you're on the last turn of the game, what do you need those unusable facedown resources for? Pump the mother +21 ATK and deal as much damage as you can.

Volcana doesn't need a Doom - Kristoff and/or Doomstadt will be fine =)

As for Darkoth, the only problem with his sac ability is that in this deck the lack of resources might hurt - especially earlier on...if you pump to +21 ATK only to have reinforcement, or a PT that eliminates the breakthrough, etc, then you've just screwed yourself big time;)

Still. Darkoth can be a useful bugger, which is why I put him in in the first place...

Wait, you can sac three resources for one attack? I was assuming that it was a triggered ability.

I wasn't at all suggesting you sac resources to Darkoth early on ... the proper way to play it would be to alpha strike with him on the last turn of the game (preferably after a clutch Power Cosmic gives you initiative!) and saccing all resources you don't need, since it's the last turn anyway. In that sense I think he has more late-game potential than Volcana.