The Reservist ability is a very interesting one. Before the Avengers set, only a small set of cards made use of character cards in your resource row, and playing them on the field from the resource row was reserved for a handful of cards. The Reservist keyword changes this dramatically, and there are several benefits for using this keyword.

1) "The Second Hand": When you can place a character down in the resource row and recruit it later, you've made the resource row a more versatile 'second hand'. It's a lot harder for someone to force you to lose cards from your resource row, so you can be more secure in hitting your drops, as they're sealed away where only the Darkseid's Elite can easily get to them.

2) Resource Cycling: The fear of using a card like Clocktower on one's own resources is that you have the potential to put a character there you'd want to have drawn, since it's now trapped there. Not only does having the Reservist keyword get around that pesky problem, but it allows things that cycle cards into your resource row potentially hit drops for you. If every character is a reservist, there's nothing you can have cycled in that can't be of some use.

3) Avengers Reservists: With three in-team ways to cycle reservist cards out of your resource row, as well as four more that work off of revealing reservist character cards, the headline team of the set offers even more rewards for using characters with this keyword.

With this in mind, here is a beta version of the Avengers Reservists deck type.

Characters (34)
Hercules x3
Wonder Man x4
She-Hulk x4
Carol Danvers x3
Hawkeye x4
Black Panther x4
Quicksilver x4
Dane Whitman <> Black Knight x4
Natasha Romanoff <> Black Widow x4

Locations (10)
Avengers Mansion x3
Clocktower x2
LexCorp x2
Pym Laboratories x3

Plot Twists (16)
Call Down the Lightning x4
Combat Reflexes x4
Flying Kick x4
Shrink x4

One of my favorite things in this deck is that most of the good team attacking Avengers characters also happen to be Reservists. However, they're not always the ideal choice for this deck.

The stars of the deck are Black Panther and She-Hulk. Black Panther is a 3-drop which will often come into play as a 4-drop. This provides an immediate return, and having him be hidden typically means that he'll live for many turns, which helps to end games faster. She-Hulk serves double duty as an extra Clocktower or LexCorp in cycling dead reservists, and she also gets invulnerability in the process, which helps to pull those tight END races in your favor.

The PT selection is the part of the deck showing the least real innovation. The Combat Reflexes in particular can easily be replaced. I can see a case made for using Legendary Battles there. Savage Beatdown is also never a bad idea. Shrink works better than Acrobatic Dodge in this deck for two reasons. First, its cost is 2, meaning NSF, Detective Work, and Himon can't stop it. Second, it can be used offensively in conjuction with an attack pump to pull out an emergency One-Two Punch.

Clocktower and LexCorp, as mentioned earlier, are great in this deck. The magic number of reservists to have in the resource row is three, since that'll work with Hercules, Pym Laboratories (for Black Panther), and Avengers Mansion. Being able to drop a Dane Whitman or Natasha floating there for a Wonder Man or Flying Kick is a great trade-off, and this ability alone has won me my fair share of games. They even work to cycle out extra copies of locations, which is another bonus. Meanwhile, the Labs and Mansion are great for rewarding you for what you were doing anyway. Pym Laboratories can serve two important roles, both as a way to handle concealed-heavy decks and a way to keep important smaller characters around for longer.

In all, this deck type shows a lot of promise, and even without a lot of exploration of earlier sets, there are several other cards out there that can work with this. One can remove the Clocktowers and LexCorps, for example, to run copies of In Rememberance. You can't thin out locations, and it only works at a specific time, but it IS a +1/+1 on the defense, so it's certainly an option. Team-ups with the Squadron Supreme or Masters of Evil show some promise, as both teams have a fairly robust selection of reservists.

dane whitman is pretty foul. make space for 4 x rick jones and you'll be more than a little surprised how excellent he is.

I was running Rick Jones before. If I decided to go with Chaos Magic in large numbers, he might be more worthwhile. As it is, though, Dane Whitman has proven to be all sorts of useful, as he defeats Hounds locks, hampers GLEE locks a fair bit, and is just a solid 3/3 wall in the early game. Further, his ability has helped on several occassions where I lacked a higher-drop; having four 4-drops on turn 5 usually makes up for not dropping a 5-drop, as I see it. ^_^

4 locations = 4 reservists not in resource row so on turn 6 you could recover your two drop with pym labs no why more hawkeyes than carol danvers. If you want search throw in a couple leaders like 3-drop cap or 4 drop iron man to pitch for avengers assemble. or dont

Two of the locations are effectively identical, so it'd only be three if that proved to be necessary. Since the 'magic number' is three, having a copy of the Labs, Mansion, and one of the 'fundraiser' locations still provides that.

Of course, how many locations are actually loaded there depends in large part how you draw. Some games, you'll just have to bite the bullet and forget about using the resource row for anything really special. Other games, Wonder Man'll pick off 4-drops and you'll have reservists to spare. The way this decktype excels is when you can manage your resource row effectively, given what you've drawn. As an example, there was a game where I was running an Av/SqS version of this deck. I had four reservists and two characters, Hawkeye and She-Hulk, against his 2-drop, 4-drop, 5-drop, and 6-drop. I turned my ADUAO team-up face-down to replace it with Clocktower. I hit a 5th reservist, allowing me to auto-stun his 4-drop with Wonder Man and his 2-drop with Hawkeye. This saved me the game, for I would easily lost if I hadn't stunned the 4-drop.

try out amenhotep!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! hes a reservist who recovers!!!! and goes to the hidden! i personally like him better than she hulk because you most likely wont lost a character that turn.

even tho the locations are good, you really only wanna be running 3-4 x mansions. reservists HAVE to be in your RR to make this deck work.

and another thing i noticed. no Heroes In Reserve. why? it is like the essential pump in that deck.

Hi Nick! Agree with you on Rick Jones - he's a blessing when Prismatic Shield's not around.

But Dane Whitman's not that bad - sure his stats are pretty much lame when in the later turns but at 3/3, he's an okay 2-drop and his ability (playing 1 resource point and replacing a reservist resource, he get's +3/+3) is quite good IMO as it lets one cycle through the deck a bit faster.

Of course Natasha's the ultimate 2-drop for me. ;)

I've tested this list a little bit and it works quite well for me :

Characters (41)
4 Hercules
4 Wonder Man
4 Ahmenhotep
1 Monica Rambeau
4 Carol Danvers
2 Hawkeye
4 Black Panther
4 Quicksilver
4 Dane Whitman <> Black Knight
4 Natasha Romanoff <> Black Widow
2 Falcon
4 Rick Jones

Locations (7)
3 Avengers Mansion
4 Pym Laboratories

Plot Twists (12)
4 Call Down the Lightning
4 Legendary Battles
4 Heroes in Reserve

I just find that playing a lot of characters tend to "smooth" the deck and help to go on curve...
Also, I like to have a ressource row filled with reservist until turn 5 so T'Challa can be a curve filler on 4th and 5th turn.
Falcon is just here to make the numbers, with 10 turn two characters, you're almost sure to have one on second turn and another to go with T'Challa or Quicksilver on turn five if you have the odd init.
Falcon can fill the turn 3 and search for the lone copy of Monica Rambeau too.

I also have an all reservist deck (I call 'em the RESOURCISTS) - here's the latest build:

3 Rick Jones<>A Hero's Best Friend
4 Dane Whitman<>Black Knight, Heroic Paladin
4 Natasha Romanov<>Black Widow, Super Spy
4 Black Panther<>T'Challa
4 Quicksilver, Mutant Avenger
2 Hawkeye, Clinton Barton
4 Carol Danvers<>Warbird, Galactic Adventurer
4 She-Hulk, Gamma Bombshell
2 Hawkeye, Leader By Example
3 Wonder Man, Simon Williams
3 Hercules, Son Of Zeus

Plot Twists:

4 Heroes In Reserve
4 Prismatic Shield, Construct
4 Call Down The Lightning
4 Acrobatic Dodge
4 Legendary Battles
2 Press The Attack

Locations:

2 Pym Laboratories
1 Avengers Mansion

I'm still playtesting it but the deck is quite powerful, especially with Natasha Romanov and Quicksilver on board plus Legendary Battles. Black Panther is a great off curve choice, Wonder Man's free stun is amazing and Hercules is the perfect 7-drop for this build IMO.

A friend of mine plays Avengers Revservist and though I'm not 100% sure on the build, you'd be crazy not to go with team attacks. Here's how one game against him went (Avengers took odds, I was playing T-Bolts):

Turn 1: Rick Jones
Turn 2: Black Knight
Turn 3: Quicksilver, team attack with Legendary Battles stunning my field.
Turn 4: Carol Danvers. I stun his visible characters and he reinforces with Rick's ability. He recovers Quicksilver with Pym Labs and Carol normally.
Turn 5: Black Widow, Black Panther (revealing 4 Reservists) and Rick Jones with alternate recruit cost. Legendary Battles. Carol and Quicksilver bounce my 5-drop, Quicksilver and Natasha stun my 4, letting Natasha stun the 3, and Quicksilver + Black Panther + Rick hit me in the face for 15.
Turn 6: Wonder Man stuns my 4, leaving me with a 6 and no way to do breakthrough with Rick Jones on the table.

It was all downhill from there. He wins pretty handily with the deck most of the time, though people are starting to use Avengers Disassembled to tech against it (since we play Modern a lot).

All his characters are Reservists, and the only non-character cards he runs are:
3x Avengers Mansion
3x Pym Labs
4x Legendary Battles
3x Earth's Mightiest Heroes (just for fun)
3x Heroes in Reserve

Have a good one!
Jay

I dig the Reservists too but I think that having some Leaders in here is a good thing too. My build focuses on the turn 5 board stomp with Quicksilver, Natasha, Carol, and Monica. Wonder Man is my drop of choice for turn 6 with Hercules on 7. However, I did include some Leaders so I can utilize Avengers Assemble as well as Monica for the Team Attack, and be able to Recruit Hulk if I don't have Initiative on turn 7. Hercules is great for offense but can easily get run over by Magento or Bastion on defense.

4 Res Natasha Romanoff
4 Lead Wasp
4 Res Quicksilver
4 Res Black Panther
4 Res Carol Danvers
4 Lead Iron Man
4 Lead Monica Rambeau
3 Res Wonder Man
2 Res Hercules
1 Res Hulk
1 Lead Thor

4 Avengers Assemble
2 Avengers Dissassemble
3 Playroom
3 Avenger's Mansion
4 Savage Beatdown
3 Finishing Move
4 Legendary Battles
2 War of Attrition

Tell me more about Rick Jones. Other than his free recruit cost why is he so great? No doubting it I just haven't tried him yet.

I might try Meltdown instead. Sure, they're not reusable, but they won't clutter the resource row and have some fun alternate uses if you don't need the cycling.