The Friends We Made Along the Way (AoA Speedrun Video Added)

Card draw simulator

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journeyman2 · 24847

Age of Apocalypse Full Box Run

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Psylocke loves forcing people to be her friends making friends! Here's how

Stepping aside from the deck theme for a second, let's get into some cold hard exposition!

Our combo revolves around triggering Change of Fortuneand Unflappable using Psychic Misdirection. Because this is a (defense) card, it still counts as Psylocke defending, even though the damage goes to a minion. This triggers Unflappable, because Psylocke defended and took no damage. If damage from the attack defeats a minion, we also get to draw 2 from Change of Fortune. This works because even though Change of Fortune says "you", Psychic Misdirection counts as "you" defeating, not as the enemy defeating. If for some reason the attack did not defeat the enemy, we can trigger Psimitar for an additional 2 damage in the villain phase and still trigger Change of Fortune. Failing that, retaliate from Weapons Training not only will ping the villain after a Psychic Misdirection, but you can tank a minion attack to defeat it for Change of Fortune!

For net 0 resources, we have dodged an attack and defeated a minion! No other card in the card pool can trigger Change of Fortune while defending the villain attack completely! (Crosscounter and Forcefield Projection come close)

That's the skinny of it. Here's some wibbly wobbly, timey wimey stuff:

  • Any "after attacks and damages you" effects would not happen, but "after attacks you" effects would happen!
  • Because damage was not dealt to us, this dodges certain boost abilities like Sonic Boom as well!
  • Also because damage was not dealt to us, indirect damage would go to the intended target and not the player! This is because Psychic Misdirection redirects the damage at the dealt stage, while indirect specifies "damage dealt to a player"
  • Occasionally, Psychic Misdirection is useful for a minion attack, such as Blob's "after Blob attacks and damages a character, stun that character". We don't particularly need or want stuns, but this is something to be aware of, especially in multiplayer. Controller and Mystique are interesting for pure damage, especially since Psimitar and Weapons Training can combine to trigger Change of Fortune after. Credit to Theorel for pointing out that if you can give Controller overkill through something like Wild Wild Mojo or Tech Gauntlets, he will "double dip" and dealing damage+target's ATK to the initial target AND overkill damage+overkill target's attack to the villain!
  • Certain boost effects might also effect the attacked enemy instead as well. Extra boost cards or overkill on boost are great to pull!
  • Damage from Psychic Misdirection is not considered an attack itself, so if the damaged character survives it will not retaliate against the damaging character. No killing minions with MODOK's or Zola's retaliate!
  • Change of Fortune will trigger if you defeat a villain stage! Great for Sinister Six especially!

A word about keywords. Attacks with overkill that defeat an enemy, will deal overkill damage into the villain. So the villain can damage themself! Dummy! If you have retaliate, you will still retaliate against the attacker! Unfortunately, attacks with piercing will still pop your toughs, sad for "Come Get Me, Bub!".

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Some friendships have a lot of rules I guess. Now let's talk about the FUN!

Ok that's the big idea. There are a couple of reasons this works so well with Psylocke. Psylocke can shuffle Psychic Misdirection back into the deck using Betsy Braddock. This is important because it can be hard to draw villain phase events into a 4-card hero hand size. Shuffling them back in to a skinny deck is a good way to get them! If we draw them in alter-ego, we can spend them, then shuffle them back in right away!

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The One Where The Could Only Afford Their Apartments Because of Mind Control

The rest of the deck is relatively straightforward with more friends we've made along the way!

Friends that we met along the way and decided to cut out of our lives:

Whew, I hope that gets ahead of some of your comments, but let me know about others! There are big ships and there are small ships. There are wood ships and there are good ships. But the best ships of all are friendships! I'm so grateful to all of the Marvel Champions friends I've made along the way. 4 years on and going strong! Hope to meet even more of you in year 5!

38 comments

Sep 20, 2024 journeyman2 · 24847

Sep 20, 2024 TheMegaSage · 9

"retaliate from Weapons Training not only will ping the villain after a Psychic Misdirection"

Whoa whoa whoa. So the villain (or minion?) attacks, you misdirect that attack to another enemy, but the attacker still takes retaliate damage from you???

Sep 20, 2024 journeyman2 · 24847

@TheMegaSage You Bet! Psychic Misdirection doesn't make the enemy attack the other enemy, it just redirects the damage dealt. You played a "defense" card, so you were still the one attacked. Check the rulings in the comment above!

Sep 20, 2024 TheMegaSage · 9

Glorious!

Sep 20, 2024 Caldias · 1760

Man, I love Psylocke and this deck looks so fun!

Sep 20, 2024 Castlefrank47 · 681

@journeyman2 this is such an awesome concept, can't wait to give this a go!

Sep 20, 2024 Proust · 173

What a superb idea. But for my part I will try this combo with phoenix

Sep 20, 2024 journeyman2 · 24847

Thanks @Caldias and @Castlefrank47!

@Proust Thanks for bringing it up!! I forgot to mention in the notes, Phoenix can also run this!! However, I do give the edge to Psylocke. Being able to shuffle back Psychic Misdirection and Karma makes her much less reliant on luck of the draw to line up the combo. If Phoenix flips to alter-ego, she might lose out on Misdirection, but not so with Psylocke! This also means that Psylocke never misses copies from her opening mulligan!

Psylocke’s Psi-Energy upgrades never run out of counters, unlike Phoenix’s Power Counters (and Bub’s healing can put you out of range to REC for more…but as mentioned flipping in the Phoenix deck comes at the cost of potentially losing Misdirection anyways).

Psylocke has 2 extra ways of triggering Change of Fortune, using Telepathic Suggestion! Turns you don’t draw Misdirection, but do draw Suggestion are quite strong, neutering the villain phase and leaving you with still a full hand in the hero phase! I also like the added flexibility of Psylocke’s statline, being a 3 THW or 3 ATK on any given turn is great for board control.

Where Phoenix is superior is a much faster endgame. Going Unleashed burns the villain quite quick, but also doesn’t really interact with the combo at hand. Mind Control deals less consequential than Karma, but Karma can be recycled to the deck and also act as an emergency chump (especially multiplayer). Phoenix’s X-Men trait gives her many options Psylocke doesn’t, but none really interact with Psychic Misdirection or Change of Fortune

Sep 20, 2024 journeyman2 · 24847

I don’t want to bury the lede, that Phoenix only gets 3 ways to trigger Change of Fortune, and struggles if she flips to alter-ego. Psylocke can almost guarantee she gets it every turn in hero by shuffling used copies back in and starting with an extra 2 cards in deck to trigger it. Triggering Psimitar in the villain phase is much easier done by Psylocke

Sep 20, 2024 Proust · 173

Yea but phoenix can do something else with minions

Sep 20, 2024 journeyman2 · 24847

@Proust Fair enough! For this specific interaction, I do like that Psylocke has extra ways to trigger Psimitar in the villain phase, extra consistency to hit the combo, and lower cost curve combined with a burstier turn 1. But let me know what you like after trying them out! I’ll put out a video once Hitch’s updates :)

Sep 20, 2024 MOSER319 · 82

I've been looking for a deck for my first game as psylocke, this seems like it will spoil me and be the only one I play!

Sep 21, 2024 Dayspring · 2

I find Psylocke to be very versatile in aspect compatibility. She has options in each and Psionics really helps that. With that said, protection was the one I never felt popped. This looks like it will solve that with style. I immediately am seeing if there is a version for Cable, but PSS eats up so much deck, and Psionic is not permanent. Really cool concept.

Sep 21, 2024 Man-is-Obsolete · 5457

Very cool, I ran something very similar recently with proxies and liked splashing 1/2 Anticipation to combo with "Come Get Me, Bub!".

Very satisfying deck getting the villain to torch a minion and then you draw a bunch of cards.

Sep 21, 2024 andyr · 7327

Man, this gave a fun new twist on Psylocke. I always enjoy her for the confuse, but to enjoy her for the damage side of her villain phase cards and making Psychic Misdirection more consistent was a ton fun!

Sep 21, 2024 tjjj · 245

So no one told you life was gonna be this wayyyyy

clapclapclapclap

Sep 21, 2024 Clone · 1

Re-reading the "Defend, Defense" section in the RRG has really opened up my eyes to new interactions, so thanks for that. Also, I used to really hate the ruling for Psychic Misdirection; this is a really cool way to twist it in your favor, so great job on that.

Sep 21, 2024 turtles04 · 794

This is dope! What a great idea!

Sep 22, 2024 mv2392 · 102

Great Deck! Psylocke is on my very short list of characters I haven't really played yet, I think I have one or two games on her. I was just mulling over deck ideas to run her through, but I think this is it. Awesome work here!

Sep 22, 2024 dr00 · 44278

i forgot to comment, but this is such a strong deck. i think people greatly undervalued Psylocke when she came out, and you're proving yet again how powerful she can be.

i really love the interaction of "Come Get Me, Bub!" and Psychic Misdirection and how you can likely even preserve your tough over multiple rounds/attacks. Colossus can only dream lol

Sep 22, 2024 Dansome · 1

Cool decks as always

Sep 22, 2024 MegiDolaDyne · 5333

Psylocke continues to have some of the most fun decks out of all of X-Force. Kudos for this list, it looks incredible.

Sep 22, 2024 corbintm · 1781

I remember seeing the prototype for this deck months ago. Glad some new cards made it so it could work - I'll be checking it out for sure!

Sep 23, 2024 Nuggette · 1

Can't wait to try it out when the lgs opens on Tues. Such a long wait

Sep 23, 2024 Septuseth · 1

This might be a new favorite deck. I have an ingrained habit of flipping with Psylocke every turn, do you find that necessary or wise, once you're set up with CoF and Unflappable? I'm also curious if you have any thoughts about a particular deck type this would pair well with in 2 player.

Sep 23, 2024 VillainTheory · 27848

I love the idea here! Sadly, after having talked about Psychic Misdirection with Change of Fortune in the past, I received a comment from a viewer claiming that they do not work together because it's not "you" defeating the enemy. I looked into it at length and thought they were correct - but I'm hoping that's wrong because I really want this to work.

The gist is the redirected damage is still "damage from that attack" by the card's wording. In other words, it's the villain which defeats the minion. At no point does it become damage "you" are dealing with the event itself. The "instead of you" wording on Psychic Misdirection falls under a replacement effect in the rules reference, just changing where the damage goes while all still part of the villain's attack process, rather than have you take ownership of the damage in any capacity, by my understanding.

In a somewhat similar fashion, I don't think you can play Turn the Tide after Psychic Manipulation because although "you" thwarted in hero form because you played a thwart card, it was the villain through their own activation which actually removed the threat (and not your hero). In both cases, the events are modifying what the villain does rather than doing the thing themselves.

Thoughts?

Sep 23, 2024 Man-is-Obsolete · 5457

It works, because it is your event and thus you are causing the attack to defeat the minion thus you defeated the minion. It is a bit weird but the easiest way to parse it is without YOU playing psychic misdirection would the minion be defeated?

Sep 23, 2024 journeyman2 · 24847

Fortunately, your viewer comment is incorrect @VillainTheory! Here is the copy/paste answer I have from FFG. "I would say you've been playing it correctly. This would be covered by the events entry under "You": Events - Attacks, thwarts, defenses, action abilities, and triggered abilities that resolve from a player playing an event are also considered to be performed by that player's identity". This is from Tony specifically.

I have always made sure any published deck is thoroughly tested and rules compliant, as I have done for a majority of this game's lifespan and will continue to do well past its death.

Sep 23, 2024 journeyman2 · 24847

@MOSER319 Thank you! Let me know what you think! Looking forward to playing together soon

@Dayspring Good luck with Cable! Definitely agree, Change of Fortune really opened up Psylocke-P for me!

@Man-is-Obsolete Anticipation is definitely a viable option with her big stats! Very satisfying indeed

@andyr I used to think her 4 villain phase events were a weakness, but turns out 4 wasn't enough!

@tjjj Looking forward to your next concoction going live! Super unique combo that no one has used before and I'm here for it!

Sep 23, 2024 journeyman2 · 24847

@Clone Such an important, and ever-changing part of the RRG!

@turtles04 Thanks so much!

@mv2392 and @dr00 I've really enjoyed her, she's had some incredible lasting power from that wave for me!

@Dansome Cool comment as always! Thank you

@MegiDolaDyne High praise sir, thank you!

@corbintm I remember having a conversation about card ideas that would complete decks, and waiting for the card pool to catch up to an idea. The card pool caught up!

@Nuggette Godspeed! We ran it in our LGS on Friday, hopefully you can get the cards soon!

Sep 23, 2024 journeyman2 · 24847

@Septuseth I think you can definitely flip often with this deck, one of the main advantages over the other Psionics. We can shuffle Psychic Misdirection back into the deck with her AE ability. In a lot of decks I default to shuffling Prof, but not so here! This makes it feel super unique. I even shuffle Telepathic Suggestion quite a bit. Taunt is a good way to trigger Unflappable (though not Change) coming out of alter-ego.

As for multiplayer, first a quick reminder that Psionic Redirect and Psychic Misdirection can only be played on attacks against you! That doesn't mean we can't chump Prof/Karma/our new minion bff though! Pairing this with a deck that can deal villain damage is most synergistic. Psylocke is quite good at defending multiple time and clearing a lot of threat and minions, but retaliate 1 doesn't scale super well against multiplayer villain health. Big villain damage decks partner best!

Sep 27, 2024 HeroicSkeleton · 394

I was really hoping this interaction would work, thanks for finding the answer and building the deck! Pylocke is my absolute favorite hero and change of fortune is such a cool card. Green is by far my least played color but this card is really making me want to try it more!

Oct 07, 2024 chrisrivers13 · 1

@journeyman2 Played this deck twice today in 3 player games and loved it. Never was worried about dying. Ended up with only 1 damage at the end of both games. I find it funny that I really did not mind Shadows coming out as Chimera can be used to hit something else hard (I hit Venom for 8 damage).

Oct 07, 2024 journeyman2 · 24847

@HeroicSkeleton Psylocke has really been moving up my hero rankings. Really good hooks in every aspect, flexible stats, good economy, but still some drawbacks to work around.

@chrisrivers13 I love the interaction between Chimera and Psychic Misdirection! So much fun to have her hit the villain for huge damage. Even better that it doesn't trigger Venom's response!

Oct 08, 2024 chrisrivers13 · 1

@journeyman2 Yeah, i noticed that about Chimera and got some weird looks when I told my table to leave her alone until I explained what I was going to do.

Oct 09, 2024 Telcontar · 482

Every so often you come up with a deck that completely changes my opinion of a hero, like Full Metal Alche-fist for Colossus (honorary mention to Hit Me Babushka). This is that deck for Psylocke. So much fun!

Oct 09, 2024 Dawncaller · 30

That's probably one of my top 3 favorite decks. A lot of fun!

Oct 14, 2024 Delewobmesid · 7

What software/mods did you use to make the video?