"She Protec, but She Also Attac!" (Wasp Protection)

I've had a lot of fun using Wasp in the Protection aspect recently and wanted to share this deck. This deck has defeated Ultron expert with Under Attack (with some effort) and Klaw expert with Masters of Evil (quite easily). The latter is my usual deck-testing scenario and I was impressed by how this played in that environment.

The idea of this deck started with the thought of triggering tiny Wasp's villain damage more than you normally might through liberal usage of Energy Barrier, as well as an option to equip Electrostatic Armor. In Ultron (especially with Under Attack), the Energy Barriers are key to taking out drones on stage II and keeping the board clear so you can mow down stage III once you get there. In Klaw, I found the allies to be more useful at controlling the board state (since they weren't being constantly pinged away by Concussive Blast from Under Attack), and managed to take only 1-2 points of damage over the course of the entire game until the last few turns through ally blocking, tough status cards (Perseverance), Energy Barriers, and the occasional defense to trigger Electrostatic Armor.

There are a few key cards and themes that make this deck work well:

1. Recursion: Wasp's natural recursion in her alter-ego allows you to feed the high damage cards in her natural kit back into the deck a few times. This is most useful during the first turn, where you can hard mulligan for Energy Barriers or an Ally to help you get set up, and take any Pinpoint Strike or Wasp Sting cards that you mulliganed or used to pay for Energy Barrier/an ally while still in Alter-Ego. Clea also helps to fit into the recursion theme since she always gets shuffled back into your deck, and is often a helpful blocker in a tough spot.

2. Access to Allies: Clea's recursion, as well as the potential G.I.R.L. recursion of Brother Voodoo, Ironheart, and Nick Fury, combined with the ability to always play Lockjaw in a pinch means that you will almost always have an Ally on the field with you to add that extra thwart and damage mitigation that any Protection deck needs to survive true solo.

3. Resource Generation: Wasp's native resource generation is on the weaker side, but with 4 extra resource cards in The Power of Protection and The Power in All of Us, as well as a possible early Quincarrier can really help smooth Wasp's turns out. In the ~10 games I tested this deck, I only drew a hand of 4 resources and 1 playable card once, but one of the resources was Pym Particles which drew me into another playable card. The resources are really here for strong Ally plays, with the benefit of Energy Barrier being a perfect Power of Protection target.

4. Reliance on Wasp's Events (especially for dealing damage): Wasp can be more consistent than typical event-based heroes due to the recursion above. To make this even more consistent, Ironheart, Nick Fury, and Brother Voodoo do a great job of ensuring that you have the event you need, when you need it. Both Pinpoint Strike and Wasp Sting are good, with Pinpoint being the all-star in Tiny (typically dealing 9 total damage across a minion and the villain) and Wasp Sting being the all-star in Giant (used mainly for defeating multiple minions in a tough spot). There is absolutely enough damage within the Wasp kit to make Protection work without adding the aspect's niche attack events like Counterpunch and Tackle. On the other hand, Wasp's upgrades almost never saw consistent and valuable use, and I'd recommend de-prioritizing them in favour of Allies and Energy Barrier, at least for the first round through the deck.

5. Damage Mitigation: Protection is often at it's strongest when mitigating damage to stay in hero mode, and this deck accomplishes that through liberal stun allies (Iron Fist and Mockingbird) as well as tough status cards from Perseverance (which can be recurred if needed). Somewhat surprisingly, despite the idea of staying in Tiny as often as possible, I wasn't able to find a consistently strong use for Bio-Synthetic Wings and therefore recommend that it be used situationally at best (Energy Barrier often seemed like the better play)

Some of these themes are present in all Protection decks, and in all Wasp decks, but together they make a unique experience in playing this aspect and this hero - and it's fun to stay in Tiny mode and try to solve the puzzle of dealing as much bonus damage to the villain as possible.

Some cards that could be substituted out:

• Quincarrier could be subbed out for Helicarrier or Enhanced Awareness. The advantage of both cards is they can be played in alter-ego on the first turn and you can recur any resources spent. I like Quincarrier in true solo because it can be recurred, but after the first few turns you probably don't want to play it, so the other two cards could give you more flexibility
• The package of Med Team and Swarm Tactics is meant to keep Ant-Man around as long as possible, but I found my games where I didn't focus on that to be a bit smoother. That being said, Med Team is still helpful for Brother Voodoo and Lockjaw, so it's not a wasted slot here, and there are times that I used it to bump up Wasp's health in a pinch as well. If you want a more defense-focused version of this deck, you could sub out these three cards for some combination of Unflappable (!), Armored Vest (!), and Indomitable (not .. sad)

Hope you enjoy this deck as much as I did!