Gamora: pro stunlock

There are heroes that you can analyze on paper and easily predict how they will play. Then there are heroes that surprise you once you start playing. Your analysis turns out to be all wrong because you overlooked so many details. For me, Gamora was one of those surprises.

First off, she is definitely an aggressive style hero. I didn't get that wrong, at least, but I expected her to be much better at attack. The surprise is that she is extremely good at thwarting while only being average at attack. This is because her precision effect has more impact than her finesse effect. While finesse can sprinkle in a little bonus damage, precision goes a long way toward removing all threat each round. You are more likely to play attack events, after all.

The next thing I got wrong was her alter-ego. Upon initial analysis I was underwhelmed and concluded that she would be one of those identities that would stay in hero form. However, in play you realize that because of her excellent thwarting there is some freedom to flip down. When flipping down you quickly realize that her AE is much better than first thought. You should get an extra card each activation and Conditioning Room is fantastic, allowing you to fetch back your stun attacks Drop Kick and Tackle, as well as giving a little heal. Most of the time my flip downs would facilitate an 8 card hand on the next turn, pretty nice.

Next, I eventually found that red just wasn't her best color, and she didn't need yellow because her passive and signature thwarting was enough. Her best color is green, which gives her access to Counter-Punch and First Hit (although I didn't put it on this list) which allow her extra hero ability activations, along with Crosscounter, on the villain phase. You could do the same thing with True Grit but I didn't think the card was good enough. Green also give Gamora Momentum Shift which is perfect healing for her, being an attack event. The thing that really pushes Gamora to the green are the superior allies, particularly Brother Voodoo and Starhawk. Multiple Man and Ironfist would also be great, but were cut for cost reasons.

Drop Kick was the obvious choice for off color attack card, and I finally decided on Press the Advantage with all that stun going around. With Nebula and Conditioning Room to fetch them and Keen Instincts to pay the colored cost, you can easily and consistently stunlock the villain while having the flexibility to handle everything else.

The resulting deck has a ton of card draw resilience and finishing power allowing you to flip ever round and find what you need for any situation.