Hello everyone and welcome back to another showcase of one of Gate Ruler’s newest archetypes. While originally just a ragtag bunch of units split among various decks, the ‘Superhero‘ attribute has now consolidated its powers into a singular force to be reckoned with, under the leadership of the Vanquisher ruler. A bit more defensive in nature, the archetype is still capable of inflicting copious amounts of damage when an opponent least expects it.
The decklist
Based on what we know of the present metagame, it is my sincere belief that the deck at hand runs quite a few of the most optimal combos and synergies available to Vanquisher Superhero decks; boosting their overall sustainability and defensive prowess.
As with any deck, it is still possible to play around with the ratios and even inclusions of some of these cards, since the Superhero attribute does offer quite a bit of flexibility with regard to deck construction. Thusly, the most optimal build is not as streamlined, as Set 4 Alice purports to be for example, meaning that a lot more can be done when tailoring it to a player’s local tournament scene.
Combos
While the deck at hand runs a few obvious synergistic combos like ‘the Football Brothers‘; Thunderbolt Quarterback and Thunderbolt Receiver, others may be a tad more obscure, at least at an initial glance.
Just a Flesh Wound, despite its past issues, is actually quite a capable shield when used in conjunction with equipped ‘Gear Up‘ Units. In some instances, it might simply save the Geared-up unit from a singular attack, if its health is too low like The Silver Uppercut. However, where the health of the unit is actually quite high, as in the case of Space King Arthur ft. Adriano, it could potentially prevent incoming damage (to the player) for an entire turn, with a little bit of luck that is.
It’a Hero Time!, is a card that personally I do not like all that much, at least at the present time. It feels too restrictive and costly and while it can be used both offensively and defensively, the targets that may be summoned are somewhat lackluster to say the least. Yet, when combined with a card like Mr. Obsolete, it can once again stop incoming attacks dead in their tracks, thus lending considerable validity to its inclusion.
Card Substitutions
There are two strong Superhero attributed Units that, while not included in the present list, merit consideration. On one hand we have Dash Jordan – Space Adventurer. Granted the ‘Giant Killer‘ CNT effect might not be as significant as it was during the height of set 3, nonetheless it still remains useful to this day in a variety of matchups, not to mention the ability to sentinel summon him might come in handy in a pinch.
The second card that could also prove to be useful is the original Space King Arthur of Cosmo-Camelot. While the CNT effect attached to this Unit is rather powerful, being a Six Attack Unit with Double Attack is really what purports to make this rather costly card a viable candidate for inclusion, as it could potentially assist the deck in overcoming one of its key weaknesses in a bit more of a consistent fashion.
Please note that while ultimately including these tech choices is entirely up to the player, they were ommitted from the present decklist for a number of reasons. In the case of Dash Jordan, his sentinel summoning effect did not strike me as noteworthy enough to add to an already inflated number of defensive cards. Additionally, the CNT Giant Killer effect while still relevant, is better so replaced by a disruption Event like Embrace of Eons which is consistently more relevant. Lastly, Space King Arthur while genuinely useful due to his stat-line, ultimately proved to be a little too costly and underwhelming at times due to the inconsistent energy/resource usage of the Superhero archetype in general.
Final Thoughts
Admittedly, the archetype had a very poor showing during its initial tournament appearance. While I do take into consideration that, at the time, it was an untested alpha build with a lot of unoptimised inclusions and ratios, some of its issues persist even with this new and improved build.
The deck still struggles with overcoming ‘six health’ defensive units and in general its offensive capabilities can be viewed as somewhat lackluster. However, I believe that these two issues are counter-balanced by a decently strong defensive package by virtue of using ATLAS as a base, in addition to some ‘Superhero‘ synergy as demonstrated throughout the article above. In terms of ranking, presently I cannot confidently relegate it to a specific tier, as I would like to have a few more tournament results. Yet, within a reasonable margin of error if I were forced to provide a classification, at this point in time, I would place it at the lower end of Tier 2.
Once again, I do sincerely hope you enjoyed this write-up. If you are curious to see more, do not forget to give me a follow on Twitter and if you would like to be a part of the creative process that goes into doing these write-ups, you can also check out my Patreon. Your further support would be very much appreciated.
Special shout-out and kind thanks to C. Sweeney & Kenny as my first ‘GateRuler’ related Patrons.
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