This is my entry for the Back of the Binder challenge and I must say, I'm shocked at how good this is and I might take it to some local tourneys. In real matches this deck has:
- One -Shotted a full health tough 1 Galactic Prime
- After a Metroplex trigger killed a partner, disrupted its plan and untapped sideswipe, freeing him up for a monsterous attack
- Outpaced and outdrew a shockwave deck
If interested, keep reading and I will break down the character choices, whys and play style.
Characters:
- Sideswipe - He's the star of the show here, and it was important to me that he be the one who shines in the deck. After all this is his challenge. We will take advantage of his Alt mode ability more than his Bot mode ability. Lets break it down.
- When you flip to this mode This gets +2 until end of turn for each character in your KO area....that is not something that is limited to one time. if you flip him to car mode twice in a turn...you get another +2 per ko'd teammate. If he is the last character standing in this list and you flip him to car mode 2 times, he will be swinging for 2 for car mode + 6 + 6 = 14. This WILL take your opponent by suprise, and because this team is WIDE and has many untaps...I can almost guarantee you will be able to go after the juciest target available.
- In his Bot mode it states: When one of your other characters is KO'd during your opponent's turn Untap this. Opponent Zap's one of your characters to death? Untap. Metroplex just swung and tapped your whole team down and THEN does one damage to everyone and that one damage killed one of your teammates? Untap. This ability won't go off often, but it is a nice to have and ideally, Sideswipe will always be in bot mode while tapped.
- Cliffjumper- Sideswipes best friend. When you do this deck right you are pretty much only fliping sideswipe and when you flip from car to bot mode cliff's card draw ability triggers. Cliff is also here to present a tough choice. If you kill sideswipe you power up cliffjumper. If you kill cliffjumper, you power up sideswipe. Its a really tough choice for your opponent.
- Firedrive - If everyone is untapped, your opponent must hit firedrive. When he is tapped all attacks have to go into him, this is another difficult choice for your opponent.
- Private Stakeout - a solid choice. 4 stars, car, autobot. That would normally be enough, but his tap ability will let you flip sideswipe another time by sacking a white pip. So if firedrive is dead that could be an extra +2 to your attack you weren't planning on.
The Important Cards (in order of importance):
- Showing Off - the MVP of the deck. This is the fuel on how you will generate MONSTER levels of attack with Sideswipe. You will be able to trigger his car ability multiple times, stacking attack buffs. With brainstorms, start your engines, roll outs and this you can flip him to car mode somewhere around 3-4 times. If cliffjumper is still on the field, you are also going to draw a boatload of cards with your flips helping you dig to the most important cards in your deck.
- Kinetic Intensifier Whip - What a weapon for sideswipe. Every flip of sideswipe will give you bold 2. In this deck I have swung for 16 bold 12 because of this thing before and it feels great. Get this on him as soon as possible. It almost equals a delete key!
- Brainstorm - the combo maker. You cant get the super outtrageous numbers without this card, and ideally, 3 of them. if you have 3 showing offs and 3 brainstorms, you probably just won the game due to the amount of flips you can do to trigger sideswipe.
- Heroism / stealthiness (tie) - the backup defense. When fireflight goes down, this is the next step. Staple Heroism onto stakeout but attack with sideswipe. Your opponent attacks sideswipe, but all damage transfers and kills stakeout? Untap sideswipe. Stealthiness is there to keep sideswipe from getting attacked in a pinch, especially with no fireflight on the wheel turn.
- Start Your Engines - 1. its another way to flip sideswipe to car mode. 2. it can untap sideswipe or another one of your cars. Extra attacks are ALWAYS good. Or use it to trigger stakeout's tap ability again.
- Kinetic Converter - if you get this on sideswipe early in the game, you will draw half of your deck easily. From car to bot = draw 2. flip back to car = draw 1. flip back to bot = draw 2. congrats you drew 1/6th of your deck. and you also powered up sideswipe. This becomes more important in disruption type decks.