Wolverine is an iconic x-men character and in VS2PCG the flavor of his MC cards match him well. He is an aggressive MC that has the recipe to pack a punch. He has several positives over other aggressive decks but some downfalls as well. We will take a look at what type of decks shape around him and how to take advantage of his aggressiveness.

Leveling

Best at What He Does - Level up (3): When Wolverine makes a solo attack and stuns an enemy character, he gains an XP.

Wolverine has been for the most part in the comics a rebel who likes to do things his way as far as I know so that fits his flavor. He starts off as a 3/4 which are decent stats for an aggressive character. Like most main characters, they want to level up as fast as possible. Wolverine is no exception to this. It is even more important with Wolverine as the longer you wait, the larger your opponents characters will get which will hamper your chances of stunning them. A fair amount of characters can have a bad draw and level up a little later on but with Wolverine it is much harder to level up later in the game if you can't get early stuns.

This makes you play him very aggressively, often with lots of plot twists as supporting characters really can't help him level other than clearing out some bigger characters so Wolverine can hopefully stun something. He doesn't have flight so it can be hard to get to the squishier characters hidden in the back row at times. Your opponent will know that you need to level quickly or you will struggle so they will try to slow you gaining XP as much as possible trying to stop you from leveling. Aggressive strategies can be hard in the meta if everyone is playing defensive plot twists as most defensive plot twists are larger than more attack boosts making it an uphill battle. Wolverine however helps make that battle a little easier with his super powers.

With heavy plot twist decks going second could be advantageous as you will have more cards in hand to use than the opponent can defend with. However, you will also always be battling up curve and that difference could matter a little bit. In a match vs Luke Cage, I found it really disadvantageous to go second as Luke could attack you every turn. and have no supporting characters for you to attack back. While you could stun him back, you had nothing to attack on your turn. If you expect Luke Cage to be in the Meta at all, I wouldn't chance going second because I think it is pretty much would be a loss at that point. Just something to consider when playing Wolverine.

Super Powers

Level 1 Power: SNIKT! - Combat : Wolverine gets +3/+0 this combat.

This 3 ATK pump is on par with most defensive plot twists or greater and is better than just running an Open Fire alone. With a use of this power he can, at the moment, stun any level 1 MC's and several level 2 MC's if they don't play a defensive plot twist on you. This ability will be key in leveling him but make sure you time it and use it wisely as you can often just get away with a single plot twist for the first turn or two.

While this is an "any turn" combat ability, at least until Wolverine levels, I would not be using it except when attacking. It isn't worth wasting the resource if you still need to level as you will need everything you have to punch through the enemies defenses.

Level 2 Power: Healing Factor - Main : Heal a wound from Wolverine.

The level 2 power is very flavorful and practically a necessity for Wolverine. His starting 4 defense means along with his aggressive play style will more often than not leave him battered and bruised after the first few turns. His healing factor helps mitigate this by prolonging his aggressive plan and allowing him to hunker down for a longer fight. He is extremely dependent on this ability, especially since his defense doesn't go up, his attack just increases.

It is nice that his wound healing is proactive recovery rather than having to be used as a defense in combat such as Magneto's defensive super power or Luke Cage's defensive super power. That way Build the Hive doesn't screw you over like it can with Magneto and Luke Cage if they are out in play. With 4 Defense though, the healing factor won't quite catch you up but stabilize you for as long as you can keep using those resources and cosmo or She-Hulk MC aren't there to spoil your day.

Deck Construction

As I mentioned before since Wolverine has to do a lot of solo attacking and overall a lot of heavy lifting for the deck, it tends to be a fairly plot twist heavy deck to solidify early stuns. Wolverine doesn't have flying or range so giving them to him or being able to manipulate your opponents characters to be able to consistently get to your opponents MC is crucial. That is what I would look for in characters to compliment this deck.

Playing with other teams allows you access to more plot twists to pump Wolverine up. Finding a mix between being able to get extra pumps and being able to get to your opponents MC is a delicate balance and is ultimately what most Wolverine decks should optimally strive for in my opinion. Several different factions offer up characters and plot twists that could greatly help Wolverine achieve victory but deciding which ones to go with is a tricky endeavor and might greatly depend on the Meta you are playing in.

Wolverine needs his resources badly so I wouldn't plan on using any of the same resource types unless it was to combat a critical issue that might hinder or shut down your deck. I could see using yondu early to clear a cosmo so that wolverine can use either of his abilities or using a later in the game for something like Cable to clear the way for Wolverine or Private Hudson to protect Wolverine later in the game.

I hope you enjoyed the article and let me know what you guys think of my analysis of Wolverine MC. I will be adding links to other articles for decklists as I start posting them. If there are any rules questions of card interactions for Wolverine MC, feel free to ask and I will update this article to include them.