Get the Scoop: Tigra

When Tigra was first revealed alongside Hulkling in the Civil War article, a lot of players had a pretty negative reaction because they are both lesser known heroes. For me, I actually quite like when they pick these "B or C tier" heroes. I'm not too familiar with her so she feels like a fresh, new hero, which is a nice change of pace. I think that a nice mix of popular and niche heroes is a good direction for the game. Also, Tigra and Hulkling are both visually striking and unique.

The Civil War Article hinted at Tigra being a minion focused hero. I'm not really drawn to these types of heroes in general, so that didn't have me too hyped at first. A few waves ago, I would have even been concerned by this. Minion focused heroes used to be underpowered, as there wasn't many ways to ensure that there were enough minions on the board. The Age of Apocalypse wave changed all of that. Now we have ways to summon minions in each aspect, and we just got Winter Soldier, who was very well received. So I'm confident that they can make her work well.

At first glance, her stats look pretty good. 10 hit points is less than ideal for a hero that wants to collect minions, but the 3 defense somewhat makes up for that. Her On the Hunt ability is like a modified "Bring It!" that she can innately use every turn. That is really strong, and provides enough incentive to go through the trouble of collecting minions. Extra card draw can help keep her alive, as it enables you to play more allies and other cards that can be used defensively. Greer Nelson's alter ego ability, Undercover Work, searches both the deck and discard for a copy of Hunted and adds it to your hand. There are 3 copies of this 0 cost minion upgrade in her signature kit, and it will be the focal point of her playstyle. The first thing that this does is search the encounter deck and discard pile for a minion and puts it into play. This is a really big deal, as this is the most flexible minion summoning card we've seen so far. Searching is better than the common alternative of discarding cards until you find one, as it allows you to choose the best target rather than leaving it up to chance. Being able to choose minions in the discard pile makes it even better. The only other card in the game that can do this is Valkyrie's event, Chooser of the Slain. Searching the discard is so strong because you can pick the best (least threatening) target, defeat it, then keep picking that same target over and over again. With Greer's alter ego ability, you can get a copy of Hunted back to your hand from either your deck or discard. If you want to maximize how many times you can use it, you'll want to grab them from the discard. That way, you'll draw the other copies as a bonus. Every turn, Tigra can summon any minion you want from anywhere. We've never seen this level of minion summoning before. The only limitation is that you need to go to alter ego to guarantee getting a copy of Hunted.

The Tigra preview article, On the Hunt, is here and I want to talk about it! Go read it first if you haven't yet, and come back after. I'm not going over every card individually. Instead, I want to discuss my initial thoughts on the character; how I think she'll play, and some deckbuilding ideas.

But will she really be summoning minions that much? It looks like the most that she would even want would be 3 at a time. Can she survive being engaged with that many enemies? The thing is, she doesn't really want to keep minions in play, she wants to cycle through them. Hunted does two things that encourage this. First, it stuns the minion. This seems to be key to her survivability. That minion will not activate on the next villain phase, but it will on the turn after that. So what do you do? Defeat that minion next turn, and then go back to hunting. If you are playing 1 copy of hunted each turn, that's 1 less minion to worry about activating. The other effect on Hunted is that it readies Tigra when you defeat the minion. At first, I was thinking of this as reward for defeating the minion, like how Winter Soldier rewards you by removing threat. But now, instead of a reward, I think of it as a cost-reduction on clearing the minion. One major issue of minion slaying decks is that its not always very cost effective. You may get a reward for summoning, and you may get a reward for defeating them, but it also costs resources (basic activations are a resource). If Tigra has enough attack to defeat the minion in one shot, then Hunted negates the entire cost of clearing the minion by readying her back up. Even if 3 minions ends up being hard to manage, having one or 2 around powers her up significantly. Two minions means 7 hand size in hero form, Cat's Head Amulet produces 2 extra resources, and Tooth and Claw costs 2 and deals 8 damage.

Comparisons

An obvious comparison to Tigra is Valkyrie. Hunted can be considered as an evolution of Death-Glow. Even though it looks like Death-Glow is more expensive, the two cards are actually the same cost. That's because Death-Glow isn't taken from your hand, so it is effectively -1 cost. But Greer's alter ego ability, and the extra effects on Hunted make it look much better.

The other comparison that stands out to me is with Nightcrawler. What Kurt does with defending, Tigra is like a mirror version of that but for attacks. Bamf! lets Nightcrawler block the minion without defending, which is very similar to how Hunted lets Tigra attack a minion, and ready back up. Kurt's alter ego ability lets him search the deck for a copy of Bamf! and his hero ability lets him search the discard. Greer took both of these abilities and combined them into one alter ego ability.

One potential issue she could have is in trying to flip to alter ego with a bunch of minions out. They will all scheme now instead of attack, potentially making you lose the game to threat. She has Precinct HQ, which acts more as a counterbalance to minions thwarting than an actual threat removal tool. It removes more threat per minion engaged with you, but more threat is also getting added from those minions. In multiplayer, this should relieve enough pressure to comfortably flip between hero and alter ego each turn. Solo might be a different story entirely. It doesn't prevent threat, it removes it after the fact. So in solo, or even two players, you may need to take out the minions first. Once again, Hunted is the solution here. If you have three minions each with Hunted attached, and your basic attack is high enough, you can knock them down one by one, Unleash Nova Force style, then flip down.

She's got this "King of Tokyo" kind of feel. Staying engaged with minions "in Tokyo", gaining bonuses as long as possible, then backing out when it becomes too much to handle. I can see three possible playstyles with her: 1) Stay in hero form and try to rush the villain before you lose, 2) Flip between hero and alter ego often, and 3) Stay in hero form but control the minions/ mitigate the damage, so that you can use the extra card draw and resources to build out faster.

A lot of us were expecting Tigra to mirror the aggression ally, healing damage after defeating minions as a survivability tool. Turns out that wasn't the case...but I think she does actually mirror the ally if you think about it. I don't really think of the ally ability as healing, what it's really doing is countering consequential damage. So in effect, it allows you to attack with her more often. That's the same thing that Hunted does! Is that a stretch? I think that they feel very similar! Both like to hit minions, and they can do it a lot.

Deckbuilding

I can't go over every single card that will work well with her, so I'm just going to focus on the most interesting or unique ones. Starting with basic, I have to mention Cell Phone. Hunted will ready Tigra when the attached minion is defeated, no matter who landed the final blow. This means that in multiplayer, there is no issue with other players taking them out for you. The only problem is with the turn structure. If they trigger it after your turn ended, you will ready but can no longer use your basic activation. Or if they do so before your turn and you aren't even exhausted, the ready will be wasted. Carrying a couple Cell Phones solves this problem, as it allows off-turn basic activations. Anyone can bring them too, and they always have a use. Have everyone throw one copy into their deck and you'll see much smoother turns.

Unsurprisingly, she will work great with a lot of aggression. Minion focused allies like Hurcules, Angela, Throg, Winter Soldier, and Spider-Girl will find their way into a ton of decks. She might be interested in the minion summoning cards Looking for Trouble and Spoiling for a Fight, but Hunted is already bringing out a lot of minions for her, so they are not necessarily going to be staple cards. "Bring it!" is another interesting one. I already established that she will likely want to cycle minions rather than collect a whole pile of them, so you won't be drawing tons of cards with this. But if you consistently have at least 2 minions out, it could be worth it. Limited deck space will make it hard to include, but I can see 1 or 2 copies going into some decks.

There's a lot of attack events that she might want to run. Toe to Toe can combo with Hunted. The attack from the minion gets countered by the stun, then you deal 5 to that minion. This makes it a cheap way to handle hunting down high hp minions. There's also Press the Advantage, which can easily draw you a card off of a Hunted minion. Firepower will be interesting, since her Sharp Claws are not restricted.

Keep up the Pressure works great with Tooth and Claw. by bumping it from 8 damage (4+4) up to 10 (5+5). Aggressive Stance will be another great way to search for more attack events, as Tigra can so easily summon minions. The last one I want to point out is Hall of Heroes. There's a good chance that when Tigra flips to alter ego, you'll actually draw less cards than in hero form. This card will make up for that. It's also going to be easy for her to trigger.

Next, lets talk about Protection, which might be her strongest aspect. That's because of one card: Pinned Down. With this upgrade, you can easily keep engaged with a bunch of minions, reaping all of the benefits without any downside. Add all of the other survivability tools protection offers, and it should be the best way to keep minions out all game, while also staying in hero form where she wants to be. And with those bonus resources, she can afford allies like Siryn and Iron Fist who can help keep your enemies in check. "Come Get me, Bub!" also sounds perfect: you get a minion and survivability, both of the things she really wants!

There's still cards left to reveal, but from what we've seen so far thwarting seems to be her weakness. So going with justice to make up for that might be a good idea. Infiltration can be used to thwart while getting more minions, but it also could be used in a way that guarantees you wont get any minions. This is because you can use Hunted first to pull all of the minions out of the deck. You'll know when there's no more left, and you are totally safe to play this event for cheap thwarting!

Show of Empathy also looks interesting. Hunted lets you find any minion you want, so this lets you easily turn the strongest one into a new ally! You lose out on the bonuses from Hunted, but it still seems worth it.

She should be strong in Leadership and Pool, but they seem the least interesting to me. I couldn't think of many specific cards that would combo with her kit, but if you just play the usual powerful cards, it should work out. Avengers ally build would be a good direction to go. And we haven't seen Tigra's signature ally yet, so perhaps she could run Sidekick.

Whew...that was a lot. We only got a few cards revealed, but there was so much to talk about! I like heroes that are less straightforward and have a lot of deck building options, so I'm really looking forward to trying out Tigra for myself! Let me know what you think. What kind of build do you want to try with her first?