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Pojo's Marvel VS Card of the Day

The Joker,
Joker's Wild

DC Origins

Date Reviewed: 8.20.04

Constructed Average Rating: 2.8
Limited Average Rating: 2.65

Ratings are based on a 1 to 5 scale
1 being the worst. 3 ... average.
5 is the highest rating.

IQ	The Joker, Joker's Wild hmmm… card advantage. CONSTRUCTED That’s all this guys is seen as and will always be seen as. I had no idea what his stats were or if he had flight, range or a purple monkey up his… never mind. The point is that I knew nothing about this card other than his boost of 2 that would allow me to draw five new cards on turn five and that’s all I needed to know to start my deck list off with four copies of him. The fact that he wasn’t a 0/0 was just an add on, his loyalty simply meant I was gona be kicking around a lot of Arkham decks and his mulligan effect was the heck of a kicker. A lot of my Arkham decks rely on their small curve with a lot of aggressive plot twist and either Avalon Space Station or Recon Program so that I may be able to play this evil mad man every turn after turn five. I’m well aware of the fact that this crazy strategy ties up five of my resources every turn after turn five but I can’t complain about being able to pay a resource point to draw a card and get a kamikaze 3/3 while I’m at it. 4/5 LIMITED A lot of the inmates are pretty common which means this guy can still be a card drawing mad man for you. Granted, the most you’ll get out of him in a game is six extra cards but I’m not turning the opportunity to get a six card jump on my opponent and don’t think you should either. 4.25/5
Johnny Blaze	The Joker, Joker's Wild – I think that 3 drop characters are my favorites in the game. There is just so much variety to choose from an array of ATK/DEF (8/8 for Mammoth all the way to a 0/3 for Phantasm). There are also a wide array of different powers and abilities to choose from. The 3 drop Joker is one with a different type of power that we haven’t seen before in a VS. card. If you choose to take a mulligan, and Joker is in your hand, you may reveal Joker instead and if you do then put your hand on the bottom of your deck (like usual) in any order and then draw five cards. You may not take a mulligan after this. Constructed: 2/5 – With only a 3 ATK/3 DEF Joker is below average to a lot of the other 3 drops in the game. With his Loyalty you want to be running other Arkham Inmates. For pure ATK value I would choose Penguin for my 3 drop as he can be a possible 5/5 on Turn 3, but if you are looking for extra draw power then Joker is your man. Limited: 3/5 – Extra drawing capabilities is only great in draft. If you get enough of Arkham Inmates to use then definitely play this Joker in your draft deck
Jason Bunch	The final card in our trip through Arkham is The Joker, Joker's Wild. 3/3 for a 3 drop is on the small side, but the effects are what make this card fun to play. In a perfect world, you will never play this card on turn 3. If you have him in a bad opening hand, mulligan for 5. If you have him in a mediocre starting hand, its a tougher choice, but the chance to start the game with card advantage is usually too much to pass up. His Boost ability is the real kicker. If turn 5 comes around, and you have nothing good in your hand, you are in serious trouble. Even being able to toss what's left in your hand and draw 5 new cards is a negligible benefit, because you just played a 3/3 on Turn 5. It had better be 5 darn good cards, because you are taking a butt whipping this turn. Loyalty is a good thing in this case, because you'll want another Inmate on the field to reinforce him and save you long enough to make it to Turn 6. If you put him in your deck for his first effect, then you expect to draw bad opening hands. If you put him in for his second effect, you're expecting to have a bad hand and nothing good for a 5 drop. The solution: don't put him in your deck. In Limited, stay away from him. The card advantage is tempting, but in the long run, you're better off building a solid deck that doesn't need to pack a contingency plan for bad hands. Ratings: Constructed - 2/5 Limited - 1/5
Paul Hagan	The Joker, Joker's Wild isn't good. It's mediocre at best. My biggest issue with the Joker is that he eats slots in your deck. OK, great, you can start with one additional card, but only if one of the four Jokers (at most) in your deck show up in your first hand. I think (if my math is right) that this will happen around one in every four games. Now think about how often you mulligan. I do about once every third draw. Now let me ask you this: do I ship back a good hand with Joker in it? No, not usually, I don't. Why would I risk a poor hand for one additional card when my first hand was good as was? So now we are looking at, for Joker to be effective, you need to a) have a mediocre or bad hand, and b) draw Joker's Wild. Some people are quick to point out, "What about The Joker's boost ability? It's good!" Well, I'm not so sure. First off, on Turn 5, I rarely want to be playing a 3/3, even if it is netting me five cards. How many other decks play 3/3s on Turn 5? Not too many, I would think -- the deck I'm running right now has an 11/11 for Turn 5. Is that better or worse than a 3/3? Well, you can at least play it on Turn 3, right? Well, sure, but how good is it there? What is the smallest 3-Drop character that you've seen played recently in contructed? The smallest I can think of was a 3/4 in the form of Quicksilver, Pietro Maximoff, but at least he can do 5 Endurance when he needs to. In short, save your time and money -- don't play the Joker's Wild in constructed. Constructed Rating: 2.0 Limited Rating: 2.5
Nakaiya21	The Joker – Joker’s Wild Hmmmmm….Now this is an interesting card….. I love being able to mulligan. (It is too bad that you can not do this in YGO without the use of Reload.) Therefore, I think I will be a little biased when it comes to this card. So you pull your opening hand only to find that you have this card and nothing else that will work until late in the game. Do you panic? No, simply show this card and toss your hand to the bottom of your deck. Then draw 5 cards! Hey, you were going to mulligan anyways…might as well earn an extra card for your efforts. It would be nice if you could mulligan the new hand too, but oh well…. This card is even good late in the game. If you are having a problem getting decent late-game cards then on turn 5 put this guy on the field, discard you hand, and get five new cards. Ninety percent of the time doing this will also increase the number of cards in your hand as well….now how can you go wrong with that??? There is only one downside to this card. Since this guy is a solid 3-drop it is going to be hard to determine when you should mulligan and when you should hold on to your hand. There is a good chance that if you mulligan your hand, that you will pull a hand that is worse than the one you started with. Just remember ONLY to use him if you were going to mulligan anyway…don’t fall for the temptation to use him all the time. Ratings AI constructed – 4.0/5.0 ….I would probably run 4 of these in an AI deck…never underestimate the power to get a fresh hand. Limited – 2.5/5.0 ….He has loyalty so he is going to be harder to use later in the game.

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