Phase 1: Complete. You’ve seen the Cerritos and a few of the cards you can expect in Lower Decks. Just incase you missed it, here’s the reveals from Beckett Mariner: Part 1.

I know most players come here for the reveals, with a side of my witty banter and studious reviews (heh!), so here’s the cards. The analysis on down below.

Connecting the Dots
The Action is pretty interesting. Picking up cards from the stage is an effect that has gotten out of hand in recent years, so it has to have it’s restrictions. Playing this card on your own turn will effectively net you -3 speed, but if you’re saving some worthwhile attacks in there, it could be a nice benefit. The obvious use of being able to block with any card in your stage without adding to progressive is super strong. This card will be an effective defensive piece for the Chaos symbol, which struggles in that department with plenty of aggressive characters with low life totals.

Overhead Toss
Nothing to see here. Just a 4-diff, 5 damage throw that can easily get bigger. This’ll be one of those cards I’ll want to keep a playset of on hand. It’ll be finding it’s way onto the end of quite a few deck lists.

All in this Together
Interesting that on the card pool clogging symbol, this card doesn’t say “rival’s card pool”, but I’m all for it! Strong speed piece that gives Water a boost that it may need. But for the 4-check, great stats all around. Easy to throw this card in when you’re not sure what 1-diffs to add.

Family Secret
I think this is one of those cards that won’t see play early on, but people will figure out it’s value when there’s a 2-check attack on the symbol that is worth a slot. When you have a 2-check in your deck, you have to play differently because your risk tables are different than a normal deck. It’s the reason why decks with 2-check attacks don’t usually top since Jiro .I left. Cards like Life of Danger and Family Secret allow these decks to play like those 2’s don’t exist while still utilizing that power.

Run, Idiot!
You know, the more these cards come out that modify speed, the more High Value Target gets exposed as just the same card. Running a playset of these could turn a frail character into a semi-bulky one if you can block enough attacks. Aided by Connecting the Dots, there’s some great defensive pieces in this deck that’ll give you a bit of control of the board in a format that’s seeing huge attacks and relentless card pool cluttering pressure!

Secret Past
Pure potential. There haven’t been a ton of cards that manipulate the bottom of your deck, and a few of them put attacks there. BUT! If you can store up a 5 check for literally any check you need it for, that’s going to win games that you would have lost. The only question is do you have an engine that can stock up those checks without going out of your way to do so? See you in the lab on that one.

Welp, those are the highlights of Beckett for me. I think it’s one of the stronger Challenger Decks, with a good number cards you’ll use after you upgrade to a custom strategy. Beckett is a great teaching character, while also offering enough risk and reward to keep games interesting. UVS definitely didn’t disappoint with my favorite Lower Decks character. ^_^ Make sure you get to your Local Game Stores on December 6th to pick up Beckett and the other Lower Decks characters and their playmats! Until then, I’ll see you on the tables!