All factions
Science Fiction Double Feature
SHAPESHIFTERS
Medium
Copy other players' power and abilities, boost your minions' power, and destroy and replace your minions with other minions, especially from your deck.
Description
The Shape Shifters are one of the 4 factions from the Science Fiction Double Feature set.
Morph into your friends and your enemies. They'll never see it coming.
Their complexity rating is: Medium.
Other factions from the same set: Cyborg Apes, Super Spies, Time Travelers.
Cards Overview
The Shapeshifters have the usual 10 minions and 10 actions. The total minion base power (not counting any abilities) is unusually low at only 21 or an average of 2.1 per minion compared to the usual 30 and 3. However, this does not count the inevitable power boost that Mimic will get in the presence of other minions.
Among their actions, there are:
* 3 play-on-minion actions: Cellular Bonding, Shell Game, Splice as Nice,
* 0 play-on-base actions,
* 7 standard actions (6 that affect one or more minions, in bold): “... Really?”, Bacta the Future, Genetic Shift (2x), Mitosis, Transmogrify (2x),
* 3 actions that directly increase a minion's power: Genetic Shift (2x), Splice as Nice.
1x “... Really?” - Destroy one of your minions. Play an extra minion from your discard pile with the same or lower power.
1x Bacta the Future - Destroy a minion. That minion’s owner may immediately play an extra minion.
1x Cellular Bonding - Play on a minion. Choose an action on a minion. Ongoing: This card has the abilities of the chosen action.
2x Genetic Shift - Each of your minions gains +1 power until the end of the turn OR one of your minions gains +3 power until the end of the turn.
1x Mitosis - Choose your minion in play. Play a copy of that card from your hand as an extra minion.
1x Shell Game - Play on a minion. Ongoing: This minion cannot be destroyed.
1x Splice as Nice - Play on a minion. Ongoing: This minion has +2 power.
2x Transmogrify - Destroy one of your minions. Search your deck for a minion with the same or lower power and play it as an extra minion. Shuffle your deck.
Actions
1x “... Really?” - Destroy one of your minions. Play an extra minion from your discard pile with the same or lower power.
1x Bacta the Future - Destroy a minion. That minion’s owner may immediately play an extra minion.
1x Cellular Bonding - Play on a minion. Choose an action on a minion. Ongoing: This card has the abilities of the chosen action.
2x Genetic Shift - Each of your minions gains +1 power until the end of the turn OR one of your minions gains +3 power until the end of the turn.
1x Mitosis - Choose your minion in play. Play a copy of that card from your hand as an extra minion.
1x Shell Game - Play on a minion. Ongoing: This minion cannot be destroyed.
1x Splice as Nice - Play on a minion. Ongoing: This minion has +2 power.
2x Transmogrify - Destroy one of your minions. Search your deck for a minion with the same or lower power and play it as an extra minion. Shuffle your deck.
Characters
1x Doppelgänger - power 5 - Ongoing: After this minion goes to the discard pile from play, search your deck for a minion and play it as an extra minion.
2x G.E.L.F. - power 4 - Talent: Search your deck for a non-G.E.L.F. minion of power 4 or less. Shuffle this minion into your deck and play that minion here as an extra minion.
3x Mimic - power 0 - Ongoing: This minion’s power is equal to the highest power printed on a minion card in play.
4x Copycat - power 2 - Choose another player’s minion in play. This card has the same ability as that minion until the end of the turn.
Strategy
Shapeshifters cause sudden and often drastic changes to the game, so they favor on-play abilities.
Synergies
Shapeshifters cause sudden and often drastic changes to the game, so they favor on-play abilities. Pairing with a faction with extra printed power makes sense, and since Shapeshifters can destroy their own minions for benefits, pairing with ones that can revive minions also makes sense.
*Itty Critters: Predominantly filled with on-play abilities, the Critters function well. They also help put minions back into your deck for Shapeshifters to change into, and Critter Champion and Coachs can send out either Mimics or Copycats.
*Zombies: Destroy your minions and revive them. Zombies have lots of on-play abilities, too.
Shapeshifters actually synergize with certain opponents, so that's what happens here.
*Elder Things: Lots of good on-play abilities, and punish your opponent foolish enough to play Elder Thing without breaking a base.
Tips
While not among the most complicated factions in the game, Shapeshifters require quite a bit of knowledge of the game to play effectively. The more you know about your own and your opponents' factions and what to expect from them, the better. Do your opponents' minions have great abilities for your Copycats to copy, and if they aren't in play right now, is it worth waiting until they are? Can you pull off wild combos with your Mimics? Not every faction you and your opponent chooses will be of use to Shapeshifters, so avoid picking them as your first faction.
Mechanics
Copy other players' power and abilities, boost your minions' power, and destroy and replace your minions with other minions, especially from your deck.