Fire in the Sky

Background: In the cartoon, Jetfire is called Skyfire and he has a cool backstory revealed in the episode called "Fire in the Sky."  This is probably why he's called Skyfire, because "Jet in the Sky" would be a dumb name for an episode.

Millions of years ago, before the Decepticons and Autobots started fighting, Skyfire/Jetfire (We'll stick with Jetfire from here on out for convenience sake) and Starscream were buddies exploring the galaxy.  When they were charting Earth, a storm separated them and Skyfire/Jetfire was lost.

Flash forward to the present and the Decepticons are messing around with a crystal that converts the Earth's heat into energon cubes.  While digging around the crystal, Rumble finds Jetfire frozen in the ice and the Decepticons dig him out and fix him.  Starscream is glad to see his old buddy and because he is loyal to Starscream, Jetfire joins the Decepticons.

Meanwhile, the Autobots and their human allies Spike and Sparkplug head up north to figure out why its freezing everywhere. Things don't go well and pretty much all of them get captured.

Megatron starts to sense the Jetfire isn't down with being a total jerk, so he orders Jetfire to execute Spike, Sparkplug, Ironide, Ratchet, Hound, and Gears.  Jetfire refuses and Starscream blasts him and the prisoners with his null-ray (Luckily, Hound used his hologram powers to save the day).  When Starscream leaves, the injured Skyfire is repaired by Ratchet.

Jetfire proudly declares himself to be an Autobot and he and Starscream end up in an aerial dogfight.  Skyfire manages to bury the crystal before he crashes back into the ice.  The Autobots are sad and leave him in the ice for a few episodes for some reason before finally digging him out in the episode "Fire on the Mountain."

Characters:

Captain Starscream (12)

Jetfire Air Guardian (10)

Mounted Missles (2)

Vandalize (1)

Battle Cards (Pip Color)(Number):

Bashing Shield (OG)(2)

Bombing Run (B)(2)

Crash Landing (No Pip)(2)

Defensive Configuration (O)(1)

Disarm (B)(3)

Dismantling Claw (BG)(3)

Extra Padding (BG)(3)

Increased Durability (BL)(3)

Minor Medic Kit (BL, BL)(2)

Mounted Missiles (OO)(2)

Multi-Missile Pod (B)(3)

Null-Ray of Starscream (O)(1)

Reactive Armor (OG)(3)

Scrapper Gauntlets (O)(3)

Smelt (BG)(3)

Vandalize (O)(1)

Vaporize (B)(3)

Breakdown: 15 Orange, 20 Blue, 14 Green, 7 Black.  12 Actions, 9 Weapons, 14 Armor, 5 Utility.

Why these characters: I wanted to recreate the story of these two buddies who grew apart.  I picked Captain Starscream because it features the cybertronian jet alt mode, which I imagine he would have looked like back when they were friends way back in the day.  That only left me with enough stars for the smaller Jetfire.

Why these battle cards: Sort of by accident I stumbled on an interesting pair dynamic.  Starscream likes to scrap enemy upgrades while Jetfire lets you add upgrades from your scrap pile.  This seems like a good way to approximate two planes that started out as bros but ended up enemies.

Bashing Shield, Disarm, Dismantling Claw, Reactive Armor, Scrapper Gauntlets, Smelt, Vaporize and Vandalize try to take advantage of Starscream's "When an upgrade is scrapped, do 1 damage to that enemy" power.

Bashing Shield, Defensive Configuration, Extra Padding, Increased Durability, Minor Medic Kit, Crash landing*, and Reactive Armor were included to take advantage of Jetfire's "When you flip to this mode, put an Armor or Utility from your scrap pile onto this character" ability.  In particular, Defensive Configuration allows another armor to be placed, which I might need if he lives long enough to flip a few times. I liked Mounted Missiles because it has a double orange pip and it is a weapon that could be placed in an armor or utility slot.

Starscream's Null-ray had to be included because he totally blasted his former friend with it. 

Crash landing is obviously useful with planes, but I also liked how it fit what happened in the episode.

Finally, Bombing Run is included to try to keep my two tall planes alive.

Strategy: Starscream transforms first to get the additional attack and goes first.  Hopefully, this gets some utilities or armor into the scrap pile for Jetfire to claim when he flips in round 2.  With Starscream in bot mode, any cards that scrap an upgrade do 1 damage to that enemy.  Starscream can stay in this mode in round 3 to hopefully take advantage of his scrap/chip damage ability while Jetfire keeps flipping back and forth to claim upgrades.  

What do you think of this deck?  Is there any chance of a Starscream/Jetfire reconciliation?

Note: I am short two multi-mission pod cards from actually being able to run this deck, so if you have extra, hit me up!

*Update: Thanks to some feedback, I realize Jetfire can't grab Crash Landing because Jetfire isn't in plane mode when he uses this ability.  I still like it as a card I can play on Jetfire the normal way so I can hurt someone when he dies, but would be open to some other nominations for upgrades he could snag. I've received some good suggestions to use Superior Jetpack or Superior Plating instead of Crash Landing, as Jetfire's scrap pull ability allows you to use them without needing Tech Research.