When I yelled into the void and said I wanted all the news about the Transformers TCG RIGHT NOW, I really should have thought twice.

As we creep ever closer to Toy Fair 2019, the Transformers TCG is churning out reveals faster than I can keep up with them. Almost immediately after I clicked Submit on last week’s Superion post, they revealed the next massive box set: Devastator. A couple of days later, we finally got to see the new, super rare Triple Changers. And then, just yesterday, they went in for the killing blow and revealed a Transformers TCG companion app!

You ready to wade in? Let’s do this.

Devastator Deck

Have you been not-so-patiently waiting for Devastator to be revealed as part of the Transformers TCG Wave 2 “Rise of the Combiners”? Your day has finally arrived, though the big guy isn’t exactly what we thought he’d be.

Rather than be included as part of the Wave 2 booster packs, Devastator will have his own separate box set, just like Wave 1 Metroplex (yes, that means there’s still one more Decepticon combiner, keep reading). It will be a fantastic way to jump right into the Combiner mechanic without having to scour through boosters for a full team.

And since he’s not a part of the wave, Wizards of the Coast is giving him a little extra something, a tower-building mechanic that only applies to the Constructicons. Let’s check it out.

Constructicons

Yeah, he’s pretty important. (Image: Wizards of the Coast/Hasbro)

All six Constructicons are part of the Devastator Deck (no weird minus-one configurations here). But the most important is Scrapper, Constructicon Foreman. With him on the battlefield, you place your Tower tracker near your KO pile and start building it up. He’s a pretty squishy bot, but he’s actually got the highest health out of all the Constructicons. The reason? Whenever one of your team members gets scrapped, you get to add another level to your Tower tracker.

The bigger they are, the harder they fall! (Image: Wizards of the Coast/Hasbro)

As I said, the rest of the team are all four-star and have fairly middling stats. Their main purpose is to attack in alt-mode for as long as they can to continue building the tower…then flip to Bot mode before they’re inevitably taken out.

(Image: Wizards of the Coast/Hasbro)

Devastator

Build ’em up and knock ’em down! (Image: Wizards of the Coast/Hasbro)

When you’ve got the Constructicon Enigma and all six characters in bot mode, you can combine them to form this beast. Here’s where that tower you’ve been diligently building comes into play.

First off, don’t worry about all that damage your characters have soaked up. Yes, they count against Devy’s 33 health, but you instantly get to repair an amount of that equal to your tower height. And that’s just the beginning. Devastator has Bold 2 when your tower is at least 6 units high. If it’s more than 10, his damage jumps from a mediocre 6 to a very respectable 10.

Constructicon Enigma

Yes he can! (Image: Wizards of the Coast/Hasbro)

But what if your tower isn’t at 10 yet? Are you stuck with whatever height it was when you combined? Not at all – use the Constructicon Enigma as an action after you’ve combined to keep building your tower.

With no generic subtype to draw on, I’ll be very curious to see what Constructicon-specific battle cards end up in the box set and how the deck is, ahem, constructed. It should be around $19.99 (like the Metroplex box) and come out right around the same time as Wave 2.

Triple Changers, New Characters, and Battle Cards

The reveal train has kept right on rolling since the unveiling of the Devastator box (ironically, no trains have been unveiled). At the top of the “not a combiner” list is the very much anticipated reveal of the super-rare triple changers, Blitzwing and Springer!

Whaddya wanna do t’night, Springer? Same thing we do every night, Blitzy… (Image: Anthony Karcz)

Blitzwing

If you’re not playing a combiner and this isn’t in your deck, I want some of what you’re sipping. (Image: Wizards of the Coast/Hasbro)

Ol’ Blitzy here is an 11-star bot that takes full advantage of the new Wave 2 card type, with both alt modes on either side of the folded card and his bot mode on the unfolded card. What’s awesome is that he’s both the tank and jet types, so you can mix and match your favorite Battle Cards from each subtype. His quick change ability (activated when you flip a blue and orange pip) allows you to quickly modify your strategy based on the battlefield. In tank mode, he has Brave, forcing enemies to attack him. In jet mode, he has Stealth, allowing him to avoid combat altogether. He’s a no-brainer for your deck if you’d rather not mess with a combiner team and want to keep your options open.

Springer

CAR NOT TRUCK (Image: Wizards of the Coast/Hasbro)

Sadly, his Autobot counterpart isn’t nearly as much of a slam dunk. Springer is a truck (despite obviously being a car) and helicopter (which has zero subtype Battle Cards). His base stats are respectable, but you’re going to have to plan way, way ahead to make him useful. In, sigh, truck mode, he has Tough, allowing him to flip more cards when he’s defending…but only if he has an armor upgrade. In jet mode, he has Bold, which lets him flip extra cards while attacking…but only if he has a weapon equipped. In bot mode he has Pierce, which does extra damage regardless of defense…but only if he has a utility upgrade. He’s an expensive and fiddly 12-star that’s going to take some real theorycrafting to be effective.

Bombshell and Dirge

You see this on the battlefield, you run. (Image: Wizards of the Coast/Hasbro)

Bombshell is going to generate some truly ungodly decks and I can’t wait to see them. His special ability allows him to scrap cards from your hand whenever he attacks in bot mode. If he scraps the same number of cards as the defender has stars, that character is KO’ed. This is especially useful for quickly taking out those 4-star Constructicons!

Tapping? Pfft. That’s for amateurs. (Image: Wizards of the Coast/Hasbro)

Dirge on the other hand is a perpetual murder machine. If he can do just enough damage to KO a character without doing extra, he can be untapped. In alt-mode, he has extra damage based on however many of your opponents characters are in their KO area. Given how many combiner teams start off with characters in their KO area by default, this is going to be a “must-include” card for Wave 2 anti-combiner decks.

Battle Cards

(Image: Wizards of the Coast/Hasbro)

The newly revealed battle cards let you take those lovely special abilities of the triple changers and add them to a character of your choice. Bravery and Stealthiness upgrades do exactly what you’d think they do. The Surprise Attack action lets you add Springer’s Pierce 3 to a character for a round. And Inferno Breath is just a nice auto-attack. Helpful for when you need to do just a little more damage to finish someone off. Defensive Driving is a curious upgrade that I’ll need to see in action before I pass judgement on it. It lets you avoid 1 point of non-combat damage, which seems rather limited on the surface.

Final Combiner – Dreadwing

Now about that final combiner – the Transformers TCG got sneaky on us and added, not a five-bot combiner, but a two-bot combiner!

It’s a bit of cheat, but you’re still gonna love these guys. (Image: Wizards of the Coast/Hasbro)

Dreadwing is the combined form of Blackwing and Dreadwind, and I’ve got to say I’m enjoying the deck-building opportunities that this team opens up. The two bots are 8-stars each, which leaves you plenty of room for 1-star Battle Cards or additional characters. They’re jet sub-type, which has tons of useful upgrades, weapons, and actions available. And the combined form itself is no slouch, with 24 health and 7 attack. This is going to be a fun pair to have at your disposal.

Mobile Companion App

Keep track of your collection…or select everything if you’re a completionist like me. (Image: Wizards of the Coast/Hasbro)

Last but not least is the release of the Transformers TCG app for iOS and Android! With this you can track your collection, create teams of characters, track in-game damage (for you and your opponent), and access all the available rules.

I’d love to see Battle Cards added to the app as well so that I could create full decks, but I’m more than happy to ditch the paper damage counters and d20s that I’ve been using for something with less clean up.

And that’s it! There will, of course, be more reveals as we wend ever closer to the March 1 release date. Hopefully I’ll be getting a booster box or two as soon as they’re out so that I can do some unboxing on my Instagram account. Until then, keep an eye on this space for more news!