Trashdome - Marvel Heroes VS Marvel Heroscape

Marvel Heroes feels like it might have been a good game.. IF you didn't tell me it was supposed to be about Marvel characters. I suppose if we called it "Dudes on a Map fighting it out Rock-Paper-Scissors-Deluxe style" it might have been better accepted.

For pure fun and Marvel theme, you have to go with Marvelscape.

What happens when you damage Hulk in Marvel Heroes? He gets KO tokens, and eventually gets knocked out.

What happens when you damage Hulk in Marvelscape? He gets angry.

You don't want to see Hulk angry.

Played Marvel Heroes once and the only super that I could find was a superabundance of Euro-tedium.
Haven't played Marvel Heroscape, but from what little I've read it seems to be a neutered Heroscape.
Vote for fun: vote for (Marvel) Heroscape.

Notahandle wrote:

Haven't played Marvel Heroscape, but from what little I've read it seems to be a neutered Heroscape.

That's true... if by neutered you mean pumped full of super-soldier serum. They're borderline imbalanced. Like superheroes.

Octavian wrote:

maka wrote:

Some of the battles (especially vs. big villains and masterminds) are full of excitement and tension, and not only because you're hanging there, waiting for a die roll, but actually playing against someone, trying to outguess them.

I want to play whatever version it is you're playing!

Same as you, only I didn't give up and actually learned how to play the game... If you can't see the tension, battle strategies and the outguessing element from the game, then it's you who have a problem

Octavian wrote:

metalface13 wrote:

Marvel Heroes

Except 90% of the character depicted above are represented by cards that say "discard this for what is ostensibly this guy using his power but is abstracted to the point of absurdity".

So? What's the problem with that? Those other heroes are secondary characters. They offer more meaningful decisions to the player (should I play it or not, should I use it now or save it, etc...) and add some flavor to the game. I rather have them like that than not have them AT ALL...

Keep'em coming!

BTW, I want concrete arguments, especially against the combat system. Seriously. I've played a lot of games with dice based combat systems and I can't find a better system than this one. Heroscape uses your tyical fixed stats, roll to attack, roll to defend. AH is ok, considering you're combating vs. the game system. I thought WoW:tBG would be similar, but I found it tediously long, with almost no meaningful decisions...

The combination of the RPS-like mechancic with stat based dice rolling is just genius. I'd like to see more games based over this kind of system...

Maka, my main beef with MH is that it abstracts the characters too much. Hulk doesn't feel very different from say The Thing, or even Jean Grey for the matter. Sure, if you really dissect it, you might see how they are different, but isn't visceral, it doesn't hit you like a solid punch to the gut -- which is how I think superhero games should be. I shouldn't have to carefully analyze why Wolverine is actually different from Spiderman.

Marvelscape does this way way way better.

Sure the combat system may be elegant, but it doesn't feel like much of a superhero fight.

I think Maka is going to stab somebody if MARVEL HEROES goes down.

Which it probably will.

Won't somebody think of the children? No child wants to play MARVEL HEROES, and it may very well make the baby Jesus cry. MARVEL HEROSCAPE brings joy to the children of the world, much like Michael Jackson but with less inappropriate touching.

MARVEL HEROES is kind of like the Rockwell of these two. You can kind of hear MARVEL HEROSCAPE/Michael Jackson in it, but not quite. And Rockwell's record didn't bring happiness and joy to the children of the world like "Thriller", did it?

MARVEL HEROSCAPE brings joy to the children of the world, much like Michael Jackson but with less inappropriate touching.

How many children actually own this game? I think my local Wal-Mart sold one copy. To me. And I only bought it so I could trade it for Hybrid, which also sucked.

Apparently, not too many other joyous little tykes bought it either, because it seems to have tanked.

Fer fucks sake! Really? You had to put both hero games up against it other? C*******ing m***********!

First some ground rules for the comparison:

Marvel heroscape on it's own is kind of lame. You gotta throw your heroes in against the regular(?) heroscape troops/heroes for the best effect. You also need more terrain from the other sets, otherwise it's a knife fight in a phone booth.

Marvel Heroes needs to play the FFas written, none of this idiotic "official" FAQ crap with Reed and Sue neutering Dr. Doom. Sue cancels dice after you make your re-rolls, not before.

Now to the comparison:

Let see, both games could easily have had sweet expansions. FFG decided Marvel Heroes was the one game out of their entire f-ing lineup of big box games that they weren't going to give an expansion for. Hasbro did them one better by actually showing pictures of an expansion, then never actually releasing it to the public. Mildly annoyed at FFG, super-pissed at Hasbro/WotC. I want my Super Skrull!. I guess that's a point to FFG and Marvel Heroes.

The bits: bit of a toss-up since they both give you pre-painted mini goodness. Marvel Heroes gives you more of them, but Heroscape has the nicer sculpts. The terrain included in Marvel heroscape is a bit weak sauce, but the counters/board for Marvel Heroes are what we call "functional" (the villain card art is alright). That's a point for Heroscape.

The gameplay: I do like the choose which power decisions in Marvel Heroes combat, and I do appreciate that's there's a bit more complexity to it than you would expect from a super hero game. I'm still not sold on the story cards, and some of my friends do complain that the powers are a bit abstracted. Personally, I think they've retained the general feel of each power in much the same way as the vs. system did, which I was also on board with. I also like that the teams are reasonably balanced, but that each team and arch villain plays a bit differently .
Heroscape has the fun of watching the Hulk tearing through a horde of orcs/knights/roman legionnaires getting stronger as he takes wounds. None of the Marvels are broken when mixing it up with the regular Heroscape guys, but are suitably kick ass for their high point costs. It's actually kind of closer than I might have thought, but point to Marvel Heroes.

What else do people rate when doing comparisons like this? The Marvel Heroes rulebook would probably be better if it was translated into English (I kid, I kid!). Seriously, maybe a bit more emphasis could have been made on the various special rules/exceptions, but it's nothing a nice player aide can't fix and Universal Head's got one done up. Heroscape doesn't really have rules. You could pretty much guess how everything works just by looking at the cards, dice and activation markers.

Overall: What's the score? 2-1? That's a bit sad. Pretend I compared a bunch of other stuff and call it about 8-5 in favor of Marvel Heroes. That feels about right. Marvel Heroes is the better game and deserves to win this round of Trash Dome, but I'd be awfully sad not to have the Marvel guys available for our Heroscape drafting.

VOTE: Marvel Heroes

Marvel Heroes was a failure of epic proportions. Just reading the rules one has to think where is the action?

Marvel heroscape gets it right. It blows away heroclix as well!

I vote Marvel Heroscape!

Heroclix is garbage. Seriously, run your guy up and end your turn. Take a beating from you opponent. Take damage for activating him on your next turn to attack, or take another beating on your opponent's next turn. Wizkids made neat bits, but their rules were garbage. The only other decent hero board game is Capes & Cowls. Who do you have to sleep with to get a playtest copy of that Marvel Team Up\Game Z that a certain personality keeps name-dropping?

Who do you have to sleep with to get a playtest copy of that Marvel Team Up\Game Z that a certain personality keeps name-dropping?

Steve Avery.

Vote: Marvel Heroscape

It's Heroscape. 'Nuff said.

While Marvel Heroes is a good game in its own right, Marvel Heroscape is an awesome kids game! I would have absoulutely loved spending a scorching summer day setting up a sprawling heroscape set and having a massive showdown when my dad came home from work. If any of my kids did this now I would probably order pizza and start picking teams. I would purposely pick only a few powerful units and then lots of cannon fodder so they could have fun mowing them down. That is something you would remember fondly for the rest of your life.

Marvel Heroscape

Marvel Heroscape, if only because it can be combined with normal Heroscape.