Marvel Champions

Kmann wrote: That mechanic makes much more sense for Hulk than it does Spider-Ham. And it explains his 4-card hand. However, nothing explains supposed 'Genius' Bruce B only having a 5-card draw though...

Thematically, the 5-card hand for Bruce makes sense because he is usually a fugitive with nothing but a pair of pants. In terms of game balance, it is another excessive penalty for playing a Hulk deck.

this is the WIP cards ive got made up for the Hulk scenario im working on, if yall wanna check em out

drive.google.com/drive/folders/1JL7HsV_0...RgwUt_MX?usp=sharing

An old friend stopped by yesterday to play some Marvel Champions. He retired several years ago and still seems mentally sharp, but I am surprised at his weak grasp of the game. I got him hooked on the game more than a year ago and he now has a collection about equal to mine, except that I also have several custom hero decks and several custom scenarios and modular sets. Anyway, he still struggles with remembering the difference between events and upgrades/supports, and sometimes has to be reminded when to tap a card and when to discard it.

He came over for two reasons: to get help on organizing his collection and to play a game or two with some custom content. While helping him organize his cards, I got the impression that he hadn't played much, because quite a few of his scenario cards were still in numerical order. Everything was sleeved, and he had some nice dividers, though unlabeled. I suspect that he has been playing with other players and using their cards for the scenarios and modular sets and his own hero decks. A few of his scenarios did get mixed together and I helped him sort those out, and persuaded him to store his modular sets in their own section. He didn't realize that he could often mix and match modular sets for scenarios, whenever the scenario lists a modular set as only recommended.

With those warning signs, I should have stuck to an easier custom scenario, but he chose Super-Adaptoid because he recognized the villain. It comes with a nice AIM modular set that adds in some minions and some bonus boost card effects. In the comics, Super-Adaptoid copies superpowers from his opponents, and in this scenario, he tends to shift through five different forms, which basically function as temporary attachments that boost his stats or give him traits like Overkill. In an odd twist of luck, he stayed in Iron Man form the whole game. My friend played the excellent custom Wolverine deck, and did reasonably well aside from frequently asking for advice. I played the Banner/SHIELD deck, and it got off to a sluggish start and then finally delivered the big thwarts too late to save the game.

For our second game, I recommended the more normal difficulty Scorpio scenario with the suggested Experimental Weapons module. My friend chose my War Machine/leadership deck so I chose Captain America/leadership. This game went extremely well. My friend quickly caught on to the ammo usage of War Machine and ran him pretty well with minimal guidance. My Cap deck did all the usual Cap stuff and the leadership part also worked out well. It helped that I got Hawkeye out on turn two, because there are 11 Zodiac minions in the Scorpio scenario. There was a rough spot near the end where War Machine got knocked down to 1 hit point due to back-to-back indirect damage effects while he had no allies in play. But we rallied for a decisive win while poor Scorpio never even got to the second stage of his scheme. Both of my decks were only slightly tuned, so either they are already Expert decks or Scorpion on Standard was just a little too easy.

got all the hulk cards up, plus the Nightmare modular set if you wanna take a look

its almost assuredly too hard atm. the Sanctum HP needs to be finely tuned, and currently its just a guess. but i think the idea is sound at least.

last message i promise, but i made a TTS mod of this hulk scenario. you can use it to get the cards into any of the really nice full TTS mods and play it, if youre so inclined. im partial to the Hitch mod these days, its ridiculously nice.

steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2853301272

ive played it fully 3 times now. 1 standard true solo, 1 standard 2 handed, 1 standard expert. standard felt very doable, expert felt spicy but i still won. need to tweak some numbers and stuff still, but its definitely in a fun and playable state imo. so let me know if you have a chance to check it out

I will definitely take a close look at this Hulk scenario this weekend.

Shellhead wrote: I will definitely take a close look at this Hulk scenario this weekend.

the current version is tuned too hard for sure, having played it a few more times with heroes who cant stun every turn. the Sanctum damage effect on scheme needs to be nerfed hard, maybe moved to only stage 3 for a late game expert difficulty hit. my last game i triple schemed from unlucky encounter card draws on like the first turn, and it basically killed the sanctum right there.

if youre planning on checking this out on TTS this weekend ping me and i'll make sure ive updated it before you do

edit: drive and TTS are both updated, and the newest version feels pretty good imo. played expert with some heroes that dont stunlock and it still felt solid... ended on 8/25 sanctum health and it felt close and dangerous the entire was through.

edit edit: another game with squishier heroes ended up with Captain Marvel getting knocked out early stage 3, and Hawkeye almost carrying the day solo but getting knocked out by Sanctum damage 4 damage short of KOing the Hulk.

also, the rabbit hold of custom MC stuff is deep and inviting im not interested at all in custom heroes or aspect cards, but custom scenarios have a lot of appeal to me... especially since you can play them in TTS without having to print stuff.

Played Ms Marvel aggression last night finally. Been meaning to build her since Honed Technique dropped and she did not disappoint. Uppercut, Melee, Moment of Triumph, Into The Fray all get crazy once she's set up. They're outstripping Swinging Web Kick Still my favorite hero in the game, and now she's not just built for Justice once again (though she still crushes Justice).

Taught a friend of mine this tonight, using the Justice spiderham and aggression sp//Dr decks I had built and laying around. I said how hard do you want and he said all the way, so I set up expert venom goblin minus goblin gear plus the inheritors... It was not a long game. We didn't even take the tough off venom Goblin 2 we swapped out inheritors for City In Peril and won... Not handily but pretty convincingly. Was a lot of fun, and he wanted to play more so that's a win.

I haven't gotten around to looking closely at your custom Hulk scenario yet. This is the time of year when I frantically try to finish up various yard and house projects before it gets too cold. But my cards were still sitting out after playing with a friend a couple of weeks ago, so I set up a different scenario for Captain America and War Machine: Klaw plus the Wrecking Crew modular set. My decks are still only modestly adjusted, so I still play on standard.

First game was going pretty well, except that the Living Laser came out early. Due to bad luck, crisis (!) side schemes from Klaw and the Laser popped out in tandem at two different points, causing Klaw to win via scheming. Also, three of the Wrecking Crew showed up early and some chances to activate before we could take them out.

Second game, had a similar arch, but Living Laser came out later in the game and we were better set up to clear his side scheme quickly. Cap and War Machine are a very good team, with Cap quickly ready for action and War Machine need some setup time to become really effective. With both heroes running Leadership decks and Make the Call, they were able to borrow allies from each other. Cap focused on steady thwarting and occasionally stunning Klaw, while War Machine cleared minions and smashed Klaw. The Wrecking Crew minions are usually beefy enough to hang around for a turn, but War Machine and his allies were really dishing out the damage, such that no member of the Wrecking Crew ever got a chance to activate in this game. Although Klaw got to the second stage of his main scheme, it was still a solid win for the heroes.

We finished our 2 player standard run through Sinister Motives campaign with Nova Justice and Spider Man Aggression. My partner replied that we were probably good to go expert from now on - We trounced it - Finished with 29 or 30 rep points - Even though we were crushing it by the time we hit the sinister six, it was still a good time.

I spent and evening tearing decks apart and putting everything away....while simultaneously building a cap deck to take on RoTRS solo expert. That was a fun set of games - I am firmly of the mind that RotRS should be the first buy after the core set for everyone - There are some really great scenarios that are good for learning a bunch of the mechanics in the game - and some softballs too. The campaign is definitely too easy, with the current card pool, but it's a good spot for a untuned decks (which every noobie is playing). Such a good value early on - for the guy who has everything, this is the campaign you play with your friends that are learning the game. And Crossbones, and Zola are good to go all the time (and are great for encounter set tweaking.....put Doomsday Chair in Zola :0 ) with Red Skull being really fun in multi player. Absorbing Man, Standard II, and a nastier villain focused mod (under attack/Weapons master/etc) can be a pretty tense fight. Taskmaster can be fun as long as everyone agrees to ban One Way or Another from the card pool and agrees to make the win condition finding all the allies.

I need to play some more of the GMW / MTS fights as stand alones - I have played tons of the Sinister Motives villains, because Spidey!, basically. And RotRs was the first pile of villains to play after defeating Norman Osborn and Klaw 200 times, so It got a lot more time that the middle boxes.

Drang has hit the table, a lot - in the same vein that I used Klaw and Rhino as good stress tests for decks. Ebony Maw, and Thanos hit the table often - But the rest haven't gotten a shot outside of campaign play yet.......I like Collector II, and I think Ronan might be more fun without the campaign crap...Tower Defense and Hela are always a kick in campaign so I should like them well enough - Maybe it's the amount of set up.

This week's diversion is a new round of Marvel Team Up starring Adam Warlock. I'm trying out different non Wild Tutor builds.

www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/news/2022/9/8/thunderstruck/

Storm announcement. She looks super fun. Streets of Mayhem environments on demand, and events that interact with which weather you have in play... Man I love it.

I have only played with the Streets of Mayhem modular set a few times. In theory, the global effects are neutral because they affect all characters equally. In practice, the global effects often seem to favor the villain, who is reliably getting at least one activation per hero plus minions in play. I suppose Storm can manipulate effects to greater advantage if she is changing the weather at least once a turn. Let's look at each of her weather cards and see when is the best time for each to be in play:

Clear Skies (stalwart): Always good to have this out if you are facing a villain or even minion with stun/confuse effects, like Thanos, Klaw, or even Scorpion. Bad to have this out if you are running a stun-lock deck or Dr. Strange.

Hurricane (retaliate): Good during the villain turn. Bad during the player turn unless just thwarting.

Thunderstorm (+1 ATK): Good during the player turn. Bad during the villain turn.

Blizzard (-1 ATK): Good during the villain turn. Bad during the player turn.

If all Storm did was go back and forth between Thunderstorm and Blizzard, she would have alternating good and bad turns. If she has a card that allows her to change the weather an additional time in a turn, she can break that pattern up to her advantage. Otherwise, she will want to alternate Clear Skies in the mix, or Hurricane. Of course each weather card also has a special effect that she can trigger at least once per turn, so it's always worthwhile for her to have a weather card in play.

A bigger problem is that Storm is a glass cannon. She has 10 hits points and a DEF of 1, though she can get her cloak upgrade out for +1 DEF. And her REC is only 3. Her default Leadership deck at least gives her decent chump blocking capability, but the only other decent aspect for her would be Protection, with healing and defense cards.

I was initially underwhelmed by her weather cards, but I think that Storm can be an effective hero for an experienced player, offering interesting tactical decisions from round to round.

Presumably you will flip to something good for your team for the hero phase and then flip to something bad for the villain before the villain phase.

Edit: also you should try low HP heroes outside leadership and protection personally I never ever (ever) play protection, and I almost never pay leadership.

Edit edit: I DID build a leadership spider ham deck recently to abuse Clarity of Purpose and the incredible web warrior ally stuff. It was maybe the most busted deck I've played in recent memory, do that was fun

Sure, Storm can change the weather once per turn, so she can start with something good for her team, then switch to something bad for the villain. But then her turn starts with something that was bad for the villain and now bad for her team, and needs to switch to something good for her team that may also be good for the villain. Unless she can change the weather twice (or more) in her turn, she will be alternating good and bad turns. And if she is part of a multi-player game, the first player token becomes another consideration.

Low hit point heroes tend to have a decent DEF or upgrades to boost DEF. For one example, Black Widow has DEF 2 and an upgrade that gets her to DEF 3. Iron Man has just DEF 1, but gets extra hit points from various armor upgrades. But Hawkeye only has a DEF of 1 and no way to improve it in his kit, so I like to run him in Leadership for the chump blocking. He is okay in Justice or Aggression if he is playing on a team, but still spends more time on REC than I like to see. Storm starts with DEF 1, REC 3, and just 9 hit points, and has just one upgrade that gets her to DEF 2. So she is slightly better off than Hawkeye.