Sunday Catch-Up #1: Extremis Upgrade

So, had a busy couple of days, as usual for the end of the week, though more than usual due to exams on Thursday and Friday.  Saturday evening was taken up by Doctor Who and a work night out, so it’s up to today to make up for what we’ve missed. The first being this lovely piece of equipment, courtesy of Soshi Kenpachi over at his Tek Upgrade blog:

Wait a second…I’ve seen that before somewhere…

Anyhows, enough of that silliness, and on to the mini-review, as Mr Kenpachi has gone into it in almost as much depth as the card can possibly have discussed about it. A 0-cost, non-unique, concealed-optional, stun-remover is pretty darn nice. In order to offset that rather nice effect, it’s character-stamped to Dickhe.. Iron Man. Of course, as I’ve digressed with all of the character-stamped plot twists and locations so far, it’s an ample card for Mystique, Shapely Shifter to use and abuse.

With the upcoming metagame likely to involve a lot of Hulk beatdown decks, having Mystique up front, and non-stunning (and thus, not receiving breakthrough as well) will mean a much tougher time for your opponent to try and finish the game at Turn 4/5, the time Mystique is able to come into play.  Of course, there’s only going to a maximum of four of these cards in your deck, so they need to be used sparingly, but coupled with Iron Man’s other legend-content revealed this week, Stark Armory, you’re much more guaranteed to be able to accrue those +1/+1 counters, and thus beef up Mystique to avoid too much of a beating in the later turns. There’s also the fact that your opponent is going to be forced into tactical decisions of when to use cards such as Righteous Anger, as recovering Hulk to attack again may be a waste if the person he’s attacking can just avoid being stunned.

Actually, it looks like Iron Man could be a rather potent character for Marvel Universe. Shame he’s a di…rector of S.H.I.E.L.D.

Just When You Thor-t It Was All Army Characters…

So, we’ve had two previews come up now, the first being the real version of the S.H.I.E.L.D Helicarrier:

Not pictured: This Helicarrier is in fact on it’s side having been hacked again, and speeding towards the ground.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t crash and burn into New York City like it should do, but I think we can just about forgive it, due to that rather tasty card-text. Popping three of your S.H.I.E.L.D Agents/ 2 Agents & Squirrel Girl back into your hand, which makes them ready to recruit all over again is a small price to pay for the ability to attack the support row, and have that sometimes-vital +2 ATK, whilst the card is safe and sound of course.

The cost may seem slightly restrictive, but on Turn 3, you can flip this card over once there’s three resources, pick up your 3-cost combination of past characters, and then recruit them all over again for endurance burn, saving you some characters for later turns. Let’s not forget Squirrel Girl allows you place a 1-cost S.H.I.E.L.D Army character into play alongside her, which means you’ll potentially have 6 endurance burn for the start of the turn, as well as the extra character on the board. It’s a small bonus, but I’ve learnt never to turn my nose up at the small bonuses.

The next card is:

Is it really smart to wear a metal helmet during a lightning storm if you’re a robot?

An odd card this one. The effect in the card-text doesn’t really scream “7-drop” to me. And to be honest, by Turn 7, you shouldn’t, in my opinion, have a very large hand. At this stage in the game, most Plot Twists should be spent, characters used for +1/+1 boosts etc. So, this card to me has rather limited potential, especially as it’s not all the cards you discard, but just the S.H.I.E.L.D characters you discard that go towards the ‘X’ amount.

From the looks of things, S.H.I.E.L.D will have two strategies to play around with; the off-curve swarm, and a more standard on-curve featuring the ‘big names’, as I have no doubt Nick Fury will see at least one other version, and Iron Man’s down for legend status, so I’d guess a 6-drop as well at the very least.

We’ll just have to wait until tomorrow’s preview to see how things pan out, so adios for now.

Whilst We Wait…

…for today’s preview, which is coming from The Fallout Shelter guys over at VS Realms, I thought I’d speculate on what today’s card could be:

It could be, you never know. 😉

This Set Is Going To Be Goddamn Amazing

Some teasers about the set after Marvel Universe have emerged online, and rather than explain it in an inefficient manner, here’s the announcement from Vssystem.com:

VsSystem Update: Marvel Evolution
By David Humpherys
4/22/2008

Following the June release of Marvel Universe, the next Vs. System expansion will hit streets in November of this year.

We have been in ongoing discussions with DC Comics to expand our licensing category, and instead of delaying the release of our next set, we’ve decided to deviate from our alternating release schedule. As a result, the upcoming release of Marvel Evolution will mark the first major, back-to-back Marvel launch.

Marvel Evolution will revolve heavily around this past year’s Messiah Complex, the fan-favorite storyline that ran through all the “X” titles. Expect to see the long-awaited debut of X-Factor, X-Force, and Mr. Sinister’s Marauders. Characters from across the dimensional divide are also set to make appearances later this year. Like Marvel Legends, DC Comics Legends, and Marvel Universe, Marvel Evolution will include multiple legendary characters, such as Cyclops, Gambit, Deadpool, and many others—including some teen guest stars!

Marvel Evolution continues in the same vein as recent releases and will contain increased content. Featuring 275 cards in the same rarity distribution as the Legends sets, Marvel Evolution will introduce several new mechanics, including the keywords Shift and Energize, bringing with them new ways to play and use your favorite characters.

This may be my first ever case-buying of VS System cards I do. I’m so freaking pumped by this news, it’s unbelievable. It’s practically everything I’ve wanted from past sets rolled into one, and I really can’t see this being a bad set at all.

I love yooooooou UDE.

Worst Deck Idea Ever

Ahem…

60 x S.H.I.E.L.D Agents.

I then remembered that you only draw so many cards a round, and this wouldn’t work, but the premise is like this:

Every time you recruit one, your opponent loses 2 endurance. So let’s look at the maths:

Turn 1: 2 Endurance

Turn 2: 4 Endurance (6 Total)

Turn 3: 6 Endurance (12 Total)

Turn 4: 8 Endurance (20 Total)

Turn 5: 10 Endurance (30 Total)

Turn 6: 12 Endurance (42 Total)

Turn 7: 14 Endurance (56 Total)

So, with seven turns of gameplay, you could whittle your opponent down to 0 endurance, without ever entering into combat. You’d always have more characters than them by Turn 3 or 4, and can simply reinforce with no problem. Finally, you’ll never miss your drop.

So, what’s needed is to add into the fray a way to get cards into your hand as quick as possible, by Turn 4, as that’s when you start to drastically get diminishing returns. Something like Birthing Chamber would help, as would Damocles Base.

There’s some danger to be had from Scarecrow, Chiroptophobic, but whilst that reduces board presence to nothing, it also fills my hand up again, ready to place the cards into play again.

Once I have more of a concrete idea of what cards are in Marvel Universe, I’ll be sure to come back to this, as it seems like a great win-condition to pull on an unsuspecting opponent.

“Bushy 16-year-old tail for the win!!!”

First off, for those of a politically correct nature (and located somewhere where the age of consent is more than 16) the 16-year old comment is about how long Squirrel Girl’s been in the comics business for (1992-2008), so don’t get on any high horses. 😉

Now, on to business! The next wave (no, not that Nextwave) of Marvel Universe previews is up, and it was worth waiting until 2am to get them:

Iron Man realised next time he should put boosters somewhere more…useful next time.

The first one, Stark Armory, obviously works well in synergy with Iron Man, and will form part of his Legend tretament. However, rumblings are already afoot for the fact it looks like it can easily slot into a Doom Patrol/Horsemen of Apocalypse deck, and help 5-drop Apocalypse from reaching his much-wanted twenty +1/+1 counters. There’s also, yet again, the possiblity of using Mystique, Shapely Shifter to adopt the Iron Man name, and take advantage of some hitherto unavailable +1/+1 counters. With Stark Armory being playable from Turn 3, that’s two counters that can go on Mystique for the combat phase of Turn 4, which is nothing to be sniffed at, as she’ll be 10ATK/8DEF, comparable to a 5-drop. Plus, on Turn 5, she’ll get a third counter, giving her yet again, just a slight edge, which sometimes can make all the difference.

“This is my moody chair. Do not disturb me whilst I am using the moody chair.”

Nick Fury’s up next, and though he had a card in Marvel Legends, this one panders more to the Nick Fury character himself, being concealed to emulate his behind-the-scenes activities, and his ability to place troops into the battlefield without question. Already, the prospect of a Golden-Age team up with Multiple Man and Sentinel Mark IV is looking very appealing, as well as a team-up with the modern X-Men for some instant Fastball Special goodness.

She was never this scary in the comics. Well, unless you were Dr. Doom or Thanos.

This is one card that I know some people were fervantly wishing for in this set, and they weren’t disappointed. This preview, and the one following came from Rian Fike’s awesome Full. Body. Transplant. and I know he’s been waiting for this card for a long time. Squirrel Girl continues what appears to be the S.H.I.E.L.D theme of amassing the board with Army characters, and if this vein continues with such great cards for doing so, some games are going to need wider tables. A shame there wasn’t any humorous flavour-text, but I’m not going to complain, especially if this card means the rest of the Great Lakes Initiative get to appear.

“Quick! Fire ineffectually!”

Finally, what looks to be the base-unit for the S.H.I.E.L.D Army tactic comes with a nasty little twist, namely in the form of endurance burn. Whilst 2 endurance may not seem like much, it can make a difference during the game as a whole, and if S.H.I.E.L.D can reach the late-game, then I can’t imagine a better victory than dropping 7 or 8 of these cards for 14/16 endurance burn, which by that stage is normally enough to push your opponent into minus figures. After they’re in play, there’ll be so many of the little buggers in play, you can simply reinforce against the opponent’s attacks, and win yourself the game.

Having seen these tasty cards, I’ve finally decided what team I’ll be concentrating on when Marvel Universe arrives, and it’s definitely S.H.I.E.LD, possibly teamed up with Nextwave. (Yes, that Nextwave this time.) That is, unless Messiah CompleX/House of M characters make an appearance here too.

Horses, Hulk and Handfuls of Cash

This was supposed to be posted on Wednesday, and the Wednesday before that…and the Wednesday before that. Unfortunately, Wednesday seems to be a darn-awful day to try and get anything done. Plus, I’ve had to start getting down to business with my revision for a couple of exams next week. So, I finally present; the deck I won’t be taking to the World Championships, but would love to:

Horse Patrol (Modern)

Characters

4x Elasti-Girl, Rita Farr
4x The Infinites, AoA
4x Sugar Man, AoA
4x Mento, Steve Dayton
4x Negative Man, Larry Trainor
4x Dark Beast, AoA
3x Robotman, Cliff Steele
3x Apocalypse, AoA (5-drop)
2x Beast Boy, Freak of Nature
1x Mikhail Rasputin, AoA
1x Apocalypse, AoA (8-drop)

Plot Twists

4x Freak Out
4x Heroic Effort
3x Marvel Crossover
4x Misfits
3x Pathetic Attempt
2x Omnipotence
2x Strange Days

Locations

2x Dayton Manor
2x Breeding Pens

It’s a standard Doom Patrol/Horsemen of Apocalypse team-up, with the aim of surviving through until Turn 5, and then dumping as many +1/+1 counters onto the 5-drop Apocalypse as possible. I had a version of this deck floating around back when DC Legends first came out, but this is the first time I’ve updated it to include The Infinites and Breeding Pens. Unfortunately, the deck tends to not hold it’s weight against some of the bigger decks out there, which is why the Pathetic Attempts and Omnipotences are included. As it’s not quite as competitive a deck as my Brotherhood one is, I’ll not be considering using this for the World Championships in June, but it’s one that sees play online from time to time. Also, I’m still awaiting many of the cards from the UDE Points Store, so this deck can’t be created by me in real-life just yet anyhow.

I’ve also had to skimp on my views on the new Marvel Universe Hulk cards previewed this week, thanks to the revision again. So, whilst I can’t fit them all into this one post, I’ll place up the one that’s most intriguing for me.

The Hulk’s shouted that man’s hair off!

So, you may simply be thinking; “It’s a Hulk-stamped ungodly +8 ATK card. Aside from making me go and cry in the corner, what’s the big deal?” Well, the deal is Mystique, Shapely Shifter. From Turn 4, she can go “Hello, I’m now called Hulk. Give me the +8 ATK goodness please.” A rather nice addition to my Brotherhood deck, and if I can get a playset of this card, Sabretooth may have to make way for the shape-shifting lady.

And in addendum, I finally get my loans/grants for this term at University tomorrow, so I can go and pre-order my boxes of Marvel Universe, and buy the singles I need to finish off my Modern Brotherhood deck. If I can find copies of Random that is.

Hulk Busting

The new Hulk preview is up, and it’s an extremely potent Plot-Twist:

Forget the SHIELD Heli-Carrier, I just want to know why Hulk’s grown Cable’s left arm.

This card works in a similar fashion to Caiera from yesterday, allowing at a basic level, the opportunity for your Hulk to swing twice in one round, which coupled with the inevitable +ATK effects we’re likely to see, is going to be some serious damage to your opponent’s endurance. The difference with this card is the fact that the effect is usable two whole turns earlier, and without the cost of removing some of your board presence. It comes at the price of stunning the Hulk you want to use the effect on, and losing the card’s cost in endurance, but between 3 and 8 endurance is a small price to pay in the grand scheme of things.

Now, with what very little we’ve seen so far, Hulk is going to be one seriously tough character to put down, and keep down. The question is; how do we do that? Before today, it seemed that an out-of-combat stun, and a Finishing Move would very likely clear the board for your own characters to hit straight-to-the-face, with Hulk’s apparent strategy of having only one character in play each turn. Now, with this card, all manner of ‘Target’ effects are rendered useless as of Turn 4, provided they have this card, and more than likely some copies of Pathetic Attempt. So how do we try and sort this situation out?

My answer right now? Alternate win condition.

Of course, it’s a Brotherhood way of dealing with things, as the X-Men don’t appear to have anything that can deal with Hulk efficiently until Turn 7, with Professor X, World’s Most Powerful Telepath. This card used against Hulk, Savage Hulk is potentially a game winner, until it gets negated with today’s previewed card thanks to the Professor’s ‘Target’ effect. Thus, the answer lies with the Brotherhood, and an odd concept for them; stalling. Why, I hear you ask?

Simple, this card: Xorn’s Takeover.

Provided you can get the card out on Turn 4, then a Turn 6 win is possible. Against normal decks, this card suffers from Brotherhood decks ideally wanting to keep characters in play to cause damage, and get the game over with as quick as possible. In this case, we only need to potentially stun/remove one opposing character each turn, due to Hulk’s lone-character play. There are two ways I can see of doing this:

1.) Deliberately sending non-beefed up characters into Hulk without any help, to ensure they get stunned whilst attacking, and Hulk doesn’t, before sending in one character with enough +ATK to stun Hulk, and a low enough DEF to get stunned back. The board is all stunned, and Xorn’s Takeover gets one of it’s counters added.

2.) Getting to the Recovery phase with a lone Magneto in play, then playing Metallic Assault to get rid of Hulk and Magneto, leaving the board empty.

There’s also the option of using the Target-based effect of Finishing Move, but it’s risky with Righteous Anger and Pathetic Attempt being around.

So, the question remains; what can you think of that’ll defeat Hulk….or is he simply unstoppable?

…and New Marvel Universe Hulk Cards.

Blimey, slightly info-packed today it seems. Over at VSsystem.com, there’s not one, but two previews of new Hulk cards from the forthcoming Marvel Universe set.

The Jolly Green Giant, and his not so jolly dog.

If she really is that small compared to Hulk behind her, I dread to think of how things go in bed.

Looking at the 4-drop Hulk, the usage of a ‘gamma counter’ indicates a number of similar effects will be in play for Hulk, and possibly the Warbound team as a whole. Obviously, it takes it’s influence from the ‘Cosmic’ ability, whilst ensuring that a team-up with Cosmic teams such as Heralds of Galactus doesn’t result in Hulk being given a godly amount of counters to result in a broken card. I notice that his ability to stun 2-drop characters in play doesn’t specify just opposing characters, which means some tactical consideration is probably needed as to whether getting rid of the enemy’s 2-drops is worth the cost of your own as well. However, with “The” Ben Seck’s description of a ‘lone-character’ system for the Warbound team, mostly focusing on Hulk, it seems likely you won’t have a 2-drop in play at Turn 4 anyway, which mitigates the effect the ability will have on yourself.

The second card, Caiera, initially seems a little weak for a 6-drop ability, until you notice that the text Hulk gains doesn’t include the phrase ‘cannot cause breakthrough’, meaning that, for instance, you can use Hulk, Savage Hulk twice in a row, so that if somehow you didn’t win the game on your first swing with the character, your newly-found second attack is going to cause even more serious damage. A very effective tactic if the opponent manages to reinforce the first time round, and also another potential game-ender in a Coming of Galactus game.

That’s the only cards that were previewed for today, with more coming up during the week, the links to which can be found in the article on VSsystem.com

New VS Marquee Event

The newest VS event I can’t take place in due to no local Hobby League is here, and it’s a Modern: Bring Your Own Set (building teams only from one of the four most recently released sets) tournament. Details can be found HERE. The main reason that yet another event that’s passing me by has caught my attention, is this:

It’s a goddamn Mr Freeze playmat!

Whilst it’s partially ruined by the horrible “Chill Out!” phrase, there’s not much that can compare with Mr Freeze for sheer awesomeness, and it’s definitely my favourite playmat since the X-Men one from the Elite Series last year. I’m not sure how many there’s been since the X-Men one, but even so, still awesome.

Just a shame I’m probably never going to own one.